Hope—it's there for you

Few would deny that hope can be a powerful motivator. Hope has kept people alive in seemingly unsurvivable weather conditions, when they’ve been trapped under collapsed buildings, and in other extraordinary circumstances. Hope has given people strength to persevere in the quest for healing and has led many to Christian Science.

Hope denies predictions of failure, of death, and of uselessness. It insists that healing is possible. It led a Canaanite woman to come to Christ Jesus and ask him to heal her daughter, who she said was “grievously vexed with a devil.” The woman also expressed persistence in continuing to ask him for help, even after he had turned her away. Finally, Jesus said, “O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt.” The account continues, “And her daughter was made whole from that very hour” (see Matthew 15:21–28).

Does such a healing seem hopelessly idealistic or even impossible to us? Something that could happen “then” but isn’t possible now? The testimonies in this magazine are just a few examples of thousands published in the many years since they were first established (and you can view them at JSH-Online.com). They are proofs that Christ-healing has gone on and is going on in the world. They are signs of what can happen as Christian Science reveals the true nature of God and His healing power.

Hope denies predictions of failure, of death, and of uselessness.

A clearer grasp of God’s love opens the way to healing, and it also gives us hope. In her textbook on Christ-healing, Mary Baker Eddy writes, “To understand God strengthens hope, enthrones faith in Truth, and verifies Jesus’ word: ‘Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world’ ” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 446). Jesus’ promise that the Christ-power he lived and taught would be with us always brings with it the assurance that good does prevail, and that we will be able to see it in our individual lives. Right now that hope of God’s goodness and love is with you—with every one of us—and this means that whatever we may be facing, we are not alone.

The early Christians often faced challenges that seemed impossible to overcome. The Apostle Paul was no stranger to conditions where hope—according to a material sense of things—would have seemed pointless. Yet God never failed him, and with authority he could declare, “I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38, 39). This promise is for all of us. This is a hope you and I can trust. Take a moment in prayer each day to affirm the reality of this promise in your life. You’ll see a difference.