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].

95. 5. Through acts of redemption the Lord became justice. Christian churches nowadays say and believe that merit and justice belong to the Lord alone because of the obedience he gave in this world to God the Father and especially because of his suffering on the cross. They suppose, however, that the Lord's suffering on the cross was the act of redemption itself. That was not in fact an act of redemption; it was an act of glorification of his human nature (see the discussion of redemption under the next subheading [114-137]). The acts of redemption through which the Lord made himself justice were these: carrying out the Last Judgment, which he did in the spiritual world; separating the evil from the good and the goats from the sheep; driving out of heaven those who had joined the beasts that served the dragon [Revelation 13]; assembling a new heaven of the deserving and a new hell of the undeserving; bringing both heaven and hell back into the divine design; and establishing a new church. These acts were the acts of redemption through which the Lord became justice. Justice is following the divine design in all that one does, and bringing back into the divine design things that have fallen away from that design. Justice is the divine design itself.

These acts are meant by the following words of the Lord: "It is fitting for me to fulfill all the justice of God" (Matthew 3:15); also by these words in the Old Testament:

Behold, the days are coming when I will raise up for David a righteous offshoot who will reign as king and execute justice on earth. And this is his name: Jehovah is our Justice. (Jeremiah 23:5-6; 33:15-16)

I speak with justice; I am great in order to save. (Isaiah 63:1)

He will sit on the throne of David to establish it with judgment and justice. (Isaiah 9:7)

Zion will be redeemed with justice. (Isaiah 1:27)