When the Apostle Peter healed the lame man who sat at the gate of the Temple, he used these words: “Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk” (Acts 3:6). To me, “in the name of” means “in the authority of.” Peter was invoking the authority of the Christ, the true idea of God, which Jesus so perfectly embodied, to cast out of thought, and therefore out of experience, anything unlike God, good. 

This is our authorization as well. We, too, have God-given authority to speak in the name of Christ to anything plaguing us or others. As Jesus did, we can cast it out as having no place in Truth, God, and therefore no place in our thought or experience. Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered the laws of Christian healing, writes, “Like the great Exemplar, the healer should speak to disease as one having authority over it, leaving Soul to master the false evidences of the corporeal senses and to assert its claims over mortality and disease” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 395).

Some people might wonder about the purpose of the prayer and study (of the Bible and Mrs. Eddy’s writings) that it is common for Christian Scientists to do daily. A recent healing I had showed me that this consecrated prayer and study prepares us, like first responders, to always be ready to challenge, with the authority that comes through Christ, any discordant situation that arises.