Article December 31, 1938 Issue

Answered Prayer

STANLEY C. MORGAN

"Ask, and it shall be given you." There is no ambiguity about these words. Their meaning is simple and direct, and no less authoritative than when Christ Jesus uttered them. It would have been contrary to his divine nature to mock mankind with a promise which would not or could not be fulfilled. We are compelled, therefore, to accept the Scriptural conclusion that when we "ask, and receive not," we "ask amiss." Hence the primal importance of understanding how to ask, that is, how to pray aright.

In that form of our asking called prayer there are certain factors. First, there is the individual or the collection of individuals asking; secondly, there is the thing sought; thirdly, there is the true nature of God. The human mind is unsatisfied. Consciously or unconsciously, it is continually craving satisfaction. The unenlightened human mind believes that material things can satisfy its yearning for something better, and so men ask material things of God, who is infinite Spirit and incapable of beholding any form of limitation or imperfection. Such asking is unknown to God, and receives from Him no answer. Plainly, this is not the asking referred to by Jesus.

Christian Science illumines the Scriptures, which reveal the true nature of Deity. The enlightened understanding of God, as the source of all that is good, enables one to pray aright. For to know the Giver is to know the nature of His gifts; that is, to know those things for which to pray, to ask. In the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures," Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, gives the following definition of God (p. 465): "God is incorporeal, divine, supreme, infinite Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love."

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