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Illustrated. 18mo, 30 Grapes of Eshcol. 16mo, • 60 <©r, (Bleaningg from tfje lLanD of promise. ^utfjot of "ponttng anb |%fji SSaftfjss/' "Memories of §SciIjmtg," tPc 3\ T ctD Sjork : gobcrt feto « growers, 33S IBroabbag. WW. :e>Tsoi " Thus take thy heart into the ' Land of Promise.' Shew it the pleasant hills and fruitful valleys : Shew it the Clusters of Grapes which thou hast gathered ; to convince it that it is a Blessed Land, flowing with better than milk and honey." — Richard Baxter, [1615.J " The milk and the honey is beyond this wilderness. God be merciful to you ; and grant that you be not slothful to go in to possess the land. " They had the City itself in view : and they thought they heard all the bells therein to ring, to welcome them thereunto." — John Bunyan, (1623.) By Bx^fc* njra THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS DEDICATED TO ONE, WHOSE CALM SUBMISSION TO THE HAND OF GOD UNDER A LINGERING SICKNESS, AND HER BRIGHT HOPE OF " A BETTER COUNTRY," WHERE a THE INHABITANT SHALL NO MORE SAY, I AM SICK," HAVE INSPIRED NOT A FEW OF ITS THOUGHTS AND MUSINGS. " afllljeret'ore, ©elotiea, seeing; tljat pe look foe ^ttctj tljingtf, be Diligent, rijat pe map be found of l^int in peace, tmtljout 0pot, a no blameless." 2 Peter hi. 14. PECULATIVE difcuffion, attra&ive il- luftration, or the syftematic treatment of a great theme, will not be found in thefe pages. They confift mainly of simple meditations on the glories of a Future World, — fragmentary thoughts and reflections, written with special reference to the chamber of sick- nefs, the couch of suffering, and the home of bereavement. Nothing surely can so cheer the fainting be- liever, bowed down with sin and sorrow, as the profpect of Heavenly biifs. It is the thought of the joy in the morning of immortality which dries earth's bittereft tears. The heart of the child leaps at the sight of his Father's houfe. ' The lights in the diftant windows cannot fail to revive his spirit and quicken his footfteps. The following are a few such diftant rays Vlll PREFACE. from "the Excellent Glory," — a few GRAPES gathered by " Faith and Hope, the two spies from the true Canaan," — a few Pifgah-glimpfes of its Vineyards and Oliveyards. Glimpfes, in- deed, only they are, — at beft fitful and tranfient ; for even the mount of faith is oftentimes wreathed with clouds and vapours, dimming to the bright- eft vifion its views of the future. But shadowy and indiftin6l as at beft they mufl be, they may help us the better to defcend the Valley, complete our warfare, and, finally, with our pilgrim-staff, "to pafs over this Jordan," (Gen. xxxii. 10.) By revealing a diftant view of the crown, we may be enabled the more cheerfully to bear the crofs. " The very hope we have of it, works wonderful joy in the heart of a Chriflian. David did not live to see the glory of Solomon's temple, but he made provijion for it, and caft the model of it, and he took much delight in the contemplatio7i of what it would be. ... . Here are some sparks, some be- ginnings of the Glory of Heaven, and of that great joy which we shall have hereafter? * The night-watch, with some whofe eyes may * Archbifhop Ufher, (1638.) PREFACE. IX trace thefe pages, cannot now be long. Already the gray streaks of morning may be telling that they are " nearing sunrife." New strains of celeftial mufic may be wafted from the half- opened portal — new voices from the spirit-land heard saying, " Come up hither." " Strangers and pilgrims" on the earth! let your citizenfhip be in Heaven. Let the rents and fissures which trial, in its varied forms, may have made in the walls of your frail earthly tabernacle, only serve to let the rays of the ineffable glory steal more brightly through. May thefe feeble fore- taftes quicken your longings for the full and gladfome fruition. It will be seen that the Meditations have been numbered, so as to extend over a month, in cafe any should defire to use them as Daily Readings. There has been no attempt to link the chapters together by any train of confecutive thought. Each, purpofely short, is independent of what precedes or follows. The reader may, moreover, find similar ideas or re- flexions more than once reappearing. But as the grand leading characleriftics of Heavenly X PREFACE. happinefs revealed in Scripture, are compara- tively few, such repetition (in the cafe of a devo- tional series) was, to a certain extent, unavoid- able ; and by thofe who read for profit, not for criticifm, will be readily underftood and forgiven. PAGE I. REST, . , I II. CEASELESS ACTIVITY, . 13 III. CONTINUAL PROGRESS, 25 IV. MANY MANSIONS, 33 V. MANY MANSIONS, , , 43 VI. JOYFUL REUNIONS, 5i VII. NO SICKNESS, . 65 VIII. THE DEATH OF DEATH, 75 IX. WAKING REALITIES, 85 X. FACE TO FACE, . . 9i XI. UNNEEDED LUMINARIES, 99 XII. VISION AND FRUITION, 107 XIII. LOCALITY AND CHARACTER, . "5 XIV. THE MUTUAL JOY, 127 XV. THE MUTUAL JOY, 135 XVI. DIVERSE MAGNITUDES, 143 XVII. GLORIFIED BODIES, , 151 XVIII. NO TEMPLE, . , 159 cii CONTENTS. PAGE XIX. THE GLORIOUS TRANSITION, . l67 XX. THE ALL IN ALL, 175 XXI. SUFFERING AND GLORY, l8l XXII. THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER, 191 XXIII. THE BRIMMING FOUNTAIN, 199 XXIV. IMMEDIATE ENTRANCE, 207 XXV. FROM GLORY TO GLORY, 215 XXVI. THE HEAVENLY FIRMAMENT, . , 221 XXVII. THE VICTOR'S SONG, . 231 XXVIII. THE VICTOR'S DRESS, . 239 XXIX. THE NIGHTLESS WORLD, 247 XXX. LIVING FOUNTAINS, 257 XXXI. FOR EVER, . 265 " Chime on, ye bells ! again begin, And ring the Sabbath morning in. The labourer's week-day work is done, The reft begun Which Chrift has for His people won." a There remaineth therefore a reft to the people of God."— Heb. iv. 9. OW sweet the mufic of this firfh heavenly ■ chime floating acrofs the waters of death from the towers of the new Jerufalem ! Pilgrim, faint under thy long and arduous pilgrimage, hear it ! It is REST. Soldier, carry- ing still upon thee the blood and duft of battle, hear it! It is REST. Voyager, toffed on the waves of sin and sorrow, driven hither and thither on the world's heaving ocean of vicis- situde, hear it ! The haven is in sight ; the very waves that are breaking on the shore 2 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. seem to murmur — " So giveth He His beloved REST." It is the long-drawn sigh of exiftence at laft anfwered. The toil and travail of earth's protra6led week is at an end. The calm of its unbroken Sabbath is begun. Man, weary man, has found at laft the long-sought- for rest in the bofom of his God ! This Heavenly Rest will be a rest from sin. Sin is the great difturber of the moral uni- verfe. The world — the soul — was once like an ^Eolian harp ; every paffing zephyr woke it into melody. Now it is tunelefs, unftrung ; its notes diffonant and harfh. Not till the Sabbatic morning of heaven dawn, w T ill the old harmonies be reftored. Joyful anticipation ! perfect and entire emancipation, not only from all tempta- tion without, but from all bias to evil within. No latent principle of corruption — no depreffing confcioufnefs of inherent sin — no germinating seeds or roots that can develop themfelves into fruit — no languid frames — no guilty fears and apprehenfions — no sorrowful eftrangements from that Love whofe smile is heaven ; — a reft from REST. 3 Satan's deceitful wiles and infidious snares ; — tliefe no longer felt or feared. What more can be needed ? A reftfro7n sin, and a reft in God. As the needle in the compafs, after many tremu- lous vibrations, at laft settles in steady repofe in the direction of its pole, so the redeemed spirit — all its tremblings, and faintings, and fitful aberrations at an end — shall remain, with its refined energies, its ennobled powers, and puri- fied afpirations undeviatingly fixed and centred on Jehovah Himfelf. Its eternal motto will be — " This is my rest for ever!' Heaven will be a Rest from all doubt and error. Here, how much there is of darknefs and uncertainty! The volume of the Divine ways is a myfterious volume. As the breath dims the window-pane in looking out on the faireft land- scape, so the breath on the windows of senfe and sight often obfcures the glory of the moral landfcape, caufing us to exclaim — " Now we see through a glafs darkly f" The material world around us, and the spiritual world within us, are full of enigmas which we cannot solve ; much 4 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. more may we expe6t marvels and myfteries in the ways and dealings of God — "deep/' great deep " judgments !" But then all will be cleared. "In Thy light shall zve see light!' The day will then break, and the looming murky shadows shall for ever flee away. Doctrinal difficulties will be explained, apparent inconfiftencies removed, withering doubts for ever silenced. No more impeach- ments of the Divine veracity, or queftionings of the Divine procedure. Looking down from the summit of the everlafting hills on the mazy windings of the earthly pilgrimage, every ran- somed tongue will have the one confeffion — "He hath done all tilings welly The Rest of Heaven will be a rest from sorrow and suffering. This is a weeping world. Deny it who may ; it has its smiles, but it has as often its tears. Ye who have the cup of its joys fulleft, be thankful while it is yours ; but carry it with trembling. The head that is now planning its golden projects may to-morrow be laid on the REST. 5 pillow of sicknefs, with the dim night-lamp for weary months its companion. The joyous circle, now uninvaded by the King of Terrors, may to- morrow be speaking of their " loved and loft." The towering fabric of human happinefs, which is now rapidly uprearing, may, in the twinkling of an eye, become a mafs of ruins. But if " weeping endure for the night," "joy cometh in the morning." Yet a little while, mourning believer! and you will shed your laft tear, heave your laft pang. Once enter that peaceful haven, and not one wave of trouble shall ever afterwards roll. The very fountain of your tears will be dried. Your re- membrance of all the tribulations of the nether world will be like the vifions of some unquiet dream of an earthly night, which the gladfome sunfhine of morning has difpelled, the confufed memories of which are all that remain. "And ihere shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain : for the former things are paffed away" (Rev. xxi. 4.) Here our trials are needed. The angel has to come down " to trouble the waters," in order to 6 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. make us senfible of his prefence. It is when the pool is dijiurbed we see moft of our God. But in heaven, though the Great Angel will be ever prefent, there will be no more waters to trouble. It is " a sea ofglafs." The laft ripple of the laft murmuring billow will break upon the shores of Jordan, and "immediately" there will be "a great calm? The Rest of Heaven is a rest which " remaineth? Nothing is permanent here. The beft of earthly joys are evanefcent ; — like the bubble rifing to the surface of the stream, which glitters for a moment in the sunfhine in its rainbow-hues, and then* is gone, the place that knew it know- ing it no more ! But the reft above is eternal; — no foe can invade it, no storms can difturb it. It is the reft of a final home, over the portals of which is written, " Ye shall go no more out" Reader, pitch not your tabernacle here ! Yours now is, or ought to be, a tent or nomad life. The Chriftian is an Arab in the prefent probation state. He has no fixed abode. His dwelling is conftructed not of stones or enduring material. REST. 7 The rope, and the canvas, and the wooden pins, all indicate "the pilgrim and stranger on the earth." It is a wildernefs reft. He mull be content with wildernefs provifion. If you have many sources of earthly happinefs, sit loofely to them. Let thefe rills only draw you nearer the Fountain-head; — let thefe gifts only unite you clofer to the Giver. " He gave them," says Richard Baxter, "to be refrefhments in thy jour- ney ; and wouldft thou dwell in thy inn, and go no further?" Soon He Himfelf — your " exceed- ing joy" — will superfede them. The rill will be no longer needed when you have the Great Source ; the starlight when you have Sunlight ; creature-comforts when you have the Infinite Prefence. " There remaineth a rest!" Liften to this, child of suffering and sorrow! Thou who art beaten about now with "a great fight of affli6tions," thou wilt soon be at home; — soon with God; — and nothing then, evermore, to break the trance of thy blifs! Every time the sounding line is let down, the refponfe is, " Nearer shore!" Sainted ones in that spirit-world, like the birds which greet the earthly voyager as he approaches 8 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. land, are hovering around thee, telling that thy Home is at hand — that soon thou shalt furl thy sails, and reach the defired haven. " My little bark," says one who has now realifed her glow- ing anticipations, " is riding serenely through the storm, and soon I shall drop my anchor in the still waters of eternal rest and glory."-* The joys of the Heavenly Rest will be enhanced by contrast This is one beauteous element in the contem- plation of future blifs, which angels know nothing of — the joy of contrast. Thefe Bleffed Beings never knew what it was to sin or to suffer. Thefe glorious Veffels, launched on the " summer seas of eternity," never knew what it was to wreftle with the tempeft, or, like the shipwrecked apoflle, to be "nights and days in the deep" of trial. The blind man exults in the boon of reftored sight, in a way which others who have never known its lofs cannot experience. The sick man appreciates the return of vigorous health, in a * Mrs Winflow's Life. REST. 9 way which others can know nothing of who have never felt its privation. The labourer enjoys his nightly repofe all the more by contrail with the hours of toil which preceded it. The soldier, after years of suffering and privation, appreciates the mufic of that word u home" as he never could have done unlefs he had undergone the terrible difcipline of trench, and night-watch, and battle- field. Will it not be the same with the believer in entering on his Reft ? Will not his former expe- rience of suffering, and sin, and sorrow, enhance all his new-born joys ? It is said of saints, that they will be " equal to the angels." In this refpetSt they will be superior! The angel never knew what it was to have an eye dimmed with tears, or to be covered with the soil of conflict. He never can know the exquifite beauty of that Bible pi6lure (none but the weeping pilgrim of earth can underftand or experience it) where, as the climax of heavenly blifs, God is reprefented as u wiping away all tears from their eyes ! " Beautiful thought ! The weary ones from the pilgrim-valley seated by the calm river of life, 10 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. bathing their temples — laving their wounds — ungirding their armour ; — the duft of battle for ever wafhed away; — and liftening to the pro- clamation from the inner sanctuary — the soft strain stealing down from the Sabbath-bells of glory — " The days of your mourning are ended T (Isa. lx. 20.) Chriftian, has this glorious reft the place in your thoughts it ought to occupy ? Are you delighting to have frequent Pifgah-glimpfes of this Land of Promife ? Are you living as the inheritor and heir of such a bleffed immor- tality, "declaring plainly" that you "seek a better country?" How sad, how strange, that the eye of faith should be dimmed to thefe glorious realities by the fugitive and paffing things of senfe. Gro- vellers that we are ! with all this wealth of glory within reach — with thefe deathlefs spirits claim- ing to outlive all time — that we should suffer the seen and the temporal to eclipfe the splendours of eternal day! "Reader, look to thyfelf, and refolve the queftion ; afk confcience, and suffer it to tell thee truly that thou put thine eternal REST. 1 1 reft before thine eyes as the great bufinefs thou haft to do in this world. Haft thou watched and laboured with all thy might that no man take thy crown?"* Sit no longer cowering in darknefs when light is streaming from your Father's windows and inviting you upwards. A few more rolling suns — a few more swings of Time's pendulum — and the world's curfew-bell will toll, announcing the Sabbath of eternity has come. Seek reft in Chrift now. Flee to the crevices of the Rock of Ages now, if you would neftle for ever in the golden eaves of the eternal Temple. Be ever sitting on the edge of your nest, pluming yourfelf for flight; — so that when death comes, " with wings like a dove" — the celeftial plumage of faith, and hope, and love — you may soar upwards to the Sabbath of your God, and be at rest FOR EVER! * Baxter. II. " A little while the fetters hold no more. The spirit long enthrall' d is free to soar, And takes its joyful flight, On radiant wings of light, Up to the throne, to labour or adore ! " "They reft not day and night." — Rev. iv. 8. IHAT a seeming paradox is this! We laft contemplated Heaven under the beautiful and significant figure of a state of rest; — here it is spoken of as a state of unrest! "They reft"— "They reft not." It is what the" old writers quaintly defignate, " The rest without a rest!' The combination of thefe two simili- tudes involves no inconfiftency ; they bring to- gether two different but not antagoniftic ele- ments of earthly happinefs, which will have their higheft exemplification in the blifs of a perfefl world. 14 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. The emblem suggefts two views of a future Heaven — Firjl, It is a state of ceafelefs activity in the service of God. Conftituted as we now are, a condition of lift- leffnefs and inactivity is moft inimical to true happinefs. Indeed, if we can judge from the references in Scripture to the conftitution of higher and nobler natures, we are led to infer that activity is a great normal law among the loftieft orders of intelligent being. Angels and archangels, cherubim and seraphim, the " burn- ing ones and the shining ones," are " minijiering spirits," engaged in untiring errands of love to redeemed man, and probably alio to other pro- vinces in God's vaft empire ; nay, with reverence be it said, the Great God Himfelf is ever putting forth the unceafing activities of His omnipotence. "He thatkeepeth Ifrael neither slumbers nor sleeps!' "My Father" said Chrift, " worketh hitherto, and I workr It is sublimely said of Him, "He fainteth not, neither is zveary" (Ps. cxxi. 4; John v. 17; Ifa. xl. 28.) The human spirit has the same lofty heritage CEASELESS ACTIVITY. 1 5 Activity is linked with pure and unfullied enjoy- ment. The very curfe of labour and the sweat of the brow — the birthright of toil — is the birth- right of mercy. A philofopher of ancient times said, if he had truth in his grafp, he would open his hand and let it fly away that he might en- joy the purfuit of it. Transfer this to heaven. There the law and love of activity wall still be a governing principle among the spirits of the glorified ; and in this we shall be affimilated to the " living ones" whofe very name indicates the ardour of their holy being. " They rest not/" There will be no more of the laffitude and lan- guor of earth. Here our bodies are clogs and hindrances to mental a<5tivity. There the glori- fied frame will be a help and auxiliary to the ecftatic soul. Here the remains of indwelling corruption is like the chained corpse which cri- minals of old were compelled to drag behind them. It elicits the mournful cry, " O wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from this body of death ? " (Rom. vii. 24.) That soliloquy will be heard no more in the " better country." There, every chain will be unloofed, and the un- l6 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. caged spirit soar upwards unhampered by the impediments of its earthly coil. Glorious defcription ! " They serve Him day and night; 1 (Rev. vii. 15.) No more paufes from wearinefs or faintnefs ; no more fitful frames and feelings. It has been said of God's people in the prefent world, " Though they do not weary of their Matter's work, they often weary in the work." Their experience is impreffively given in the Song of Solomon, when the Church, or believer in his earthly state, is reprefented as saying, "/ sleep, hit my heart waketh" (Cant. v. 2) — worldly cares and bufinefs and engroffments chaining down the soul, and inducing a state of drowfy infenfibility. But there, they shall not require to " lift tip the hands that hang down, and the feeble knees^ (Heb. xii. 12;) no more waking up refrefhed from the repofe of exhaufted nature — no more complaining that " the spirit is will- ing, but the flefh is weak;' (Matt. xxvi. 41.) If any of us have felt the pleafurablenefs of doing good, even in a prefent imperfect, chequered world, what will — what mujl this feeling be, in a state of holy a6livity, with no sin or CEASELESS ACTIVITY. I J weaknefs to reprefs our ardour or damp our energies ? And let us note the chief ingredient, the grand element, in this state of ceafelefs employ- ment. It will be the service of God. " They rest not day nor night" uttering the threefold afcription to a Triune- Jehovah — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God of hofls" (Ifa. vi. 3.) If activity be an effen- tial element in true happinefs, surely that happi- nefs will be enhanced by the attra6livenefs of the service in which it is our privilege to be engaged. An earthly servant, poffeffed of an honourable nature, would feel himfelf obligated to perform work faithfully and confcientioufly even to a bad mafter ; but how would his joy in the performance of his duty be increafed by the confcioufnefs that he was serving some lofty and beneficent spirit who was an ornament to his station and revered by all ? If we carry this law to the pinnacle of all greatnefs and moral excellence, surely here will be the crown and confummation of creature-happinefs — cheerful duty in the service of Him whofe favour is life ! 1 8 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. What is the trueft source of joy to an earthly- child ? Is it not by a<5tive duty, as well as by paffive obedience, fulfilling his parent's wifhes ? Will he not even suffer much for the parent he loves ? The earthly relationship is in this, as in many other refpects, a beautiful type of the heavenly. What pure and unfullied delight will it afford the sainted spirit to be engaged con- stantly in doing the will of Him who is better and kinder than the beft of earthly parents ! Look at Him who, being "very man" as well as u very God," underftood all the tendereft senfibi- lities of the human heart ! What was the great (shall we say, the only) joy which brightened the pilgrimage of the Man of Sorrows ? What was the one source of pureft, ineffable delight to Him, as he toiled on His blood-stained path ? Was it not the elevating confcioufnefs of doing His heavenly Father's will ? — " My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finijli His work /" (John iv. 34.) We are always moft will- ing to serve thofe we love moft. With what bounding joy, then, shall we embark in heaven on errands of a6live service, when we shall there CEASELESS ACTIVITY. 