1. Survey of Teachings of the New Church Meant by the New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation

[Author’s Preface]

AFTER publishing, within the span of a few years, several larger and smaller works on the New Jerusalem (which means the new church that the Lord is going to establish), and after unveiling the Book of Revelation, I resolved to publish and bring to light the teachings of the [new] church in their fullness, and thus to present a body of teaching that was whole. But because this work was going to take several years, I developed a plan to publish an outline of it, to give people an initial, general picture of this church and its teachings. When a general overview precedes, all the details that follow, of however wide a range, stand forth in a clear light, because they each have their own place within the overall structure alongside things of the same type.

This briefing does not include detailed argumentation; it is shared as advance notice, because the points it contains will be fully demonstrated in the work itself.

First, however, I must present the teachings concerning justification as they exist today, in order to highlight the differences between the tenets of today’s church and those of the new church.

105. 25 Roman Catholics today are not at all aware that their church once embraced concepts of the assigning of Christ’s merit to us and of our justification by faith in that. These concepts lie completely buried beneath their external rituals of worship, which are many. Therefore if Catholics give up some of their external rituals, turn directly to God the Savior Jesus Christ, and take both elements in the Holy Eucharist, they are better equipped than Protestants to become part of the New Jerusalem, that is, the Lord’s new church.

10. Teachings from the Formula of Concord on original sin:

(a) Since the fall of Adam, all human beings who are propagated according to nature are born with sin, which condemns and brings eternal death to those who are not born anew. The merit of Christ is the sole means and instrument through which we are reborn, and therefore the only remedy by which we are healed (pages 9, 10, 52, 53, 55, 317, 641, 644, and the appendix, pages 138, 139).

(b) Original sin is a corruption of our nature at such a deep level that there is nothing spiritually sound left in the human body or soul or in their powers (page 574).

(c) It is the source of all other, actual sins (pages 317, 577, 639, 640, 942; appendix, page 139).

(d) It is the complete absence or lack of the image of God (page 640).

(e) A distinction must be maintained between our nature, as it was created by God, and the original sin that resides within our nature (page 645).

(f) The volume refers to original sin as the Devil’s work, spiritual poison, and the root of all evils, and says it is an “accident” and a “quality.” Our nature, on the other hand, is there referred to as the work and the creation of God; it is our person, substance, and essence. The volume gives as a comparison the distinction between the person who is infected with a disease and the disease itself.