Long ago, at a business I once worked for, it was common practice to dump used oil onto the gravel driveway in front of the building where we worked. We didn't know what else to do with the unwanted crude, and it seemed a good way to keep the sand from blowing into the shop. After a number of years the driveway became an oily, sticky mess—no pleasant sight to behold or fun to work around. It was finally decided to stop this practice and start storing the oil for future reuse.

Everyone made an effort to reform, but old habits hung on. Every so often one of us would forget and throw a batch of oil onto the driveway, just as we'd always done. I prayed to find a remedy for this forgetfulness.

Thinking deeply about it, I could see that much abuse of the environment stems from the belief that the earth belongs to man and that he has a right to do with it whatever he pleases. But Christ Jesus taught people to pray "Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven"—to carry out the will of God, not a personal or willful desire (Matt. 6:10).

It is true that God gave man dominion over the earth. But God's man was not—and is not—a thoughtless mortal. He was created in the image and likeness of his Maker, to reflect only Godlike qualities—unselfishness, wisdom, and love. It is in the reflection of these and other good qualities that proper dominion is exercised.

In praying, I endeavored to think of myself and my fellow workers in spiritual terms. Instead of perceiving man as a mortal prone to sloppy habits, I understood man to be an immortal, reflecting intelligence and order. Instead of believing God to be distant from the need of the moment, I perceived an ever-present divine power at work, supplying whatever was required.

The effect was good. I found myself conforming to the new protocol. Others also broke out of the old habits. The driveway was cleaned up, and the shop was a more pleasant place to work.

Cleaning up a shop yard is one thing; decontaminating a toxic waste site is quite another. But we can learn a lesson all the same. In my workplace experience, forgetfulness and laziness had to be replaced with thoughtfulness and care. The more diligently I prayed to reflect qualities representative of the divine creator, the easier it was to put those qualities into practice. The effect was an improved environment.

No matter how removed we may feel from the larger challenges to the world environment, prayer and the action that grows out of it are viable ways to contribute to their resolution. Depleted ozone, disappearing rain forests, overpopulation, mass destruction from war, and so on are not out of the reach of anyone's prayer. More than we may realize, prayer does help resolve these challenges. Like throwing a pebble into a lake and sending ripples all around, prayer reaches out and benefits people everywhere.

We have indication of how much can be accomplished through prayer in Jesus' stilling of a storm.

Jesus and his disciples were out at sea in a boat. A storm arose. The strength of the wind and the waves was so great that the disciples feared for their lives. Mark records Jesus' response: "He arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm" (Mark 4:39). Through the power of God, Jesus tamed the storm and the sea—forces of nature that many would consider to be out of the reach of any type of control.

"Peace, be still" rebukes the turbulent elements of thought that would prevent clear, constructive thinking on the subject of the environment. Emotionalism, distorted views of the truth, and doomsday predictions are corrected by Christ, Truth.

"The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof," the Bible tells us (Ps. 24:1). God is the determiner of all that happens to His earth—His own immortal idea. Abandoned toxic waste dumps, oil-soaked beaches, carbon-dioxide-filled air are temporal, mortal conditions. They are not a part of God's plan for earth. They are not eternal. They cannot endure. God's idea of earth is spiritual; it is one of purity, order, and superabundant love. As mankind expresses more of these divinely sanctioned qualities, the wrong concept of earth—manifest as pollution, contamination, and filth—is eliminated, and the true idea appears.

A spiritually enlightened view that beholds the good earth of God's creating recognizes that it is found in Spirit. God creates spiritual ideas, and these ideas reflect divine qualities. The earth of God's creating, then, is a most magnificent and beautiful sight to behold. But this divine creation is not a mass of matter revolving in a spatial orbit. Love, life, wisdom, order, beauty, and intelligence are the substance of the true idea of earth. The more we identify with these spiritually derived qualities, the more we see evidence of them, whether in the majesty of the Grand Canyon or in the beauty of spring flowers. With this spiritual standpoint, we are also able to discern that the primary enemy to the environment is not a person or group of people doing harmful things, but the destructive thoughts behind such actions. This outlook helps us to know how best to respond in a given situation.

For example, when praying about the careless behavior that resulted in a polluted shop yard, I was striving to see myself and my fellow workers as spiritual ideas, as God made man, able to express purity and order. The more I saw that it was only natural for man to express good qualities such as these, the more apparent those qualities became.

In the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy writes: "Prayer cannot change the unalterable Truth, nor can prayer alone give us an understanding of Truth; but prayer, coupled with a fervent habitual desire to know and do the will of God, will bring us into all Truth. Such a desire has little need of audible expression. It is best expressed in thought and in life" (p. 11).

My first responsibility in cleaning up the shop yard was to think and act rightly myself. Everyone's first responsibility in cleaning up the earth is the same—to think and act rightly ourselves. This happens as we understand our real nature to be the reflection of God.

Earnest prayer "to know and do the will of God" brings us consciously under God's government. When this happens, all people are benefited. The environment is benefited. And the will of God is done.