Consider the simple faith expressed in this psalm to the Lord. A confidence that evil will be punished and that good will always prevail. The future is bright. There is no need to worry.

We might assume that the author was an idealistic youth - one who has never experienced pain or disappointment. Yet this psalm did not come from any naive child. It was written by a very old man, a man who had known incredible hardships. It is a psalm of David.

Think of David. Although from a shepherd he became king, he also knew hardship. As a youth he had to flee for his life from the jealous Saul. He felt the grief over being responsible for the death of his infant son. Later, as king, he saw his children rape and kill one another. He was forced to flee Jerusalem for his life, because his own son Absalom had rebelled. Then he regained his throne at the cost of his beloved Absalom's life.

David experienced intense pain. Yet he could advise us not to worry about those who do evil. All we need do is trust in the Lord and do good. Indeed, he claims that those who commit their way to the Lord will have everything they need, even if it be but a little in comparison with those who are evil. There is nothing in the future to fear. The good will be rewarded for their efforts.

Comparing this psalm with David's life, we may think that he had an unrealistic view of providence. But consider a similar teaching from the doctrines of the New Church: "When the Lord is present with someone, he leads him, and provides that all things which happen, whether sad or joyful, befall him for good; this is the Divine providence" (Arcana Coelestia 6303). Whatever happens - being promoted or fired, realizing our dreams or having them dashed - all result in good!

A difficult idea to accept - in large part because it seems like the Lord thereby is just manipulating us, causing evil to come into our lives.

But such is not the case. The Lord would never make anything bad happen. And He would prefer that we never suffer any pain. His providence is a gentle leading which causes good things to happen, and tolerates evil things. However He permits us to hurt ourselves and He allows others to cause us pain. Not as punishment, but as the result of free choices by individuals and groups.

One of the greatest stumbling blocks to sensing mercy in His providence is that when we feel pain or worry about serious problems we think that is all there is in life. We cannot see beyond the suffering, the hurt. But while we are occupied with worry, the Lord is already looking ahead - to what can come from the experience, to how He can lead us to grow in spite of the difficulty. For the Lord's view is eternal. He sees hope when we see none. He leads to happiness when we feel hurt.

The apparently random and purposeless events in life are described in the Heavenly Doctrines with pebbles. The Lord allows a person "to go here and there, so that the moments of his life appear like scattered pebbles. But the Lord then sees whether he fills up that space between them; He sees what is lacking and where; and then, continually, what is next in order, after a hundred or a thousand years" (Spiritual Experiences 4692[m]). The Lord's sight and providence encompasses eons of time. He sees all we are, and all we might become. He then gradually provides for it - not immediately, but over the course of an eternal lifetime. Whatever happens, whatever decisions we make, or whatever others do to us - the Lord eventually turns everything to good.

Unfortunately, our view is seldom as long. We cannot see how things will turn out in twenty, much less two thousand years. And when we are suffering our sight is even more limited. So we worry about what will happen. We may try to trust in His guidance, but we are more likely to feel abandoned by the Lord. Whatever He might be doing is both invisible and insensible to us.

In such a frame of mind we might wish we could see the future, be certain of how things will work out. If we were assured of the specific outcome, or knew exactly which path were the best to follow, we could really trust in the Lord - have confidence in Him to lead us.

Yet, in this, as in all other things, the Lord knows us better than we know ourselves. He does not hide the workings of providence from us as a test of our trust, or a puzzle for us to sort out. The Divine does not tease us. But the Lord is fully aware that if we were to know the future, or if we received the "right" answers to our specific questions by a voice out of heaven, we would wind up destroying ourselves.

Imagine what we would feel like if someone predicted every last thing that we would experience for the 24 hours. At first we would disbelieve, but what if the predictions started coming true? It would be disturbing, to say the least. And would we not begin to feel restricted, and try to prevent the predictions from coming true?

