The casual student of Scripture is inclined to believe that each reference made to the wilderness—whether identified as the desert of Beer-sheba, Paran, Shur, or Zin—simply suggests some barren region of sand and rock, heat and serpents; while the Christian Scientist surveys the wilderness in the light of revealed Truth, which discloses that the physical elements of the desert are but the typification of carnal thoughts. He has learned that the wilderness out of which we must find our way has but one locale— that of individual human consciousness. It is here that the arguments and testimony of barren lack and stubborn resistance, pervaded by hate and subtle purpose, threatening to obscure the presence and reality of God's creation, power, and purpose, must be overcome.
This metaphysical approach to Scriptural references to the wilderness renders a practical service to the student today. It reveals the essential changes of thought which were indispensable in carrying the bewildered Israelites through those three stages of experience identified as the flight from Egypt, the wilderness wandering, and the promised land. The gradual mental changes which took place under Moses' leadership and teaching were objectified as constantly changing physical experiences, which the children of Israel called Egypt, the Red Sea, and the wilderness. The promised land, held before them as an encouragement to continue their struggle, was likewise visualized by them as a land of physical ease and plenty.
Material thinking, which enslaved Israel in the past, is today exercising its oppressive influence on much of mankind, whether living in earth's crowded cities, vast prairies, or at the lonely outposts of civilization. Because the wilderness is a mental state which is shared in common by all mankind, each person is being divinely driven or led to seek his way out of it and so attain the promised peace and spiritual freedom to be found only in the consciousness of God and His spiritual kingdom.
