No Tears In Heaven
DELIVERED ON SUNDAY MORNING, AUGUST 6, 1865,
BY C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Revelation 7:17.
IT is an ill thing to be always mourning, sighing and complaining
concerning the present. However dark it may be, we may surely recall
some fond remembrances of the past. There were days of brightness,
there were seasons of refreshing from the Presence of the Lord. Be not
slow to confess, O believing Soul, that the Lord has been your help!
And though now your burden is very heavy, you will find an addition to
your strength in the thought of seasons long since past when the Lord
lightened your load and made your heart leap for joy.
Yet more delightful will it be to expect the future. The night is dark,
but the morning comes. Over the hills of darkness the day breaks. It
may be that the road is rough but its end is almost in view. You have
been clambering up the steep heights of Pisgah and from its brow you
may view your glorious heritage. True, the tomb is before you, but your
Lord has snatched the sting from death, and the victory from the grave.
Do not, O burdened Spirit, confine yourself to the narrow miseries of
the present hour, but let your eyes gaze with fondness upon the
enjoyment of the past and view with equal ardor the infinite blessings
of old eternity when you were not, but when God set you apart for
Himself and wrote your name in His Book of Life!
Let your glance flash forward to the future eternity, the mercies which
shall be yours even here on earth and the glories which are stored up
for you beyond the skies. I shall be well rewarded this morning if I
shall minister comfort to one heavy spirit by leading it to remember
the Glory which is yet to be revealed.
Coming to our text, we shall observe, in the first place, that as God
is to wipe away tears from the faces of the glorified, we may well
infer that their eyes will be filled with tears till then. And in the
second place, it is worthy of reflection that as God never changes,
even now He is engaged in drying tears from His children's eyes. And
then, coming right into the heart of the text we shall dwell upon the
great Truth of God, that in Heaven Divine Love removes all tears from
the glorified. And so we shall close by making some inquiry as to
whether or not we belong to that happy company.
I. Our first subject of meditation is the inference that TEARS ARE TO
FILL THE EYES OF BELIEVERS UNTIL THEY ENTER THE PROMISED REST. There
would be no need to wipe them away if there were none. They come to the
very gates of Heaven weeping and accompanied by their two comrades,
Sorrow and Sighing. The tears are dried and Sorrow and Sighing flee
away. The weeping willow grows not by the river of the Water of Life,
but it is plentiful enough below. Nor shall we lose it till we change
it for the palm branch of victory. Sorrow's dewdrop will never cease to
fall until it is transformed into the pearl of everlasting bliss–
"The path of sorrow and that path alone, Leads to the place where
sorrow is unknown."
Religion brings deliverance from the curse, but not exemption from
trial. The ancients were accustomed to use bottles in which to catch
the tears of mourners. I think I see three bottles filled with the
tears of Believers. The first is a common bottle, the ordinary
lachrymatory containing griefs incidental to all men, for Believers
suffer even as the rest of the race. Physical pain by no means spares
the servants of God. Their nerves, blood vessels, limbs and inward
organs are as susceptible to disease as those of unregenerate men. Some
of the choicest saints have lain longest on beds of sickness and those
who are dearest to the heart of God have felt the heaviest blows of the
chastening rod.
There are pains which, despite the efforts of patience, compel the
tears to wet the cheeks. The human frame is capable of a fearful degree
of agony and few there are who have not at some time or other watered
their couch with tears because of the acuteness of their pains. Coupled
with this are the losses and crosses of daily life. What Christian
among you trades without occasional difficulties and serious losses?
Have any of you a lot so easy that you have nothing to deplore? Are
there no crosses at home? Are there no troubles abroad?
Can you travel from the first of January to the last of December
without feeling the weariness of the way? Have you no blighted field,
no bad debt, no slandered name, no harsh word, no sick child, no
suffering wife to bring before the Lord in weeping prayer? You must be
an inhabitant of another planet if you have had no griefs, for man is
born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards! No ship can navigate the
Atlantic of earth without meeting with storms–it is only upon the
Pacific of Heaven that all is calm forevermore.
