Millions of people suffer from pain every day and wonder how to get rid of it. All kinds of methods offering relief are pursued—drugs, physical therapy, massage, meditation techniques, and more. However, there’s one approach that is often overlooked, yet can be the most effective. As Christian Science explains, prayer can take pain away.

Rather than managing symptoms in the body or brain through physical or mental manipulation, healing prayer wakens thought to the reality of life in Spirit, God, where there is no pain. In the consciousness of spiritual reality, harmony and peace take over, and health is restored to mind and body.

To illustrate, a few years ago I struggled with a growing pain in my right shoulder that occurred whenever I lifted my arm. It became acute over several months.

I mentioned to my tennis coach that my arm and shoulder were hurting. “I could barely lift my arm to serve,” I complained. He looked me squarely in the eye and declared, “Evan, there’s only one option: drugs and massage!”

He began to outline a program for relief that was common practice among tennis players and other athletes. As I listened to his plan, I felt rebellious. I knew that many of my tennis friends took medication for pain. But from what I had seen, the relief was temporary. The pain would often return after the effect of the drug wore off. I also had friends who worried about damaging their bodies by relying upon drugs to mask pain while they continued to play. In more extreme circumstances, I had seen people get addicted to pain relievers and then battle to quit using them. I was hoping to find a better solution.

As a student of Christian Science, I knew from experience that prayer could remove pain. Many times in my life, I had seen pain vanish through an illumination of my thought, and I was confident that I could heal this trouble, too, by humbly listening to God for direction.

I told my coach I had no plans to take drugs because I believed the real issue would be resolved in thought. He looked at me a bit quizzically but dropped his argument. He knew I was a prayerful person, and he respected my choice, for which I was grateful.

However, I needed to find healing. I was reaching what felt like a crisis point, for my arm was becoming useless.

As I prayed, I was led to study a statement by Mary Baker Eddy about how to find relief from pain. In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, she writes, “Let neither fear nor doubt overshadow your clear sense and calm trust, that the recognition of life harmonious—as Life eternally is—can destroy any painful sense of, or belief in, that which Life is not” (p. 495).

The words “recognition of life harmonious” stood out to me. That’s what I needed! So, to recognize “life harmonious,” which includes no sense of pain, I applied what I had learned from my study and practice of Christian Science. Christian Science teaches that God is Life. This Life is Spirit—ever present, eternal, without beginning or end. It is self-existent, not dependent upon matter, muscles, or nerves for continuity, harmony, or peace. It is never sick, injured, or in pain. It is the creator, sustainer, and maintainer of all being and acts to keep us healthy, mobile, strong, and well. This Life that is God is all-harmonious in every way, and never one iota less.

Healing prayer wakens thought to the reality of life in Spirit, God, where there is no pain.

As I prayed to accept “life harmonious” as my reality, I began to see discord in my outlook that I hadn’t noticed before. In fact, I found hanging around in thought a significant amount of disappointment, discouragement, and frustration that was not anywhere close to recognizing life as a harmonious experience.

To explain, several months earlier my tennis coach had demanded that I learn a new serve. The serve was advanced for me, but he insisted I could learn it. I tried to do what he taught, but couldn’t. For weeks I tried to execute this new serve, and failed. I got upset with myself. Frustration set in. Hopelessness took over. I felt like an athletic failure.

As I became honest about my state of mind, I began to see that the pain and helplessness I felt in consciousness about my tennis serve was manifesting itself outwardly as pain and helplessness in my shoulder. This was a major “aha” moment, for I had discovered a connection between what was happening in my thought and what I felt in my body.

To correct the problem, I prayed to better understand the truth about my relation to God, to Life without limit.

Eddy writes, “We are all capable of more than we do” (Science and Health, p. 89). As God’s reflection of boundless Life, I was capable of learning that serve, I reasoned. I decided that all those feelings of inadequacy and lack of coordination were bogus. They were not coming from God, but were the effect of not clearly understanding my unlimited ability as a child of God.

I resolved to quit identifying myself as a lacking athlete and to see myself as able, the way God made me. I was not a partial beneficiary of Life, but a full reflection of it, with no weak spots or missing talents. I declared that my existence was an expression of God, whole and complete!

I returned to the court inspired by this expanded spiritual view of myself as able to do more than I had accepted in the past. I hit the ball gingerly at first, but soon realized I could swing without pain. I was delighted, so I stepped up my game. Three days later it was clear that I could swing and serve in any pattern or motion with full gusto and no pain. My shoulder and arm were healed and have remained so.

I’m still working on mastering that advanced serve, but I’m making great progress. I’m grateful for this healing and the spiritual lessons it taught me.

For those who wonder why I didn’t take drugs or use some other material remedy and then pray for healing, it’s helpful to understand what best supports spiritual healing. The more weight our thought puts on the side of Spirit, and the less it puts on the side of matter, the quicker spiritual healing happens. For instance, when our thought declares, “I need to take a drug for pain relief,” it is also declaring, “I am a physical body in physical pain that needs a material remedy to feel better.”

While this statement appears to be hardcore truth to the human mind believing it, it is exactly the opposite of what is true for man as the child of God. In divine Truth, where harmony and peace reign, each of us has painless spiritual being. The more our thought is focused on agreeing with spiritual reality, and the less it is occupied with the body and the material treatment of it, the quicker illuminated, spiritual consciousness is reached, and the faster spiritual healing happens.

As far as drugs are concerned, their use is an extension of the belief that life abides in matter, rather than in Spirit. Drugs tend to dull thought, promote a growing dependency upon chemicals for health, and sap initiative to seek spiritual growth. The thought that is convinced it has found its savior in a chemical is not inclined to seek healing in Spirit. For these reasons, I wanted to keep my thought as close to God as possible, without getting pulled further into the path of physicality and material reasoning that a drug would have taken me on.

The prayer that recognizes life as harmonious and at one with God, Spirit, heals suffering. My patience and persistence with spiritual healing paid off, for I not only found that prayer can take pain away permanently, but I was also improved mentally, morally, and spiritually. I came out of the experience a better person, which is what spiritual healing is all about.