1 9 have unfolded to us (what we here know so little of) the unfpeakable love of Him who for us spared not His own, His only Son ! Oh, what a motive will there be here for all the energies of the glorified body, and all the faculties of the glorified spirit ; — to love, and serve, and honour, and adore Him, around whom our deepeft affec- tions are centred, and our heart of hearts en- twined ; — getting ever nearer Him and liker Him, — gazing more intently on His matchlefs perfections — diving more into the ocean-depths and myfteries of His love, and becoming the channels of conveyance of that love to others ! Then, indeed, will duty be turned into enjoy- ment, and supreme and unfwerving devotednefs to His service be its own beft reward. It will be a confecration, too, not only of un- fettered, unclogged, unwearied powers ; there will be the still further element of a pure and single-eyed devotednefs, which earth never knew. Here, alas ! in the holieft activities of the prefent state of being, there are ever, even when we our- selves may be infenfible to them, the exiftence of mingled motives. Wretched self, in its thou- 20 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. sand infidious forms, so imperceptibly creeps in, marring and mutilating our beft endeavours to pleafe God. Our beft offerings are full of blemifhes — our beft thoughts are polluted with low, grovelling cares. But there l self will for ever be dethroned. This ufurping Dagon will then be broken for ever in pieces before the pre- sence of the true Ark, in that temple wherein "there is nothing that defileth." God's glory will then be the one grand, abforbing, and ter- minating obje6l of all defires and all afpirations; — then, for the firft time in reality, shall we come to realife and exemplify that great truth, which many from their infancy have had on their lips — " Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to en- joy Him for ever." Thus will aflive and ceafelefs occupation in the service of God form one of the sweeteft em- ployments and sources of happinefs in the upper sandluary. "They reft," in a bleffed abfence from all sin, all suffering, all trial. " They reft not" in the lofty behefts and engagements ox holinefs. Believers are called in this world by the name of "servants" "workmen," "husband- CEASELESS ACTIVITY. 21 men." They will still retain thefe same defig- nations of aftive duty. " His servants" we read. " shall serve Him" (Rev. xxii. 3.) God, in every portion of His wide univerfe, seems to work by creature agency. He does not require to do so. A simple volition of His sovereign will would suffice to fulfil His counfels as effectually as if never an angel sped on his embaffy of love ! But as on earth He accomplices His purpofes in His Church by human agency, and as in Heaven He employs angelic agency, — thofe who "excel in strength" "doing His commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word," — so it would seem, as if in merciful confideration for the happinefs of His glorified saints, He is to make this a permanent law through eternity ; so that Heaven will be only a development of the prefent condition of Grace — with this single, but important difference, that there will be no sin. Indeed, it is this very idea of Heaven as a state of action, that brings out the beauty of the former reprefentation as a state of rest. Rest, to be enjoyed, suppofes previous a6livity or labour; and although it can have no such relation in a 22 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. place where wearinefs and fatigue are unknown, we can readily carry out the beautiful idea of Pollok, in his " Courfe of Time," of the ranfomed spirit retiring from the loud hallelujahs around the throne, to hold its silent meditations apart by " the living fountains of waters :" — this, how- ever, only for a time; — once more to return with unflagging and unabated energy to refume the song, and speed on new errands of love. Reader, is this your anticipation of Heaven? — Heaven, not as it is pictured in the dreams of the sentimental or contemplative Chriftian ; — not a drowfy Mohammedan paradife — a state of torpor and inaftion ; but as it is known to angels, who are now, though unfeen to us, travelling down to our world in ceafelefs agencies of love and comfort ? Do we realife this, and in realifmg the grand truth, are we training for thefe lofty duties ?— ready to take the angels' place, or to join the angels' company, on similar miniftries to some other diftant provinces of creation ? What the poet has said of the prefent life is as true of its glorious counterpart hereafter — " Life is real, life is earned." CEASELESS ACTIVITY. 23 Reft not until you have attained a well- grounded affurance that this future state of a6live bleffednefs is to be yours ; — that you are looking for it, preparing for it, ready for it. Teft your meetnefs for the Heaven that is before you by the queftion, Do I delight now in energetic employment in the service of my God ? Is prayer a seafon of refrefhing ? Does praife call into willing and gladfome exercife all the re- newed affeftions of a heaven-born nature ? Is the Sabbath a joyful paufing-place in life's chequered journey ; — not a mere interlude of re- pofe for the tired and jaded body after the in- ceffant toils and cares of the week, but the day which summons into exercife the loftier activities of my nobler being ? Do I spend it under the feeling of Eternity being an everlajling Sabbath, and that everlafting Sabbath occupied in some perfonal miniftry of holinefs and love ? In this life there should, at leaft, be affimilations to the life hereafter. Though not in degree, it should be the same in kind. If aftivity in a little child gives indication of the energy and refolution of the man, so aftivity in the service of God, in a 24 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. state of grace, will be the pledge and earneft of nobler a<5tivities in a state of glory. " O bleffed reft ! when we ( reft not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Al- mighty ! ' — when we shall reft from sin, but not from worfhip — from suffering and sorrow, but not from joy! O bleffed day! when I shall reft with God — when I shall reft in knowing, loving, rej oicing, and praifmg ! — when my per- fect soul and body shall together perfeftly enjoy the moft perfedl God — when God, who is love itfelf, shall perfectly love me, and reft in His love to me, and I shall reft in my love to Him — when He shall rejoice over me with joy, and joy over me with singing, and I shall rejoice in Him."* * Baxter. III. " Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Is our deftined end or way; But to act that each to-morrow Finds us further than to-day." " They reft not day and night." — Rev. iv. 8. [E have already regarded this defcription of the Redeemed in heaven — "They reft not" — as denoting a condition of ceafe- lefs employment in the service of God. We may confider it now as suggefting a state of continual progrefs. If we have found activity to be a law of our nature, we may affert the same, with equal truth, with reference to progrefs. The mind is ever afpiring after advancement. " Not as though I had already attained" is the utterance not merely of the renewed spiritual nature ; — it is the voice 26 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. of man's reftlefs spirit in all the varied phafes and conditions of humanity. It is exemplified in every-day life. Without the confcioufnefs of advancement we have not a perfect idea of happinefs. Who does not feel, for example, a ceafelefs and ever-increafing afpiration after more know- ledge? This is all the more remarkable, too, in the cafe of thofe who have made the largeft acquifitions in human learning.* The range of their acquirements, inftead of satisfying, seems rather to whet their appetite for more ; so that the nobleft and moft gifted of the human spe- cies, — our Lockes, and Bacons, and Newtons, — are thofe who are alike moft confcious of the limited range of present knowledge, and moft ardently defirous of adding to their intellectual wealth. Transfer this to Heaven. There, there will be a conftant afpiration after increafed know- ledge, holinefs, love, and refemblance to God. All our prefent mental capacities will doubtlefs be indefinitely expanded on our entrance into * See Whately's " Revelations on a Future State." CONTINUAL PROGRESS. 2J blifs ; but this will be only a frefh starting- point for loftier acquifitions. The soul and its glorified afpirations will be like the sun " coming forth from his chamber, and rejoicing like a strong man to run his race ; " ever climbing the firmament, yet never reaching the meridian ; coming nearer and nearer " the excellent glory," and yet still speaking of it as "light inacces- sible!" We have some pledge or foretafte given us of this advancement, even in our prefent spiritual state. The renewed man goes " from strength to strength ; " he advances in the divine life ; he becomes more and more " meet," by the trans- forming powder of the Holy Spirit, for the hea- venly inheritance. May we not warrantably infer from analogy, that this advancement will not be arrefted, but rather increafed and carried on in a mightier ratio ? " If grace," says the author of the " Saint's Reft," " makes a Chriftian differ so much from what he was, as to say, ' I am not the man I was;' how much more will glory make us differ! Doubtlefs as God ad- vanceth our senfes and enlargeth our capacity, 28 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. so will He advance the happinefs of thofe senfes, and fill up with Himfelf all that capacity." Add to all this — this element of progreffion will be in one direction. Not as on earth, where there was alfo a law of perpetual progrefs, but it was often a doivnward progrefs, — where the aphorifm, " Knowledge is power," had, alas ! too often the fatal interpretation attached to it of a power for evil ; not bringing the heart nearer God, but aflimilating it more with the fiend, enlarging the intellect only for its degradation. But the advancement of the soul, in all the future phafes of its moral and spiritual being, will be entirely God-wards. — It will be the eagle's flight, soaring ever upward, nearer the sun, till loft in the blaze of " the excellent glory." God is alone of all beings unchangeable. He is as incapable of any addition to His effential glory and happinefs, as thefe are incapable of detraction. — " He is without variablenefs or the leajl shadow of turning" (James i. 17.) The devils in a loft state are subje6l to a continual and progreffive change y but it is a downward and progreffive deterioration ; with the sainted spirit CONTINUAL PROGRESS. 2g it will be entirely amelioration. While the others are sinking deeper and deeper in the abyfs of woe, or retreating into wider and more eccentric orbits from the great central Sun of all light and happinefs, the redeemed will ever be narrowing their orbits, coming nearer and nearer the great central throne. Reader, you are lifping here only the alphabet of knowledge ; you know nothing as you are yet to know. Heaven will be, in a nobler senfe than ever was realifed on earth, a student life. The angels, we read, " defire to look into " the myfteries of salvation. They " stoop over " (as the w r ord literally means) this vaft volume in the archives of eternity. You will then unite with thefe principalities and powers in talking your immortal intellect with frefh difcoveries of " the manifold wifdom of God." We know that thofe saints on earth who have attained moft know- ledge of God, are thofe who have longed with greateft ardour to know more of Him. Though Mofes had seen more of His glory than others, his prayer is, " / beseech thee, shew me thy glory" (Exodus xxxiii. 18.) Davids whofe thirft had 30 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. been quenched more than mod at the Fountain of infinite love and excellence, is heard exclaim- ing, " My soul thirjleth for God" (Psalm xlii. 2.) Pauly who had soared to the third heaven, and who " counted all tilings but lofs for the excellency of the knowledge of Chrijl" (Phil. iii. 8,) still prays, like a lifping learner, "■ that I may know Him;' (Phil. iii. io.) Nor will it be one theme only that will engrofs and engage the saints' glorified powers and acti- vities. We muft not think of Heaven as some startling and violent revolution of prefent taftes, and studies, and occupations ; as if we shall then be no longer the beings we once were, and be able to find no traces of perfonal identity. Our feelings, our taftes, our studies, may poffibly and will poffibly continue the same as they were, only glorified, san6tified, and purified from the drofs of sin ! May we not there poffibly de- light still to unravel the myfterie's of science, the laws which govern a renovated creation ; or to ponder the story of Providence paft ; — this, too, not confined to one atom-world, but as un- folded in God's works and ways in other pro- vinces of His empire ? The very feelings and CONTIN UAL PROGRESS. 3 1 affeftions, alfo, of our prefent nature (the beft, at leaft, and nobleft of them) will not be quenched or annihilated ; they will, on the contrary, have vafter objefts and loftier spheres for their exer- cife. Take, for example, apparently the moft airy and vifionary of all our prefent emotions, HOPE. Hope will not perifli with the prefent preliminary state. Poetry, under a beautiful im- perfonation, has truthfully reprefented her as relighting her torch "at nature's funeral pile/' It is, in one senfe indeed, true, that Hope will then be changed into fruition ; all diftradting fears and mifgivings will ceafe. The hope of eter- nal life, the hope full of immortality, the hope of being with God and His Chrift, which in our moments of depreffion and faithleffnefs was clouded here, that hope will be " swallowed up " in complete fulfilment. But many of theprefe?it joyous elements of hope will still remain ; — the hope of reaching higher degrees of perfeftion, the hope of acquiring deeper and yet deeper views of the charafter and glory of Him who is paft finding out ; the hope of becoming more and more affimilated to His holy image, climb- ing higher and higher the altitudes of blifs, and 32 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. obtaining a wider and still wider sweep of the moral landscape that grows upon our view with the widening horizon. I love that beautiful defcription of Heaven, as the "rest" of God's people ; when the clarion of battle is hufhed, — every storm-cloud paft, — every weary night-watch at an end, — the spirit cradled in perfect peace, — the Sabbath of eter- nity ! But more elevating and glorious still seems the defcription of Heaven as a place of endlefs and ceafelefs progreffion ; the spirit making giant advances in all that is pure, and lovely, and godlike ; ever adding to the domain of knowledge ; having new and more w r ondrous revelations of the Divine character and attri- butes ; — comprehending more and more the myfteries and secrets of Redeeming love, and yet thefe myfteries growing with every frefh difco- very ; still speaking of its " heights and depths," its " lengths and breadths/' and these as " pafs- ing underftanding ! " IV. 9$an? 9£aiisffoii& "All our earthly journey paft, Every tear and pain gone by, Here together met at laft, In the manfions of the sky, Each the welcome c Come'' awaits, Conqueror over death and sin ; Lift your heads, ye golden gates, Let the ranfom'd travellers in !" " In my Father's houfe there are many manfions."— John xiv. 2. [ANSIONS "— " many manfions "— " a houfe " — " my Fathers houfe." How many reflections are crowded into this one brief utterance of our gracious Redeemer ! With what a homelike afpeft do they invert our every thought of Heaven ! They were among His laft words ; He Himfelf was on His way to that peaceful " homeftead " of which He speaks. c 34 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. Let us gather around Him, with the houfe of His Father in sight, and tafte this Efhcol grape which He himfelf plucks from the borders of the Heavenly Canaan. The verfe speaks of MULTIPLICITY — "many manfions." Had He been addreffing His own difciples alone, the affurance would have been sufficient, " There will be a home for each of -you? But He is difcourfing for all time. His omnifcient eye difcerned at that moment the unborn my- riads whom this chapter and this verfe were to confole and cheer. He would, therefore, certify that there is abundant provifion made for all — patriarchs, prophets, saints, martyrs ; — from the time that righteous Abel bent alone, a righteous, redeemed saint, before the throne — the firft sheaf of a mighty harvefh — until the garners be filled, and the song of the ranfomed become " as the voice of much people, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings," (Rev. xix. 6.) He is to bring "many sons unto glory." There is grace for all — crowns fo\ all — manfions for all ! Heaven has been filling for MANY MANSIONS. 35 six thoufand years, and still there is room. How different its " recompenfe of reward " from worldly crowns and worldly honours ! In the earthly race " many run, but one (only) receiveth the prize," (1 Cor. ix. 24.) In the heavenly the competition is open to " whofoever will." There is no jarring of interefts in this loftier arena. The glorification of one is not attained there at the expenfe of another's downfall or exclufion. The manfions are many. The candidates are a mighty multitude which no man can number. Believer ! "so run that you may obtain !" The verfe speaks of PERMANENCY — they are " manjions" The word in the original (/jlovol) is not a tent or temporary tabernacle, but a durable refidence, never to be altered or demolifhed. The moft graphic of Eaftern travellers thus gives a de- scription of tent-life, which, by contrail, affords the befb illuftration of the manfion-life of hea- ven : " When the cold, sullen morning dawned, and my people began to load the camels, I always felt loth to give back to the wafte this little spot of ground, that had flowed for a while 36 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. with the cheerfulnefs of a human dwelling. My tent was spared to the laft, but when all elfe was ready for the start, then came its fall. The p%s were drawn, the canvas shivered, and in lefs than a minute there was nothing that re- mained of my genial home, but only a pole and a bundle." * " The tents of the Eaft," says another,f " sel- dom remain long in the same place. The tra- veller ere£ts his temporary abode for the night, takes it down in the morning, and journeys onward. The shepherds of the country are also always moving from one place to another. The brook fails on which they relied for water, or the grafs required for the support of their flocks is confumed, and they wander on to a new station. ,, How strikingly illuftrative is this of the Bible figure, "the houfe of our earthly tabernacle" being "diffolved" (or taken down), (2 Cor. v. 1.) The framework of mortality, like the Arab tent, is upreared for a time, but, after subferving its temporary purpofe, it is, pin by pin, demolifhed, and the place that once knew it knows it no more. * " Eothen." f Profeffor Hackett. MANY MANSIONS. 37 Not so the ever-during manfions of our Father's houfe. They are " incorruptible " and " eternal in the heavens." No failing of brooks there! No joys withered and smitten there, like the grafs of the wildernefs. "The Lamb that is in the midft of the throne shall feed them, and lead them to living fountains of waters," (Rev. vii. 17.) Ah! it is the saddeft, the mod humiliating feature of the joys of earth, that, however pure, noble, elevating they may be at the moment, there is no calculating on their per- manency. The mind will, in spite of itfelf, be haunted with the dark poffibility of the ruthlefs invader of all happinefs coming and dafhing the full cup in a thoufand fragments on the ground. In Heaven no shadow of viciffitude or change can ever enter to dim an ever-brightening future. Once within that heavenly fold, w T e are in the fold for ever. On the lintels of the eternal man- sion are infcribed the words, " Ye shall go no more out." Our happinefs and joy will be as immutable and stable as everlafhing love and power and faithfulnefs can make them. The verfe speaks of DIVERSITY — there are 38 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. " many manfions ; " — not only many in number, but manifold in their degrees of glory. All will be happy. A halo of unutterable blifs and glory will encircle each separate dwell- ing, beyond what eye hath seen, or ear heard, or heart conceived. But as " one star differeth from another star in glory," so, alfo, we have reafon to believe, there will be gradations in the scale of future bleffednefs. The allufion here is evidently to the different courts of the Jewilh temple. Thefe were diverfe in name and chara6ler. The outer and inner courts, the court of the Gentiles, the courts of the priefts, the Holy of Holies. All thefe were confecrated as portions of the same " Houfe of the Lord." The lowlieft Ifraelite was within sight of the altar, and within hearing of the High Prieft's benedi6lion. But there were some courts more hallowed and glorious than others, — their sacrednefs increafing the nearer the wor- shipper approached the place where dwelt the myftic Shekinah. It will be the same with the " many manfions " of the Heavenly Temple. All the vaft multitude in the new Jerufalem will be MANY MANSIONS. 39 within range of the benediction of the Great High Prieft, and as such they muft be bleffed. But there will be "inner courts'' and enclofures of greater honour and glory. The more intenfe and exalted his love and devotednefs on earth, the nearer will the believer be permitted to ap- proach the Holieft of all, — the nearer admiffion will he have to the Father's prefence, and receive the more diftinguifhing badges of the Father's love. There will be one manfion for him whofe pound hath " gained five pounds," and another manfion for him whofe pound hath " gained ten pounds." Each, too, will be apportioned accord- ing to some earthly antecedents. There will be the special manfion of the martyr, who was borne from his earthly tent in the chariot of fire. There will be the special manfion of the miffronary, who surrendered home, eafe, worldly honour, in his noble embaffy, and ftood alone and unbe- friended on Pagan shores, witneffing for a de- spifed Saviour. There will be the manfion for the minifter of Chrift, who boldly proclaimed the meffage of life and death. There will be the manfion for the Sabbath-fchool teacher, who 40 CRAPES OF ESHCOL. toiled to bring youthful trophies to the foot of the crofs. There will be the manfion for the pining sufferer, who glorified God by patience and unmurmuring refignation ; — for the child, that fell on earth a withered bloffom, whofe tent was taken down "while it was yet day/' but re- constructed into a building of God eternal in the heavens. There will be a manfion for the old veteran of the crofs, the champion in a hundred battles of the faith ; and for the youthful soldier, who was only buckling on his armour when summoned from the earthly struggle. The leaft in the kingdom, I repeat, will have bleffednefs to the full — a glory and a joy which leaves no void or vacuum. As in the terreftrial, so in the celeftial firmament. Though every planet circling round the Sun of Deity will shine with a borrowed splendour, yet the larger the planet, and the nearer its orbit is to its grand centre, the greater will be its radiance and glory. Though every flower will in itself be perfect, reflecting the lovely Iries and tints of heaven, yet they will be of diverfe form and colour. Some will dififufe a sweeter fragrance, or clufter in larger and richer groups than others. But all, MANY MANSIONS. 