Believers must, through much tribulation, inherit the kingdom of
Heaven. "Trials must and will befall." Death contributes to our woes.
The heirs of immortality are often summoned to gather around the tomb.
Who has not lost a friend? If Jesus wept, expect not that we shall be
without the tears of bereavement. The well-beloved Lazarus died and so
will our choicest friends. Parents will go before us. Infants will be
snatched from us. Brothers and sisters will fall before the scythe of
Death. Impartial foe of all, you spare neither virtue nor vice,
holiness nor sin–with equal foot you tread on the cherished loves of
all!
The Christian also knows disappointments as bitter and as keen as other
men. Judas betrays Christ. Ahithophel is a traitor to David. We have
had our Ahithophels and we may yet meet with our Judas. We have trusted
in friends and we have found their friendships fail. We have leaned
upon what seemed a staff and it has pierced us like a spear. You
cannot, dear Friends, traverse the wilderness of this world without
discovering that thorns and thistles grow plenteously in it and that,
step as you may, your feet must sometimes feel their power to wound.
The sea of life is salt to all men. Clouds hover over every landscape.
We may forget to laugh but we shall always know how to weep. As the
saturated fleece must drip, so must the human race, cursed by the Fall,
weep out its frequent griefs.
I see before me a second bottle, it is black and foul for it contains
tears distilled by the force of the fires of sin. This bottle holds
more than the first and is far more regularly filled. Sin is more
frequently the mother of sorrow than all the other ills of life put
together. Dear Brothers and Sisters, I am convinced that we endure more
sorrow from our sins than from God's darkest Providences. Mark our
rebellions want of resignation! When a trouble comes it is not the
trial which makes us groan so much as our rebellion against it. It is
true the ox goad is thrust into us, but we kick against it and then it
hurts us far more. Like men with naked feet, we kick against the
pricks. We head our vessel against the stream of God's will and then
murmur because the waves beat violently upon us!
An unsubdued will is like a maniac's hand which tears himself. The
chastisements which come directly from our heavenly Father are never so
hard to bear as the fretting and fuming of our unhumbled self-will. As
the bird dashes against the wires of its cage and breaks its own wing,
even so do we! If we would take the cross as our gracious Father gives
it, it would not gall our shoulders–but since we revolt from it and
loathe the burden–our shoulders grow raw and sore and the load becomes
intolerable. More submission, and we should have fewer tears.
There are the tears, too, of wounded, injured pride–and how hot and
scalding they are! When a man has been ambitious and has failed, how he
will weep instead of standing corrected, or gathering up his courage
for a wiser venture! When a friend has spoken slightingly of us, or an
enemy has accused us, how we have had to put our fingers to our hot
eyelids to keep the tears from streaming out–and have felt all the
while as full of wretchedness as we well could be. Ah, these are cruel
and wicked tears! God wipe them away from our eyes now! Certainly He
must do it before we shall be able to enter Heaven!
How numerous, too, are the tears of unbelief! We manufacture troubles
for ourselves by anticipating future ills which may never come, or
which, if they do come, may be like the clouds–all "big with mercy,"
and "breaking with blessings on our head." We get to supposing what we
should do if such-and-such a thing occurred, which thing God has
determined never shall occur. We imagine ourselves in positions where
Providence never intends to place us, and so we feel a thousand trials
in fearing one.
That bottle, I say, ought never to carry within it a tear from a
Believer's eyes and yet it has had whole floods poured into it! Oh, the
wickedness of mistrust of God and the bitterness with which that
distrust is made to curse itself! Unbelief makes a rod for its own
back. Distrust of God is its own punishment. It brings such want of
rest, such care, such tribulation of spirit into the mind that he who
loves himself and loves pleasure had better seek to walk by faith and
not by sight. Nor must I forget the scalding drops of anger against our
fellow men, and of petulance and irritation because we cannot have our
way with them. These are black and horrid tears–as noisome as the
vaults of Tophet. May we be saved from such unholy tears.
