Our right to be inspired
Many tend to just go through the motions of daily life, believing that inspiration is for others or is hard to find. But according to the Scriptures, we each are the offspring of God, the expression of infinite Spirit or Love, which is the source of inspiration. The book of Job says, “The spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life” (33:4). So, being alive and awake to our Father-Mother God and having the inspiration to do that which is right and needed are natural to us. Our lives come with spiritual inspiration just as they come with breathing.
We see this borne out in the largest sense when we look at the life of the master Christian, Jesus, whose every word and action moved human life Godward, bringing forth health, progress, and freedom. He moved through his life with unwaning light and wisdom—and brought them out to and in others. His assertion “I and my Father are one” (John 10:30) not only remains a promise of the forever unity we each have with our divine Parent but also guarantees that whatever our source—divine Spirit—includes we include as Spirit’s reflection. Jesus proved that we can all experience this animating divine influence by turning to God—and not just in times of need but as a daily practice. When his follower Paul wrote to a group of Christians who were just finding their way in Christ’s teachings and practice, he guided them in spiritual paths that would open thought to the wellspring of insight and motivation that guide rightly and are ever ours. He instructed them, for instance: “Pray without ceasing. . . . Quench not the Spirit” (I Thessalonians 5:17, 19).
Prayer, even if not yet ceaseless in our lives, is the desire to know God, to hear divine Love’s guidance, and to be Christlike. It is always beneficial, for us as well as all of whom we think. Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy explains the wonderful effect of such enlightened understanding: “Inspired thought relinquishes a material, sensual, and mortal theory of the universe, and adopts the spiritual and immortal” (p. 547). But to make metaphysical discoveries—to discern the divine news that consistently brings hope, renewal, joy, solutions, and healing—a regular prayer practice is the greatest possible help.
If we’re feeling a lack of inspiration, each of Jesus’ own spiritual practices is a ladder let down from heaven for us.
Jesus provided the blueprint for this, and we see the outcome of it in the abundant healing works of his ministry. He took time to be alone with God, sometimes spending all night in prayer. He also knew the Scriptures and, the New Testament reports, “as his custom was” (Luke 4:16), attended church (synagogue). All these practices made room for the heaven-born illumination of thought that opened the door to individual spiritual growth and reform, the healing of sickness and sin, and even community progress.
If we’re feeling a lack of inspiration, each of these spiritual practices is a ladder let down from heaven for us. The challenges we face today may look different from those in Jesus’ time, but the human need is the same.
One claim may be that we don’t have the time—or the attention span—to study, pray, or attend church. We can remember that neither spiritual understanding nor healing needs time to appear or develop but simply a wholehearted willingness to turn to God and listen for His thoughts. The light of Love and Truth is always at hand and accessible, ready to lift us up and, through us, others.
What about the thought that some people are just inherently inspired while others are not? In truth, not one of God’s children is deprived of a single Godly trait or Godward inclination. And since God is ever-present good and infinite Spirit, each of us as the expression of Spirit is incapable of dullness, decline, or mortality. Illumination continually characterizes God’s likeness—the actual identity of every individual the world over.
This spiritual light isn’t just for us, but compels us to reach beyond ourselves and touch the lives of others. Once, when I was dealing with a long-standing skin condition on my face, my prayers led me to a realization that while I’d been busy focusing on myself, I hadn’t been giving much spiritual attention to the world around me. I’d been “breathing in,” taking in my own inspiration, without “exhaling,” allowing that inspiration to impel my love and prayer for others. As I became engrossed in praying more for my community, over the course of a few weeks I actually forgot about the condition until someone made a positive comment about my skin, and I realized I’d been healed.
We are each spiritual, made in the image of Spirit, and because of that, the inspiration that we seek is innate in all of us. It is with us all the time. We become conscious of it through Christ, the spirit of Truth and Love, which blesses us and moves us to bless others.
Ethel A. Baker, Editor
