We read in
many places in the Word that the Lord
taught that there are four steps to eternal life: To
obey the Ten Commandments; To turn away
from the allurements of material wealth; To do good to others; And to
do all of
these things in His name. Our purpose is to examine more closely
what
it means to do things in His name. Our text for today is a part of the
Gospel
of Matthew that covers the period after the Lord showed Himself as the
Divine
Human to Peter, James, and John, and just before His entry into
Jerusalem as a
King.
This part
of the Word contains many of His most powerful
and clear lessons about heaven and the moral life on earth that leads
to
heaven. This text predicts the early period of the Christian church
when it was
just a few people who gathered in small groups to listen to the
disciples teach
what they had learned from the Lord. It also speaks of the New Church
because
in the whole world there are relatively only a handful of people who
know of
the existence of the Heavenly Doctrines.
The
ancient Greek civilization gave us the concept of
democracy, which introduced a sense of justice into civil government,
and has
provided a sphere of intellectual freedom where the church has been
able to
grow. At the same time it has led to false notion that the
majority is always
right. The fact that a lot of people may hold a false idea does not
make it
true. The truth is the truth, and it is not changed by the number of
people who
know it. When a person holds a religious view different from
all the people he associates with, it can make him begin to wonder if
he is
wrong, for how could all those people be wrong? The error must somehow
be his.
We also
know that it makes us feel much better to be
with people who share our views, as it is a common experience that
there is
strength in numbers. The more people who hold a view similar to our
own, the
more we feel that our beliefs are valid, correct, and the right way to
live. We
might imagine, if Noah were an actual historical figure, how different
he would
have felt from his neighbours as he prepared for the flood.
The
Christian Church, which many of us have secretly
envied for its size, numbers, and wealth, is today becoming fragmented
as the
division begun with the Reformation continues to break the church into
ever
smaller denominations. On the other hand, we see a number of very
strong, growing
religions in the East. When compared with Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam in
its
various forms, and the several other Asian religions, Christianity in
general
appears to represent a small fraction that is actually growing smaller.
Obviously,
since all people are created for heaven,
the Lord must have provided a great many ways for them to get to
heaven. As Westerners,
our attention has primarily been focused on our method, but
upon a
moment’s reflection, we soon realize that there must be many
other ways to
heaven that are suited to the many other kinds of people in world.
If we
imagine a whole world full of different people,
each with their own different kind of religion suited to their
particular way
of thinking and suited to preparing that kind of person for heaven, you
will
have a picture of what the Heavenly Doctrines of the New Church call
the
“church universal.” A great many people in every nation of
the world belong to
the church universal. In fact, all people who try to do the
best they
can to follow the commandments of their religion, to turn away from the
loves
of self and the world, to care for others, and to do all of these for
the sake
of their God, however they may understand Him, will find their
way to
heaven. They will find their eternal home there because they love to do
heavenly
things.
In the
work Heaven and Hell, Swedenborg reports, I have sometimes
talked with those belonging
to … common people, who, while living in the world, believed in
God and did
what was just and right in their occupations. Since they had an
affection for
knowing truth, they inquired about charity and about faith, having
heard in
this world much about faith and in the other life much about charity.
They were
therefore told that charity … is willing and doing what is just
and right in
every work, and faith is thinking justly and rightly; and faith and
charity are
conjoined, …the same as thought and will; and faith becomes
charity when that
which a man thinks justly and rightly he also will and does, and then
they are
not two but one. This they well understood (HH 364,
emphasis
added).
But if the
church universal is a “general” church, it
needs to get its life and doctrine from somewhere, it must have a
vessel for
reception, and it must have a means or medium by which life may flow
into it
through the heavens from the Lord. The means for this to happen is the
Lord’s
specific church on earth, that church where the Lord Jesus Christ, the
one God
of Heaven and Earth in His Divine Human is known through the Word and
worshipped.
So we can
see that in one sense, our text means
exactly what it seems to say, that the Lord makes Himself especially
present
with people when they gather together in His name, no matter who they
are,
where they are, or by what tradition they worship. And yet there is
more. Our
text also tells us what it is like for those who learn to love to live
a life
of charity and faith and who thus become angelic even while in this
world.
