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Bridgewater,
Massachusetts,
April 27, 2003
 Genesis
3:1-7 The woman and the serpent
Now the serpent
was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord
God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say,
'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
The woman said
to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the
garden; but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from
the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you
must not touch it, or you will die.'"
"You will not
surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God
knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened,
and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
When the woman
saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and
pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining
wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to
her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the
eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that
they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and
made coverings for themselves.
Revelation
12 The woman and the dragon
A great and
wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with
the sun, with the moon under her feet, and a crown of
twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out
in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another
sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with
seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads.
His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and
flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of
the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might
devour her child the moment it was born. She gave birth
to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations
with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to
God and to his throne. The woman fled into the desert to
a place prepared for her by God, where she might be
taken care of for 1,260 days.
And there was
war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the
dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But
he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in
heaven. The great dragon was hurled down--that ancient
serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole
world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels
with him.
Then I heard a
loud voice in heaven say: "Now have come the salvation
and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the
authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our
brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night,
has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of
the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did
not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in
them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the
devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury,
because he knows that his time is short."
When the dragon
saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the
woman who had given birth to the male child. The woman
was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she
might fly to the place prepared for her in the desert,
where she would be taken care of for a time, times and
half a time, out of the serpent's reach. Then from his
mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake
the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. But the
earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and
swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of
his mouth. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and
went off to make war against the rest of her
offspring--those who obey God's commandments and hold to
the testimony of Jesus.
 Apocalypse
Revealed #533The woman clothed with the sun
"A woman clothed
with the sun, and the moon under her feet" symbolizes
the Lord's new church in heaven, . . . and the Lord's
new church about to be on earth, which is the New
Jerusalem.
A great and
wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with
the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of
twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out
in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another
sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with
seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads.
(Revelation 12:1-3)
Women and
reptiles go a long way back in the Bible story. In fact,
they first square off against each other in Genesis
chapter 3, very close to the beginning of the Bible. In
that encounter, the woman loses. She is taken in by the
serpent, eats the forbidden fruit along with her
husband, and as a result, they both experience shame for
the first time--not to mention bringing various curses
down upon themselves and getting thrown out of the
Garden of Eden, where they had lived innocently and
happily up to that time.
And now in
Revelation chapter 12, very close to the end of the
Bible, they square off against each other again. The
lowly serpent of Genesis has grown monstrously large,
becoming an enormous, many-headed red dragon. We know it
is the same character, since in verse 9 of our chapter,
the dragon is identified as "that ancient serpent called
the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray."
However, the woman has also grown much more powerful.
The Eve of Genesis is a simple woman, created out of a
bone taken from Adam's chest. The woman of Revelation 12
is a glorious being, clothed with the sun, standing upon
the moon, and with a crown of twelve stars adorning her
head. And this time the woman holds her own against the
mammoth reptile--with a little help from her friends.
In the Bible,
women--especially women of stature, and most especially
women of cosmic status--regularly represent the Lord's
church. This does not mean the institution of the church
so much as it means the whole community of people who
believe in the Lord and in the Lord's Word, and live
according to that belief. In many places throughout the
Bible, especially in the Prophets and the book of
Revelation, the Lord's church is presented as a woman
who is the bride and wife of the Lord God.
For example,
several chapters later in Revelation, an angel says to
John, "Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the
Lamb" (the Lamb being a reference to Christ). And then
the angel shows him "the holy city Jerusalem, coming
down out of heaven from God" (Revelation 21:9, 10). A
few verses earlier, John had already mentioned seeing
"the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of
heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed
for her husband" (Revelation 21:2). This is the same
holy city that has twelve gates to receive the redeemed
from all the nations of the earth. It is an obvious
symbol of the human community of faith, also referred to
as the "body of Christ" and simply as the church, which
is the bride and wife of the Lord.
The woman
clothed with the sun has the same representation as the
holy city New Jerusalem that is the bride and wife of
Christ. She represents the body of believers that is
part of the new era of genuine Christianity that we
believe has now begun both in heaven and on this earth.
The name of our church, "The New Jerusalem Church," is a
reference to this new Christianity. Not that we believe
we are the new church that the Lord is forming in
our day, but that we believe in it, and aspire to
be a part of it.
