Testimony of Healing March 13, 1902 Issue

It is nearly two years since I came into Christian Science

W. A. B.

It is nearly two years since I came into Christian Science. I came not from choice, but as a last resort. I was facing a problem that I could not solve, and while I tried to face it manfully, my resources for help seemed exhausted. The fear of the surgeon's knife, the hope of postponing for a time at least, what seemed inevitable, caused me to suggest to my wife that she try Christian Science. I wished at first I had not done so, for it came as a crushing blow to her. She is the daughter of a physician, and she felt that I did not fully realize how much she suffered if I thought she could be helped by Christian Science. Nevertheless, I finally persuaded her to give Science a trial.

We had, in January, 1900, withdrawn from our work in church and Sunday School with the thought of making a fight for her life. We had consulted five of the leading specialists in Chicago and her case had been discussed at their meetings. Two of these specialists had said that the enlargement on the back of her neck was a tumor. One of them shook his head, looked grave, examined both spine and lungs and said, "Come again." Still another said, "I do not know," and recommended us to see the fifth whom he said was the leading spine specialist of Chicago and was well known, not only in this country but also in Europe. We consulted him and he spent two or three days in studying the case and pronounced it tuberculosis of the spine. He said she must be placed in a steel frame and strapped to the bed for a number of weeks while the spine healed. All agreed that she had appendicitis and said the sooner the operation the better, as another attack might prove fatal. The day for the operation was fixed. I shudder even now as I recall those dark days.

Weary and heavy laden, my wife sought a healer with the thought of pleasing me. The bright things of life seemed slipping away. She loved her God, her church, her people. She had asked her pastor and one or two devout members of the church to pray for her. I have no doubt they prayed, but no relief had come. To seek for help elsewhere seemed contrary to reason, and yet she went. She went, to find the healer away from home, and rejoiced that she was gone. However, Truth seemed leading her. From the home of the healer she went to a friend of her childhood, — a woman who makes no pretence of being religious, and who, during the call, astonished my wife by saying, "Why don't you try Christian Science?" "Why," she added, "my cook is a Scientist, and while your religion does not appeal to me, hers does." Demonstrations were mentioned while there that could not help but appeal to one who was catching at the last straw, and the result was that the following day my wife again went to the healer. This time she was at home. She found a woman in whose face the light of Truth was shining and to her she told her story. She prefaced it by saying she was a Methodist, that she was prejudiced against Christian Science, and that she came with no thought of giving up her church or her religion. The healer quietly answered, "Methodists have been healed, and those who are prejudiced have been healed." Thus the good work began. The first treatment relieved the intense pain along the spinal column. Each day the fetters which had held her captive yielded, and finally the spinal trouble and the suffering from the appendix disappeared, and various other ailments went with them.

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