Spiritual insights and structural engineering

Michael Noyce

As a child I attended Sunday School, where I learned that in Biblical times some people heard God speak audibly to them. Although I was also told that God is present with us today, as I grew older I felt I would need to purify my thought a great deal before I could "talk with God." During my graduate work, however, I was most impressed by a professor who explained how he had prayed to God in order to gain the inspiration needed to solve a problem.

Shortly thereafter I found myself facing a crisis in finishing up my master's thesis.I was studying to be a structural engineer, and my thesis involved carrying out some experimental work on concrete columns. At the same time I had to develop a computer program that could predict the physical results. My research had gone well, I had worked hard, but right at the end I was stuck. With only a few days to go, I realized vividly that God is Mind, which includes all knowledge and intelligence. I did not hear God's word audibly, but I suddenly knew what to do.

In those days computer programs were written on punched cards. In a box of hundreds of cards I needed to change about three, and the program turned out to be a success. That was the first time I had really prayed for guidance in my work, and my prayer was answered. These words from Isaiah state it so beautifully: "Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left" (30:21). I listened and I heard, not physically but mentally, what I needed to know.

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