Article March 31, 2014 ISSUE

Addressing discouragement

Mary Trammell

This originally appeared as a blog on time4thinkers.com with the following question as the title.

Question: How can I keep from feeling discouraged and second-guessing my choices when a healing is delayed?

Your question really touched my heart. Before I even finished reading it, I was sending you a mental hug!

Actually, a long time ago I went through something like what you’re describing. After being quite ill for almost two years—praying about it almost every moment and working with a very dear Christian Science practitioner—I was still struggling.

Then one day I found something that Mary Baker Eddy said about her own dramatic healing of semi-invalidism. “The uplifting of spirit was the upbuilding of the body,” she wrote (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 169 ).

Reading that, I suddenly saw something new. My recovery depended on “the uplifting of spirit.” Not on what I ate, or how much I slept, or how I felt physically, or what the material prognosis was for my condition. It didn’t even depend on how many pages of the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy, I read each day. It depended on my own spiritual progress, my journey with God.

Well, realizing that made me focus on what was really important—walking hour by hour with God, to the best of my understanding. Of course, I can’t say I completely stopped paying attention to what my body was saying, but I sure did a lot less of that than I had before. What really became important to me was uplifting my “spirit” by living more of what Christian Science teaches that God is—Life, Truth, Love, Mind, Soul, Spirit, Principle. Especially Love. Remembering how much Father-Mother God loves each one of Her children, including me. And how much I love God.

That helped so much! I started feeling a peace I hadn’t felt for a long time. My heart began to heal. And so did my body—gradually and permanently.

The important thing is that God loves you, too. No matter how long you’ve wrestled with an illness, it’s still not part of you. It’s not part of God’s will for you or me—or anyone. Jesus knew this. He was never intimidated by how long an illness had gone on or how serious it looked. He instantly healed a woman who’d been bleeding for 12 years (see Mark 5:25–29 ), a woman who’d been crippled for 18 years (see Luke 13:11–13 ), and a man who’d been an invalid for 38 years (see John 5:5–9 ). He even healed a man who’d been blind all his life (see John 9:1–7 ).

So everything’s possible to God. And if you love what you’re learning about God in Christian Science, you’re already experiencing an “uplifting of spirit.” Now keep on going! And don’t be surprised if, sooner or later, that spiritual uplift translates into “the upbuilding of the body”—into physical healing. Nothing could be more natural.

About the author

Mary “Trinka” Trammell is a practitioner and teacher of Christian Science, who divides her time between Boston, Massachusetts, and Boca Raton, Florida. She is also a member of the Christian Science Board of Education.

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