41 large and small, the saint a hundred years old and the child tranflated in infancy, will (notwith- standing this diverfity) have the same quality of blifs. The planet at the outfkirts of the hea- venly sphere and that neareft the centre will be bathed in one and the same rays of ineffable glory. But whil]J expefted — often juft when the fondeft vilions of earthly joy are being realifed. Do we think of it — we who may be living all carelefs and thoughtlefs, lulled by the dream of prosperity, prefuming on our prefent cloudlefs horizon — that each moment, with sleeplefs vigi- lance, the stealthy foe is creeping nearer and nearer? — that the smooth current is gliding slowly but surely onward and still onward towards the brink of the catara<5r, where all at once the irrevocable leap will and mujlhz taken? Reader, perchance you can even now tell the tale ! You may at prefent be reading it, or you may have recently done so, with tearful eyes and a breaking heart. You may be marking the vacant seat at your table, miffing the accents of some well-known voice, or the sound of some well-remembered footfall; a beaming eye in your daily walk may be gone, and gone forth for ever of time ! What other antidote for hearts smitten down by thefe simoom-blafts which leave earth a blackened wildernefs — but a look beyond, to that Better Land, where this enemy's power is neither felt nor feared? In that glorious refur- 78 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. re6tion-morning, the sceptre which he has wielded for six thoufand years will be wrefted from his grafp, and that chorus will begin for which cen- turies of suffering hearts have been wiftfully longing, " O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy vi£lory ?" (i Cor. xv. 55.) Sounding trumpets commenced the song of the Lord in the temple of old, (2 Chron. xxix. 27.) It was a type of a mightier feftival in the temple of glory. " The trump of God " is to sound ftrft. Slumber- ing millions will start at the summons, "Awake and sing, ye that dwell in daft!" (Ifa. xxvi. 19.) Believer! seek to contemplate death from the heavenward side, as a foe doomed and conquered. If you are now in Jefus, vi6lory over death is yours by anticipation. You cannot sing the song of vi6lory completed ; but you can be weav- ing the garlands of triumph, and tuning your harp for the prophetic strain ! The garden of the Pagan Hefperides was said to be watched by a dragon. But although death is between us and the heavenly paradife, the monfter's sting has been plucked away, and cafh into the flames of the Saviour's sacrifice. Safe in Chrift !- — then, THE DEATH OF DEATH. 79 indeed, is death difarmed of its real terrors. It becomes a stupendous triumphal arch, through which God's redeemed legions pafs into glory. A dark Valley, but bridged by the bow of pro- mife, with its radiant hues of love, and joy, and peace ! Lean on the promifes now ; they alone will support you in the hour of death, and prove to you, like Elijah's horfes and chariots of fire. Living now near to Jefus, you will have nothing to do when the laft solemn hour does arrive, but to step into thefe chariots, and be upborne by angels to your Father's houfe ! O blifsful confummation ! once acrofs that threjhold, and every remembrance of sadnefs which death generates here, and which often makes life one valley of Baca — one "vale of weeping" — will be obliterated, and that jfor ever! No sun going down "while it is yet day;" no glory of manhood suddenly eclipfed ; no early bloffoms nipped in the bud ; no venerable trees, under whofe shadow we have long repofed, suc- cumbing to the axe of the Deftroyer. Viewing death from the earthly side, it seems the mourn- ful " exodus of life," — the fatal extinguifher, 80 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. the dread annihilates of fondeft hopes and pureft happinefs. Taking the heavenward view, it is what Matthew Henry significantly calls " the parenthefis of being.'' It is the bridge from the finite to the infinite ; the birthday of immor- tality ; the momentary rafping of the shallows in entering the quiet haven ; the day which, while it terminates the joys of the worldling, only truly begins thofe of the believer ! Suffering saints of God ! ye who may have been " toffed about with a great fight of afflic- tions," long out on the stormy sea, neither sun nor stars appearing, and, like the seamen in Adria of old, " wiftfully looking for the day," — be com- forted. Each day is bringing you nearer and nearer thefe peaceful shores. You may even now be difcovering indications that you cannot be far from the defired port ! It is beautifully recorded by the biographer of Columbus, that, as he was approaching the hitherto unknown confines of the new world, " one day, at sunrife, some rufhes, recently torn up, were seen near the veffel ; a plank, evidently hewn by an axe ; a stick, skilfully carved by THE DEATH OF DEATH. 8 1 some cutting inftrument; a bough of hawthorn in bloflbm ; and, laftly, a bird's neat-built neft on a branch which the wind had broken, and full of eggs, on which the parent bird was sitting amidft the gently rolling w r aves, were seen floating paft upon the w r aters ! The sailors brought on board thefe living and inanimate witneffes of their ap- proach to land. They were a voice from the shore confirming the affurances of Columbus. The pilots and seamen, clinging about the mafts, yards, and shrouds, each tried to keep the beft place, and the closeft watch, to get the earlieft sight of the new hemifphere. . . . Delicious and unknown perfumes reached the veffels from the dim outlines of the shore, with the roar of the waves upon the reefs, and the soft land-breeze. In a few hours his foot trod the sands of a new world ! " — (See Lamartine's " Columbus.") Beau- tiful picture of a nearing heaven ! " Affli6led, tempeft-toffed, and not comforted," " lift up your heads with joy, for your redemption draweth nigh!' (Luke xxi. 28.) Yet a little while and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry. Every new sorrow that vifits you ; every new 82 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. seafon which paffes over you ; every friend taken from you ; — thefe are so many silent meffengers from the shores of glory, whifpering, "Nearer eternity!" Time itself seems not to be without significant monitors — signals scattered on its ocean that "the day is at hand!" Prophecy is faft fulfilling. There are thofe who, from the shrouds and rigging, can descry, in the hazy diftance, the dim outline of a more glo- rious hemifphere than that of earth — " the new world" — even " the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteoufnefs !" (2 Pet. iii. 13.) " And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the firjl heaven and the jirjl earth were pa/fed away; and there was no more sea. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the taber- nacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God him- self shall be with them, and be their God. 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 THE DEATH OF DEATH. 83 pain : for the forme}' tilings are paffed away," (Rev. xxi. I, 3, 4.) " Then, looking up through sorrow's night, We trace the spirit's homeward flight ; The Prince of Life has mark'd that road, Through the Dark Valley, home to God. " Where once the Mafter lowly lay, Let the tired servant rest to-day; And in the Father's houfe above, For ever share the Mailer's love." IJL " Whilft I see Thy love to me, Every obje£l teems with joy; Here, oh may I walk with Thee, Then into Thy prefence die ! " Thee to praife, and Thee to know, Conflitute my blifs below ; Thee to see, and Thee to love, Conflitute my blifs above." TOPLADY. " I shall be satisfied, when I awake, in thy likenefs." — Psalm xvii. 15. [HAT a glorious awaking, after earth's unquiet dream ! With God ! Like God ! Happinefs has been well defined to be " the coincidence of the finite will with the Infinite.' , On earth that coincidence is never perfect. There are difturbing forces in the moral atmofphere tempting the soul ever and anon, 86 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. like some wandering planet, to break loofe from the sphere of the Divine favour, and purfue a devious and erratic orbit. Strange, indeed, that, defpite of leffons conflantly enforced, it should cling so fondly to the delufion that there are ele- ments of heart-satisfying happinefs independent of God. Vain thought ! Even when the objects on which the affe6tions are lavifhed seem the pureft and nobleft, there is ever a confcioufnefs of unfated longings, yearnings after something better, which earth cannot give. In this chafe after happinefs a point may be reached, but not the point. In grafping the imaginary good, it is but a shadow. It appeared, in approach- ing, fair and captivating. It proved, in reality, a piece of fairy froft-work ; on touching it, it fell. But in Heaven the coincidence will be com- plete. Man's will and love will there be entirely subordinate to the will and love of God. The lineaments of the Divine image, erafed and effaced at the Fall, will be there again imprinted. There will be no competing affe6lion to alienate WAKING REALITIES. %J from the great Source of happinefs, — no vacuun requiring aught elfe to fill it. The rills will be unneeded in the prefence of the great Fountain- Head, — Him who is " effential love, effential goodnefs, effential glory." " Lord," says Augus- tine, " Thou haft made us for Thee, and our heart is unquiet until it repofeth in Thee ! " Thofe immortal powers and energies and affec- tions made for God, will then repofe for ever in God. There will be nothing more to be defired or longed for; and the rejoicing soul, gazing around on the floods of the excellent glory, will be able to say, " I am satisfied ! " " Once I dreamed," says Payfon, " of being tranfported to heaven ; and being surprifed to find myfelf so calm and tranquil in the midft of my happinefs, I inquired the caufe. The reply was, When you were on earth, you refembled a bottle but partly filled with water, w T hich was agitated by the leaft motion — now you are like the same bottle filled to the brim, which cannot be difhurbed." Yes ! then every soul will become a temple, and its diftinguifhing glory will be \ \ 88 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. tAat of Solomon's on the day of confecration — ''the houfe was filled with the glory of the Lord!" (i Kings viii. II.) Other and minor sources of happinefs there may be. There may be the waving of incenfe, sounds of sweet melody, the high praifes of God chanted by a mighty multi- tude which no man can number, and the lofty companionfhip of cherubim and seraphim ; but the believer's pre-eminent dignity and bleffed- nefs will confift in his own soul becoming a con- secrated shrine for the myftic Shekinah — " God dwelling in him, and he in God? Reader ! whatever be the Divine dealings and difcipline in fitting thee for such a Heaven, and such a likenefs, submit to them. To employ a well-known but beautiful illuftration : — The re- fining of silver is not complete, until the refiner beholds his own image refle<5ted brightly in the fufed metal. And if He who calls Himfelf "a Refiner of silver" keep thee long in the crucible, — subje6l thee for long to the furnace, — it is only that every grain and speck of alloy may be purged away, and that in Heaven thou mayest WAKING REALITIES. 89 awake rejoicing, and " satisfied " in "His like- nefs." What a glorious, what a strange transforma- tion ! Who would recognife the spirit that is now chafed and buffeted with temptation and sin, corruption and iniquity, then made refplen- dent with the image of a holy God ? As the shapelefs, unfeemly root of the flower or plant struggling amid rubbifh and stones and cheerlefs darknefs, after faftening its fibres in the soil, sends up a graceful stalk, efflorefcing in loveli- nefs and beauty, its leaves waving in the sun- light, and filling the summer air with their fra- grance ; — so will it be with the soul. It is here sown in corruption. It fallens its roots in a w r orld dark and cheerlefs, by reafon of sin. Its im- mortal fibres are nurfed and difciplined amid trials and sorrows, difficulties and perplexities. It is soiled and degraded with the corruptible elements through which it has to fight its upward way. But there is a glorious summer-time at hand, when the root thus nurtured shall burfl its mortal coil, and its leaves and bloffoms shall not 90 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. only be bathed in the hues of heaven, but their every tint will be refplendent with a glory re- flected from the Great Source of all light and joy, X. " Brief life is here our portion, Brief sorrow, short-lived care : The life that knows no ending, The tearlefs life, is there. There, glory yet unheard of Shall shed abroad its ray, Refolving all enigmas, — An endlefs Sabbath-day.' ' — Bernard o/Cluny, 12th century. " Now we see through a glafs, darkly, but then face to face." — 1 COR. xiii. 12. ^a^fglHAT an extenfion in the domain oi l&Wfil ^ now ^S e on that bleffed morning when " the day shall break," and earth's twi- light shadows shall " flee away for ever.'* The myfteries in Providence, the " deep things " in Scripture, the apparent difcrepancies in God's moral government, all unfolded, vindicated, ex- plained. " In thy light," O God, we shall " see light," (Ps. xxxvi. 9.) 92 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. How this new illumination will be effected we cannot say. We can only venture a few dim conjectures on a great problem which the future itfelf alone can solve. Much of our curtailed and partial knowledge here, is owing to the limited range of our prefent faculties. It is quite poflible to conceive in a future world a vaft and indefinite extenfion and amplification of our prefent mental and bodily pow r ers ; such an amplification as the man born blind experiences when his eyes are opened for the firft time, on a world of whofe glories he has only been previoufly cognifant by hearing about them. We can quite well imagine some faculty which either we do not now poffefs, or which hitherto, like the sight of the blind man we have suppofed, has been lying sealed and dormant, all at once imparted; — "eyes of our underftanding" opened, which are now clofed ; — new powers, shall we say, of thought and reafoning, taking in know- ledge at intuition which now r requires years of laborious thought. Even in the cafe of the lower animals, we see powers and inftin6ls which we do not poffefs, but which, if we did poffefs them, FACE TO FACE. 93 would add incalculably to our capacities. In- stance, as familiar examples, the flight of the migratory birds, or that of the bee winging its way to a vafh diftance from its hive ; yet, not- withftanding its tortuous aerial journey, finding, with unerring precifion, its way back to the hid- den nook whence it started. The prefent limited range alike of our phyfi- cal and moral powers of obfervation may have been, as an able writer surmifes,* the reafon why St Paul, when he was caught up into the third heavens, tells us he saw things which it is not " pofjible for a man to utter." Why not pojjible ? Simply becaufe he was not gifted with earthly powers or faculties or language capable of giving expreffion to what he saw. The phe- nomena of heavenly glory (if I might so call them) were alike, in kind and degree, so diverfe from all he had been converfant with here, that he would have needed another dialect and voca- bulary to evolve his meaning. * See Archbifhop Whateley's " Scripture Revelations on a Future State," — a book profoundly thoughtful and suggeftive. 94 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. " But THEN shall I know ! " All enigma and difficulty will then vanifh, — all will be made plain to ennobled, refined, and purified powers. Here a paffing breath from a carnal world dims my glafs, and obfcures my spiritual vifion. There, there will be no taint of sin to mar or blight my lofty contemplations. Here, amid the twilight shadows of an imperfeft state there is much to caufe doubt, and, alas ! difagreement among God's children. There, all shall see " eye to eye;" they will only wonder that trifles should have been suffered so sadly to divide and eftrange. Here, we are in the gloomy crypt, walking amid the humiliating wrecks of sin and death, reading the myfterious records of mortality. There, it will be in the "cathedral aifles" of light and love, harmony and peace — the noon-day splen- dour of eternity. Glorious profpeft ! all made bright before that Sapphire Throne. That mys- terious providence, that defolating bereavement which, like a sweeping avalanche, tore up by the roots the fibres of affe6tion, then I shall know r , and see, and acknowledge it to have been all for good. Then I shall underftand, (what my aching FACE TO FACE. 95 heart cannot now,) that the child I wept over, — the parent I laid prematurely in the grave, — the friend, early severed from my side, — were all thereby taken from much evil to come, and in- verted with an earlier blifs. I shall wonder how I could ever have sorrowed on their behalf. Meanwhile let me bow submiffive to my Righteous Father's will, how r ever dark and start- ling sometimes it may be. In infancy, the child takes much on trufb ; in after life, he gets his difficulties explained. Let this be my pofition regarding the "deep things" of providence and grace. Wait patiently the explanation of my Father in heaven. I shall see in the completed plan that all events had their end and miffion, — the Lord evolving glory to Himself from all. At prefent I behold only one or a few links, while He has the whole chain in His hands. Then, in retracing that long line of unbroken kindnefs, I shall feel satisfied that not only all was/never had here — of His glory as the great end of life and being. Our prefent knowledge of God, even revealed knowledge, is but like the prattling of infancy, a mere attempt at a spoken language, moft of which is still unintelligible. But then I shall be " filled with all the fulnefs of God." Not by any means that my knowledge of Him can be perfeft. There will always be depths in that ocean-fulnefs, beyond the fathom- ing of any finite mind. Nay, further, the more I know, the more I shall feel that I have to know. When I know moft, my befitting exclamation will be, "Oh the depth !" "It PASSETH know- ledge? (Eph. iii. 19.) " This is life eternal to know Thee? God, by His varied difcipline, is meanwhile training me in this knowledge. And, as a sainted writer has well said, " we muft wait till w r e get quite home to have leffon-books put by for ever. But .what- FACE TO FACE. 97 ever are the gradations in our books, or in what- ever shape the leffon comes to us, this is the one grand bleffed obje6l aimed at by our wondrous Teacher in all, 'Acquaint thy/elf now with HIM, and be at peace! " — (Mifs Plumptre.) " No difappointments shroud The angel-bowers of joy ; Our knowledge hath no cloud, Our pleafures no alloy. " The fearful word, to part, Is never breathed above ; Heaven hath no broken heart Throughout her realms of love." XL fltfnnccfccti ILmnitwvm, * Oh, how beautiful that region, And how fair that heavenly legion, Where thus men and angels blend ! Glorious will that city be, Full of deep tranquillity, Light, and peace, from end to end ! All the happy dwellers there Shine in robes of purity, Bound in firmed unity. Labour finds them not, nor care, Ignorance can ne'er perplex, Nothing tempt them, nothing vex ; Joy and health their fadelefs bleffmg, Always all things good poffeffing." Thomas a Kempis, 1380. The city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it : for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." — Rev. xxi. 23. [EAVEN is here compared to a city. But it is no created orbs, no material luminaries, which light up its glorious IOO GRAPES OF ESHCOL. edifices. Thefe are superfeded. There is no longer need of the intervention of means as on earth. All the knowledge and light and glory of the Church triumphant emanate direct from the Divine Source of all excellence. The immediate prefence of the Creator and the Lamb will render unneceffary every other medium of communi- cation. As a veffel requires props before being launched to sea, — or a houfe in building requires scaffolding before it can be completed, — so the Church, in its earthly condition, requires the props and scaffolding of ordinances and means of grace. But when the eredtion is finifhed — the laft stone placed on the confummated strudlure, — then the scaffolding is removed — it is needed no more. "There shall be no more prayer there," says Baxter, " becaufe no more neceffity ; but the full enjoyment of the thing prayed for. God's face shall be the Scripture where we shall read the truth." We have servants in the lower banqueting-houfe ; — angels are miniftering spirits sent forth " to minifter to the heirs of salvation." The Church has ordained office-bearers to carry the veffels of the san6luary. In Heaven, the UNNEEDED LUMINARIES. 101 Matter "girds Himfclfa.r\& serves," (Luke xvii. 8.) Here it is mediately through the creature our spi- ritual wants are supplied ; — there all will be sup- plied immediately from God and the Lamb. It is " THE LAMB who leads to the living fountains of water." It is " God" who " wipes away all tears from the eyes!" (Rev. vii. 17.) Here the ufe of means is indifpenfable. They are adapted for our state of imperfection. The infant or sick man cannot bear the full blaze of the sun ; — - they mull have the curtain drawn, or the bright- nefs tempered and subdued; it is only with in- creafmg age or returning health that either are able to look on the light. So in the infancy and weaknefs of our probation-ftate we could not bear to gaze on the unveiled majefty of God's glory ; — w r e could not endure its intolerable brightnefs ; it would blind and confume us. The figurative "sun" and a moon" of ordinances are, therefore, gracioufly appointed for the feeble- nefs of our earthly condition, But when iiv vefted with the nobler powers of our heavenly manhood, we shall be abie to difpenfe with thefe ; — we shall fe>? able to draw afide the veil- 102 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. ing curtain, which is needed now to subdue and modify, and to gaze with eagle-eye on the brightnefs of Jehovah's prefence. To borrow an apt illuftration : None of the lower animals can hold, in the nobleft senfe of the word, fellowfliip with man, as they are at prefent con- stituted ; but let one of them have suddenly imparted to it the gift of reafon, then it becomes immediately fitted to do so. So it is with regard to our prefent and future relation to God. We are unable, with our prefent limited powers, to hold, in the higheft senfe, intimate fellowfhip with Him ; — we have the feebleft conceptions of His glory, the moft inadequate apprehenfion of His goodnefs, and power, and excellency, and majefty. But when we come in a glorified state to have higher and nobler spiritual endowments conferred on us, we shall be able to see, as we cannot do now, His glorious perfections, and to enjoy, as we cannot do now, His prefence and favour, His fellowfhip and love. The city will then have no "need" of the sun ! It is needed now) — the softer and more subdued light is required now ; but earth's darknefs will UNNEEDED LUMINARIES. 103 then be part, and the true Light will shine. We shall be able (without being, like Mofes, hidden in the cleft of any sheltering rock) to " see God and live!" (Exod. xxxiii. 