Sometimes, too, there are streams which arise from depressed
spirits–spirits desponding because we have neglected the means of
Divine Grace and the God of Grace. The consolations of God are small
with us because we have been seldom in secret prayer–we have lived at
a distance from the Most High and we have fallen into a melancholy
state of mind. I thank God that there shall never come another tear
from our eyes into that bottle when eternal love shall take us up to
dwell with Jesus in His kingdom!
We would never overlook the third bottle which is the true crystal
lachrymatory into which holy tears may drop, tears like the "lachrymae
Christi," the tears of Jesus so precious in the sight of God. Even
these shall cease to flow in Heaven! Tears of repentance, like
glistening dewdrops fresh from the skies, are stored in this bottle.
They are not of the earth–they come from Heaven–and yet we cannot
carry them there with us. Good Rowland Hill used to say repentance was
such a sweet companion that the only regret he could have in going to
Heaven was in leaving repentance behind him. He could not shed the
tears of repentance there.
Oh, to weep for sin! It is so sweet a sorrow that I would wish to be a
constant weeper! Like a dripping well, my soul would always drop with
grief that I have offended my loving, tender, gracious God! Tears for
Christ's injured honor and slightedness glisten in the crystal of our
third bottle. When we hear Jesus' name blasphemed among men, or see His
cause driven back in the day of battle, who will not weep? Who can
restrain his lamentations? Such tears are diamonds in Christ's esteem!
Blessed are the eyes which are mines of such royal treasure! If I
cannot win crowns I will at least give tears. If I cannot make men love
my Master, yet will I weep in secret places for the dishonor which they
do Him.
These are holy drops, but they are all unknown in Heaven. Tears of
sympathy are much esteemed by our Lord– when we "weep with those that
weep" we do well. These are never to be restrained this side the
Jordan. Let them flow! The more of them the better for our spiritual
health. Truly, when I think of the griefs of men, and above all, when I
have communion with my Savior in His suffering, I want to cry with
George Herbert–
"Come all you floods, you clouds, you rains, Dwell in my eyes! My grief
has need
Of all the watery things that nature can produce! Let every vein suck
up a river to supply my eyes, My weary, weeping eyes, too dry for me,
Unless they get new conduits, fresh supplies, And with my state agree."
It were well to go to the very uttermost of weeping if it were always
of such a noble kind as fellowship with Jesus brings. Let us never
cease from weeping over sinners as Jesus did over Jerusalem. Let us
endeavor to snatch the firebrand from the flame and weep when we cannot
accomplish our purpose. These three receptacles of tears will always be
more or less filled by us as long as we are here.
But in Heaven the first bottle will not be needed, for the wells of
earth's grief will all be dried up and we shall drink from living
fountains of water unsalted by a tear. As for the second, we shall have
no depravity in our hearts and so the black fountain will no longer
yield its nauseous stream. And as for the third, there shall be no
place among celestial occupations for weeping even of the most holy
kind. Till then we must expect to share in human griefs and instead of
praying against them, let us ask that they may be sanctified to us.
I mean, of course, those of the former sort. Let us pray that
tribulation may work patience and patience experience and experience
the hope which makes us not ashamed. Let us pray that as the sharp edge
of the engraving tool is used upon us it may only remove our filth and
fashion us into images of our Lord and Master. Let us pray that the
fire may consume nothing but the dross and that the floods may wash
away nothing but defilement. May we have to thank God that though
before we were afflicted we went astray, yet now, by His Grace, we have
kept His Word. And so shall we see it to be a blessed thing, a divinely
wise thing, that we should tread the path of sorrow and reach the gates
of Heaven with the tear drops glistening in our eyes.
II. Secondly, EVEN HERE IF WE WOULD HAVE OUR TEARS WIPED AWAY WE CANNOT
DO BETTER THAN RETURN TO OUR GOD. He is the great tear wiper. Observe,
Brethren, that God can remove every vestige of grief from the hearts of
His people by granting them complete resignation to His will. Our
selfhood is the root of our sorrow. If self were perfectly conquered it
would be insignificant to us whether love ordained our pain or ease
appointed us wealth or poverty. If our will were completely God's will,
then pain itself would be attended with pleasure and sorrow would yield
us joy for Christ's sake.
