The spiritual foundation of this month's website.
Read About the Concept
- an introduction to this month's spiritual concept
THE NEW CHURCH
by Rev. Walter Orthwein
"And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold,
I make all things new" (Revelation 21:5).
During his exile on the isle of Patmos, the Apostle John received
strange and wonderful visions of things to come. He saw cataclysmic
upheavals, and then a new reign of peace, a new golden age, symbolized
by a beautiful city descending from God out of heaven: a New Jerusalem,
adorned as a bride for her husband.
This prophetic book, the Book of Revelation or Apocalypse, has
never been understood in the Christian Church. No prophecy is every
really understood until its fulfillment. We can see this in regard
to the Lord's first coming. He was unrecognized because the ancient
prophecies concerning the Messiah had been misunderstood as meaning
an earthly king, who would deliver the nation Israel from her enemies.
But in truth the Lord came as a spiritual king, who would conquer
the hells and redeem all mankind from spiritual slavery.
It is our belief that the prophecies contained in the Book of
Revelation have been and are being fulfilled today, and that they
refer, not to the end of the world, but to the end of the first
Christian era, and the establishment of a new Christian age on
earth-a new church.
Jerusalem, where the temple was, the center of worship and instruction
in the Scriptures, stands for the Lord's church on earth; and the
New Jerusalem, symbolically portrayed in John's vision, stands
for a new church-not a new church organization, primarily, but
a new dispensation of Divine truth from heaven, which, when received,
creates a new state of spiritual love and wisdom within the hearts
and minds of people on earth. This is where the church essentially
exists within people who know and love the Lord.
"And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all
things new." He that sat upon the throne is no other than
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. His throne is heaven, where He
is acknowledged as king; and more than king, the source of life
itself. And from His kingdom of heaven the Lord is continually
recreating or making new the life of religion in the person who
believes in Him as the only God of heaven and earth. This is what
the Lord makes new-all things of religion.
Religion should always be new, perpetually fresh and alive, stimulating
the imagination, filling the affections with delight. The Lord
is called "the bright and morning star" (Revelation 22:16)
and "the dayspring from on high" (Luke 1:78). His doctrine
is said to descend from heaven like the dew which vivifies the
grass at the beginning of each new day (Deuteronomy 32:2). Every
coming of the Lord to man is like the dawn of a new day, spiritually,
a day in which there is the greatest potential for new states of
love and understanding.
Religion should be always new, not bound by dead traditions or creeds which
are merely recited without understanding or meaning. It should never be compartmentalized
as something separate from the rest of life, but should enter into every aspect
of life, as the heart sends blood to all parts of the body.
In order to come into the kingdom of heaven, the Lord said, "you
must be born again," that is, made entirely new: seeing God
where you never: saw Him before, aware of His presence in new ways,
looking upon spiritual things with the freshness and wonder of
a child, rediscovering the spiritual dimension of life-this is
the newness the Lord makes.
And how does He bring a person into this state of life? How does
He bring into existence a new church, in which He appears with
new clarity and Power to save? He does it by means of a new revelation
of Divine truth, coming down from heaven to make all things new,
to raise up a new and perfect Christianity.
The Lord has always revealed Himself to men, as far as He possibly
could according to their state of understanding. He spoke through
the prophets of the Old Testament. Then He was born on earth Himself
as the Word made flesh, or Divine truth in human form. After His
resurrection, He appeared to His disciples, and later to John on
the isle of Patmos, foretelling wondrous things to come.
But revelation did not end there. The Bible looks forward to,
and specifically refers to, future revelation. For instance, when
He was on earth the Lord told His disciples, "I have yet many
things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit, when
He the Spirit of truth is come, He will lead you into all truth" (John
16:13).
This promise of a new revelation, we believe, has been fulfilled in the teachings
given through Emanuel Swedenborg, who, like the prophets of old, served as
the human instrument whereby the Lord could reveal new truths for all people.
The solemn testimony of this well-known and respected scientist, philosopher,
and statesman, was that the Lord appeared to him, opened his spiritual eyes,
and revealed to him all the teachings contained in the theological writings
which he then published; and furthermore, that not one word of those teachings
came from himself or any other merely human source, but from the Lord alone.
The New Church, founded upon this new revelation, does not look
to Swedenborg as the source of truth-not in the least; but to the
Lord Jesus Christ, who has come again, as the Spirit of truth (that
is, spiritual truth, or truth about spiritual things) in the teachings
revealed through Swedenborg.
These Writings do not supplant or replace the Bible, any more
than the New Testament supplanted the Old, but rather, they infill
the Sacred Scriptures by disclosing the hidden meaning contained
within them. This internal sense, or spiritual sense, is as the
soul or spirit within the letter of the Word. Without it, our understanding
of the Scriptures is as limited as that of Nicodemus, who, when
the Lord said to him, "ye must be born again," asked:
How can I, a grown man, return to my mother's womb? (see John 3).
