Decisionmaking

Making decisions is often agonizing. Sometimes the choice seems to be a tug of war between two options, both options equally promising or else equally unpromising. Other times, the elements of the issue to be decided are extremely complicated and difficult to sift through.

What resources can we bring to the dilemmas that human life presents? Surely we need a thorough knowledge of the facts involved; we need wisdom, acumen, good judgment of people, even prophetic intuition. But often it is not possible to have all the facts on hand. As for wisdom and acumen, we can ask with Job, ''Whence then cometh wisdom? and where is the place of understanding?'' n1

n1 Job 28:20.

Christians believe in one infinite divine Spirit. Spirit, Almighty God, is also the one Mind, the source of all genuine wisdom and intelligence. We can appeal to this Mind in prayer. It is natural for a Christian to confront decisionmaking with earnest and honest prayer. God, infinite Mind, is omniscient , omnipresent. Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, writes, ''The real jurisdiction of the world is in Mind, controlling every effect and recognizing all causation as vested in divine Mind.'' n2

n2 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 379.

God, being the one God, is everyone's God - everyone's actual Mind. Wisdom, righteous judgment, accurate perception, and intuition are all available to us through our relationship to the one Mind. The attributes of God, good, are not abstractions shrouded in mystery. God's intelligence and love are ever available to us in prayer wherever we are, because the spiritual fact of our being is that we're inseparable from God, from our creator.

A personal sense of wisdom isn't reliable. Our personal background, composed perhaps of hereditary tendencies, education, and other varied influences, has no constant to enable us to reflect an absolute standard and focus for judgment.

Christ Jesus' wisdom was the spontaneous reflection of the absolute intelligence and universal love of the divine Mind. The Christ he lived is the eternal Truth, revealing the true nature of God and man. To conscientiously consult the Christ-spirit within each of us taps infinite, divine resources and enables us to reflect the necessary acumen and intuition with which to fashion right decisions.

Tomorrow this newspaper will carry the first of several topics to be covered this year in its ''Great Decisions '83'' series. U.S.-Soviet relations will be discussed in this first installment.

Governments are always in the throes of decisions. As citizens of the world, we may feel like little fish swimming in the giant ocean of political and economic decisions - decisions far beyond our individual influence and control. No matter which way we swim, the currents seem to carry us with them. The real deciders seem to be the heads of government, far away from our opinions and desires.

But the Christian does have an important influence on world events - not simply personal but prayerful - an influence that sets aside his own limited perspective and reflects his faith in the power of God. Prayer is not mental lobbying for our political opinions or interests. Rather, it's an acknowledgment of God's supremacy, a yielding to His will.

Far above mere political interest, personal or political ideologies, is the confrontation between the Christ ideal and atheistic evil. To a Christian the battle lines are clear, and he is confident of the inevitability of the triumph of universal good and divine Love.

Clarifying her view on the subject of prayer for the peace of nations, Mary Baker Eddy once wrote to her followers: ''I cited, as our present need, faith in God's disposal of events. Faith full-fledged, soaring to the Horeb height, brings blessings infinite, and the spirit of this orison is the fruit of rightness, - 'on earth peace, good will toward men.' '' n3

n3 First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 281.

The Word of God realized in prayer insists on decisions that reflect genuinejustice and contribute to the spiritual progress of all mankind toward peace, prosperity, universal health and harmony.

What contribution can we make in these historical considerations and great decisions? We can decide to pray. DAILY BIBLE VERSE Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding in infinite. Psalms 147:5