“As it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared
for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his
Spirit; for the spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of
God.” 1 Corinthians 2:9,10
How very frequently verses of Scripture are misquoted! Instead of turning
to the Bible, to see how it is written, and saying, “How readest thou?” we
quote from one another; and thus a passage of Scripture is handed down
misquoted, by a kind of tradition, from father to son, and passes as current
among a great number of Christian persons. How very frequently at our
prayer meetings do we hear our brethren describing heaven as a place of
which we cannot conceive! They say “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him;” and there they stop, not seeing that the
very marrow of the whole passage lies in this-”But God hath revealed them
unto us by his Spirit.” So that the joys of heaven (if this passage alludes to
heaven, which, I take it, is not quite so clear as some would suppose), are
after all, not things of which we cannot conceive; for “God hath revealed
them unto us by his Spirit.”
I have hinted that this passage is most commonly applied to heaven, and I
shall myself also so apply it in some measure, this morning. But any one
who reads the connection will discover that the apostle is not talking about
heaven at all. He is only speaking of this-that the wisdom of this world is
not able to discover the things of God-that the merely carnal mind is not
able to know the deep spiritual things of our most holy religion. He says,
“We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom,
which God ordained before the world unto out glory: Which none of the
princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have
crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear
heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God
hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us
by his Spirit, for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of
God.” And then he goes on lower down to say, “But the natural man
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto
him: neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned.” I
take it, that this text is a great general fact, capable of specific application
to certain cases; and that the great fact is this-that the things of God cannot
be perceived by eye, and ear, and heart, but must be revealed by the Spirit
of God; as they are unto all true believers. We shall take that thought, and
endeavor to expand it this morning, explaining it concerning heaven, as
well as regards other heavenly matters.
Every prophet who has stood upon the borders of a new dispensation
might have uttered these words with peculiar force. He might have said, as
he looked forward to the future, God having touched his eye with the
anointing eye-slave of the Holy Spirit, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things that God hath
prepared for them that love him; but God hath revealed them unto us by his
Spirit.” We will divide the economy of free grace into different
dispensations. We commence with the patriarchal. A patriarch, who like
Abraham was gifted with foresight, might have looked forward to the
Levitical dispensation, glorious with its tabernacle, its Shekinah, its
gorgeous veil, its blazing altars; he might have caught a glimpse of
Solomon’s magnificent temple, and even by anticipation heard the sacred
song ascending from the assembled thousands of Jerusalem, he might have
seen king Solomon upon his throne, surrounded with all his riches, and the
people resting in peace and tranquillity in the promised land and he might
have turned to his brethren who lived in the patriarchal age, and said, “Eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man, the
things which God hath prepared for them that love him’ in the next
dispensation. Ye know not how clearly God will reveal himself in the
Paschal Lamb-how sweetly the people will be led, and fed, and guided, and
directed all the way through the wilderness-what a sweet and fair country it
is that they shall inhabit. Eye hath not seen the brooks that gush with milk,
nor the rivers that run with honey, ear hath not heard the melodious voices
of the daughters of Shiloh, nor have entered into the heart of man the joys
of the men of Zion, ‘but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.’”
And so, moreover, at the close of the Levitical dispensation, the prophets
might have thus foretold the coming glories. Old Isaiah, standing in the
midst of the temple beholding its sacrifices, and the dim smoke that went
up from them, when his eyes were opened by the Spirit of God, said-”Eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man, the
things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” He saw by faith
Christ crucified upon the cross; he beheld him weltering in his own blood in
Gethsemane’s garden; he saw the disciples going out of Jerusalem, to
preach everywhere the Word of God; he marked the progress of Messiah’s
kingdom, and he looked down to these latter days, when every man under
his own vine and fig tree doth worship God, none daring to make him
afraid; and he could well have cheered the captives in Babylon in words
like these,-”Now ye sit down and weep, and ye will not sing in a strange
land the songs of Zion; but lift up your heads, for your salvation draweth
nigh your eye hath not seen, nor your ear heard, the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him; but he hath revealed them unto me by his
Spirit.” And now, beloved, we stand on the borders of a new era. The
mediatorial dispensation is almost finished. In a few more years if prophecy
be not thoroughly misinterpreted, we shall enter upon another condition.