20.) And what a fellow/hip will this be ! — The Being of all beings, the Light of all lights ! David felt it to be subj e£t-matter of gratitude and joy, — "I am companion to them that fear thee" He had a hallowed joy in the fellowship of kindred spirits on earth. What will it be to be the companion of God Himfelf ? — to be linked with all that is effentially great, and glorious, and good, in the univerfe : — not only to be brother to the angelic hofts, but, in a higher senfe than even the Father of the faithful knew it, " to be called" (and to BE) "the friend of God!" If, even on earth, I have known something of Him as my " Light " and my " Salvation," — if I have seen somewhat of His glory shining through the battered chinks of my ruined soul, — what will it be to bafk in the floods of infinite light and love before the Throne? "What can be defired," says one now in the midfl of the glorious reali- ties on which he often dwelt, " beyond the blifs 104 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. imparted by the confcioufnefs of loving and being loved by Him, in whofe smile of love the higheft archangels find the very heaven of hea- ven to confift ?" I shall be independent of all that contributes to light up my earthly pathway. Friends I may have then among the angels — hallowed reunions of earthly affection may and will take place in that world of glory ; but though I expe6l to prize and cherifh them, I shall have no " NEED " of them. They will be among the " leffer glories," having no glory (comparatively) by reafon of " the glory that excelleth." The sun- light and the moonlight will pale into nothing- nefs in the prefence of mightier beams ! But while I shall be loft in amazement at the exceeding greatnefs and excellency of this great Being, who is enthroned " in light, inacceffible, and full of glory ;" — while all the eloquence of earth that has tried to portray the majefty of His glory will fall immeafurably short; — it will, at the same time, be a softened glory. Never, in thefe sublime pictures of Heaven which we have in the Book of Revelation, is the Lord God UNNEEDED LUMINARIES. • 105 Almighty spoken of but in conjunction with "the Lamb? John "saw no temple; the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb were the temple," (Rev. xxi. 22.) Now he sees no light. The luftre of earthly sun, and moon, and stars, have faded, and are quenched for ever, but "the Lord God Almighty AND THE Lamb are the light thereof? He hears the redeemed multitude sing a lofty anthem, but it is this> — " Salvation to our God that sitteih upon the throne y AND UNTO THE LAMB," (Rev. vii. 10.) What is the defign of this oft-recurring imagery and symbol but to keep ever before the Church, even in its triumphant state, the intervention of a Mediatory by w r hom alone it is that we can see God and live ? " The Lamb is the light thereof 7" Calvary's crofs and Calvary's Saviour will still be the theme and problem of eternity ! And if light be the emblem of purity, how I ought, in the profpeft of such a Heaven and such a Prefence, to make it my great ambition to be "perfecting" that " holinefs, without which 110 man can see the Lord?' (Heb. xii. 14.) Holi- nefs becometh that city ! Its gates are never 106 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. shut except againft sin. Let me seek, as its chartered citizen, that every veftige of the ac- curfed thing be now put away. What a happy world, where temptation shall no longer be felt or feared ! — where I shall never more, by reafon of sin, be mourning an abfent Lord, — never more, in the midft of my own erring eftrange- ments, be uttering the plaintive soliloquy of the patriarch, " Oh that I knew wJiere I might find Him!" but ever repofing in the joyous con- scioufnefs, " / am still with Thee ! " " With Him all gather'd ! to that bleffed home, Through all its windings, still the pathway tends ; While ever and anon bright glimpfes come Of that fair city where the journey ends. Where all of blifs is centred in one word, 1 So shall we be for ever with the Lord.' " XII. mifstfon anti JFrtttttom u So the wifh grows deeper, fonder, Friend of souls ! Thy face to see, In Thy pleafant Salem, yonder, Where no tear nor sigh may be ; And God's prefence on the sight Shines in pure unfhadow'd light." " We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is."— i John hi. 2. HIS beautiful verfe of John comprifes the two grand elements of heavenly glory: To "see God"— to be "like God." It defcribes the matured manhood of the Chriftian. We are now in a state of infancy and nonage. As a child on earth is incapable of comprehend- ing much that is made plain in after years, so, with regard to divine knowledge, " we know in part, and we prophesy in part," (1 Cor. xiii. 9.) But in the full development of our spiritual IOS GRAPES OF ESHCOL. being we shall " see Him face to face." The earthly prayer will, for the firft time, in all its amplitude, be fulfilled — "I befeech thee, shew me thy glory," (Exod. xxxiii. 18.) See Him ! What an advance does this an- nouncement indicate in the moral capacities and privileges of the glorified, beyond what they enjoyed on earth ! We cannot bear to look even on the natural sun here ; we are dazzled and blinded with his intolerable brightnefs. But there, "the Lord our God" is to be our "ever- lafting light," (Ifa. lx. 20.) The spiritual vifion will be enlarged and adapted for the augmented glories of this higher manifeftation. See Him ! What an honour ! The Jewifh High Prieft was highly favoured in being per- mitted, once a year, to gaze on the auguft symbol of the Divine prefence — the Temple Shekinah. What will it be to enjoy the eternal and uninter- rupted contemplation of the great God Himfelf — that, too, undimmed by any myftic or shadowy rites ; but " with open face," {lit. face unveiled,) " beholding as in a glafs the glory of the Lord," (2 Cor. iii. 18.) And it is to "see Him as He is." VISION AND FRUITION. IO9 Not canopied in clouds and wreathed in rain- bow-form, awful, inapproachable ; — but God in our nature, " Immanuel, God with us." It is plain that it is Jefus of whom the Apoftle of love speaks in our motto-verfe. Jefus as He was, and is, and ever shall be— the Elder Brother — the kinfman Redeemer — " the same yefterday, and to-day, and for ever," (Heb. xiii. 8.) Often are we confcious of the thought pre- senting itself, "Would that I had been among the number of thofe who of old were privileged to hear that loving voice, and gaze on that coun- tenance, ' fairer than the children of men ! ' Would that I had sat on the Hill of Beatitudes, and liftened to thofe words of matchlefs wifdom ; or stood by the sea-shore of Gennefaret, or in the graveyard of Bethany, or mingled in the jubilant crowd on Olivet!" This honour is ours in reverfion. We shall "see the King in His beauty." " Tell ye the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy King cometh." " They shall see his face ; and his name shall be in their fore- heads," (Rev. xxii. 4.) It will be said of His redeemed people in glory, as the queen of I IO GRAPES OF ESHCOL. Sheba said of His earthly type, " Happy are thy men, happy are thefe thy servants, which stand continually before thee ! " (i Kings x. 8.) " Like Him ! " This is spoken of here as the second element in Heavenly blifs. Even on earth the contemplation of Chrift by faith is reprefented as bringing about a refem- blance to Himfelf. " We are changed into the same image from glory to glory? How much more, when, as divine artifts, gazing on His un- veiled luftre, we shall be enabled to copy the Divine Original, feature by feature ! " We shall be like Him, FOR we shall SEE Him." We can- not, even in the prefent world, be much in the company of an individual without infenfibly contrafting a refemblance to him, — catching up his tones, his manners, his habits of tafte and thought. So will it be in Heaven with Jefus. We shall become more and more "Saviour-like." Oh, surely if it be an exalted honour to see Him, with what glory will it inveft the ranfomed thus, in any feeble meafure, to refemble Him ! If it be the Chriftian's secret afpiration on earth to be VISION AND FRUITION. 1 1 1 like Abraham, or Mofes, or David, or John, or Paul, what will it be to be " like Him," of whom thefe are but the faintefl shadow? But, more than this ; — not only is likenefs to Jefus an honour ; it is a neceffary requirement or qualification to render the believer meet for the enjoyment of Heaven. I need, in some de- gree at leaft, conformity to Him in character, in order to be able to appreciate His home of purity and love. The moft beautiful landfcape may be placed before the blind man, but, de- prived of the organ of vifion, by which alone its beauties can be apprehended, he can see no love- linefs in it. So Heaven in its holinefs would be one vacant and dreary blank, if I have no moral eye with which to behold it. But that moral vifion will be imparted. The perfe6lly-renewed heart, a copy of its Lord's, will then be the true " organ of sight." There will be no sin to mar the contemplation of the Divine Original ; — no- thing to difturb or divert the spiritual eye. The heart's affeftions will repofe with full compla- cency on Him, the great centre of attraction. There will be perfe6l unifon with His will, and 112 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. entire, unreferved confecration to His glory ; all the ennobled, renovated, san6tified powers of the glorified nature will be willingly embarked in His service. The feet will run for Him ; the heart will be an altar confecrated to His wor- ship ; memory will be a labyrinth of remem- bered mercies ; the tongue will be a glorified inftrument to refound His praife ; the whole regenerated being a storehoufe of colle6led materials to proclaim and teftify of His greatnefs and majefty — His grace, and truth, and love. Be this, then, the view of Heaven I seek to have conftantly before me, — that I am to be "like my Lord!' What a solemn and searching teft is thus afforded wherewith to try my anticipations of future blifs ! Amid the mofl intenfe world- linefs, there may be etherial speculations about the glory of the Saints' Everlafhing Dwelling- place. But do I long after its manfions becaufe their blifs confifts in having a heart affimilated in holinefs to that of Chrift ? Like the Elder Brother, and in Him to the whole brotherhood in glory — saints, angels, God ! Oh, if the confcioufnefs of following, as His VISION AND FRUITION. II3 ranfomed Ifrael, the pillar of His prefence in the wildernefs be delightful, what will it be to fol- low Him in the Promifed Land ? If the Efhcol pledges be grateful, what will it be to pluck for ourfelves in the heavenly vineyard, under the shadow of the living Vine Himfelf ? Lord Jefus ! prepare me for meeting Thee, seeing Thee, enjoying Thee. Were I going, in a few years, to refide in a diftant land, how I should strive now to mafter its language — to know its hiftory — to put myfelf in a state of training for its habits and occupations. Heaven is that country; and this is the meffage sent by let- ter from its shores to every stranger and pilgrim on the earth, "And every one that hath THIS HOPE in him purifieth himfelf, even as Chrifl is pure" (1 John iii. 3.) The priefts in the earthly temple had to wafh and purify themfelves ere they could engage in sacerdotal service. So, if I am to be a " prieft unto God " in the heavenly Jerufalem, I mufb sanftify myfelf for this ever- lafting feaft. It is a quaint but a true saying, "The man who does not find heaven in his soul here, will not find his soul in heaven here- H 1 14 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. after." Unlike Jefus now, I cannot expert to be like Him for ever. The fine chifellings of the perfected model, indeed, will be added in glory ; but the germ of the likenefs — the bold outlines of the moral sculpture — muft be begun on earth. Meanwhile, let the words sound in my ears, like the preparation-bell for the great Sabbath- services of the Church in heaven — let them follow me like a celeftial monitor wherever I am, and howfoever engaged, "Let this mind be in you, which was alfo in Chriji Jefus" (Phil. ii. 5 .) XIII. ilocalttp ana Cljaramr* " The whole creation groans, And waits to hear that voice, That shall reftore her comelinefs, And make her waftes rejoice. Come, Lord, and wipe away The curfe, the sin, the stain, And make this blighted world of ours Thine own fair world again ! " " Neverthelefs we, according to his promife, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- nefs." — 2 Peter iii. 13. SITTLE has been said in Scripture fitted to gratify an idle curiofity regarding the circumftantials of future blifs. The ex- treme and studied referve, indeed, of the sacred writers on this subje£t forms one of the striking indirect evidences that they were neither impof- tors nor enthufiafts — neither pleafers of men, nor compilers of cunningly-devifed fables. Had they Il6 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. been so, they would doubtlefs have appealed more than they have done to the fancy and paffions of their readers, expatiating on the scenery and splendours of the world to come. While, however, the statements are brief and fragmentary regarding the locality and charac- teriftics of Heaven, it becomes us, with a modeft precaution, to be " wife up to what is written." The verfe of the apoftle Peter offers us two themes for meditation on a future state of blifs — two Grapes to be gleaned from the Efhcol clufters. I ft, We are to look for "new heavens and a neiv earths The prefent globe on which we dwell is to undergo a purifying procefs by fire. When the day of the Lord comes " as a thief in the night," " the heavens shall pafs away with a great noife, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat i the earth alfo and the works that are therein shall be burned tip" (2 Peter iii. 10.) Although, how- ever, a conflagration be here spoken of, we have strong reafon to conj eflure that this planet, over which "the morning stars sang together," and LOCALITY AND CHARACTER. llj which the Almighty Creator"Himfelf pronounced to be " very good!' is not to be annihilated — not to be expunged from the " records of creation," — but rather only remoulded and reconftrufted into a "new earth" nobler and more beautiful than when the Sons of God shouted over it their lofty anthems. Again, (although we have no pofitive authority in affigning a special locality for the future home of the glorified,) we can affirm, with strong grounds of certainty, that that home — be it where it may — muft confift of a material habitation of some kind, suited to mate- rial bodies. Whatever change may take place hereafter on our phyfical frames, — however re- fined and even spiritual in one senfe they may be, — we know that a glorified body cannot, in the nature of things, be an ethereal, angelic, spiritual effence ; floating, in dreamy, shadowy form, through the regions of space. It muft affume a subftantial, vifible, tangible shape. It is to be "fajliioned" like unto the glorious re- furreftion-body of Jefus, (Phil. iii. 21.) Much of our prefent corporeal organifm, as we may afterwards more particularly note, may, and mod 1 1 8 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. probably will, be retained and reftored ; only their functions vaftly augmented, and the sphere of a6livity vaftly enlarged. If, then, for thefe glorified bodies some local material habitation muft neceffarily be provided, another step leads to the probable (the natural) inference, that their old abode, purified and renovated, would form the moft befitting locality for their eternal refi- dence. We have seen, in a previous Meditation, that the Great Being, at whofe feet they are to caft their crowns, is moft frequently spoken of and adored by them under His suffering title, " The Lamb!' If He delights to remember earth as the scene of His humiliation — if He delighted to dwell in its " habitable parts " in eras long antecedent to the Incarnation, and ere the mil- lions He was to save were called into exiftence, — how much more will He delight to traverfe it, when — "His blood, His pain, His toils" all paft — it becomes the monument and trophy of His unfpeakable grace and love ! Is it not reafon- able to infer that the theatre on which His re- demption-work was achieved, so far from being erased from the univerfe, will rather be retained LOCALITY AND CHARACTER. 119 — in reftored and renovated beauty — a luftrous point on which principalities and powers will delight to fix their wondering gaze, and get from its memories frefh matter and motive for praife ? Will not the song liftened to by Ifaiah in the old Jerufalem temple, — when he heard "one cry to another," — rife to its full cadence, in the in- gathered Church of the Redeemed, when, on the platform of " the new earth," and under the dome of "the new heavens," the ten thoufand times ten thoufand and thoufands of thoufands will be heard rolling in the threefold afcription — "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hojls! The zvhole EARTH is f till of His glory?" (Isa. vi. 3.) If we are forbidden to hazard stronger affer- tion, we may, at all events, speak of all this as warrantable conjecture. Earth (our own prefent sin-ftricken, woe-worn earth) may only have to put off thefe her afhen robes of guilt and woe, to become a heavenly and eternal home for her ranfomed children — beautiful amid " a sifterhood of worlds." Scripture significantly speaks, not of the reneiving or remodelling of all things, but of "the reflitution of all things," (Acts iii. 21.) 120 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. It is the building of the old fabric which the earthquake had shattered ; — the difentangling of stone by stone from the matting weeds and ivy, and chifelling them jfrefh for the heavenly Temple. All that sin has left unfullied may remain as it is. We may have the same glo- rious sky for a canopy — the same everlafting mountains to gaze upon — the same grateful viciffitude of seafons, — the same winds to chant — the same waves to chime, " Glory to God in the higheft!" The eye may be charmed, as now, with harmonious colouring, — the ear de- lighted, as now, with mufic and song. The senfes may be as sufceptible (or more sufcep- tible) than they now are of the ^sublime and beautiful in nature ; — art may vindicate, under nobler aufpices, her claim to be the handmaid of all that is pure and lovely and of good report ; — the harpers, harping on a glaffy sea, undimmed and unfretted by a ripple of sin or sorrow ; — the very words which are now at times attuned to our sinful lips in a sinful world, may be set to the higher mufic and melodies of a w r orld of purity and love — " O Lord, how manifold are thy LOCALITY AND CHARACTER. 121 works! in wifdom Jiajl thou made them all! THE EARTH is full of thy riches!" (Ps. civ. 24.) The 2d statement in the words of Peter, is the special chara£leriftic of thefe " new heavens and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousnefs" This brings us again to the great truth, that it is the moral afpe<5l and character of heaven, and not its locality, which moft concerns us. If the Bible defcriptions and pictures of a future ftate teach us anything, it is this — not to indulge in fanciful theories about the acceffories of heavenly blifs, but to keep our minds focufed on this great truth — that " hoiinefs becomeih that kingdom!" It matters comparatively little where we shall be, but it matters much, and it concerns us much, to know what we shall be. We may not be able categorically to pronounce whether Heaven is on some diftant, and as yet untraverfed nook in creation ; or w r hether it may be this very earth, confecrated by so many mingled memories of sin, suffering, and glory. But this we do know, that RigJiteousnefs will be the great law of that blifsful empire. We repeat the great truth dwelt 122 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. upon in the previous chapter — " It doth not yet appear what zve shall be, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be LIKE Him! 1 It is sin which forms the foul curfe and blot on the " pre- sent evil world." In itfelf, our earth is all one could wifh as a beauteous and befitting habita- tion for glorified natures. Take sin away, which has blighted and blafhed whatever is fair within it, and you transmute it at once into a " Paradife reftored." Yes ! imagine this world — this very world— purged of its evils — its selfifhnefs — its profligacy^ — its covetousnefs — its jealoufies — its backbiting.s ; — each heart a pellucid fountain of pure and holy thought — each houfehold a little Bethel— every life within it an incenfe-breathing altar;— each nation linked with its fellow in everlafting brotherhood — the curfe of Babel re- moved, and the one univerfal tongue the lan- guage of love ! Then, following the expulfion of sin, pifiture the expulfion of suffering. The cries of infancy — the pains of sicknefs — the pangs of difeafe— the hectic flufh (the sad premonitory symptom of coming diffolution) — the bitter be- reavement-— the tolling of the funeral bell— the LOCALITY AND CHARACTER. 1 23 crowded grave-yard — the weeds of mourning, and deeper yawning chafms of bitternefs in the soul which no human plummet can gauge ; — imagine all thefe unknown — thefe " former things paffed away." Moreover, add to this negative, the pojitive view of a world of blifs, — the pre- sence of God — the perfonal love of an ever- prefent Saviour — fellowfhip with angels — com- munion with all that is holy and happy ! Oh, I need not go and make the sun my chariot, and sweep the azure firmament ; — I need not traverfe the nightly plains, and make every star a refting-place in my search for a happy heaven ; — I have it w T herever God and righteoufnefs is ! He might erect for me in infinite space some gigantic palace, glittering with corufcations of unearthly splendour — its halls gleaming with the ranfacked treafures of the univerfe — re- splendent with beauty, refonant with song. But if sin were there — Heaven it could not be ! " Bleffed are the pure in heart, they alone can see" — they alone can enjoy "God/" (Matt. v. 8.) Is my mind and character now, in any feeble meafure, fitted for this sinlefs abode? No unre- 124 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. newed, unregenerate man could be happy there. Take a peafant from the plough, and set him on a throne ; how ill at eafe would he feel at the strange tranfition! — how ill qualified to cope with the duties and cares and refponfibilities of empire! Take a deaf man to liften to melo- dious mufic — or a blind man to gaze on the glories of a landfcape, both would fail to imbibe one pleafurable emotion, seeing they are deftitute of the requifite inlets of enjoyment. The objefts of pleafure are, in both cafes, locked to their senfes. So in Heaven. Without holinefs, I could have no relifh for communion with God. I muft have a moral vifion to render me capable of appreciating the moral lovelinefs of its scenery ; — I muft have spiritual taftes and likings to render its holy society congenial. As little could an inhabitant of our earth, with his prefent bodily organifation, be able to suftain life n a planet nearer the sun, (such as Mercniyl) as the sinner, with his spiritual organifation unchanged, be able to bear the blaze of that heaven of unfullied purity! LOCALITY AND CHARACTER. 