We value our freedom, our sense of self. We will protect it at all costs. When we are forced to do something, or if we are pressured into one course of action, do we not rebel, wanting to act against that pressure?

Such resistance is not adolescent or infantile reaction to authority. It stems from our inner freedom of thought. For us to be human beings we need to think things out for ourselves and then act in freedom. Whatever choices we make determine the kind of person we become - and whether our choices are good or bad, at least they make us who we choose to be, not who someone else forces us to be.

Yet, when we are confused or suffering, we have a tremendous yearning to see something of the potential the Lord sees for us and those we love. Unfortunately, if we were able to glimpse it, we would probably work against it. A paradox which can be frustrating and lead us to worry about the future.

It would be much better if we could just let go and trust the Lord to make the best of whatever we do. That is what the angels do. They have no memory of past events from their earthly life to trouble them. Nor do they have any desire to know what is to come. For they are content in the present. Imagine if we could be so fully engaged in our present activities, dealing with what we can do rather than what is beyond our power, that we had no time to worry about the future! It is a goal worth striving for.

But for now, we tend to worry. We tend to worry about our jobs, our health, our children, the international situation, our spiritual state. It can on go on and on. Certainly some amount of thoughtful consideration is important. We are meant to make plans for the future - use good judgment to provide for our families. And we can delight in looking forward to continued productivity or happier times. But planning and worrying about what might or might not occur can become excessive.

The Psalms admonish us: "Cease from anger, and forsake wrath; do not fret - it only causes harm" (37:8). Do not worry, it only causes pain. Thinking too much of the future can lead us to forget that the Lord's providence is silently guiding us. The doctrines of the New Church point out that, "a longing to know the future is innate with most people; but this longing derives its origin from the love of evil" (Divine Providence 179).

Anxiety about the future stems from a lack of confidence that the Lord can lead us to happiness. Since He works invisibly, we can think that we are the only ones who have any direct influence upon what happens. It is a subtle trust in self, and denial that the Lord can be relied upon. Certainly it appears as if we have to do all the work, but it is not the reality. For we could not have created ourselves. We can't even make ourselves happy!

So the Heavenly Doctrines describe the Lord's providence "as when one walks in thick forests, the exit out of which he does not know; but when he finds it, he attributes the discovery to himself, whereas providence meantime is as one who stands in a tower, sees the wanderings of such a person, and leads him without his knowing it to the place of exit" (Spiritual Experiences 4393). The Lord is in the tower, inspiring our thoughts, motivating our actions so that we can be led from darkness into light.

But His guiding can only be effective when we cooperate. We have to search for ways out of the forest. The Lord gave us the ability to think so we would use it. If we sit back and ponder our situation, how hopeless it may seem, little is accomplished. Can we add one cubit to our height by worrying about it? We also need to act. If we stand around and complain about how lost we are, or how unfair life is, it is very difficult for the Lord to lead us anywhere. He will not drag us out of our forests against our wills.

It is as the Psalm said: "Trust in the Lord and do good." Such simple advice, but so true! We cannot alter the past, but we can do something in the present, enabling the Lord to create a happy future.

There will still be times of selfishness where we long to know how things could possibly work out, and there will still be things happening to us which are not pleasant. We cannot control life. But we can avoid being defeated by it. We have been given the knowledge of how the Lord operates to bring about happiness in the long term. We have been given the freedom to act with reason. We have the basis for trusting in Him.

Let us then listen to the Psalm, not worrying about the future, not worrying about what is or what might be. Let us do the good that we can, and leave the rest to the Lord. After all, He should be able to do a much better job than we. Let us commit our ways to the Lord, trusting in Him, and He can give us the heavenly desires of our hearts.

