784. The formation of a new heaven before that of a new church on earth is in accordance with Divine order. For there is an internal and an external church; the internal church makes one with the church in heaven, and so with heaven, and the internal must be formed before the external, which is formed afterwards by means of the internal. Clergy in the world are well aware that this is so. In proportion as this new heaven, which makes up the internal of the church in the case of a person, grows, so the New Jerusalem comes down out of that heaven, and this is the new church. This therefore cannot happen in an instant, but happens as the falsities of the previous church are banished. For what is new cannot come in where falsities have been formerly established, unless these are uprooted. This will happen with the clergy, and so spread to laymen. For the Lord said:
No one puts new wine into old leather bottles, without the bottles bursting and the wine being spilled; but they put new wine in new bottles, and both are then kept safe together. Matt. 9:17; Mark 2:22; Luke 5:37, 38.
[2] These events only take place at the ending of the age, which means the end of a church, as is evident from the Lord's words:
Jesus said, The kingdom of the heavens is like a man sowing good seed in his field; but while people were asleep, his enemy came and sowed tares, and went away. But when the plants sprouted, then the tares appeared too. The servants came along and said to him. Do you want us to go and gather the tares? But he said, No, for fear that in gathering the tares you uproot the wheat together with them. Allow them both to grow together until harvest-time, and when it is time for the harvest I shall tell the reapers, First gather the tares and bind them into bundles to be burnt; but gather the wheat into my barn. The harvest-time is the ending of the age; as the tares are gathered and burnt in the fire, so will it be at the ending of the age. Matt. 13:24-30, 39, 40.
Wheat here means the various kinds of truth and good in the new church, the tares the falsities and evils of the previous church. For the ending of the age meaning the end of a church, see the first section of this chapter.