This is a grand
and glorious vision for our church! And it is a vision
that can inspire us as we struggle along, dealing with
prosaic issues of building and grounds maintenance,
budgets, and the question of our church's programs,
growth, and outreach. It can inspire us as we deal with
the inevitable frustrations, friction, conflicts, and
disappointments that accompany every human institution
and every human community--including the church. As we
face our own internal issues here in the Bridgewater New
Jerusalem Church, and also the issues now facing the
wider bodies of our Association and our denomination,
this vision of the woman clothed with the sun can give
us inspiration on how to be a church that is a part of
the wider body of Lord's new church on earth and in
heaven.
The first thing
we notice about the woman is her dazzling attire. She is
wearing the sun itself as her clothing. She is a being
of intense light and intense warmth. The sun, we know
both from Swedenborg and from ancient tradition, is the
primary symbol in nature of the Lord God, the creator
and ruler of the universe. Our little cosmos--or solar
system--centers on and revolves around the sun, which is
not only the focal point, but also the binding force
that holds together all the planets, moons, comets,
asteroids, and other bodies that inhabit our solar
system. Its heat and light are the source and engine of
all life on earth. Without the sun, this earth would be
a cold, dark, dead rock--if it existed at all.
The sun's
heat--its primary life-giving attribute--not only
represents, but corresponds in a living way to the
intense love of God, which is the central essence, the
very being of God. It is God's love that both
creates and sustains us as living, spiritual beings. And
sun's light, which comes to us blended with its warmth,
is the Lord's eternal truth, enlightening our minds and
guiding us in everything we do.
So the first
attribute we notice about the woman, spiritually
speaking, is that she is fully wrapped in the Lord's
love and truth, a being of light and love. This means
that our church, also, is to be wholly wrapped up in the
Lord's love and truth. In Biblical terms, we are
commanded to "love the Lord your God with all your heart
and with all your soul and with all your strength"
(Deuteronomy 6:5), and to "love your neighbor as
yourself" (Leviticus 19:18). If our lives, both
individually and collectively, are not centered on the
Lord's love and on loving and serving our neighbors here
on earth, then we are not a part of this woman who
represents the new Christianity that the Lord is forming
on this earth.
The woman is
also supported by the moon, which is under her feet--the
foundation, as it were, on which she is standing. The
moon shines by reflected light from the sun, and is a
visible, guiding light when the sun itself is not in our
sky. It represents our faith in the Lord, which carries
us through our darker times when we do not feel the Lord
in such a living way as in our times of spiritual
daylight. Even when our lives are centered around the
Lord, we do not always feel the Lord's love burning in
our hearts. Yet if we have developed a strong and true
faith, it can carry us through our times of darkness.
And the stars
that crown the woman's head--all those tiny, beautiful
points of light that stud the night sky and guide us in
our times of darkness--are the eternal, spiritual
truths, the principles of spiritual living, that we
discover and learn, and that guide us when our hearts
are not so warm, and our mind not so enlightened as in
our emotional daytimes.
This is the
vision provided in Revelation 12 of the new Christian
Church as it is meant to be: centered on God's love and
wisdom, sustained by faith, and guided by all the
beautiful eternal spiritual truths that the Lord gives
to all whose minds are clear. This is the vision of
powerful spiritual life to which we can aspire as a
church.
The woman is
pregnant, and about to bring forth a male child.
Spiritually, children represent new births within
us--births of new feelings of love for the Lord and for
one another, and of new understandings of the truth.
These, especially, are the spiritual fruit that we bear
when we are spiritually married to the Lord, and living
a life of faith and kindness.
The child that
the woman is about to bear is a male child; so he
represents a new spiritual understanding. Specifically,
since he is the child of the woman who represents the
new Christian church, he symbolizes that church's
newborn understanding of spiritual truth. In other
words, the male child is the teachings, or in
traditional terms the doctrine, of the new church that
the Lord is forming both in the spiritual world and in
the material world.
In our church,
we believe that the primary visible form of that new
doctrine is found in the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg,
whom the Lord commissioned to deliver to the world a
renewed and deepened understanding of the Christian
faith, of the spiritual world, and of the life we are to
lead as Christians. The teachings of our church are, in
a special sense, the male child that has now been born
into the world, and that will, in due time, "rule all
the nations with an iron scepter."
