24. The Healing of the Nobleman’s Son (Jn 4:43-54)

John Chapter 4:43-54
But after the two days, He went out from there, and went away into Galilee. (44) For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own fatherland. (45) Therefore, when He came into Galilee, the Galileans received Him, seeing all things which He did in Jerusalem at the Feast. For they also went to the Feast. (46) Then Jesus came again to Cana of Galilee where He made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman whose son was sick in Capernaum. (47) Hearing that Jesus was coming from Judea into Galilee, this one went out to Him and asked Him that He would come and heal his son, for he was about to die. (48) Then Jesus said to him, Unless you see miraculous signs and wonders, you will not at all believe. (49) The nobleman said to Him, Sir, come down before my child dies. (50) Jesus said to him, Go! Your son lives. And the man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went away. (51) But already, as he was going down, his slaves met him and reported, saying, Your child lives. (52) He then asked from them the hour in which he had gotten better. And they said to him, Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him. (53) Then the father knew that it was at that hour in which Jesus said to him, Your son lives. And he himself, and his whole house, believed. (54) Again, this second miraculous sign Jesus did, coming from Judea into Galilee.

Apocalypse Explained 815 by Emanuel Swedenborg
The Lord healed [the nobleman’s son] and others according to their faith, because the first and primary thing of the church then to be established was to believe that the Lord is God Almighty, for without that faith no church could have been established. For the Lord was the God of heaven and the God of earth, with whom no conjunction is possible except by an acknowledgment of His Divinity, which acknowledgment is faith. The [nobleman in coming to the Lord]… acknowledged Him to be God Almighty…all the diseases healed by the Lord represented and thus signified the spiritual diseases that correspond to these natural diseases; and spiritual diseases can be healed only by the Lord, and in fact by looking to His Divine omnipotence and by repentance of life…the faith by which spiritual diseases are healed by the Lord can only be given through truths from the Word and a life according to them; the truths themselves and the life itself according to them make the quality of the faith…he who is in faith from the Lord asks for nothing but what contributes to the Lord’s kingdom and to himself for salvation; other things he does not wish, saying in his heart, Why should I ask for what does not contribute to this use? Therefore if he were to ask for anything except what it is granted him from the Lord to ask he would have no faith of God, that is, no faith from the Lord. It is impossible for angels of heaven to wish and so to ask for anything else, and if they were to do so they could have no faith that they would receive it.


 

We have seen that the main geographical regions of the land of Canaan correspond to the different levels of life within a person. And we have been following the Lord’s journey from Jerusalem in Judea to Sychar of Samaria and now we see a movement from Samaria to Cana of Galilee. The activity in Judea, which represents the affections of the will, was centred on baptism, whereas the activity in Samaria largely took place around a conversation at the well and now on entering Galilee we have the activity of a miraculous sign being performed.

Here in a summary form is a picture of the process by which divine truth makes its way from what is more interior within a person into the external levels of their life. It begins with the Lord as the divine truth being active within the human mind. In the beginning was the Word says the opening verse of John’s gospel – from which we learn that all beginnings in spiritual life and growth are initiated by the divine good coming forth as the perception of truth within the human mind.

In the Lord’s descent from Judea to Galilee we have illustrated the same process of incarnation outlined in the opening chapter of the Word becoming flesh and His glory being revealed. Only here the principles are connected more directly to the processes of our regeneration. In the order of descent, form Judea to Galilee we have described how the Lord reveals His power in our life and our part in that process. In the disciples baptising in Judea we have illustrated the need to use truths to have our affections purified. What prevents us from seeing the Lord as the Word are the falsities that cling to the evils in our life and unless these are removed we will struggle to see Him. We can see this illustrated in our own experience.

When we are caught up in more extreme external emotional states, when negative emotions rise up and really get hold of our faculties we enter into a kind of temporary insanity as our perspective becomes wrapped and we can’t see beyond our own hurt, or anger, or disappointment. When we allow such emotions to take control we are unable to think clearly or rationally, in other words we fail to see what truth is applicable in the situation because we can’t get in touch with what is good. And as the Lord is both truth and good, our inability to connect with these in the midst of our emotional storm is an inability to connect with the Lord. Our evils blind us to His presence with us.

What is not so easy to see is how this works on a deeper level. There are more deep seated beliefs in the natural man that are simply false and they serve to hide us from seeing the evils of our proprium or they prevent us from seeing the extent and true nature of our selfish tendencies. It is this state of deception that prevents us seeing the Lord as the Word, the Lord in each other, and the Lord’s presence and care in ALL our circumstances and situations.

