(Author: Kate Jones) When Christianity is presented as a science, the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ is diminished and pasteurized into something unrecognizable. I spent the first forty years of my life living under the false pretense that I was actually a Christian. I was not. Oh, I looked like a Christian from the outside but on the inside I never knew Jesus, not intimately, actually, not at all.

Editor: The author, an accomplished and likable woman in her 40s, was eager to share her story with Ananias readers — but reluctant to hurt or antagonize a number of family members who still follow Christian Science. So this account is published under a pen name with identifying personal references omitted. What does it say about the CS culture and mindset, that adherents tend to be wounded by a friend or loved one leaving the church and saying why, candidly but respectfully? Now, on with “Kate Jones’s” testimony.

My religious training began in a Presbyterian church in the Midwest; I was baptized there and we attended there until I was three. The only memories I have about that time were of white gloves, punch and cookies at Sunday School and a drawing I did of what I thought God looked like which involved some rather undisciplined lines from an orange crayon.

In boyhood my oldest brother was suffering from severe asthma and at that time medicine could not help him. My mother had been raised in Christian Science and it seemed to offer a possible solution and at least some comfort. The best thing about that decision is that it led the whole family into a world that revolved around prayer which turned out to be very good training but my family unwittingly started down a path that was simply headed in the wrong direction.

I realize now that my understanding of who Christ is, has been warped for most of my life; it has been a series of mixed signals. I was taught that he was just a man, not God incarnate, and that he was the example that we should all follow but we shouldn’t worship him. I learned that he represented the Christ “idea” and did not die on a cross, suffer for our sins and rise from the dead.

I was also taught that everything in my world, or “matter,” was an illusion and that if my thinking was correct, I could overcome anything; any illness, any relationship problem, any financial disaster, any business issues…anything. Sadly though, it was also implied that if I couldn’t overcome a problem, it was because my thinking was incorrect.

This paints a rather sad picture of my religious upbringing but I didn’t know I was missing anything or that there was anything wrong with it, I really hadn’t been exposed to anything else from age 3 on. I remember a high school friend asking me if I believed in Jesus as my Lord and savior and I didn’t really understand what she meant by that. She made some remark about how anyone that didn’t believe it would go to hell and she wanted to make sure I was going to heaven. I have thought of that exchange many times and when I think about it I realize that her question was very gutsy and loving as well.

Near the end of college I learned that my mother was having a serious physical problem. Apparently she had been praying with her practitioner (a Christian Science healer of sorts) for nearly a year. She was facing cancer and it was a very tough battle for about two and a half years. She lost her battle, and I started to wonder if Christian Science was really the be all and end all that I had I been told it was.

It was devastating. I lost my mother whom I adored, and I also felt I had lost my way spiritually. One of the oddities about Christian Scientists is that they don’t really grieve as others do. They teach that death, sickness, sin and evil are not real. Because I never felt like I was allowed to grieve, I ended up grieving for nearly 22 years. I felt like such a failure as a Christian Scientist because sickness and death felt very real to me.

My father re-married quite soon, which had its own set of challenges and I found myself in a spiritual desert. I attended church out of respect for my father and because it was what I was familiar with but I was empty. Each Sunday, I grew wearier of the message. I wondered why the lessons used portions of sentences to fit the subject and used verses out of context which presented a very different idea than was originally written or intended. It would be many years before I found my way out of the desert but as I look back, I can see that God was leading me the whole time all the while pursuing me and trying to get me to see His face.

Though much of what I went through was unpleasant, I finally got it. As I neared the age of forty, I had a very good marriage, I was the mother of a wonderful daughter and son, a business owner for over 20 years and perfectly miserable. I was sinking into a depression as I tried living a double life. I would tell people I was a Christian Scientist all the while not believing much of what I heard each Sunday. One of the most difficult things about depression is the insomnia that often goes along with it. Frequently I moved out to the couch so I wouldn’t disturb my husband with my tossing and turning and inevitably I would turn on the television in an effort to bore myself to sleep.

As I flipped through the channels I would come across this lady televangelist over and over and her audience seemed to always be laughing. I paused once to see what was so funny and Joyce Meyer was telling it like it is and putting God’s truth into a context that anyone could understand. I thought I was just tuning in now and then for a laugh or two when I realized that it had become an every morning thing. I was learning things I had never learned before and listening with a more open mind. I was being fed the truth for the first time and so the pursuit continued.

