“Growth in Grace”

In Science and Health, Mary Baker Eddy has written, “What we most need is the prayer of fervent desire for growth in grace.”

A number of years ago, with great help from the practitioner in Plainfield Church, I was having many healings, which I sorely needed. Then, at our Wednesday testimony meeting, I would tell about the healings. But I began to notice that on the next day, Thursday, I would have some experience to challenge whether or not this really was a healing. It was like the devil was saying, “Oh yeah?”

I talked with a Plainfield practitioner about it. She laughed, and said, “If this challenge, or testing time, comes on the day after testifying about a healing, you should be just as happy to prove again that you have, indeed, been healed!” She asked me to work with that statement from Science and Health, and to pray for that “fervent desire for growth in grace.” Once the lesson was learned, those experiences on Thursdays stopped happening.

How wonderful to learn to have this “fervent desire”! These proving times are so valuable, and we can be grateful for each and every one.