When we hear the word "truth," we tend to think of statements that are rather cold, dry and academic. That kind of truth, however, is a form taken to the most specific, external levels; at its heart truth is simply an expression of love, and the closer it is to that love the more dynamic, warm and creative it is.

Think, for instance, of a beautiful picture sent from one person to another through computers. The first person sees the picture, is moved by it, and wants to share it. The computer analyzes that picture as millions of tiny colored dots that can be expressed mathematically, information that can be shared. The second person’s computer gets that information, puts all the colored dots together and shows the picture so the second person can be moved as well. In the eyes of the two people, that picture is a relatively internal truth, a pretty direct container for specific feelings. In between, broken into tiny bits of information, that picture is still a truth - it still exists - but it is in much more external form, further removed from the emotional content.

The uiltimate "emotional content" is, of course, the Lord’s love, so perfect and powerful that we can only picture it by imaging a walk on the sun. It’s immediate expression is "the light" in this verse - what the Writings call divine truth. It’s like taking that pretty picture and multiplying it to the zillionth degree, until it’s so beautiful it knocks us from our feet and forces us to shield our eyes. It is the expression on the Lord’s face, if we could stand seeing it; it’s like the sound of His voice if we could stand hearing it. That picture is truth - it is a way of sharing internal states at the most extreme, exquisite level.

So how can we tap into that? How can we bring that kind of truth into our lives? The answer is that we need to be "the world," finding the light in "every man." The world represents the church, which the Writings define as "where the Lord is known and where the Word is." We have the Word, in the form of the Bible; knowing the Lord is up to each of us as an individual. "Man" here represents truth on a more external level, expressions of the Lord’s love broken down into ideas that can be applied to our lives.

What this verse tells us, then, is that if we read the Bible with the Lord’s love in mind, we will find ideas and guidelines that will lead us to be good, loving people. We can connect with the divine truth and get it in little bits that we can use.

(References: Apocalypse Explained 196; Arcana Coelestia 9407 [13])

4415. Recently arrived souls, or novitiate spirits - that is to say, people who a few days after death of the body have entered the next life - are utterly amazed at the existence of light in the next life, for they bring with them the uninformed idea that there are no other sources of light than the sun and material flame. Still less do they know of a light which brings light to the understanding, for they have not observed it during their lifetime; and still less that such light provides the capacity to think, and by flowing into forms which exist from the light of the world frames everything seen in the understanding. If those novitiate spirits have been good people they are raised up, for the purpose of their instruction, to heavenly communities, passing from one community to another. They are raised up to these so that they may recognize through actual experience that light exists in the next life, a light that is brighter than that which shines in the world can ever be, and that the amount of light they dwell in there determines the amount of intelligence. Some borne up into spheres of heavenly light have spoken to me from there, confessing that they had never believed in any such thing and that the light of the world in comparison was darkness. From there they also looked through my eyes into the light of the world, which they saw to be nothing other than dark cloud. And they said, doing so with feelings of pity, that such was the darkness in which men dwelt. From what has been said one may also see why in the Word the angels of heaven are called angels of light; also that the Lord is the Light, and consequently the Life, for men, John 1:1-8; 8:12.