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Scripture: Matthew 7.7-11 (CJB)
7Keep asking, and it will be given to you; keep seeking, and you will find; keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who keeps asking receives; he who keeps seeking finds; and to him who keeps knocking, the door will be opened.
9 Is there anyone here who, if his son asks him for a loaf of bread, will give him a stone? 10 or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 So if you, even though you are bad, know how to give your children gifts that are good, how much more will your Father in heaven keep giving good things to those who keep asking him!
Quote
The "appropriation" of the Lord's life comes from His love and mercy toward the whole human race, specifically His will to give Himself and what is His to each individual, and His actual giving to the extent that an individual accepts~that is, to the extent that one is a likeness and image of Him, involved in a life of goodness and a life of truth. Since this kind of divine effort from the Lord is constant, His life is appropriated, as stated.
*Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1771), The Universal Human, section 3742
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Comments
The Scripture clearly affirms and thoroughly indicates the Creator wills to give much good to all persons. Why is the person often lacking so much this good? What is the way to the good?
The term "appropriation," as Swedenborg notes, is key in answering these questions of good. "Appropriation" is from the Late Latin appropriare, "to make one's own."
We will use the example of a vessel to receive liquid, say water. The extent a container receives water is the extent to which it is shaped to receive water; or, its capacity. A gallon jug can receive a quart of water. The inverse is not true. A quart jar cannot receive a gallon of water~this is an example that natural law reflects spiritual truth, or spiritual principle. Therefore, as in all natural law, the lesser cannot contain the capacity of the higher, while the higher contains and increases the capacity of the lesser.
Now, if there were a Universal Watergiver, whose nature was freely and abundantly to give water, should the Watergiver be seen as withholding from the quart the amount the Watergiver gives to the gallon? That is, does the amount of giving indicate any prejudice or reluctance to give by the Watergiver? Obviously not. To come to that conclusion would be to judge the capacity of the Watergiver to give water based on the capacity of the recipient vessel to receive water. Rather, the intake of the container reflects not on the will of the Watergiver but the extent of capability of the container to appropriate water.
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