Everything
in the Word is significant, especially
numbers. Complex numbers get their signification from the simple
numbers of
which they are composed. The simple numbers are two, three, five, and
seven.
“Three” signifies what is full and complete, and also has
to do with truths,
while “two” and “four” have to do with good.
The reason for this is that “two”
brings to mind the idea of the marriage or conjunction of two things,
and
spiritual conjunction is love itself (See AE 532). One who
knows the spiritual sense of the Word can know also why it is
said … ’where there are two or three,’ namely,
because ‘two’ is predicated of
good, and ‘three’ of truth, consequently ‘two and
three’ of all who are in
truths from good (AE 411). So in the spiritual sense,
“two or three”
does not mean two or three individuals, but rather any person or
group
that is in truth from good.
Let us
reflect for a moment on what that means. The
doctrines are talking about a person who is in a state of truth from
good. That means that they have already been in a state of good, and
the only
way to enter a state of good is by living according to the truth from
the Lord
in the Word, that is, obeying the commandments. So what it means when
it talks
about a person who is in truth from good is that the person has first
learned
the truth from the Word, then compelled himself to live according to it
because
he believed that the Lord wanted him to do so. When a person has
entered into
such a state of the good of life, the Lord can flow into his mind and
open up a
new understanding of the commandments, revealing their moral and
spiritual
levels.
A person
who obeys the commandments in the Lord’s name
is given enlightenment into the truths of faith, that is, he is given
to see
the commandments as part of the larger picture. That new understanding
is
“truth from good.” And because the truth is given by the
Lord because of the
prior state of good, it is also called the “wisdom of
intelligence”, that is,
the wisdom that comes from putting knowledge and skill to use for the
benefit
of others. This is truth from good, the wisdom that comes from doing
the Lord’s
will. Our text is then speaking of an angelic state, making the promise
that if
we are good and faithful, that if we do the best we can, because we
believe
that to do so is what the Lord Himself wants us to do, to do good for
His sake
and not our own, we too can have the Lord in our “midst,”
which is to say, have
Him eternally present.
With some
people there is the belief that the mere
mention of the Lord’s name, without any knowledge of the Word,
somehow,
magically, brings salvation (See AE 102), but the Heavenly
Doctrines tell
us that this is not so, that doing things in the name of the Lord means
not
only His name, but also requires the acknowledgment of Him as the
Redeemer and Saviour,
and at the same time obedience to Him, and at length the genuine faith
in Him
that can result only from a life of charity (See TCR 682) We read in
the Arcana
Coelestia that the “name of Jehovah” signifies all the
truths in one complex by
which God is worshipped, thus all the good of love and truth of faith;
and “in
the midst of him,” as being what is in Him, thus also what is
from Him; for the
good of love is of such a nature that what is in it, is also from it in
others,
because it has the power of communicating itself. For it is a characteristic of
love that it wishes everything of its own to be out of itself in
others; and as
this is effected from the Divine Itself through and out of its Divine
Human,
therefore also the Lord as to the Divine Human is called “the
name of Jehovah.”
(AC 9310)
So in
conclusion, we can see that when considered only
from the strict sense of the letter, our text does indeed mean that the
Lord is
present with those who gather in His name, even when there are just a
very few.
We certainly should not seek to have small groups by excluding
others,
but on the other hand we should not let the issue of numbers by
itself
be discouraging. After all, the Lord has many ways to lead people to
heaven,
each way especially suited to a particular set of needs. However, when
viewed
from the knowledge of the internal sense, we can see that there is a
deeper,
richer meaning that applies to each one of us in our daily lives.
The
phrase, “Two or three gathered together,” is
speaking about a person who has come into state of wisdom from a life
according
to the Lord’s commandments in the Word. “In My name”
tells us that this person
is in a state of genuine worship towards the Lord from a knowledge and
acknowledgment of the truth of His Divine Humanity and he
conscientiously lives
the kind of life that follows such knowledge. “There I am in the
midst of them”
tells us that with such people there will be eternal, reciprocal
conjunction with
the Lord.
Our text
then develops, explains, and reinforces the
Lord’s promise that those who obey His commandments; turn away
from the loves
of self and the world; and love the neighbour as themselves out of love
and
regard for the Lord Jesus Christ, will live to eternity in Heaven with
Him.
