Testimony of Healing December 28, 1907 Issue

I have thought many times it was a duty I owed to God,...

T. S. Walker

I have thought many times it was a duty I owed to God, to our dear Leader, and to myself, to acknowledge the blessings which have been mine for the past five years through the wonderful message of Science and Health, of which Mrs. Eddy's devotedness to God and to mankind has made it possible for the whole world to avail themselves. Some eleven years ago my sister at Colorado Springs was in such delicate health that the doctors advised her to go to a lower altitude. I was starting out as a traveler when she, having no means of support at that time, appealed to me to settle down and let her come and do what she could to make a home for me, and that I could provide for her in return. The only assurance I could get from the best local physicians regarding my sister was that it might be possible for her to live six months, and I felt I could save enough money in that time to bury her. My occupation being that of a train despatcher, in a month's time I was sent to Tucson, Ariz., and had to leave my sister among acquaintances in Oakland, where, thank God, some one interested her in Christian Science. I however, fought it so hard that I was about to stop her allowance in order to make her give it up, but her appeals were so loving that I relented.

Her condition was a complication of diseases, heart trouble being the worst, to my thinking; but she was healed, made entirely well in less than a year I should say, and is to-day a living monument to Truth's power, with a long life ahead of her. Even after her healing I opposed Christian Science on every pretext that mortal mind, or rather that a narrow mind, could bring up. I had seen another sister go with lung trouble, and I had a cough which seemed like hers, but the dear loving sister who had been healed in Christian Science kept at me to try it. To please her I at last applied to one of Mrs. Eddy's students, at Los Angeles, as I was at that time despatching trains for the Southern Pacific. I also suffered from a severe stomach and bowel trouble, pronounced by doctors in Illinois to be the result of intemperance. How well I remember with what bigotry I walked into the practitioner's office and introduced myself and mission, saying, I had come to please my sister, so that she would not annoy me further on the subject. I told the Scientist that I was not only an infidel, but that I had all the bad habits except smoking cigarettes; that I had not come there to tell her her business, nor to pick her doctrines to pieces, but was prepared to risk five dollars. The lady wanted to treat me for the drink and tobacco habits, but I told her to cure the stomach trouble, and as to my habits, I would think of that later. She gave me treatment, which I afterwards understood to be silent prayer, and when she looked up she said I could go home, and that my stomach and bowels would not trouble me again. I was thoroughly disgusted, but to my surprise that night I felt all right. I waited a short time for the customary ill turn, wishing to have it done with before starting for my work, and as no sickness came over me I even tried to force it, but failed. In spite of this relief I felt it was foolish to pay out money that way and I stopped the treatment. Shortly after, I had another attack of the trouble, and this time it took six months to cure me, as I still held on to all my bad habits.

It was a year and a half before I decided to try to overcome intemperance, and I had figured it would take a long while to subdue this habit as I had tried will-power so often and suffered so much from the attempt. To my astonishment, however, I was cured in one treatment, which cost me just one dollar, and this has saved me from thirty to fifty dollars each month ever since. I was also cured of a double rupture, after wearing a truss for six years. There are many railroad men as well as others in Los Angeles who can testify to this healing, as the saloons even after I was cured were my headquarters up to the time I came here, nine months ago. I feel that, as I am taking up the religious part of Christian Science, I can do as much good outside of saloons as I was latterly able to do in them, although my example set many of my companions to thinking and through me several have come into Christian Science, so I feel I have done some good. Through my influence a conductor on the Tucson division of the Southern Pacific was saved from death by Christian Science, also an operator in Los Angeles, who was cured of paralytic trouble, and another operator, who was cured of intemperance. I am now able to meet for myself most of the troubles that come up, and could give many experiences, although I have various things yet to overcome, but I know they can be met by constant study and application of the truth. The spiritual uplifting I prize as much as the physical overcoming. I am endeavoring to live as near to the teachings of Christian Science as is possible with my present understanding. I love our dear Leader, and when I see how patiently and with what love she meets persecutors, it strengthens me to follow her example. I often thank God that He has given us such a good Leader and that I have become a channel for this demonstrable truth.

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