Editorial September 8, 1928 Issue

"Thou hearest me always"

Duncan Sinclair

Standing by the tomb of Lazarus before he raised him from the dead, Christ Jesus uttered these memorable words: "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me." We read the Master's words after all these years, and are grateful that for the people's sake who stood by he expressed himself as he did; for they enable us to see how profound, how scientific, was his understanding of God and of man's relationship to Him.

"Thou hearest me always"! Was God, then, always listening for the prayers of the Nazarene? Obviously, else He would not always have heard him. And if God was always listening for the prayers of His well-beloved Son, and was always hearing them, can the same be said of the prayers of others? The answer is one in which mankind is intensely interested, because of the value it places on prayer.

Now, many have sought in vain for an answer to this very question. They have been unable to understand how God, who is Spirit, could hear their words or even their thoughts. They have been unable to understand how it was possible to inform God, who is infinite Mind; for being infinite in intelligence, did He not know all that was true already? And what were they, the puny sons of men, to call on Deity, on Him who eternally sustains the universe and to whom creation is known in its entirety? It was surely expecting too much, some of them have thought, that the Supreme Being should deign to bend His ear towards them, to say nothing of hearing them always! Not an easy question, seemingly, to the unenlightened thought! Not a simple question to one uninstructed in divine Science!

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