1. True Christianity

Containing a Comprehensive Theology of the New Heaven and the New Church

The Faith of the New Heaven and the New Church

THE faith of the new heaven and the new church is stated here in both universal and specific forms to serve as the face of the work that follows, the doorway that allows entry into the temple, and the summary that in one way or another contains all the details to follow. I say "the faith of the new heaven and the new church" because heaven, where there are angels, and the church, in which there are people, act together like the inner and the outer levels in a human being. People in the church who love what is good because they believe what is true and who believe what is true because they love what is good are angels of heaven with regard to the inner levels of their minds. After death they come into heaven, and enjoy happiness there according to the relationship between their love and their faith. It is important to know that the new heaven that the Lord is establishing today has this faith as its face, doorway, and summary.

85. 2. Jehovah God came down as the divine truth, which is the Word; but he did not separate the divine goodness from it. Two things constitute the essence of God: divine love and divine wisdom; or, what is the same, divine goodness and divine truth. (Above at 36-48 we showed that these two constitute the essence of God.) The expression "Jehovah God" in the Word means these two qualities. "Jehovah" means divine love or divine goodness; "God" means divine wisdom or divine truth. This is why these names occur in various ways in the Word. At times just Jehovah is named; at other times, just God. When the subject is divine goodness he is called Jehovah. When the subject is divine truth he is called God. When both are involved he is called Jehovah God.

It is clear from John that Jehovah God came down as divine truth, which is the Word:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by it, and nothing that was made came about without it. And the Word became flesh and lived among us. (John 1:1, 3, 14)

"The Word" in this passage means divine truth because the Word that exists in the church is divine truth itself. The Word was dictated by Jehovah himself, and what Jehovah dictates is pure divine truth - it cannot be anything else.

[2] Nevertheless, because it passed all the way through the heavens into the world, it became adapted to angels in heaven and also to people in the world. As a result, in the Word there is a spiritual meaning in which divine truth is in the light and there is an earthly meaning in which divine truth is in shadow. The divine truth in this Word is what was meant in John.

This is clearer still from the fact that the Lord came into the world to fulfill all the things in the Word. This is why it says many times that this or that happened to him in order to fulfill Scripture [see 262]. Divine truth is precisely what "the Messiah" and "Christ" mean, what "the Son of Humankind" means,and what the Comforter, the Holy Spirit that the Lord sent after his death means. During his transfiguration on the mountain before his three disciples (Matthew 17[:1-13]; Mark 9[:2-13]; Luke 9[:28-36]) and also during his transfiguration before John in Revelation [1:12-16], the Lord represented himself as the Word, as we will see in the chapter below on Sacred Scripture [222].

[3] From the Lord's own words it is clear that he was present in the world as divine truth: "I am the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6). This is also clear from these words: "We know that the Son of God came and gave us understanding so that we would know the truth. And we are in the truth in the Son of God, Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life" (1 John 5:20).

This becomes still clearer from the fact that he is called the light, as in these passages:

He was the true light that enlightens everyone who comes into the world. (John 1:9)

Jesus said, "For a brief time the light is still with you. Walk while you have the light so the darkness will not overtake you. While you have the light, believe in the light so that you may become children of the light. " (John 12:35-36)

I am the light of the world. (John 9:5)

Simeon said, "My eyes have seen your salvation, a light of revelation to the nations. " (Luke 2:30, 32)

This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world. Those who do the truth come toward the light. (John 3:19, 21)

There are other such passages as well. "The light" means divine truth.

180. The Gospel writers described the stages of decline and corruption that the Christian church would undergo (Matthew 24; Mark 13; Luke 21). Their reference to "a great affliction such as has never existed since the world began and will never exist again" [Matthew 24:21] means an attack by falsities against the truth until there is no truth left that has not been falsified and finished off. ("Affliction" has the same meaning in other passages in the Word as well.)

Their reference to "the abomination of desolation" means the same thing, as does "the desolation [flying] on a bird of abominations" and "the close and the cutting down" in Daniel [Daniel 9:27]. The events in the Book of Revelation listed in the previous section [179] also describe the same attack.

This attack came because the church saw God's unity in the Trinity and his Trinity in the unity in three persons instead of one. The church has been mentally based on picturing three gods and vocally based on confessing one God. People in the church have separated themselves from the Lord, even to the point where they no longer have any concept of divinity in relation to his human nature. Yet he is in fact God the Father in human form, which is why he is called "Father of Eternity" (Isaiah 9:6) and why he says to Philip, "Those who have seen me have seen the Father" (John 14:7, 9).