From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!” (Matthew 4:17)
Readings
Deuteronomy 30:11–14
My word is very near to you
Now what I am commanding you today is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away. It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will go up to heaven for us to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may do it?” Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross to the other side of the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may do it?” For the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may do it.
Matthew 3:1–3
The kingdom of heaven is near
In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!” This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: “A voice of one calling in the desert, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord; make his paths straight.’”
Matthew 4:12–17
The kingdom of heaven is near
When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the seacoast in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali—to fulfill what was said by the prophet Isaiah:
Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, along the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles—the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light; on those who sat in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.
From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!”
Matthew 10:1, 5–8
The kingdom of heaven is near
He called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority over evil spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and sickness. . . . Jesus sent these twelve out with the following instructions: “Do not go among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans. Go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven is near.’ Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.”
Heaven and Hell #302
Our close connection with heaven
I have talked with angels about the union of heaven with the human race, and have told them that people in the church do say that everything good is from the Lord and that there are angels with us, but that very few people actually believe that angels are so close to us, much less that they are in our thoughts and feelings. . . .
Yet in fact the union is so vital that we could not think the least thought apart from the spirits who are with us. Our spiritual life depends on this. . . . And if this connection were severed, we would instantly drop down dead.
If we believed the way things really are, that everything good comes from God, and everything evil from hell, then we would not take credit for the good within us, nor take blame for the evil. Whenever we thought or did anything good, we would focus on the Lord; and any evil that flowed in we would throw back into the hell it came from. But since we do not believe in any inflow from heaven or from hell, and therefore believe that everything we think and intend is in us and from us, we make the evil our own, and defile the good with a feeling that we deserve it.
Reflection
From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!” (Matthew 4:17)
Most of the people living on this earth probably do not spend a lot of time thinking about heaven. In fact, I would venture to say that even for religious people, heaven is not a primary subject of everyday thought. Most of the time, we are too busy focusing on getting along in this world to have much time left over for contemplating the other world.
Of course, there are certain times when we spend more time thinking about the afterlife, such as when we have lost someone close to us. And if it is someone in our own household and our own immediate family that we have lost, our thoughts may linger in heaven much more. After all, when a piece of our heart is in heaven, our mind will naturally follow our feelings of love and closeness to the one who is no longer with us.
Yet for most of us, heaven is something far off, over the horizon. In our younger years death is usually far from our minds. It is something that happens to old people. As far as we’re concerned, our own death is so far away that it’s not even worth thinking about. Even in the middle years of our lives, we are usually so busy with work, family, and community responsibilities that our minds are very firmly anchored in this world.
Our elder years, as we move closer to death, would naturally be a time to think about what comes next. But especially in this culture, many people avoid thinking about death as long possible. For many of us, I’m afraid, it is only when death is staring us right in the face that we start thinking seriously about what might come next.
The fact is, none of us knows what the day of our death will be. We probably have in our mind some estimate of how long we’re going to live; and as we go about our daily lives, we presume we’ll have about that much time left to accomplish what we want to accomplish here. As long as we are young, it seems very likely that we will be able to do a lot of great things with our lives, and we may go out into the world with great idealism.
It is often only when we have left the halfway mark of our lives behind that we realize there simply won’t be enough time to follow all our dreams—and that we are no longer quite as healthy and adventurous as we used to be, anyway. We may then make some wild attempts to grasp something of heaven for ourselves right here. A new sports car. A new face. A new career. A new husband or wife. Time is running out, we realize, and if we are going to experience any of our dreams, we’d better get going before it’s too late!
Sooner or later, though, as another decade or two goes by, we reluctantly realize that most of our life is behind us. Yet we may still be able to do some wonderful things here on earth. Even if we are not physically as strong as we once were, our retirement years can give us some of the precious time to ourselves that we never had enough of before. In that time, we can choose to follow some of the interests and dreams that before would have been impossible. We can also have the pleasure of watching the younger generations coming along, without so much pressure of responsibility keeping us from savoring each moment we spend with those whose bodies are as young as their minds, and who are still full of wonder at the miracles happening all around us.
For many in the older generation, all of this is enough to keep the mind, most of the time, off of the inevitable approach of death and our entrance into whatever comes next. But for all of us, the time will come when, quite literally, “the kingdom of heaven is near.” However long or short our life on earth may turn out to be, from the moment of our birth there is one fact that cannot be avoided: each one of us will die.
