Testimony of Healing January 1, 1910 Issue

I was brought up to read the Bible and to search it for...

Lucy Holtzclaw

I was brought up to read the Bible and to search it for spiritual guidance. When I was a young girl I read it through word for word twice, as a matter of duty, besides many other readings, not as a whole. One verse which I heard sung in church when I was eight years old, stayed with me. It was from Psalms: "One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple." The words and their accompanying melody entered into my consciousness, never to leave. My longings for that "one thing" were indefinite, though earnest, and my prayers were blind pleadings to a monarch in some far-off place in the skies. My life did not unfold as I longed for it to do; I wanted to be kind, and thoughtful of others, patient, gentle, sincere. I wanted my home to be clear of the little frictions of anger and fret, but my faults seemed so many to me and so big. I made a list of them and magnified them into terrible realities. I also made a list of beautiful things to do each day, and for a time I faithfully carried them through, and though I did not look to self quite so much. I was still not satisfied—that "one thing" was not attained.

My health became poor,—a stomach disorder, sleepless ness, and worn-out nerves. I am a teacher, and in seeking a cure, I found healing in Christian Science. Then that faint light which came to the child, the desire to "dwell in the house of the Lord," expanded into the understanding of what the "one thing" is, what heaven and God are; and I am beginning "to behold the beauties of the Lord" and learning what it means "to enquire in his temple." I am glad I learned the stories of the Bible in youth, and read its pages later for comfort, even though I had to wait for the golden key that opens its meaning, thus transmuting to my dulled sense its words into letters of fire. The Bible has become, indeed, the Book of Life, and I am grateful to her who, catching its practical import, has courageously given it to humankind through "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures."
Lucy Holtzclaw, Chattanooga, Tenn.

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