SPEAKER_00: Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our adult service here at the Barnathan Cathedral.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Reverend Stephen Gunther, and I'm on the pastoral staff here at the Barnathan Church.
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to begin our service this morning with our reading from the Lord's Word, both from the sacred scripture and from the heavenly doctrine from the New Church.
SPEAKER_00: Our first reading comes from the New Testament, from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 28.
SPEAKER_00: Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them.
SPEAKER_00: When they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.
SPEAKER_00: Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you.
SPEAKER_00: And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Next we turn to the Book of Revelation, a portion of chapter twenty-two.
SPEAKER_00: And behold, I am coming quickly, and my reward is with me, to give to everyone according to his work.
SPEAKER_00: I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed are those who do his commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city.
SPEAKER_00: But outside are dogs and sorcerers, and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.
SPEAKER_00: I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches.
SPEAKER_00: I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star, and the Spirit and the bride say come, and let him who hears say come, and let him who thirsts come.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever desires, let him take of the water of life freely.
SPEAKER_00: Turning now to the teachings of the new church, we read first from the Apocalypse Revealed, a portion of number 956.
SPEAKER_00: Let him who hears say come symbolically means that anyone who hears about the Lord's coming and about the new heaven and new church, thus about the Lord's kingdom, and so has some knowledge of these, should pray for the Lord to come.
SPEAKER_00: Let him who thirsts say come, symbolically means that any one who longs for the Lord's kingdom and truths at that time should pray for the Lord to come with light.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely, symbolically means that whoever is moved by love to learn truths and assimilate them into himself will receive them from the Lord apart from any endeavors of his own.
SPEAKER_00: To desire symbolizes love, because whatever a person desires from the heart is something he loves, and whatever he loves is something he desires from the heart.
SPEAKER_00: The water of life symbolizes divine truths obtained from the Lord through the word, and to obtain them freely means symbolically, apart from any endeavors of his own.
SPEAKER_00: Something similar to the symbolic meaning in this verse is that of the wish contained in the Lord's Prayer.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord's kingdom is the church that is united with heaven.
SPEAKER_00: So it is that we are now told, let him who hears say come, and let him who thirsts come.
SPEAKER_00: And we read finally from the work, The True Christian Religion, number 791.
SPEAKER_00: After this work was finished, the Lord called together his twelve disciples who followed him in the world, and the next day he sent them forth into the whole spiritual world to preach the gospel that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns, whose kingdom shall be for ever and ever, according to the prediction of Daniel and in the revelation, and also that they are blessed who come to the marriage supper of the Lamb.
SPEAKER_00: This took place on the nineteenth day of June in the year 1770.
SPEAKER_00: This is meant by these words of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He shall send his angels, and they shall gather together his elect from one end of the heavens to the other.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Here end our lessons.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it.
SPEAKER_00: The new church is in many ways a revolutionary and radical faith in the Christian world.
SPEAKER_00: And if we were raised in the new church, we may not necessarily think that way.
SPEAKER_00: But some of the key teachings that we hold as the foundation of what we believe in the new church are ideas that are revolutionary out there in the broader world.
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps the boldest of our assertions in the new church is the belief that the second coming of the Lord has already taken place, and that it took place through the revelation of truth in the heavenly doctrines of the new church, done through the writings of Immanuel Swedenborg.
SPEAKER_00: And if we accept that, if we accept this idea that the second coming of the Lord has already taken place, then we can look at the way the second coming took place through the revelation of these teachings.
SPEAKER_00: And we can look at the Lord's first advent, his life in the natural world where he was born and lived here as Jesus Christ and all of his public ministry and his miracles and teachings that he performed.
SPEAKER_00: And we can see parallels and comparisons between the Lord's first coming and his second coming.
SPEAKER_00: This morning I want to draw our attention to one of those parallels, and that is the way that the Lord finishes or ends each one of these advents.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of the Lord's first advent and his life in the world, it ends with our reading in the Gospel of Matthew this morning, where Jesus gathers his disciples on a mountain in Galilee, and he sends them out with a mission.
SPEAKER_00: He sends them throughout the world and says, Go into all the nations and baptize people in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the things that I have commanded them.
SPEAKER_00: And then in the second advent, the way the Lord ends, his second advent comes at the very end of his work, True Christian Religion, which is the last of the works that Swedenborg wrote and published of the Heavenly Doctrines.
SPEAKER_00: And we read it this morning that at the end of that work he added a note that says, When this work was completed, the Lord gathered together his disciples who followed him in the world, and he sent them throughout the whole spiritual world to preach the gospel or spread the good news that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns, and his kingdom shall be forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: And so once again we have this image of the Lord gathering his disciples and sending them out with a special purpose.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of his first advent, he gathered together and he gathered them together and sent them throughout the natural world with the mission of baptizing them and teaching people to observe the Lord's commandments.
