I would like to express my gratitude for a profound healing I had many years ago on Christmas Eve.

If Christmas were simply about being with friends to exchange presents, it could be a short-lived joy for some and an emptiness for those who are alone. For many, Christmas is a celebration of the birth of the baby Jesus bringing a message of hope and peace for all mankind. But those who are suffering at this time of year may feel as if they are still waiting . . . waiting for that promised peace, and for freedom from suffering or loneliness or sin.

That is the way I felt that particular Christmas Eve. Although I had experienced many healings of physical problems through prayer, this time the condition just seemed to keep getting worse. I had been suffering with what appeared to be symptoms of pneumonia, and I was beginning to feel hopeless—as if I might not last until Christmas morning. I felt very cut off from the joy and expectation of good that Christmas brings.

But then I began thinking about the true meaning of Christmas. It’s not just about colored lights, festive food, and material gifts. It’s about God’s precious gift of His Son, Christ Jesus, who was sent to show us—not in the distant future, but right now—God’s unfailing love for us and our unbreakable relationship to divine Love. Through the virgin birth, God, Love, was demonstrated as the real Father-Mother of each one of us.

Everything that God, Spirit, creates is very good eternally. This includes the divine inheritance of perfect health, which we each have as God’s child. This can never be lost nor taken away. So none of us is trapped or limited or cursed by heredity or genetic defect, by disease, contagion, or abuse.

Jesus was conceived by Mary through the Holy Ghost, and she recognized him as an already complete, holy spiritual idea of God. The shepherds, wise men, Simeon, and Anna were all blessed by this angel message when the baby appeared, because they recognized his birth as a gift from God. I realized that the Holy Ghost was revealing this same truth to each one of us as God’s pure, perfect reflection, right now!

As I began rejoicing in all the blessings I had already received from Christ Jesus’ teachings and from Mary Baker Eddy’s recognition of the Christ message of our present perfection, I began to feel the heavy weight in my chest lift and dissolve. Within minutes, I felt free of the fear, the fever, and the suffering. I got dressed, went downstairs to join my family, and soon realized the illness was completely gone.

This gift of the Christ, Truth, demonstrated in the virgin birth of Jesus and his inherent spirituality, even as an infant, is showing each of us that health, abundance, goodness, purity, and joy are natural to all of us right now and can never be lost. It makes me want to cry out, “Hallelujah!”—God be praised!