Article March 24, 1928 Issue

The Listening Ear

LOUISE C. MATTHEUS MARTIN

MANY a fervent prayer has apparently gone unanswered, not because God does not hear, but because thought has not been receptive to God's answer. The listening ear has the assurance of answered prayer. The "still voice" of Truth is always speaking, but it remains unheard when men are unwilling to hear. From time to time, throughout the round of mortal existence, there appears upon the arena of human activities someone who is able to catch sweet strains from the realm of immutable harmony, and give to his fellow-men a message of hope and encouragement, even when the evidence of the physical senses indicates hopelessness. This furnishes a useful lesson for those who are still waiting for the answer to some unsolved problem.

There is the Biblical account of Isaiah comforting the people with these words, when circumstances pointed to despair: "The Lord God hath opened mine ear. . . . For the Lord shall comfort Zion: he will comfort all her waste places; . . . joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody." Isaiah discerned the governing cause which preserves man and the universe from harm—even God, the divine Principle of all that is harmonious and eternal. This conviction, caught through the open ear of understanding, assured the prophet that physical sense with its noisy pretense of power could not disturb or destroy the harmony of being. Those about him evidently listened to and accepted the clamorings of mortal sense, while his consecration prepared him to receive intuitions of something higher and more steadfast.

Centuries later, when a heavenly host proclaimed the birth of the Saviour, only the wakeful, watchful shepherds caught the overture from on high, and received it with joy and thanksgiving in the silence of the Syrian night. When the jealous and materialistic Herod was informed of the birth of the Christ-child, he decreed the death of "all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under." But again the blare of mortal mind, with all its unrighteous decrees, could not drown the "voice of melody" foretold by the prophet, proclaimed by the angelic host, and afterwards immortalized by him who grew "in favour with God and man"—by him whose gentleness drew the little children unto him, whose tenderness touched the multitudes with compassion, and whose wonderful love lives on as a vitalizing power in Christianity. The keynote of his mission was harmony, but harmony not of the physical senses. He said, "As I hear, I judge." On this basis he healed the sick, raised the dead, stilled the sea in storm, and brought life and joy into manifestation.

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