Testimony of Healing November 20, 1920 Issue

About 1916 I found myself afflicted with nearly everything...

W. C. Skaggs

About 1916 I found myself afflicted with nearly everything that flesh is heir to and was given up to die by some of the leading heart specialists of New England. I had a wife and three children, one not yet a month old, who needed my support. I had tried every earthly remedy and all had failed. The outlook was indeed dark, when from somewhere the inspiration came to me to try Christian Science. That was enough. It seemed that I could not get to the telephone quickly enough to call a practitioner. I told her my story and she assured me that all would be well. On the fifteenth day my waistline shrank nine inches and the dropsical condition was entirely gone from limbs and body, and in ten days more I was a perfectly healed man and dismissed the practitioner. With joy and gratitude to the Giver of all good, and to our revered Leader, Mary Baker Eddy, I took up the study of Christian Science and attended its services and took part in its Wednesday evening meetings. This brought forth many unpleasant experiences both at home and in social circles, but I clung to the truth. Many of my clients and former friends, however, refused to employ me, and I was forced to leave and go to a distant state and begin all over again.

Everything went well for a time, but being alone and away from church influences and absorbed with business cares, the mesmerism of materialism crept in and ere I was aware the sunlight of Truth and Love was shut out. Try as I might, I could not extricate myself. I then wrote to a practitioner for help. Everything remained dark and gloomy for about ten days, and discouragement was getting in its work. I was sitting in my office one evening after supper, trying to realize the truth. I had not yet turned the lights on and was sitting in the twilight when I commenced very slowly to repeat the "scientific statement of being" as found on page 468 of Science and Health: "There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter." Here was a rift in the mental cloud and I caught a glimpse of God's man. "All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all." The rift became greater and through it came more light and a clearer view of God's man. "Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error. Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal." Here I got a clear vision of God's man, pure and perfect. "Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness. Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual." Here the mist entirely disappeared, the mesmerism was broken, perfect harmony reigned, and I saw God's man as I had never seen him before, pure, perfect, in God's image and likeness, standing as it were, on the mount, above the material world. I am grateful for this experience, for all that Christian Science has done and is doing for me and mine. I write this, trusting it may help some struggling one on his journey out of materiality. I am also very grateful for the privilege of membership in The Mother Church, The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston.—W. C. Skaggs, London, Ky.

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