I find a major problem with this. To help illustrate this problem I will now read a passage from the Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis.
"Whichever he adopts, your main task will be the same. Let him begin by treating the Patriotism or the Pacifism as part of his religion. Then let him, under the influence of partisan spirit, come to regard it as the most important part. Then quietly and gradually nurse him on to the stage at which the religion becomes merely a part of the 'Cause' in which Christianity is valued chiefly because of the excellent arguments it can produce in favour of British war effort or of pacifism. The attitude which you want to guard against is that in which temporal affairs are treated primarily as material for obedience. Once you have made the World an end, and faith a means, you have almost won your man, and it makes very little difference what kind of worldly end he is pursuing. Provided that meetings, pamphlets, policies, movements,causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraments and charity, he is ours--and the more "religious" (on those terms), the more securely ours. I could show you a pretty cageful down here."
This is what the demon Screwtape wrote to his nephew Wormwood, about tempting his "patient".
I noticed as I was talking to this woman, that she was so caught up in the healing part of her religion, that she didn't pay attention to the basics of Christianity. She even told me that she rejected apologetics because she "has nothing to apologize about". There are two definitions of the word apologize. One of them meaning to "express regret for something bad that one has done" and the other definition means to "defend and explain". Apologetics means "the branch of theology that is concerned with the defense of Christian doctrines." It is irrational to use the definition of apologize as it relates to the word apologetics and say, I reject apologetics because I have nothing to defend." We live in a world where every single person who is born rejects God, Christians have everything to defend. If any belief you have matters anything to you, then you should be ready to defend it.
She also told me that there are multiple roads to Heaven and that it doesn't matter what religion I have as long as I just believe one. I was shocked to hear that from a supposedly Christian woman. If you believe that Jesus died for your sins so that you can get to Heaven, then it is idiotic to believe there are multiple roads to Heaven. If you are a Christian who believes there are multiple roads to Heaven, then the sacrifice of Jesus means nothing to you. You are saying to Jesus, "Thanks for dying for my sins and everything, but I could have gotten to Heaven another way."
Since Christian Science has emphasis on healing, every Christian Scientist is supposed to be working to obtain that spiritual gift. There is a huge problem with this that Paul explained in his first letter to the Corinthians:
"The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts, and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ." (1 Corinthians 12:12, NIV)
A couple verses later Paul goes on to say, " Now the body is not made up of one part but of many." (1 Corinthians 12:14, NIV)
He then says:
"If the whole body were an eys, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body." (1 Corinthians 12:17-20, NIV)
Paul is painting a beautiful picture here. He is using the word "body" for "church". He is saying that we are all one with the church, but at the same time we are distinct members. That if we aren't distinct members, we aren't a church. If we all have the spiritual gift of healing, we aren't distinct from each other and therefore not a church.
Paul polishes this picture by saying, "Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. And in the church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all have the gift of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? But eagerly desire the greater gifts." (1 Corinthians 12:27-31, NIV)
God obviously didn't intend for all of us to have any one spiritual gift. This brings me back to a quote from the Screwtape Letters:
"What we want, if men become Christians at all, is to keep them in a state of mind I call 'Christianity And.' You know--Christianity and the Crisis, Christianity and the New Psychology, Christianity and the New Order, Christianity and Faith Healing, Christianity and Psychical Research, Christianity and Vegetarianism, Christianity and Spelling Reform. If they must be Christians, let them at least be Christians with a difference. Substitute for the faith itself some Fashion with a Christian colouring."
What this little devil wanted is for humans to claim to be Christians but to claim something else too, so that we wouldn't focus on the light, and be soothed back into the dark. If we say Christianity and Faith Healing we are putting faith healing at the same level as Christ. Nothing should be at the same level as Christ because nothing is. Christianity and nothing . . . you have to admit it has a ring around it.
