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A Christian Science practitioner once told me that angel messages come with action; they are not just good thoughts, but involve results. I had been devoting lots of my prayer time to thinking about church.

I am the librarian of a Christian Science Reading Room in a busy downtown area of a city in central California. Assisting visitors in their search for spiritual insights and guidance has been rewarding.

Imagine standing at the threshold of the fourth century after Christ Jesus’ ascension and watching the shadows gather portending a dark time ahead for humanity, as Christian healing disappeared from the practice of Christianity. What if you knew it would be over a millennium before Christ’s Christianity, with its attendant “signs following,” would begin to reappear? Would you just give up, feeling it was futile and pointless to stand against the currents of such an overwhelming nighttide? Or would you dig deep, and resolve never to abandon the Truth you had witnessed the power of—not only for your own sake, but at least as importantly, for the sake of the many in need you could still help and heal? Your decision would have outsized effect—as a modern-day analogy illustrates.

While reading the allegory of the Greek philosopher Plato, born about 400 years before the Christian Era, I was able to draw parallels between it and what Mary Baker Eddy, the Founder of Christian Science, discovered about God and spiritual man in His image. In the allegory, found in his influential work The Republic, Plato imagines some prisoners in a cave, who have lived there all their lives.

Listening to the news these days, we might feel dismayed by the many problems confronting us, including wars, weather extremes, immigration crises, and political conflicts. To anyone who is concerned about the state of the world, helping humanity can feel like a daunting challenge.

As a child, I got a good look at the Milky Way for the first time when our family moved to Oregon. In the dark skies above our ranch, the stars and clusters seemed very close.

One summer, I was visiting Boston from Canada for the Annual Meeting of The Mother Church. I had been inspired by how the Church wraps its arms around the world, spreading the message of God’s love.

I had just finished reading the story of Moses’ encounters with God in Exodus. The Bible records that “the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend” ( Exodus 33:11 ).

The apostle Paul’s admonition  “Pray without ceasing” ( I Thessalonians 5:17 ) is one of a list of prayer counsels I’ve come to call my prayer checklist. Unceasing prayer can seem impossible with everything else one has to do.

A fellow church member said to me, “Our church is just a shadow of what it used to be. ” I reflected on that for a moment.