One day last year, I woke up with a bloodshot eye. I knew that I could be calm and unafraid, confident that there is no spot where God, good, is not. I called a Christian Science practitioner, an individual who provides metaphysical treatment through prayer for those who request it.

The practitioner shared this passage from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy: “Christian Scientists, be a law to yourselves that mental malpractice cannot harm you either when asleep or when awake” (p. 442).

Later in Science and Health, mental malpractice is explained as “the injurious action of one mortal mind controlling another from wrong motives, . . . practised either with a mistaken or a wicked purpose” (p. 451). While there wasn’t another person controlling my thinking, I was perhaps listening to false and limiting thoughts about myself instead of to true thoughts from God.

My study of Christian Science has revealed to me that we must refuse to accept into our consciousness any suggestions regarding the reality and presence of illness or any other discord. God gives us good, upright thoughts that help us overcome any challenges. Each of God’s children has the privilege of destroying false, material beliefs by understanding God’s true nature as infinite Spirit and our true, spiritual nature as His offspring—and we can do this without fail.

Our ongoing motive needs to be to glorify God by always listening to Him. We, as God’s image and likeness, naturally reflect everlasting harmony because God has only good for all of us, and we are each a perfectly cared-for child of God, whether asleep or awake.

This incident occurred just before Easter, and a family member felt that I should not attend an upcoming family gathering because she thought I might have a contagious disease.
I agreed not to attend, and my wife, not wanting me to be alone, planned to stay home with me. However, the practitioner, my wife, and I steadfastly continued our prayers, and soon the redness vanished, and the eye was completely clear. The concerned family member was informed of the healing and, after looking at my eye again, readily gave her approval of my attending the Easter event. 

I was very grateful to witness the manifestation of the spiritual perfection that God always sees in His creation—which includes me and all mankind. We are never separate from our Father-Mother God. As the psalmist says, praying to God, “As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness” (Psalms 17:15). And Science and Health assures us, “When we fully understand our relation to the Divine, we can have no other Mind but His,—no other Love, wisdom, or Truth, no other sense of Life, and no consciousness of the existence of matter or error” (pp. 205–206). 

This healing was God’s victory and clear proof that His is the only power. 

Robert Pennamon
Manchester, Missouri, US