8939. 'I will come to you and bless you' means God's presence at that time, and influx. This is clear from the meaning of 'coming to someone', when said by Jehovah, as presence, as also in 5934, 6063, 6089; and from the meaning of 'blessing', when said by Jehovah, as being endowed with faith and charity, dealt with in 2846, 3406, 4981, 6091, 6099, 8674, thus also as flowing in since faith and charity flow in from the Lord with a person. These are the blessing in the internal sense, for they are what make a person blessed and happy eternally. While living in the world a person calls those things a blessing which make him blessed and happy temporally, that is, wealth and important positions. Temporal blessings however are not what are meant in the internal sense of the Word but eternal ones, in comparison with which the temporal are nothing at all. For there is no ratio between what is temporal and what is eternal; there is no ratio even between several thousands or several millions of years and what is eternal, since those years have an end whereas what is eternal has no end. Therefore what is eternal Is; for that which exists without end Is, since it has its Being from God, who is Infinite - the Infinite in relation to time being He who is Eternal. But the temporal by comparison Is not, because when it has reached its end it exists no longer. From this it is also evident that 'a blessing' in the spiritual sense is that which has Being from God within it, thus is those things which constitute eternal life, consequently things which are aspects of charity and faith.

[2] The truth that worldly blessing is nothing in comparison with heavenly blessing, which is eternal, is taught in the following way by the Lord in Matthew,

What does it profit a person if he gains the whole world but suffers the loss of his soul? Matthew 16:26.

But the person immersed in worldly and earthly interests does not understand this saying; for worldly and earthly interests have a stifling effect, and cause him not to believe even in the existence of eternal life.

[3] But I can positively declare that as soon as a person dies he is in the next life, living as a spirit among spirits, and that then he seems to himself and to all others there to be altogether like a person in the world, endowed with all the senses, internal and external, 1881. I can say too that therefore death of the body is merely a laying aside of such things as had enabled the person to serve and function in the world, and in addition that death itself is a continuation of life, though in another world which is not visible to the eyes of the earthly body but is visible there in light a thousand times brighter than midday light in the world. Since all this is known to me from actual experience which I have had over so many years and continue to have, I declare it positively. I have spoken to almost all those with whom I was acquainted in the world and who have died, to some two or three days after their decease; and I speak to them still. The majority of them have been extremely displeased that they had had no belief at all in the continuation of life after death. I have talked to those people not just for a day but over months and years. I have also been allowed to witness their succeeding or progressive states of life taking them either to hell or to heaven. Consequently let anyone who wishes to be happy for evermore know and believe that he is going to be alive after death; let him think about it and remember it, for it is the truth. Let him also know and believe that the Word is the one and only teacher of how a person should live in the world in order to be happy for evermore.

45. Since the goal of the Lord's divine providence is a heaven from the human race, it follows that the goal is the union of the human race with the Lord (see 28-31). It follows also that the goal is that we should be more closely united to him (32-33) and thereby be granted a more inward heaven. It also follows that the goal is for us to become wiser (34-36) and happier (37-41) because of this union, because we are given heaven through our wisdom and in proportion to it, and this is what gives us happiness. Lastly, it follows that the goal is for us to have a clearer sense of our identity and yet to be more clearly aware that we belong to the Lord (42-44).

All of these are part of the Lord's divine providence, because all of them are heaven, which is the goal.

40. Divine love and wisdom are both substance and form. People commonly have an idea of love and wisdom as abstract entities flying about or floating in the subtler air or ether, or as exhalations emanating from something of that nature. Scarcely anyone thinks that they are really and actually substance and form.

People who do see that they are substance and form still perceive love and wisdom round about the subject of which they are predicated as properties emanating from it; and what they perceive round about a subject as emanating from it - even if perceived as something flying about or floating - they also call substance and form, not knowing that love and wisdom constitute the subject itself, and that whatever is perceived as flying or floating round about it is simply the appearance of the subject's underlying state.

[2] This has not been seen before for a number of reasons. One of these reasons is that the first perceptions out of which the human mind forms its understanding are appearances, appearances which it cannot dispel without investigating their cause; and if the cause lies deeply hidden, the mind cannot investigate it without keeping its intellect for a long time in spiritual light, which it cannot do because of the natural light that constantly draws it back down.

Yet the truth is that love and wisdom are real and actual substance and form, which constitute the very subject of which they are predicated.