Tuesday, June 6, 2006 at 12:12am
A church should be healers, shouldn't it?
The first time I thought about healing I couldn't have been more than ten years old. It was about the time the healings Jesus demonstrated in the Bible sparked my curiosity. I started thinking that I too could be healed and learn to heal others.
I had been attending a Christian Science Sunday school where we studied the Bible and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science. I was learning that there is no spot where God is not. God is Love. He loves me and will always meet my every need.
It was about this time that I remember receiving my first treatment from a Christian Science Practitioner. A Christian Science Practitioner is a person who devotes himself to the public practice of treating individuals with the bible-based system of healing known as Christian Science. Practitioners treat individuals who enlist their services by spiritual means alone through prayer.
I woke up one morning crying because it hurt to move. My head hurt so badly I remember feeing as if I couldn't get out of bed. Compounded by a stiff neck, my ten year old self was afraid and in pain.
My mother was a student of Christian Science but my father was not. So, as I grew older my mother would give me the choice of using medicine, going to a doctor or relying on Christian Science for healing.
I had heard people give testimonies of Christian Science healing all kinds of ailments just like the healings performed in the Bible. So that day I chose the practitioner to treat me through prayer.
We spoke by telephone. My mother dialed the number of a practitioner she had found listed in The Christian Science Journal. She put the receiver by my ear. I don't remember what the practitioner and I shared. However in that brief exchange, I do remember feeling comforted, totally embraced in love. I went back to sleep and when I woke a little while later the headache and stiff neck were gone. In the years since, I learned that that healing and subsequent healings took place as I recognized (like that practitioner had done for me) my spiritual identity as a child of God and my inseparability from him.
It felt good to be free of the pain I was experiencing but it felt even better to realize that I can practically and confidently rely on God to meet my needs.
Over the years I've called practitioners and learned how to better pray for myself and others with the ideas shared in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. This book has opened up the Bible's spiritual messages for me. It's helped me realize that the central message of the Bible is love and that God is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent. I learned that man reflects, as God's image and likeness, all the love, intelligence, dominion and power of God all the time. I learned that the comprehension of these spiritual truths or divine laws - heal.
By the time this column is published I will have attended, the annual meeting of The First Church of Christ, Scientist founded by Mary Baker Eddy which is held in Boston, Massachusetts (and on the worldwide web at www.tfccs.com. Like annual meetings or annual conferences held by other churches, this is a special time to revisit, refresh, and even restore my love and commitment to my church. The theme for the Christian Science Annual Meeting 2006 is "A Church of Healers."
That theme, "A Church of Healers," reminds of the JB Phillips New Testament Bible where he calls the book of The Acts, "The Young Church in Action." I love that depiction of The Acts because it captures the verve and fervor of church and the commitment to healing works demonstrated by the followers of Christ.
In "Science and Health", Eddy defines church as: "The structure of Truth and Love; whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle. The Church is that institution, which affords proof of its utility and is found elevating the race, rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and the demonstration of divine Science, thereby casting out devils, or error, and healing the sick."
This church that Eddy defines heals. In its purest form its universal, a spiritual structure that can be realized by anyone because its foundation is "Truth and Love," or God. We are in church when we are at one with God. When we are at one with God, we are found healing. The institution or material structure of church is legitimized only as it is "found elevating the race and rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and divine Science."
We are all capable of healing as Christ Jesus and his disciples healed. Learning more about our spiritual heritage enables us to be both healed and healers of the seemingly myriad images of limitations presented to us. We simply need to understand this fact and be a church of healers in our world today.
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Kwadjo Boaiteyis a lifelong Christian Scientist devoted to uplifting public thought and serves as the Christian Science Committee on Publication for Georgia. He lives in Stone Mountain Georgia with his wife, the lovely Karama. You can send him an email at {email kwadjosun@gmail.com}kwadjosun@gmail.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Kwadjo Boaitey
— — —
UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum is a big tent for all expressions
of faith and spirituality, neither excluding nor favoring any.
