Seeking once more the Lord's
help and to grant me the words to speak to this evening, I'd
like to direct your attention to the chapter that we read together,
Revelation 21, and the text you'll find in verse four. And God shall
wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more
death, neither sorrow nor crying, Neither shall there be any more
pain, for the former things are passed away. Those of you who were with us
this morning will remember that we looked at the ten commandments
that were given to Moses and the children of Israel and how
God set forth his mind upon tablets of stone for his law. And we notice that with every
law there is a a consequence if you break it, a punishment
for breaking God's holy law. And if, as we saw, even down
to the breaking of the Sabbath a day in the old covenant was
punishable by death. And so as God sought to set forth
his law, And all those who live underneath that law, underneath
its authority, would be punishable for breaking that law. And we
notice that the Lord Jesus Christ, the very reason why he came to this earth was to
come under the law and to come under the authority of his law
that he may be able to live a perfect life and fulfill that law, every
line and every dot of it, to enable him to be the perfect
sacrifice for sin, the Lamb of God which takes away the sin
of the world and to enable him to to work a perfect righteousness
for all those who are found in him, and that those who are found
in him are credited with his righteousness. They are not only
found without sin, but they are found with a positive righteousness,
having credited to their account all the good, all the perfect
life that Christ lived. And as they live by faith, they
have that beautiful prospect of being able to spend eternity
with him. Now, if the book of Revelation
would not have been written, we would find it very difficult
to picture what it would be like after we pass from this world
to the next. And as the Lord Jesus Christ
appeared to the Apostle John on the Lord's Day, as we looked
at this morning, he is given a great privilege to be able
to view heaven itself and the things that would take place
at the end of time. And after the Lord Jesus comes
and as he gathers his people to himself, there is that eternity
of perfect peace and perfect happiness and perfect joy and
perfect love which will take place. In the chapter that we
read together, we are granted a little glimpse into that heavenly
realm, that new heaven and that new earth. 21 and verse 1, it
says, and I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first
heaven and the first earth were passed away and there was no
more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city,
New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven prepared as
a bride adorned for her husband and I heard a great voice out
of heaven saying behold the tabernacle of God is with men and he will
dwell with them and they shall be his people and God himself
shall be with them and be their God. We know as we look through
the Old Testament of that great distance there was between God
and man and the great ceremonial, the great effort that had to
take place for the old covenant people to have a relationship
with God and the many barriers that were there to stop them
from coming to have fellowship with God. We see the sacrificial
system and the high priests and the prophets and the holy of
holies and all of those things that hindered them from having
true access to God. What we see is that temple, that
curtain was broken down in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.
That that way into God through the Holy of Holies was made. But still there is a barrier. And that barrier between us and
God is the Lord Jesus Christ. That we as sinful people, can
never have full fellowship with God because we are still housed
in sinful bodies. There's always a barrier between
us. Yes, through the Lord Jesus Christ,
we have access to the Father. No man comes to God but by the
Lord Jesus Christ. And we can never view him as
he is in all of his splendor, in all of his glory. because
we are still housed in a sinful body. But John in his revelation
tells us something wonderful that would take place. The tabernacle
of God is with men and he will dwell with them and they shall
be his people and God himself shall be with them and be their
God and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. For God to wipe away tears there
has to be a closeness. If a child is crying Maybe they're
afraid and they come running to you and they've got tears
running down their faces. You have to have a sense of compassion
towards them. You have to bend down to them.
