In the thirteenth chapter of Genesis we read, "The Lord said unto Abram, ... Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward: for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever."

When the Lord appeared unto Abram and made the promise that all the land which he saw should be his, Abram, eager to reestablish himself after his separation from Lot, was wise enough to obey the command, which was the condition of the promise. The Lord said, "Lift up now thine eyes, and look." Accustomed to obey, Abram understood that the magnitude of the Lord's gift depended upon his once more implicitly following His command. He realized that upon his following the direction to lift up his eyes and look depended the extent of the land which was to belong to him and unto his seed forever; for the Lord said, "All the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it." Reluctance to obey would have narrowed his possessions; but obedience in lifting up his eyes and looking from the place where he stood, in all directions, widened his vision immeasurably, and consequently enlarged the scope of his newly possessed land. By looking eagerly in all directions, his little domain grew into a heritage of innumerable acres. All he needed to do was to look up,—to look away from the place where he stood.

How often we limit our possessions by tenaciously, stubbornly, gazing down at our feet! How we fear that if we look up and away, the very ground upon which we are standing, and which is all that we seem to possess, that even that little, limited holding may vanish from our sight! How often we anxiously view our slim stores, and keep our gaze fixed upon them, instead of lifting our eyes to behold the glorious universe over which God gave man dominion! The limited material sense of possession becomes, not only useless to us, but a burden, the care of which brings us fear and anxiety.

If we would confidently look up and away from what is in our hand, who can tell what wonderful things we might see to the north, and to the south, and to the east, and to the west,—things that we might possess merely by discerning them? Could we but always look from the place where we stand to the land wherewith the Lord has blest us, our little personal problems would vanish into nothingness, utterly forgotten in the glory that is visible to the north, to the south, and to the east and to the west. We then should find ourselves in possession of all the wondrous beauty and bounty of God's creation.

Abram might also bring us another lesson. God's promise reads, "All the land which thou seest." It has truly been said that we see that for which we look. Now Abram might have looked a little way from the place where he stood. Had he done so, he would not then have seen this land which God had given him as a wonderful gift. How often we do just this thing! When an opportunity comes to us to do some work in the church, or to make a change in our daily routine which, while it promises new and bigger blessings than we have yet known, holds the possibility of some problems which may give us work to do to solve,—how often we draw back and tremble at the sight of the possible difficulty, instead of looking in all directions at the new land and seeing the wondrous view promising rich blessings! How often we refuse to lift up our eyes and see the good land!

If we look for problems, we shall find many things to discourage and terrify us; but if we view all things through spiritual sense, which, Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 298), "can bear witness only to Truth," even these things which seem most hopeles cease to look like difficult situations and become glorious opportunities. Mrs. Eddy goes on to say, on the same page, "Spiritual sense, contradicting the material senses, involves intuition, hope, faith, understanding, fruition, reality."

Abram, or Abraham as he was afterwards called, certainly perceived his heritage through spiritual sense, not through the material senses; for we know that his possessions became very large and a great joy to him. He had sufficient faith in the loving-kindness of God to expect to see something very good and satisfying when he lifted his eyes and looked. He looked eagerly, with eyes clear with confidence and expectancy; he looked as far as he could see in all directions; he looked for good only, and he found good in abundance. The vision through which he saw his new land was the same vision which afterwards enabled him to see and entertain the three angels.

It is this vision—spiritual sense—which man possesses as the reflection of the all-seeing God. It is this vision by which we may see angels. We need only to come consciously into possession of our land, through following Abram's example; and lifting up our eyes, and looking from the place where we are northward, southward, eastward, and westward,—in all directions,—we may look at the land which God has promised us, with the clear, confident eyes of spirituality. The evidence of the material senses is not to be trusted as accurate information about man or the universe. It is only as we, like Abram, look away from the material, which the physical senses try to tell us constitutes man's environment, into the realm of Spirit, reality, that we are able to come into possession of the domain which God has promised shall be ours, the land over which we are given dominion.

Looking up and in all directions away from the place—material belief—where we stand, brings us the realization of all good. In Science and Health (p. 575) Mrs. Eddy gives us a wonderful vision of this infinite good, when she writes of "the city of the great King," saying: "Northward, its gates open to the North Star, the Word, the polar magnet of Revelation; eastward, to the star seen by the Wisemen of the Orient, who followed it to the manger of Jesus; southward, to the genial tropics, with the Southern Cross in the skies,—the Cross of Calvary, which binds human society into solemn union; westward, to the grand realization of the Golden Shore of Love and the Peaceful Sea of Harmony."