“There is a spiritual meaning throughout the Word and in all its details. “ (Doctrine of the Sacred Scripture 9)

On each day of my working life as a proofreader I looked closely at words. Now that enjoyable task has re-entered my life, and in the past few months I’ve been pondering on the associations between three word-related things I do every day.

1. Each morning, my husband and I play Wordle on his iPad. At first it’s a total guess as to what that day’s 5-letter word will be. We usually figure it out well within the six tries that players are allowed.

2. Then we move on to Connections, where we must arrange 16 words into 4 groups of 4 associated words. This is trickier, and is heavily weighted to American thinking, culture, expressions etc. We’re getting better at it, even if we don’t really always ‘get’ the connections the game makes.

3. Finally, if time allows, I’ll spend a while proofreading an assigned part of the digitised version of Potts’ Concordance. (Early in 2024 I joined a growing team of people working on this particular aspect of the New Christian Bible Study project.) 

Like the game Connections, Potts’ Concordance has many closely associated words. It goes alphabetically through terms used in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Writings. I love this proofreading work! It gets me deep into what words / phrases used in the Bible mean on a correspondential level, and also shows where to find further references and explanations for words used in the Writings themselves. Even if I don’t always ‘get’ what is being said (which does happen quite often), surely my soul is learning!

Isn’t it true that when someone reads the Word, their associate angels understand the deeper levels of what is being read, even if the person grasps only the very natural level? When children hear the literal stories of the Word, don’t their angels understand the deeper meanings of those stories? Well, I came across this just yesterday (though I’ve used its most recent translation, not the English of the 1895 Potts’ Concordance): 

“When young children know and think about this information and other information like it [i.e. details of stories in the Word], the angels with them think about the divine attributes represented and symbolized. Because the angels are moved by these thoughts, their emotion is communicated to the children, creating the pleasure and delight the children feel in such knowledge, and preparing their minds to receive genuine truth and goodness.“
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This kind of link is not ‘visible’ to those in this world who are reading or hearing the Word. Yet it clearly happens, even if we are unaware of it. It shows why it’s so important to teach children stories from the Word!

In a seasonal bit of serendipity, the Easter season found me proofreading ‘Divine Human’. Shortly after that, working on ‘Kingdom of the Lord’ prompted a feeling that I was reading really important things; I could almost hear the angels rejoicing in what was being said there. An uncanny sensation of uplift in my very being….

Another thought. When we move on to the next world, communication is always in language we understand – it never needs a translator! Is that because real communication comes from the heart? And because love is at the very heart of communication, and the way of showing love is not always verbal?

Anyway, I like words, I like the connections between them, I like correct spelling. The fact that I am now focusing on these things to help the church, even in a small way, has added an unexpected bonus to my retirement years.