You have to get a tissue or your sleeve to wipe away those tears
and then to comfort them. There's got to be a love and
a compassionate heart to embrace them and to bring them to yourself. and the relationship with the
believer once he has passed from this world to the next and the
closeness in which they will be enabled to relate to God is
that intimate relationship of being close enough that God will
wipe away even their tears. And so there will be a new heaven
and a new earth, for the former things are passed away. After the coming of the Lord
Jesus Christ, as he will come to judge and to divide the nations
and to bring his people unto himself, there will be a restoration,
a new heaven and a new earth. But we are not there yet. See it says the former things
will pass away. We are in those former things. We are in those things because
these things have not yet passed away. But we can talk about those
things which have been revealed to us about heaven. We can talk
about the day. that is going to come when the
Lord Jesus Christ will come again and gather his people unto himself. We can talk about the day when
God will wipe away our tears. We can talk about the day when
there will be no more death. Neither will there be any sorrowing,
neither any crying, neither shall there be any pain. We can talk
about all of those things and we can look forward to those
things. as we view them by faith in Christ
and we believe that we have a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and
that one day we will be with him, then we can think about
that day when these things shall be passed away. If you think
about when you're going on a long journey, Maybe it's boring, difficult,
lots of traffic, lots of rain and roadworks and stuff like
that. What pushes you to keep going
and not turning back? Your destination. Where you are
going. Who are you going to see? What
are you going to do when you get there? And if you've booked
a holiday, you will go through all the manner of obstacles to
enable you to get to the destination, because the destination is where
you want to go. And what enables the Lord's people
to persevere on the narrow way that leads to life? Yes, aided
by the Spirit of God, but their view by faith of the heavenly
thing. That final destination causes
them to press on through the pain. That final destination
causes them to press on through the tears, through the crying,
through the death and the sadness and the sorrow of this world.
because they view by faith that glorious kingdom which is going
to come, those mansions in the skies, that beautiful heaven
itself with its wonderful streets of gold and Christ himself that
they will see face to face. But the tears, and the sorrow
and the death are the things of this present age. And they are things that we have
to walk through to enable us to reach the final destination. If you remember in the book of
Psalms, Psalm 23, it says, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall
not want. In verse four he says, yea, though
I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear
no evil, for thou art with me and thy rod and thy staff, they
comfort me. That is our journey. Our journey
is a walk through the valley of the shadow of death and we
are heading to eternal green pastures and we're heading to
eternal still waters where we will see the Lord Jesus Christ,
our Good Shepherd, face to face. And as we battle on this journey
in the here and now, we suffer the consequences of the contamination
of sin which is in ourselves and in the very societies that
we live in. If you look at the punishments
that were given to Adam and to Eve there in Genesis chapter 3 we
read there that In verse 16, he says, unto the
woman, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. I will multiply thy sorrow. In sorrow shalt thou bring forth
children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall
rule over you. Because of sin, sorrow came to
the woman, And she says, I will multiply your sorrow. And in
sorrow, you are going to bring forth children. And you know,
it's two ways, isn't it? There is sorrow in bringing forth
children, and there is sorrow in not being able to bring forth
children. It is sorrowful. It brings a
sadness. And unto the man, Adam, he says,
because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hath
eaten of the tree which I commanded thee, saying thou shalt not eat
of it. Cursed is the ground for thy
sake. In sorrow, in sorrow thou shalt eat of it all the days
of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth
to thee, and thou shalt eat of the herb of the field. In the
sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread till thou return to
the ground, for out of it was thou taken, for dust thou art,
and under dust thou shalt return. For the woman, sorrow, multiplied
sorrow. And for the man, sorrow. He's
going to labour in the sweat of his face, under the heat of
the day. He's going to have thorns, he's
going to have thistles, he's going to eat the herb of the
