In Revelation, John records one of his momentous spiritual experiences as follows: "I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. . . . And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new."

Equally clear realization of God's presence and purpose is made possible to us today through the teachings of Christian Science, as we strive with longing hearts to know Him and to love Him. Really to love God, to feel His nearness, to be consciously enfolded in His presence, is to be freed from the fears and besetments of earthly experience. Small wonder that the Scripture tells us to love God with all our heart and mind and soul! Love as great as this lifts us into the tabernacle wherein God is sensibly with us, even as He was with the spiritually-minded characters mentioned in the Bible. Such wholehearted turning to our Father-Mother God will never fail to win for us the peace and comfort which are rightfully ours as His children.

This fact was impressed upon a student of Christian Science in an experience by which great healing came to him. Traveling across the bay from Sausalito to San Francisco late one night, he sat upon the deserted upper deck immersed in deep discontent and gloom occasioned by a difficult personal involvement. Knowing the utter futility of such a false state of mind, he turned resolutely away from this personal sense to contemplate the star-gemmed heavens. Soon they seemed to beckon to a greater vision of Him who made all that is real in beauty and harmony. This beauty flooded his consciousness with inspiration, and he thought of Mrs. Eddy's words in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 87), "In our immature sense of spiritual things, let us say of the beauties of the sensuous universe: 'I love your promise; and shall know, some time, the spiritual reality and substance of form, light, and color, of what I now through you discern dimly; and knowing this, I shall be satisfied.'

How natural, then, it was to reach out to divine Love and to say, All that I want, dear God, is You, a deeper understanding, a firmer realization of Your love for me, and mine for You! How simple it seemed to talk with Him as to a friend, and to realize how wonderful is the Father! How close to His child, closer than all earthly hopes and desires of a lifetime! And the "great voice out of heaven" spoke in the consciousness of that student, assuring him of his security, his freedom, and the fulfillment of his spiritual longings.

Does not an experience such as this represent one of the highest forms of healing we may know? It wipes out so many little things; it stifles vain longings and frustrations; it brings to one the true sense of God's universe of spiritual ideas. God is universal, and to think universally and love universally is to reflect Him and to love Him as the infinite Being, which includes all real being.

Such vitalizing realization of God's presence and love awakens a truer affection for those who are close to us in our earthly pilgrimage. These assume a nobler place in our esteem, so that our affection is chastened, brought to a diviner standard, and friendship becomes a golden treasure. By loosing from our own false thinking those who are close to us, and seeing them with ourselves in God, divine Love, we lay down a personal sense of responsibility or dependence, and find a comradeship of mutual helpfulness.

We shall never be in danger of separation from our loved ones when we see them and ourselves as dwelling in God. By loosing them we shall not lose them, but shall gain a truer sense of them as expressions of divine Love. Were it otherwise, our confidence in the all-loving God would be misplaced. The ignorant mortal mind belief that evil is real and a product of the creator is dispelled when we learn that all God's ways are right and His creation perfect, whether we always see this or not.

In Isaiah we read: "And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever. And my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting places." Striving for the realization of God's presence and care for us is "the work of righteousness." It brings us into our homeland, where we dwell with our divine Father-Mother. And this illumination of thought is not a complex process. Rather is it one of sublime simplicity, replacing human straining with the unlabored motion of divine Love.

Why is this true understanding possible of attainment? Because of the grace of God. If we seek God, it is because He first loves us. Success in the acquirement of this realization is measured by our obedience to Truth, by our refusal to encourage contrary beliefs, by our dismissing of errors as unrealities. Constant vigilance is required if we are to find our reward. Each one of us, as an individual reflection of the one Mind, has the ability to express the thoughts which come from this Mind. The material personality called "me" has to forgo and forget itself. Thus the old demands of self-satisfaction make way for genuine love, which is self-giving and not self-seeking. Then the wilderness of human life, so hedged in with belittling and sometimes tragic trivialities, yields to the spiritual freedom of Soul.

In some such way the journey across the bay brought to this student a calm and wholesome tranquillity, replacing restlessness and mental turmoil. The recognition of the spiritual splendor of our heavenly Father had broken the gloom of material thinking. The student's earnest turning to God was a prayer surely answered.