As one fire puts out another, so the master passion of love to God and
complete absorption in His sacred will quenches the fire of human grief
and sorrow. Hearty resignation puts so much honey in the cup of gall
that the wormwood is forgotten. As Death is swallowed up in victory, so
is Tribulation swallowed up in complacency and delight in God. He can
also take away our tears by constraining our minds to dwell with
delight upon the end which all our trials are working to produce. He
can show us that they are working together for good and as men of
understanding, when we see that we shall be essentially enriched by our
losses, we shall be content with them!
When we see that the medicine is curing us of mortal sickness and that
our sharpest pains are only saving us from pains far more terrible,
then shall we kiss the rod and sing in the midst of tribulation, "Sweet
affliction! Sweet affliction!" And rightly so, since it yields such
peaceable fruits of righteousness. Moreover, He can take every tear
from our eyes in the time of trial by shedding abroad the love of Jesus
Christ in our hearts more plentifully. He can make it clear to us that
Christ is afflicted in our affliction. He can indulge us with a
delightful sense of the Divine virtue which dwells in His sympathy and
make us rejoice to be co-sufferers with the Angel of the Covenant.
The Savior can make our hearts leap for joy by reassuring us that we
are written on the palms of His hands and that we shall be with Him
where He is. Sick beds become thrones and hovels ripen into palaces
when Jesus is made sure to our souls. My Brethren, the love of Christ,
like a great flood, rolls over the most rugged rocks of afflictions–so
high above them that we may float in perfect peace where others are a
total wreck! The rage of the storm is all hushed when Christ is in the
vessel. The waters saw You, O Christ! The waters saw You and were
silent at the Presence of their King!
The Lord can also take away all present sorrow and grief from us by
providentially removing its cause. Providence is full of sweet
surprises and unexpected turns. When the sea has ebbed its uttermost,
it turns again and covers all the sand. When we think the dungeon is
fast and that the bolt is rusted in, He can make the door fly open in a
moment! When the river rolls deep and black before us He can divide it
with a word, or bridge it with His hands. How often have you found it
so in the past? As a pilgrim to Canaan you have passed through the Red
Sea in which you once feared you would be drowned.
The bitter wells of Marah were made sweet by God's Presence! You fought
the Amalekite. You went through the terrible wilderness. You passed by
the place of the fiery serpents and you have yet been kept alive and so
shall you be! As the clear shining comes after rain, so shall peace
succeed your trials. As fly the black clouds before the compelling
power of the wind, so will the eternal God make your griefs to fly
before the energy of His Grace. The smoking furnace of trouble shall be
followed by the bright lamp of consolation.
Still, the surest method of getting rid of present tears is communion
and fellowship with God. When I can creep under the wing of my dear God
and nestle close to His bosom, let the world say what it will and let
the devil roar as he pleases and let my sins accuse and threaten as
they may–I am safe, content, happy, peaceful, rejoicing–
"Let earth against my soul engage,
And hellish darts be hurled.
Now I can smile at Satan's rage,
And face a frowning world."
To say, "My Father, God." To put myself right into His hands and feel
that I am safe there. To look up to Him though it is with tears in my
eyes and feel that He loves me–and then to put my head right into His
bosom as the prodigal did and sob my griefs out there into my Father's
heart–oh, this is the death of grief and the life of all consolation!
Is not Jehovah called the God of All Comfort? You will find Him so,
Beloved. He has been "our help in ages past." He is "our hope for years
to come." If He had not been my help, then my soul would have perished
utterly in the day of its weariness and its heaviness, Oh, I bear
testimony for Him this day that you cannot go to Him and pour out your
heart before Him without finding a delightful solace!