SPEAKER_00: And at the end of his second advent, he sent them throughout the spiritual world to spread the good news that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns and his kingdom shall be forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: And then finally, we have at the very end of the book of Revelation, which is a book full of amazing imagery, all of which is talking about the establishment of the new church.
SPEAKER_00: The whole book of Revelation talks about the ways in which the people have turned away from the Lord or lost sight of who he really is and what he's really teaching and what his word really teaches.
SPEAKER_00: And the ways that the Lord will come again and share that truth with us and restore this.
SPEAKER_00: And at the very end of the book of Revelation, in the very last chapter, what we read this morning, it ends with an invitation where the Lord says, Let anyone who hears say come, let anyone who thirsts come, and let anyone who desires, let them take of the water of life freely.
SPEAKER_00: So with these three, these three examples of the first commission of the Lord gathering his disciples on the mountain in Galilee and sending them out, and then the Lord gathering again his disciples in the spiritual world and sending them out again, and this invitation at the end of the book of Revelation, we see the ultimate message of the new church for each one of us.
SPEAKER_00: We see the ultimate commission that is here for each one of us.
SPEAKER_00: And so let's take time and let's look at each one of these three elements, these three stories, and see what the message is for all of us and what is the thread that ties all three of them together.
SPEAKER_00: Well, at the end of the Lord's first advent, when he calls the disciples together on that mountain in Galilee, he sends them out with a specific mission.
SPEAKER_00: He sends them out to baptize.
SPEAKER_00: He tells them to go into all the nations and baptize people in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what does that mean for each one of us?
SPEAKER_00: Well, there's a lot that can be said about the meaning of baptism.
SPEAKER_00: But today I'll focus on two elements of baptism.
SPEAKER_00: The first is that baptism is an intentional step.
SPEAKER_00: It's something that people do with intention to say, I want to follow the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: There's something about it that involves us going to the Lord and saying, I want to commit myself to following the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That's one part of baptism.
SPEAKER_00: And the other side of baptism that we're told in the teachings for the new church is that baptism is a sacrament of instruction.
SPEAKER_00: Baptism isn't something that we normally come to after we have done all of our reading and all of our studying and all of our research and we've started to apply all the Lord's teachings to our lives, and then once we finish all of that process, then we then we get baptized.
SPEAKER_00: No, baptism is the beginning of our journey of faith.
SPEAKER_00: Baptism is an initiation to say, I am committing myself to learning these ideas, to seeking the Lord where he might show up in my life.
SPEAKER_00: It's a beginning point, and it's about instruction and us learning from the Lord's truths that he has given us.
SPEAKER_00: So then we move to the second great commission that comes at the end of the true Christian religion, where the Lord once again gathers his disciples and he sends them out.
SPEAKER_00: This time not in the natural world, but this time in the spiritual world, which shows that we're now thinking of the spiritual domain of our lives, the spiritual level of our being.
SPEAKER_00: And he sends them out with another clear mission.
SPEAKER_00: And this time, it's not to baptize people or to teach them, it's to spread the good news that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns, and his kingdom shall be forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: Now we'll notice that they didn't go through the spiritual world saying, there's a new church being formed.
SPEAKER_00: And they didn't go through saying, Swedenborg finished the last book.
SPEAKER_00: But instead, the message that they sent out on June 19th, 1770, is the message that the Lord God Jesus Christ reigns.
SPEAKER_00: And what does that mean for us in our lives, for the Lord to reign in our lives?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the thing about that, I want to take a minute and talk about the word kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Because the second part of that is where it says that the Lord's kingdom shall be forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: And in the New Testament, Jesus says a lot about the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: He says, the kingdom of God is at hand, and the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, or the kingdom of God is like something else.
SPEAKER_00: There's lots of teachings where he uses this phrase.
SPEAKER_00: And the Greek word that's being used there for kingdom is a little bit different than the English word that when we hear the word kingdom, what comes to mind?
SPEAKER_00: When we hear the word kingdom, we usually think of the country over which a king rules.
SPEAKER_00: We think of the land and the people.
SPEAKER_00: That is a king's kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: But the Greek word that's used in the New Testament when Jesus talks about the kingdom of God could almost be more properly translated as the kingship of God.
SPEAKER_00: It's the state of being where the Lord is in charge.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord's state of being the king over all of us.
SPEAKER_00: And so the Latin word that's used at the end of the true Christian religion, when they're sent out to say that the kingdom of God will be forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: It has a similar meaning and a similar connotation to it.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's talking about this state of the Lord ruling over us and being king over us.
SPEAKER_00: And this is talking about a point at which we've already been through the first stage.
