Testimony of Healing January 8, 1927 Issue

It is with a grateful heart that I write this testimony of...

Vivien U. Willard

It is with a grateful heart that I write this testimony of what Christian Science has meant to me. The beneficent influence of Christian Science came into my life when doubt, discouragement, and ill health made the future seem very dark indeed. And now for nearly fifteen years it has been my only help in every hour of need.

I was reared in a Christian church. Later on I became very active in the work of that church; and when I went to college, a large university in the Middle West, it was natural that I should find myself very busy with the work of the Young Women's Christian Association in that university. I was a sincere student of the Bible, and the exercise of religious duties played a large and happy part in my life. During the latter part of my junior year I became vitally interested in the work of the Student Volunteer Movement, and with the idea of becoming a missionary to China, in the capacity of teacher or Y. W. C. A. secretary, I signed the pledge for foreign service. Having always been in very frail health, I knew that I might not pass the required physical examination for service abroad; but since this was the highest idea for serving my fellow-men that I had at the time, I hoped some day that I should be able to go.

During the latter part of my college course, however, a great change took place in my thinking about religion. I found that I did not have a reasonable and logical explanation of God and the universe. I was no longer satisfied with the blind faith of the church, and its creeds and dogmas failed to satisfy. Professors, Bible teachers, and ministers could not answer my questions to my satisfaction; so for a time I delved into the study of various philosophies and religions, all of which gave me nothing to which I could cling. I became, as I thought, an agnostic. I stopped going to church, stopped praying, and put my Bible away. After several years of wandering about in this mental state, a crisis took place in my physical condition. A complete nervous breakdown occurred, and physicians said there was not much hope that I would ever be well.

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