When your friends cannot wipe away the tears–when you yourself with
your strongest reasoning and your boldest efforts cannot constrain
yourself to resignation–when your heart beats high and seems as if it
would burst with grief– then pour out your hearts before Him! God is a
refuge for us! He is our castle and high tower, our refuge and defense.
Only go to Him and you shall find that even here on earth God shall
wipe away all tears from your eyes!
III. Now we shall have to turn our thoughts to what is the real
teaching of the text, namely THE REMOVAL OF ALL TEARS FROM THE BLESSED
ONES ABOVE. There are many reasons why glorified spirits cannot weep.
These are well known to you, but let us just hint at them. All outward
causes of grief are gone. They will never hear the toll of the death
knell in Heaven. The mattock and the shroud are unknown things there.
The horrid thought of death never flits across an immortal spirit. They
are never parted. The great meeting has taken place to part no more.
Up yonder they have no losses and crosses in business. "They serve God
day and night in His Temple." They know no broken friendships there.
They have no ruined hearts, no blighted prospects. They know even as
they are known, and they love even as they are loved. No pain can ever
fall on them–as yet they have no bodies! But when their bodies shall
be raised from the grave they shall be spiritualized so that they shall
not be capable of grief. The tear glands shall be plucked away.
Although much may be there that is human, at least the tear glands
shall be gone–they shall have no need of that organ.
Their bodies shall be unsusceptible to grief. They shall rejoice
forever! Poverty, famine, distress, nakedness, peril, persecution,
slander–all these shall have ceased. "The sun shall not light on them,
nor any heat." "They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more,"
and therefore well may their tears cease to flow. Again, all inward
evils will have been removed by the perfect sanctification worked in
them by the Holy Spirit. No evil heart. No unbelief in departing from
the living God shall vex them in Paradise! No suggestions of the arch
enemy shall be met and assisted by the uprisings of iniquity within.
They shall never be led to think harshly of God, for their hearts shall
be all love–sin shall have no sweetness to them for they shall be
perfectly purified from all depraved desires.
There shall be no lusts of the eyes, no lusts of the flesh, no pride of
life to be snares to their feet. Sin is shut out and they are shut in.
They are forever blessed because they are without fault before the
Throne of God! What a Heaven must it be to be without spot, or wrinkle,
or any such thing! Well may they cease to mourn who have ceased to sin!
All fear of change also has been forever shut out. They know that they
are eternally secure. Saints on earth are fearful of falling. Some
Believers even dream of falling away. They think God will forsake them
and that men will persecute and take them.
No such fears can vex the blessed ones who view their Father's face.
Countless cycles may revolve, but eternity shall not be exhausted. And
while eternity endures, their immortality and blessedness shall
co-exist with it. They dwell within a city which shall never be
stormed! They bask in a sun which shall never set! They swim in a
flood-tide which shall never ebb! They drink of a river which shall
never dry up! They pluck fruit from a tree which shall never be
withered! Their blessedness knows not the thought, which would act like
a canker at its heart, that it might, perhaps, pass away and cease to
be!
They cannot, therefore, weep because they are infallibly secure and
certainly assured of their eternal blessedness. Why should they weep
when every desire is gratified? They cannot wish for anything which
they shall not have. Eyes and ears, heart and hands, judgment,
imagination, hope, desire, will–every faculty shall be satisfied! All
that their vast powers can wish, they shall continually enjoy! Though,
"Eye has not seen, nor ear heard the things which God has prepared for
them that love Him," yet we know enough, by the Revelation of the
Spirit, to understand that they are supremely blessed! The joy of
Christ, which is an infinite fullness of delight, is in them. They
bathe themselves in the bottomless, shoreless sea of infinite
beatitude!
Still, dear Friends, this does not quite account for the fact that all
tears are wiped from their eyes. I like better the text which tells us
that God shall do it and I want you to think with me of fountains of
tears which exist even in Heaven, so that the celestial ones must
inevitably weep if God did not by a perpetual miracle take away their
tears. It strikes me, that if God Himself did not interfere by a
perpetual outflow of abundant consolations, the glorified have very
deep cause for weeping. You will say, "How is this?" Why, in the first
place, if it were not for this, what regrets they must have for their
past sins. The more holy a man is, the more he hates sin. It is a token
of growth in sanctification, not that repentance becomes less acute but
that it becomes more and more deep.