One day, I am
convinced, the teachings given to the world through the
pen of Emanuel Swedenborg will be the reigning theology
and faith of the entire world. This I believe, not just
because Swedenborg said so, but because the spiritual
philosophy presented in Swedenborg's writings represents
the best and the highest of all spiritual truth found
throughout all the ages of humanity's searching for
enlightenment and for God. Things are not true because
Swedenborg says so; rather, Swedenborg says things
because the Lord showed him the truth, and he expressed
that truth to us in the clearest form possible for a
human mind of the time and place in which those truths
were published.
However, though
Swedenborg's writings are an especially potent
manifestation of the male child born to the woman, they
are not the only way that this child appears in
our world and in our lives. Every time we as individuals
or as a church community bring forth new truth, new
understanding, new enlightenment that we had not grasped
before, and offer it to the world around us, we are
bringing forth the male child. Every time we as a church
offer to the people of our community the spiritual
wisdom that we have been given by the Lord, we are
the woman clothed with the sun, giving birth to a child
whose destiny is to reign in the hearts and minds not
only of the people of our community, but of all people
of faith throughout the earth.
Please
understand, this does not mean everyone on earth will
become Swedenborgians! But it does mean that the core
principles of our church will be the reigning principles
of all genuine religions throughout the earth. Those
principles are a belief in one God, who is pure love and
pure wisdom; a belief in the inspired Word of God,
containing depths of truth that go beyond all human
understanding; and a dedication to living a life of love
and service to our fellow human beings according to the
teachings of our religion. These principles will, I
believe, reign in the human community on earth as we are
ready to receive them.
Unfortunately,
this does not happen without powerful resistance. The
woman is crying out in pain as her child is about to be
delivered. And who wouldn't cry out when there is a
huge, seven-headed dragon standing by to devour the
child as soon as it is born?
The dragon, that
ancient serpent called the devil and Satan, represents
everything that resists the birth of the new Christian
church within us, and in our world. For Eve, it was
especially the desire to base her life on the evidence
of her physical senses rather than on the spiritual
inspiration that came from God. She disobeyed God's
words in order to eat a fruit that looked pleasing to
her eyes. And ever since, when we humans have followed
the lead of our senses rather than listening to the
voice of God from within, we have come to know pain,
shame, conflict, and spiritual death.
In our day,
there is enormously more material knowledge that can
lead us away from God and toward materialism and
selfishness if we let it rule us instead of serving us.
The simple serpent of Eve's far simpler day has grown
into an huge, threatening dragon. It is very difficult
to maintain our faith and our love for God in the face
of the powerful, many-headed voice of materialism and
materialistic science and philosophy that pervades our
world. That dragon of faith in the material world and in
human ingenuity and technology is doing its best to
destroy all faith in the Lord and in spirit. And it has
made great inroads.
But the destiny
of our new Christian faith is not to be swallowed up by
materialism and greed. The moment the child is born, it
is caught up to heaven--to our deeper, spiritual
minds--out of the reach of the devouring dragon. And the
woman herself finds a place in the desert, where she is
protected from the dragon.
Our church, too,
has found itself in a desert of small numbers and
struggling congregations. Often we have felt the need to
hide our precious, beautiful new beliefs away from the
crowd of religious fundamentalists, traditional
Christians, and secular skeptics that would chew it up
and destroy it before it has a chance to grow to a
powerful adulthood in our minds and hearts. For so many
decades, we have faced the question, "Why are we so
small, when our teachings are so incredibly powerful and
beautiful?"
We have been,
and in many ways still are, facing a dragon of
resistance to the truths of the new Christianity that
have now been born into the world. But we can take heart
from our story. The beliefs we hold so precious will not
be destroyed from this earth, even if they must remain
hidden for a while. Our church will not perish--even if
it must spend some time in the desert. This, too, shall
pass. And when the battles are fought and the old ways
of the world are overcome, the woman and her child will
re-emerge as the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down
from God out of heaven.
What Jesus said
to his little band of disciples two thousand years ago,
he also says to our little band of believers today: "Do
not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been
pleased to give you the kingdom" (Luke 12:32). Amen.
Artwork:
Night by Edward Robert Hughes 1851-1914
Music:
Velvet and Diamonds (the star filled sky)
© 2003 Bruce De
Boer
Used with Permission
No Right Click and
Color Scroll Bar Scripts Courtesy of:
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