Grateful for God's 'outstretched arm'
Christian Science reveals that every day Christ is inviting man to “come and dine” (see John 21:12 )—and what a glorious meal Christ provides. Not only did Christ Jesus feed thousands with a few loaves and fishes (see, for example, Matthew 14:13–21 and Mark 8:1–9 ), but the Christ—God’s messages speaking to humanity—feeds us spiritually, daily providing spiritual nourishment. And this nourishment leads to the healing of all the claims of sin or sickness.
As I have experienced healing in Christian Science, I have felt the joy that the disciples must have felt, learning from Jesus how to overcome error of every sort. I recall one time when gratitude for one healing contributed greatly to a subsequent healing.
One day I fell and seriously injured my arm. All sensation in the arm was gone, and it hung limply. I didn’t get a medical diagnosis, but it appeared that my shoulder had been dislocated. Concerned, I began praying. The next night, as I was reading in my Bible about Jesus healing the man with the withered hand (see Matthew 12:10–13 ), I came across Jesus’ command, “Stretch forth thine hand.”
Suddenly an angel message consisting of two phrases came strongly to my thinking: “God’s mighty, outstretched arm,” a paraphrase of Deuteronomy 26:8 , and “the unfurling of power,” a paraphrase of a verse from Hymn 203 in the Christian Science Hymnal (Lewie Prittie Castellain). Immediately I saw myself as God’s likeness, spiritual and without flaw. My arm regained strength and freedom of movement, and I was healed right in that moment.
About a month later, I was working on a project in my home when I struck the outside of my hand and my little finger with a hammer. I cried out in pain, but immediately I heard and felt God speaking to me. The message that came was that God hadn’t stopped caring for me, and that a picture of injury didn’t have any spiritual reality.
As I prayerfully listened, I began quieting down my thoughts—and the pain quieted down, too. I had learned from Christian Science that “accidents are unknown to God, or immortal Mind, and we must leave the mortal basis of belief and unite with the one Mind, in order to change the notion of chance to the proper sense of God’s unerring direction and thus bring out harmony” (Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 424 ).
I declared that an accident could never have happened, could never have touched my spiritual identity. I was able to go forward and finish what I was working on by using just the thumb and first two fingers of that hand.
That night, however, when I looked at my hand, the edge was black and swollen. But I was confident that complete healing was coming because all that day I had been thinking about the healing of my arm the month before, and feeling such healing inspiration and gratitude for what had occurred. I knew God could heal my hand, also.
I kept my thoughts on many of the Bible’s healing promises, like Jesus’ command, “Stretch forth thine hand” (Matthew 12:13 ). I also thought about the Apostle Paul’s statement that we should be “willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord” (II Corinthians 5:8 ). Within just a few days, my hand and little finger were normal in appearance and were functioning painlessly. I felt so much joy!
In both these healings, I felt that I was invited to dine with Christ—to see my spiritual needs met abundantly. As Jesus promised, “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6 ). Christian Science, as explained by Mary Baker Eddy in Science and Health, shows us how this hunger for spirituality results in healing.
Helena Rhonda Bullion
Baltimore, Maryland, US