He look the Lord's words at their literal face value and so missed
the whole meaning, which was spiritual. Or, to take another example,
remember the woman of Samaria whom the Lord met at Jacob's well.
When the Lord spoke to her of the "living water" which
He had to give, she asked Him where He would get it, since He had
no pail to draw it with. He was speaking of Divine truth, of course,
but she understood Him only literally (see John 4).
In reading the Bible, we must understand that the words applied to the Lord
in the New Testament, "without a parable spake He not unto them" (Mark
4:34), I apply to the whole of the Scriptures. The creation story, the story
of the flood, the histories of the patriarchs, the wars and tribal laws of
Israel, the mysterious visions and actions of the prophets-all of these have
a spiritual meaning, which for the most part is hidden within the literal sense.
This is not just a general "moral" which the stories illustrate,
but a very specific and continuous spiritual meaning, contained in every detail
of every verse, and running throughout the whole of the Lord's Word. This inner
meaning concerns the history of the church on earth, or its stages of spiritual
growth; individual human regeneration; and in the highest sense, the Lord Himself,
His temptation-combats with the hells while on earth, His victories over them,
and His glorification. It is because of this spiritual sense that the Word
is holy.
The Lord Himself referred to this inner meaning, and disclosed
its existence to two of His disciples on the road to Emmaus after
His resurrection. We read in the Gospel of Luke: "He opened
their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures" (Luke
24:45). "And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded
unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself" (Luke
24:27). So moved were they by this revelation that they said, "our
hearts burned within us."
It is this revelation of the internal sense of the Word which makes all things
of religion new. It gives a new vision of the Lord Jesus Christ as the one
God of heaven and earth. It fulfills the Lord's promise that the time would
come when He would teach no more in parables but would show us plainly of the
Father (that is, of the Divine itself). This new vision of the Lord is seen
in the Word, in its internal sense. This new vision is what is meant by the
second coming of the Lord. It is not a second physical coming, or a coming
in person, but is a spiritual coming. The Lord said that He would come again
as the Spirit of truth, or as new truth about spiritual things. New truth about
Himself. The essence or soul of all truth. This is what the revelation of the
spiritual sense of the Word discloses.
It is also said that the Lord would come with clouds, which our
teachings interpret as meaning that He would appear anew in the
Word or Sacred Scriptures. "Clouds" represent the letter
of the Word, the literal sense, which is a "cloud" when
it is only obscurely understood. It is also said that He would
come as a thief in the night, that is, unrecognized for the most
part, as, indeed, He was at His first coming (see Revelation 3:3;
Matthew 24:43).
No one is asked to accept any of this on faith. It is a cardinal principle
of the new revelation that religious truths must be freely accepted, not supported
by emotional persuasion, external human authority, or "blind faith." What
a person does not see for himself to be true and freely choose to follow is
not really his own.
But do investigate these doctrines for yourself, and see if they
do not provide deep and satisfying answers to the important questions
of life, in full agreement with the Scriptures, and also with what
common perception tells you must be reasonable and true. You will
find, contrary to what is widely believed, that spiritual things
can be understood. They can be and should be. The Lord wants us
to understand His ends in our creation and thus be able freely
to cooperate with them.
In these books, which we call simply "the Writings," or
the Heavenly Doctrine of the New Jerusalem, you will find new ideas
about the nature of God and His creation, about how Jesus Christ
is one with His Father, as He said, and is to be worshiped in His
Divine Human as the only God; about the government of the Lord's
Divine Providence; about life after death and the nature of the
spiritual world; about true charity or love of the neighbor, and
the life of use which is its essence. You will find a new, spiritual
and heavenly concept of marriage, which shows marriage to be eternal.
And you will find many other things, all new and all contributing
to a renewal of spiritual life and Christianity in the world.
The New Jerusalem is not limited to any organization, although
there are New Church bodies in the world; but it exists in the
minds of those whose lives have been made new by the new revelation.
It is not Catholic, not Protestant, but a new dispensation, a New
Church. It is eminently Christian, for it worships the Lord Jesus
Christ as God, and seeks to bring the teachings of His Word into
life.
The New Church is open to all. The city seen by John in his vision
was foursquare, with twelve gates, three on each side. These gates
are never shut, but are open to all people of whatever religious
background. Each gate is a great pearl, the pearl of great price,
worth acquiring above all else-the acknowledgment of the Lord Jesus
Christ as the one God of heaven and earth.
Amen.
LESSONS: Isaiah 65:17-25; Revelation 21; True Christian Religion 784
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