For many years Sundays were particularly bad. I would fight with my husband, develop a headache and use every excuse I could think of to stay home from church. If he managed to get me there it was an hour of day dreaming and mental to do lists and no sooner was I out of the church parking lot, then I was back to feeling like there was an enormous hole in my heart. I didn’t realize it was a God-shaped hole but it was.

Fortunately, a dear friend, whom I had confided in, invited me to her church one Sunday. Knowing that something had to change, my husband and I decided to take the summer and investigate some other churches. It was a difficult decision to leave my church and the people there that I had known and loved for over 30 years; but it was a life-changing and life-saving decision for sure.

As the policemen ushered countless cars into the parking lot I asked myself, “Could all of these people and the millions like them around the world be wrong?” Heavy traffic was never an issue at the Christian Science church. Once inside, I could sense a vibrancy that I had never experienced before. The music was incredible. I hadn’t ever seen big screens with the lyrics and a “worship team” giving it their all. Then we sang “Above All.”

It was like I was awakened from a long sleep. “…like a rose, trampled on the ground, you took the fall and thought of me, above all.” I could feel my heart pounding, my throat tighten and my eyes fill with tears. This man, this Jesus that literally hundreds of people had crowded into this church to worship that day, was real. He wasn’t just a man, He was GOD and He loved me. He knew me, my sins, my weaknesses, and my unbelief and yet, He gave his life for me.

From that day on I couldn’t wait for Sundays and approximately six months into our “church-search” I happily gave my life to Christ during a Sunday service and I have emerged from the desert with a deep love for Him and the knowledge of what it means to be born-again. In many ways, I’m truly glad that the journey took so long because I really appreciate what I have. My path to God has been a circuitous one but this is the first time, in a long time that I can see the direction that God wants me to go. I have always pursued a life of service not for God but to help others and now I feel He has found a way for me to do both.

I can see that there have been indications for some time now that counseling is a viable career choice for me. For as long as I can remember, friends and acquaintances have come to me for guidance and advice. I think my sense of humor is disarming and people trust that whatever counsel I might give is purely out of love for them and the desire to help them to the best of my ability. I am a very good listener and have often been told that I have a very empathic nature.

When I look back I realize that God has been directing this every step of the way. I would not have been a good candidate for this career when I first graduated from college, because I didn’t have any life experience. Now that I am 24 years older I can honestly say that I have an abundance of life experience. I have faced loss, depression and other health challenges. I have become a wife, now approaching 18 years and I am the mother of two great kids. I have spent 22 years owning and operating my own company where I have learned how to relate to and handle over a hundred different employees and countless customers that have tested me on every level imaginable.

Last year I had the wonderful opportunity to take part in a mother/daughter ministry at our church. One week we were given the assignment to identify our spiritual gifts which was a great experience. After dozens of questions and a lot of thought, I discovered that my most dominant gifts were mercy, service and exhortation. I feel confident that these three gifts would serve me well in any career but I think they lend themselves particularly well to counseling. While I haven’t had a great deal of experience with Christian ministry, teaching or preaching, which I attribute to the fact that I have not been a Christian for all that long, I do however feel the desire to share Christ with non-believers and I am learning how to do this more and more and I am growing more passionate about it every day. I can visualize sitting face to face with a client and gently leading them to Christ and rejoicing with them as they find the freedom that the true healer has for them.

Since that glorious day when I found Christ waiting for me with open arms, I have found myself in tears on many a Sunday, overwhelmed by the magnificence of his love. Not once, in forty years, was I moved to tears in my prior church. Emotion had no place there. After all it was a “science”. Today, I feel Jesus living inside me, changing me, molding me and finding new ways to use me. When I consider this step of attending seminary, and I see the path that I am on now, I am so joyful to be heading in a direction that will serve him. I have seen the value of Christian counseling in my own life and I feel that I can help others by guiding them with the same loving concern that was given to me. In my opinion, no meaningful, permanent healing can take place without Jesus Christ and I am excited to learn how I can best bring that to the vocation that He has chosen for me.

My joy in finding the true Jesus Christ is so profound and there is nothing “scientific” about it at all, it is my reality and one that I can’t wait to share with others through counseling.