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Letters of Myrtle Fillmore., by Myrtle Fillmore, [1936], at sacred-texts.com
It is not enough to pray. Prayer is one step that you take, but you need other steps. You need to think of God, the all-powerful Healer, as being already within you, in every part of your mind, heart, and body. To keep one's attention and prayers in the spiritual realm of mind, without letting them work out into the soul's expression and into the actual physical doing of that which corresponds with what the mind and heart has thought and spoken and prayed, is to court trouble. To keep declaring love and power and life and substance, and yet unconsciously, perhaps, assuming limitations and living them, will cause explosions and congestion that work out in the physical. We need to harmonize our thinking and our prayers with actual living experiences.
Sometimes we pray to a God outside of ourselves. It is the God in the midst of us that frees and heals.
With our eye of faith we must see God in our flesh, see that wholeness for which we are praying in every part of the body temple. "Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you. . . . Glorify God in your body" (1 Cor. 6:19, 20).
Prayers aren't sent out at all! Sometimes that is our
trouble. Where would we send our prayers? We should direct them to our minds and hearts and affairs. We commune with God-Mind within our own consciousness. Prayer is an exercise to change our thought habits and our living habits, that we may set up a new and better activity, in accord with the divine law rather than with the suggestions we have received from various sources.
We sometimes think that we pray when we read and declare statements of Truth. We have very little idea of the way in which the answers to those prayers are coming. And we do not prove that we expect them to be answered. Almost immediately after praying we go on doing the things we have been doing, which does not allow answers. And we think and say that which is not in accord with the prayers we have made. For example, we go into the silence and declare statements of prosperity. Then in writing a letter we speak of lack and failure and longing which proves that we have those thoughts and feelings of lack in our hearts and that we are dwelling on them more strongly than we are on the Truth that we have prayed.
Prayer, then, is to change our minds and hearts so that God's omnipresent good may fill our minds and hearts and manifest in our lives. If we do not keep on thinking in accord with the prayers we have made, we do not get good results. For all thought is formative; all thought has its effect in our lives. When some of
our thought energy is expended in negative beliefs and feelings, and we show that we have old mental habits in the subconscious mind, we get those old negative results--even when we are praying daily and when others are praying for us.
We have a very decided part; we are to cease worrying, and being anxious, and thinking and speaking of the past and of the apparent lack and idleness. We are to concentrate all our attention upon the Truth of God, and the truth of our own being, upon the very things we would see taking place in our lives. We cannot do this so long as we have negative thoughts in our hearts.
As we pray, the word of life is going into us, breaking up old fixed beliefs and reorganizing our lives. The word of life--life as God has planned it--is taking hold of our subconsciousness, and we know that we are free and will begin to use our freedom. Working in the consciousness of freedom, we will be happy and well and busy and prosperous. But our attention will be upon what we are doing rather than upon outer results. The results will take care of themselves once we have started our foundation in Truth.
"With God all things are possible" (Mt. 19:26). Those who receive spiritual help are the ones who place their undivided faith in God and who bring their thinking in line with His Truth. "You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free" (Jn. 8:32).
Prayer, as Jesus Christ understood and used it, is
communion with God; the communion of the child with his or her Father; the splendid confidential talks of the son or daughter with the Father. This communion is an attitude of mind and heart. It lifts the individual into a wonderful sense of oneness with God, who is Spirit, the source of every good and perfect thing, and the substance that supplies all the child's needs--whether they are spiritual, social, mental, physical, or financial. Positive declaration of the truth of one's unity with God sets up a new current of thought power, which delivers one from old beliefs and their depression. And when the soul is lifted up and becomes positive, the body and the affairs are readily healed.
Sometimes I have written a letter to God when I have wanted to be sure that something would have divine consideration and love and attention. I have written the letter, and laid it away, in the assurance that the eyes of the loving and all-wise Father were seeing my letter and knowing my heart and working to find ways to bless me and help me to grow. So I suggest that you write a letter to God, putting into words that which your heart holds and hopes for. Have faith that God is seeing your letter and your heart, and that there is wisdom and power and freedom and love to accomplish that which will meet your needs. After you have placed your heart's desires with God, don't be anxious or worried or negative. Don't look for signs that He has responded. Busy yourself with
the work God gives, and with study and prayer develop into a real companion and a real radiator of happiness and inspiration. As you do so you become the radiating center toward which those are drawn who will add to your happiness and cooperate with you in making your life a beautiful success. Spirit intends you to be a radiating center that will draw to you whatever you need to be well and strong, successful and prosperous.