While our world has been all tumultuous chaos this year, I have been reading through Divine Providence with some friends. Throughout the book, I have been reminded of the STEADINESS of our Savior. The steadiness of Him and of His purpose. Below I am sharing one of my new favorite comfort passages: Divine Providence 332.2-4. I hope you enjoy! And I pray you have a blessed New Year!

Simply consider a fruit tree. It is first born from a tiny seed as a tender sprout, is it not, and gradually grows after that into a sapling and spreads its branches, and these become covered with leaves, until it puts forth flowers and bears fruit, and in them places new seeds by which it provides for its perpetuation.

The same is the case with every bush and with every herb of the field. Do not each and all of the constituents in them proceed from first end to last end constantly and marvelously according to the laws of their order? Why not the primary end likewise, which is a heaven from the human race? Can there be anything in its progress which does not proceed constantly according to the laws of Divine providence?

Since a person’s life has a correspondence with the growth of a tree, let us draw a parallel or comparison. A person’s early childhood is comparatively like the tender sprout of a tree shooting up from its seed out of the earth. A person’s later childhood and adolescence are like the same sprout growing into a sapling and its little branches. The natural truths with which every person is first equipped are like the leaves which cover the sapling’s branches (leaves have just this symbolic meaning in the Word). A person’s initial introductions into the marriage of goodness and truth, or spiritual marriage, are like the flowers which the tree produces in the spring. Spiritual truths are the petals of those flowers. The first stages of the spiritual marriage are like the beginnings of the fruit. Spiritual goods – the goods of charity – are like the fruits themselves (they are also symbolized by fruits in the Word). The propagations of wisdom from love are like the seeds, as a result of which propagations a person becomes like a garden or paradise. A person is also described by a tree in the Word, and his wisdom from love by a garden. Nothing else is symbolically meant by the Garden of Eden.

A person is, indeed, owing to his seed a bad tree, but still possible is an engrafting or insertion of shoots taken from the tree of life, which turn the sap drawn from the old root into a sap producing good fruits.

We draw this comparison to make it known that, since the progress of Divine providence is so constant in the growth and rebirth of trees, it must be utterly constant in the reformation and rebirth or regeneration of people, who are of much more value than trees, in keeping with these words of the Lord,

Are not five sparrows sold for two small coins? And not one of them is forgotten before God. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than… sparrows… .

Moreover, which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? If you then are not able to do the least, why are you anxious for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow?. (That) if … God so clothes the grass in the field, which today is and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will He clothe you, O you people of little faith?

Luke 12:6-7, 25-28

“And it came to pass that when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.

And she exclaimed with a great voice and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!

And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?

For behold, as soon as the voice of thy greeting sounded in my ears, the babe leaped in my womb for gladness.

And happy is she who has believed that there shall be a performance of those things which were spoken to her from the Lord.”

Luke 1:41-44

“The merely natural person says to himself, “What is Divine providence? Has it any reality, or is it any more than a term used by the common people, having heard it from a priest? Who sees anything of it? Is it not prudence, wisdom, cunning and malice that accomplish everything in the world? All other happenings, then, are they not inevitabilities and consequences? And are not many of them also chance occurrences? Does Divine providence lie hidden within them? How can it be present in scams and swindles? And yet people say that Divine providence is responsible for everything.

“Cause me to see it, therefore, and I will believe it. Can anyone believe in it prior to that?”

So speaks the merely natural person. But the spiritual person speaks otherwise. Because the spiritual person acknowledges God, he also acknowledges Divine providence, and moreover sees it. However, he cannot show it to anyone who thinks only within the realm of nature in terms of nature. For such a one cannot elevate his mind above nature and see in its appearances anything of Divine providence, or form conclusions about it from its laws, which also are laws of Divine wisdom. If he were to clearly see it, therefore, he would introduce nature into it and so not only envelop it in misconceptions but also profane it; and instead of acknowledging it, he would deny it. And one who at heart denies Divine providence, also denies God.