(Odkazy: Arcana Coelestia 6303; Divine Providence 176; Spiritual Experiences 2178, 4393, 4692)

427. Till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads. That this signifies that those who are in truths from good must first be separated, is evident from the signification of sealing, which denotes to distinguish and separate, and of which we shall speak presently; from the signification of the servants of God, as denoting those who are in truths from good (concerning which see above, n.6); and from the signification of forehead, which denotes the good of love. The basis of this signification of the forehead is correspondency; for everything in man's body, both internal and external, corresponds to heaven, the whole heaven in the Lord's sight being as one man and so arranged as to correspond to each and all things in man. The whole face, where the organs of the sensations of sight, smell, hearing, and taste, are situated, corresponds to the affections and thence to the thoughts in general, the eyes corresponding to the understanding, the nostrils to perception, the ears to hearing and obedience, and the taste to the desire of knowing and of becoming wise. But the forehead corresponds to the good of love, from which all these proceed, because it forms the highest part of the face, and embraces at once the anterior and primary parts of the brain, whence are man's intellectual [powers]. Hence the Lord looks upon the angels in the forehead, and the angels look to the Lord with the eyes; the reason of this is that the forehead corresponds to love, from which the Lord looks upon them, while the eyes correspond to the understanding, from which they look to the Lord. For the Lord permits Himself to be seen by means of the influx of love into their understandings. Concerning this fact see Heaven and Hell 141, 151), and that the whole heaven collectively represents one man (n. 68 to 87); and that therefore there is a correspondence of all things of heaven with all things of man (n. 87-102). From these things it is evident that being sealed on their foreheads, signifies to be in the good of love to the Lord from the Lord, and by means of that to be distinguished and separated from those who are not in that love. For the Lord looks upon them in the forehead, and fills them with the good of love, from which they look to Him with thought from affection. Others cannot be looked upon by the Lord in the forehead, because they avert themselves from Him, and turn to that opposite love, which fills and attracts them. That every one in the spiritual world, and also man as to his spirit, turns the face to the ruling love may be seen in Heaven and Hell 17, 123, 142-144, 153, 552).

[2] That to be sealed does not mean to be sealed, but to be brought into that state in which their quality can be known, so that they may be conjoined with those who are in a similar state, and separated from those who are in a dissimilar state, is signified by being marked, and by a mark, in the following passages.

In Ezekiel:

"And Jehovah said," to the man clothed in linen, "Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that mourn and that sigh for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof. Go ye through the city after him, and smite; let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity; but come not near any man upon whom is the mark" (9:4-6).

The subject is here the separation of the good from the evil. To be marked (or sealed) on the forehead has the same signification as in this passage in the Apocalypse, that is, to be distinguished and separated from the evil, and conjoined to the good. The casting-out of the evil, and their condemnation are also afterwards described. Those who are in good are described by the men that cry and sigh for all the abominations done in the midst of the city of Jerusalem. Those who mourn and sigh over the abominations are such as are not in evils and the falsities therefrom; mourning and sighing over them signify aversion and grief on account of them, Jerusalem denoting the church, and the city doctrine. The casting-out of the evil and their condemnation are afterwards described, by the command that they should go through the city after him and smite, and that their eye should not spare. To smite and to kill signify to be damned, for spiritual death is damnation, and is signified in the Word by natural death.

[3] In Isaiah:

"He will come to gather together all nations and tongues, that they may come and see my glory. And I will set a mark among them" (66:18, 19).

These words are spoken concerning the Lord, and the new church to be established by Him, and therefore concerning the new heaven and the new earth, as is evident from verse 22 of that chapter. By gathering together all nations and tongues, the same is signified as by gathering together the elect from the four winds (Matthew 24:31). To gather together signifies to call His own to Himself; nations signify those who are in good, and tongues, those who are in a life according to doctrine. To come and see the glory of the Lord, signifies to be enlightened in Divine Truth, and thus to experience heavenly joy; for the glory of the Lord signifies the Divine Truth, and the illustration and joy which it affords. To set a mark among them, signifies to distinguish and separate them from the evil, and conjoin them to the good.