One of the important functions of Divine revelation is to make us aware of this state of our inner life because in and of ourselves we are blind to it. But Divine revelation is useless to us, if we don’t recognise that it is in fact the Lord Himself with us. We have to give the Word and the Heavenly Doctrines divine status in our life if we want to see the transforming power of Lord’s love released into our life.

Why? Because Divine Revelation teaches us how things really are inwardly. And how it really is, is not how our proprium sees things, and until we acknowledge that the Word and Doctrines are the Lord we are at the mercy of our proprium’s judgement as to what we will accept or not accept from it. It is not for us to sit in judgement of the Word and the Heavenly Doctrines, whether they agree with how we see things or not. We have to realise that in spiritual matters we are blind and until we see the Word is the light that opens our understanding we will continue to walk in the darkness of our own self intelligence and pride. We have to be prepared to let go of our own ideas and learn to see things from the Lord’s perspective.

Our willingness to do this enables the Lord to enter our life because we are then open to what the Word and the Doctrines teach concerning ourselves and when we take the Word and Heavenly Doctrines into our life and live from them we are effectively taking the Lord into our life.

Can we not now see that it is this willingness to allow truths to begin to work in our life that initiates a baptism or cleansing of our affections? This attitude of willingness and openness enables the Lord to draw to Himself those affections for good and truth that He had planted within our minds and as these come forth into consciousness we are given new motivations and desires that orientate our minds in a favourable way toward heavenly modes of life. This is what is spiritually described in the baptism of many in Judea by the Lord’s disciples.

As new motivations and desires begin to awaken within we are then given the ability to recognise the difference between what is of the Lord and what is of self. This desire for what is higher, given to us by the Lord causes the mind to begin to clarify its thought structures, its beliefs and ideas concerning what living a spiritual life means for us in real terms. We develop a need for understanding this better and so we find we have a growing thirst for the Word and the Heavenly doctrines which contain the words of life. In these we are give what can satisfy our deepest yearnings. In Judea the focus was on the purification of the affections for what is good, but once we begin to look to the Word to build our understanding we move into a states involving the development of truths in our minds and this was what was represented by the Lord being by the well in Samaria, for a well or fountain corresponds to the Word and doctrine. Here, for the well of the Word we learn what love is, we learn that the spiritual life is a balance between knowing and doing and that just seeking to satisfy a purely intellectual hunger is not enough, that we need to respond to truth as a matter of life.

Here, in the Samaritan woman, is illustrated the awakening of an affection for truth that is orientated towards good or a desire to be useful and this naturally follow through into a desire to bring what is of the Lord into the most external reaches of our life, into its thoughts and its affections. So now, moving into the more external natural part of the mind where this can be realised, we have the Lord going into Galilee, the region of Canaan that corresponds to the good of life.

For a person to become spiritual the natural level of mind has to be regenerated. This means that the Lord has to rule there with authority and with power. The statement that, “a prophet is without honour in his own land” reveals the state of this level of mind in relation to spiritual influence. For a prophet is the mouth piece of God and as such represents what the Lord teaches through doctrine. The natural mind is inherently resistant to the authority of spiritual teaching, for it calls us to account, asks us to face our states of brokenness and fragmentation and to cast ourselves upon the Lord. A prophet or teaching is honoured when it is obeyed and lived by.

In the Lord stating that a prophet is without honour in his own country, He is saying that dependence on our natural faculties means there is a struggle to get beyond a natural understanding of the Word. That we will struggle to get beyond its literal meanings to see its spiritual meaning. For to enter into the spirit of the Word is not an intellectual exercise. It is an exercise of the will or response to truth, a willingness to take these things into our life, for when they are in our life then the spiritual sight can be opened.

To have spiritual insight is to have an understanding of what lies within the Word and this comes from living from it. We can see this in the fact that the preparation for the Lord being received in Galilee began at a feast in Jerusalem which is in Judea which is as we have seen relates to the will or affections. We read of this preparation…

(45) Therefore, when He came into Galilee, the Galileans received Him, seeing all things which He did in Jerusalem at the Feast. For they also went to the Feast.

