24. Verse 6 And God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let there be a distinguishing of the waters from the waters.

After the Spirit of God, which is the Lord's mercy, has brought out into the daylight cognitions of truth and good, and has shed the light of dawn to reveal that the Lord does exist, and that He is good itself and truth itself, and that no good or truth exists except from the Lord, a distinction is at that point made between the internal man and the external man, and so between cognitions which reside with the internal man and the facts which belong to the external man. The internal man is called 'an expanse, and the cognitions residing with the internal man are called 'the waters above the expanse', while the facts belonging to the external man are called 'the waters below the expanse'.

[2] Until his regeneration starts a person is not aware of even the existence of the internal man, let alone the identity of the internal man. Submerged in bodily and worldly concerns he imagines there is no difference between the two. Furthermore he has submerged in those same concerns the things that belong to the internal man and has made one thorough obscurity out of things that are distinct and separate. For this reason it is first said, 'Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters', and then, 'Let there be a distinguishing of the waters from the waters', and not a distinguishing of the waters. But this is followed immediately by the statement, Verses 7-8, And God made the expanse and He made a distinction between the waters that were under the expanse and the waters that were above the expanse; and it was so. And God called the expanse Heaven.

[3] The second thing therefore that a person notices when being regenerated is that he is starting to become aware of the existence of the internal man, or that what reside in the internal man are goods and truths which are the Lord's alone. And since the external man during regeneration is such as still imagines that he is the source of the good deeds he performs, or of the truth he utters, and since such a person, by means of them, is led by the Lord to do good and to speak truth as if they were his own, therefore the identification of those under the expanse comes first, and the identification of those above the expanse follows. It is also a heavenly arcanum that the Lord uses those things that are man's own - both his illusions of the senses and his desires - to lead and direct him towards the things that are goods and truths. Every single movement of regeneration is accordingly a progression from evening to morning - from external man to internal, that is, from earth to heaven. This is why the expanse, or internal man, is now called 'heaven'.

20. To the seven churches. That this signifies to all those who are in truths from good, or in faith from charity, is evident from the signification of seven, as being all. For, seven in the Word, signifies a beginning and an end, thus an entire period and a full state, just as a week does (Arcana Coelestia 728, 6508, 9228). And because it signifies what is full, it also signifies all, because all make what is full; for fulness in respect to those who constitute any society, in this case the church, denotes all therefore, when magnitude is treated of in the Word, seven signifies what is full, and when multitude is treated of, seven signifies all. Three, also, in the Word signifies full and all (as may be seen, n. 2788, 4495, 7715); but where anything holy is treated of in the Word, seven is used, and in other cases three (n. 10127). Here, therefore, seven is used, because the subject treated of is truths from good, which are the holy things of the church. This also appears from the signification of churches, as denoting those who are in truths from good, or in faith from charity. The reason why such persons are meant by churches is, because those truths constitute the church with every one; for those who are not in truths from good, although born within the church, yet are not of the church, because no church exists in them. This is why the Lord's church consists of all those, wheresoever they are, who are the church, that is, who are in truths from good. (That the church, like heaven, is in man, and not outside of him, and hence that the man who is in truths from good is a church, may be seen, Arcana Coelestia 3884; and in the work, Heaven and Hell 53, 54, 57.) It is also said, "who are in faith from charity," because this is the same thing; for truth belongs to faith, and good to charity; that is to say, everything that a man believes is called truth, and everything that he loves is called good. (That all truth is from good, and everything of faith is from charity, may be seen in the small work, The New Jerusalem and its Heavenly Doctrine 84-107, 108-122, and The Last Judgment 33-39; as also in Heaven and Hell 364, 424, 482, 526.) He who knows nothing of the internal sense of the Word, believes nothing else, when he reads these things, than that by the seven churches are meant the seven churches afterwards named (verse 11); but churches are not meant, but all those who belong to the church; such being the spiritual sense of the Word.