1 25 O happy time ! when alike the world with- out and the world within will be purified — hal- lowed — " made meet for the Matter's ufe." Every paffion quelled — every ufurper overthrown — when from this creation, now " groaning and travailing in pain," shall arife a perpetual hymn of praife and love ; — when sin, which like a vaft avalanche has been crufhing it down, shall have melted away for ever! And more than this, when my own heart — regenerated, glorified — will become a confecrated altar, on which the sacrifices of righteoufnefs will be offered con- tinually; — self, sin, corruption, no longer burn- ing their defiled incenfe and strange fire, but all shall "grow" into an " holy temple in the Lord." Lord! I would seek to have this Heaven be- gun ! Let me not only see the Efhcol clufters ; — let me tajle them. Give me grace to become more and more holy. Let the power of evil wax weaker and weaker, and the power of holinefs wax stronger and stronger. It has been beauti- fully said, " The upper streets of glory are on earth." Let it be so with me. Let my heart 126 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. become now a miniature heaven. Let me know, in my blifsful experience, the truth of the Sav- iour's words, " The kingdom of God is WITHIN yoiC " Many a joyful sight was given, Many a lovely vifion here, Hill, and vale, and starry even, Friendfhip's smile, affection's tear; Thefe were shadows, sent in love, Of realities above ! " Here were sweet and varied tones, Bird, and breeze, and fountain's fall ; Yet Creation's travail-groans Ever sadly sigh'd through alL There no difcord jars the air, Harmony is perfect, there ! " Here devotion's healing balm Often came to soothe my breail, Hours of deep and holy calm, Earnefls of eternal reft. But the glory was unknown, Which shall there be all my own !" XIV. %l)z Mutual gjojn " Lo ! He beckons from on high! Fearlefs to His prefence fly. Thine the merit of His blood, Thine the righteoufnefs of God ! Angels, joyful to attend, Hovering round thy pillow bend ; Wait to catch the signal given, And escort thee quick to heaven.'* u Father, I will that they also, whom thou haft given me, be with me where I am ; that they may behold my glory." — John xvii. 24. N emigrant is about to sail for a diftant land. As the veffel weighs anchor, and *' his family are gathered on the shore to bid a sorrowful farewell, his laft words re- mind them that it is but a temporary separa- tion, — that in a few brief years, by a favouring Providence, he will be back again, to take them along with him to his adopted home ! 128 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. Or, a father gathers his children around his death-bed, to give them his laft bleffing. With his eye looking upwards to the glorious world on which his spirit is about to enter, he tells them, in faltering accents, to dry their tears ; for in a little w r hile they will be reunited in that " better land " which knows no parting. Here is the utterance of a departing Saviour to His orphaned children. It forms a petition in His laft interceffory prayer, w r hen about to leave the world, and return to the Father. " Oh, the full joys," says Richard Baxter, speaking of this verfe in his " Saint's Rest/' " offered to a believer in this one sentence of Chrift ! Every word full of life and joy!" The verfe brings before us thefe two thoughts in connexion with a state of future blifs : — The SAVIOUR'S joy in Heaven in being with His people; and His PEOPLE'S/^ in Heaven in being with their Saviour. I. The Saviour here speaks of His own joy in having His saints with Him in glory. THE MUTUAL JOY. 1 29 The language is that of a conqueror claiming a stipulated reward. God seems to say to Him, " Afk of me, and I will give thee." " Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine." And what does He afk ? He had Heaven at His command — " thrones, and dominions, and principalities, and powers." But He prefers the requeft to be crowned as " Lord of all," in the midft of His saints ; — that redeemed sinners, like celeftial planets, might through eternity circle and conftellate around Him, their central Sun. " He will reft in his love ; he will joy over them with singing," (Zeph. iii. 17.) On earth, a man likes to live and die among thofe he venerates. The old village patriarch defires to be laid where his fathers sleep, in his native churchyard. The Jew will travel back from the moft diftant region of the world, that his bones may be laid in the Valley of Jehofha- phat, under the shadow of Olivet, and within hearing of the Kedron. " Where thou dieft," said Ruth to the one she loved beft, " I shall die, and there shall I be buried," (Ruth i. 17.) So speaks alfo an ever-living Saviour of His 130 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. people. "Where I live," He says, " there ye are to live alfo ; eternity shall not separate between you and me." The well-known tomb of a great earthly Architedt is placed immediately under the dome of the vaft temple his genius had reared. With reverence we say it, Jesus is through eternity to be enfhrined in the Temple of His saints, — the living stones rifing tier on tier around, — each glowing with the infcription, " He loved me, and gave Himfelf for me." What joy thus to behold around Him the travail of His soul, the purchafe of His agony! If we value great refults generally in proportion to the labour and toil befhowed on them ; — ii the philofopher, in arriving at some brilliant achievement in science, has all the greater joy when he thinks of it as the refult of months and years of patient and unwearied application ; — if the artift or sculptor has all the greater joy in contemplating his completed w r ork, by retravers- ing in thought years of inceffant labour, — the line by line, and stroke by stroke, until he worked it up to the now r breathing marble ; — if the Great God Himfelf, in refting from the work of crea- tion, when He contemplated its magnitude, had THE MUTUAL JO Y. 131 delight when He pronounced it " very good," — what muft be the tranfcendent joy with which the adorable Redeemer beholds the completion of an undertaking which involved in it so unpa- ralleled a coft of humiliation and pain and woe ! What shall be the complacency with which He, the mighty Architeft, contemplates the living, breathing forms of immortal life, which, by His own and His Spirit's work, were chifelled and fafhioned to adorn the Heavenly Temple ! Here was " the joy" we read of " that was set before Him;" — the joy of seeing "a multitude which no man can number" who had "wafhed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." If the courageous mariner has joy, who, at the rifle of his life, bravely dafhed into the water, and refcued some struggling caft- away from the weltering waves ; — if the Patriot- Philanthropift could with joy stand in thought amid the grateful millions whofe fetters he had struck off, and into whofe lips he had put the mufic of freedom ; — if the honoured minifter has joy, who, on his death-bed, can say, at the re- trofpeft of a lifetime of self-sacrificing devoted- nefs in his Matter's caufe, "Bleffed be God, my 132 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. work is done," * — what shall we say (if we can compare the earthly with the heavenly — the finite with the infinite) of that everlafting joy which shall fill the bofom of the Saviour as He sees thofe once bound with the fetters of sin, struggling in the waves of defpair, now saved with a great salvation, exulting in " the glorious liberty of the sons of God ! " If He had joy — as we believe He had — when in the depths of a bypaft eternity He said, " Lo, I come/' (though in that coming He had all the appalling profpecl of ignominy and shame ;) — if " Wisdom " had " delights with the sons of men and rejoiced in the habitable parts of the earth," when the solitary treading of the wine-prefs had yet to be borne; — if He had joy when He stretched forth His hands over His " Church in the wildernefs," and said, " Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," — what intenfer and holier joy muft that be, when, every woe and pang and sorrow at an end, His people shall be with Him " where He is ; " earth's battle, with its " confufed noife and garments rolled in blood," terminated ; the everlafting * Rev. Edward Bickerfteth. THE MUTUAL JOY. 1 33 triumphal proceffion of eternity begun, — im- mortal palm-branches strewed in the way, — and the streets of the new Jerufalem echoing to the cry, " Hofannah to the Son of David" — "Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reign- eth!" (Rev. xix. 6.) Behold, then, Heaven as a place where the Saviour himfelf shall rejoice over His ranfomed ones. They are " glorified together." They are glorified in Him, and He is glorified in them. " Heaven would not be enough for Jefus without His people. It seems as if their prefence were effential, not to His deity, (this cannot be,) but to His mediatorial happinefs." * The joy in that happy world would seem to begin at the centre, and to be deepeft there, but sending out its waves to the circumference of glory. * Harington Evans. XV. " All their toils and conflicts over, Lo ! they dwell with Chrift above ; Oh ! what glories they difcover In the Saviour whom they love ! Now they see Him face to face, Him who saved them by His grace." Kelly, " Father, I will that they alfo, whom thou haft given me, be with me where I am ; that they may behold my glory."— John xvii. 24. [N our laft, we confidered this verfe as expreffive of the Saviour's joy in Hea- ven in being with His people. We may confider it now as expreffive of His people's joy in Heaven in being with their Saviour. Let us enumerate some of the caufes or rea- sons of this joy. (1.) The very fa£l of His being joyful will give tJiemjoy. I36 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. When a son hears of some honour done to his hoary-headed parent, or of some event or occur- rence that has given him pleafure, the joy or the pride in the parent's bofom will be transfufed into that of his child, and become part of his own. Or if we hear of the promotion in the world of a brother or a friend — that by dint of intellect or goodnefs or worth he has rifen to some pofition of honourable eminence — what a joy his succefs gives to us ! And shall it not be so in an infinite degree with the redeemed in glory ? When they behold the Brother of bro- thers, the Friend of friends, reaping the fruits of the " travail of His soul," and " being satisfied," His joy will become their own ! (2.) The thought of His being near them and with them will impart to them joy. It makes us happy to have thofe near us we love. We never enjoy friendfhip so much as when that friend is by our side. We may be cheered from time to time by an abfent brother's letters, his kind meffages, and warm expreffions of attachment; but the wfitten epiftle does not supply the blank of the living one — we long to THE MUTUAL JOY. 1 37 see him face to face ere our joy can be com- plete. So in Heaven with Jefus. " In Thy prefence" " there isfulnefs of joy." Then and there shall that prefence be fully unveiled. If even in this twilight world the Chriftian can say, in the enjoyment of a prefent Saviour, " It is good for me to be here;" how good to be there! If even now the meffages of this abfent Elder Brother, through His Word and Spirit, be cheer- ing and joyful, what will be the vifion and frui- tion of the Brother Himfelf ! If the manna from the banqueting-table be precious, what will it be to have the vifion and fruition of the Mafter of affemblies ! (3.) The thought of His not only being with them and near them, but EVER with them, and EVER near them> will greatly intensify their joy, A friend or brother comes from a difhant land. His vifit is cheering at the time, but it is only a paffing glimpfe. The joy of his home-coming is soon damped by the neceffity or summons again to return. The joy of the difciples in having their Lord with them in the days of His flefh 138 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. was sadly clouded by the announcement, " It is expedient for you that I go away." " Becaufe I have said thefe things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart," (John xvi. 6.) Not so will it be with His second and more glorious coming. " The Matter is come," will be the joyful meffage and cry, " and He will never more be taken from us" — He will be no longer " a wayfaring man that turneth afide to tarry for a night" — no farewell tear will ever again be shed, — no Olivet in Heaven, like the earthly one, where He is to be "parted from them!" Oh, the joy comprehended in that key-note to the song of the Redeemed, "And SO shall we EVER be with the Lord 7" (4.) One other element of the joy of the Re- deemed in Heaven in having Jefus with them, is that His prefence will through eternity be the Pledge and guarantee of their safety. The Tree of Life in the firfh Eden was the guar- antee of Adam's safety, so long as he continued faithful to his Maker. Chrift is the Tree of Life in the midft of the Heavenly paradife — the im- mortal pledge of His people's covenant security. THE MUTUAL JOY. 1 39 "Becaitfe I live ye shall live alfo," (John xiv. 19.) Their happinefs through eternity is secured by His meritorious work ; — they are there as His blood-bought trophies ; — their prefence in Hea- ven is an anfwer to the prayer we are now con- sidering ; it is the glorious Vi6lor claiming His purchafed rights, "Father, I WILL." And not till He revokes that "will" — in other words, not till an unchanging Saviour become change- able, — can His people's happinefs be altered or impaired. Reader ! learn from all this the same prac- tical leffon we have previoufly enforced, — how little it matters where the locality of Heaven is. It is " with Chrijl" That is enough. " With ME ! zvhere I AM ! " and the Chriftian needs no more. The lafh words of invitation of Jefus to His Church, when that Church is taking its tranfition step from the militant to the triumph- ant state, will be, " Come, ye bleffed of my Father ! " Obferve, it is not, " Go, ye bleffed, to some paradife of my providing : I am about to return to my heavenly throne : I have marked out some new Eden for you ; — some blifsful soli- 140 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. tude where you can reign alone ; — but though separated from me, I have made provifion for the fulleft meafure of joy." No; this would hufh every harp, and cloud every spirit. It would be like sending them to a univerfe with- out a sun. It would be to tell them they were to be dependent on the fitful luftre of glimmer- ing stars. But it is, " Come, ye bleffed ! Come with ME ! I afcend to my Father and your Father — to my God and your God. We go together. I will be your forerunner. I will shew you the path of life. My glory is to be your glory. My gladnefs is to be your gladnefs. ' Enter ye into the joy of your Lord! " In some exalted senfe, may we not put the words of the apoftle into the mouth of his Lord and Mailer, and suppofe Him thus to addrefs His saints on the Great Day — " What is my joy or crown of rejoicing? Are not ye in My own prefence?" The prayer of Jefus we have been confidering is afcending now. It has beex afcending and fulfilling for six thoufand years. Though unfeen to mortal eye, He, the great covenant Angel, is THE MUTUAL JOY. 141 even now standing before the throne, with the breaftplate of His unchanging priefthood. The hand that was once transfixed to the tree, is pointing to the names engraven there, and saying, " Father, I will " that thofe here im- perifhably infcribed " be with me where I am." With what solemn significance may we con- ned the utterance of that prayer with every believer's death. The Church on earth may be weeping and mourning over some bright light on the eve of being extinguifhed, wondering, perhaps, at the myfterious providence which is about to carry bereavement into a stricken houfehold. Could they liften to the tranfa6lions in the upper san6luary, every repining word would be hufhed into silence. They would find the death-bed on earth was the anfwer to the requeft in Heaven — ''Father, / will;" — angels hovering over it with the joyful summons, " The Matter is come, and calleth for thee ! " Chriftian ! exult in this " bleffed hope." Covet the poffeffion of this fulnefs of joy ; — beholding Jefus as He is, rejoicing over you with all the joy of His infinite Godhead and His glorified 142 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. humanity. Here we are merely among the shallows of this ocean of infinite love ; what will it be when we shall be " able to comprehend with all saints, what is the height and depth, and length and breadth, and to know the love of Chrift, which paffeth knowledge !" (Eph. iil 1 8, 19.) XVI. SDtftersfe S^agmtuDtg* " There, are thofe everlafting gardens Where angels walk and seraphs are the wardens, Where every flower, brought safe through death's dark portal, Becomes immortal. Each blooming bright, Though some reflecting more of Heaven's all-glorious light." " One star differeth from another star in glory."— i Cor. xv. 41. [N that world of light, and love, and glory, all will be supremely bleffed. But it is a thoroughly scriptural view of the happinefs of the Redeemed in glory, to reprefent it, though the same in kind, as differing in degree. The saints will be classified — " enrolled in moral genealogies." Diverfity is a law of God's univerfe. It extends to great things as well as to little things. Some 144 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. flowers are more beautiful than others. Some intellects are more lofty than others. One planet in the firmament is of greater magnitude than another. There are gradations too in the heavenly hierarchy. Angels and archangels, — principalities and powers, — " the greateft and the leaft " in the kingdom of heaven. And have we not reafon alfo to believe that it will be so with glorified saints ? All, indeed, will have reached their thrones and their crowns through "the one only way." We cannot speak of any of that white-robed multitude as being more juftified than others ; for they equally point, as the ground of their juftification, to the finifhed work and righteoufnefs of their adorable Surety. They all equally feel that in being saved they were " saved by grace," — that nothing but the blood of that precious Lamb of God was be- tween them and everlasting ruin ! And juft as one law binds the planets and the atoms which compofe them ; so the one great principle of love to Him who died for them, will bind together the vaft family of the ranfomed, from the soaring Paul to the weeping Magdalene. But the degree DIVERSE MAGNITUDES. 1 45 of the saints' happinefs will be regulated accord- ing to their advances in holinefs. Our bleffed Lord Himfelf very emphatically enunciates this same truth, more efpecially in His parable of the Talents, where the amount of the reward is in exact proportion to diligence and fidelity in trading ; — a parable the leffon of which the great Apoftle has thus tranflated into one of his weighty aphorisms : " Whatfoever a man sowetky that shall he alfo reap" (Gal. vi. 7.) Works will form no plea or ground whatever for acceptance before the throne. But while it is not said of the " bleffed dead" that their works " go before them," (as a paffport to their crow r ns;) it is said "their works dofolloiv them," (Rev. xiv. 13.) There will be a vaft difference between the happinefs of the man who had done much for Chrift on earth, — who had long stood " a pillar in the temple of God," — and that of the monument of grace who had juft been plucked at the eleventh hour " a brand from the burning." As memory, we have reafon to know, will form a fearful element in the mifery of the loft (Luke xvi. 25 ;) so, we may conclude, K I46 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. will the exercife of the same ennobled faculty- form an element of exalted blifs in the cafe of the righteous and the saved. The recollec- tion of all that we have done out of love to the Saviour, and to promote His caufe on earth ; — the sacrifices, little though they be, w r e have made for Him, — the denial of self for the furtherance of His glory, — the afifeftion we have borne to His people, — the pleafures we have forfworn and forgone for His sake, — all such will be matter of hallowed joy. Jesus will love to recount them ; — His words will carry their approving echo through all eternity, — "Inasmuch as ye did it to the leajl of thefe, ye did it unto me!' " Ye have been faithftd over afeiv things, I will make you ruler over many things" (Matt. xxv. 23, 40.) But yet, with all this diversity in blifs and glory, there will be no strife among the heavenly, as once among the earthly difciples, as to " which should be the greatest.'' In this world, the race for diftinflion is limited and re- stricted ; only a favoured few can attain pre- eminence. " They which run" (on earth) " a race, run ally but one receive th the prize," (1 Cor. ix. DIVERSE MAGNITUDES. 147 24.) In Heaven, each will receive his reward. The runner may be diftanced in the earthly courfe by his competitor — not so in the heavenly. " In the race for moft worldly objects, one who has prepared himfelf, however well, runs uncertainly, since, after all his exertions, another may out- strip him ; whereas he who aids a brother in striving for the incorruptible crown, is ever bene- fiting himfelf." * There will be crowns with varying lustre, and harps of varying tone ; but, like the blending of different colours to the eye, or different notes to the ear, all will be pervaded by one beautiful harmony. The saint on the loftieft pinnacle of glory, and the saint on the outfkirts of the spiritual horizon, will have the same confeffion — "We are all one in Chrift Jefus." There will, moreover, be a felt and acknow- ledged equity in this future retribution. The grace or virtue moft assiduously cultivated by the believer on earth, will, (in subordination to God's glory,) be the main channel of his happinefs in heaven. In the words of Richard Baxter, " we * Whately. I48 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. shall join with Mofes in his song — with David in his pfalm of praife. We shall see Enoch walking with God — Noah enjoying the end of his singu- larity — Jofeph of his integrity — Job of his patience — Hezekiah of his uprightnefs, and all the saints the end of their faith." On earth, the cultivation of particular branches of knowledge brings a pleasure to their pos- seffors which is denied to thofe ignorant of them. The man, for example, who has culti- vated the science of miijic, is capable of enjoying the elaborate compofition and exquifite har- monies of some great master, in a way which another cannot do who has neglected this study. So in Heaven ; we believe that whatever may have been the tree of righteoufnefs — the Christian grace or virtue or labour — you have moft affidu- oufly nurtured and cultivated here, you will through eternity encamp under its shadow and partake of its fruits. Whatever were the cha- rities to which your lips and your heart were moft frequently attuned below, you will refume with moft intenfe pleasure amid the sublime harmonies of " the new heavens and the new DIVERSE MAGNITUDES. I49 earth." Whatever kindled your luflre as an earthly star, that radiance will be perpetuated in the celeflial firmament. Heaven will not ex- tinguifh your earthly taftes and longings — your earthly energies and a<5tivities. As a luminous orb you will still shine for God — not abforbing your light, but delighting to be a holy medium in giving forth radiations to others. Not a volume bound up and put under lock and key in the library of Heaven, but continued as a living epiftle to be read by other orders of in- telligent beings. Not a life of dreamy ina6lion — all its moral activities arrested on entering the spirit-world, but occupied in true angel-work — endlefs ministries of love. Jefus, knowing the taftes and capacities of His ranfomed, will delight to lead from foun- tain to fountain — from scene to scene — from eminence to eminence, as He knows they will be severally able to appreciate them. Oh, what an incentive is this to be " up and doing," — to be adding to your faith the bright catalogue of Christian graces ! Seek an "abun- dant entrance!' It will be joy indeed, hap- ISO GRAPES OF ESHCOL. pinefs far tranfcending earth's happieft hours, to bafk as a star on the outfkirts of glory. But why not be fired by the noble ambition to be near the all-glorious Centre ? Your crown, given by grace and sprinkled with blood, can never be dim, — but why not strive now, that when '" the Lord the righteous Judge " shall " give it you," you may be " found unto praife, and honour, and glory," at His second appearing? XVII. " Grave, the guardian of our duft, Grave, the treafury of the skies ; ' Every atom of thy dull, Refts in hope again to rife. " Hark, the judgment-trumpet calls, Soul, rebuild thy houfe of clay, Immortality its walls, And eternity its day." " Fashioned like unto His glorious body."