More than human support was present

One night a number of years ago, I woke with pain in my stomach. When I got out of bed, the pain intensified. I hobbled into the living room and sat in a chair, where I prayed in silence to God. The discomfort eased, but when I stood up, I felt sharp pain.

I returned to bed and woke my wife. She read to me from Science and Health, beginning on page 390.  The situation had forced me to recognize just how deeply and totally I needed God, and so when my wife started reading, I listened with all my heart. Drinking in those spiritual truths felt like coming home. I was tremendously comforted. My wife was right there supporting me, but I could feel that something more than human support was present. I knew that divine Love was with us and that this Love not only comforts, it heals. After my wife had read several pages, I found that the pain had melted away, and I slept through the rest of the night. I woke in the morning free from the pain, which did not return.

Part of what my wife read to me that night was this: “We cannot deny that Life is self-sustained, and we should never deny the everlasting harmony of Soul, simply because, to the mortal senses, there is seeming discord. It is our ignorance of God, the divine Principle, which produces apparent discord, and the right understanding of Him restores harmony” (Science and Health 390:4–9). If ignorance of God produces discord, then pain and fear are the byproducts of that ignorance. Because Mind, God, is the very source of our lives, we can gain freedom from this ignorance. Naturally, when this ignorance – this illusion of life cut off from God – is replaced by the clarity and solidity of spiritual understanding, pain vanishes and the harmony that is naturally ours is restored.