Sermon: Moses and Regeneration
Pittsburgh New Church
November 3, 2019
Rev. Calvin Odhner
We’ve been talking about the children of Israel, how they came into the Land of Egypt, into the land of Goshen, and what a land it was!
Egypt was a place of great knowledge—they built pyramids, the sphinx-the largest statue of its time, amazing artwork, gold inlaid mummies, artifacts of incredible talent!
Long ago the ancient churches were there and these even had communication with heaven. Their worship was full of beautiful correspondences, we read
[3]…Divine things present themselves in the world by correspondences…the Word has been written exclusively by means of them. The Lord spoke by correspondences, because He spoke from His Divine, for that which is from the Divine, descending into nature, is turned into such things as correspond to Divine things. (Doctrine for sacred scripture 20:3)
The Egyptian hieroglyphics are nothing else but correspondences from the spiritual world! See if you can decode some of them!
This story of Moses’ birth is how the Lord is born in our mind by means of the internal man. Just as the Lord was born into a harsh environment Moses too was in danger. The children of Israel had entered into the land of Goshen just as the elementary truths and memory knowledges enter into our mind from the internal man. These truths are placed there by the Lord until they are ready to receive good from the internal man, good that will lead us to the beginning of regeneration.
This endeavor of the Lord to enter into every person is incredibly powerful! But you’ve seen in everywhere! When you lift up a piece of plywood and there’s a plant growing underneath it. When it looks like a tree is growing right out of a rock, this powerful force comes from the Divine through the internal man into our minds. You have witnessed how a son looks like his father! or even how a son can even look like his grandfather.
We read
…the inmost of life, which is from the father, is continually flowing and working into the external, which is from the mother, and is in the effort to make this like itself, even in the womb, can be seen from sons, in that they are born into the disposition of the father, and sometimes grandsons and great-grandsons into that of the grandfather and great grandfather. (AC 6716)
This is how the Lord was able to be born like any other man but from his Father become Divine. This flow from the internal man can get blocked off if we work at it hard enough and this is what happened to the Egyptians of that time. The Egyptians’ spiritual struggle was that they believed that life was from themselves rather than they are a vessel and all life is from the Lord.
The whole universe! All the planets with infinite humans on them of all shapes and sizes, no matter how far away they are, receive the Divine that proceeds from the Lord. This is Life. These are the goods and truths from the Divine Love and Divine Wisdom that create the order you see in the natural world and the order we have in our minds. But when man gets confused, we read and
believe that all things are blind flowings, and that if there comes forth anything that has been determined, it is of his own prudence, he perverts order; for he applies to himself the things of order with a view to taking care only of himself, and not of his neighbor, except insofar as his neighbor favors him. (AC 6692)
This perversion of order, believe it or not, has a strange effect and is what leads to magic! For what is magic, but something that looks one way but really is another—its craftiness. We read
Hence, wonderful to say, all who have firmly impressed on themselves that all things are of their own prudence, and nothing of the Divine providence, are in the other life very prone to magic… (AC 6692:2)
There is actually a place called the “hell of the magicians.” Just so you know how “into it” the Egyptians were, below this “magician hell” is another world, where the Egyptians of that time were full of magic.
Speaking of magic, just imagine if I had a match in my hand and I wanted it to disappear (performing magic trick). Magic is deception by craft and it gets stronger the more we believe life is from ourselves.
1. And there went a man from the house of Levi, and took a daughter of Levi.
2. And the woman conceived, and bare a son; and she saw him, that he was good, and she hid him three months.
3. And she could no longer hide him; and she took for him an ark of rush,
Baby Moses represents the Word and he was laid in a little ark made of rushes, which represent simple truths. How does the Lord enter into our life? Through those simple truths—being kind to others, helping people in need, remembering to call someone who’s hurting. These simple truths are the basis and beginning of a spiritual life.
and daubed it with bitumen and with pitch;
Bitumen and pitch represent our minds which are a mix of good and evil.
We read
When a man is being reformed, he is kept by the Lord as to his internal in good and truth, but as to his external he is let into his evils and falsities, consequently among infernal spirits who are in these evils and falsities. These hover round him, and endeavor by every method to destroy him.
Is there anything that you can imagine that could look more precarious than a baby in a homemade reed boat floating down a river? Yet, this is the picture the Lord gives us of our spiritual condition before regeneration starts. It looks as though we don’t have a chance and yet the Lord protects us from deep within the internal man every moment. We read
…the good and truth which flow in through the internal render him so safe that the infernal spirits cannot do him the least harm; for that which acts inwardly prevails immeasurably over that which acts outwardly;
(AC 6724:2)
And Pharaoh’s daughter came down to wash at the river;…
And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews’
children. And his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, Shall I go and call
thee a woman, a nurse…..And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, Go.
It is our affection for knowledge that creates the basis of our rational mind. Without knowledge we have picked up along the way, truth would have nothing to attach itself to. In our curiosity for learning these truths, displayed by Pharaohs daughter, she asks “what’s in the basket?” which leads to our discovery of the Divine in the Word. We read
factual knowledge is what those who are being regenerated must learn first, for that knowledge is the groundwork for things that compose the understanding, and the understanding is what receives the truth of faith (AC 6750)
As our internal man continually seeks to come forward into our rational, the stages of regeneration commence in our lives. Can we assist in this process? This week seek out those moments of quiet reflection, where you can hear the voice of the Lord. Find a quiet place to have that conversation so that you may feel the presence of the Lord.
1. And there went a man from the house of Levi, and took a daughter of Levi.
2. And the woman conceived, and bare a son; and she saw him, that he was good, and she hid him three months.
Amen. Let us pray