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.

115. 1. Redemption was actually a matter of gaining control of the hells, restructuring the heavens, and by so doing preparing for a new spiritual church. I can say with absolute certainty that these three actions are redemption, because the Lord is bringing about redemption again today. This new redemption began in the year 1757 along with a Last Judgment that happened at that time. The redemption has continued from then until now. The reason is that today is the Second Coming of the Lord. A new church is being instituted that could not have been instituted unless first the hells were brought under control and the heavens were restructured.

Because I have been allowed to see it all I could describe how the hells were brought under control and how the new heaven was built and put into the divine design, but that would be the subject of a whole work. In a little work published in London in 1758 I did lay out how the Last Judgment was carried out.

Gaining control over the hells, restructuring the heavens, and establishing a new church was redemption because without those actions no human being could have been saved. In fact, they follow in a sequence. The hells had to be controlled first before a new angelic heaven could be formed, and that heaven had to be formed before the new church on earth could be instituted, because people in the world are so closely connected to angels from heaven and spirits from hell that at the level of the inner mind they are one. This point will be taken up in the last chapter of this book, which specifically covers the close of the age, the Coming of the Lord, and the New Church [753-791].

355. 5. Faith without Goodwill Is Not Faith; Goodwill without Faith Is Not Goodwill; and Neither of Them Is Living Unless It Comes from the Lord.

The church today has separated faith from goodwill. The church says that faith alone apart from the works of the Law justifies us and saves us. It says that goodwill cannot be united to faith, because faith comes from God while goodwill (to the extent that it becomes actual in deeds) comes from ourselves.

These concepts, however, never entered the minds of any apostle, as their letters make obvious. This separation and division was introduced into the Christian church when the one God was partitioned into three persons and each was allotted equal divinity.

The next part of this chapter will illustrate that there is no faith without goodwill or goodwill without faith, and that neither of them has life except from the Lord. Here the following points need to be demonstrated in order to pave the way:

a. We are able to acquire faith for ourselves.

b. The same is true of goodwill.

c. The same is also true of the life within each of them.

d. Nevertheless, no faith, no goodwill, and none of the life within faith or goodwill comes from ourselves; instead they come from the Lord alone.