This poor earth of ours, which has been swathed in darkness, shall put on
her garments of light. She hath toiled a long while in travail and sorrow.
Soon shall her groanings end. Her surface, which has been stained with
blood, is soon to be purified by love, and a religion of peace is to be
established. The hour is coming when storms shall be hushed, when
tempests shall be unknown, when whirlwind and hurricane shall stay their
mighty force, and when “the kingdoms of this world shall become the
kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.” But you ask me what sort of
kingdom that is to be, and whether I can show you any likeness thereof. I
answer no; “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered the
heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him,”
in the next, the millennial dispensation; “but God hath revealed them unto
us by his Spirit.” Sometimes, when we climb upwards, there are moments
of contemplation when we can understand that verse, “From whence we
look for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall be revealed from
heaven,” and can anticipate that thrice blessed hour when the King of kings
shall put on his head the crown of the universe, when he shall gather up
sheaves of sceptres, and put them beneath his arm-when he shall take the
crowns from the heads of all monarchs, and welding them into one, shall
put them on his own head, amidst the shouts of ten thousand times ten
thousand who shall chaunt his high praises. But it is little enough that we
can guess of its wonders.
But persons are curious to know what kind of dispensation the Millennial
one is to be. Will the temple, they ask, be erected in Jerusalem? Will the
Jews be positively restored to their own land? Will the different nations all
speak one language? Will they all resort to one temple? and ten thousand
other questions. Beloved, we cannot answer you. “Eye hath not seen, nor
ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man, the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him.” We do not profess to understand the
minutiae of these things. It is enough for us to believe that a latter-day
glory is approaching. Our eyes glisten with joy, in the full belief that it is
coming, and our hearts swell big at the thought that our Master is to reign
over the wide, wide world, and to win it for himself. But if you begin
questioning us, we tell you that we cannot explain it. Just as under the legal
dispensation there were types and shadows, but the mass of the people
never saw Christ in them, so there are a great many different things in this
dispensation which are types of the next, which will never be explained till
we have more wisdom, more light, and more instruction. Just as the
enlightened Jew partially foresaw what the Gospel was to be by the law, so
may we guess the Millennium by the present, but we have not light enough:
there are few who are taught enough in the deep things of God to explain
them fully. Therefore we still say of the mass of mankind-”eye hath not
seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man, the things which
God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them
unto us by his Spirit,” in some measure, and he will do so more and more,
by-and-bye.
And this brings us to make the application of the subject to heaven itself.
You see, while it does not expressly mean heaven here, you may very
easily bring it to bear upon it; for concerning heaven, unto which believers
are all fast going, we may say “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither
have entered the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for
them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.”
Now, beloved, I am about to talk of heaven for this reason: you know, I
never preach any funeral sermons for anybody, and never intend. I have
passed by many persons who have died in our church, without having made
any parade of funeral sermons, but, nevertheless, three or four of our
friends having departed recently, I think I may speak a little to you about
heaven in order to cheer you, and God may thus bless their departure. It is
to be no funeral sermon, however-no eulogium on the dead, and no oration
pronounced over the departed. Frequent funeral sermons I utterly abhor,
and I believe they are not under God’s sanction and approval. Of the dead
we should say nothing but that which is good: and in the pulpit we should
say very little of that, except, perhaps, in the case of some very eminent
saint: and then we should say very little of the man, but let the “honor be
unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever.”
Heaven-then, what is it? First what is it not? It is not a heaven of the
SENSES-”Eye hath not seen it.” What glorious things the eye hath seen!
Have we not seen the gaudy pageantry of pomp crowding the gay streets.