Feasts played an important part in Jewish religious life. Because they were times of festivity focussed on the Lord and involved the taking in of food and drink for the body they corresponded to the reception of the life the Lord offers as the Word or food and drink for our spiritual life. The Galileans represents those aspects of ourselves that are open to taking in goods and truths from the Word in the natural level of our minds. They have a connection to Jerusalem or celestial teachings and so are able to receive the influx of the Lord life. To affirm truths and live from them is to be at the feast, for spiritually to feast is to take truths into the life so that the goodness in them is released to nourish our spirits. The Galilean elements in us are built up and we are made receptive to the Lord on the more external plane of our life when on a deeper level we have cultivated a desire for the practise of heavenly things. From this there develops an ability to recognise and receive the Lord which is to see Him in the Word and the Heavenly Doctrines.

When we are in Galilee we are in the realm of useful activity that has spiritual ends in view. This desire to see spiritual principles as the mode of life we live from, in all that we do, down to the very externals of life, is what brings the Lord into this lower sphere of the mind. In the literal sense of the Word it is described as Him returning to Cana of Galilee, the place where He changed water into wine, or where a natural understanding of the Word is transformed into something spiritual. This is the point of meeting, the point of spiritual transformation and power in the natural levels of existence and for all of us it hangs on how we see and understand the Word.

The precursor to the Lord’s presence in Cana was the confession of those in Samaria, this is the Christ. The Word is the Christ. Without seeing this the Lord remains distant for us, we see Him as someone separated from the very Word we have in our possession, and we don’t appreciate just how close He is to us. Cana is the place of marriage, the place where love and wisdom comes together in uses that look to spiritual wholeness in our life and the life of others.

A desire that looks to the spiritual well being of others is married to the Lord’s own desire for the salvation of the human race and when this is becoming something more conscious in the natural man then the state of mind is called Cana. It is a state in which the Lord is present and active within a person. Our desire to be more loving and understanding is captured in the coming to the Lord of the nobleman whose son is sick in Capernaum. If you recall Capernaum has a double meaning, it means field of consolation and it also means field of repentance. To be consoled in spiritual matters is to see our desire for spiritual loves to rule over natural selfish loves fulfilled. This is only possible through repentance, or metanoia, which literally means “change of mind”. This place of transformation is Cana and it is to Cana that the nobleman is drawn. For he hears that the Lord is coming from Judea into Galilee. This nobleman is our desire for the Lord to be present in the lowest levels of our life, and because he is said to hear of the Lord, he represents our obedience to the understanding of truths we have, for in the Word to hear spiritually is to obey.

The literal story gives us insight into the process whereby the Lord is able to bring His life down into us. First there must be a recognition of our state of life without Him. Because the nobleman represents our desire to have goodness rule in our life he also represents our sensitivity to our short comings in this area. He is our perception that all is not well, and that our tendency to live our own life apart from the Lord means that the truths we have are on the verge of dying.

This is the son caught in the clutches of a fever. The fever corresponds to a lack of goodness due to active selfish tendencies that need to be removed from our life. These lusts or evils feverishly undermine our spiritual health and well being by drawing our attention away from the Word as the rule for living a spiritual life. The son represents truths that need to be brought into connection with the Lord so that we can apply ourselves to the tasks of self examination and repentance on this more external plane of life. This can be seen from the fact that the son is in Capernaum or the field of repentance.

Without our own acknowledgement of our state of spiritual sickness the Lord can’t do anything for us, for we don’t see that we have any need for Him. It is the father that seeks the Lord out because the father represents a will for good and it is this that seeks out the truth expressed in his urging the Lord to come down, or in those being regenerated it is a desire for the Lord to descend into the more external areas of life where His presence is needed if a person is to become regenerate.

To acknowledge our own states of selfishness is the first step to recovery and wholeness. This acknowledgement can only be made from the light that the Word and the Heavenly doctrines shines upon our own states, and its an acknowledgement that comes from a recognition that the Word alone has the power to heal every spiritual ailment.

What draws the Lord and the sick son, or the Word and our finite understanding of truth into connection is the father or desire for goodness. In this father coming to the Lord we have pictured representatively our need to come to the Word by acknowledging that all good and truth is from the Lord alone. This acknowledgement is a recognition in life that God is the Word and that it alone can penetrate to the depths of our being and so bring healing to the trouble minds of all human beings. We are explicitly told in the opening verses of John’s Gospel that God is the Word. When this is truly seen we have the beginnings of a genuine new church within the mind of a person and it is this faith that will see the Lord respond to our request saying…

Go! Your son lives…

In these words we see that when the Word is acknowledged and we give it its rightful place in our life then those truths that lacked the power of life receive into themselves the influx of the Lord’s own life and a new quality of faith or belief is born within the heart, where upon the father and all his house believed.

Amen.

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