When Christ Jesus told his followers that they could not serve both God and mammon, he was emphasizing Joshua's challenge of centuries before to the people of Israel (Josh. 24:15): "Choose you this day whom ye will serve."

Christian Science is a religion of love based on the life and teachings of Jesus, and from these teachings we learn that God knows only good. He is never conscious of the material world with all its tragedies and sufferings. God and evil are not coexistent and cannot coexist. Christian Science reveals that evil is unreal, no part of true creation.

That this Science heals is a positive, established fact, proved continually by those who put its teaching into practice. Christian Science declares that God, Spirit, is the only true healing power and that therefore the Christianly scientific method of healing is the only genuine one. In the textbook we read (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 230), "According to Holy Writ, the sick are never really healed by drugs, hygiene, or any material method." Then on the next page Mary Baker Eddy gives further reasons why we should choose God, good, as the only healing power: "Unless an ill is rightly met and fairly overcome by Truth, the ill is never conquered. If God destroys not sin, sickness, and death, they are not destroyed in the mind of mortals, but seem to this so-called mind to be immortal. What God cannot do, man need not attempt. If God heals not the sick, they are not healed, for no lesser power equals the infinite All-power; but God, Truth, Life, Love, does heal the sick through the prayer of the righteous."

When we think of Christian healing, we think of Jesus, our Master and Way-shower, we think of love and humility, patience and compassion. Jesus manifested no power that cannot be appropriated by all on earth today. He knew that God is the lawmaker and the only power. He claimed no power of his own, but gave the assurance to his followers that all power belongs to God. He never hesitated for one moment to affirm his oneness with God, his unity and sonship with the Father.

Jesus not only claimed man's perfection as the image and likeness of God; he knew or understood it. And it was this knowing that enabled him to heal the sick. The spiritual and unequaled healing ministry of Jesus was often spoken of as miraculous, but his healings were normal and natural consequences of choosing good and knowing the truth, the truth that man is immortal and spiritual, not material and mortal.

Mrs. Eddy also healed by knowing this same truth that Jesus taught and practiced. Through the study of Christian Science we all have the blessed privilege of choosing whom we will serve and of knowing the truth that heals the sick and sets at liberty those that are bound. This bondage is not always sickness or pain. Oftentimes it is fear, doubt, failure, limitation, or worry about home or business. All discord is, however, unreal, and all harmony is real and available now through the study and application of Christian Science. Healing occurs when we change our thought from belief in the unreal to the recognition and understanding of that which is real and eternal, when we realize even in a degree the presence of the perfect man of God's creating, for this correct concept of man annuls the false sense of man as mortal, manifesting sickness, sin, selfishness, greed, resentment, or hatred. A consciousness filled with thoughts of health, joy, and peace can never be conscious of sickness, sadness, or discontent.

The last chapter in the textbook, consisting of one hundred pages, is entitled "Fruitage." Within these pages one finds testimonies of healings which resulted from merely reading the textbook. Mrs. Eddy made provision for the relating of healings through the monthly and weekly periodicals. Also, a portion of the Wednesday meetings held by every branch of The Mother Church is devoted to the giving of testimonies and experiences in Christian Science.

I have experienced many physical healings through choosing God, good, as the only healing power, as taught in Christian Science. A back injury, caused by an automobile accident, troubled me during my early study of Christian Science. I asked for Science treatment when the accident occurred. At the same time I had X-ray pictures made and also underwent a complete physical examination. Later I had different types of pathological treatments, first one and then another, for several weeks, but grew steadily worse. The thought came to me that these material treatments might be interfering with my healing through Christian Science, but immediately I justified them by saying that I had not taken any medicine or drugs.

A few more weeks of suffering, and I discontinued all help, both physical and metaphysical. However, one evening about three months later, when the suffering had reached the point we might term torture, I again turned to the textbook, opening it at random to page 424. I suddenly remembered that I was reading the very reference given me by the practitioner called at the time of the accident. It was, "Accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind, and we must leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of chance to the proper sense of God's unerring direction and thus bring out harmony."

I continued to read for hours and hours, in fact until after midnight, at intervals turning back to this particular reference. Then the light came, and I realized that I did not need to do anything to my back, but that I did need to take my stand for God, Spirit, and for His spiritual mode of healing. I needed to be healed of trying to mix Spirit with matter, spirituality with materiality, of attempting to serve God and mammon. My problem was not an injured, painful, distorted back, but a divided trust, a "house divided against itself (Matt. 12:25). And when this light came, the healing followed and was complete and permanent. When the false belief is eliminated, there can be no further manifestation of it. This healing occurred about twenty years ago, and I have never had the slightest discomfort from my back since that time.

Of far greater importance to me than the physical healing of an injured back, broken bones, or torn ligaments was the clearer, purer concept of God I gained through this experience. I learned many lessons, the greatest being that God is All-in-all, a God near, dear, and powerful. I realized then and there that the work the Christian Science practitioner did at the time of the accident was not lost, but was effective, even though I had not awakened to this fact at the time. This experience brought added proof of the fallacy of physical examinations and medical diagnoses in cases of physical discord. Much better to "leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind."

Is it any wonder that Christian Scientists literally pour out gratitude for Mrs. Eddy, whose spiritual-mindedness enabled her to discover Christian Science and give her discovery to the world, thereby helping all mankind? Today thousands are seeing the light of Truth and are being healed of all manner of discord, which proves that many are choosing the right and the good. "Choose you this day whom ye will serve," and may this choosing be God.