We have seen the procession of kings and princes; our eyes have been
feasted with the display of glittering uniforms, of lavished gold and jewels,
of chariots and of horses; and we have perhaps thought that the procession
of the saints of God may be dimly shadowed forth thereby. But, oh it was
but the thought of our poor infant mind, and far enough from the great
reality. We may hear of the magnificence of the old Persian princes, of
palaces covered with gold and silver, and floors inlaid with jewels- but we
cannot thence gather a thought of heaven, for “eye hath not seen “it. We
have thought, however, when we have come to the works of God, and our
eye hath rested on them: surely we can get some glimpse of what heaven is
here. By night we have turned our eye up to the blue azure, and we have
seen the stars-those golden-fleeced sheep of God feeding on the blue
meadow of the sky, and we have said, “See! those are the nails in the floor
of heaven up yonder;” and if this earth has such a glorious covering, what
must that of the kingdom of heaven be? And when our eye has wandered
from star to star, we have thought, “Now I can tell what heaven is by the
beauty of its floor.” But it is all a mistake. All that we can see can never
help us to understand heaven. At another time we have seen some glorious
landscape; we have seen the white river winding among the verdant fields
like a stream of silver, covered on either side with emerald; we have seen
the mountain towering to the sky, the mist rising on it, or the golden
sunrise covering all the east with glory; or we have seen the west, again,
reddened with the light of the sun as it departed I and we have said,
“Surely, these grandeurs must be something like heaven; we have clapped
our hands, and exclaimed-
“Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood,
Stand dressed in living green.”
We have imagined that there really were fields in heaven, and that things of
earth were patterns of things in heaven. It was all a mistake;-”Eye hath not
seen” it.
Equally does our text assert that “the ear hath not heard” it. Oh! have we
not on the Sabbath day sometimes heard the sweet voice of the messenger
of God, when he has by the Spirit spoken to our souls! We knew
something of heaven then, we thought. At other times we have been
entranced with the voice of the preacher, and with the remarkable sayings
which he has uttered; we have been charmed by his eloquence some of us
have known what it is to sit and weep and smile alternately, under the
power of some mighty man who played with us as skilfully as David could
have played on his harp, and we have said, “How sweet to hear those
sounds! how glorious his eloquence! how wonderful his power of oratory!
Now I think I know something of what heaven is, for my mind is so carried
away, my passions are so excited, my imagination is so elevated, all the
powers of my mind are stirred up so that I can think of nothing but of what
the preacher is speaking about!” But the ear is not the medium by which
you can guess anything of heaven. The “ear hath not heard” it. At other
times perhaps you have heard sweet music, and hath not music charms,
even on savage breasts like some of ours? We have heard music, whether
poured from the lungs of man-that noblest instrument in the world-or from
some manufacture of harmony, and we have thought, “Oh! how glorious
this is!” and fancied, “This is what John meant in the Revelation-’I heard a
voice like many waters, and like exceeding great thunders, and I heard the
voice of harpers harping with their harps’ and this must he something like
heaven, something like the hallelujahs of the glorified.” But ah! beloved,
we made a mistake. “Ear hath not heard” it.
Here has been the very ground of that error into which many persons have
fallen concerning heaven. They have said that they would like to go to
heaven. What for? For this reason: they looked upon it as a place where
they should be free from bodily pain. They should not have the head-ache
or the tooth-ache there, nor any of those diseases which flesh is heir to, and
whenever God laid his hand upon them they began to wish themselves in
heaven, because they regarded it as a heaven of the senses-a heaven which
the eye hath seen or the ear heard. A great mistake; for although we shall
have a body free from pain, yet it is not a heaven where our senses shall
indulge themselves. The laborer will have it, that heaven is a place,
Where on a green and flowery mount His weary soul shall sit.
Another will have it that heaven is a place where he shall eat to the full,
and his body shall be satisfied. We may use these as figures, but we are so
degenerate that we are apt to build a fine Mahometan heaven, and to think,
there shall we have all the delights of the flesh; there shall we drink from
bowls of nectared red wine, there shall we lavishly indulge ourselves, and
our body shall enjoy every delight of which it is capable. What a mistake
for us to conceive such a thing! Heaven is not a place for the delight of
mere sense, we shall be raised not a sensual body, but a spiritual body. We
can get no conceptions of heaven through the senses; they must always
come through the Spirit. That is our first thought. It is not a heaven to be
grasped by the senses.
