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전에는 내가 그들로 사로잡혀 열국에 이르게 하였거니와 후에는 내가 그들을 모아 고토로 돌아오게 하고 그 한 사람도 이방에 남기지 아니하리니 그들이 나를 여호와 자기들의 하나님인 줄 알리라
에스겔 39:28
The Inner Meaning of the Prophets and Psalms # 161
161. Internal Meaning of Ezekiel, Chapter 38
1-2 Those who are in the mere sense of the letter of the Word, and in a worship therefrom which is external without an internal, are meant by Gog. (2)
3-7 Everything and all things of that worship will perish. (2)
8-16 That worship will possess the church, and will vastate it, and it will thus be in externals without internals. (2)
17-19 The state of the church will therefore be changed. (2, 7)
20-23 And the truths and goods of religion will perish in consequence, and falsities will succeed in their place. (2)
True Christian Religion # 307
307. In the celestial sense father means our Lord Jesus Christ, and mother means the communion of saints, that is, His church scattered throughout the world. It is clear from the following passages that the Lord is father:
A child is born for us, a son is given to us, whose name is God, Hero, the everlasting father, the Prince of peace, Isaiah 9:6.
You are our father. Abraham does not know us, and Israel does not acknowledge us. You are our father, our Redeemer from eternity is your name, Isaiah 63:16.
Philip said, Show us the Father; Jesus says to him, He who sees me sees the Father. Why then do you say, Show us the Father? Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me, John 14:8-11; 12:45.
It is clear from the following passages that mother in this sense means the Lord's church:
I saw the holy city the New Jerusalem arrayed like a bride adorned for her husband, Revelation 21:2.
The angel said to John, Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb; and he showed me the city, the holy Jerusalem, Revelation 21:9-10.
The time has come for the wedding of the Lamb, and his wife has made ready; blessed are those who are invited to the wedding-feast of the Lamb, Revelation 19:7, 9. (See further Matthew 9:15; Mark 2:19-20; Luke 5:34-35; John 3:29; 19:25-27.)
On the New Jerusalem meaning the new church now being established by the Lord, see Apocalypse Revealed (800, 881). It is this church, not the earlier one, which is wife and mother in this sense. The spiritual offspring born of this marriage are the various kinds of good which constitute charity, and the truths which constitute faith; and those whom the Lord puts in possession of these are called 'sons of the wedding,' 'sons of God,' and 'born of God.'
