Quick and complete healing of back injury

During summer vacation one year, I had just finished a wonderful day of beach volleyball training with a professional, to better myself as a coach, and all was going fine until I helped him pick up a large shade tent. I felt something snap in my back, and suddenly I couldn’t breathe without excruciating pain. My gratitude for this day and its opportunities buoyed me through the next few minutes, as I looked for a truth to hang on to.

The college volleyball team I coach studies specific passages from the Christian Science Pastor—the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy—and prays with them to put them into practice. That summer’s Bible passage was fresh in my thought: “There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways” (Psalms 91:10, 11). Wow! This assured me that I was safe and protected, and that I truly dwelled in Spirit—not in a bunch of matter.

After a few moments of settling quietly into, and prayerfully considering and feeling comforted by, the assurances in that passage, I smiled with gratitude as I thought of the passage from Science and Health we had been focusing on: “The relations of God and man, divine Principle and idea, are indestructible in Science; and Science knows no lapse from nor return to harmony, but holds the divine order or spiritual law, in which God and all that He creates are perfect and eternal, to have remained unchanged in its eternal history” (pp. 470–471).

How perfect! Our relationship to God, as His spiritual image, is “indestructible.” There can be “no lapse from … harmony.” We are “perfect and eternal.” This identity is forever “unchanged.” Christ Jesus proved this.

On the drive home, at first I was just holding to these passages and really trusting that this was indeed an opportunity for healing, period! This was not about a problem potentially hindering the rest of my days of vacation. It was about standing up for man’s divine rights and boldly trusting only God, Mind, who knows only good, to inform me of my “condition.” I could feel a sense of peace wash over me, and soon I was really feeling the truth of those passages. I was being comforted and calmed by divine Truth.

There was still considerable pain whenever I moved, but I was so sure healing would come—how cool! But I needed to continue to hold on to these truths and climb Spiritward in my thought, acknowledging that God never sends harm to His creation, so we can never truly be harmed.

As I was getting ready for bed and continuing to pray, I read an article about beginning rightly, by always choosing the premise of spiritual perfection in our practice of Christian Science. Right then I made a promise to myself that I would choose the correct premise, striving to leave the deception of matter for the spiritual reality. I could do that. I could choose what I know about God as my starting point, and I could pray to stay alert to make sure I was sticking with it.

The next day was filled with outings with my daughter, and I was able to participate, as there was some progress with my back. I was grateful for this, and I continued to stay alert and on track mentally, keeping my thought turned to God. I thought of something Mrs. Eddy wrote on page 357 of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany: “ ‘There is no matter’ is not only the axiom of true Christian Science, but it is the only basis upon which this Science can be demonstrated.” I didn’t simply want my material body to feel better. I also wanted to get clearer in the understanding that I am spiritual. The rest of the day my prayers were affirmations along the lines of “I am not matter—I am the reflection of God, expressing harmony and wholeness.” Through these prayers I glimpsed more of my true, perfect, spiritual identity.

By the time I went to bed that night, I realized I was healed. I had just freely jumped into bed. We had a big family adventure the next day four-wheeling on Catalina Island, and there was not even a vestige of limitation with my back, nor has there been any since.

Mary Ann Sprague 
Elsah, Illinois, US