field, he's going to sweat to provide for his family. Sorrow
is the banner that hangs over us as sinners that walk this
earth. Sorrow brings forth tears. Psalm 6 tells us. In verse 6, I am weary with my
groanings. All the night make I my bed to
swim. In water, my couch, I water my
couch with my tears. Sorrow and sadness are the anthem
of this world and it doesn't take long for sorrow to enter
into our lives. We may have joy for a moment
but sorrow will come again. And there is that continued sadness. We look at the state of the world
at this time, the wars that are taking place. We think of Gaza
and Israel and the other place on the Red Sea. Then you've got
Ukraine and Russia. And all over the world, it's
just wars and rumors of wars. But you think of the sadness
and the sorrow that those people are experiencing. It's easy just
to watch it and to read about it. But those who are being killed
have wives, they have husbands, they have children, they have
mothers and fathers. And it's constant sadness, constant
weeping and mourning. And if you look at this world
as it is, every day there is people mourning and weeping and
full of sorrow. Every single moment of every
single day, because of all the sadness that takes place in this
world of ours. Because of sin. Sin has entered
in and corrupted what God created and it has brought sorrow and
sadness. And the effects of that sin and
the effects of that sadness, it is seen every single day. The world weeps daily because
of all that takes place. There are many different reasons
why we weep. Sometimes we weep because we're
even happy. Sometimes we weep because we
are sad. Sometimes we've listened to some
piece of music and we begin to cry for no reason at all, that
the music has moved us in an emotional way. Sometimes we listen
to a sermon and the word of God touches us and breaks us and
we begin to weep. Sometimes it's death. Sometimes it's saying goodbye
to family and friends. You know, with Sam and Hannah
and the difficulty it is in separating from your loved ones and the
sadness that that brings and the tears that it brings and
the emotions that it brings. And so we cry then and we weep
for many reasons. I thought of Hezekiah. in the book of Kings, 2nd Kings
20 and verse 1. Hezekiah was sick. The scripture
tells us that he had a boil and he was sick unto death. And in those days was Hezekiah
sick unto death. And the prophet Isaiah, the son
of Amos, came to him and said unto him, thus saith the Lord,
set thine house in order, for thou shalt die and do not live.
And he turned his face to the wall and prayed unto the Lord,
saying, I beseech thee, O Lord, remember now how I have walked
before thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done
that which was good in thy sight. And Hezekiah wept sore. And so Hezekiah wept because
he had been told that he was going to die. Although a king,
a good king, and yet the prospect of death stirred him to weep. And it's not a natural thing
to want to die. It is an unnatural thing. And
although Christians may have that foresight of heaven and
have that desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far
better, yet they still have that fear of death or even that sadness
of leaving family and friends. I was speaking to somebody once
who had cancer and they were quite content to pass away. But what brought them sadness
was the fact that they were going to leave their wife and their
children. Yes, they had that desire to
be with the Lord, but they had those natural feelings which
clung to their wife and to their children. What would happen to
them? I would never see my children
grow up. I would never see them get married. And these things
stir upon the emotions and bring about tears. Hezekiah, he wept
sore. Whether it was because he was
going to die or what was the reason, yet he wept. He was afraid
that news that he had stirred his emotions and he broke down,
but he broke down in prayer. And it's a good thing, isn't
it? If we do receive such news like that, you're going to die. You're going to die. And if that
news points us or moves us to pour out our heart to God, seeking
for guidance and direction and a favour in his sight, and even
if it breaks us to weep sore, God answered the prayer of Hezekiah. And he says, Turn again and tell
Hezekiah, the captain of my people, thus saith the Lord. The God
of David, thy father, I have heard thy prayer. I have seen thy tears. I have seen thy tears. Behold,
I will heal thee. And on the third day thou shalt
go up unto the house of the Lord. The prophet hadn't seen the tears
because Hezekiah had turned his face towards the wall. Naturally
speaking, especially men and men of power and influence, they
don't like to cry. This is seen as an act of an
emotional weakness. Yet God saw. Or maybe you, even
this week, you have been weeping, hiding away and you have been
weeping and you've thought, nobody knows, nobody's able to see me,
but God saw. And he says, I've heard your
prayer. And I've seen everything that you are going through. I've
