THE DOCTRINE OF LIFE (pt. 24)

THE DOCTRINE OF LIFE
for the
NEW JERUSALEM
FROM THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
Emanuel Swedenborg
— Doctrinal Series —
(pt. 24)
IN PROPORTION AS A MAN SHUNS EVILS AS SINS,
IN THE SAME PROPORTION HE DOES GOODS,
NOT FROM HIMSELF BUT FROM THE LORD.

And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. (John 3:19-21)

i. If a man wills and does goods before he shuns evils as sins, the goods are not good.
This is because, as already said, he is not in the Lord before he does so.

For example:  if a man gives to the poor, renders aid to the needy, contributes to places of worship and to hospitals, renders good service to the church, his country, and his fellow-citizens, teaches the Gospel and makes converts, does justice in his judgments, acts with sincerity in business, and with uprightness in his works; and yet makes no account of evils as being sins, such as fraud, adultery, hatred, blasphemy, and other like evils, then he can do only such goods as are evil within, because he does them from himself and not from the Lord, and therefore self is in them and not the Lord, and the goods in which is a man's self are all defiled with his evils, and have regard to himself and the world.

And yet these very deeds that have just been enumerated are inwardly good if the man shuns evils as sins (such as fraud, adultery, hatred, blasphemy, and other like evils), because in this case he does them from the Lord, and they are said to be "wrought in God" (John 3:19-21).

(LIFE 24)