 |
| "... New Jerusalem ... prepared as a bride..." Rev. 21:2 |
TO CHEW ON: "'And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.'" Revelation 21:4
Our reading today is so rich, it's hard to pick out one idea on which to focus. But the "no more"s listed here have their hands up and are waving wildly, so let's take a minute to ponder them and a few more found in Revelation. These are things that will have no place, that are no more in the "new heaven and a new earth" that God has prepared.
No more sea - Revelation 21:1Hmm, interesting. But I love the sea—from a place of safety, of course, when on land looking at its beauty and appreciating its place in the water cycle. Of course the sea is also the source of much heartache, taking the lives of sailors, sweeping coastal communities away in its storm surges and tsunamis. In God's wisdom our new home, that 'holy city," will have no more sea.
No sorrow. No crying - Revelation 21:4"Sorrow" and "crying" stand in for a host of experiences and emotions from disappointment to devastation, having hurt feelings to experiencing the pain of abuse and separation. All the things that would make us sorrowful and cause us to cry will someday be NO MORE!
No pain - Revelation 21:4No more physical pain that makes us grit our teeth to go on, or confines us to beds or wheelchairs. There will be no more psychological and emotional pain either—that pain that drives people to depression or to seek the bitterest of relief in addictions or obsessions.
No curse - Revelation 22:3.What curse? The curse spoken of in Genesis 3:17-19, of obstacle-filled yet necessary work that seems so pointless when it leads, in the end, to us joining the ground we spent our whole lives tilling.
No night - Revelation 22:5No dark to stumble around in, a cover for evil. Perhaps no more need to sleep.
No death - Revelation 21:4No more untimely separations from those we love.
What a future to contemplate!
PRAYER: Dear God, it's hard to even imagine a future without things like sorrow, pain, crying, obstacles, death. I love Your guarantee: "I make all things new." Help me to remember this when events in my life cause me to become disheartened and weary, even distraught and panicked. Amen.
MORE: No More Night sung by David Phelps
***********
New King James Version (NKJV) Used with permission. The Holy Bible, New King James Version Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
No comments:
Post a Comment