Man is deathless, spiritual," Mary Baker Eddy writes in Science and Health...

Carla Worthy-Skinner

"Man is deathless, spiritual," Mary Baker Eddy writes in Science and Health (p. 266). Christ Jesus said in the Bible, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death" (John 8:51). These precious statements of truth helped heal me of grief and great sorrow over the sudden death of my adult son.

My broken heart is whole again.

It was not overnight demonstration, but took weeks and months of consistent and persistent affirmations of Truth. And it was not an intellectual exercise either, but a day-by-day, conscious, deeply felt, prayerful living of spiritual consciousness and embracing only what I knew to be true. I needed to see through the mist (the lie) of material creation, to the reality of spiritual creation, to reach the understanding of divine sonship. I prayed to know my son's true identity is not in a finite, material form, but in divine Love, safe and eternal.

Science and Health explains: "The admission to one's self that man is God's own likeness sets man free to master the infinite idea. This conviction shuts the door on death, and opens it wide towards immortality" (p. 90). And elsewhere in the book we read: "This is the doctrine of Christian Science: that divine Love cannot be deprived of its manifestation, or object; that joy cannot be turned into sorrow, for sorrow is not the master of joy; that good can never produce evil; that matter can never produce mind nor life result in death. The perfect man—governed by God, his perfect Principle—is sinless and eternal" (p. 304).

Each and every morning I would begin my day by knowing my son as he truly is, the child of God, never separate from Him. Cherished and protected from all evil. My son's origin is God, and he is not subject to death. Death can never, and will never, end Life, God. I learned that it is impossible to believe my son died if I know that Spirit is the creating force. Was my son ever material, ever born into matter or dying out of it? No! This is not true about him or any of God's precious, spiritual ideas.

Throughout the day, if sadness or grief would try to encroach on my thought, I would pray to my Father, and His love would embrace me, comforting me and reassuring me of His tender care for all of His children. This was my constant prayer; to know God and my son's relation to Him.

I can honestly say I feel no separation from my son. My broken heart is whole again. To say I am grateful for this healing somehow seems an inadequate expression of how I truly feel. There is no one word, or group of words, that can describe the joy, peace, and serenity that come by understanding, even so slightly, the nothingness of death. I am satisfied for today, knowing the promise of spiritual things to come.

Carla Worthy-Skinner
Solana Beach, California

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Testimony of Healing

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