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:

461. After Death, We Enjoy Every Sense, Memory, Thought, and Affection We Had in the World: We Leave Nothing Behind except Our Earthly Body

Repeated experience has witnessed to me that when we move from the natural world into the spiritual, which happens when we die, we take with us everything that pertains to our character except our earthly body. In fact, when we enter the spiritual world or our life after death, we are in a body as we were in this world. There seems to be no difference, since we do not feel or see any difference. This body is spiritual, though, so it has been separated or purified from earthly matter. Further, when anything spiritual touches and sees something spiritual, it is just like something natural touching and seeing something natural. So when we have become a spirit, we have no sense that we are not in the body we inhabited in the world, and therefore do not realize that we have died.

[2] As "spirit-people," we enjoy every outer and inner sense we enjoyed in the world. We see the way we used to, we hear and talk the way we used to; we smell and taste and feel things when we touch them the way we used to; we want, wish, crave, think, ponder, are moved, love, and intend the way we used to. Studious types still read and write as before. In a word, when we move from the one life into the other, or from the one world into the other, it is like moving from one [physical] place to another; and we take with us everything we owned as persons to the point that it would be unfair to say that we have lost anything of our own after death, which is only a death of the earthly body.

[3] We even take with us our natural memory, since we retain everything we have heard, seen, read, learned, or thought in the world from earliest infancy to the very end of life. However, since the natural objects that reside in our memory cannot be reproduced in a spiritual world, they become dormant the way they do when we are not thinking about them. Even so, they can be reproduced when it so pleases the Lord. I will have more to say soon, though, about this memory and its condition after death.

Sense-centered people are quite incapable of believing that our state after death is like this because they do not grasp it. Sense-centered people can think only on the natural level, even about spiritual matters. This means that anything they do not sense - that is, see with their physical eyes and touch with their hands - they say does not exist, as we read of Thomas in John 20:25, 27, 29. The quality of sense-centered people has been described above in 267, and in notes there.

296. APOCALYPSE. CHAPTER 5.

1. And I saw in the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne a book written within and on the back, sealed up with seven seals.

2. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a great voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?

3. And no one was able, in heaven nor upon the earth nor under the earth, to open the book, neither to look thereon.

4. And I wept much, that no one was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon.

5. And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not; behold, the Lion that is from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath overcome to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.

6. And I saw, and behold, in the midst of the throne, and of the four animals, and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb standing as if slain, having seven horns, and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.

7. And He came and took the book out of the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne.

8. And when He had taken the book, the four animals and the four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one harps, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

9. And they were singing a new song, saying, Worthy art Thou to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; for Thou wast slain, and didst redeem us to God in Thy blood, out of every tribe and tongue, and people and nation;

10. And hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign upon the earth.

11. And I saw, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the animals and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands;

12. Saying with a great voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive the power, and riches, and wisdom, and honor, and glory, and blessing.

13. And every created thing that is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and those that are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Unto Him that sitteth upon the throne and unto the Lamb be the blessing and the honor and the glory and the might, unto the ages of the ages.

14. And the four animals said, Amen; and the four and twenty elders fell down and worshiped Him that liveth unto the ages of the ages.

EXPOSITION.

Verse 1. And I saw in the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne a book written within and on the back, sealed up with seven seals.

1. "And I saw in the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne," signifies the Lord in respect to omnipotence and omniscience (n. 297, 298); "a book written within and on the back," signifies the state of life of all in heaven and on the earth, in general and in particular n. 299; "sealed up with seven seals," signifies altogether hidden (n. 300).