The joy of discovery

Have you ever noticed the joy a child has in discovering something new? Maybe it’s the thrill of balancing on a bike for the first time, or the smell of a rose—whatever it is, it’s wondrous to the child. We realize it isn’t new, but the child has just become aware of it.

I like to think of how Mary Baker Eddy must have felt when she discovered the Science of the Christ, Christian Science. She realized that the truth she had discovered had always existed, and she spent years elucidating this truth in her book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. Every student of Christian Science has had moments when the truths of this Science have dawned in consciousness.

Many years ago, when I’d been married less than a year, I became ill with alarming symptoms. My mother took me to a doctor she had known for some years. The diagnosis was kidney infection, and a prescription was given. I took the drug, and the symptoms cleared up but returned in about a week. Another drug was prescribed, with the same results. This continued through five prescriptions, and the increasingly strong drugs seemed to be doing more harm than good. Eventually, I was told I would need surgery and should not get pregnant, because the problem with my kidneys would not allow me to carry a child.