Last spring I noticed a slowly developing pain in my foot

Richard Biever

Last spring I noticed a slowly developing pain in my foot. Over a period of several days I gradually lost the ability to walk comfortably, and a limp became quite obvious.

I knew I wanted to handle this trouble through Christian Science treatment, but I was not making much progress. In fact, the pain was growing worse each day. After approximately five days, it occurred to me that I really needed to examine the substance of my prayers.

As I honestly considered how I was praying, it became clear that my motive was to take away the pain so that no one would notice I had a problem! This certainly was not the way Christ Jesus prayed. Mrs. Eddy says of prayer: "What are the motives for prayer? Do we pray to make ourselves better or to benefit those who hear us, to enlighten the infinite or to be heard of men?" And in the next paragraph she points out, "God is not moved by the breath of praise to do more than He has already done, nor can the infinite do less than bestow all good, since He is unchanging wisdom and Love" (Science and Health, p. 2).

Within six hours, all vestige of pain left.

I then called a Christian Science practitioner and asked for help in praying with truer motives. The practitioner told me that there was only one relevant question to ask myself: "Could this condition possibly be real or true?" God is omnipotent good. He neither creates nor allows evil to exist in any form. A painful foot was simply a manifestation of a mistaken concept of creation.

I realized that I was trying to fix a material discord with prayer. Mrs. Eddy warns in Science and Health, "It is mental quackery to make disease a reality—to hold it as something seen and felt—and then to attempt its cure through Mind" (p. 395). I stopped focusing attention on trying to fix my foot because I knew that pain could not be true in the kingdom of heaven, which is the only place I could ever be. I also knew that my only identity was not even temporarily in matter, but was wholly spiritual as an idea of divine Mind.

This had immediate results! The pain began to diminish. I stopped mulling over the human events of the past few days and stopped worrying about what would or would not happen in the next few days. Within six hours, all vestige of pain left. Some days later, the pain started to return, but I was immediately able to arrest the offending suggestion and cast it out with the authority of God. There has been no return of the trouble.

I am so grateful for every element that led to this healing, including my growing desire to heal exclusively through prayer; for the revealing of correct human footsteps as prayer is utilized; for the availability and insight of Christian Science practitioners; and for the ever-available pastor of the Church of Christ, Scientist, the Bible and Science and Health.

Richard Biever
Paoli, Pennsylvania

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