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Giving Thanks for Creation
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| The Old Testament |
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Genesis 1:1,3,6,9,11,14-15,20,24,26,27
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In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth....
Then God said, "Let there be light" and there was light....
Then God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear" and it was so....
Then God said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose see is in itself, on the earth" and it was so....
Then God said, "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night..." and it was so....
The God said, "Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth...."
Then God said, "Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind..." and it was so....
Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness...." So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him: male and female He created them...
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Genesis 1:29,31
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And God said, "See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food...." Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good.
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Psalm 67:5-7
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Let the peoples praise You, O God;
Let all the peoples praise You.
Then the earth shall yield her increase;
God, our own God, shall bless us.
God shall bless us.
And all the ends of the earth shall fear Him.
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Psalm 104:24
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O Lord, how manifold are Your works!
In wisdom You have made them all.
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| Psalm 145:10 |
All Your works shall praise You, O Lord.
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| Psalm 145:15-16 |
The eyes of all look expectantly to You,
And you give them their food in due season.
You open Your hand
And satisfy the desire of every living thing. |
| Psalm 150:6 |
Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord! |
| Psalm 116:12,13 |
What shall I render to the Lord
For all His benefits toward me?
I will take up the cup of salvation,
And call upon the name of the Lord.
I will pay my vows to the Lord
Now in the presence of all His people. |
| Psalm 148 |
Let them praise the name of the Lord,
For He commanded and they were created. |
| Isaiah 40:26, 28 |
Lift up your eyes on high,
And see who has created these things...
Have you not known?
Have you not heard?
The everlasting God, the LORD,
The Creator of the ends of the earth,
Neither faints nor is weary.
His understanding is unsearchable. |
| The New Testament |
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John 1:3
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All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
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| Revelation 4:11 |
"You are worthy, O Lord,
To receive glory and honor and power:
For You created all things,
And by Your will they exist and were created." |
| Revelation 14:6-7 |
Then I saw another angel flying in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to those who dwell on earth - to every nation, tribe, tongue, and people - saying with a loud voice, "...worship Him who made heaven and earth, the sea and springs of water." |
| John 1:10 |
He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. |
| The Heavenly Doctrines |
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The Purpose of Creation
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Arcana Coelestia 9237
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The end of creation is the human race, that there may be a heaven from it. |
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True Christian Religion 773
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The purpose of the creation of the universe was none other than the formation of a heaven of angels from human beings, [one] where all who believe in God shall live forever in eternal blessedness. |
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Conjugial Love 85
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Since the Lord God the Creator is love itself and wisdom itself, and the universe was created by Him, being in consequence a work, so to speak, issuing from Him, it must be that in each and every created thing there is some goodness and truth from Him. For whatever is accomplished by and issues from anyone, derives from him a character similar to his. Reason can also see that this is so from the order which each and every thing in the universe was created in, in which one thing exists for the sake of another, and in which one thing therefore depends on another, like the links in a chain. For all things exist for the sake of the human race, that from it may come the angelic heaven by which creation returns to the Creator, its source.
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Divine Love and Wisdom 170
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The universal end of creation...is for an eternal conjunction of the Creator with the created universe to take place, and this is not possible without vessels in which His Divinity can exist as though in itself, thus in which it can dwell and abide. For these vessels to be His dwellings or abodes, they must be recipients of His love and wisdom as though of themselves, thus recipients which will as though of themselves elevate themselves to the Creator and conjoin themselves with Him. Without this reciprocity, conjunction is not possible. These vessels are human beings, who are able as though of themselves to elevate and conjoin themselves.... By that conjunction the Lord is present in every work created by Him. For everything was created ultimately for the sake of humankind. Consequently the uses of all that He created ascend by degrees from the lowest created forms to humankind, and through humankind to God the Creator from whom they originate.
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Reflecting on Creation
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Conjugial Love 479
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The Creator of the universe distinguished each and every thing He created into kinds, and each kind into species, and differentiated each species, and likewise every variety, and so on. This in order to present an image of the Infinite in an endless multiplicity of qualities. |
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Divine Providence 3:2
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The assertion that the universe with each and all of its constituents was created out of Divine love by means of Divine wisdom can be confirmed from all visible objects in the world. Simply take any particular object and examine it with some wisdom, and you will be convinced. Take a tree, or its seed, or its fruit, or one of its flowers or leaves, and summoning up the wisdom in you, examine it with a good microscope. You will see marvels. And the marvels within, those that you do not see, are still more marvelous.
