Article July 17, 1909 Issue

The disciples and Paul did heal themselves and others...

R. Stanhope Easterday

Crawfordsville (Ind.) Journal

The disciples and Paul did heal themselves and others through spiritual means and without drugs, and such healing by spiritual means, even to the raising of the dead, continued to be practised by the early church for some three hundred years. For centuries past, however, this phase of our Lord's teachings has been practically lost sight of, until today we find our brother and many another critic of Christian Science arguing that "Jesus did not institute miraculous [so called] healing as a continuous system." There is no justification within the lids of the Bible to support this contention, while Christian Scientists find much in the Bible which enjoins upon them the necessity for emulating our Lord in "all his mighty works," and today they are but making a reasonable effort thus to maintain "undivided" the Christly garment of healing and regeneration. It is unreasonable for us, however, to expect the ultimate of experience and demonstration before preliminary steps have been taken one by one. Already every known disease has been healed in Christian Science, and the healing results, now as in Jesus' time, from moral regeneration. The "prayer and fasting" which our Lord declared so essential is still the vital essential in the Christian's effort to heal the sick as Jesus did, and in fulfilment of his direct demand. Jesus often healed the physically infirm by "forgiving the sins" of the individual, while in the 91st Psalm "long life" is promised to the faithful followers of the good. It goes without saying that no one could hope to lift another to that high moral plane which would conduce to health unless he himself were already living on that plane. If our brother will but attempt to live the life of a Christian Scientist, he will learn that the Christian Science approximation of heaven on earth leads into no "rose-colored paths." The Christian Science "theory" is like the rainbow only in the sense that it gives "promise." The "practice" of the "theory" means struggle and effort. The Christian Scientist indeed has need of the "whole armor of God."

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