- Phil. iii. 21. KS this frail body to share none of the glories of immortality? Is the de- caying tenement to slumber on, — a heap of unconfcious duft, — to be at laft swept into annihilation at the diffolution of all things ? " The voice said, Cry ! and he said. What shall I cry? All Jlejh is GRASS!" (the noble! the beautiful ! the ornamental !) all like withering, 152 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. fading grafs of the field ! (Ifa. xl. 6.) Such is the Bible's humiliating defcription of the body here, and it is echoed back in mournful experience from ten thoufand tombftones, and ten thoufand aching hearts. But " this corruptible shall put on incorrnptio7i, and this mortal immortality" (i Cor. xv. 53.) The refurrection-body, freed from the laft veftige of corruption — purged from the laft taint of earthlinefs — ennobled, purified, etherealifed — shall stand "without fault before the throne/' the crowning and culminating triumph of the redemption work, (Rom. viii. 23.) We need not dwell on nature's familiar an- alogies. The germ expanding into the perfedl bloffom ; — the little grain of corn, buried in its tiny grave of inert clod, burfting forth in the appointed spring-time ; — the torpid caterpillar cradled in a dark cell — a loathfome dungeon — yet that dungeon becoming the birthplace of a beauteous infe£t, mounting to heaven on wings of purple and gold. Thefe are the mute utter- ances of the outer world on the poffibility of a truth beyond the province of reafon. GLORIFIED BODIES. 153 But Scripture comes in where reafon is dumb or ambiguous. It tells me of the reconftruftion of the diffolved earthly tabernacle into " a build- ing °f God eternal in the heavens? It tells more ; — that the spiritual body is to be il fafhioned" like to that of a glorified Redeemer. It tells that there is at this moment a Man wearing a glorified Human body on the throne. " Chrift, the firft- fruits " — the firft Sheaf of the immortal harveft — has been waved in the new Jerufalem temple, the pledge and earneft of the myriad sheaves that are to follow; and His saints (raifed up in their bodies) will be " caught up together in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so be ever with the Lord? (1 Thefs. iv. 17.) It is vain to attempt conjectures as to the nature of the incorruptible and glorified frame, — what changes will take place on the prefent 1 condition of our bodily syftem. That there will be new powers and sufceptibilities of enjoyment added to what we now poffefs, we have the strongeft reason to believe. There will be no greater change, indeed, in a glorified state on our phyfical structure than is absolutely neces- 154 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. sary. We know, however, the dependence of the mind on the body; and it is quite pofiible to conceive, by a finer bodily organifation, a corre- sponding enlargement of the mental faculties and powers. We may be deprived of some im- portant sources of happinefs at prefent, owing to the want in our exifting bodily frames of some neceffary inlets for thefe. A man deprived of eyesight has a mind as sufceptible as others of taking impreffions of beauty ; but having no organ to be the medium of their conveyance, he forfeits the pleafures which his fellows enjoy. So, may it not be poffible in heaven, by means of a more perfect bodily stru6lure — a phyfical frame even more " fearfully and wonderfully made " than our prefent one — to have the way opened for new inlets of exalted enjoyment — waking into energy dormant powers of which we are now as unconfcious as the deaf man is of the sweets of mufic, or the blind man of the glories of the sun, or the tiny infant of the philofopher's speculations?* We may infer, moreover, that whatever be the * Whately. GLORIFIED BODIES. 1 5$ nature of the change, and however vaft, it will not be so vast as to deftroy perfonal identity. We might recur to earthly analogies here also. The grown-up man has an entirely different body in its component parts from what he had as an infant. The particles which make up his material framework have again and again been renewed, yet in person he remains the same. Heaven will be the manhood of our earthly be- ing. But though the transformation muft neces- sarily be great from our prefent " infant state/' perfonal identity will remain undeftroyed. " Then shall I know, even as alfo {now) I am (here) known," (i Cor. xiii.) The features of my buried friend I shall recognife again. The beaming face of cherilhed affection shall wear the old im- prefs of earth : — no change but this, that the shifting tent is tranfmuted into " a building of God," reared of permanent and imperifhable materials — a bodily structure that shall know no decrepitude — smiles that shall never die — new powers conferred which earth may have longed for, but never poffeffed — all emulous for the divine glory, and inftin6l with burning and 156 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. untiring zeal in His service ! And more than all, it will be Humanity in its nobleft type — "fafliioned like to Chriffs glorious body!' There will be a family refemblance to the elder Bro- ther, bodily, spiritually. It is said that He shall come to be " glorified " not only BY his saints, but " in his saints," as they bear His image, and wear His likenefs. " We know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is;' Some of our lovelieft garden flowers are grafts from wild plants in brake and foreft — thicket and hedgerow. So beauteous are these tranfplants as almoft to belie their pedigree. Their perfect tints, and symmetrical forms, and sweet perfume, however, prove the culture and development of which the plant or flow r er in its native state was capable. So shall it be in a far higher and nobler senfe with flowers tranfplanted into the garden above. The glorified body! how immeafurably will it tranfcend in phyfical and moral beauty the old earthly tabernacle ! " Sown in corruption, raifed in incorruption ; sown in weaknefs, raifed in power ; sown a natural body, raifed a spiritual GLORIFIED BODIES. 1 57 body." The firft was "of the earth, earthy," the second is fafhioned like unto the glorious body of "the Lord from heaven!" (1 Cor. xv. 42.) Glorious body, indeed ! without sin, without pain, without weaknefs, or wearinefs, or infirmity. The thought of diffolution, which now cafts its cold shadow acrofs our path, no longer known or dreaded ! Paul's earthly soliloquy changed to this, "O happy man that I am, now that I am delivered from this body of death!" The Chriftian's grave, however lowly, is thus "hal- lowed ground." There slumbers, in thefe clods of the valley, redeemed dujl. The maufoleum ot clay becomes the cafket of a gem which is to sparkle through eternal ages in the Redeemer's crown. XVIII. fesk£ ; * Jerufalem, my happy home, Name ever dear to me, When shall my labours have an end In joy and peace in Thee ! " When shall thefe eyes thy heaven-built walls, And pearly gates behold ? Thy bulwarks with salvation strong, And streets of shining gold. " Oh, when, thou city of my God, Shall I thy courts ascend, Where congregations ne'er break up, And sabbaths have no end." " And I saw no temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." — Rev. xxi. 22. [EAVEN without A temple! How strange, at firft sight, is this figurative description ! The temple was " the excellency of beauty" in the earthly jerufalem. It was the place of solemnities, the sanctuary of l6o GRAPES OF ESHCOL. prayer, the frequented haunt of angels ; nay, the vifible pavilion where God himfelf in myftic splendour dwelt. To the exile of Patmos it had more than an Israelite's wonted hallowed affocia- tions. Through its " Beautiful Gate " he had oft and again paffed, in company with his Divine Mafter. In its sacred porticos he had liftened to the voice of Him who spake as never man spake. But as the celeftial vifion now paffes before him, he looks in vain, amid the shining por- tals, and jasper walls, and golden-paved streets, for a similar sacred shrine. He is struck with the myfterious abfence. " I saw 710 temple therein /" This apparent omiffion in the infpired picture tells us that there will be no more need of Temples in Heaven. There was no temple required in the firft Eden ! There our firft parents, in the days of their innocence, worfhipped God under the blue vault of nature's temple ! The angels in heaven, so far as we know, have no vifible san£luary, there is nothing in their sinlefs world to interrupt their interchanges of NO TEMPLE. l6l love and fellowfhip, or to mar the cadence of their song. Sin firft demanded some special localities for religious worfhip — consecrated spots partitioned off from the world. There was no need of sheepfolds, so long as no wolf prowled abroad. But when sin and Satan gained entrance, the little flock required the sheltering covert, wherein they might reft in safety amid " the mountains of prey!' (Ps. lxxvi. 4.) As it was of old in the earthly paradise, so will it be amid the glories of " Eden refhored " — there will be no " prefent evil world " to difturb its worfhippers, and render needful the quiet and seclufion of hallowed edifices, to secure the sanftities of devotion. Every place in the vaft domain of Heaven will be a Temple, — every spot hallowed ground. Divifions, too, there will be none. Here, alas ! the exiftence of many and separate Temples, is too often the painful indication of divided churches and severed believers ; worfhipping apart, — refufing to hold fellowfhip in one and the same shrine, and drawing lines of unfeemly demarcation between each other. In Heaven, all 1 62 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. shall see " eye to eye." No walls of separation there. No rival Gerizims and Zions there. The worfhippers being afiimilated to God, shall be afiimilated to one another. They shall have one temple, one motive, one heart, one song. " See how thefe glorified Chriftians love one another!" But if the apoftle, in gazing on the apocalyptic vifion, "saw no temple," what was the subfli- tute ? The want of the earthly symbol of glory and beauty, muft surely be supplied by something nobler and sublimer! Yes, there IS to be a Temple in Glory, but it is a houfe " not made with hands." Materialifm, with all its magnifi- cent dimenfions, melts away ; — " The Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple thereof? There is one senfe, indeed, in which, at this moment, God and the Lamb are the Temple of the univerfe. God's prefence is all-pervading. The splendours of the vifible firmament are but the hangings and drapery of a more august and awful shrine. But I cannot now, with my feeble faculties, difcern the majefty of His glory. I feel that in this " childhood-world " I am like NO TEMPLE. 163 the infant in the affembly of philofophers, who is all unconfcious of the superiority of the minds around him, and can hold no fellowfhip with them in their lofty themes of converfe. Though surrounded on all hands with the footprints and manifeftations of a prefent Divinity, my befitting exclamation is, " Canjl thou by searching find out Godr (Job xi. 7.) In Heaven there is to be a vaft revelation of a " hidden God." In the Temple on earth, He was screened by an interpofmg veil ; — that veil in glory is to be withdrawn. Nay, I am to be en/Jirined in Deity ! Heaven is not to be so much the temple of God, as God the temple of Heaven. His attributes are to be the walls and bulwarks of my everlafting security. But this verfe of our prefent Meditation tells us more than this. Jefus " the Lamb" is to form the " Gate Beautiful " of this Temple — the Revealer of Him who dwells " in the light which no man can approach tmio /" (1 Tim. vi. 16.) We believe it will be as true of the glorified saint, as of the ranfomed on earth, "No man 1 64 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. hath seen God at any time : the only-begotten SON which is in the bofom of the Father he hath de- clared him" (John i. iS.) He will be the true Angel " standing in the sun," the all-glorious medium through which we can see God and live! " The Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple thereof 7" This tells me that all my knowledge will come dii'eft from God in Chrifl. Now, there is needed the intervention of the Word, Ordinances, Sacraments. Then, the spi- ritual world will no more be lighted up by sa- tellites ; the " fairnefs of the moon " will give way to the " brightnefs of the Sun ;" — the star- light will be quenched and superfeded by the Great Spiritual Luminary. " You have but now and then seen your Beloved looking through the lattice of ordinances, — what a burfl of joy awaits you when you shall see Him face to face, and evermore be with Him ! " * Yes, indeed, ineffable blifs ! fulnefs of joy! No more yearning defires after "something better;" — the infinite all-satisfying "good" at- tained ; — as happy as everlafling goodnefs and * Mifs Plumptre. NO TEMPLE. I65 wisdom and omnipotence can make me. My feeble voice swelling the joyous anthem within temple-walls whofe only confines are light and love. Is my title clear to this glorious Heaven ? Am I fitted now to be the inhabitant of such a Temple ? — to dwell with God, (yea, in God,) occupying these inner chambers of Deity ? Heaven is a City. It is an amazing privilege the thought of reigning there as King. But not lefs elevating, surely, the thought of Heaven as a Temple, where I shall be occupied as a miniftering prieft, — " a prieft unto God" — ready to caft my cenfer as well as my crown at His feet, and " offer the sacrifice of praife con- tinually !" Be it mine to prepare for the sacerdotal work. " Holinefs to the Lord" was written on the high prieft's frontlet of old. Let it be my superfcrip- tion now. Let the eye of faith delight to dwell efpecially on the great High Prieft — He who, as the Covenant Angel, is interceding for me ; and who, through eternity, will form the blood-be- fprinkled entrance, — the ever-open gate conduft- 1 66 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. ing into the Holy Place. There may, and doubtlefs will be many other lofty anthems that shall refound in that temple ; but " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain" will ever be the sublimeft chant of the Church of the firft-born. We shall exult in its other glories. But it will be the inscription over the portal that will be the theme of eternity — " Boldnefs to enter into the holieft by the blood of Jefus!' "Far beyond the grave's dark night, What bright Temple meets my sight ? Softly stealing on the ear, What strange mufic do I hear ? 'Tis the golden harps on high, 'Tis the chorus of the sky ! " Give my soul the spotlefs drefs Of Thy perfect righteousnefs ; Then, at length, a welcome gueft, I shall enter to the feaft, Take the harp and raife the song, All Thy ranfom'd ones among/' ^a^> XIX. dje dPlorious ^rangitioru u There stiil my thoughts are dwelling, 'Tis there I long to be ; Come, Lord, and call Thy servant To bleffednefs with Thee ! Come, bid my toils be ended — Let all my wanderings ceafe ; Call from the wayside lodging To the sweet home of peace." Gerhardt. u Abfent from the body, and to be prefent with the Lord."— 2 COR. v. 8. GAIN the curtain of glory is lifted, and what do we see ? The emancipated spirit burfting its chrysalis shell — soar- ing upwards on immortal wings to be "with the Lord," and that " for ever!" We are interefted in the firft look we get of "a great man" on earth. What mufh the firft glance be in heaven of JESUS ! — that mystic name which has here 1 68 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. put mufic into the heart in many a dark hour, and lighted up its wildernefs with a halo of ioy! If Jacob longed intently to see Jofeph, what will be the saint's ardent defire to gaze on the true Jofeph — Him w T hom his "soul loveth !" Yes, on entering heaven, it will not be the burning ranks of angel and archangel, cheru- bim and seraphim, that will fix his arretted gaze. His exclamation will be, as his eye winders upwards to the central Throne, and settles on a Countenance there beaming with unutterable lovelinefs, — " Is that indeed the Saviour, whom, though so long unfeen, I have neverthelefs loved!" And what shall he see ? It will be the same Lord to whofe sublime utterances of love he has so often liftened in thought, as eighteen hun- dred years ago He " spake as never man spake." The same Being who wept, and groaned, and sympathifed, and suffered. He will think of Him at Sychar's well — on Tabor — on Tiberias — on Olivet — by the Kedron — at Bethany — at Calvary. It is " that same J ejus " — He who once lay, in a borrowed cradle, a helplefs babe at THE GLORIOUS TRANSITION. 169 Bethlehem ; He who spake comfortable words to the bereaved, and gave back to widowed and yearning hearts their perifhed joys ; He who invited the weary to reft, and never scorned the penitent's tears, or left unfuccoured the call of mercy ; He who lay convulfed in anguifh on the cold ground of Gethfemane ; He who bowed His head on the bitter tree ; He who met the weeping Mary with words of joy as she stood difconfolate by His grave, and accofted Peter with the gentlefh and moft tender of rebukes. I shall see (if I be one of His ran- somed people) " that same J ef its" — I shall enjoy with Him near and confidential intercourfe, and nothing shall ever separate me from His love ! Of old, some of the tranfient earthly glimpfes of this Saviour were bleffed and confoling. If it were gladdening when Jacob saw Him in His angel-form at Peniel — or aged Simeon clafped Him in his withered arms in the temple — or the difciples beheld Him on Tabor — or Martha and Mary wept with Him at Bethany — or when the beloved apoftle leant on His bofom, met Him on the way to Emmaus, or on the lonely shores 170 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. of Patmos ; what will it be to have thefe seafons of intercourfe renewed without their tranfience ; — to bafk through eternal years under the radi- ance of His smile, — His own words obtaining an everlafting fulfilment — " Where I AM, there shall alfo my serva?it be /" Here, too, we are again reminded that means and agencies will be re- quired no longer in His communications with us. The streams will come welling frefh from the living fountain ; — the rays will be untainted and undimmed by tranfmiffion through any impurer medium ; — there will be perfonal communings between every saint and his living Head, — " They shall see His face!' Whatever may be the be- liever's relation to the infinite circumference of heaven — to the thrones, and dominions, and principalities, and powers — he will be ever near to the all-glorious Centre ! " He," it has been w r ell said, " who is now in every saint the hope of glory, w T ill then be in every saint the poffes- sion, realifation, and fulnefs of glory."* And, obferve from our motto verfe, it is an immediate tranfition. The spirit, " with a bound," * Cheever's " Windings." THE GLORIOUS TRANSITION. 171 at the hour of death, as it forfekes its earthly tabernacle, enters the Divine presence and the heavenly Home. Be affured, Paul would never have uttered the wifh for departure, in order to lapfe into a mefmeric trance or lethargic {lum- ber. Never would he have ufed such language as this, — " We are confident" (we are bold, as the word means, in the profpect of death) " ' and will- ing rather to be abfent from the body" if he had any lefs elevating defire and profpect than to be "prcfent with the Lord!' Far rather would he have remained on earth, enjoying the bleffed experiences of the Saviour's felt prefence and love, and the confciousnefs of promoting His caufe, than to have paffed into a state of dreamy, drowsy infenfibility and torpor. The exchange, in such circumftances, would have been a pofi- tive diminution of bleffednefs. It would have been the withdrawal from active work and warfare in the Church below, — an inglorious tranfition for his hero-spirit. Dungeon, chains, watching, fafting, stripes and sufferings with Chrift on earth, would have been, to a soul like his, infinitely preferable to such a state of slum- 1/2 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. brous oblivion . and unconfcioufnefs. But he specially guards us againft any such suppo- fition : " Not" says he, "for that we would be unclothed" — not that I long merely to quit the trammels of the flefh, in order to efcape from the encumbering clay — " but to be clothed upon, that mortality might be szvallowed up of life" (2 Cor. v. 4.) Am I prepared for this prefence ? am I living under the power of this " blejfed hope?" Were I to be ufhered into the prefence of an earthly sovereign, how careful should I be in my pre- paration for so auguft a privilege ! What shall it be in the profpect of appearing before Him in comparifon with whom the loftieft monarch of earth is but as a paffing shadow — an atom of duft — the mote of a sunbeam! u Prefent with the Lord!" What an honour ! The brighteft of thofe bright and holy beings who bow before His throne with adoring reverence, know no higher! "It is not here," says the author of the "Saint's Reft," "that He hath prepared the prefence-chamber of His glory ; He hath drawn the curtain between us and Him ; we are THE GLORIOUS TRANSITION. 1 73 far from Him as creatures, and farther as frail mortals, and fartheft as sinners." Death is the robing-room, where the ragged pilgrim-garment is thrown off, and where, as glorified guefts, we shall receive our wedding attire. But the barrier shall in due time be taken down, and we shall be ufhered amid the uncurtained splendours of the "new heavens and the new earth." Then shall His own voice be heard announcing the believer's consummated blifs, and its mightieft element — "Enter thou into the joy of THY LORD." " The pains of death are paft, Labour and sorrow ceafe ; And life's long warfare clofed at laft, His soul is found in peace. " Soldier of Chrifl, well done ! Praife be thy new employ ; And while eternal ages run, Reft in thy Saviour's joy." XX. "Every voice is then harmonious, Praifing God in hymns symphonious, Love each heart with light enfolding, As they stand in peace beholding There the Triune-Deity!" Thomas a Kempis. "God . . all in all." — I Cor. xv. 28. [E may shift and alter the heavenly kaleidoscope, but God is still the centre of its ineffable blifs — " the glory of its glory.'' In union and communion with Him alone, will the longings of the immortal spirit be at length fully and for ever satisfied. Exiftence is one long-drawn sigh after some infinite good. The difciples of Plato, in their gropings in the dark, afpired after a myftic, un- defined Pleroma or " Fulnefs," the poffeffion of which was affociated with perfect happinefs. 