Article August 11, 1951 Issue

HEALING WORKS A REQUISITE

OLIVER WENDELL WOODARD

It was Mary Baker Eddy's reading of the account of the healing of the palsied man as given in Matthew (9:2-8) that preceded her own healing of a serious injury caused by a fall on the ice. She had read this, of course, numerous times; but this time the light of spiritual sense, of understanding, came to her consciousness, and she was free. She relates of this experience (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 24), "As I read, the healing Truth dawned upon my sense." It was in the same atmosphere of illumined spiritual sense that she wrote "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," interpreting to us the true meaning of the Scriptures. With this spiritual sense she healed the sick and taught others to heal. And it is only through this spiritual sense that we can understand her writings or demonstrate their truth.

It is not a purely intellectual understanding, that we seek, though we have a right to thorough, intelligent understanding, as well as to the satisfaction that comes from a logical and scientifically provable religion. Christian Science does not merely give a reason for the hope that is in us, but it fulfills that hope. It does not promise vainly, but it does require obedience to its spiritual law. An intellectual grasp of the teachings of Christian Science is not sufficient. We ought never to allow ourselves to be "corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ" (II Cor. 11 :3).

Instead of always trying to reason things out humanly, we should cherish childlike trust. We need to set aside the human sense and, rising above the realm of problems, listen to the divine voice; for it is the divine Mind which supplies us with the spiritual ideas that meet all our needs. Through a human sense, doubts and arguments, ifs and buts, arise, but through the spiritual sense come assurance, inspiration, guidance, and protection. We are wrong when we believe that we have to work out our salvation alone. The Apostle Paul said (Phil. 2: 13), "It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

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