EXPERIENCE teaches mortals that merely to pray does not of itself bring the desired blessing, although their petitions may be fervent and sincere. The fact that some realize distinct and marked benefits from prayer, while others who are apparently as earnest in their petitions do not, proves that there is a vital condition or element needed to make prayer effective. Seeds which lack vitality decay in the soil, although the labor expended in their sowing may be as arduous and as faithfully done as that bestowed on good seed. It is much the same with prayer. There is a vital kind which demonstrates its power and utility, and there is a lifeless kind which brings nothing to pass except disappointment or indifference. It is evident that the vitalizing element necessary to effective prayer is not dependent upon any outward form, and must be found in the thought of the petitioner.

Prayer understood and used aright is not an idle ceremony; it is the motive power of the Christian's progress Christward. Without it the pilgrim is at a standstill. It is as if one should undertake to run a motor-car with the gasoline-tank empty. The machine might be beautiful to look at, of the latest model, be kept in perfect condition, and the different parts be correctly manipulated, but it would not take one anywhere. Christians should not be satisfied to stand still in their religious experience; they ought to be moving onward and upward to better living. Time is too short to spend in praying or working ineffectively. The motor-car would go if the motive power were supplied, and the Christian's prayer will bring him what he needs if he sees to it that its effective element is supplied.

Men do not judge the value of seed by the lifeless kind, nor the utility of motor-cars by one without gasoline; and neither should they decide as to the efficacy of prayer by the ineffective sort, such as the Scripture speaks of as being offered "amiss." Only good seed is real seed, and effective prayer is the only real prayer; that is, the prayer which avails with God and which meets the needs of men. Christian Scientists have found that their new apprehension of Truth enables them to supply the effectiveness which their prayers formerly lacked, and they have been able, to some extent, to overcome disease and sin and lesser forms of evil. Prayer has become the motive power in their daily experience, lifting thought above and away from the conditions that make human life wretched and sordid and sinful.

Jesus defined the effective point in prayer when he said, "All things whatsoever ye pray and ask for, believe that ye have received them, and ye shall have them." (Rev. Ver.) Comparatively few of Jesus' professed followers accept this standard today, therefore but few have any very lively faith in the efficacy of their prayers, or in the probability of their receiving the things asked for, much less believing that they are already received. This, doubtless, is because they are guided in their judgment by material appearance instead of by faith in the unseen spiritual reality. Yet our Lord warned his disciples not to judge (or be deceived) by "appearance," but to "judge righteous judgment," ‹ that is, according to Truth.

Modern religionists excuse their disobedience to this precept of Jesus by arguing the impossibility of its fulfilment without denying the evidence of the physical senses. How can we, they say, believe we have received what our senses declare we have not? The Master was assuredly aware that material testimony would have to be denied in order to pray as he enjoined, and no doubt his teaching was received with the same incredulity as it is today when reiterated in Christian Science; but Jesus was not influenced by physical evidence, his vision took in the spiritual, eternal reality of things. He said of the child supposed to be dead, "The maid is not dead." His prayers affirmed the presence of Life and harmony. They were the realization of perfect being, the knowledge that God's will is done in earth "as it is in heaven," whatever physical sense might declare to the contrary.

To pray with the belief that we have the things prayed for involves of necessity a disbelief in the sense of lack, whatever its name may be. This gives prayer a quite different meaning from what is generally attached to it. Ordinarily the religionist centers his thought upon his need, and thinks of God as having not yet supplied it, implying that man is ever in want and that God is ever withholding. In Christian Science this position is reversed. The Scientist in prayer thinks of man as the "image and likeness of God," and hence as never lacking anything, ‹ as never sick, never sinful, never separated from the Father. This prayer is not a mere petition, since it regards God as constantly bestowing all good upon man. It is, rather, the effort to realize the ever-presence of God as All-in-all, and that His children possess all things.

How, then, does the Christian Scientist think of the human sense of need which drives him as well as others in prayer to God? As a false sense of things, a wrong concept of being, and not as a God-bestowed or God-permitted reality. He recognizes this false sense as a condition to be denied and overcome before he can know God or man aright. The Scientist believes that in his real, spiritual self he has received all the good he can desire or ask for, although to human sense he is not wholly conscious of it, and he prays in order that he may become conscious of it. Recognizing that God is All and does all, his prayer affirms this truth, and leads to the realization that man's needs are always supplied. If this sounds paradoxical, it must be because one is believing in error more than in Truth. Jesus uttered no paradoxes; he demonstrated in his own experience all that he taught others to do. Christians who have full faith in their Master's works must have full faith in his words also, and know that in obeying them they are fulfilling the truth, even though they go contrary to the wisdom of the material world.