seen your tears. I've seen your emotions being
poured out on the pillow. And I am going to heal you and
you will be restored. and Hezekiah was restored. They
took a lump of figs and they laid it upon the boil and he
recovered. He recovered of his sickness
and he was granted an extra 15 years of life. And so bad news, what we class
as bad news, can stir us to cry, can break us, it can cause us
to lose hope, and it can make us weep. Also, you think of the Lord Jesus,
when he wept in John 11, when Lazarus was dead. was it when he had died. And
the Lord Jesus waited for some days before he went to see him. And
when he went to see him, he went to Mary and they took him to
the grave. And when Mary was come down where
Jesus was and saw him, she fell down at his feet saying unto
him, Lord, if that has been here, my brother had not died. Verse
33, when Jesus therefore saw her weeping and when the Jews
also weeping, which came with her, he groaned in the spirit
and was troubled and said, Where have you laid him? You see, in
this in our text where it says the
former days, in these days which are still subject to the consequences
of sin, there is a death. And when there
is a death, it is followed by weeping. And Jesus saw them weeping,
and Jesus saw the Jews weeping, and he asks, where have you laid
him? And they said, come and see. Verse 35 is just, Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, behold how
they loved him. You see the outpouring of the
tears of the Lord Jesus Christ was seen as an act of compassion,
And they knew that by the tears of the Lord Jesus Christ, that
he loved Lazarus. And so as we walk through this,
the valley of the shadow of death, and we come across those times
of sadness and those times of unexpected difficulty and unexpected
news and we we break out in in tears and when somebody passes
away our response to that sadness
is to cry. The scientist people or the doctors
say that it is it's good that we cry. It's beneficial to our
bodies when we do cry. My own life, my past year after
we came back from Kenya, there was so much going on in
my mind. There's a trouble in the mission. There was the ministry
here, the calling of the pastor. There was work. There was pressure,
this side and that side. People telling me, have you got
a house yet? Have you got any work? Are you
going to be a pastor? What are you going to do about
Kenya? And all of this was in my mind, and I just cracked. I said, I can't cope. And I just
broke down and cried and cried and cried like a little baby.
And afterwards, I went to sleep. And when I woke up. It was like
the Lord had. Dealt with it all. And with the
outpouring of the tears, all the stress had to be had been
poured out in those tears, and I and I felt restored. And that's how it is, as we walk
this side of heaven, as we walk this side of glory, as we follow
the Lord Jesus Christ, the unknown pathway brings anxiety and stress
and tears, the disappointments that we have. things that come in our life
that we so look forward to, and then they come crashing down.
It brings us tears and emotion and sadness. We think of loved ones who have
no concern for their souls, who are far out in the world, and
we lay them before the Lord. And it brings us tears, brings
us sadness for their state. We know the consequences of their
actions, and it brings us heartache and sorrow. But Jesus wept. He understood
the emotional impact that death has upon the human body. And every single believer that
has ever walked this life knows what it is to weep. But do you know what the most
blessed tears are? The most blessed tears that ever
a Christian can shed are those tears of repentance. You see, when Christ works in
the heart, he touches the very core of our
emotions, and he reveals to us our sin, and it breaks us. He shows us how unclean we are,
and that causes us to be moved with sadness and sorrow, which
makes the tears to flow. Matthew chapter 5, in the Sermon
on the Mount, Jesus says in verse 4, Blessed
are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. We know that
mourning is sorrow. Often you mourn over somebody
who has passed away, and that involves tears. It's an emotional
state in which somebody is in. And Jesus says they are blessed. It is a blessed condition to
be in, a condition of mourning, not over the mourning of a loved
one, but over the mourning of one's own sin. the blessed condition. Jesus
says, come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden and
I will give you rest. Come unto me all you that mourn
and you will be comforted. You will be comforted by the
great high priest who is able to be touched with the feelings
of our infirmities. Why? Because he has wept. He
knows what it is to weep, not over sin, but over the effects
of sin upon the human race. And as he saw the Jews and the
Marys weeping over their brother, Lazarus, he was moved in compassion
towards them. You think of the time when he
looked at Jerusalem and he said, oh, Jerusalem, oh, Jerusalem.