When we do die, if all the prophets, mystics, and other travelers into the spiritual realm are right, our lives will continue uninterrupted in a world that is both above and within this earthly world. And whatever our outward accomplishments may have been in this world, in that world only our inner character will count. If we have devoted our lives here on earth to gaining possessions, pleasure, and power, without developing the inner qualities of understanding, kindness, and love for our fellow human beings, that inner emptiness will follow us into the other world. We will find out too late that we have “gained the whole world, and lost our own soul” (Matthew 16:26).
The course we set for ourselves here on earth continues into the other life. Once we leave our physical body and the material world behind, our direction becomes set, and we can no longer change course. To quote “The Teacher,” King Solomon: “Whether a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where it falls, there will it lie” (Ecclesiastes 11:3).
Now we begin to see the force of the words spoken by John the Baptist, by the Lord himself, and by his disciples when they went out to preach the good news: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!” The word “repent” may be a little old-fashioned, but it simply means to change our attitudes, change our direction, change our ways. It means to turn away from the direction in which we have been going so far, and start out in a different direction. It means to aim our lives toward the things of God and spirit instead of toward the things of this world.
When we realize that our entrance into the kingdom of heaven (or into the other place) is getting closer and closer, these words gain more and more weight for us. As we grow older and wiser, we begin to realize that the things of this world can never satisfy us. We begin to think that perhaps we should turn away from temporary, material things and toward the eternal, spiritual things of love, wisdom, understanding, and compassion for the people who share our world with us. We begin to realize that the kingdom of heaven is near, and it is time to turn our lives toward preparing ourselves not just for life in this world, but for eternal life in the spiritual world. Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!
Yet there is another sense in which the kingdom of heaven is far closer to us than the day of our death. The Lord tells us in our reading from Deuteronomy:
Now what I am commanding you today is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away. It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will go up to heaven for us to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may do it?” Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross to the other side of the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may do it?” For the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may do it.
In terms of time, we tend to think of heaven as something for a future time, and not as a present reality. In terms of space, we tend to think of heaven as something far above us, and not as something right here within us. And yet, the Lord tells us that his word, which comes down through heaven, is not at some great distance in heaven where it is inaccessible to us. No, it is very close to us. It is in our hearts, in our minds, right in our own mouths, where we can feel it and know it and express it to one another. And like the Lord’s words, the kingdom of heaven is not some distant, abstract dream. In Luke 17:20–21 we read:
Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation, nor will people say, ‘Here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For the kingdom of God is within you.”
We think of heaven as a place where we go after we die. But do we think of it as something that is with us right now? Swedenborg tells us that even while we are living here on earth, we are inwardly inhabiting the spiritual world. He says that we have both good spirits and evil spirits with us all the time, influencing our feelings and desires, and through them our thoughts. In fact, if we did not have this connection to the spiritual world, our minds would go completely blank, and we would not feel a thing in our hearts. Further, if we lost our connection to the spiritual world, we could not even continue to live; we would instantly drop down dead. This is what Jesus was referring to when he said to Pilate, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above” (John 19:11).
Whether we want to believe it or not, all of our power, all of our thoughts, all of our desires come from the spiritual world every instant. Our very life, our very bodies, are continually held in existence from the spiritual world. So it is not only when we approach our death that the kingdom of heaven is near. The kingdom of heaven is always near, in our heart and in our mouth, calling to us, bending our will—but never breaking our will and forcing us—toward God and heaven. We are continually in the hands of both good spirits and bad, continually in a balance between heaven and hell, so that we can freely choose which path we will take—and in which direction we want the tree of our life to fall whenever we do, in the course of time, cross the threshold of death and enter fully into the spiritual world.
We are not merely creatures of this world. Right now we are living in the spiritual world as well. And if we can keep this in mind as we go about our daily lives, it will help us to stay focused on the things that really matter. It will help us to focus each day and each moment, not only on the things of this world, but on the higher, more beautiful, enlightening, and loving things that lead to eternal life.
Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!
(This post is the second chapter in my book, On Earth as it is In Heaven, originally published in 2005. For a description and Table of Contents, please click here. This material is copyright 2005 by Lee Woofenden.)
To review or purchase On Earth as it is In Heaven in paperback on Amazon, click here.
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Lee Woofenden is an ordained minister, writer, editor, translator, and teacher. He enjoys taking spiritual insights from the Bible and the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg and putting them into plain English as guides for everyday life.
Spiritual Insights for Everyday Life 
Hey Lee, hope you’re doing well.
