the Lord is bringing about redemption again today. This new redemption
began in the year 1757 along with a Last Judgment that happened at that
time. The redemption has continued from then until now. The reason is
that today is the Second Coming of the Lord. A new church is being insti-
tuted that could not have been instituted unless first the hells were brought
under control and the heavens were restructured.
Because I have been allowed to see it all I could describe how the
hells were brought under control and how the new heaven was built and
put into the divine design, but that would be the subject of a whole
work. In a little work published in London in 1758 I did lay out how the
Last Judgment was carried out.
Gaining control over the hells, restructuring the heavens, and estab-
lishing a new church was redemption because without those actions no
human being could have been saved. In fact, they follow in a sequence.
The hells had to be controlled first before a new angelic heaven could be
formed, and that heaven had to be formed before the new church on
earth could be instituted, because people in the world are so closely con-
nected to angels from heaven and spirits from hell that at the level of the
inner mind they are one. This point will be taken up in the last chapter
of this book, which specifically covers the close of the age, the Coming of
the Lord, and the New Church [§§ 753 – 791 ].116 Many passages in the Word make it clear that while he was in the world
the Lord fought battles against the hells, conquered them, brought them
under control, and made them obedient to himself. I will extract just a few.
In Isaiah:
Who is this who comes from Edom, from Bozrah with his clothes
spattered, this one honorable in his clothing, walking in the magnitude
of his strength?
“It is I who speak with justice, great in order to give salvation.”
Why are your clothes reddish? Why are your clothes like those of
someone trampling in a winepress?
“I trampled the winepress alone. There was no man from the peo-
ple with me. Because I trampled people in my anger and stamped on
them in my rage, their victory was spattered on my clothes. For the day
of revenge was in my heart and the year of my redeemed had come. My
arm performed salvation for me. I made the enemies’ victory go down
into the ground.”
He said, “Behold those others are my people, my children.”