Testimony of Healing April 26, 1941 Issue

It is with heartfelt gratitude to God, and sincere appreciation...

Mary E. Hoyt with contributions from Ellen Hoyt Friday

It is with heartfelt gratitude to God, and sincere appreciation of Christian Science that I give this testimony. More than twenty years ago a doctor who had been taking care of me for almost a year, said that there was nothing more he could do for me. Almost every organ of the body was affected, and there was a serious tubercular condition of one of them. It seemed to have been brought on by grief over the condition of our young daughter, who was a hopeless cripple. At birth she had been a normal baby, but when about seven months old she began having convulsions, due to indigestion, and it was found that milk, in any form, had been acting like poison. This malnutrition resulted in underdevelopment of the bones, so that she was unable to stand or walk without support. She was given all the foods and medicines which were supposed to strengthen and build up bones. This went on until she was two years old. At this time a well-known orthopedic specialist was called in, and he stated that she lacked bone substance, and immediately put on braces from her hips to the soles of her feet. With these she could walk, but was helpless without them. This continued for another two years with no physical improvement. Her lower limbs had not developed since she was seven months old. The doctor finally said that there could be no improvement unless the limbs were broken and put into casts, and that even if this were done he could make no promises beyond straightening the limbs.

It was at this time that the doctor attending me had said that he could do no more for me, adding that only God could help. Neighbors of ours who knew something of Christian Science, but were not themselves students, urged my husband to have Christian Science help for me. I was daily growing weaker, and so, very reluctantly, my husband consented. I was given a list of practitioners, and I selected one, whom I, like Nicodemus, went to see at night. He said very little to me. All I remember was his question, "Do you believe in God?" and my reply, "I believe that I believe in Him." It then came to me clearly that if I believed in the omnipotence of God I could not be sick, and I wept. I was then and there healed of the terrible fear which had held me every time the child had convulsions. I was also healed at that time of the need for the strict diet on which I was existing. The practitioner told me to read aloud to the children every day the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy, in addition to the Bible, which I always studied. This I did, and I also read them to myself every spare minute, day and night. On my second visit to him I took the little girl with me. He did not look at her, but smiled and spoke reassuringly to me.

When I finished reading the textbook I told the practitioner that I did not understand it at all. He lovingly told me to start again at the Preface and read it through. The second time, when I came to the statement (p. 469), "We bury the sense of infinitude, when we admit that, although God is infinite, evil has a place in this infinity, for evil can have no place, where all space is filled with God," it came to me so clearly that God knew nothing of evil, therefore it had no place, that I was filled with joy, and everything started to clear. It must have been at that time that our daughter was healed, for five days from the first visit to the practitioner, the child told me she did not need the "shoes," as she called the braces, refused to allow them to be put on, and started walking without them. The week before, when the shoes had to be changed and the braces were taken off, she had made no effort to walk, but had crawled on the floor. Within a few days after her first steps alone, she was running, something she had always wanted to do, but had been told she never could.

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