But, secondly, it is not a heaven of the IMAGINATION. Poets let their
imaginations fly with loosened wings, when they commence speaking of
heaven; and how glorious are their descriptions of it! When we have read
them, we say, “And is that heaven? I wish I was there.” And we think we
have some idea of heaven by reading books of poetry. Perhaps the preacher
weaves the filigree work of fancy, and builds up in a moment by his words
charming palaces, the tops of which are covered with gold and the walls
are ivory. He pictures to you lights brighter than the sun, a place where
spirits flap their bright wings, where comets flash through the sky. He tells
you of fields where you may feed on ambrosia, where no henbane groweth,
but where sweet flowers cover the meads; and then you think you have
some idea of heaven: and you sit down and say, “It is sweet to hear that
man speak, he carried me so away; he mace me think I was there; he gave
me such conceptions as I never heard before, he worked on my
imagination.” And do you know, there is not a greater power than
imagination. I would not give a farthing for a man who has not imagination
he is of no use, if he wishes to move the multitude. If you were to take
away my imagination I must die. It is a little heaven below, to imagine
sweet things. But never think that imagination can picture heaven. When it
is most sublime when it is freest from the dust of earth, when it is carried
up by the greatest knowledge, and kept steady by the most extreme
caution, imagination cannot picture heaven. “It hath not entered the heart
of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.”
Imagination is good, but not to picture to us heaven. Your imaginary
heaven you will find by-and-by to be all a mistake; though you may have
piled up fine castles, you will find them to be castles in the air, and they will
vanish like thin clouds before the gale. For imagination cannot make a
heaven. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered the heart
of man to conceive” it.
Our next point is, that it is not a heaven of the INTELLECT. Men who take
to themselves the title of intelligent, and who very humbly and modestly
call themselves philosophers, generally describe heaven as a place where
we shall know all things; and their grandest idea of heaven is, that they
shall discover all secrets there. There the rook which would not tell its
origin shall bubble forth its history, there the star which would not tell its
date, and could not be made to whisper of its inhabitants shall at once
unravel all its secrets; there the animal, the fashion of which could scarcely
be guessed at, so long had it been buried amongst other fossils in the earth,
shall start up again, and it shall be seen of what form and shape it really
was:- there the rocky secrets of this our earth that they never could
discover will be opened to them, and they conceive that they shall travel
from one star to another star, from planet to planet, and fill their enobled
intellect, as they now delight to call it, with all kinds of human knowledge.
They reckon that heaven will be to understand the works of the Creator:
and concerning such men as Bacon and other great philosophers, of whose
piety we generally have very little evidence, we read at the end of their
biographies-”He has now departed, that noble spirit which taught us such
glorious things here, to sip at the fountain of knowledge, and have all his
mistakes rectified, and his doubts cleared up.” But we do not believe
anything of the kind. Intellect! thou knowest it not! “It hath not entered
into the heart of man.” It is high; what canst thou know? It is deep; what
canst thou understand? It is only the Spirit that can give you a guess of
heaven.
Now we come to the point-”He hath revealed it unto us by his Spirit.” I
think this means, that it was revealed unto the apostles by the Spirit, so that
they wrote something of it in the Holy Word; but as you all believe that,
we will only hint at it, and pass on. We think also that it refers to every
believer, and that every believer does have glimpses of heaven below, and
that God does reveal heaven to him, even whilst on earth, so that he
understands what heaven is, in some measure. I love to talk of the Spirit’s
influence on man. I am a firm believer in the doctrine of impulse, in the
doctrine of influence, in the doctrine of direction, in the doctrine of
instruction by the Holy Spirit; and I believe him to be an interpreter one of
a thousand, who reveals unto men his own sinfulness, and afterwards
teaches him his righteousness in Christ Jesus. I know there are some who
abuse that doctrine, and ascribe every text that comes into their heart as
given by the Spirit. We have heard of a man who, passing by his neighbor’s
wood, and having none in his own house, fancied he should like to take
some. The text crossed his mind-”In all those things Job sinned not.” He
said “There is an influence from the Spirit. I must take that man’s wood.”
Presently, however, conscience whispered, “Thou shalt not steal,” and he
remembered then that no text could have been put into his heart by the
Spirit, if it excused sin or led him into it. However we do not discard the
doctrine of impulse, because some people make a mistake; and we shall
have a little of it this morning-a little of the teaching of God’s gracious
Spirit, whereby he reveals unto us what heaven is.