Surely, dear Friends, when we shall be made perfectly holy, we shall
have a greater hatred of sin! If on earth we could be perfectly holy,
why, I think we should do little else than mourn to think that so foul
and black and venomous a thing as sin had ever stained us! We should
weep bitterly that we had ever offended such a good, gracious, tender,
abundantly loving God. Why, the sight of Christ, "the Lamb in the midst
of the Throne," would make us remember the sins from which He purged
us. The sight of our heavenly Father's perfection would be blinding to
us if it were not that by some sacred means, which we know not, God
wipes away all these tears from our eyes.
And though we cannot but regret that we have sinned, yet perhaps we
will know that sin has been made to glorify God by the overcoming power
of almighty Grace–that sin has been made to be a black foil–a sort of
setting for the sparkling jewel of eternal, Sovereign Grace! And it may
be that for this reason we shed no tears over our past lives. They
sing, "Unto Him that has loved us, and washed us from our sins in His
blood." But they sing that heavenly song without a tear in their eyes.
I cannot understand how this may be, for I know I could not do so as I
now am–let this be the best reason that God has wiped away the tears
from their eyes.
Again, do you not think, Beloved, that the thought of the vast expense
of shame and woe which the Savior lavished for our redemption must, in
the natural order of things, be a constant source of grief? We sing
sometimes that hymn which reminds us of the angelic song before the
Throne and in one of its verses the poet says–
"But when to Calvary they turn,
Silent their harps abide.
Suspended songs a moment mourn
The God that loved and died."
Now that is natural and poetical, but it is not true! You know very
well that there are no suspended songs in Heaven and that there is no
mourning even over Christ "that loved and died."
It seems to me that if I were thoroughly spiritualized and in such a
holy state as those are in Heaven, I could not look at the Lamb without
tears in my eyes. How could I think of those five Wounds–that bloody
sweat in Gethsemane? That cruel crowning with thorns in Gabbatha–that
mockery and shame at Golgotha–how could I think of it without tears?
How could I feel that He loved me and gave Himself for me without
bursting into a passion of holy affection and sorrow? Tears seem to be
the natural expression of such hallowed joy and grief–
"Love and grief my heart dividing,
With my tears His feet I'll bathe."
I must think it would be so in Heaven if it were not that by a glorious
method, I know not how, God shall wipe away even those tears from our
eyes! Does it not need the interference of God to accomplish this
wonder? Is there not another cause for grief, namely, wasted
opportunities? Beloved, when we once ascend to Heaven there will be no
more feeding of Christ's hungry people. There will be no giving of
drink to the thirsty. No visiting His sick ones, or His imprisoned
ones. No clothing of the naked. There will be no instructing the
ignorant. No holding forth the Word of God among "a crooked and
perverse generation."
It has been often and truly said if there could be regrets in Heaven,
those regrets would be that we have wasted so many opportunities of
honoring Christ on earth–opportunities which will then be gone
forever. Now in Heaven their hearts are not steeled and hardened so
that they can look back upon sins of omission without sorrow. I believe
there will be the most tender form of conscience there–for perfect
purity would not be consistent with any degree of hardness of heart. If
they are sensitive and tender in heart, it is inevitable that they
should look back with regret upon the failures of the life
below–unless some more mighty emotion should overwhelm that of
contrition.
I can say, Beloved, if God would take me to Heaven this morning, if He
did not come in and by a special act of His Omnipotence dry up that
fountain of tears, I should almost forget the glories of Paradise in
the midst of my own shame! Shame that I have not preached more
earnestly and have not prayed more fervently and labored more
abundantly for Christ. That text, to which we heard a reference from a
dear Brother during the week, where Paul says, "I call God to witness
that for the space of three years I ceased not night and day with
tears, to warn every one of you," is a text that we cannot, any of us,
read without blushes and tears.
