124.
Since many in the church to-day lack any belief in life after death, and almost all belief in heaven and in the Lord as the God of heaven and earth, I have had the interiors of my spirit opened by the
Lord, so that I can, while remaining in the body, be together with angels in heaven, not only talking with them, but seeing the astonishing sights of heaven and describing them. This may prevent them
afterwards asking, who has come from heaven to us and reported on its existence and what it contains? But I know that those who have previously denied in their hearts the existence of heaven and
hell, and life after death, will become all the more set in their unbelief and continue to deny their existence. It is easier to turn a raven white than to turn those who have once rejected belief at
heart into believers. This is because they always take a negative, never a positive, view of such matters. So let what I have so far said and shall say further about spirits and angels be addressed
to the few who do believe. However, to guide the rest to some sort of acknowledgment, I have been allowed to report facts likely to entertain and excite the attention of the curious; so I shall also
report now on the worlds in the starry sky.