Prayer time 19 August 2026
— Audio file to be added —
Does the sun choose to shine?
What God is like — Principle.
Download a PDF of the prayer script
Orientation
Tīhei mauri ora. Welcome.
Over the last four weeks we have kept in mind the main aspects of God — Life, Truth and Love. Intelligence. Soul. Spirit. And this evening, we think of God as Principle, or Law.
Normally, when we think of God we have a more personal or relational leaning towards our idea of God. But with God as Principle, we have an idea of Law to work with. This may raise the question, how can I be in relationship with a Law? Which of course is just the point, for prayer to and from God within is an inherent relationship within, not a dualistic one.
Perhaps this aspect of God is in fact the simplest to pray with.
As we bring our prayers to God as Principle, or Law, that Principle does not do any deciding on our behalf. If we are praying with Law, then the Law that is God holds regardless of the moment, person, situation or condition of prayer. The Law we pray in is current now, yet has been the same for all of time.
Why do we pray, especially if there is a law or principle that is set? If God is not choosing an outcome for us, why do we bother?
We pray because it is good to pray, and because Jesus taught us to pray. We also pray with an expectation, and that expectation comes from the lesson one of Job's friends gave in a moment of counsel in Job's hour of need.
You will pray to him, and he will hear you, and you will pay your vows. You will decide on a matter, and it will be established for you, and light will shine on your ways.
(Job 22:27–28, New Revised Standard Version)
A note on this passage. These are the words of Eliphaz, one of the friends who came to Job, and the book itself goes on to challenge much of what those friends said. H. Emilie Cady set these two verses at the head of her lesson on affirmation, and they are used widely in Unity circles. We receive them here as she did, as a description of how spiritual law works.
So let us move through the five steps of Unity affirmative prayer with the idea of God as Principle.
Relaxation
We'll take a moment to relax and settle where we are.
Are you holding yourself in your prayer posture, or is your prayer posture holding you?
Our full body sweep.
No struggle, no striving. Just ease, simplicity, silence.
Nothing here depends on your effort.
We breathe.
And we create stillness.
Silence falls.
We pause together.
Concentration
Gather your prayers. See the people. See the conditions. See the things. Bring them all in here. How about this week, even sweep up the worries, any grumpiness, perhaps some hurt or hard feelings. Take a moment — find your prayers.
Even just feeling for the prayers is helpful, not even necessarily naming each person, place or thing.
Golden Key: God is Principle, and Principle does not change.
These principles were true a billion years ago and they will be true a billion years hence. They cannot and do not change, for a principle changes not. (Emmet Fox, The Seven Main Aspects of God)
Prayer is answered because God is principle, eternally manifest in the same way. When we pray rightly we bring ourselves into harmony with His Law of Being. (Emmet Fox, The Seven Main Aspects of God)
We do not have to beseech God any more than we have to beseech the sun to shine. The sun shines because it is a law of its being to shine, and it cannot help it. No more can God help pouring into us unlimited wisdom, life, power, all good, because to give is a law of His being.
(H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth, Lesson Two, 1894)
Friends, see your prayers. Give them pause. And now we ask — does the sun decide to shine? Or does the sun simply shine? Light is what the sun is made of. God is not deciding about giving you light where there appears darkness. Giving light is simply what God is, and who God is.
God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5, New Revised Standard Version)
Pause. Do not rush this moment. Can you see, feel, know, believe it to be true, that the light for your prayers is already given before any of us paused to pray? The sun is shining its light, and God's giving is already underway before a word is even on our lips.
A wonderful reminder for us — hear these words and let them work in your heart a moment:
You do not change God's attitude toward you one iota by either importuning or affirming. You only change your attitude toward Him. (H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth, Lesson Five, 1894)
Prayer does not change God. It changes us. (Charles Fillmore, Dynamics for Living)
Simple prayers now, to clear our thinking before the quiet.
I let go of the belief that God may be feeling differently about me today.
God does not change, and the law of God does not change.
I let go of the belief that my prayers need to be articulate to sufficiently incline God in my favour.
I come into agreement with what is already so, and my agreement is the prayer.
I let go of the belief that a prayer without a visible answer is a prayer that failed.
The law is at work in me now, and it continues its work even when I am not looking.
Meditation
Our silence together now.
Time to put aside our concentration, and allow the light to warm and fill our hearts and mind.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. (Hebrews 13:8, New Revised Standard Version)
The same. Yesterday. Today. Forever.
[silence]
Song: 'Fleeting' by Ocean Fal-Cav, used with permission.
Realisation
Come back gently.
Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. (Matthew 7:7–8, New Revised Standard Version)
Everyone who asks. Every single one.
God is my help in every need;
God does my every hunger feed;
God walks beside me, guides my way
Through every moment of the day.
I now am wise, I now am true,
Patient, kind, and loving, too.
All things I am, can do, and be
Through Christ, the Truth that is in me.
God is my health, I can't be sick;
God is my strength, unfailing, quick;
God is my all, I know no fear,
Since God and Love and Truth are here.
(Hannah More Kohaus, ‘The Prayer of Faith,’ Wee Wisdom, August 1898)
We now pray the affirmations of Florence Scovel Shinn, who understood Principle as clearly as anyone.
God is my unfailing and immediate supply of all good.
I am always under direct inspiration. I know just what to do.
I am in perfect harmony with the working of the law, for I know that Infinite Intelligence knows nothing of obstacles, time or space. It knows only completion.
My good is a perfect and permanent idea in Divine Mind, and must manifest for there is nothing to prevent.
God's promises are built upon a rock. As I have asked I must receive.
I know there is nothing to defeat God, therefore there is nothing to defeat me.
I am unmoved by appearances, therefore appearances move.
I stand steadfast, immovable, giving thanks for my seeming impossible good to come to pass, for I know, with God, it is easy of accomplishment, and His time is now.
God works in unexpected and magic ways His wonders to perform.
I now make my perfect records through the Christ within — the records of Health, Wealth, Love and perfect self-Expression.
(Florence Scovel Shinn, Your Word Is Your Wand, 1928, and The Game of Life and How to Play It, 1925)
God does not change. I pray, and I expect wonderful results.
Appreciation
Thank you, God, who is Principle.
God is the name we give to that unchangeable, inexorable principle at the source of all existence. To the individual consciousness God takes on personality, but as the creative underlying cause of all things, He is principle, impersonal; as expressed in each individual, He becomes personal to that one, a personal, loving, all-forgiving Father-Mother. (H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth, Lesson Two, 1894)
Law at the source of everything and our Father-Mother at the point where we are.
And what of seemingly unanswered prayers? It is a real thing, especially if something has had long and repeated prayer attention. Charles Fillmore wrote this for our encouragement:
If you find yourself disappointed because you do not at once demonstrate health or success, be at peace and know that your earnest prayers and meditations are working out in you a soul growth that will yet become manifest beyond your greatest hopes. (Dynamics for Living)
And Scriptures as prayers of appreciation:
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1, New Revised Standard Version)
The light of God surrounds us; the love of God enfolds us; the power of God protects us; the presence of God watches over us; wherever we are, God is.
(James Dillet Freeman, ‘Prayer for Protection,’ Unity, 1941)
Prepared by Jacinda Faloon-Cavander for Unity of NZ