AMEN.
Then the
LORD said to Noah, “Come into the ark, you
and all your household, because I have seen that
you are righteous before Me in
this generation. {2} “You shall take
with you seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two
each of
animals that are unclean, a male and
his female; {3} “also seven each of
birds of the air, male and female, to keep the species alive on the
face of all
the earth. {4} “For after seven more
days I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days and forty nights,
and I
will destroy from the face of the earth all living things that I have
made.” {5} And Noah did according to all that
the LORD commanded him. {6} Noah was six
hundred years old when the
floodwaters were on the earth. {7} So
Noah, with his sons, his wife, and his sons’ wives, went into the
ark because
of the waters of the flood. {8} Of
clean animals, of animals that are unclean,
of birds, and of everything that creeps on the earth, {9} two
by two they went into the ark to Noah, male and female, as
God had commanded Noah. {10} And it
came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were on the
earth. {11} In the six hundredth year of
Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the
month, on that day
all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of
heaven
were opened. {12} And the rain was on
the earth forty days and forty nights.
{13} On the very same day Noah and Noah’s sons, Shem, Ham,
and Japheth, and
Noah’s wife and the three wives of his sons with them, entered
the ark; {14} they and every beast after its
kind, all cattle after their kind, every creeping thing that creeps on
the
earth after its kind, and every bird after its kind, every bird of
every sort. {15} And they went into the ark to
Noah, two by two, of all flesh in which is
the breath of life. {16} So those
that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had
commanded him;
and the LORD shut him in. Amen.
“Take
heed that you do not despise one of
these little ones, for I say to you that in heaven their angels always
see the
face of My Father who is in heaven. {11} “For
the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost. {12} “What
do you think? If a man has a hundred
sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine
and go to
the mountains to seek the one that is straying? {13} “And
if he should find it, assuredly, I say
to you, he rejoices more over that sheep than
over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. {14} “Even
so it is not the will of your Father
who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. {15} “Moreover
if your brother
sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.
If he
hears you, you have gained your brother. {16} “But
if he will not hear, take with you one
or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every
word may be
established.’ {17} “And
if he refuses to hear them, tell it to
the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to
you like a
heathen and a tax collector. {18} “Assuredly,
I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and
whatever
you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. {19} “Again
I say to you that if two of you agree
on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by
My Father
in heaven. {20} “For
where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the
midst of
them.” Amen.
[12]
“To believe in His name” has a similar
signification as “to believe in Him,” since the
Lord’s “name” signifies every
quality of faith and love by which He is to be worshipped, and by which
He
saves man. This is signified by “His name,” because in the
spiritual world
names that are given to persons are always in accord with the quality
of their
affection and life, and in consequence the quality of each one is known
from
his name alone. So when anyone’s name is pronounced, and the
quality that is
meant by the name is loved, that one becomes present, and the two are
united as
companions and brethren. The quality of the Lord however is everything
of faith
and love by which He saves man, for that quality is the essence
proceeding from
Him; therefore when that quality is thought of by man the Lord becomes
present
with him, and when this quality is loved the Lord is conjoined to him.
Thence
it is that those who believe in His name have eternal life. This shows
how necessary
it is that man should know the quality of faith and love, that is, the
Lord’s
“name;” also how necessary it is to love that quality,
which comes by doing
those things that the Lord has commanded. The names “Jesus”
and “Christ”
moreover involve this same quality, since “Jesus” means
salvation, and “Christ”
or “Messiah” Divine truth, which is everything of faith and
love as to knowledges,
doctrine, and life. When, therefore, these names are mentioned their
quality
must be thought of and they must live according to it. This is what is
meant by
the words of the Lord in Matthew:
Jesus said, If
two of you on earth shall
agree in My name respecting anything that they shall ask it shall be
done for
them by My Father who is in the heavens. For where two or three are
gathered
together in My name there am I in the midst of them (18:19, 20).
There is,
indeed, a presence of the Lord with all and
also a love towards all; and yet man cannot be led and be saved by the
Lord
except in the measure of his reception of the Lord by faith in Him and
love to
Him. Amen.