¹ And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. ² In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.³ And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:⁴ And they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads. (Revelation 22:1-4)

As we approach New Church Day this Friday, my family and I have been reading through Revelation. We decided to make leaves out of sculpey and put them onto a bookmark as a reminder of the Tree of Life described in the passage above.

In this year full of many unexpected changes and concerns on a global scale it has been reassuring to spend time focusing on the Word and learning more and more about living a full, loving, and meaningful life through the teachings of the New Church.

Arcana Coelestia 9481 (included below) describes the representative connection between the stories in Revelation and the New Church.

‘”In accordance with all that I show you, the pattern of the dwelling-place’ means a representative of heaven where the Lord is. This is clear from the meaning of ‘the pattern of the dwelling-place’ as a representative of heaven; for ‘the pattern’ means a representative, and ‘the dwelling-place’ means heaven. The reason why ‘the pattern’ means a representative is that Divine realities in heaven are also manifested in visible shapes, which are representatives. For the meaning of ‘the dwelling-place’ as heaven where the Lord is, see 8269, 8309. What the representatives that appear in heaven are like is clear in the prophets, for example in John’s Book of Revelation, in which he describes lampstands, Chapter 1:12ff; a throne with twenty-four thrones around it, and four living creatures before the throne, Chapter 4:2ff; a book sealed with seven seals, Chapter 5; horses going out when the seals were opened, Chapter 6; angels who are clothed in various ways and have bowls, Chapters 9, 10, 15, 16; a white horse, Chapter 19; and at length a new Jerusalem, its walls, gates, foundations, height, breadth, and length, Chapters 21, 22. Similar sights are also described by other prophets.

[2] All those sights are representatives such as appear unceasingly in heaven before angels’ eyes, manifesting in visible shapes the Divine celestial realities that belong to the good of love and the Divine spiritual realities that belong to the good of faith. Such realities taken all together were represented by the tabernacle and its contents, that is, the ark itself, the table on which loaves were laid, the altar of incense, the lampstand, and everything else. Therefore when these objects, being outward forms of Divine celestial and spiritual realities, were beheld by the people while they were engaged in holy acts of worship, such realities as were represented by those objects were brought to notice in heaven. These, as stated above, were the Divine celestial realities that belong to the good of love to the Lord and the Divine spiritual realities that belong to the good of faith in the Lord. All the representatives of that Church had that kind of effect in heaven. It should be realized that a person always has spirits and angels present with him and that a person cannot live without them. It should likewise be realized that through them the person is linked to the Lord, and that in this way the human race, and heaven too, is kept in being. From this one can see what purpose was served by the representatives and also the ritual observances of the Church established among the Israelite nation. One can also see what purpose is served by the Word, in which all things mentioned in the sense of the letter correspond to Divine realities that exist in heaven, thus in which all the objects mentioned are representative and all the words used carry a spiritual meaning. This is what brings about the linking of a person to heaven, and through heaven to the Lord. Without that link the person would have no life whatever, for without being linked to the actual Essential Being (Esse) of life, from which the Coming-into-Being (Existere) of life emanates, no one has life.

[3] But these considerations are unintelligible to those who think that life exists essentially in a person himself and that a person lives without spirits or angels, thus without influx from the Divine by way of heaven. But in actual fact anything that is not linked to the Divine perishes and ceases to exist. Indeed nothing can ever come into being without that which is prior to itself, thus without the Divine, who is the First and is self-existent Being (Esse) or Jehovah; nor consequently can it remain in being, for remaining in being is constant coming-into-being. Because ‘the dwelling-place’ means heaven where the Lord is, it also means the good of love and faith, since these compose heaven; and because all good comes from the Lord, and heaven is called heaven by virtue of its love to and faith in the Lord, ‘the dwelling-place’ also means in the highest sense the Lord, as is evident in Isaiah 63:15; Jeremiah 25:30; Ezekiel 37:26-27; Psalms 26:8; 43:3; 90:1; 91:9; Exodus 15:13; Deuteronomy 12:5, 11; and other places. From this it is clear that the tabernacle was called Jehovah’s sanctuary and dwelling-place for the reason that it represented the realities mentioned above.”