Testimony of Healing May 11, 1912 Issue

I am truly glad of the opportunity given us in bearing...

Etta Helfer

I am truly glad of the opportunity given us in bearing testimony to the wonderful benefits of Christian Science. In October, 1909, I was loaned a copy of Science and Health by a lady whom I met in the mountains, where I had gone in hope of bettering my health. For about fifteen years I had suffered from many ailments, until my life seemed to be a heavy burden. Female trouble, nervousness, a serious heart affection, catarrh, etc., were some of my daily trials, besides defective vision, which was said to be responsible for severe headaches. I had heard of Christian Science very little (mostly by way of ridicule) until I met the lady above mentioned. When she loaned me her copy of Science and Health I disliked to take it, but I decided to read it anyway and see what it was like, for I really wanted help if it contained any, though I had no faith in it.

Well, this was the outcome. My husband was working nights at the time, so after he had gone I took up the book and before I laid it down, to go to sleep, it was nearly twelve o'clock. So enwrapped had I been in the wonderful truths it contained, that I had taken no notice of the time. It seemed to supply a long-felt want, something for which I had been hungering all my life, although I had been a faithful church-member and strove with all my might to live up to its requirements. Many of my ailments, in fact all of them excepting catarrh and a bowel disorder, disappeared after a few days of study. These ills, however, seemed to stick persistently to me, but there is much improvement and I know that I have but to continue in the path that I have entered and I shall be free in good time. I wish also to state that I have never used my glasses since the first night I began to study, nor have I needed them.

To me the physical healing has been a source of endless gratitude, but the spiritual uplift means much more. The Bible has been opened to me and I can see so much in it, while before I took up the study of Christian Science I could get comparatively nothing from it. I used to read it faithfully, and then had to reread it to see what I had read, so I was still in darkness; but I kept on in the church and worked all that my ill health would allow, because I feared eternal punishment if I did not do my best. I never can be grateful enough to Christian Science for relieving me from the awful fear, which I had carried with me all my life, of death and the grave and the awful consequence if we were unfaithful. I can now see that this fear had much to do with my ill health, for I had always had the evil side held up to me instead of God and His love. Through Christian Science has also come a much more contented feeling; my disposition has much improved and it is such a comfort to laugh and be happy and to know that God is not frowning at me.

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