Testimony of Healing December 18, 1909 Issue

"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?"...

Elizabeth Wagner

"Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?" Is life worth living? These are some of the questions that confronted me when the pains of false material sense were pressing hard, increasing as time wore on, until materia medica pronounced me incurable. When I was quite young a Christian Science practitioner came to the place where we then lived. She had not been there long when a pastor in that place prepared a special sermon, wherein he thought he proved from the Bible that Christian Science is a false doctrine. Having been reared in the orthodox faith, I was taught that clergymen are ordained of God, and that they therefore preach only the truth. This sermon made such a strong impression on me that I turned away from Christian Science, after having had a few treatments with some good results.

After the practitioner left I again lived in bondage to drugs, disease, and other beliefs of mortal mind, for several years longer. I had attacks of illness in the spring and fall, each attack more prolonged than the previous one. At this time physicians called the disease a catarrhal affection of the stomach, and after I had been treated by them for several years and was growing much worse, it was given a new name. I followed the doctor's directions faithfully, but constantly grew thinner. In the fall of 1902 he advised me to go south for the winter, which I did. (He had said to others that I had tuberculosis of the stomach and could not possibly recover.) The last remedies prescribed were very strong drugs, and their use was followed by a physical collapse.

In addition to the stomach trouble I suffered from a disease of the foot. At a convention of noted physicians in the eastern states, this condition was discussed, and it was agreed that the only relief obtainable would be to remove the metatarsal joint. The operation, however, was deferred. I realize that my friends in the medical profession did all in their power to relieve me, but all material remedies were doomed to failure. It may be proper to state that I had used many local applications, also osteopathy and electricity for this difficulty, but all were ineffectual. After living in Texas for some time, I broke down again, feeling worse than ever before, I had now suffered for eight long weary years, and the hope of ever being well had fled. I was always hungry, but was afraid to eat, and afraid to drink, as I had not taken a cold drink for over two years. I was literally starving in the midst of plenty, but my greatest need was the bread from heaven.

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