Lead Article December 1, 2014 Issue

Understanding God brings healing

Phyllis Andreasen

The Christian church of my childhood taught me to love Jesus, and I fully accepted its teachings. Later, I enrolled in a missionary training school to follow my dream of becoming a missionary. During my first semester at the school, however, in a course called “The Life of Jesus,” I found I had many questions about Jesus and his place in the Christian faith that the teacher wasn’t able to answer. This included the idea that Jesus was God. At that point I began to question my religious education, and I eventually left the school.

What was the intent of my heart? To heal matter, or to understand God better?

I was dating a Christian Scientist (whom I later married), and we often talked about religion. He explained that Christian Science is based on the teachings and healings of Christ Jesus, and he shared with me Mary Baker Eddy’s definition of Jesus in the Glossary of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: “The highest human corporeal concept of the divine idea, rebuking and destroying error and bringing to light man’s immortality” (p. 589). I felt that this statement was more logical and natural than the belief that Jesus is God, and I eventually became a sincere student of Christian Science.