Exalted June 2, 2009

Because exalting He hath exalted. That this signifies that He has manifested His Divine in the Human, is evident from the signification of “exalting oneself,” when said of the Lord, as being to manifest the Divine in the Human. The reason why this is signified by “exalting He hath exalted Himself,” is that the Divine is the Highest or Supreme; and the Lord, when He was in the world, made the Human in Himself Divine, and thus “exalting He exalted.” (That by what is “high” in the Word is signified what is Divine, see n. 8153.) ~AC 8264.

The Lord was made Divine by ascending. It would be interesting to try to do a sermon on the abstract concepts of the Lord in a really down to earth way.  Maybe that is not a good idea though. Maybe things that are abstract are distant for a reason, maybe the cloaking of the abstract is there as a gate so that people don’t enter what they are not ready to handle.  Wonderful things come in ugly container sometimes.

Naaman June 1, 2009

Ronnie, Great question. I always saw Naaman’s non-Israelite status being the key. As a convert, we have here a lesson of moderation and accommodation. The Lord is not asking Naaman to compromise his usefulness as a Syrian general. I also think Naaman taking some of the land with him shows us the answer: he is taking with him the true good of the church, which makes his outward shows of piety (or his apparent obedience to the secular world of cognitions) enlivened, even if secretly. Mostly, though, I don’t have an aswer – have done any digging into the exposition? Scott On Thu, Oct 9, 2008 at 11:25 AM,

Schnarr, Ronald wrote: Hi Scott, I hope I am not bugging you with all my theological questions, but I have another one for you. Why is Naaman forgiven for bowing down to another God because of pressure from his king, but while other stories like that of Daniel not bowing down, seem to suggest this is the most important spiritual law to follow. Naaman is not an Israelite so I understand that historically he is probabely considered a lesser being, but spiritually what would it mean that Naaman can bow to another God? ~Ronnie

Dug this out of my emails.  I guess we are allowed to have the true good of the church in our natural lives.  Piety can be enlivened by the internal being present.  Keep shunning evil and let the external world be what it is.

Desert May 30, 2009

[8] Moreover, as the Word spoken by the Lord contains innumerable things within it, and as “desert” or “wilderness” is a word of wide signification, for all that is called a “wilderness” which is not cultivated and inhabited, and all interior things are called “inner chambers,” therefore by a “desert” is also signified the Word of the Old Testament, because this is regarded as abrogated; and by “inner chambers” the Word of the New Testament, because this teaches interior things, or those which concern the internal man. So also the whole Word is called a “desert,” because it no longer serves for doctrinal things; and human institutions are called “inner chambers,” which, because they depart from the precepts and institutes of the Word, make the Word to be a “desert.” This is also known in the Christian world; for they who are in holy external and in profane internal worship, for the sake of innovations which look to their pre-eminence over all and their opulence above all as the ends in view, abrogate the Word, and this so far as not even to permit it to be read by others. And although they who are not in such profane worship hold the Word to be holy, and permit it to be among the people, they nevertheless bend and explain all things therein in favor of their doctrinal matters, which causes the rest of what is in the Word, and which is not in accordance with their doctrinal matters, to be a “desert.” ~AC 3900

The Word being stripped of its true meaning is a desert.  Think of John 3:16.  It has been stripped of its meaning.  The truth is gone which is its water.  The heat is still there which is the holiness and therefore the presence of the Lord.  The Lord is where there is order and where the Lord is becomes Holy.  The Lord is still in the form of the Word and also in that people attribute the Word to His mouth.  This makes it Holy though it lacks water for their thirsty throats.

May 27, 2009

“Nobody, not even an angel, can know all the different ways in which people accept the Lord.” New Jerusalem and Its Heavenly Doctrine 86 Emanuel Swedenborg

Wow.  Variety is so important. You never know when someone else really loves some aspect of the Lord you are not connected to.  The Lord’s mercy on us all is so great. Thank you Lord.

Seeing Ends May 26, 2009

AC 3796- it is the mark of someone wise to be aware of which ends are present in himself. Sometimes it does seem as though his ends are selfish when in fact they are not, for the human being is such that in everything he considers how it affects himself. This he does regularly and habitually.

