A man who liked to watch parades always took an orange crate along. When his view of the parade became obstructed, he simply stood on the crate and saw everything that was going on.

Spiritual truth works in our lives like that man's orange crate. It lifts us higher. But we have to be willing to use it and to depend on it.

Fear is a common obstacle for many of us. Fear of sickness, of failure, of uncertainty. A material point of view is the basis of fear, which points to our need of an "orange crate" solution—a higher view. A material starting point does not allow us a correct view of reality. It produces fantasy as opposed to fact. It produces an inaccurate and often discordant concept of creation. Creation, properly viewed, is spiritual, harmonious, and infinite.

To recognize ourselves as the real man, made in God's likeness, we need to express the spiritual nature of the true creation in intelligence, wisdom, beauty, love, and other Godlike attributes. None of the qualities of God exposes us to anything we need fear. On the other hand, nobody wants to settle for limitation and discord. Though these seem to be a part of human life, they are part of the fantasy, or dream, that life is material. This lie can be faced and progressively dismissed by Christian Science.

We do this—we correct our perspective—by affirming the spiritual truth Christian Science reveals. It lifts up our thought to the eternal fact that God made all things good and there is no good thing He did not make. As the Bible clearly states, "All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made." ^{John 1:3;} And in Science and Health Mrs. Eddy makes a similar point: "There is but one primal cause. Therefore there can be no effect from any other cause, and there can be no reality in aught which does not proceed from this great and only cause." ^{Science and Health, p. 207;} When we lift our thought to this spiritual truth, afflictions, fears, and difficulties begin to lessen and lose their hold on us. It is as if we could see beyond the wall of fantasy to the fact, or truth, of what is really going on in the kingdom of God, the only creation there is.

A man who had been struggling with a painful condition severely hampering his activity became fearful he would not be healed of it. Turning to Christian Science for help, he discovered that impatience had been bothering him for a long time and that the pain was more severe when his impatience increased. He had allowed many trivial things to irritate him. He now resolved to improve his disposition. He saw that impatience and irritation are falsities, not to be indulged in. The omnipresence of God's love precludes all possibility of these destructive emotions being in God's children, made in His likeness. God's children are loving and lovable, he reasoned, and as God's child, so was he. How could the fantasy of fear and impatience be real where all is divine Love and its expression?

As he thought along these lines, he very soon felt himself becoming more forbearing, and as this came about, his fear began to lessen and lose its hold on him. He came to understand that the law of divine Principle is always operating to keep harmony, happiness, and freedom expressed, and that because Principle is in control his fears were without cause. As he found himself free of fear and irritation, the pain ceased. He was healed.

No human problem is solved by entertaining a fantasy. We need to see and understand the truth—what is really going on. Lifting thought above the difficulty to divine Principle, we can discern that all that has ever really happened in the past, as well as all that is really happening in the present, is under the control of Principle, God, and will ever so continue. We don't have to believe what isn't true. When we know we're really Love's idea, Truth's children, we cannot continue believing in the fantasy of fear, impatience, or any other mortal emotion that carries only misery to the one who believes it.

When we know the divine fact and stick to it, we become invulnerable to suggestions of fear and impatience. We become more lovable and more loved as a result. We meet and handle fear with the truth that rules it out of our thought as we realize that God has made nothing that can fill us with fear. He has already filled us with love.

Love governs our entire being, and it does not include an element of fear. We live in divine Love. We don't live in some realm of human will, doubt, and fear, outside the realm of perfect Love. The Bible assures us, "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love." ^{I John 4:18.}

As we come to understand Love and Love's creation fear disappears. We make this practical by seeing ourselves as perfect in Love. We are perfect ideas of God, expressing the Christ ideal, spiritual being. We are abundantly, completely loved by our Father-Mother God, the source of all creation, and it is natural for us to know it.

Seeing the spiritual reality clearly enough lifts us above the barriers and false beliefs of a material, mortal, and discordant world apart from God. We no longer find ourselves to be mere victims of human existence. We control our lives by letting divine Love control us. Our lives overflow with God's love for us and for all creation, so that the suggestions of fear and impatience no longer touch us or dominate us. Such control enables us to love God more and to see how loved we are as God's fearless children.

We have crossed over the wall of fantasy into the harmonious realm of fact.