[4] It is said of Cain, that Jehovah set a mark upon him, lest any should kill him (Genesis 4:15). Unless this interior fact of the Word be known, that by persons named in its historical parts, things are meant in the spiritual sense, or that every person there mentioned represents, and consequently signifies, something pertaining to the church and heaven, nothing further can be known than the literal history, which appears to be no more divine than other histories. But in every detail of the Word, both prophetical and historical, there is the Divine, which does not appear in the letter, except to those who are in the spiritual sense and acquainted with it. The interior spiritual fact contained in the history of Cain and Abel is that Abel represents the good of charity, and Cain the truth of faith; and this good and this truth are also called brethren in the Word. The truth of faith is called the first-born because truths which are afterwards to become the truths of faith, are first acquired and stored up in the memory, in order that good may take thence as from a storehouse what it can conjoin to itself, and thus cause them to be truths of faith. For truth is not of faith until man wills it and does it, and as far as man does this, the Lord conjoins him to Himself and to heaven, and from love flows in with good, and by means of good into the truths which he has acquired from his childhood, conjoins them to good, and causes them to become truths of faith. Before this has taken place, they are nothing more than cognitions and knowledges (scientiae), and these he believes as yet only in the same way that he believes what he hears from others which he can give up if he afterwards think differently, therefore this faith is the faith of another in himself, and not his own, and yet a man's faith must be his own, in order that it may remain with him after death. It becomes his own when he sees, wills, and does what he believes, for then it enters into the man, moulds his spirit, and becomes an integral part of his affection and thought; for the spirit of man in its essence is nothing else but his own affection and thought.

[5] That which is of affection is called good, and that which is of thought therefrom is called truth; nor does a man believe anything to be the truth, but that which belongs to his affection, that is, to the interior affection of his spirit. Wherefore what a man thinks from interior affection is his belief, and nothing else that he retains in his memory, whether from the Word or the doctrine of the church, from reading, from preaching, or from his own understanding, is faith, although he thinks that it is, and although it is declared and believed to be so at this day. This primary and first-begotten [principle] is represented and signified by Cain in the above historical part of the Word, for Cain was the first-begotten. When it is believed that such a faith saves man, and not the willing and doing of it, or a life according to it, then there arises the baneful heresy that faith alone saves whatever the life may be, and that there may be faith without life, although this is not faith, but merely knowledge exteriorly in the memory, and not interiorly in the life. If this be called faith it is historical faith, which is the faith one man has from another, and has no life in itself, until he who possesses it sees for himself that what he has received is true, and this first takes place when he wills and does it. When that heresy prevails, then charity, which is the good of life, is annihilated, and at length rejected as not essential to salvation. This was represented by Cain's slaying his brother Abel; for faith and charity or the truth of faith and the good of charity, are called brethren in the Word, as stated above.

[6] That Jehovah set a mark upon Cain lest he should be slain, signifies that he distinguished him from others, and preserved him, because saving faith cannot exist, unless historical faith precede, which is the knowledge of the things of the church and of heaven derived from others, in a word, the knowledge of such things as shall afterwards pertain to faith. For unless a man from his infancy received truths from the Word, from the doctrine of the church, or from preaching, he would possess none, and the Lord cannot act upon such a man, nor can he receive influx out of heaven from the Lord, for He operates and inflows by means of good into the truths which a man possesses and conjoins them, and thus makes charity and faith one. From these considerations it is evident what is signified by Jehovah setting a mark on Cain, lest any one should slay him, and by him that should slay him being avenged sevenfold. Besides, those who are only in historical faith, that is, in the knowledge of such things as belong to faith, - and such persons and faith are signified by Cain, - are also preserved, because they can teach others truths from the Word, for they teach from the memory.

