Editorial February 18, 1922 Issue

Spiritual Healing

Duncan Sinclair

The Christ has always been in the world to heal the sick. Throughout all ages the Christ, Truth, has done wonderful things for those desirous of and pursuing the way of good. The Science of spiritual healing, it is true, was for long unknown and unformulated; but, notwithstanding, spiritual law has always been operative to destroy the illusions of material sense when men have been receptive to spiritual truth. Thus the pslamist declares: "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;" and in Isaiah, after describing the nature of the "fast that I [the Lord] have chosen," we read: "Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily." The spiritual seers of old knew that the application of spiritual sense in the pursuance of good brought about the inevitable result of healing.

In the gospel narratives of the life of Christ Jesus there are recorded many wonderful healings of disease and sin. The Prophet of Nazareth illustrated what he taught by deeds. He healed the withered hand, restored sight to the blind, cured paralysis, deafness disappeared before his spiritual understanding, lepers were cleansed, and those of unsound mind had their reason restored to them. All of these spiritual healings are recorded in the New Testament. And it is significant that in no single instance did Jesus use matter in any form to aid the cures he brought about, neither did he suggest the use of anything of a material nature toward this end. He relied absolutely on the power of Truth to heal the sick, as is done in Christian Science to-day.

Jesus himself not only healed through spiritual means, but commanded his twelve disciples and the seventy to do likewise. "And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples," Matthew says, "he gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease." Now Christ Jesus did not give to the world the letter of his method of healing, but its spirit he bestowed in abundance upon his followers, else they could not have done, even in a measure, what he did; and this same spirit was in evidence in the world, potent to heal spiritually, for, possibly, two or three hundred years after the Master's time. It remained, however, for Mary Baker Eddy to discover the Science of Christianity, the Science which has always supported spiritual healing, and to work out its rules for the use of all mankind. Mrs. Eddy discovered the nature of divine Principle, identified divine Principle with God, showed man's constant relationship to divine Principle, revealed the spiritual law through which this spiritual relationship is sustained, and not only demonstrated the truth thus enunciated, but made it quite clear in her book "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" how others could do likewise if they possessed the same Mind as was in Christ Jesus. On page xi of the Preface to this book, Mrs. Eddy has written: "The physical healing of Christian Science results now, as in Jesus' time, from the operation of divine Principle, before which sin and disease lose their reality in human consciousness and disappear as naturally and as necessarily as darkness gives place to light and sin to reformation."

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