Just wanted to ask if you’ve ever heard of Edgar Cayce and what your thoughts were about him.
Hi Moore,
Yes, I’ve heard of Edgar Cayce, though I am not all that familiar with his writings. An Edgar Cayce follower joined the Swedenborgian congregation I was pastor of in Massachusetts, though she mostly did not bring up her Edgar Cayce beliefs in the church. She thought his views were compatible with Swedenborg’s. I don’t know enough about Cayce to say whether or not that’s so.
In general, I’m not in favor of spiritism and using mediums. You really don’t know who you’re connected with on the other side. There are deceiving spirits who can impersonate people, and provide false information. It’s not necessarily all bad, but it is risky. Many people have gained many mistaken ideas from listening to communications from spirits. For more on this issue, please see:
What about Spiritualism? Is it a Good Idea to Contact Spirits?
Hi Lee alot of people when it comes to Ufos , sasquatches and various paranormal monsters and such obviosuly make say they are physical however all the evidence points to them being like Thought forms or sentinent hallucinations which is in line with what swedenborg would say regarding spirits influencing hallucinations but when it comes to say Ufo abudctions or in ages past things like fairies abducting people and such i know its not physically happening but do you think swedenborg would say that these events like alien/fairie abductions, lucid dreaming, OBEs and such are taking place in the world of spirits as to me they would not take place in any of the heavens or hell so i can only assume its the world of spirits as so many people are left thinking its physically happening as it feels so real and it feels like they are still in the world and that reminded me when swedenborg said that there is literally minimal difference between our physical world and the world of spirits that some people do not know the difference , what are your thoughts ?
Also i have a really long comment which is more a kind of congratulations and a thank you to what you do and have done for people and how its affected me and my own kinda story ,
Is it best to leave it on here or email it to yourself ?
Hi AJ749,
If these UFO and abduction experiences happen entirely in the spiritual world, then yes, most likely they would take place in the world of spirits, not in heaven or hell. That’s because our closest connection with the spiritual world while we are living in the material world is with the world of spirits, which, as you say, is in a state similar to our mixed state here on earth.
This does not necessarily mean that these experiences take place “in the streets of the world of spirits,” so to speak. More likely they would take place in the equivalent of a spiritual movie theater. In other words, these aren’t experiences of the ordinary life that we have in the spiritual world after we die. Rather, they are psychological dramas played out in the theater of our spiritual mind, and perceived by our spiritual senses.
Another possibility is that they are experiences in which things perceived with people’s spiritual senses are superimposed on their surroundings in the material world as perceived by their physical senses.
In is perfectly possible for our spiritual senses and our physical senses to both be operating at the same time. Swedenborg commonly had the experience of being simultaneously conscious in the spiritual world and the material world. For example, he writes of attending an acquaintance’s funeral while he was speaking with the deceased person in the spiritual world.
Swedenborg, of course, was aware of the difference between the spiritual world and the physical world. He was able to distinguish what was coming to him via his physical senses from what was coming to him via his spiritual senses. An ordinary person, however, who was not used to having spiritual experiences, might not be able to tell the difference.
Consider, for example, the various angel visitations to people in the Bible. Abraham saw three men visiting him at the door of his tent. He had Sarah cook them a meal, and they ate it in his presence, and then had a conversation with him. It quickly becomes apparent in the story that these are not ordinary human visitors, but are messengers (“angels”) sent from God. So what was going on here? It could have happened entirely in the spiritual world. But more likely, I think, he was seeing the angels with his spiritual eyes, and hearing them with his spiritual ears, and that experience was being superimposed on his material surroundings—the door of his tent, his flocks and herds, the landscape, and so on. How the angels were able to eat a meal of physical food prepared for them I cannot say. Perhaps the incident did take place entirely in the spiritual world. But it seems likely that Abraham and Sarah were seeing spiritual beings with their spiritual senses while their physical senses were still seeing their ordinary surroundings.
The same could be said for Mary seeing the angel or angels at Jesus’ empty tomb, and of many other appearances of spiritual beings to people in the Bible, who are described as visiting people in their ordinary earthly surroundings.
This could be how people out on a walk in the dark of night look up and see a UFO in the sky. They are seeing their ordinary earthly surroundings with their physical eyes. But they are also seeing something with the eyes of their mind, meaning their spiritual eyes, superimposed upon those physical surroundings. The same could be said for UFO abductions, and so on. Perhaps the experience is a mix of physical sensations and spiritual sensations. After all, our spiritual body has all of the senses that our physical body has, including touch, taste, and smell as well as sight and hearing.