And in Heaven, I think if I saw the Apostle Paul, I must burst out in
weeping if it were not for this text, which says that, "God shall wipe
away all tears"–and these among them. Who but the Almighty God could
do this! Perhaps, again, another source of tears may suggest itself to
you–namely, regrets in Heaven for our mistakes and misrepresentations
and unkindnesses towards other Christian Brethren. How surprised we
shall be to meet in Heaven some whom we did not love on earth! We would
not commune with them at the Lord's Table. We would not own that they
were Christians at all!
We looked at them suspiciously if we saw them in the street. We were
jealous of all their operations. We suspected their zeal as being
nothing better than rant and we looked upon their best exertions as
having sinister motives at the bottom. We said many hard things and
felt a great many more than we said. When we shall see these unknown
and unrecognized Brethren in Heaven, will not their presence naturally
remind us of our offenses against Christian love and spiritual unity? I
cannot suppose a perfect man looking at another perfect man, without
regretting that he ever ill-treated him– it seems to me to be the
trait of a gentleman, a Christian and of a perfectly sanctified man
above all others, that he should regret having misunderstood and
misconstrued and misrepresented one who was as dear to Christ as
himself.
I am sure, as I go round among the saints in Heaven, I cannot (in the
natural order of things) help feeling, "I did not assist you as I ought
to have done. I did not sympathize with you as I ought to have done. I
spoke a hard word to you. I was estranged from you." And I think you
would all have to feel the same–inevitably you must if it were not
that by some heavenly means, I know not how–the eternal God shall so
overshadow Believers with the abundant bliss of His own self that even
that cause of tears shall be wiped away!
Has it never struck you, dear Friends, that if you go to Heaven and see
your dear children left behind unconverted, it would naturally be a
cause of sorrow? When my mother told me that if I perished she would
have to say, "Amen," to my condemnation, I knew it was true. And it
sounded very terrible and had a good effect on my mind. But at the same
time I could not help thinking, "Well, you will be very different from
what you are now," and I did not think she would be improved. I
thought, "Well, I love to think of your weeping over me far better than
to think of you as a perfect being, with a tearless eye, looking on the
damnation of your own child."
It really is a very terrible spectacle, the thought of a perfect being
looking down upon Hell, for instance, as Abraham did and yet feeling no
sorrow. For you will recollect that in the tones in which Abraham
addressed the rich man, there is nothing of pity. There is not a single
syllable which betokens any sympathy with him in his dreadful woes. And
one does not quite comprehend that perfect beings, God-like beings,
beings full of love and everything that constitutes the Glory of God's
complete Nature, should yet be unable to weep, even over Hell itself!
They cannot weep over their own children lost and ruined! Now, how is
this? If you can tell me, I shall be glad–for I cannot tell you.
I do not believe that there will be one atom less tenderness, that
there will be one fraction less of amiability and love and sympathy–I
believe there will be more–but that they will be in some way so
refined and purified that while compassion for suffering is there,
detestation of sin shall be there to balance it and a state of complete
equilibrium shall be attained. Perfect acquiescence in the Divine will
is probably the secret of it. But it is not my business to guess–I do
not know what handkerchief the Lord will use. But I know that He will
wipe all tears away from their faces and these tears among them.
Yet, once again, it seems to me that spirits before the Throne, taking,
as they must do, a deep interest in everything which concerns the honor
of the Lord Jesus Christ, must feel deeply grieved when they see the
cause of Truth imperiled and the kingdom of Christ, for a time, put
back. Think of Luther, or Wickliffe, or John Knox as they see the
advances of Popery just now. Take John Knox first, if you will. Think
of him looking down and seeing cathedrals rising in Scotland, dedicated
to the service of the Pope and Satan. Oh, how the stern old man, even
in Glory, I think, would begin to shake himself! And the old lion would
lash his sides once more and half wish that he could come down and pull
the nests to pieces that the rooks might fly away.