All opinions expressed belong to the writer alone, and are
not necessarily shared by UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum.
I had been attending a Christian Science Sunday school where we studied the Bible and the writings of Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science. I was learning that there is no spot where God is not. God is Love. He loves me and will always meet my every need.
It was about this time that I remember receiving my first treatment from a Christian Science Practitioner. A Christian Science Practitioner is a person who devotes himself to the public practice of treating individuals with the bible-based system of healing known as Christian Science. Practitioners treat individuals who enlist their services by spiritual means alone through prayer.
I woke up one morning crying because it hurt to move. My head hurt so badly I remember feeing as if I couldn't get out of bed. Compounded by a stiff neck, my ten year old self was afraid and in pain.
My mother was a student of Christian Science but my father was not. So, as I grew older my mother would give me the choice of using medicine, going to a doctor or relying on Christian Science for healing.
I had heard people give testimonies of Christian Science healing all kinds of ailments just like the healings performed in the Bible. So that day I chose the practitioner to treat me through prayer.
We spoke by telephone. My mother dialed the number of a practitioner she had found listed in The Christian Science Journal. She put the receiver by my ear. I don't remember what the practitioner and I shared. However in that brief exchange, I do remember feeling comforted, totally embraced in love. I went back to sleep and when I woke a little while later the headache and stiff neck were gone. In the years since, I learned that that healing and subsequent healings took place as I recognized (like that practitioner had done for me) my spiritual identity as a child of God and my inseparability from him.
It felt good to be free of the pain I was experiencing but it felt even better to realize that I can practically and confidently rely on God to meet my needs.
Over the years I've called practitioners and learned how to better pray for myself and others with the ideas shared in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mary Baker Eddy. This book has opened up the Bible's spiritual messages for me. It's helped me realize that the central message of the Bible is love and that God is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent. I learned that man reflects, as God's image and likeness, all the love, intelligence, dominion and power of God all the time. I learned that the comprehension of these spiritual truths or divine laws - heal.
By the time this column is published I will have attended, the annual meeting of The First Church of Christ, Scientist founded by Mary Baker Eddy which is held in Boston, Massachusetts (and on the worldwide web at www.tfccs.com. Like annual meetings or annual conferences held by other churches, this is a special time to revisit, refresh, and even restore my love and commitment to my church. The theme for the Christian Science Annual Meeting 2006 is "A Church of Healers."
That theme, "A Church of Healers," reminds of the JB Phillips New Testament Bible where he calls the book of The Acts, "The Young Church in Action." I love that depiction of The Acts because it captures the verve and fervor of church and the commitment to healing works demonstrated by the followers of Christ.
In "Science and Health", Eddy defines church as: "The structure of Truth and Love; whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle. The Church is that institution, which affords proof of its utility and is found elevating the race, rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and the demonstration of divine Science, thereby casting out devils, or error, and healing the sick."
This church that Eddy defines heals. In its purest form its universal, a spiritual structure that can be realized by anyone because its foundation is "Truth and Love," or God. We are in church when we are at one with God. When we are at one with God, we are found healing. The institution or material structure of church is legitimized only as it is "found elevating the race and rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas and divine Science."
We are all capable of healing as Christ Jesus and his disciples healed. Learning more about our spiritual heritage enables us to be both healed and healers of the seemingly myriad images of limitations presented to us. We simply need to understand this fact and be a church of healers in our world today.
— — —
Kwadjo Boaiteyis a lifelong Christian Scientist devoted to uplifting public thought and serves as the Christian Science Committee on Publication for Georgia. He lives in Stone Mountain Georgia with his wife, the lovely Karama. You can send him an email at {email kwadjosun@gmail.com}kwadjosun@gmail.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Kwadjo Boaitey
— — —
of faith and spirituality, neither excluding nor favoring any.
All opinions expressed belong to the writer alone, and are
not necessarily shared by UPI Religion & Spirituality Forum.