Testimony of Healing September 21, 1929 Issue

In August, 1914, when arriving in Zurich, Switzerland, I...

Jenny Miehle with contributions from Eleanor Hoppock Leonard

In August, 1914, when arriving in Zurich, Switzerland, I fell and injured my knee. I suffered a great deal and could hardly walk. Three physicians told me that I had fractured a cartilage and would probably be lame for years. About four days after this accident I was stopped in the street by a gentleman who was staying in the same hotel. He asked me about my knee and inquired whether I had ever heard of Christian Science. I told him that Christian Science might be very good for imaginary troubles, but he could not make me believe that I did not fall, or that I had no pain. He replied that he did not want to make me believe anything, but I surely must know that the first chapter of Genesis says that God (and here he defined "God" as "divine Mind") made man in His own image and likeness, and made him perfect. His definition of God interested me at once, for I had always been looking for someone who could explain God to me. He then said that if I could let go of the mortal (carnal) mind or physical senses, and cling to the divine Mind, I should not feel any pain. This gentleman left for Holland two days after this conversation, and I secured passage on the first steamer leaving Rotterdam. When we reached the Dutch boundary, we stopped several hours, and it was then that my friends told me that I did not limp any more. Not knowing much about Christian Science at that time I could not explain this improvement, but I knew that during that slow journey through Germany I had pondered a great deal on the explanation of God as divine Mind, in contrast to the carnal or mortal mind; and whenever the pain seemed unbearable I could in this way look away from my knee.

On my return to America I was glad to get some information about Christian Science and soon bought a pocket edition of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. Just by reading this book I had many physical healings, of chronic bronchitis, sprained ankle, severely injured instep, colds, almost weekly headaches that lasted two or three days, homesickness, and of the need for glasses that I had worn for a number of years for what a noted oculist called the worst kind of astigmatism, with one eye farsighted and one nearsighted. One year after I had laid aside glasses, the same oculist said that in all his practice he had never seen a case like mine, as, instead of growing blind as he expected at my age, my sight had rather become stronger.

In 1919 I visited a friend in Chicago who was a Christian Scientist. When I told her that, though I had received all these physical healings, I never felt anything of the spiritual uplifting of which the Scientists spoke in their testimonies, she told me to buy a Bible and read the Lesson-Sermons in the Christian Science Quarterly. A short time after beginning to read these lessons carefully I felt as if a light had come within me; and as my understanding of the truth grew, many undesirable traits, like self-centeredness, resentment, intolerance, criticism, and so on, disappeared. I am still far from what I should like to be, and my daily prayer is for growth in love.

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