The Secret of True Prayer

If you see your source of supply as being something in this world, for example, your career or your own abilities, then what happens when something changes? —as it always does in this world... What if your Source cannot change or fail? Then you’re putting your faith where faith is justified.

If the universe is in perpetual change and God is changeless and eternal, which would you rather have as your source? If you need something then you’re coming from weakness, but if you need nothing then you can come from the strength of God.

If you need something—and you would have to lack it to need it—then remember that it’s just a substitute for God, and that a sense of separation from Him is the only real problem. You’re having a dream of scarcity, but it’s not true. Christ needs nothing. When you have a deep desire for anything then you must think you’re a body, or separate from God in some way. What else could want something? If you’re spirit, or joined with God, then you need nothing.

The secret of true prayer is to forget the things you think you need. In prayer you overlook your specific needs as you see them, and let them go into God’s Hands. There they become your gifts to Him, for they tell Him that you would have no gods before Him; no Love but His.

When you go to God, you are not trying to get anything—you simply love Him. In doing so, you find that you are loved by Him, for now and for eternity.

As one example, when you meditate, you might visualize yourself taking Jesus’s or the Holy Spirit’s hand and going to God. Then you might think of yourself as laying your problems and goals and idols on the altar before Him as gifts. Maybe you’ll tell God how much you love Him and how grateful you are to be completely taken care of by Him—forever safe and totally provided for. Then you become silent.

You have the attitude that God created you to be just like Him and to be with Him forever. Now you can let go of everything, join with God’s Love and lose yourself in joyful Communion with Him. 

A couple of days later, you might be eating a sandwich or working on the computer and all of a sudden it hits you; an inspired idea just comes to you. (The word inspired, as you know, means “in spirit.”) By joining with spirit you’ve been given the answer. People are always looking for God to answer their prayers. If they knew more about how to pray then they’d know how the answer is given.

His answers don’t come in the form of physical answers, they come to your mind in the form of guidance—an inspired idea, an echo of God’s Love: "The form of the answer, if given by God, will suit your need as you see it. This is merely an echo of the reply of His Voice. The real sound is always a song of thanksgiving and of love."

That’s the key: joining with God in love and gratitude. You forget everything else and get lost in His Love. That’s what it is to be filled with the spirit. That’s the Song of Prayer. The echo is a fringe benefit, but that’s not the purpose of the prayer. It just happens naturally when you join with God and love Him. You cannot, then, ask for the echo. It is the song that is the gift. Along with it come the overtones, the harmonics, the echos, but these are secondary.

Now you can come from a position of strength rather than weakness. You may find yourself being more patient and relaxed in your work, and thus more effective. By emptying your mind of your perceived desires when you go to God, you can experience His Love. Upon returning to the world where you think you are, you can remember more regularly where you really are—with God.

God’s answers are internal, not external. If something shows up in the world it’s a symbol. Don’t think that God acts in the world; He doesn’t. The results of following your guidance can show up in the world as symbols of safety or abundance. Consider the beauty that you see, or even just think of, to be a symbol of your abundance as Christ. 

Now you can see your transitory careers and endeavors as tools that can be used as symbolic expressions of your constant supply. Now your Source becomes a bottomless well where you can go for guidance that will always come in some form of inspiration. If your tool happens to break, so what? You don’t have to be attached to it because it’s not your Source. If your Source is constant, then one tool can be easily and quickly replaced by another one—through the very natural occurrence of inspiration. You can relax knowing that you can’t  lose your Source.

At times you will see, very naturally and very clearly, what you should do in this world to solve your problems—or if you are faced with an important decision, exactly what that decision should be. The most striking evidence of this approach’s validity will be that it works. As you accept the gifts of your Father, remember that you are eternally with Him.