Burdened Sense Relieved Through Prayer

I want to give thanks for Christian Science, this independent church, and also I’d like to give thanks for the fine readings tonight, the goodness of God. This is a theme that should appeal to everyone. It said at the end of the Bible reading, “Rejoice in the Lord, ye righteous, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.” There was a time, a number of years ago, when I felt like there were a lot of demands and expectations on me, and I felt like I was at the end of my rope, as if I had nothing, and then I was expected to do more.

Well, I sat down in my living room and remembered hearing that there was a very special prayer in the book of Habakkuk, Chapter three. I opened the book and read this prayer, from lines 17 and 18, “Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit for the vine be on in the vine, the laborer of the olive shall fail, and the flock shall be cut off from off the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stable. Yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will joy in the God of my salvation.”

When I read that, I said, “Okay, it looks like I’m kind of like at the end of my rope. What am I going to do? I’m not going to complain about it. I’m going to look for some things to be thankful for. I will follow the example of Habakkuk as best I can and rejoice in the Lord and give thanks to him.” Well, as soon as I took that position firmly in my mind, I did find some things to be thankful for. It gave me a lot of encouragement. And as far as the things that I thought were pressing, I released them all, and a lot of them I ended up not doing. I the thing that was most impressive, I started to be happy. And I was very happy about that, as you can imagine. So life went on. Whatever needed to be done was done. The thing that was needed most of all was for me to release the sense of burden and start rejoicing in our God. And I remember that experience. It was very helpful to me, something that’s dear to my heart, and I remember it very clearly. Thank you, Father.