37. As for the statement that 'the lights will be for signs, and for set times, and for days, and for years', this contains more arcana than can be presented at this point, though no arcanum at all is visible in the sense of the letter. For now only this can be said: Change in spiritual and celestial things takes place both on general and on particular scales, and is comparable to changes that take place through the day and through the year. Changes through the day are from morning to midday, from then on to evening, and through the night to the morning. Changes in the year similar, from spring to summer, from then on to autumn, and through winter to spring. These bring changes in temperature and amount of daylight, and so in the fertility of the earth. Compared to such changes are the changes that take place in spiritual and celestial things. Life without changes and variations would lead to sameness, and so no life at all. Good and truth would not be recognized and identified, let alone perceived. In the Prophets such changes are called 'ordinances', as in Jeremiah,

[Thus] said Jehovah who gives the sun for light by day and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for light by night, These ordinances will not depart from before Me. Jeremiah 31:35-36.

And in the same prophet,

Thus said Jehovah, If I have not established My covenant of day and night, the ordinances of heaven and earth . . . Jeremiah 33:25.

But these things will in the Lord's Divine mercy be dealt with at Genesis 8:12.

2156. 'My Lord' means the Three in One, that is to say, the Divine itself, the Divine Human, and the Holy proceeding; and as the Three exist in One the word 'Lord' in the singular is used, as similarly it is used -

In verses 27, 31 'Behold now, I have undertaken to speak to my Lord'.

In verses 30, 32, 'Let not now my Lord be incensed'.

The three men are also called Jehovah -

In verse 13, Jehovah said to Abraham.

In verse 14, 'Will anything to be too wonderful for Jehovah?'

In verse 22, Abraham still stood before Jehovah.

In verse 33, And Jehovah departed, when He had finished speaking to Abraham.

From these places it is clear that the three men, that is, the Divine itself, the Divine Human, and the Holy proceeding, are one and the same as the Lord, and the Lord one and the same as Jehovah. In the statement of Christian faith called the Creed the same is recognized, where it is explicitly stated,

There are not three uncreated, not three infinites, not three eternals, not three almighties, not three Lords, but One.

There are none who separate Three that are within a One, apart from those who say that they acknowledge one Supreme Being, the Creator of the Universe. Such an acknowledgement is excusable among those outside the Church; but in the case of those inside the Church who declare the same, these do not acknowledge any God at all, though they say and sometimes think it. Still less do they acknowledge the Lord.