Good Definition of Use

In Conjugial Love 183:3-4 angels discuss the importance of use (or, “application to useful purpose,” as it is translated here) and provide a good definition of it.

[L]ove and wisdom without application to useful purpose are only abstract and theoretical ideas, which, even after being entertained for a time in the mind, eventually pass away like the winds. But love and wisdom are brought together in application to useful purpose... and in this they become a single entity which is called actual. Love cannot rest unless it acts, for love is the active force in life; nor can wisdom exist and endure unless it does so from love and together with love whenever love acts, and to act is application to useful purpose. Therefore we define application to useful purpose as the doing of good from love through wisdom. Application to useful purpose is what good is.

Love without wisdom - what is it but a kind of foolish infatuation? And love accompanied by wisdom, but without application to a useful end - what is it but an airy affectation of the mind? On the other hand, love and wisdom together with application to a useful end - these not only make a person what he is, but they also are the person.

Angels Pay Attention to Motive

[Angels] never pay any attention to what a man does with his body, but they are concerned with the will from which the body acts. This they call the man himself, and the understanding they call the man so far as it acts as one with the will. (Heaven and Hell 61)

Evil Spirits Were Needed in Heaven For a While

Before the Lord came into the world evil spirits were in parts of heaven. This was not a good thing, but Arcana Coelestia 8054 tells us that before they were cast out (Rev 12:7-9) the Lord used them for an important use.

[B]efore the coming of the Lord the region of heaven into which they who were of the spiritual church would come, was occupied by evils and falsities....

The region where the spiritual heaven was to be, was occupied by those who were in falsity and evil, but who could be kept in some truth and good by external means, especially by means of ideas of eminence and dignity, just as is the case in the world, where they who are in evil and falsity are nevertheless obliged to as it were think and speak truths, and as it were will and do goods, by external means, which are honors and gains. The reason why this region of heaven was then occupied by such spirits, was that good ones were lacking, and they who were of the spiritual church had not as yet been prepared, and yet every place had to be filled by spirits, in order that there might be continuity from the Lord down to man, for without continuity man would have perished. At this day also there are some regions of heaven occupied by such; but they who are there are withheld by a strong force from the doing of evils.

[At] the end of the church the evil are cast down, and the regions they had occupied are given to the good, who in the meantime have been prepared for heaven.

Loving the Lord

What does it mean to love the Lord? It doesn't mean just feeling love towards the Lord. In John 14:15 the Lord says,

If you love Me, keep my commandments.

Arcana Coelestia 10645:2, 4 explains in an interesting way why loving the Lord has to involve keeping His commandments.

[S]omething must here be said in regard to the worship of the Lord from faith and from love. Many suppose that they worship the Lord by faith when they believe the things of the doctrine of the church, and that they worship the Lord by love when they love Him. Yet the Lord is not worshiped by merely believing, and by merely loving, but by living according to His commandments, because these persons alone believe in the Lord and love Him. The others say that they believe in Him, and yet they do not believe; and they say that they love Him, and yet they do not love Him. The reason why those alone believe in the Lord and love Him who live according to His commandments is that the Lord is not in the understanding of truth without the willing of it; but is in the understanding of truth together with the willing of it. For truth does not enter into a man and become his, until the man wills it and from willing does it, because the will is the man himself, whereas the understanding is only so far the man as it partakes of the will. ...

[T]o believe in the Lord is to imbue one's understanding with the truths of faith; and... to love the Lord is to imbue one's will with the goods of love; and... this cannot be done except by learning truths from the Lord, by willing them, and by doing them.

Understanding the Coming of the Lord

There are some beautiful teachings in the Heavenly Doctrines about the coming of the Lord. Here are two examples—one about His first coming and one about His second coming. Both passages indicate that the Lord did not just come twice to all people in a general way: He also comes to each individual person, over and over again throughout his or her life.

The Lord is present with every man, urging and pressing to be received; and His first coming, which is called the dawn, is when man receives Him, which he does when he acknowledges Him as his God, Creator, Redeemer, and Savior. From this time man's understanding begins to be enlightened in spiritual things, and to advance into a more and more interior wisdom; and as he receives this wisdom from the Lord, he advances through morning into day, and this day lasts with him into old age, even to death; and after death he passes into heaven to the Lord Himself; and there, although he died an old man, he is restored to the morning of his life, and the rudiments of the wisdom implanted in him in the natural world grow to eternity. (True Christian Religion 766)

The coming of the Lord is not according to the letter, that He is to appear again in the world; but it is His presence in everyone; and this exists whenever the gospel is preached and what is holy is thought of. (Arcana Coelestia 3900:9)