Speaker: We'd like you to hear a fine example of a healing of a child which came about entirely through reliance on God. Mrs. Elsie Henke of Evanston, Illinois, is the mother of two children, and she's going to tell you of the healing of her daughter.

Mrs. Henke: Shortly after our daughter, Cheryl, was born we noticed that her eyes didn't focus properly. As time went on, it became more and more obvious that her eyes were crossed. Our neighbors and relatives often talked about it. Perhaps I should say right here that both my husband and I were brought up in Christian Science. We both had had many proofs of God's healing power. So it was natural for us to turn to Christian Science for the solution of this problem. There was some slight improvement, but it seemed to take a long time. We had help from a Christian Science practitioner several different times.

Speaker: Did Cheryl still have the condition when she started school?

Mrs. Henke: As a matter of fact, she did. The school authorities called the situation to our attention, and by the time she reached second grade, they insisted something should be done. They told us the trouble would not only be a handicap to her in her schoolwork, but that the continued use of her eyes in this position would tend to weaken them. As time went on, and the child still was not healed, we became quite concerned about all the talk there was about our daughter's condition. We wanted to continue to rely on God alone for healing, but we finally took her to an eye specialist to inquire about glasses.

The specialist examined her eyes very carefully. He said that glasses would be of absolutely no avail and that an operation would be necessary and the only thing that could help her. My husband and I talked it over, and we decided we were going to continue to rely wholeheartedly on God for the healing. We asked a Christian Science practitioner to help us regularly. I still remember how much I was helped by talks I had with this practitioner.

Of course, we discussed many spiritual truths about the child. But what stands out to me most vividly is the way I was awakened to see our daughter as the perfect child of God. I saw more clearly that that was her real, spiritual identity, that she was forever coexistent with God, that she had always existed with Him and always would, and that there had never been any separation from God's perfection and love. I also found verses in the Bible that were very comforting to me. I remember two of them particularly. One was from Proverbs, where it says, "Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee." The other verse was from Isaiah, where it says, "I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight."

Well, as I've said, I worked regularly with the practitioner. I talked with her every day. I started each day thinking correctly about the situation. And I continued the rest of the day studying systematically the Bible and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy and thinking over these truths about God and about man as God's child. I let everything else go; I did just the barest essentials. I devoted all my time to this kind of prayer. I just saw so clearly that the child really was spiritual, not material, and this trouble really had no identity, was no part of her, because God never made it. This was in my thought continually, no matter what I was doing.

Speaker: Of course all this uplifted thinking was true prayer, wasn't it, a spiritual state of thought, which was bound to have its effect.

Mrs. Henke: Well, the next thing I knew our daughter was healed. It all happened within about three weeks from the time I really devoted full time to prayer. I don't think I could tell you the exact moment when the healing occurred. It was as though the condition had never been. I just realized after two or three weeks that the work was complete. And it was. That was the end of the trouble. Since then, a school eye examination has rated her vision as 20/20—completely perfect.

Speaker: It's so kind of you to tell us just how you worked out this problem, Mrs. Henke. What a beautiful healing!

Mrs. Henke: Yes, it was, but there was even more to the experience. You see, Cheryl was seven at the time of the healing of her eyes, and in the meantime her second teeth had come in quite crooked. But evidently during the period when we were devoting so much thought to prayer and the perfection of God's child, her teeth also were straightened. We hadn't given any special attention to her teeth, but when I was getting her ready for bed one evening, I noticed that all her teeth were straight. Since then the dentist has commented on this, too.

Now she's learned about the healing herself. But at the time, she didn't quite realize what a wonderful thing it was. It means a lot to her now, however. During this same year Cheryl's brother Rad was completely healed of a case of eczema, which was said to be lifelong.

You can imagine how much these healings have meant to us and how grateful we are that our children have had such clear-cut proof of God's healing power.

Speaker: Indeed we can, Mrs. Henke. We know how much such healings would mean to any parent. We certainly thank you for sharing them with us.

Friends, we are especially pleased to have you hear Mrs. Henke's experience with her children, because it illustrates so clearly how a home is benefited when its members prayerfully rely on god in every need. You can see that such reliance brings not only confidence and peace to the family circle, it brings actual healing, actual correction of whatever is discordant.

Christian Science shows that the state of thought entertained by parents plays a very important part in the health and well-being of children in the home. But much more than mere optimism is needed. It is essential to maintain a quiet, prayerful acknowledgment under all circumstances that man is the spiritual child of God, forever maintained by God in perfect harmony. Such prayerful reasoning includes the recognition that regardless of how troubling or even frightening an affliction may seem to be, it really is no part of the child of God's creating, no part of the perfect, spiritual likeness of the ever-loving Father. It was on this basis that the Master, Christ Jesus, healed the sick and the deformed. His method is explained by Mary Baker Eddy in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" in these words (pp. 476, 477): "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick."

Christian Science helps the parent to rise above fear and discouragement by making plain that there is in reality no frightened or confused human mind to stand in the way of health and harmony. Actually there is only one Mind, God, and man reflects that perfect divine Mind at all times. When this great spiritual truth is understood, the parent no longer is the victim of fear, no longer accepts physical evidence of disease or deformities as real. Today, as in the time of the Master, this prayerfully correct view, this divinely inspired view of spiritual man, brings health to the sick and replaces deformity with wholeness and perfection.

You'll remember that Paul in the Bible declared, "Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." As parents, you and I are spiritually transformed in the degree that we acknowledge the unchanging completeness and perfection of man as God's perfect child. And such acknowledgment frees our children from bondage just as it did in our guest's family. The opportunity is ours today to prove that reliance on God does bring freedom to our children.

The musical selection on this program was Hymn No. 51 from the Christian Science Hymnal (Eternal Mind the Potter is).