"WITH GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE"

Archibald McLellan

Paul followed up his question to King Agrippa, "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?" with convincing proof that "with God all things are possible." Notwithstanding this, mortals have gone on believing that mortality is as real as immortality; that materiality is the sum total of being, and sickness and death are the inevitable and unescapable lot of mankind. Because of these beliefs, there has grown up the correlative belief that material means are necessary for the healing of sickness, and that the means which Christ Jesus employed are too transcendental for ordinary use.

Throughout the centuries, however, there has been a thread of faith which has kept alive the hope of salvation from all evil—from sickness and death, as well as from sin—through a correct understanding of God. From about the third century until late in the eighteenth, when Mrs. Eddy made that wonderful discovery which she named Christian Science, the rare cases of spiritual healing which occurred were regarded as miracles,—as something which had taken place in violation of law and because God Himself had reversed His regular course in dealing with humanity. Such was not the belief of the Son of man, however, for he declared that he came not to set aside the law of God, but to fulfil it, and it was because of Mrs. Eddy's perception of this fact that she was able to promulgate the Science of Christian healing as it was practised by Jesus and the early followers of his teachings.

A fundamental of Christian Science is that "man is not material; he is spiritual" (Science and Health, p. 468), and it naturally follows that man is not made either sick or well by inanimate matter. That this latter proposition is today admitted by many physicians, is proved by the number who believe that disease can be healed by suggestion. The basis of this belief is, however, far from being either scientific or salutary, because it is the supposition that one mortal mind has power over another mortal mind, and a necessary part of this supposition must be that the influence may be for good or for evil, as the so-called "operator" elects.

The mere belief that hypnotism or suggestion can be used for harmful purposes, forever bars it from possessing a divine, spiritual, or God-given basis, and stamps it as being foreign to the method which Christ Jesus demonstrated in his own ministry and commended to his followers. He demonstrated that neither material drugs nor suggestion is necessary to the healing of disease; on the contrary, that disease, not being of God's creation and therefore unreal, a false belief, is healed by the understanding of God, divine Mind, Truth, which destroys all error.

The fact that thousands and tens of thousands have been healed through Christian Science and without resort to drugs or suggestion, and that they have been morally and spiritually reformed, proves that faith is fast ripening into understanding,—that understanding which "is a well-spring of life unto him that hath it;" and materiality is slowly but surely giving place to spirituality in human affairs. It has been necessary for faith in God to be again aroused, and through the teachings of Christian Science this is being accomplished, heralding the approach of "that happy day, when man shall recognize the Science of Christ and love his neighbor as himself,—when he shall realize God's omnipotence and the healing power of the divine Love in what it has done and is doing for mankind" (Science and Health, p. 55).

Archibald McLellan.

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