Article May 11, 1968 Issue

There Are No Walled Cities

HELEN OAKLEY ROCKHOLD

There is a tendency mentally to label and pigeonhole places as well as people. We say that each area has its own individual mental environment and atmosphere. Then, because we ourselves have attached these labels, we see the results we have anticipated.

One locale appears ready and eager for expansive thinking; it seems adventurous, receptive to new ideas. We consider another area less inclined to accept new ideas or change, even resistant to progress.

In Isaiah we read, "Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west; I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth."^{Isa. 43:5, 6;} We may have fallen into the habit of thinking that mentally, as well as geographically, men are "far" from God, perhaps even at the "ends of the earth." Nevertheless, the spiritual fact is that each one in his true identity is a child of God. Regardless of points of the compass, the omnipresence of God is the only environment. This is in complete accord with the Scriptural teaching, "In him we live, and move, and have our being."^{Acts 17:28;}