3616. 'And I send and fetch you from there' means that at that point the end in view has been reached. This is clear from what comes before and after; for the end in view, meant here by 'sending and fetching you from there', is reached when truth accords with good, and in that way truth has been made subject to good, and is subservient to it. This end, following Jacob's stay with Laban, is represented by the occasion when Esau ran to meet Jacob, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him, and they wept, Genesis 33:4. For when the end in view, which is conjunction, is reached, the good of the rational flows into the good of the natural directly, and through the good of the natural into the truth there, as well as indirectly through the truth of the rational into the truth of the natural, and through the truth of the natural into the good there, 3573. From this it is evident why Rebekah, who represents the truth of the rational, said to Jacob, who represents the truth of the natural, 'I send and fetch you from there'.

4672. 'And he, still a boy' means at first. This is clear from the meaning of 'a boy' - when this expression is used to refer to a new Church - as at first, that is, as the first state of that Church. For the Church is like an infant, a boy, a man, and at length an old man, in that it passes as the individual does through its own phases of life. The Church also resembles the human being in general, and is actually called one. Furthermore, within the Church which is called 'a boy' because of the phase it is at, and which is by nature such that it soon becomes wayward, the Lord is present at first, both with those who teach and those who learn. But after a while they dissociate themselves from Him, as is also represented by the brothers throwing Joseph into the pit and selling him.

[2] Every Church which begins with faith is like this, but a Church beginning with charity is different. A Church that begins with faith is controlled solely by the understanding, and the understanding by that which has been inherited, namely self-love and love of the world. These loves induce the understanding to gather texts from the Word which support their desires, and to give its own interpretation to those which do not support them. It is different in the case of a Church which begins with charity. This Church is controlled by good, the Lord being within that good. For good which is the good of charity and love is a mediator between the Lord and faith; and unless it is there as a mediator between them no spiritual communication is possible. Without that intermediary He cannot possibly flow into faith. If evil exists there instead of good it drives away the Lord and casts aside or else perverts everything that is the Lord's and so the whole of faith; for faith comes from Him through good.