That was an emotional statement. How often would I have gathered
you as a hen gathers her chicks unto herself, but you would not. And so the most blessed tears
are tears of repentance. You know, tears of repentance
bring joy in heaven. The scripture tells us there
is joy in heaven over one sinner that repents of their sin. And
although we may be sorrowful and weeping over our sin, yet
heaven is rejoicing that one has seen their need of the Lord
Jesus Christ. And you think of Peter. In Matthew chapter, Matthew 26. After he had denied the Lord
Jesus Christ, he had sinned. He was a believer in the Lord
Jesus, yet was filled with confidence in himself, and yet he failed. He sinned against his master
in denying the Lord Jesus Christ. And as the cock crew Peter remembered
the words of Jesus, which he had said unto him, before the
cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And he went out and he
wept bitterly. You see, Peter was a believer
in the Lord Jesus. He had been brought to repentance
and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He was following the Lord Jesus
Christ yet he sinned against his master. He denied him before
men. Yet he was brought to a knowledge
of that sin and it broke him and it caused him to weep bitterly. I wonder When was the last time
you and I wept over our sin? When was the last time you pictured
the face of the Lord Jesus Christ looking at you after you have
committed some sin, after you've failed him? When was the last
time that we have shed tears of sorrow over our sins because
of a tender conscience I would say of my own self, not regularly
enough. You may say our prayers and say,
please forgive me for my sins. But when have we actually felt
it? When has it actually stirred
our emotion and brought forth true tears of sorrow? And we
have wept bitterly. You see, it's an ongoing work. Yes, we are brought in and the
angels rejoiced that day when we were brought in to be with
Christ. But there is that continued walking out of the Christian
faith and there is that continued failing. Daily, we fight against
sin and daily we fail. Daily, there is that confession
of sin to Christ, asking for that continued cleansing and
washing. as we continue to look by faith
to that blessed day when the battle will be over and the tears
will be wiped away by God himself. And we will be housed in a holy
body that is able to stand before the throne of God. There will
be no more death. There will be no more sorrow,
no more crying. Neither shall there be any more
pain, for all of the former things are passed away. In Africa, they would say hallelujah.
The struggles and the difficulties will be gone and we'll be with
Christ, which is far, far better. I want you to see the contrast,
though. You see, there is a contrast. Verse 8, but the fearful and
the unbelieving and the abominable and the murderers and the whoremongers
and the sorcerers and the idolaters and all liars shall have their
part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone which
is the second death. You see, the Christian has a
prospect of leaving this world of tears and going to a world
of joy where God will wipe away those tears. He has the prospect
of going to a place where there is no more death, where there
is no more sorrow, where there is no more crying, where there
is no more pain. And so they will go from the
sorrowful to the joyful. But the unbeliever goes from
bad to worse. He goes from weeping, from death
and crying and pain in time. And then he steps over into an
eternal suffering of weeping and pain and crying and an eternal
death. which will never, ever end. And that's the contrast. We sorrow
now, but we will be rejoicing. Yet the unbeliever, the one outside
of Christ, sorrows now. He still experiences those sufferings
and the sadness now. Yet he will undergo a greater
suffering, a greater torment for all eternity. And I wrote down in Matthew,
the gospel according to Matthew, he speaks four times, Jesus speaks
four times of the sorrow and the weeping of hell. In Matthew
8 and verse 12. But the children of the kingdom
shall be cast out into outer darkness, and there shall be
weeping and gnashing of teeth. You see, Jesus speaks to John
and says, God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. The
former things shall be passed away. But those in hell, as they
step from time to eternity, experience in greater measure the eternal
wrath of God, and there will be weeping, but nobody to wipe
their tears. There will be no heavenly father
to stoop down and to and to and to wipe away in a compassionate
manner those those sad tears, the tears of anguish and sorrow
and pain. And in chapter 22. And verse
13. Well, from verse 12, and he said
unto him, Friend, how camest thou in hither not having the
wedding garment? And he was speechless. Then said
the king unto the servants, Bind him hand and foot and take him
away and cast him into outer darkness. And there shall be
weeping and gnashing of teeth. And again, the contrast. In the
kingdom of heaven there is a light having no need of sun because
Christ and God is there. He is the light of that place.