Observe in its development the progression by which a tree grows from a seed even to the production of new seed, and consider whether the progression does not have in it throughout a continual effort to propagate itself further. For the ultimate end to which it advances is its seed, in which its propagative power exists anew. Moreover, if you are willing then to think spiritually (as you can do if you are willing), will you not see wisdom in that seed? And still more, if you are willing to think spiritually to such a point, will you not see that that wisdom does not originate from the seed, nor from the world's sun, which is nothing but fire, but that it originates in the seed from God the Creator, who possesses infinite wisdom? And this not only at the time it was created, but also continually afterward? For continued sustenance is a continual creation, as continued existence is a continual coming into existence.
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Apocalypse Explained 340
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[N]othing is a blessing except what is given by the Lord, for that alone is blessed because it is Divine and eternal, and contains in itself heaven and eternal happiness. All other things which have not in themselves what is Divine and eternal are not blessings.
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Attributing All Life to the Lord
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Arcana Coelestia 3880:7
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True confession of the heart, because it flows from celestial love, is confession in the genuine sense. The person with whom it exists acknowledges that everything good comes from the Lord and everything evil from self. When that acknowledgement exists with him it is a state of humiliation, for in this case he acknowledges the Lord to be everything in him and he himself in comparison to be nothing. And when confession is made in this state it flows from celestial love.
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Heaven and Hell 9
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Angels say that not only everything good and true is from the Lord but everything of life as well.... This being the belief of the angels, they refuse all thanks for the good that they do and are indignant and withdraw if anyone attributes good to them.
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| Divine Love and Wisdom 171 |
The Lord the Creator continually raises up from the earth forms of useful endeavor and activity in succession, culminating in the human being, who in respect to his body is from the same origin. The human being is then raised up by his reception of love and wisdom from the Lord. Moreover, in order that he may receive love and wisdom, all the means have been provided. He has also been formed such that he is capable of receiving them if only he is willing. |
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Giving Thanks
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Apocalypse Explained 689
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Saying, "We give Thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty", symbolizes the acknowledgment that all being, living, and ability are from the Lord.
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Arcana Coelestia 5957
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The Lord does, it is true, demand humility, worship, thanksgiving, and much else from a person, which seem like repayment, so that His gifts do not seem to be free. But the Lord does not demand those things for His own sake, for the Divine derives no glory at all from a person's humility, worship, or thanksgiving. It is utterly inconceivable that any self-love should exist within the Divine, causing Him to require such actions for His own sake. Rather, they are required for a person's own sake, for if someone possesses humility he is able to accept good from the Lord, since in that case he has been parted from self-love and its evils which stand in the way of his accepting it. Therefore the Lord desires a state of humility in a person for that person's sake, because the Lord can flow in with heavenly good when that state exists in him.
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| see Apocalypse Explained 1210 |
The reason why praising God symbolizes to confess and worship, is, that the Lord does not desire to be praised or glorified from any love for Himself, but from His love for a person. For a person cannot do otherwise than praise and glorify the Lord, or give praise and glory to Him, when he acknowledges in heart that there is nothing good in himself, and that he can do nothing from himself, and on the other hand that all good is from the Lord, and that the Lord can do all things. |
| Apocalypse Revealed 630 |
"‘And adore Him Who has made the heaven and the land and the sea and the fountains of waters" (Revelation 14:7) means that the Lord Only ought to be worshipped, because He Only is the Creator, Savior and Redeemer, and from Him Only do the angelic heaven and the Church and all the things thereof exist. That by "to adore" is meant to acknowledge as holy...and therefore by "to adore", when said of the Lord, is meant to acknowledge as the God of heaven and earth and to worship. By "to make the heaven and the land and the sea and the fountains of waters" in the natural sense is understood to create them, but in the spiritual sense it means to make the angelic heaven and the Church.... |
| True Christian Religion 308 |
[T]here proceeds constantly from the Lord a Divine sphere of heavenly love towards all who embrace the teaching of His church, and who, just as children in the world obey their father and mother, obey Him, are attached to Him, and seek food, that is, instruction from Him.... [T]he Lord, by means of the sun and the earth in the natural world, provides all necessities for living creatures and for inanimate matter. That is why we read in Job (12:7-9): "Ask, I beg you, the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of the sky, and they will report to you; or the plant of the earth, and it will instruct you; and the fish of the sea will tell you. Who does not know from all these things that the hand of Jehovah has done this?" |
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