new church life: jan uary/february 2016
Every created thing is considered valuable if it is inwardly good, and worthless if it
is inwardly bad, even where inner badness lies within outer goodness. Every wise
person in the world and every angel in heaven evaluates people and things in this
way. (True Christianity 595)
The Lord said, “Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with
righteous judgment.” (John 7:24) Judging rightly means judging them by
their will and intentions. (Married Love 453) A person who is wise pays
more attention to a person’s intentions than the person’s actions. “One who is
spiritual pays even less attention to the deeds, but explores the will.” (Apocalypse
Explained 98) “All angels pay attention to these things, as do all wise people in
our world.” (True Christianity 96; see also Secrets of Heaven 5094.4, 8855, New
Jerusalem 56)
Genuinely loving one’s neighbor does not mean loving everybody in the
same way, regardless of the quality of goodness that is in them. It is more
spiritual to “examine carefully the quality of a person’s life, and show good
will accordingly.” (New Jerusalem 85) To love our neighbor we should know
what is going on inwardly – “examine carefully,” “search out,” “explore,” and
“pay attention to their intentions and will” (especially their good intentions –
Secrets of Heaven 1079, 1088), so that we can know how to show love to them.
To love another person is to feel his or her joy as our own (Divine Love
and Wisdom 47), and, if he or she is suffering, to have compassion (compassion
literally means “suffering together”).
All compassion is a feeling of love, for someone who has love or good will also has
compassion, and our love and good will become compassion when our neighbor is
poor or miserable and in that situation we bring him help. (Secrets of Heaven 6180)
Small groups provide a context for getting to know people more deeply than
we can in a five-minute visit after church. We may hear people’s hopes and
dreams, or stories of their struggles and successes. So we can know them more
deeply and love them more truly.
Loving Others Requires Wisdom and Truth
In order to love others we need to know how to love them. The more we know,
the more genuinely helpful we can be. So in the New Church we focus not just
on believing the truth, but understanding it, and seeing truth for ourselves.
If there is something we don’t understand, we are encouraged to question it.
(Faith 1-2) A motto of the New Church is that “We are now allowed to enter
with understanding into the mysteries of faith.” (True Christianity 508)
As noted above angels often use questions and discussion in small
groups as a way of teaching. (You can read more about this in the Rev. Dan
Goodenough’s excellent survey, “Angelic Methods of Instruction,” New Church
Life, 1977, p. 68.) After talking with a gathering of couples about married love
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