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

脚注:

598. The reason we cannot be reformed unless we have some freedom is that we are born into evils of all kinds, evils which need to be taken away if we are to be saved. They cannot be taken away unless we see them within ourselves, admit that they are there, then refuse them and ultimately turn away from them. Only then are they taken away. This cannot happen unless we are exposed to both good and evil, since it is from good that we can see evils, though we cannot see what is good from evil. We learn the good spiritual things we can think from infancy from the reading of the Word and from sermons. We learn the moral and civic values from our life in the world. This is the primary reason we need to be in freedom.

[2] The second reason is that nothing becomes part of us except as a result of some affection of love. True, other things can enter us, but no deeper than into our thought, not into our volition; and anything that does not enter our volition is not ours. This is because thinking is derived from our memory, while volition is derived from our life itself. Nothing is ever free unless it comes from our volition, or what amounts to the same thing, from a particular affection that stems from our love. Whatever we intend or love, we do freely. This is why our freedom and the affection of our love or intentions are one. So we also have freedom in order to be able to be moved by what is true and good, or to love them, so that they do become part of us.

[3] In a word, anything that does not enter us in freedom does not stay with us, because it does not belong to our love or intentions; and anything that does not belong to our love or intentions does not belong to our spirit. The actual reality of our spirit is love or volition - using the phrase "love or volition" because whatever we love, we intend. This is why we cannot be reformed except in a state of freedom.

But there is more on our freedom in the extracts from Secrets of Heaven below.

258. APOCALYPSE. CHAPTER 4.

1. After these things I saw, and, behold, a door opened in heaven; and the first voice that I heard, as of a trumpet speaking with me, said, Come up hither, and I will show thee things that must come to pass hereafter.

2. And immediately I was in the spirit; and behold a throne was set in heaven, and upon the throne was One sitting.

3. And He that sat was in aspect like to a jasper stone and a sardius; and a rainbow was round about the throne, in aspect like an emerald.

4. And around the throne were four and twenty thrones, and upon the throne I saw four and twenty elders sitting, arrayed in white garments, and they had on their heads golden crowns.

5. And out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunders and voices; and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which were the seven spirits of God;

6. And in sight of the throne a glassy sea like crystal. And in the midst of the throne and around the throne were four animals, full of eyes before and behind.

7. And the first animal was like a lion; and the second animal like a calf; and the third animal had a face like a man; and the fourth animal was like a flying eagle.

8. And the four animals, each by itself, had six wings around about; and they were full of eyes within; and they had no rest, day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was, and who is, and who is to come.

9. And when the animals gave the glory and the honor and the thanksgiving to Him that sitteth upon the throne, that liveth unto ages of ages,

10. The four and twenty elders fell down before Him that sitteth upon the throne, and worshiped Him that liveth unto ages of ages, and cast down their crowns before the throne, saying,

11. Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for Thou hast created all things, and by Thy will they are, and they were created.

EXPOSITION.

It was pointed out above (n. 5) that this prophetical book does not treat of the successive states of the Christian Church from its beginning to its end, as has been believed heretofore, but of the state of the church and of heaven in the last times, when there is to be a new heaven and a new earth, that is, when there is to be a new church in the heavens and on the earth, thus when there is to be a judgment. It is said a new church in the heavens, because the church is there as well as on the earth (See in the work on Heaven and Hell 221-227). As this is the subject of this book, the first chapter treats of the Lord who is the Judge; and the second and third chapters treat of those who are of the church and of those who are not of the church, thus of those in the former heaven which was to be done away with, and of those in the new heaven which was to be formed. That the seven churches treated of in the second and third chapters mean all who are in the church, and also all things of the church, see above (n. 256, 257). This fourth chapter now treats of the arrangement of all things, especially in the heavens, before the judgment; therefore a throne was now seen in heaven, and round about four and twenty thrones upon which were four and twenty elders; so also four animals were near the throne, which were cherubim. That these things described the arrangement of all things before the judgment and for judgment will be seen by the examination of this chapter. Be it known, that before any change takes place all things must be prearranged and prepared for the coming event; for all things are foreseen by the Lord, and disposed and provided for according to what is foreseen. A "throne," therefore, in the midst of heaven means judgment, and "He that sat upon it," the Lord; the "four and twenty thrones upon which were four and twenty elders," mean all truths in the complex, by which and according to which is judgment; "the four animals," which are the cherubim, mean the Lord's Divine Providence that the former heavens should not suffer injury through the notable change about to take place, and that all things should then be done according to order; that is, that those interiorly evil should be separated from those interiorly good, and the latter be raised up into heaven, but the former cast down into hell.