My prayer for peace

By Sandie Vankeuren
Palm Harbor, Florida, USA

I like the idea that God controls His creation. God, as the source and center of all good, controls the situations that try to dictate a state of ward.

I can see, recognize, and experience God's perfect harmony. Right where conflict seems to be, there is perfect peace, harmony, and calm. It may take discipline to consistently be attuned to this, but just knowing that it is always there and a present possibility gives power to my attempts to experience its reality.

This is a prayer of affirmation, a prayer that states what is true. What IS Truth? God is good, and man is made in the image of goodness.

These words assure me: "Whatever envy, hatred, revenge—the most remorseless motives that govern mortal mind—whatever these try to do, shall 'work together for good to them that love God ...'" (Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896, p. 10).

World prayer

By Jan Linthorst
Irvine, California, USA

The prayer for the world that came to mind when the war started was in Psalm 96: "Sing unto the Lord a new song: sing unto the Lord, all the earth. ... O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness ...." The reason that this came to mind was that the human scene does not always give us the right picture. The right picture of the reality of God is "the beauty of holiness." The psalm also says: "Honour and majesty are before him: strength and beauty are in his sanctuary." It seems that the place to dwell at this time is "in His sanctuary." I felt deep peace knowing that the only place where we perceive what is true about God's universe is in His sanctuary. Through my prayers, I have come to better understand this statement from Science and Health, "Entirely separate from the belief and dream of material living, is the Life divine, revealing spiritual understanding and the consciousness of man's dominion over the whole earth" (p. 14).

Love, the only power

By Victor Hayes-Allen
Tabuk, Saudi Arabia

I've lived in Saudi Arabia for many years. Two things stand out clearly to me when I pray [for the Middle East]. One is an idea that Mary Baker Eddy wrote about—that God knows only good and that evil flees "like a shadow at daybreak" (see Unity of Good, p. 27). This helps me see that as we draw closer to God and know that good is the only reality, this understanding dissolves hatred. We become aware only of the power of divine Love.

Another article by Mary Baker Eddy that I find helpful in my prayer is "Love your enemies,' which says, in effect, that the only enemies we have are those we create in our own thoughts (see Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896, p. 9).

I am learning to forgive past wrongs and to trust God to work in His own way. I am praying to see human justice pattern divine justice. These ideas are helpful in the current situation because I know that prayer based on these truths is potent.

Peace poem

Forever in control
No government
No nation
Can stop or stay
The power of Your strength
Not yesterday
Not today.

One omnipotent power
Forever here
Always, guiding, protecting, healing
Humanity
You hold so dear.
In conscious thought
I hold you close,
And witness peace.

—Linda Bulla
Sacramento, California, USA

How I am praying for peace

By William H. Hill
Dallas, Texas, USA

My prayers for peace received an impetus recently when I was praying with the 91st Psalm. It was the word secret that caught my attention in the very first verse: "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty" (verse 1). Secret could be defined as something unseen to the physical senses. This could be something discovered in the realm of thought. This is where prayer should lead us. If, for example, we want to feel protection from the fears and anxieties of [war], we are going to find it through prayer. Our defense is in the unseen realm, the "secret" place of God. Christ Jesus tells us how to pray: "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly" (Matt 6:6).

What is this secret place? It is the consciousness of the nature of God. It is the recognition that God is infinite Spirit, therefore ever-present in times of trouble. It is the awareness that God is Love and that we all dwell in Him as spiritual beings, feeling the comfort and protection He is always providing. How do we achieve this state of consciousness? Jesus tells us to enter the closet and shut the door. We need to set aside time and place to pray, and then shut out the evidence of the material senses. Then the voice of God will be heard. It will tell us what needs to be known. Then harmony will reign.

'The still, small voice'

By Karee Henshaw
Holt, Missouri, USA

Recently, I humbly asked God to show me how to pray for peace in the Middle East. (Up to this point, my prayers had tended to border on my telling God how I thought things should be.) I awoke early the next morning with these words from Science and Health in my thoughts: "The 'still, small voice' of scientific thought reaches over continent and ocean to the globe's remotest bound. The inaudible voice of Truth is, to the human mind, 'as when a lion roareth.' It is heard in the desert and in dark places of fear" (p. 559).

I was comforted by these words, and I thanked God for this inspiration. I was grateful to realize that the voice and presence of God was reaching everyone involved in the war, wherever and whoever they might be. I praised our universal Father-Mother God for being loud enough to be heard above the horrific sand storms, amidst all the terrors of war, in homes and on the battlefields, where fear could seem overwhelming.

Since this time several weeks ago when I first asked God for direction on how to pray, I have continued to find these three sentences to be an inspiring basis for my prayers to end conflict in the Middle East.