Whatever our idea of God may be, the perception of Reality is always an inner perception. As Moses tells us, the word is not afar off but in our own mouths, and Jesus, that the Kingdom of Heaven is within. The prayer of power is not so much a petition as it is an inner recognition.

We cannot doubt that the Spirit has already made the gift of Life-since we live. Ours is the privilege of acceptance. Thus we are to assume the attitude of a grateful beneficiary of the Divine gifts. This should be done simply and directly. The Spirit is not something that was, or that is going to be or become. The Truth is that which is; it exists at the very center of our being. To pray in spirit and in truth means to recognize this indwelling Spirit and to declare the truth about Its activity through us.

God is not poor, weak, sick or unhappy. God is not impoverished, limited or in bondage. It is this Spirit to which we pray, the Reality which we approach at the center of our own being. It is the Silent Partner in every man's life-a wise and loving Presence every ready to respond to us. Since we neither created this Presence nor incarnated It within us, there is nothing we can do but accept It. Jesus said, "Ye must be born again." The second birth is a birth from appearances to Reality. Robert Browning said, "There is an inmost center in all of us where Truth abides in fullness."

The purpose of prayer, or spiritual communion, is to seek conscious union with this indwelling Presence. Jesus claimed that the words he spoke were not his but were the activity of the Spirit within him. Since there is but One Mind this must be true. It is impossible to lose this "imprisoned splendor" unless we comply with Its nature, which must be Truth, Harmony, and Wholeness.