1. In the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew, we find the Lord talking to his disciples about the close of the age, the last time of the church. ¹ At the end of his prophecies concerning the sequence of states of its love and faith ² he says:

Immediately after the suffering of those days, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then the sign of the Human-born One will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will lament. And they will see the Human-born One coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a trumpet and a loud voice, and they will gather his chosen ones from the four winds, from one end of the heavens all the way to the other end. (Matthew 24:29-31)

When people understand these words according to their literal meaning, they can only believe that all these things are going to happen just as this meaning describes them, at that end of time called the Last Judgment. This does not mean only that the sun and moon will be darkened and that the stars will fall from heaven, that the sign of the Lord will appear in heaven, and that he will be seen in the clouds with angels blowing trumpets. It also includes matters prophesied elsewhere, statements that the whole visible world is going to be destroyed and that afterward a new heaven and a new earth will come into being.

Many people in the church these days are of this opinion. However, people who believe such things are not aware of the hidden depths that lie within the details of the Word. There is in fact spiritual meaning in these details, for they intend not only the outward and earthly events that we find on the literal level but spiritual and heavenly events as well. This holds true not just for the meaning of phrases but even for each word. ³

The Word is in fact written in pure correspondences ⁴ so that there may be deeper meaning in the details. Questions about the nature of this meaning can be resolved by all the things I have set forth about it in Secrets of Heaven. A selection of these may be found also in my explanation of the white horse in the Book of Revelation. It is in this deeper sense that we are to understand what the Lord said in the passage just cited about coming in the clouds of heaven. The sun that will be darkened means the Lord in respect to love, ⁵ the moon means the Lord in respect to faith. ⁶ The stars mean insights into what is good and true, or into love and faith. ⁷ The sign of the Human-born One in heaven means the appearing of divine truth. The wailing tribes of earth mean all the elements of what is true and good, or of faith and love. ⁸ The Lord's coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory means his presence in the Word, and revelation. ⁹ The clouds refer to the literal meaning of the Word ¹⁰ and the glory to the Word's inner meaning. ¹¹ The angels with a trumpet and a loud voice mean heaven, which is where divine truth comes from. ¹²

This enables us to see what these words of the Lord mean. They mean that at the end of the church, when there is no longer any love and therefore no longer any faith, the Lord will open the Word by disclosing its deeper meaning and will reveal the heavenly contents hidden within it. The particular hidden contents to be disclosed in the pages that follow have to do with heaven and hell and with our own life after death.

Church people these days know practically nothing about heaven and hell or their life after death, even though there are descriptions of everything available to them in the Word. In fact, many who have been born in the church deny all this. In their hearts they are asking who has ever come back to tell us about it.

To prevent this negative attitude - especially prevalent among people who have acquired a great deal of worldly wisdom - from infecting and corrupting people of simple heart and simple faith, it has been granted me to be with angels and to talk with them person to person. I have also been enabled to see what is in heaven and in hell, a process that has been going on for thirteen years. Now I am being allowed therefore to describe what I have heard and seen, in the hopes of shedding light where there is ignorance, and of dispelling skepticism.

The reason this kind of direct revelation is taking place today is that this is what the Coming of the Lord means.

Footnotes:

1407. Verse 1 And Jehovah said to Abram, Go away from your land, and from the place of your nativity and from your father's house, to the land which I will cause you to see.

The events described here and in what follows took place in history as they are recorded; yet the historical events as described are representative, and every word carries a spiritual meaning. 'Abram' is used to mean in the internal sense the Lord, as stated already. 'Jehovah said to Abram' means a first awareness of all things. 'Go away from your land' means the bodily and worldly things from which He was to depart. 'And from the place of your nativity' means bodily and worldly things that were more exterior. 'And from your father's house' means such as were more interior. 'To the land which I will cause you to see' means the spiritual and celestial things that were to be brought to view.

9814. 'And you shall make holy garments for Aaron your brother' means a representative sign of the spiritual kingdom lying adjacent to the celestial kingdom. This is clear from the meaning of 'garments' in general as truths, and more particularly as truths clothing good, dealt with in 5954, 9212, 9216. The meaning of 'garments' as truths owes its origin to things in heaven, where angels appear dressed in clothes in keeping with the truths they have that spring from good, 165, 5248, 5954, 9212; and from this it may be recognized that Aaron's garments represented the Lord's spiritual kingdom lying adjacent to His celestial kingdom. For Aaron represented the Lord in respect of the Divine Celestial, 9810, and therefore the garments he wore represented the Divine Spiritual adjacent to the celestial kingdom like clothing next to the body, the Divine Spiritual being Divine Truth emanating from the Lord's Divine Good. It presents itself in heaven as light, indeed it is the light which illuminates both the outward and the inward powers of sight that angels possess. Modifications of this light - which are determined by the subjects, that is, the angels, that receive it - produce different visible phenomena, such as clouds, rainbows, and various colours and brightnesses; they also produce shining garments about the angels. From all this it may be recognized that the Lord's spiritual kingdom was represented by Aaron's holy garments. For there are two kingdoms into which the heavens are divided, the celestial kingdom and the spiritual kingdom, regarding which, see 9277. Those in the celestial kingdom appear naked, but those in the spiritual kingdom appear in clothing. From this it is again clear that Divine Truth, or the Divine Spiritual, which appears as light, is that which serves to clothe.

[2] But who would ever credit it that, even though the Word exists within the Church and consequently enlightenment regarding Divine and heavenly realities, ignorance reigns there, so great that no one knows that angels and spirits take on the human form, appear to themselves as human beings, and see, hear, and talk to one another? Still less does anyone know that they appear clothed in garments. The idea that they do so is met not merely with doubt but also with complete denial on the part of those so blind to everything other than external things, that they think that the body alone lives, and that what they cannot see with the eyes in their body or touch with the hands on their body has no existence whatever, see 1881. But in actual fact the heavens are full of human beings, who are angels, and these are clothed with garments shining in varied degrees of brightness. But these beings cannot at all be seen by a person on earth through the eyes of his body, only through the eyes of his spirit, when the Lord opens them. The angels who were seen by the ancients, such as Abraham, Sarah, Lot, Jacob, Joshua, Gideon, and also the Prophets, were not seen by those persons' bodily eyes but by those of their spirit which had been opened then. The fact that they would also have appeared clothed in robes is clear from the angels sitting at the Lord's tomb, whom Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James saw, and who were wearing shining white garments, Matthew 28:3; Mark 16:5; Luke 24:4, and in particular from the Lord Himself when seen in His glory by Peter, James, and John, in that His clothing was dazzling white and like the light, Matthew 17:2; Luke 9:29. This clothing too represented the Divine Spiritual, or the Divine Truth that emanated from Him.

[3] All this makes clear what 'white garments' means in the Book of Revelation,

You have a few names also in Sardis, who have not soiled their garments, and they will walk with Me in white ones, for they are worthy. He who conquers will be clad in white garments. Revelation 3:4-5.

'Garments' here are spiritual truths, which are truths springing from good, as shown above; and 'white' is authentic truth, 3301, 4007, 5319. The following words that occur elsewhere in the same book are similarly made clear,

I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse; and He who sat on it was called faithful and true, and in righteousness He judges and goes into battle. His armies in heaven were following Him, clothed in linen white and clean. Revelation 19:11, 14.

And elsewhere again in that book,

On the thrones I saw twenty-four elders, clad in white garments. Revelation 4:4.