“All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies.”
Each and every challenge calling for watching, prayer, spiritual warfare always involves movement of my mentality from problem-consciousness to solution-consciousness. Dwelling on the problem is error. Dwelling on the solution to the problem is truth. These two states of mind are completely opposed to each other: one is covenant-breaking and the other is covenant-keeping. Holding to the testimony of the 5 senses is not keeping His testimonies, but rather losing sight of them, casting them away.
Victory is assured only when I go up higher, orienting my mind (and mood) toward the solution, refusing to sink into the depths of the problem.
Of the 12 spies sent out to report on the lay of the promised land, only 2 were solution-oriented and brought back a good report. The rest of the spies were problem-oriented to the point of despair.
As Churchill declared, “Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.”
“… [T]he Master bade his students be wise as the serpent, i. e., never allow the belief of Life and sensation in matter to put to silence the opposite, science of being.” (Science and Health, 1st edition, p. 250)
10 of the 12 spies “put to silence the science of being” with disastrous results. Fear puts to silence the voice of the angels that hold the key to the solution of every problem imaginable to humankind.
“We saw the giants … and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.” (Numbers 13:33.) Thus, as the 10 spies fixed their gaze on the false testimony of their 5 senses, their despair doubled: not only did they see themselves as utterly squashable insects but imagined their enemies viewing Israel as easy prey as well.
A similar example of such misuse of imagination occurs in the Apocalypse of John, where mortal mind has magnified the serpent of Genesis into a dragon of monstrous proportions.
As the saying goes:
“Two men looked out through prison bars:
One saw mud, and the other saw stars.”
2 Israeli spies saw “stars” – namely, Omnipotence, Omnipresence, Omniscience, and Omni-Activity – and the problem of “giants” made a swift getaway: into its native nothingness.