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changed and became new ? The Lord Himself was different and the way in which He comes to men is different . Can the New Word therefore be an iteration of the old ?
• In New Church Life March / April 2017 the Rev . Michael Gladish , in his sermon “ What the Lord Actually Accomplished ,” noted in Arcana Coelestia 6371 : “ Prior to His coming into the world there was among men and among spirits an influx of life from Jehovah or the Lord which came by way of the celestial kingdom , that is , through the angels who were in that kingdom . This was the source of their power at that time . But when the Lord came into the world , and by so doing made the Human within Himself Divine , He took to Himself what had rested with the angels of the celestial kingdom , namely power and control . For what flowed from God and passed through that heaven had until then been the Divine human . That influx was also the Divine person who presented himself , when Jehovah revealed Himself in this way . But this Divine Human came to an end when the Lord made the human within Himself Divine .”
• Another passage of interest is Arcana Coelestia 1775 : “ I have conversed with certain spirits concerning the Word , saying that it has been necessary that of the Lord ’ s Divine Providence some revelation or Word should come into existence , for a revelation or Word is the general recipient vessel of spiritual and celestial things , thus conjoining heaven and earth . . .” Are the Writings neither revelation nor Word ? It would seem that this passage is not talking about the Bible but about the revelation or Word to come into existence and which has , within the natural sense , spiritual and celestial things thus conjoining heaven and earth .
• Arcana Coelestia 3179 , commenting on man ’ s regeneration , indicates that we are able to see almost nothing of the internal sense of the Word : “ There are innumerable , nay , illimitable secret things by which man is at that time led by the Lord , some only of which shine forth from the internal sense of the Word .”
• Arcana Coelestia 1955 clearly states that there is far more to the internal sense than the words on the page : “ That the words before us involve arcana , everyone can see from the single consideration that no one can know what it is to ‘ see after Him that seeth Me ,’ except from an internal sense , in which also there must be such things as cannot be explained to the apprehension , except by means of ideas like those of the angels , which do not fall into words , but only into the sense of the words ; and this quite apart from the material ideas out of which come the ideas of
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