Article January 12, 1918 Issue

True Prayer

WILLIAM LLOYD

When we first hear of Christian Science healing, we are apt to receive it with wonder and doubt, and when upon further inquiry we are told that this healing is the result of prayer, our wonder and doubt are little lessened; but when we go still farther and take up the study of Christian Science and find what constitutes true prayer, both wonder and doubt vanish. What a wonderful thing true prayer is, and how divinely natural that it should result in healing all manner of disease, sin, and sorrow. How good it is to know in what true prayer consists, so that we may strive to reach its certain goal instead of groping vainly as we did before a knowledge of it dawned on us. Then there is the blessed comfort of knowing that while thus striving we do not have to await our answer until we attain it in its fullness, for we rest in the joyful certainty that just in proportion as we come to understand true prayer, just in that measure will our prayer be answered. Yes, answered many times more than our feeble and imperfect realization deserves!

What constitutes true prayer? Among its essentials is sincerity; and to be sincere means that we really and truly desire what we pray for. True desire requires honesty; and to be honest with God necessitates obedience, calls upon us to live in accordance with His law, so that our lives may be pure, true, unselfish, loving. Sincerity can in fact be evidenced only by our lives. Then there is gratitude,—real and true thankfulness for what we have already received, with rejoicing, praising and blessing God. Another element is faith, and this means that we really and truly expect to receive what we ask for. It is the same kind of faith, exercised in the same degree, as that of a gardener when he plants his seeds; he has an absolute assurance that he is about to see the result of his work. Next comes understanding,—a knowledge of God and of man's relation to Him; a full acceptance and realization of the Father's all-power and ever presence, and of man's real, spiritual, and inviolate existence in, by, and of Him.

Another essential to true prayer is fearlessness, going to God with such full assurance of His all-power and loving care that fear vanishes. Next comes perseverance. We must continue to work steadfastly, and if our prayer is not answered immediately, we should not let discouragement enter, but courageously examine ourselves and our prayer to find what essential is lacking; for we may be certain that it is a lack in ourselves or our prayer, and not in God. This brings us to humility. We humbly come to God in prayer, knowing that even as Jesus could do nothing of himself, neither can we. Last but not least is repentance, true sorrow for past misdeeds and evil thoughts. True sorrow of course carries with it reformation, for if we are truly sorry for having done or thought wrongly, we cease to err. And all this is in secret, just between our loving Father-Mother God and ourselves. We at length cease to wonder that true prayer is answered, when we find what true prayer is. A prayer that combines sincerity in desire and life, gratitude, faith, understanding, fearlessness, perseverance, humility, repentance and reformation, must necessarily be answered, because it brings us to the atonement,—renders us at-one with our creator, the Principle of the universe.

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