Seeking solutions? Find Truth.

London commuters regularly hear the public service announcement “See it. Say it. Sorted.” This is a message of assurance – if something disturbing is going on, you can call the British Transport Police to come and sort it out.

It occurred to me recently that we might believe that this is also how prayer works. We see that we have a problem. We go to God in prayer. Then we expect God to sort it out for us.

But Christian Science gives us insight into praying from the standpoint that, in God’s view, everything is already “sorted.” This kind of prayer recognizes that our need isn’t to have God fix our problem by turning the experience we seem to be undergoing into a better one; it is instead to yield what we are seeing and are convinced is true to what God, Spirit, knows, which is the spiritual and the only real.

As we do this, we see that we are not mortals at the mercy of conditions beyond our control, but rather citizens of God’s kingdom, completely under God’s control, which never wavers and is 100% benign.

This describes the reality known so vividly to Jesus, who proved it in his remarkable physical healings – which included, on more than one occasion, feeding thousands when resources appeared limited to a few fish and loaves of bread. In each case, the situation seemed far from sorted, yet he showed that it was.

Jesus consistently entertained the Christ view, which perceives the spiritual fact and power of God’s governance. He had a constant, conscious understanding of divine Science, described in Mary Baker Eddy’s “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures” as “the understanding by which we enter into the kingdom of Truth on earth and learn that Spirit is infinite and supreme” (p. 281).

In this kingdom, it’s not a set of circumstances that brings us happiness but the joy of knowing our oneness with God – divine Truth – which endures independent of shifting circumstances. It’s not having a rewarding career or being popular that brings fulfillment, but the consciousness of being a spiritual idea of the divine Mind, God, and forever needed for God’s expression of Himself to be complete. And it’s not merely regaining or sustaining health, but gaining “the absolute consciousness of harmony and of nothing else” (Mary Baker Eddy, “Rudimental Divine Science,” p. 11) that brings bliss, peace, and purpose.

The kingdom of Truth is the consciousness of our spiritual identity and everyone else’s – of a flawless goodness that leaves nobody out.

As Jesus’ healing ministry proved, the Science that reveals Truth’s kingdom also brings to light the presence of what we might appear to lack, such as health, provision, or right relationships. These things are certainly needed and welcome, and are more consistent in our experience when they emerge from our spiritual progress.

But we aren’t seeking the kingdom to eat the loaves, so to speak, as Jesus counseled those he sensed were following him for that reason. The meat that never perishes is the spiritual reality that we discern and demonstrate – the eternal Truth, which can never become untrue.

Jesus wasn’t a displaced seeker after the true kingdom; he was at all points anchored in it. But he knew that the rest of us have to shift from focusing on what we seem to need to seeking the purely spiritual and ever-present good that he was so conscious of. He said of that divine goodness, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened” (Matthew 7:7, 8).

Every time we ask for a clearer understanding of reality, we will receive it; whenever we sincerely seek Truth, we will gain it; and when we knock on the door of God’s kingdom to apprehend, accept, and express its reality and harmony, we’ll find that whatever seemed out of kilter is already sorted.

This seeking and finding involves sitting at the feet of Christ to gain Truth’s ever-fresh inspiration and its insight into itself. Science and Health says, “Spirit imparts the understanding which uplifts consciousness and leads into all truth” (p. 505). As we study the Bible and Mrs. Eddy’s writings and pray, our thoughts open to this divine imparting that lifts us above a limited, material sense of existence to the “consciousness of harmony and nothing else.”

Adapted from an editorial published in the Sept. 2, 2024, issue of the Christian Science Sentinel.