SPEAKER_00: We have made an intentional decision to follow the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We have gone to him in his word.
SPEAKER_00: We have learned the things that he has taught us.
SPEAKER_00: And now, on a spiritual level, it's time for us to ask the Lord to rule over us.
SPEAKER_00: To say, Lord, I don't want to live the way that I want to live.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to guide my steps.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to lead me forward and show me the way that I can walk that will lead me to heaven, that will lead me to happiness and peace in my life.
SPEAKER_00: And what's amazing about the teachings for the new church, this new revelation, the second coming of the Lord, is that for the first time we have everything we need to be able to walk on that path.
SPEAKER_00: For the first time, there is nothing that is left hidden for us.
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing that we have to just guess at.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord has given us all of the truth that we need.
SPEAKER_00: He has given us the tools, he has shown us the way.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's contained in the Word and in the heavenly doctrine.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why at the end of the book of Revelation, this book that tells about the prophecy of the coming of the new church, the coming of the revelation of this new doctrine, these new teachings from the Lord, it ends with this invitation that says, Anyone who hears, say come, and anyone who thirsts, come, and anyone who desires, let them take of the water of life freely.
SPEAKER_00: And in our reading this morning from the Apocalypse Revealed, which talks about the meaning of that section of the book of Revelation, it explained that the meaning of that is that when people learn about the Lord's coming, when they learn about the Lord's heaven and his church, that they should pray for the Lord to come.
SPEAKER_00: But that might seem kind of strange, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: Because if we know about it and we believe that the Lord already has come, why would we then have to pray for him to come again?
SPEAKER_00: Is the Lord asking us to pray for him to come a third time?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: The message in this is that when we learn the truths that the Lord has given us, when we see that the Lord is on our side and he is leading us towards goodness and happiness, that we can pray for the Lord to come into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: We can open ourselves to allow the Lord into our minds and into our hearts so that he can guide us, so that he can rule over us, so that he can lead us on the paths forward towards heavenly happiness, both in this life and in the next.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is the thread that connects all three of these.
SPEAKER_00: That when we see these three passages stacked together like this, we see a complete calling from the Lord to each one of us.
SPEAKER_00: From the first commission, sending his disciples out into the natural world to baptize, is calling each one of us to make an intentional decision to say, I want to follow the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I want to have a relationship with him.
SPEAKER_00: I want him in my life.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm going to go to the Lord in his word.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to seek his truths and his teachings so I can learn what he wants me to know.
SPEAKER_00: And once we do that, then we move to the second commission.
SPEAKER_00: We move to the spiritual level, where then it's time for us to ask the Lord to be our King, to reign over us, to say, I don't just want to study and understand these ideas.
SPEAKER_00: I want these ideas to lead and guide me in my life.
SPEAKER_00: I want them to set the path before me and show me the way that I need to live.
SPEAKER_00: And when we do that, when we make that commitment and we decide that we are ready to walk in the Lord's paths, then we can realize that there is nothing holding us back.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord has given us all of the teachings that we need.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is the main message of these commissions.
SPEAKER_00: But what's powerful about this is often when we think about the Great Commission, particularly the first Great Commission, at the end of the Gospel of Matthew, we often think about it as being a commission to go out and grow the church.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord sent his disciples into all the nations to baptize people.
SPEAKER_00: We have this idea that the commission is to go out and try to get people to sign on the dotted line and join the church and be a part of it.
SPEAKER_00: And that's a part of what all of this is.
SPEAKER_00: But the reality is that the message for each one of us is that the way that we grow the church, the way that we spread the message of the new church, is by answering the Lord's commission, each and every one of us, in our own minds, in our own hearts, and in our own choices.
SPEAKER_00: Because when we do this, when we make an intentional commitment to follow the Lord and we learn his teachings, when we ask the Lord to rule over us and we enter into his city and we follow him in our lives, what's going to happen?
SPEAKER_00: We are going to see our lives transformed.
SPEAKER_00: We are going to see the way that our relationships become stronger and deeper.
SPEAKER_00: Our friendships are greater.
SPEAKER_00: Our feeling that the Lord is with us every moment becomes clearer and clearer.
SPEAKER_00: We feel more peace, more happiness, more joy.
SPEAKER_00: And naturally, people will see that and they will wonder, what is it about you?
SPEAKER_00: How have you found this peace and this happiness in your life?
SPEAKER_00: Why is your marriage as strong as it is?
SPEAKER_00: Why are your friendships as deep and meaningful as they are?
SPEAKER_00: What is it that has helped you get to this point in your life?
SPEAKER_00: And it's at that point when people notice and they ask that we will be ready to share with them the good news of the Lord's first commission and his second commission.
SPEAKER_00: And we can share with them and say anyone who desires, they can take of the water of life freely.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.