Our thoughts all procede from our loves.  If we are focused to much on spiritual growth we can move away from being focused on being useful to mankind.  One question we might ask ourselves is are we interested in what is useful or are we interested in what take us to the next level.  Going to the next level is a merit thought.  Merit must be extracated.  Ask what would merit do and then ask what would the Lord do?

There is a certain fear that attends to thought of use to others.  Can we be useful, will it be good enough?  This is merit speaking.  We must extricate ourselves from the lie that merit exists in actions. We do the right thing at first because God calls us to it and later because we love it.

What to do? May 20, 2009

“To love the Lord is to love to keep the commandments of the Decalogue; in proportion as a person, from love or affection, keeps and does them, in the same proportion the person loves the Lord. The reason is that the Ten Commandments are the Lord with man.”

~Apocalypse Explained 981 Emanuel Swedenborg

I’m always wondering what I am supposed to do in this life.  The real question is what do I get to do in this life.  Life should be motivated by love.  Love of use, and of sharing and of doing good things for eachother and basically regular life (HH 358)  The area we need to compel ourselves is in following the Lord’s rules.  The ten commandments are the rules which make our life.  The truth is we are all big bags of evil and we could not possibly deal with all the evil in ourselves. That is why we choose little things as representative images of our willingness to be changed and the Lord does the rest. We do the little worms.  He does the big ones.

The Divine Truth becomes bigger and bigger as we grow older.  We realize how different the Word is from who we are.  We all start forming our religions around how we can feel good about ourselves, but slowly we realize we can’t be that perfect image we see in the Word.  The Word becomes the Lord to us and all we can have is humility in our lowly state.  One is good and that is the Lord.  Eventually I think we realize we have nothing of goodness from ourselves, and when that happens the Lord will speed up the process of reforming the external and we will all the sudden be in a beautiful shining world which hasn’t changed at all, but all the details shine brighter than you ever saw before.

Beuty is truth and love is fire. May 16, 2009

“their truths of faith are known from their faces and the beauty of these in respect to their form; and the good itself, which is the use, from the fire of love therein which gives life to the beauty;”  ~AC 9297

I think when deciding if you really love someone you have to look past their form and see if there is the gentle warmth of innocence in the love.  Sometimes when beauty is intense I think it is hard to see if there is really any fire there.  Truth by itself is faith alone.  It does not mean that beauty is bad, but that sometime beauty makes it hard to see love in the world.

AE 248- Presence through removal of evil heart and thoughts. May 15, 2009

“the Lord’s perpetual desire to conjoin Himself with man, is man’s ability to abstain from evils; and so far as he does abstain the Lord opens the door and enters; for the Lord is unable to open and enter so long as evils are in man’s thought and will, since these block the way and close it up. Moreover, it has been granted to man by the Lord to know the evils of the thought and will, as also the truths by which evils are to be dispersed; for the Word is given wherein these things are disclosed.” ~AE 248

It is always a good reminder that I the it is not because the Lord doesn’t like me that He is not around, but because I have to many evils and falsities in me.  It is refreshing to know the Lord will enter more and more as I remove evil.

Miracles

I don’t know if miracles are real or not.  I believe that the Lord will do everything he can to help us in this world.  It makes most sense that miracles would be used where freedom would not be taken away, but would the very act of miracles apart from us seeing them affect our freedom. I don’t think it would.

It is clear though that the Lord works through means of people.  This would mean that miracles would only be possible by the Lord’s power flowing through us as a means on a subconscious level for miracles to happen.

The Lord told the twelve disciples that everything he did was through them.  This is becaus nothing is unconnected.  The Lord is in our relationship to each other and Him. What is there, but relationship.  Anything unconnected would perish.  It is good to remember that the Lord is the God of everybody, not just me and all this spiritual work is so other people will be better off.

Healing

“Your faith has made you well.”

Our inmost is the Lord’s.  It is the Lord.  It is love. It is what makes us run. It is untouchable, unknowable, perfect, pure and discretely separate from us.

Then we have truth or “faith”. This is our reception of the Divine.  Life on earth is about gather truths that we might form a temple from these truths that the Lord can descend into. This temple is our minds.

A passage in AC say “Where there is order the Lord is present and where the Lord is present there is order.” Life is about ordering our minds with truths.  Figuring things out and then putting them to work.

Faith heals our spirits.  It brings order back to our spiritual bodies.  It heals us of our sickness.  Lord help us to believe that you can heal the sick, love the broken and raise the dead.