First of all, we think a Christian gets a gaze of what heaven is, when in the
midst of trials and troubles he is able to cast all his care upon the Lord,
because he careth for him. When waves of distress, and billows of affliction
pass over the Christian, there are times when his faith is so strong that he
lies down and sleeps, though the hurricane is thundering in his ears, and
though billows are rocking him like a child in its cradle, though the earth is
removed, and the mountains are carried into the midst of the sea, he says,
“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Famine
and desolation come, but he says, “Though the fig tree shall not blossom,
neither shall there be fruit on the vine, though the labor of the olive shall
fail, and the field shall yield no increase, yet will I trust in the Lord, and
stay myself on the God of Jacob.” Affliction smites him to the ground; he
looks up, and says, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.” The blows
that are given to him are like the lashing of a whip upon the water, covered
up immediately, and he seems to feel nothing. It is not stoicism; it is the
peculiar sleep of the beloved. “So he giveth his beloved sleep.” Persecution
surrounds him; but he is unmoved. Heaven is something like that-a place of
holy calm and trust
“That holy calm, that sweet repose
Which none but he who feels it knows.
This heavenly calm within the breast
Is the dear pledge of glorious rest
Which for the church of God remains,
The end of cares, the end of pains.”
But there is another season in which the Christian has heaven revealed to
him; and that is, the season of quiet contemplation. There are precious
hours, blessed be God, when we forget the world-times and seasons when
we get quite away from it, when our weary spirit wings its way far, far,
from scenes of toil and strife. There are precious moments when the angel
of contemplation gives us a vision. He comes and puts his finger on the lip
of the noisy world; he bids the wheels that are continually rattling in our
ears be still; and we sit down, and there is a solemn silence of the mind. We
find our heaven and our God; we engage ourselves in contemplating the
glories of Jesus, or mounting upwards towards the bliss of heaven-in going
backward to the great secrets of electing love, in considering the
immutability of the blessed covenant, in thinking of that wind which
“bloweth where it listeth,” in remembering our own participation of that
life which cometh from God, in thinking of our blood-bought union with
the Lamb, of the consummation of our marriage with him in realms of light
and bliss, or any such kindred topics. Then it is that we know a little about
heaven. Have ye never found, O ye sons and daughters of gaiety, a holy
calm come over you at times, in reading the thoughts of your fellowmen?
But oh! how blessed to come and read the thoughts of God, and work, and
weave them out in contemplation. Then we have a web of contemplation
that we wrap around us like an enchanted garment, and we open our eyes
and see heaven. Christian I when you are enabled by the Spirit to hold a
season of sweet contemplation, then you can say-”But he hath revealed
them unto us by his Spirit;” for the joys of heaven are akin to the joys of
contemplation, and the joys of a holy calm in God. But there are times with
me-I dare say there may be with some of you- when we do something more
than contemplate-when we arise by meditation above thought itself, and
when our soul, after having touched the Pisgah of contemplation by the
way, flies positively into the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. There are
seasons when the Spirit not only stands and flaps his wings o’er the gulf,
but positively crosses the Jordan and dwells with Christ, holds fellowship
with angels, and talks with spirits-gets up there with Jesus, clasps him in
his arms, and cries, “My beloved is mine, and I am his; I will hold him, and
will not let him go.” I know what it is at times to lay my beating head on
the bosom of Christ with something more than faith-actually and positively
to get hold of him; not only to take him by faith, but actually and positively
to feed on him; to feel a vital union with him, to grasp his arm, and feel his
very pulse beating. You say. “Tell it not to unbelievers; they will laugh!”
Laugh ye may; but when we are there we care not for your laughter, if ye
should laugh as loud as devils: for one moment’s fellowship with Jesus
would recompense us for it all. Picture not fairy lands; this is heaven, this is
bliss. “He hath revealed it unto us by his Spirit.”
And let not the Christian, who says he has very little of this enjoyment be
discouraged. Do not think you cannot have heaven revealed to you by the
Spirit; I tell you, you can, if you are one of the Lord’s people; and let me
tell some of you, that one of the places where you may most of all expect
to see heaven is at the Lord’s table. There are some of you, my dearly
beloved, who absent yourselves from the supper of the Lord on earth; let
me tell you in God’s name, that you are not only sinning against God, but
robbing yourselves of a most inestimable privilege. If there is one season in
which the soul gets into closer communion with Christ than another, it is at
the Lord’s table. How often have we sang there,
“Can I Gethsemane forget?
Or there thy conflicts see,
Thine agony and bloody sweat,
And not remember thee?
Remember thee and all thy pains,
And all thy love to me,-
Yes, while a pulse, or breath remains,
I will remember thee.”