It can be seen that to pray according to the rule of Jesus demands the rejection of whatever condition asserts itself in place of the divine reality; hence the Christian Scientist has the highest Scriptural example and authority for his much-criticized practice of denying evil and disease. It is morally impossible to believe opposites; if one is accepted, the other must be denied. If one affirms that God supplies his need, he must in all consistency deny the sense that would declare otherwise. It is error that would prevent the perception of truth by declaring itself true; and it is a false condition accepted which prevents the human recognition of man's real being. Undoubtedly the cause of ineffective prayer is that the material concept of man, which pictures him as a sick, sinful, suffering, dying being, is accepted as true; which prevents the recognition of the spiritual side of the question, wherein man is upright, harmonious, holy, the image of God. It is self-evident that if the Christian should think of the good as already his, he-ought not to think of the evil as his.

The denial of error is not, however, the main act or purpose of prayer, but rather is it preliminary to reaching its real effective point, viz., the realization of man's spiritual sonship with God, the divine unity of Father and son in which man embodies all goodness. This is not a mere intellectual recognition, but such as one's daily thought and conduct rest and rely upon. Until prayer attains this point it is not effective, for it perpetuates rather than effaces the false sense of alienation from God. The declaration, "Son, all that I have is thine," expresses God's side of prayer; and Jesus' words before quoted define the Christian's side. But, say the sick, how does this method of praying apply to us? How can we believe ourselves to be well when we feel so wretchedly sick? By recognizing that God's man is never sick, and by knowing that it is ours to enter into this true consciousness of freedom. Discord, disease, sin, death do not obtain in God nor in His likeness; they are therefore a false, abnormal sense or consciousness with which God has nothing to do, and which men should condemn and deny with all their might. Christian Scientists deny evil that they may understand and do good. They deny disease that they may perceive the wholeness of man. When they pray for health they affirm health, and turn away from the belief of disease, ‹ not because of physical evidence, but because of the omnipotence and omnipresence of God.

While mortals cling to the evils from which they suffer, they cannot grasp the opposite facts of goodness and peace in which lies their salvation. One cannot see the landscape, the trees, flowers, or sky, or the faces of his friends if his view is obstructed, although all these are there. So their sense of evil hides from mortals the presence and the reality of good; but if they have faith in the latter they will deny the former, and continue this course until the good they affirm becomes to them a realized fact. If Christians apprehend as did St. John that they are now the sons of God, they can fulfil Jesus' ideal of prayer in every respect, knowing that God has provided for every need of man.

It should be the aim of every Christian to pray effectively and successfully, just as it is his aim to work effectively and successfully in his chosen occupation or profession; but one cannot do this because of desire, or because he believes it to be his duty. He must have an intelligent foundation for his faith, that it may abide serene and secure in the face of all contrary suggestion or testimony. He must know why he believes, and his assurance of God's allness be such as to destroy his confidence in the asserted power or presence of evil. In Christian Science mankind may find this foundation and gain this knowledge and assurance. In Science and Health, the text-book of Christian Science, Mrs. Eddy gives such a logical and conclusive definition and explanation of God and man, as divine Principle and idea, that Jesus' rule regarding prayer becomes plain and practical, and is seen to be the only form consistent with the infinite fatherhood of God.

Christian Scientists are sometimes criticized because, as it is alleged, they do not pray at all, and sometimes it is asked why Christian Scientists need to pray if they believe their needs are already supplied. The fact is that Christian Scientists pray more and better than before they accepted this teaching. They go to God as children, and not as beggars or outcasts. Their attitude in prayer is not so much that of a petitioner as that of a recipient. They feel constrained to pray, "without ceasing," the prayer of affirmation, because human sense, if not guided by Truth, is apt to be deceived by material suggestions. They pray, not because God is less than the infinite, ever-loving Father, but that they may be ever mindful of His fatherhood. They pray, not because they believe what physical sense declares about them, but because they desire to keep in mind the "perfect model" (Science and Health, p. 407) and grow like unto it. They pray, and feel their need to pray, not because God has forgotten or neglected them, but lest they forget God and His infinite goodness. ‹‹‹‹‹

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