Go to work

How could I? I had received notice terminating my employment, like thousands of others throughout the nation. Yet there it was -- the demand that I go to work. It was in the letter from a Christian Science practitioner responding to my request for his prayers.

"We must 'pray without ceasing,'" Mary Baker Eddy n1 writes, pointing to the Bible. I considered carefully those words and the ones that follow: "Such prayer is answered, in so far as we put our desires into practice." n2

n1 Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science.

n2 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,m p. 15.

I needed to deepen my desires. They couldn't be just for position -- that wouldn't get me where I wanted to go. Instead, my desires needed to be to see what God sees, to know the reality He knows, to glorify Him.

God is all-seeing, all-knowing, all- acting, divine Mind. Therefore the seeing, knowing, and acting of man -- God's timeless, spiritual expression and my true identity -- are always intelligent and concordant. This truth of God and man began to form the basis of my prayers.

The underlying problem was that the confusion of the physical senses presented unemployment as unavoidable. But I rejected this. Matter can't stipulate conditions for God's man. I claimed my true identity as God's idea and realized that God, being divine Love and the only true cause, governs all creation in perfect harmony.

I found as I prayed in this way that I could break through the misconceptions that would prevent my seeing, knowing, and acting correctly. I began to lose my fear.

One specific thing I knew I could do was obey God. I could practice the Biblical command to Love God and my neighbor as myself. I reminded myself constantly during this time of the simple facts of God's true nature and His love for man. "Hold thought steadfastly to the enduring, the good, and the true ," says Mrs. Eddy, "and you will bring these into your experience proportionably to their occupancy of your thoughts." n3

n3 ibid.,m p. 261.

I tried to do just that. What concrete efforts should I make toward looking for a job? I took the ones each day indicated by intelligence and reason, not by fear. But most important, I looked to the Christ, God's saving idea, for support. I kept active physically and mentally even though the situation wasn't improving.

Suddenly I knew I was rich. Rich in ideas, rich in identity, rich in the reflection of the allness of God. This is what I had been searching for all along. I was employed. "Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest?" Christ Jesus had asked his disciples. And he explained: "Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest." n4

n4 John 4:35.

By that time there was little doubt about my employment. A very satisfying position soon opened, and I took it. When retirement came 40 years later the avenues through which to glorify God were still there. I still go to work with God as my employer. DAILY BIBLE VERSES My judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God. Isaiah 49:4