What is actually happening in any particular case I cannot say. But the human body and mind/spirit are complex, and they have a complex interaction with one another. It is quite possible that many of these experiences don’t take place entirely in the spiritual world, but are a mix of spiritual experiences and physical sensations.
About your long comment, if it’s something you want other people to see, you are welcome to post it in one of the comments sections here. But if it’s something intended for my eyes only, feel free to send it to me directly by email.
Hi Lee i think i will email yourself if thats okay, i do have one question,
As ive seen in the comments and in other articles you mention about peoples physical and spiritual senses overlapping so even in the physical world we can see spiritual things such as angel visitation in the bible where the prophets could not distinguish the angels from a physical being. From what i have found out which i will explain more in my email this sounds like it would perfectly describe UFOs, alien abudction, sasquatch, demon and other paranormal being sightings. As everyone who describes them sees them as being physical as they cant distinuish from physical reality and yet it would also explain the various paranormal activites that would seem to defy our physical physics.
As you say it can be indistinguishable from reality so you couldnt tell these people were not of this world, which is what Psychologist turned swedenborgian Wilson van dusen discovered in his patients.
My question though is How is the protective barrier people have broken?
as you say kinder spirits/angels can materialise from people who have faith and positvely open to spiritual truths but what about the negative experiences with spirits / aliens, monsters etc how is the barrier broken so that they see negative things.
Obviously people who invite spirits will recieve more negative entitys but can say occult rituals break this barrier ?
Hi AJ749,
Yes, occult rituals can pierce the veil that usually keeps our spiritual senses closed while we are living here on earth. Any activity that involves seeking contact with spiritual beings, whether good ones or bad ones, can pierce that veil if the people engaging in that activity are open to spiritual influences.
It can also be pierced by hallucinogenic drugs, though the experiences people have under their influence are distorted, and are not experiences of the spiritual world as it actually is. Some strong medical drugs can also pierce the veil. After all, many hallucinogens and other hard drugs started out as medical drugs, and some are still used in medical practice. Once again, spiritual experiences that take place under their influence will be distorted, because the drug is affecting the person’s brain, to which the person’s spirit is still connected while it is dwelling in the physical body.
Of course, it can be pierced by close brushes with death, when our spirit begins to separate from the body, but does so only partially and temporarily rather than fully as it does when we die permanently.
It can also be pierced by mental illnesses, whether they are physically induced or whether they result from a series of bad choices on a person’s part, or a combination of both.
And, persistently making bad choices can in itself invite the presence of evil spirits that may sometimes show themselves when the person’s mind is susceptible to it, as in times of great fear and panic.
This is not an exhaustive list, but these are some of the circumstances under which people will see or sense spirits around them, and have some glimpse of the spiritual realm—though usually not a normal view of it such as Swedenborg had for many years.
On the positive side, sometimes God will send angels to visit people when there is a need for it, or it will do some good. Not all spiritual encounters are negative. Many of them are very positive, and change people’s lives for the better.
Hi lee agreed there are countless stories of positive visions by angels, rounding back to Occult rituals, if ancient rituals like sacrificial rituals and others that need specific steps like animal parts and so forth can bring about negative spirits / devils can specific entities be called upon ?
So basically like there are angels called gabriel who as swedenborg describes is actually a community of angels can certain groups of devils who may have a biblical name be called up on with the right ritual ?
Hi AJ749,
The external, physical rituals with animal body parts and such are mostly for externally-minded people who do also have a belief in spirits and spiritual influences. But in the mind of those people, the spirits are often almost physical beings. Hence stories of fairies, goblins, leprechauns, and so on that are believed to inhabit the physical realms, not the spiritual realms.
For a spiritual-minded person, there is no need to have physical reminders, such as the liver of a donkey, to connect with spiritual entities. Those physical reminders are there to remind physical-minded people of the spiritual things that correspond to them, whether good or evil.
So in physical-minded cultures of the past, and similar physical-minded cultures of the present who also believe in the presence of spirit beings and forces, those rituals have meaning and power. But for Christians who live in the spirit of Christ, and not in the physical-minded superstitions that have often taken their place in historical Christianity, there is no need for such rituals. That is why the Temple sacrifices were ended only a few decades after Christ came, as the Christian church was beginning to be established in the place of Judaism as God’s leading religion on earth.