Here we are in the 21st century. We know that the universe is an enormous place. We're just bursting with scientific knowledge. But how are we doing with the even-bigger ideas? Our human societies seem to be erasing them, or ignoring them - maybe we think we're too busy for them.

Here on the New Christian Bible Study site, we'll buck the trend. We want to explore the big ideas that give us a framework for living better lives. Here's a start on a list of big ideas from a New Christian perspective. For each idea, there is a footnote that lists some references in Swedenborg's theological works:

1. God exists. Just one God, who created and sustains the entire universe in all its dimensions, spiritual and physical. ¹

2. God's essence is love itself. It's the force that drives everything. ²

3. God's essence comes into being, that is, it exists, in and through creation. ³

4. There are levels, or degrees, of creation - ranging from spiritual ones that we can't detect with our physical senses or sensors, to the level of the physical universe where most of our awareness is when we're alive here. ⁴

5. The created universe emanates from God, and it's sustained by God, but in an important way it is separate from God. He wants it to be separate, so that freedom can exist. ⁵

6. God operates from love through wisdom - willing good things, and understanding how to bring them about. ⁶

7. The physical level of creation exists to provide human beings with an opportunity to choose in freedom, with rationality, whether or not to acknowledge and cooperate with God. ⁷

8. God provides all people everywhere, regardless of their religion, the freedom to choose to live a life of love to God and to the neighbor. ⁸

9. God loves everyone. He knows that true happiness only comes when we're unselfish; when we're truly motivated by a love of the Lord which is grounded out in a love of the neighbor. He seeks to lead everyone, but will not force us to follow against our will. ⁹

10. God doesn't judge us. He tells us what's good, and what's evil, and flows into our minds to lead us towards good. However, we're free to reject his leading, and instead opt to love ourselves most. Day by day, we create habits of generosity or of selfishness, and live out a life in accordance with those habits. Those habits become the real "us", our ruling love. ¹⁰

11. Our physical bodies die eventually, but the spiritual part of our minds keeps going. It's been operating on a spiritual plane already, but our awareness shifts - so that we become fully aware of spiritual reality. ¹¹

Footnotes:

9494. 'And put them on [its] four corners' means firmness. This is clear from the meaning of 'corners' as strength and firmness, the reason why this is meant by 'corners' being that the greatest resistance [to pressure] resides there, and also the whole is bonded together there. Because 'corner' means strength and firmness such as Divine Truth derived from Divine Good possesses, the Lord is called 'the corner-stone': In David,

The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner. Psalms 118:22; Matthew 21:42.

And in Zechariah,

From Judah will be the corner-stone, from him the tent-peg, and from him the battle-bow. Zechariah 10:4.

Also in Isaiah,

The Lord Jehovih will lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, a tested stone, a precious corner-stone, surely founded. Isaiah 28:16.

In these places 'corner' in like manner stands for the firmness of teachings which consist of truth that is derived from good.

[2] In Jeremiah,

Nor are they to take from you a stone for a corner, or a stone for foundations. Jeremiah 51:26.

Because firmness is meant by 'corners' horns were placed on the four corners of the altar, regarding which the following is stated in Moses,

You shall make the horns of the altar on its four corners; its horns shall be of one piece with it. ¹ Exodus 27:2.

'The horns' are the power of truth derived from good, thus its strength and firmness, see 2832, 9081.

[3] 'The corners' again means strength and power in Jeremiah,

Fire has gone out of Heshbon, which has devoured the corners of Moab. Jeremiah 48:45.

And in Moses,

A star will arise out of Jacob, and a sceptre rise up out of Israel, which will crush the corners of Moab. Numbers 24:17.

'Moab', whose power was going to be destroyed, stands for those who adulterate the Church's forms of good, 2468, their 'corners' standing for the power of falsity that results from the adulterated forms of good. Since power and strength are meant by 'the corners' those who lack the power of truth derived from good are called the cut off of the corner, ² Jeremiah 9:26; 25:23. What the meaning is when 'corners' refers to the four quarters or winds, see below in 9642.

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