Article March 10, 1980 Issue

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The second dispatch heals

MARJORIE MACARTNEY

It was the middle of the night. We were in a hotel twelve thousand miles from home when we heard the alarm, followed by a sharp knock on the door and a voice shouting, "Fire!" Clouds of smoke were coming up from the stairwell. As I proceeded down the stairs, the dynamic truth revealed to Elijah on the mount came back to me. I remembered that God is not in destructive earthquake, wind, or fire. Then, I reasoned, if omnipotent, omnipresent, all-seeing, all-knowing God isn't in that fire, it has no power—nothing to start or sustain it.

The account of Elijah's experience continues, "And after the fire a still small voice."^{I Kings 19:12;} To me, this was the second dispatch! How many times I had studied Mrs. Eddy's words in Science and Health: "A blundering despatch, mistakenly announcing the death of a friend, occasions the same grief that the friend's real death would bring. You think that your anguish is occasioned by your loss. Another despatch, correcting the mistake, heals your grief, and you learn that your suffering was merely the result of your belief. Thus it is with all sorrow, sickness, and death. You will learn at length that there is no cause for grief, and divine wisdom will then be understood. Error, not Truth, produces all the suffering on earth."^{Science and Health, p. 386;}

Immediately I was reassured, knowing that the second dispatch—the healing truth appropriate for the situation—had arrived. Soon the manager of the hotel calmly announced, "You may return to your rooms; the fire is out."

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