Sunday, July 29, 2012

AC 3212 - being made new

AC 3212 [3-4]
When a person is being regenerated,
he is then becoming altogether another, and is being made new;
therefore also when he has been regenerated,
he is called "born again," and "created anew."
Then, although he has a similar face and a similar speech,
yet his mind is not similar;
his mind, when he is regenerate, is open toward heaven,
and there dwells within love to the Lord and charity toward his neighbor,
together with faith.
It is the mind that makes a person another, and a new person.
This change of state cannot be perceived in the body of a person,
but in his spirit,
the body being merely the covering of his spirit;
and when it is put off, then his spirit appears,
and this (provided he has been regenerated) in altogether another form,
for it then has the form of love and charity in beauty inexpressible . . ..

From this image it may in some measure be conceived
what the glorification of the Lord is.
He was not regenerated as a person is;
but became Divine,
and this from the very Divine Love itself,
for He was made the Divine Love itself.
What His form then was,
was made apparent to Peter, James, and John
when it was given them to see Him,
not with the eyes of the body but with the eyes of the spirit,
namely - that His countenance shone like the sun (Matt. 17:2);
and that this was His Divine Human
is evident from the voice which then came out of the cloud, saying,
"This is my beloved Son" (verse 5).

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