Micah 4:1,2. When a church stops honoring what is good and what is true it comes to an end, and the Jehovah sets up a new church. ¹ The prophesy of Micah, like many of the other prophecies in the Bible, tells about such a happening: the end of the Israelitish church, and the start of Christianity. ² The older words are used because they still mean the same spiritual idea. Jehovah was Jacob's God,, just as He is our God today. Zion and Jerusalem still correspond to the good and truth of the Lord’s church. ³

Micah 4:3,4. In that new church - that "house of God" - everyone will have spiritual truth written on the heart. Changing weapons into farming tools, and not going to war anymore, means that people will agree about the Lord’s truth without any dispute, and - because there are no evils in that house - they will be safe and without fear.

Micah 4:5. The Word uses many names for God, and any name is okay when it means the one creator, savior and redeemer. ⁴

Micah 4:6. Of those who "go up", all who need help will be given what they need.

Micah 4:7. Jehovah shall reign over all who are walking in his ways. ⁵ Those who are outcasts mean those who can’t see where to walk. Those that are lame can’t walk. The outcasts will have their eyes opened, and the lame will have their legs healed.

Micah 4:8-10. The "daughter of Zion" ⁶ means the affection of truths and goods with those of the church. The bringing forth means the multiplication of goods and truths because of the affection for them. Inhabiting the field means that the church will learn truths of many kinds and may even understand what Babylon has spoiled. But there will be no harm there, since the Lord protects.

Micah 4:11, 12. Falsities want to infest those who belong to the Lord, but He protects them. People who hold those falsities will be “threshed”, or judged.

Micah 4:13. The goods and truths that the Lord provides are as “iron” or “bronze”. ⁷ The falsities that are to be “threshed” aren't as strong, and can’t withstand them.

There are a lot of truths here for us, and there are appealing images. If we "go up" -- try to learn the true ideas in Christianity, and to walk in the Lord's ways, there will be healing, and affection, and understanding, and multiplying good, and protection.

Бележки под линия:

343. Unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, signifies the Lord in respect to Divine good and to Divine truth. This is evident from what has been said and shown above n. 297, namely, that "throne" signifies heaven; "Him that sitteth upon the throne" Divine good proceeding, and "the Lamb" Divine truth proceeding, both of these filling the heavens and constituting them. Because Divine good proceeding from the Lord as a sun is received by the angels in His celestial kingdom, and Divine truth by the angels in the spiritual kingdom, therefore two are mentioned, namely, "He that sitteth upon the throne" and "the Lamb;" but in the internal sense, the two mean the Divine Proceeding from the Lord's Divine Human, which is Divine good united to Divine truth, while in the sense of the letter it is distinguished into two for the sake of reception. The Divine that constitutes heaven and gives to angels and men love, faith, wisdom, and intelligence, proceeds not immediately from the Lord's Divine Itself, but through His Divine Human, and this Divine that proceeds is the Holy Spirit (See above, n. 183).

[2] In this way it is to be understood what the doctrine of the church teaches, that the Son proceeds from the Father, and the Holy Spirit through the Son, also that the Lord's Divine and His Human are not two, but a single person or one Christ; for the Lord's Divine is that which assumed the Human, and for that reason He called it His Father; thus He did not call Father another Divine which is at this day worshiped as His Father in place of His own Divine. And the Divine Proceeding is what is called the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Truth, and the Paraclete; since this is the holy of the Spirit, or the holy Divine which the Spirit speaks, and not another Divine, which is worshiped as the third person of the Divinity. That this is so all can understand who are in any light of heaven. And yet it is declared in many places from the doctrine of the Trinity that was given by Athanasius, that the three are one. Let anyone examine himself when he says with the mouth that God is one, whether he does not think of three, when yet there is but one God, and the three names of the Divine are names of the one God. Athanasius, because he did not understand this, believed the three names to be three Gods, though one in essence.

[3] And yet they cannot be said to be one in essence when something is attributed to one and not to another, for thus the essence is divided; consequently a personal name is given to each essence. But they are one essence when the three are names of one person, namely, the Divine Itself, called the Father; the Divine Human, called the Son; and the Divine Proceeding, called the Holy Spirit (See The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem 280-310). These things have been said to show that "He that sitteth upon the throne," and "the Lamb," do not mean two but one, namely, the Lord in respect to the Divine Proceeding.