"Eternity in the Present?" (08/03/24)
"Behind the turmoils of nations which mark the course of history there runs unbroken the serene stream of Divine Providence. Behind the noise of arms, its show of force, the rise and fall of vaunted theories, and the competitions of
economic life with its contrasts of wealth and poverty, of struggle and security, there breathes the real life of humankind with its familiar story of simple joys and earnest endeavors, of kindliness and neighborly help; the story of love, of birth, of innocence, and of tender parental care, repeated in unending generations which all in turn display the same yearnings to explore and embrace the gifts of life and employ their human faculties to reach the greater freedom of reasoned
conduct. The triumph of the conqueror is brief. At length it is the meek that will inherit the earth." (Rev. Dr Hugo Lj. Odhner, NEW CHURCH LIFE, 1952)
It has not yet been realized that Divine Providence focuses on our eternal state at every step of our journey. It cannot focus on anything else because Divinity is infinite and eternal, and what is infinite or eternal (or Divine) is not in time. It therefore sees the whole future as present. Since this is the nature of Divinity, it follows that there is something eternal in everything it does, overall and in detail.
People who think in terms of time and space find this hard to grasp, though, not only because they love temporal matters but also because they think in terms of what is present to people in the world and not what is present to people
in heaven. This latter is as remote from them as the ends of the earth. However, people who are engaged with the Divine base their thinking on the Lord and are thinking in eternal terms even while they think about what is present to them; so they say to themselves, “What is anything that is not eternal? Aren’t temporal things nothing at all by comparison, and don’t they become nothing when they end?” What is eternal is different. It simply is because there is no limit to its being.
Thinking like this is thinking in terms of eternity even while we are thinking about what is present; and when we both think and live this way, then
emanating divinity with us, or divine providence, focuses on the state of our eternal life in heaven at every step of our journey, and is leading us to it. (Swedenborg, Divine Providence # 59)