[7] Since the forehead corresponds to the good of love, and therefore the Lord from His Divine Love looks upon angels and men in the forehead, as stated above, it was commanded that a plate of pure gold, upon which was engraved "Holiness to Jehovah," should be placed upon the mitre of Aaron on the forehead, concerning which it is thus written in Moses:

"And thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave upon it, like the engravings of a signet, Holiness to Jehovah. And thou shalt put it on a thread of purple, upon the forefront of the mitre it shall be, that it may be upon Aaron's forehead, and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they may be accepted before Jehovah" (Exodus 28:36-38).

For Aaron, as the chief priest, represented the Lord as to the good of Divine Love, and therefore his garments represented such things as proceed from that love. The mitre represented intelligence and wisdom, and the forefront of it, love, from which are intelligence and wisdom, and so the plate of pure gold, upon which "Holiness to Jehovah" was engraved, was there placed upon a thread of purple. The pure gold of which the plate was made signifies the good of celestial love; the purple forming the thread upon which the plate was put, signifies the good of spiritual love, and spiritual love is the love of truth; the engraving of a signet signifies continuance to eternity; holiness to Jehovah signifies the Lord as to the Divine Human, from which every thing holy of heaven and of the church proceeds. These were upon the front of the mitre which was on the head of Aaron, because the mitre like the head, signifies Divine Wisdom, and the forehead, the Divine Good of Love. Aaron represented the Lord as to the good of love, as may be seen in the Arcana Coelestia 9806, 9946, 10017). "Purple" signifies the love of truth (n. 9466, 9687, 9833); and the mitre signifies intelligence and wisdom (n. 9827).

[8] Since the forehead signifies the good of love, the Israelites were therefore commanded to bind upon their foreheads the precept concerning love to Jehovah.

Thus in Moses:

"And thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And thou shalt bind these words for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be for frontlets before thine eyes" (Deuteronomy 6:5, 8; 11:18; Exodus 13:9, 16).

It is said, that they should be for frontlets before the eyes, to represent the fact that the Lord looks upon angels and men in the forehead, because from Divine Love, and gives to angels and men the power to see Him from intelligence and wisdom, for the eyes signify the understanding. All man's understanding also is from the good of his love, and according to that which he receives from the Lord. That they should also bind them upon the hand represented the ultimates, because the hands are the ultimates of the powers of man's soul; therefore upon the forehead and upon the hand signifies in primaries and in ultimates. Primary and ultimate signify all, as may be seen above (n. 417). This precept was bound in this manner, because on it hang all the law and the prophets, that is the whole Word, consequently all things of heaven and of the church. That the law and the prophets hang on this precept, the Lord teaches in Matthew (22:35-38, 40). From this it is evident why kings at their coronation were in former times and are to-day anointed with oil upon the forehead and upon the hand. For kings formerly represented the Lord as to Divine Truth, and because this is received in the good of love which flows in from the Lord, therefore anointing was performed upon the forehead and upon the hand. The oil also, with which they were anointed, signifies the good of love. Therefore kings in the Word signify those who are in truths from good, and in an abstract sense truths from good; as may be seen above (n. 31). From these considerations it is clear what a sign or mark upon the forehead means, as mentioned here and in other passages in the Apocalypse (9:4; 14:1; 22:3, 4).

[9] But on the other hand, the forehead signifies the evil of love which is opposite to the good of love, and therefore what is hard, obstinate, shameless and infernal. Thus in Isaiah, "hardness" is described in these words:

"Thou art hard, for thy neck is an iron sinew, and thy forehead brass" (48:4).

In Ezekiel "obstinacy."

"The house of Israel will not hearken unto me; for all the house of Israel are of an obstinate forehead and hard of heart" (3:7).

In Jeremiah "shamelessness."

"Thou hadst a harlot's forehead, thou refusedst to be ashamed" (Jeremiah 3:3).

"Infernal" in the Apocalypse (13:16; 14:9-11; 16:2; 17:5; 19:20; 20:4). For as the good of love is celestial, and therefore gentle, patient, and modest, so the evil opposite to that good is infernal, hard, obstinate, and shameless.