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Question answered, healing found

A Christian Science perspective: The realization that evil, such as sickness, is not truly part of us brings healing.

  • By Christopher McKenzie

Throughout my young adult years, I suffered from chronic migraines that hindered my daily activities. Every morning I would wake up with a feeling of fear because of this condition. Doctors prescribed medication, but it did little to ease the pain. I discussed my situation with a friend, who suggested that maybe it was just God’s will for me to have migraines.

But I couldn’t believe that it was God’s will for anyone to suffer. After all, the Bible says, “I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope” (Jeremiah 29:11, New Revised Standard Version).

I was determined to find a permanent cure for the migraines, so I started to search “Christian healing” on the internet. One website in particular grabbed my attention: christianscience.com. I had heard of The Christian Science Monitor, but I did not really know anything about Christian Science.

I browsed the website and found a video of a talk about our true, limitless identity. I desperately wanted to experience the real me – one who was not limited by migraines.

I was so motivated by the talk that I listened to it three times in one day! One idea shared was that we are all created by God, and therefore are the spiritual expression of divine Truth, Love, and Life, which are synonyms for the one God. The speaker also shared examples of how people had applied these ideas and been healed of a range of conditions such as eyesight problems and broken bones.

I decided to read “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” written by the woman who discovered Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy. I spent hours underlining sections that I found especially inspiring.

I was so excited to find the answer to a persistent question I’d had since I was a teenager: “Where did evil come from?” Despite my inquiries of family members and people at my church, I’d never received a response that satisfied me. But I found it in what I was learning now. One statement read: “All reality is in God and His creation, harmonious and eternal. That which He creates is good, and He makes all that is made. Therefore the only reality of sin, sickness, or death is the awful fact that unrealities seem real to human, erring belief, until God strips off their disguise. They are not true, because they are not of God” (Science and Health, p. 472).

I realized that as migraines were not made by God, they were not truly part of God’s creation – me – either! Once I made this discovery, I was freed from this debilitating condition. In the years since, the migraines have not returned. I have experienced other healings, too. Those words of Christ Jesus have become so much clearer to me: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).

Adapted from an article in the June 12, 2017, issue of the Christian Science Sentinel.

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Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

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