_THE LARGER OUTLOOK_
GENESIS xv. 5-18.
"And He brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven!" The
tent was changed for the sky! Abraham sat moodily in his tent: God brought
him forth beneath the stars. And that is always the line of the Divine
leading. He brings us forth out of our small imprisonments and He sets our
feet in a large place. He desires for us height and breadth of view. For
"as the heavens are high above the earth" so are His thoughts higher than
our thoughts, and His ways than our ways. He wishes us, I say, to exchange
the tent for the sky, and to live and move in great, spacious thoughts of
His purposes and will.
How is it with our love? Is it a thing of the tent or of the sky? Does it
range over mighty spaces seeking benedictions for a multitude? Or does it
dwell in selfish seclusion, imprisoned in merely selfish quest? How is it
with our prayers? How big are they? Will a tent contain them, or do they
move with the scope and greatness of the heavens? Do they just contain our
own families, or is China in them, and India, and "the uttermost parts of
the earth"? "Look now towards the heavens!" Such must be our outlook if we
are the companions of God.