Article April 28, 1923 Issue

Christian Scientists, in their efforts to bring relief to...

Hiram W. Hayes, Committee on Publication for the District of Columbia,—Washington

Times

Christian Scientists, in their efforts to bring relief to the sick, are striving their utmost to obey the command of Jesus when he told his followers to preach, "The kingdom of heaven is at hand," and to "heal the sick;" and they are striving to do this in the same way that Jesus did—by absolute reliance upon God. Jesus never diagnosed disease as organic, functional, nervous, or what not. He healed the impotent man who was lowered through the roof, the cripple at the pool, and the man who was born blind by exactly the same means that he healed Simon's wife's mother, who, it is recorded, was sick of a fever.

Those who classify diseases would doubtless have called some of the foregoing organic and some functional; but not so did Jesus and his disciples. Later, Paul healed the young man who fell out of the window at Troas and "was taken up dead," as recorded in the twentieth chapter of Acts, by the same means that he used at Melita to heal the father of Publius of a disease, which the writer of the book of Acts calls fever and flux. Christian Scientists understand that it is God "who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases; and they turn to Him in sickness just as they do in trouble. As well might one undertake to classify sins and expect in this way aid to full salvation therefrom, as to classify diseases, when seeking to be healed of sickness by reliance upon the power and promises of God. Healing by prayer or spiritual means was practiced by the early Christians for about three hundred years after the ascension. When primitive Christianity gave way to forms and ceremonies, spiritual healing was lost, and remained so until Christian Science was discovered by Mrs. Eddy in 1866. Since that time it has been proved in thousands of cases that the prayer of faith does heal the sick, as the Apostle James said it would; and there has been no marked difference in the healing work, whether these cases had been diagnosed as organic or functional by medical doctors, prior to the patient's turning to Christian Science as a last resort, when all material means had failed.

Christian Scientists do not rely upon the human but upon the divine will to free them from the ills of the flesh, as well as from the sins which so continually beset mankind. To such an extent have the discoveries of modern science been disproved in later years that Christian Scientists should not be condemned because they have discarded many so-called scientific methods, and have come to base their healing work upon the demonstrable truth found in the following statements, among others, of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 207) by their revered Leader: "There is but one primal cause. Therefore there can be no effect from any other cause, and there can be no reality in aught which does not proceed from this great and only cause. Sin, sickness, disease, and death belong not to the Science of being. They are the errors, which presuppose the absence of Truth, Life, or Love. The spiritual reality is the scientific fact in all things."

Send a comment to the editors

We'd love to hear from you!

Easily submit your testimonies, articles, and poems online.

Submit

Christian Scientists, in their efforts to bring relief to...

We'd love to hear from you!

Sign up for unlimited access