Think of Wickliffe looking down on this country where the Gospel has
been preached so many years and seeing monks in the Church of England
and seeing spring up in our national establishment everywhere, not
disguised Popery as it was ten years ago, but stark naked Popery,
downright Popery that unblushingly talks about the "Catholic Church,"
and is not even Anglican any longer! What would Wickliffe say? Why, I
think as he leans over the battlements of Heaven, unless Wickliffe is
mightily altered and I cannot suppose he is (except for the better and
that would make him more tender-hearted and more zealous for God
still), he must weep to think that England has gone back so far and
that on the dial of Ahaz the sun has beat a retreat.
I do not know how it is they do not weep in Heaven, but they do not.
The souls under the altar cry, "How long? How long? How long?" There
comes up a mighty intercession from those who were slaughtered in the
days gone by for Christ–their prayer rises, "How long? How long? How
long?" And God, as yet, does not avenge His own elect though they cry
day and night unto Him. Yet that delay does not cost them a single
tear. They feel so sure that the victory will come! They anticipate so
much the more splendid triumph because of its delay and therefore they
do both patiently hope and quietly wait to see the salvation of God!
They know that without us they cannot be made perfect and so they wait
till we are taken up, that the whole company may be completed and that
then the soul may be dressed in its body and they may be perfected in
their bliss–they wait but they do not weep. They wait and they cry,
but in their cry no sorrow has a place.
Now I do not understand this. It seems to me that the more I long for
the coming of Christ, the more I long to see His kingdom extended–the
more I shall weep when things go wrong–when I see Christ blasphemed,
His Cross trampled in the mire and the devil's kingdom established! But
the reason is all in this, "God shall wipe away all tears from their
eyes." I thought I would just indicate to you why it says that God does
it. It strikes me that these causes of tears could not be removed by an
angel–could not be taken away by any form of spiritual enjoyment apart
from the direct interposition of Almighty God.
Think of all these things and wonder over them and you will recall many
other springs of grief which must have flowed freely if Omnipotence had
not dried them up completely. Then ask how it is that the saints do not
weep and do not cry, and you cannot get any other answer than this–God
has done it in a way unknown to us–forever taking away from them the
power to weep.
IV. And now, Beloved, SHALL WE BE AMONG THIS HAPPY COMPANY? Here is the
question and the context enables us to answer it. "They have washed
their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." There is
their character. "Therefore are they before the Throne of God." The
blood is a sacred argument for their being there, the precious blood.
Observe, "they washed their robes." It was not merely their feet, their
worst parts–but they washed their robes, their best parts. A man's
robes are his most honored attire. He puts them on and he does not mind
our seeing his robes. There may be filthiness beneath, but the robes
are generally the cleanest of all. But you see they washed even them.
Now it is the mark of a Christian that he not only goes to Christ to
wash away his black sins, but to wash his duties, too. I would not pray
a prayer unwashed with Jesus' blood. I would not like a hymn I have
sung to go up to Heaven except it had first been bathed in blood. If I
would desire to be clothed with zeal as with a cloak, yet I must wash
the cloak in blood. Though I would be sanctified by the Holy Spirit and
wear imparted righteousness as a raiment of needlework, yet I must wash
even that in blood.
What do you say, dear Friends? Have you washed in blood? The meaning of
it is, have you trusted in the atoning sacrifice? "Without shedding of
blood there is no remission of sin." Have you taken Christ to be your
All in All? Are you now depending on Him? If so, out of deep distress
you shall yet ascend, leaning on your Beloved, to the Throne of God and
to the bliss which awaits His chosen. But if not, "there is none other
name," there is no other way. Your damnation will be as just as it will
be sure.
Christ is "the Way." But if you will not tread it you shall not reach
the end. Christ is "the Truth," but if you will not believe Him, you
shall not rejoice. Christ is "the Life," but if you will not receive
Him you shall abide among the dead and be cast out among the corrupt.
From such a doom may the Lord deliver us and give us a simple
confidence in the Divine work of the Redeemer and to Him shall be the
praise eternally. Amen.