I destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath (ii. 9).
And in David:—
Their fruit shalt Thou destroy from the earth, and their seed from the sons of man (Ps. xxi. 10).
But the works of charity are living, and of them it is declared that they "take root downward, and bear fruit upward;" as in Isaiah:—
The remnant that is escaped of the house of Judah shall again take root downward, and bear fruit upward (xxxvii. 31).
To "bear fruit upward," is to act from charity. Such fruit is called the "fruit of excellence," in the same Prophet:—
In that day shall the shoot of Jehovah be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel (Isa. iv. 2).
It is also the "fruit of salvation," and is so called by the same Prophet:—
Drop down, ye heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness; let the earth open, and let them bring forth the fruit of salvation, and let righteousness spring up together; I Jehovah will create it (Isa. xiv. 8).
349. That by an "offering" is meant worship, is evident from the representatives of the Jewish Church, in which, sacrifices of every kind, as well as the first fruits of the earth and of all its produce, and the oblation of the firstborn, were called "offerings," in which their worship consisted. And as they all represented heavenly things, and all had reference to the Lord, it must be obvious to every one that true worship was signified by these offerings. For what is a representative without the thing it represents? or what is an external religion without an internal but a kind of idol and a thing of death? The external has life from things internal, that is, through these from the Lord. From these considerations it is evident that all the offerings of a representative church signify the worship of the Lord; and concerning these of the Lord's Divine mercy we shall treat in particular in the following pages. That by
