Well Digging

This article is one of the Unity Classics written by legendary leaders of Unity. Some date back decades, even a century. That’s why the language may seem a bit formal, and the writers sometimes used masculine nouns and pronouns that were considered proper for their era.

O God, thank You for helping me be a good well digger as I learn the spiritual techniques of digging deep and opening up new wells of life, strength, and healing power.

Within the soul, there are areas that have never been touched—lands of the Spirit we have not yet discovered where wellsprings flow.

They flow with life and spiritual strength, healing vigor and vitality, like powerful artesian streams pouring out from a depth we have not fathomed.

In the stillness now, I seek to learn how to open each of these inner wells prepared for me and for everyone. With patience and expectancy, I begin to drill into the depths through words of praise and thanksgiving. I praise God for peace and strength and vigor that are waiting for my touch! “Thank You, God, for the guidance of Your light within me as I search.”

With words of praise and songs of thanksgiving, with faith and declarations of the goodness of God, the hardened crust of limitation and unbelief now gives way.

Deep into the soul, the light of Truth proceeds—through layers of the hardest rock of stubborn willfulness, through shelves of stony passiveness, until I wonder if a way will ever open!

And then I hear the smallest trickle of spring, and on I press in greater faith and courage until the sound is turned to visibility. Springs begin to flow with strength, bursting through the opened ground within the soul. With joyous release, the sparkling flow of Spirit pours forth and overflows the surface, racing, filling every crack and crevice with its cleansing purity. 

So flow the wellsprings of the life of the Christ in anyone who will but seek and dig, willing to become the humblest digger of a well. Each will find the wellsprings of his or her being and touch the true fountainhead of peace, life, and perfection. 

We can, through prayer, release wells of strength and vigor and renewing life. We can, through silence and consent to God’s goodwill, be strong enough to reach the depths and then relax in power unleashed, revealed. We can let the holy substance of the soul’s heritage pour into every outer phase of being. 

“Seek, and you will find” (Lk. 11:9 NKJV). The search is ours, not God’s. We, with eager, willing hearts, must only begin. And then in joyous, overwhelming measure, the universe within releases all its treasures, pouring out the wealth we had thought was somewhere else. We find it now … right here … within. We will always hear its movement and its promise of response, if we can be still and listen. 

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow! Praise God, the giver of each bountiful well within the soul! Thank You, God, for the privilege of digging wells!