Article May 5, 1923 Issue

There surely can be no danger in the method of healing...

Theodore Burkhart, Committee on Publication for the State of Oregon,—Medford

Mail Tribune

There surely can be no danger in the method of healing that is wholly spiritually, — that is, really divine; for whatever is of God must necessarily be good and not harmful. The speaker, according to your report, says all healing is of God, and, in the true sense, is divine; yet he argues for employing material means along with spiritual. It is quite true that all genuine healing is divine, — that is, of or proceeding from God. The healing that seems to result from faith in material remedies and man-made theories, brings no lasting relief from the enslaving beliefs which constitute mortal existence, since such healing results not from the correction of the mental cause that is at the root of all our troubles. Healing by means of faith in material methods leaves the patient still subject to the fears and false beliefs which infest so-called mortal mind and which cause the trouble. To be "every whit whole," we must permanently get rid of fear and belief in all that is opposed to God; and this can be accomplished only by spiritual means.

Our existence in the flesh seems to be a mixture of good and evil, — it is of "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" of which God warned Adam and Eve. If God expects or requires us "to use the means at our disposal," these material means must have been provided by Him, and their origin must be divine. But is God, Spirit, the originator of inharmonious matter, which is the supposititious opposite of Spirit? The Bible declares that God looked upon all that He had made "and, behold, it was very good;" and we know from experience that matter and material beliefs do not come up to God's standard of being wholly good. Does truth use falsehood as a means of expressing truthfulness? Is darkness employed to manifest light; or does good accomplish good through the instrumentality of evil? Christian Science logically points out the scientific impossibility of God, Spirit, being the author of aught that is not true to His nature. The material, the mortal, the evil and discordant, are not of God's making. "God," says Paul, "is not the author of confusion, but of peace."

Christian Science also accords with the Scriptures in teaching that God is omnipotent in fact as well as in theory, and has no need of material instrumentalities in order to save mankind from disease and death. If we would but take God at His word, "I am the Lord that healeth thee," "Beside me there is no God," we should lose faith in material means, and begin to understand that the power of the Almighty is exerted entirely through the mental or spiritual. Isaiah declares, "The Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save." This being true, why use any other means? Jesus never taught the use of or reliance upon material means, nor did he inculcate faith in material remedies or medical theories; but, on the contrary, he said, "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." Christian Science is to-day restoring the lost element of Christian healing; and its success in healing both the sick and sinning is the sign of Immanuel, — "God with us," thus proving the ever-presence of divine Love, and the ever-availability of God as "a very present help in trouble" and "who healeth all thy diseases."

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