Healing after Association

As you once wrote in an editorial, it was clear from both Association and Annual Meeting last year that “Christian Science is what is coming, not going.”  How many times have I shared that thought with members of our branch church as we face multiple claims of stagnation and decline!

As First Reader, preparation for our weekly services has been a kind of North Star for keeping thought spiritually focused and not relentlessly pulled down into beliefs of failure and extinction.  Some light is breaking through for our little group (in a large urban church), and there have been hints that dissolution is not the inevitable trend line.  We need to pick up the momentum – sometimes we just need to find some momentum – but some of us are beginning to believe that it’s a do-able project, despite some curve balls thrown our way. 

One healing was very meaningful for me the week immediately after Association. A small disfigurement had appeared on my forehead more than a year ago, and I didn’t give it much prayerful attention, as it was mostly inconspicuous. But in the weeks before Association it grew into a larger and unsightly blemish.  I resolved not to let it make me self-conscious or discouraged.  But there was so much going on with the new work as Reader and preparation for Association that I didn’t give it much specific thought, even as it worsened.

The week after Association, as I turned to address this claim with greater clarity, my prayer was deeper and more focused.  I saw the need to claim my innocence and deny the belief of a mortal past with imperfection and impurity as somehow stuck to my identity. This prayer was more scientific and authoritative, and it was effective.  Within a few days, the growth fell off and hasn’t returned.

This was a simple healing and happened quietly and quickly when prayer was focused and more concrete.  What impressed me was the authority we wield when we address false beliefs with the willingness to dig deep and face wrong thoughts about ourselves that need challenging.  There must have been a measure of meekness and humility in that experience, thanks to the truths shared from the address. The worldly view that we are merely and inescapably imperfect creatures with a mortal past and a bleak future can be rendered powerless.  But superficial swats are obviously not enough.

This healing has encouraged me to be more active in challenging for myself and others claims that mortal mind says are beyond remedy and beyond hope.  Nothing is impossible to Spirit, of course.  To see that truth made flesh, even in a small way, is a stirring discovery even time it happens.  Would that it was a daily experience!