And then you see what an easy transition it is to heaven:-
“And when these failing lips grow dumb,
And thought and memory flee;
When thou shalt in thy kingdom come,
Jesus, remember me.”
O my erring brethren, ye who live on, unbaptized, and who receive not this
sacred supper, I tell you not that they will save you-most assuredly they
will not, and it you are not saved before you receive them they will be an
injury to you;-but if you are the Lord’s people, why need you stay away? I
tell you, the Lord’s table is so high a place that you can see heaven from it
very often. You get so near the cross there, you breathe so near the cross,
that your sight becomes clearer, and the air brighter, and you see more of
heaven there than anywhere else. Christian, do not neglect the supper of
thy Lord; for if thou dost, he will hide heaven from thee, in a measure.
Again, how sweetly do we realize heaven when we assemble in our
meetings for prayer. I do not know how my brethren feel at prayer
meetings; but they are so much akin to what heaven is, as a place of
devotion, that I really think we get more ideas of heaven by the Spirit
there, than in hearing a sermon preached, because the sermon necessarily
appeals somewhat to the intellect and the imagination. But if we enter into
the vitality of prayer at our prayer meetings, then it is the Spirit that reveals
heaven to us. I remember two texts that I preached from lately at our
Monday evening meeting, which were very sweet to some of our souls.
“Abide with us, for the day is far spent,” and another, “By night on my bed
I sought him whom my soul loveth: I sought him and found him.” Then
indeed we had some foretaste of heaven. Master Thomas would not believe
that his Lord was risen. Why? Because he was not at the last prayermeeting;
for we are told that Thomas was not there; and those who are
often away from devotional meetings are very apt to have doubting frames;
they do not get sights of heaven, for they get their eye-sight spoiled by
stopping away.
Another time when we get sights of heaven is in extraordinary closet
seasons. Ordinary closet prayer will only make ordinary Christians of us. It
is in extraordinary seasons, when we are led by God to devote, say an
hour, to earnest prayer — when we feel an impulse, we scarce know why,
to cut off a portion of our time during the day to go alone. Then, beloved,
we kneel down, and begin to pray in earnest. It may be that we are
attacked by the devil; for when the enemy knows we are going to have a
great blessing, he always makes a great noise to drive us away; but if we
keep at it, we shall soon get into a quiet frame of mind, and hear him
roaring at a distance. Presently you get hold of the angel, and say, “Lord, I
will not let thee go, except thou bless me.” He asks your name. You begin
to tell him what your name was:
“Once a sinner, near despair,
Sought thy mercy-seat by prayer;
Mercy heard and set him free;
Lord, that mercy came to me.’
You say, “What is thy name, Lord?” He will not tell you. You hold him
fast still; at last he deigns to bless you. That is certainly some foretaste of
heaven, when you feel alone with Jesus. Let no man know your prayers;
they are between God and yourselves; but it you want to know much of
heaven, spend some extra time in prayer; for God then reveals it to us by
his Spirit.
“Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish.” You have been saying in
your hearts, “The prophet is a fool, and this spiritual man is mad.” Go
away and say these things; but be it known unto you, that what ye style
madness is to us wisdom and what ye count folly “is the wisdom of God in
a mystery, even the hidden wisdom.” And if there is a poor penitent here
this morning, saying, “Ah! sir, I get visions enough of hell, but I do not get
visions of heaven;” poor penitent sinner, thou canst not have any visions of
heaven, unless thou lookest through the hands of Christ. The only glass
through which a poor sinner can see bliss is that formed by the holes in
Jesus’ hands. Dost thou not know, that all grace and mercy was put into
the hand of Christ, and that it never could have run out to thee unless his
hand had been bored through in crucifixion. He cannot hold it from thee,
for it will run through; and he cannot hold it in his heart, for he has got a
rent in it made by the spear. Go and confess your sin to him, and he will
wash you, and make you whiter than snow. If you feel you cannot repent,
go to him and tell him so, for he is exalted to give repentance, as well as
remission of sins. Oh! that the spirit of God might give you true repentance
and true faith; and then saint and sinner shall meet together, and both shall
not only know what “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard:” but
“Then shall we see, and hear, and know
All we desired or wished below,
And every power find sweet employ
In that eternal world of joy.”
Till that time we can only have these things revealed to us; the Spirit; and
we will seek more of that, each day we live.