176 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. This mythical dream of pagan philofophy has its reality in "the fulnefs of Him that filleth all in all." Here we have at beft only some feeble foretaftes of the " fulnefs of God" — some sips at the earthly fountain ; — what shall it be when we come to stand on the margin of the infinite ocean ! Afk the angels who are now peopling that world of blifs — or the myriads of ranfomed saints whofe probation is finifhed and their glorification begun, in what their supreme happi- nefs confifts. Their refponfe would be in words they had often before ufed, but whofe true mean- ing they had only learned in Glory — " It is good for us to draw 7iear ttnto GOD," (Ps. lxxiii. 28.) The beft earthly types of Heaven in Scripture were defignedly imperfeft. How often, for ex- ample, was the earthly Zion spoken of as the pattern and image of the Heavenly. But even in this "perfection of beauty" there were defe6ls and blemifhes. No river (save the tinieft of brooks) flowed paft its walls. No war-galley (as in other earthly capitals) was ever seen sailing by, or ship of commerce unlading its stores. "But," says God, in beautiful allufion to thefe THE ALL IN ALL. 1 77 wants in the earthly Zion, "I shall come in place of them in the Jerufalem above." " The glorious Lord will be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams, wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gallant ship pafs thereby" (Ifa. xxxiii. 21.) All other j oy s will be but reflections of the Great joy. We shall be independent of starlight bleffings when we have the central sun — of the rivulet when we have the ocean. Were the alternative prefented, rather would the ranks of the glorified have God without Heaven, than Heaven without God. There will be a devout confeioufnefs throughout all their wide circle of a sweet and holy dependence on Him. They will never forget the pilgrim prayer of earth — " Hold Thou me up, and I shall be safe," (Ps. cxix. 117.) They will feel, even with the crown on their head and the victor-song on their lips, that it is He alone who maketh them to dwell in safety, (Ps. iv. 8.) They will live upon no graces. Penfioners on earth, they will exult in the feeling that they are penfioners still. The confeflion of time will be the anthem M 178 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. of eternity — " By the grace of God we are what we are," (Rom. xv. 10.) We read of the saints that, glorified though they be, they still <( fall down before the throne," (Rev. iv. 10.) Their afcription, crowned though they be, is this, " Salvation to oar God who sit- teth upon the throne" (Rev. vii. 10.) The stream may sooner do without its fountain — the parched furrow without its refrefhing shower — the firma- ment without its sun — than they without Him who is the source and fountain-head of all life, and light, and joy. " God him/elf shall be with them and be their God, and they shall see His face" (Rev. xxi. 3.) The infinite centre of an infinite circumference, they shall love all in Him, and Him in all ! Not more surely on earth do the rivers run to the ocean, than in Heaven will every afpiration of the Church triumphant be turned Godward ; and it will be our happinefs thus supremely to love, — supremely to adore Him. Here, how often, how conftantly, has the Chriftian to watch over the objects of his love, left ever and anon he be betrayed into some sin- THE ALL IN ALL. 1 79 ful excefs of idolatrous attachment. There will be no such bound set in Heaven, becaufe no such need for it. What a glory it imparts to the soul of man, — what an ennobling confcioufnefs it gives of our true dignity, — future communion with % yea, future affimilation to, the great Jeho- vah ! — gravitating towards Him as an all-glo- rious centre; — the aim and objeft of an infinite exiflence, perfe£tly to pleafe Him ! Let me prepare for this lofty deftiny, by mak- ing God more than ever "the portion of mine inheritance;" having a more conftant and habi- tual aim that His will and glory be the regulators of my daily being. This was my Saviour's defire for Himfelf. It conftituted the happinefs of His spotlefs life, — doing His Father's will and not His own. "I do think," says Lady Powerscourt, "one chief part of our happinefs hereafter will confift in our having done with wretched self, — God being all in all." Oh! what a solemnifing in- fluence would it exert on all our thoughts and feelings, our duties and engagements, our purfuits and pleafures, our sleeping and waking, our airy I SO GRAPES OF ESHCOL. vifions and worldly plans, were we to think that soon — very soon — we shall be with God, and that forever and ever! " Bleffed fold ! no foe can enter, And no friend departeth thence : God Himfelf their Sun, their Centre, And their Shield Omnipotence. a Thought, reprefs thy weak endeavour, Here mufl Reafon proftrate fall ; Oh th' ineffable for ever, And th' eternal ALL in all !" XXL w™ 5 * " The storm's black wing is never spread athwart celeftial skies ; Its wailings blend not with the voice of spring, As some too tender flowret fades and dies. " With Hope our guide, White-robed and innocent, to tread the way, Why fear to plunge in Jordan's rolling tide, And find the haven of eternal day ?" " For I reckon, that the sufferings of this prefent time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." — Rom. viii. 18. [HUS does a mafter-hand strike the balance between prefent sufferings and future glory. "/ reckon" (I make the calculation, and the deliberate refult is), that the trials of earth are not to be named in con- trail or comparifon with the peerlefs joys of Heaven. The great Apoftle was one specially fitted to make such a calculation. He was abundantly 1 82 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. verfant himfelf in the school of suffering, and well able therefore to caft up the balance-sheet. Few pilgrims that ever trod the lower valley, were more honoured than he ; but few had greater weights to carry. He felt, however, that all thefe earthly weights added together and combined, were far outweighed by one other, and that was the " weight of glory r His language here is remarkable. He infti- tutes a comparison between prefent suffering and future blifs — two things which we may think cannot well be compared. May not the follow- ing have been a few points of antithesis which suggefted themfelves, as His mind made the san6lified reckoning ? All present sufferings have intervals of releafe. There are lulls in the storm. The fevered patient may have his snatches of repofe, fitful and unrefrefhing though they be. But in the glory that is to follow, there are no intervals, no lulls, no ebbings in the ever-advancing tide of happinefs and joy. hi the sufferings of this life there are many alle- viations. The bittereft cup is mingled with some SUFFERING AND GLORY. 1 83 sweet drops — the moft aching soul is seldom without some supporting solaces. But the glory which follows knows no modifications. The golden veffels there are indeed always filling — always increafmg, but they are always full. The "juft made perfeft," though ever aspiring after frefh draughts of the living fountain, will never be heard uttering the voice of complaint — " Oh, that it were with me as in months paft !" The glory is a progreffive glory — the joy a pro- greffive joy ;— their change is a change for the better, never for the worfe. The sufferings of the present \ in the cafe of the believer, much as they may cloud and darken his earthly and outward happinefs, cannot affect the unaffailable blifs of his inner life. But the heavenly glory will interpenetrate alike his outer and his inner being. He will be steeped in blifs. He will have around and on every side of him a glory which imagination has never ventured to conceive, — while his glorified spirit will reflect, without speck or stain, the image of an all-glorious God!* * See Rev. Robert Hall on this verfe. 1 84 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. " The sufferings of the present !" Go up to that bright and glorious multitude harping with their harps, and crowding the shores of the glaffy sea. Hear their one, united teftimony. It is, that but for their trials they would never have been there. Every page in their hiftory bears the signet-mark of " much tribulation." It is endorfed with the words, " So He brought them to their dejired haven!" "So!" It was by a way not of their own choofing. " So /" It was through winds, and waves, and buffeting ele- ments ; — the ship tacking about ;— " neither sun nor stars for many days appeared, and no small tempeft lay upon them." They love now to trace all the myftic windings in that untoward voyage ; the " deep calling to deep,"- — the wave refponding to wave. They love to think, " It was thus He brought me!" There was a time when I was prone to queftion His wifdom — to arraign His faithfulnefs ; but now, I could not have wanted one thorn, one bitter drop, one tear. As the contrary winds which carry high the migratory birds are found in reality to affift their flight : so with the soul ; when the winds SUFFERING AND GLORY. 185 are contrary — the storm beating fiercely, — it only leads it to soar higher and higher — upwards and heavenwards — further from earth — nearer its God ! Oh, if we only saw our trials, not through the mifty haze of this world, but in the light of eternity; the reckoning would not be this, how little they have been, but how precious they have been ! How all (yes, all) were needed to effe<5t the defired end, all were compofite parts of one way, and that way was love ! It is with the believer as with the diamond ; the more facets there are, the brighter it sparkles ; — so, the more the tools of sanctified affliction have been on him, the brighter and more glorioufly will he shine in heaven ! Let me seek, then, to look beyond thefe portals of sadnefs, and repofe on the glory that is to be revealed. Soon the curfew-bell of time w r ill toll, telling that the fires of affliction and trial are extinguished for ever, and that the weary and jaded citizens — the weary Church — may now retire to the reft which remaineth for the people of God ! " Live in Chrift," says Rutherford, " and you are in the suburbs of heaven. There is but 1 86 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. a thin wall between you and the land of praifes. Ye are within one hour's sailing of the shore of the new Canaan. ,, It is a mighty proceffion that is sweeping onwards to the Land of Promife. A sainted writer has beautifully compared it to the vaft hoft of Ifrael entering the earthly Canaan. Some had croffed Jordan ; their footfteps were treading the covenanted soil, the land of the patriarchs — others were paffing through the river- channel, the waters standing up to make a way "for the ranfomed to pafs over;" — others were patiently occupying their allotted place in the rear, until thofe that preceded them had traverfed the dry bed of the border river. But all were moving on ; and thofe furtheft behind knew that every tread of their footftep was bringing them nearer the moment when their defert trials and privations would be at an end, and their voices too would blend in the song of viftory. And so it is with the Church of God on earth. Some are already in heaven ; — the glorified, safe on the Canaan side. Some are at this moment croffing * SUFFERING AND GLORY. 1 87 the Jordan of death — the dark river separating the wildernefs from the heavenly land. Some are still in the pilgrim rear, amid the smoulder- ing fires and afhes of their encampment, cafting a longing glance towards thofe who have already begun their everlafting^fcription of praife. But the mighty mafs moves on ! The defert is re- treating and the heavenly shores are nearing. Thoufands on thoufands of the ranfomed Ifrael of God are already safe landed, — "clean efcaped," and their triumphant song should only infpire us with frefh ardour to follow their steps and share their crowns ! The true Jofhua-Jefus, the Heavenly Precurfor, is even now standing on the celeftial shore, and to every faint and toil-worn traveller proclaiming, " Thefe sufferings are not to be compared with the glory about to be re- vealed!" How the thought of that bleffed Heaven of eternal refpite and reft, should reconcile me to any trial the Lord may see meet to lay upon me here ! It was the profpe6l of future glory which led this heavenly reckoner to 1 88 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. make so little of his earthly trials. He called that a " light affliction" which he had borne for thirty years ! Let me often school myfelf in the devout arithmetic of the tried Apoftle — putting all my trials into one scale, and all the bleffings, from grace to glory, which my God beftows, into the other, and then dare I murmur ? Lord ! it is my prayer that my trial (my peculiar trial), be what it may, may be sanctified. It is a " muffled drum" in the march of life; but it is beating "Home, brothers! home!" Let every promife of Scripture seem as if a bright angel hung out from the skies a guiding signal, saying, " The darknefs will soon be paft, and the true light will shine !" " Yet a little while, and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry," and then, the reckonings of earthly trial will give way to the reckonings of unending blifs. The voice of the Beloved will thus be heard calling on His weeping Bride to dry every tear and prepare for a tearlefs home — u Lo, the winter is pajl } the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth. The time of the singing of birds is SUFFERING AND GLORY. 1 89 come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land. Arife, my love, my fair one, and come away /" (Song of Sol. ii. 12.) " Where'er my path On earth shall lead, I '11 keep a netting bough For Hope, the song-bird, and with cheerful step Hold on my pilgrimage, remembering where Flowers have no autumn-languor, Eden's gate No flaming sword, to guard the tree of life." XXII. 44 Open is the starry hall ; Hear ye ! 'tis the Bridegroom's call ! Holy virgins, one and all, Ready stand, For the heavenly feftival Is at hand! " Come at laft the nuptial day ; Tears for ever paff'd away — Fled the prifon-houfe — the clay, And the thrall ; Chrift for ever your sure stay, And your all!" " Bleffed are they that are called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb." — Rev. xix. 9. [NDER a new and beautiful symbol, we are called to behold Jefus as the Hea- venly Bridegroom, seated at His own marriage-feaft, summoning His glorified guefts around Him! — the true Solomon, " crowned in the day of His efpoufals, and the day of the 192 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. gladnefs of His heart !" (Song of Sol. Hi. 11.) " Alone," says a writer, " in the depths of eter- nity stood Chrift and His Church before the altar of that divine efpoufal ; none was witnefs but the Father and the Holy Spirit when the vow was plighted, and the contract sealed."* But all Heaven is now to be spectator of the gladfome confummation. The bridal-day is come ! He has "sent His angels with a great sound of a trumpet to gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other," and lo ! a multitude which no man can number, " all-glorious within, their clothing of wrought gold," are seen paffing through the gates of the city "with gladnefs and rejoicing," on their way to the King's palace ! The Eride for six thoufand weary years has been calling for her Lord to " Come /" The voice of the Be- loved has at laft been heard ; the King has " brought her into His banqueting-houfe, and His banner over her is love /" (Song of Sol. ii. 4.) In that scene of feftive joy, behold — (1.) Jefus glorified. * Butler. THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER. 193 " He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied!" Oh, what a moment of joy- will that be to the Church's Divine Head, when all His blood-bought people (not one of the sealed myriads wanting) shall be affembled with Him to share His blifs ; — " betrothed unto Him for ever ; " — " prefented a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing!" If "Wifdom" rejoiced in the mere antieipatioji of redemption, — if even then His " delights were with the sons of men " dwelling in " the ha- bitable parts of the earth," (Prov. viii. 31,) what will the rejoicing be, when the vaft undertaking is all completed, and the trophies of His grace are seated by His side ! What a new and more glorious meaning will be given to His words of interceffion on earth: u All thine are mute, and mine are thine, and I am glorified in them /" (John xvii. 10.) It is their glory and joy in which much of His own mediatorial happinefs will confift. As "the Mafter," He girds Him- self at the marriage-feaft, and " comes forth to serve them," (Luke xii. 37.) He has them in view in His every thought of Heaven: "I go N 194 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. to prepare a place for you> . . . that where / am, there j^ may be alfo " — " I shall drink no more of the fruit of the vine until / drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom," (John xiv. 2, 3 ; Matt. xxvi. 29.) (2.) Behold the Church glorified. "Called" to the Mafter's immediate prefence, not to eat of the crumbs falling from His table, but of the children's bread ; to see His face ; to participate in His triumph ; and with faith changed into sight, and hope into full fruition, to exclaim, "My Beloved is mine, and I am his!" (Song of Sol. ii. 16.) Seated at the supper-table ! What nearnefs and intimacy of fellowfhip is here indicated ! Even on earth, the believer's moft blissful hours are thofe spent in intimate communion with his Lord. How the pain and wearinefs of the sick- bed are alleviated — how the pang of the crufh- ing bereavement has been mitigated, by that Presence and Name which puts mufic and joy into the saddeft heart ! What will it be in glory, with no sin to mar our intercourfe, and no sor- row to dim our eye, — the confummated union THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER. 195 and communion of everlafting love ! Truly, the glorified guefts will be able to say to their hea- venly Lord, as was said in His hearing at a marriage-feaft on earth, "Thou haft kept the beft wine till now !" (John ii. 10.) On that coro- nation-day of the Church triumphant, angels will liften with amazement, as each ranfomed one tells the story of blended grace and faith- fulnefs ;— principalities and powers will stoop to hear the Church's perpetual Te Deum, the key- note of which will be, " the manifold wifdom of God!" (Eph. iii. 10.) It will not be with the difciples in heaven as with the difciples below. When they got a momentary glimpfe of their Lord's glory on Tabor, we read, "They feared as they entered the cloud," (Luke ix. 34.) Per- fect love will then caft out fear. It is no Stran- ger, — no inacceffible, awe-infpiring Being who is to gather them around Him. It will indeed be a day of Kingly efpoufals. On His head there will be " many crowns." The Bride will "enter the King's palace," (Ps. xlv. 15.) It will be a regal — a coronation anthem that will be sung by the lips of the hundred and forty- 196 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. four thoufand, " Alleluia, for the Lord God omni- potent REIGNETH," (Rev. xix. 6.) But it is alfo called the "marriage-supper of the Lamb;" — "that same Jefus" who in His perfon is so well known to us on earth, — whofe character and life are so beautifully and truthfully pourtrayed in what we may call His four infpired bio- graphies, that w T e seem to feel as if we knew Him — knew Him intimately; — had seen Him, — had sat with Him on Tiberias' shores, and talked with Him at Jacob's well, and wept with Him at the Bethany grave ! We en- joy to be with thofe who have been kind to us; who so kind as i( the MAN Chrijl Jefus!" what fellowfhip so blissful as with the all-glo- rious One, who hath loved us with a love, in comparifon with which the moft endearing earthly friendfhip is coldnefs itfelf! How joy- ous when He shall meet us at the threfhold of glory, and condu£l us to the coronation-hall, to receive our crowns, and to become guefts at His table ! (3.) Behold here a holy and happy meeting be- tween guefl and guefl. THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER. 197 The unfeemly eftrangements of the prefent will there be unknown for ever. Cold looks, and averted faces, and diftant and uncordial recog- nitions, will be all at an end. The guefts will only wonder they could have allowed petty differences to have sundered them so long and so strangely below. Like their beloved Lord, they will become like one another. Many a Chriftian on earth, we believe, is nearer in heart and love and sympathy to a brother Chriftian, than the conventional diftinftions — the Shib- boleth of se6l and party — will permit him to avow. In Heaven there will be no such referve. The slumbering harmonies of the heart will then break forth, without one jarring note. Let me delight often to carry my eye onward to the celebration of thefe efpoufals — to draw afide the world's scenes of painted glory, and to get a sight of "the invifible;" — the great Sabbath of eternity inaugurated by this nuptial feftival, where every redeemed Veffel, like the earthly types at Cana, are "filled to the brim ;" Jefus, who went forth from His eternal throne 198 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. as the weeping " Man of sorrows," now come again with rejoicing, to bring all His ranfomed sheaves with Him ! fPs. cxxvi. 6.) "Wilt thou not/' says Baxter, "be almoft ready to draw back, and say, ' What ! I, Lord ? I, the unworthy negle6ler of Thy grace, dis- efteemer of Thy blood, and slighter of Thy love, muft / have this glory ? I am utterly unworthy to be called a son.' But Love will have it so. Therefore thou muft enter into His joy." u The watchers on the mountain Proclaim the Bridegroom near ; Go, meet Him as He cometh, With hallelujahs clear. " The marriage-feaft is waiting, The gates wide open stand ; Up ! up ! ye heirs of glory, The Bridegroom is at hand." XXIII. "Bleffed day which haftens faft, End of conflict and of sin, Death itfelf shall die at laft, Fulnefs of all joy begin. Then eternity shall prove God is Light and God is Love!" " In thy prefence is fulnefs of joy ; at thy right hand there are pleafures for evermore." — Ps. xvi. n. jjULNESS of joy r Can that be said of anything on this side Heaven ? There is a reftlefs craving in the hu- man bofom for something better than this world can give. li Although its heart is rich in pearls and ores, The sea complains upon a thousand shores ; Sea-like, we moan for ever. We are weak — We ever hunger for diviner stores." There are aching voids — deep, yawning 200 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. chafms in the soul of man, which the world and all its tinfel pleafures can never fill. Hope is ever gilding the future with the profpe6t of that happinefs which the prefent denies. Lured and dazzled, the worldling purfues the phantom. But each succeffive failure more painfully convinces him that all here is a delufion, an ignis-fatuus gleam. Happinefs, the obje6t of his life-search, is as far from him as ever ! Thefe longings of the heart are only satisfied when it finds in God its "fulnefs of joy!' The old nature, like the old philofophy, will cleave to the world as the centre of its syftem. It holds its happinefs to confift in " minding earthly things." The new nature, like Copernicus, finds out "the secret hid from ages and generations." It dethrones a ufurping earth, and makes all its affections circle and conftellate around God Himfelf, the true "Sun of the soul." What will this be in that bleffed world of purity, where there will be no difturbing forces to in- terfere with the saint's spiritual orbit, or dim and darken the emanations from the great Source of light and life, happinefs and joy ! Happi- THE BRIMMING FOUNTAIN. 