Yet in hell there is the darkness and there is the weeping and
the gnashing of teeth. Chapter 24 also and verse 51. And the Lord of that servant
shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that
he is not aware of, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint
him his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be weeping and gnashing
of teeth. And chapter 25 and verse 30,
29. And unto everyone that hath shall
be given, and he shall have an abundance, but from him that
hath not shall be taken away, even which he hath, and cast
ye that unprofitable servant into outer darkness, where thou
shalt be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And so the great contrast,
although we are together here on this earth passing through
the former things of sorrow and sadness, yet on that great day
when Christ will come and divide the sheep from the goats and
bring the sheep, his people, unto himself and shall cast the
goats into outer darkness, they will experience the complete
opposite of all that the believers are experiencing, the true love
of God, the fellowship with Christ, and the former things having
been passed away. And those on the left hand shall
be cast away from God into outer darkness, where there will be
an eternal death, eternal crying, eternal pain, And what a day that would be.
When the door of grace will be shut for all eternity and the
fate, the eternal destiny of millions will be sealed. And
they will be separated from God. But God shall wipe away all their
tears from their eyes. and there will be no more death. And so that is what enables the
Christian to keep going. The prospect of the final destination. Yes, we tread through sorrows
and it is through much tribulation we must go into the kingdom of
God. Yes, we weep daily and sorrow daily over our sin. Yet in glory,
those former things shall be passed away. We'll be given a
new body that enables us to fellowship with Christ, because nothing
that defiles will ever enter into that kingdom, but only those
that are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. The former things shall be passed
away. if Christ was to come of the
children's hymn, if Jesus should come to our meeting today and
call out the Christians by name, how we would listen to what he
would say and how solemn the moments would seem. And as we
looked at recently about redeeming the time and how our lives are
so fragile, we're just a breath away, a heartbeat away from eternity. And yet what is at stake Is the
eternal separation from God under the wrath of God with eternal
weeping? Or there is eternal fellowship
with God through Christ Jesus for all eternity? So I ask the question, how are
we today? Where do we stand? This morning
we looked at the law of Moses. or the law of God given to Moses.
And we saw that in the New Testament, those who are in Christ have
been divorced from that law by death and have been married to
Christ. And so today, this moment, we
are either under the law of God, married to the law, or we are married to the Lord
Jesus Christ and he has paid the penalty, the eternal wrath
of God for the consequences of our sins, or we are under the
law of Moses and God will judge us according to that law and
we will be found guilty. will be found guilty. And he
will say, depart from me, for I never knew you, you workers
of iniquity, and enter into that place, which is the eternal torment
under the wrath of Almighty God. Well, may the Spirit soften our
hearts and enable us to receive these truths as truth and act
accordingly and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ for our only
hope of salvation. And God, shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes. Amen. Our final hymn this evening is
from Hymns for Worship, number 145. before the throne of God above,
I have a strong, a perfect plea, a great high priest whose name
is love, who ever lives and pleads for me. Hymns 145, tune 385. I have a strong and perfect plea. How great thy grace, whose name
is love, whoever is, and bleeds for me. My name is Raven in his hands. My name is written on his heart. I know that while in heavenly
sands, Love, junk, and fear we fail to find. tells me to despair, and tells
me all the guilt within. How could I look and see Him
there, who made that end of all my sin? My sinful soul is helped and
free, full of the justice satisfied, to look on Him and pardon the wisdom that my perfect story's
righteousness and great unchangeable and with himself I cannot die. My soul is purged by his blood. I am risen with Christ on earth. With Christ, my Savior, well
and high above. Almighty God and Heavenly Father,
we thank Thee for the revelation of Thy Kingdom in Thy Word, and
we thank Thee that Thy people have that prospect of being with
Thee in glory, and that Thou remove from our eyes all tears,
and that there will be no more sorrow and pain and suffering
and death, for these former things shall be passed away. We pray
then, Lord, that thou help us to walk through these former
things in this age in which we live, to help us to overcome
and to pass through those times of sorrow and suffering. We pray that we may be taken
home in peace and in safety. Do return us, we pray, on Wednesday
as we come again to the throne of grace. And now may the grace
of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father, with
the fellowship and the communion of the Holy Spirit, rest and
abide with us each now and forevermore. Amen.