201 nefs even on earth is proportioned to the zvorlhi- ncfs of the object on which our hearts are fixed in connection with it. What muft be the happi- nefs of the glorified spirit which has its affections centred on Him who is unfearchable in His wifdom, boundlefs in His refources, unchanging in His love ! David said regarding earthly things — " I have seen an end of all perfection/' In Heaven the soul will have, in the enjoyment of God, the perfection of blifs. All the perfection of earth is finite; that is infinite. All earthly blifs has its bounds and limits; in Heaven and in God's prefence that blifs will be unbounded. Think of the happinefs of having no unfulfilled defire, nothing to be dreaded, nothing to be de- livered from ! To have the vifion and fruition of God to guarantee all, and stamp permanency and immutability on every joy. Infecurity is the attribute of all worldly joys. Ours to-day, they may be gone to-morrow. How the thought of the slender tie which binds to life muft haunt the idolater of earthly affeCtion! — that in the twinkling of an eye the cup of creature-love may be dafhed from his lips ; — his moft fondly 202 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. cherifhed fabric become a heap of humiliating ruins! Often in one's happieft moments we have (do as we like) the chilling prefentiments of com- ing trial — the feeling, A 11 this cannot laft. This gladsome mufic, — earth's high holiday, — may this night give place to the dirge of sorrow ! In Heaven, "our sun shall no more go down." No real or imagined evils will loom in a troubled future — the mufic of its eternal feftival will never be sufpended or hufhed by the intrufion of sadder notes. Here, one main source of the believer's joy is in the words, "no condemnation!" There, it will rather be, "no separation /" His sorrow will be turned into joy, and that joy no one will take from him. The wheat will be " gathered into the garner." So long as it is unharvefted — standing in the open field — it is expofed to furious winds and corroding rains. But the angel-reapers have made it secure. Thefe garnered sheaves of blifs are as safe as everlaft- ing love and faithfulnefs and power can make them! And while it is "fnlnefs of joy," (denoting its perfection) and " pleafures for evermore/' (denot- THE BRIMMING FOUNTAIN. 203 ing their security) let us not forget the nobler and grander attribute of that heavenly blifs — "Jn Thy prefencer Is it this which is drawing me to Heaven — the profpe6l of being admitted into union and communion with my God? Some are impatient to leave this world, becaufe they have been the victims of difappointed hope and croffed afifeftions. In a fit of morbid morofenefs, they hate life, and look to the grave as a refuge from its ills ! Am I confcious of nobler and loftier motives in my heavenward afpirations? Is it the thought of seeing GOD, enjoying God, loving GOD, which is drawing me there ? Other hallowed ties and motives I may have, beckon- ing me upwards. Voices huflied on earth may be stealing down, in tones of celeftial mufic, from the spirit-land;— "The Bride" (the bleffed dead, among whom my fondeft earthly memories linger) may be saying, " Comer But do I feel that even such a sacred incentive as this, is subordi- nate to the voice of the Bfidegroom? — that thefe are but star-light glories, compared to the meridian sun — " the glory that excelleth ?" Oh ! how wondrous the thought that God's pleafures 204 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. are to be my pleafures — that I am to be linked through eternity in congeniality of sentiment and enjoyment with effential goodnefs, effential greatnefs, effential love! I will joy in God, and the Lord my God will rejoice over me. He shall make me to "drink of the river of His pleafures !" (Ps. xxxvi. 8.) And soon — very soon — all this happinefs may be mine. A few more beats of the pulfe — a few more falling grains of the sandglafs, and I may be by that river's brink, wafhing off the duft and scars of battle, and bathing in the floods of ineffable joy! Meanwhile, let me seek to afpire after clofer and more intimate communion with God, so as to feel that no bleffmg on earth can be comparable to His favour, and no lofs equal to the forfeiture of His love. Let me often think of death as the moment which will admit me into the full poffeffion of this transcendent blifs ; and see the promifes of the gofpel, like so many lights hung out from the windows of my Father's houfe, beckoning me Home ! THE BRIMMING FOUNTAIN. " Onwards, upwards may I move, Wafted on the wings of love ; Looking, Lord, for Thee to come, Longing for my heavenly home ; There for ever to remain, Partner of Thine endlefs reign ; There Thy face unveil'd to see/ Find my Heaven of Heaven in Thee !" 20 < XXIV. u It seemed not as a dream, and yet I stood Befide heaven's gate. Its mighty valves were loofed ; And upward, from earth's tribulation, came A soul, whofe paflport, signed in Calvary's blood, Prevailed. Around the golden threfhold's verge I saw the dazzling of celeftial wings Trudging to welcome it. The towering form Of an archangel bore it company Up to God's throne!" " To-day shalt thou be with Me in paradife." — Luke xxiii. 43. m HEN shall I be admitted into this glo- rious Heaven — to pluck for myfelf the Grapes of Efhcol, and enjoy the sweets of the true Land of Promife ? Does the hour of death ufher me at once into the manfions of my heavenly Father ? or is there some intermediate state of purification, preparatory to being intro- duced into the prefence of the Lord ? Is the 208 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. difembodied spirit deftined meanwhile to remain in dream-land — a condition of unconfcioufnefs and torpor — till awoke by the trump of God, along with the rifen and glorified body, on the refurreclion morning? We have already seen, in a previous Medita- tion, that the Bible anfwer is explicit. We may return for a little, to ponder the same comforting theme. There is an H immediate entrance? The same moment in which I clofe my eyes on a world of sin and suffering, I open them in glory. Whenever I pafs through the swellings orjordan, my feet shall touch the shores of "the better country ;" — that day I am "with Jefus in para- dife!" St Paul's verdi£t, as we previoufly noted, is conclufive : "Having a dejire to depart and to BE WITH CHRIST," (Phil. i. 23.) Can we suppofe he would have expreffed this longing defire to leave his w r ork — to abandon his apoftlefhip — to forego the delight of winning souls to Jefus — if his spirit, in leaving this earth, was to slumber in a state of inaction and unconfcioufnefs till the day of God ? We can conceive of no other IMMEDIATE ENTRANCE, 209 poffible confideration but the thought of being ufhered into the immediate prefence of his Lord, that could make it to him a "gain to die." Nothing BUT this inftantaneous beatific vifion and fruition could have led him to add the strong affertion, " which is far better" (Phil. i. 23.) Again, how does he speak of the difiblution of the earthly tent (" tabernacle ") ? He seldom speaks more confidently. His words are ex- preffed in the authoritative and confident for- mula of a creed, " We KNOW that if this honfe of onr earthly tabernacle is diffolved y we HAVE a building of God" (2 Cor. v. I.) The pin is taken out — the cord is slipped — the tent is down ! But " immediately " a nobler and more imperifh- able structure rifes — " an hotife not made with hands, eternal in the heavens /" Why would he urge, in another place, — as an incentive to believers to run the Chriftian race, — that they are gazed upon by a cloud of sainted witneffes, (Heb. xii.,) (mentioned in the previous context,) if "the spirits of the juft" remain in a state of unconfcioufnefs till the final refurrec- tion ? 210 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. Can we suppofe that Stephen, as he gazed upwards from his martyr-pillow on " the general affembly and church of the firR-born," uttered an unanswered prayer, when he said, "Lord Jefus, receive my spirit" ? (Acts viii. 59.) Nay, rather, when he saw his Lord " standi7ig at the right hand of God," can we think the beauti- ful comment of Chryfoflom an unnatural one, that the Saviour rofe and stooped from His throne, to receive with outftretched arms the spirit of the firft of that " noble army of martyrs," who were afterwards to " praife Him?" Our bleffed Lord's own teaching is all con- firmatory of the same view. It was no mere accidental drapery, surely, in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, but an effential part of the truth it was intended to convey, when the angels are reprefented as carrying the spirit of the beggar into Abraham's bofom ; and His words here to the dying thief are themfelves (independent of all other proof) sufficient to set at reft this comforting affurance, that the gate of death and the gate of glory are one ! Vijion adds its atteftation to parable — for the IMMEDIATE ENTRANCE. 2 1 1 ranfomed multitude are reprefented now in glory, " standing before the throne" with "palms in their hands," (Rev. vii. 9.) Thrice bleffed thought ! The uncaged spirit will all at once fly upwards to neftle in the golden eaves of Heaven ! The saint, when he enters glory, can say, in the words of one of earth's infpired songs regarding the death-bed he has juft left, " / laid me down and slept — / awaked, for the Lord suflained me !" (Ps. iii. 5.) " This is none other than the hoiife of God, this is the gate of heaven /" (Gen. xxviii. 17.) "Faithful souls," says Richard Baxter, " no sooner leave their pinions of flefh, but angels will be their convoy, Chrift, with all the perfe6led spirits of the juft, will be their companions, heaven will be their refidence, and God their happinefs." No wonder that St Paul with such a bleffed certainty could say, " We are CONFIDENT and WILLING rather to be abfent from the body and PRESENT WITH THE Lord," (2 Cor. v. 8.) It is true, indeed, that though "the souls of believers are at death made perfect in holinefs, and do immediately pafs into glory," their ftdl 212 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. and perfe£l glorification does not then take place. The great coronation-day of the Church trium- phant muft come, before the saint (" complete in Chrift ") be inverted with all his purchafed privileges. The body till then, slumbers in weaknefs and difhonour. Its reunion with the spirit muft take place, — the grave muft be rifled of its treafures, — ere the Divine Vi£tor have reaped in all His trophies, and the believer receive full inveftiture of his rights. A writer beautifully speaks of the " bleffed dead," as " a silent and veiled company, like the gathering worfhippers of earth refting side by side till the bells ceafe, and vacant places fill, and all begin to sing one anthem." But be their prefent intermediate con- dition (shall we call it) what it may, they are with Chrift — that is enough. " With me /" Safe in the prefence of their ador- able Redeemer. The needle at laft fixed true to its pole — all the old earthly vibrations and ofcillations at an end ; — the ship, with all its toffings over, has reached its port, caft anchor in " the Rock " within the veil ! The sun-flower drooped only for a moment in the evening of IMMEDIATE ENTRANCE. 2 1 3 life, as the death-shades fell over it. But the morning of glory dawns ; — The Sun of Right- eoufnefs shines; and in His " unfetting beams " the leaves expand again, in unfading and undy- ing glory. " With ME !" Chrift in our nature, our Friend, our Brother ! We are happy on earth in the prefence of thofe who have befriended us, and given us proofs of kindnefs and affedtion. Who has ever been friend or brother to us like Jefus ? Eternity is a solemn word. Death ufhers into an untravelled country. The soul mounts in its arrowy flight into a region which " eye hath not seen, nor ear heard." BUT Chrift is there ; and that affurance inverts it with a home-like afpeft. I need not fear the fords of Jordan, when there is a well-known voice heard on the farther shores, — "Fear not! It is I ! Be not afraid /" (Matt. xiv. 27.) Let me look forward, then, with bounding heart, to the hour of death, as the hour of my entrance on endlefs blifs, the birthday of eter- nity. Oh, if there was "joy in heaven among the angels of God " at the hour of converfion, what will it be at the hour of glorification! If 214 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. God the Father even on earth has joy in seeing His returning prodigal ; what will it be when He welcomes him to his everlafting home! "He will rejoice over him with joy ; He will reft in His love ; He will rejoice over him with singing" (Zeph. iil 17.) The Redeemer utters His inter- ceffory prayer over the death-bed on earth — "Father, I will that this one whom tJion hast given me be with me where I am, to behold my glory!' The prayer is heard ; — the angels are sent down ; — and, swift as the volleyed light- ning leaps from the cloud, THAT HOUR, and for ever t lie is "with Jefns in paradife /" XXV. u When this aching heart shall reft, All its bufy pulfes o'er, From her mortal robes undrefl, Shall my spirit upward soar ; Then shall ever-growing joy All my thoughts and powers employ, "Jefus reigns— the life, the sun, Of that wondrous world above ; All the clouds and storms are gone — All is light, and all is love. All the shadows melt away In the blaze of glorious day." Lange. " The path of the juft is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." — Prov. iv. 1 8. mi S the Believer's path on earth is, or ought to be, a progreffive one, in knowledge, love, happinefs, and joy ; so, in a loftier and more ennobling senfe, will it be in a future world. The sun of his blifs will ever be climb- 2l6 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. ing higher and higher the firmament, but yet never attaining its full meridian. Heaven, in- deed, as we have seen in a former Meditation, would be wanting in one chief element of happi- nefs were advancement unknown. The glorified spirit, conftituted as our feelings at prefent are, would not be satisfied with a stationary blifs. "Perfect security from all danger of a change for the worfe, is a highly gratifying idea ; but the ex- pectation of a change for the better, is an effential ingredient in all our prefent notions of happi- nefs."* The Redeemed in heaven — "veffels of glory " " fitted for the Matter's ufe "—while they will be always filled, yet, if it seem not a para- dox, they will be always filling ; — ever increafing in the divine knowledge and likenefs, progreffing along the line of infinite bleffednefs flowing from God's prefence and smile. It is the privilege of the believer, even in this world, to be ever afpiring after a more intimate acquaintance with the Divine character, works, and ways. David y notwithftanding all that he had seen of Jehovah, says, " My soul THIRSTETH * Whately. FROM GLORY TO GLORY. 2\J FOR God," (Ps. xlii. 2.) Paul, notwithftanding his exalted attainments, prays, " That I MAY KNOW HlM," (Phil. iii. 10.) The whole Chriftian difpenfation, from the earlieft times till now, has been progrcffive in its character. Thofe living anterior to the flood had but dim perceptions of the glorious things which our eyes have seen, and our ears have heard. Redemption was more fully unfolded to the patriarchs — more fully still to the prophets — and " in thefe laft days," in which He has "spoken unto us by His Son," more fully than all. This gradual development will still chara6lerise "the ages to come" — each cycle of thefe ages evolving some new mani- feftation of the Divine character and attributes. As the saints advanced on earth from grace to grace ; — so now it will be afcending from " glory to glory," — each new paufe on the steeps of the everlafting hills only unfolding new and more amazing difcoveries of God's grace and love. Nor shall we ever reach that point where our knowledge of the Infinite will be complete — where we shall be able to fold the wing in its upward soaring. An old Englifh writer beauti- 218 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. fully compares the believer's knowledge of God in a future world, to the two well-known mathe- matical lines, which, though approaching nearer and nearer to one another, never meet. So the ranfomed spirit, borne upwards nearer and nearer the great Sun of all knowledge, will never reach the confines of that light which is spoken of as " inacceffible, and full of glory." Every new height reached in the infinite pro- grefs of the soul, while it will give more infight into the myfteries of God's dealings, will only infpire with greater longings to know more of His ineffable glories. The song of the re- deemed is reprefented as waxing louder and louder, the more that the mingled wifdom, and faithfulnefs, and love of the Almighty is un- folded. "The voice of a great multitude" in- creafes to the "noife of many waters ;" — deeper still, to "the voice of mighty thunderings," (Rev. xix. 6.) Here we are but children-dreamers. Our path lies through mifty shadows and murky clouds ; — our sun, either smiting with its beams, or wading through a stormy sky, or "going down while it is yet day." Here, the believer FROM GLORY TO GLORV. 219 walks in darknefs and can see no light ; or when he has light for a time, it is often fitful and tranfient ; like the luminous wake of a ves- sel on a midnight sea, which gilds, only for a moment, the waves over which it bounds, and then leaves them as dark as ever. But once acrofs the threfhold of glory, the "darknefs is part, and the true light shineth." His, then, is an "unfmiting and unfetting sun." "The sun shall not smite thee" says one, (Ps. cxxi. 6.) " Thy sun shall no more go down? says another, (Isa. lx. 20.) It is called " the inheritance of the saints IN LIGHT," (Col. i. 12.) Have I begun this path of heavenly love and knowledge now? Am I progreffmg in it ? Do I feel some dawnings of the heavenly light, — earnefts and antepafts of the full day of glory ? Let all God's dealings serve to quicken me in my way. Let every affliftion it may pleafe Him to send, be as the moving pillar-cloud of old, beckoning me to move my tent onwards — say- ing, "Arife ye, and depart, for this is not your refi" (Mic. ii. 10.) Let me be often standing now on faith's lofty eminences, looking for "the 220 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. day of God" — the rifing sun which is to set no more in weeping clouds. Wondrous progreffion ! How will all earth's learning, — its boafted acquirements and eagle- eyed philofophy, — sink into the lifpings of very infancy in comparifon with this manhood of knowledge ! Heaven will be the true "Exceljior" Its song, "a song of degrees ;" — Jefus leading His people from height to height of glory, and say- ing, as He said to Nathanael, " Thou shalt see GREATER things than thefe /" (John i. 50.) And — moft elevating thought of all ! — I shall be advancing gradually in refemblance to my Divine Lord and Mafter! And yet the further I advance, with more fervent lip and devout ardour shall I sing, — " Nearer , my God, to Thee! Nearer to Thee ! Still all my song shall be, Nearer, my God, to Thee ! Nearer to Thee!" XXVI. " They stand, thofe walls of Zion, Conjubilant with song ; And bright with many an angel, And many a martyr throng. " The Prince is ever near them ; The light is aye serene ; The paftures of the bleffed Are deck'd in glorious sheen. " And they, beneath their Leader, Who conquer'd in the fight, For ever, and for ever, Are clad in robes of light." Bernard ofCluny {\2th Century.) "They that be wife shall shine as the brightnefs of the firmament, and they that turn many to righteonfnefs as the stars for ever and ever." — Dan. xii. 3. [ERE is another Grape from the Efhcol 8 clufters — another glimpfe of coming glory. Though suggeftive of truths on which we have already dwelt, thefe may well 222 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. bear repetition, prefenting us, under a different afpe£t, with frefh motives and encouragements for purfuing with ardour our heavenly way. We are here reminded that there will be diffe- rent gradations of blifs in a coming Heaven. The "wife" are to have one reward ; "they that turn many to righteoitfnefs" will have a higher and greater. This syftem of gradation obtains throughout all the other diverfe works of the Creator, and it may in this refpect be taken as a shadow of heavenly things. In the material world, we afcend from the grain of duft and invifible atom, by giant strides, to satellites, planets, suns. In our own globe, we have the pleafing diverfity and undulation of surface, from the little tumuli on the bofom of the plain, to the stupendous Alp and Andes. In the vegetable kingdom, we have a graduating scale, from the tiny mofs and lichen and blade of grafs, through the afcending series of plants and shrubs to the monarch oak and cedar. In the animal kingdom, we afcend from the animalcule and mollufc to the lordly THE HEAVENLY FIRMAMENT. 223 lion. A still higher step brings us to the region of human intelledl and intelligence ; while this, again, in its diverfities of ranks, affords frefh evi- dence of the law of which Ave speak. It will be the same in glory. There will be varying eminences in the Heavenly landfcape — diversified grades in the Heavenly family. It will have its " thrones and dominions," its "principalities and powers" — the " firjl" and the " leafi in the kingdom." God, in a striking paffage in the prophecies of Ifaiah, reprefents " the fir, the pine-tree, and the box together" as " beautifying the place of His sanctuary," (Isa. lx. 13.) It is a picture of the heavenly courts — the celeftial gardens. An affemblage of diverfe trees, each perfe6l in their kind, from the lowly box to the stately pine. But they are " together" — in the same place ; — a glorious group, — each branch and each leaf combining to " beautify " the holy place ; — glori- fying the "houfe of His glory!" (Isa. lx. 7.) The verfe further tells us, that all %7t Heaven will be happy. 224 GRAFES OF ESHCOL. The " wise" — that is, they who have sought on earth the true "wifdom which cometh from above" — they who have repofed with undivided and unwavering truft in Chrift, the " Wifdom of God;" — who have been diligent in the cultivation of perfonal piety, — they shall shine " as the bright- nefs of the firmament? They may have been little known on earth ; their graces may have shone dimly and in obfcurity ; their faith may have even been comparatively weak, and their love languid and fitful ; — yet, being " the children of the kingdom," they will be inverted with a happinefs beyond the power of heart to conceive, or tongue to tell. Let each afk, "Am I among the number of thefe 'wife' ?" Let me see to it that mine is not the mere lamp of profeffion, deftitute of the oil of grace, leaving me at laft among the foolifh " dreamers " and loiterers upon whom " the door is shut ! " Let me make religion a matter of earneft, downright, perfonal concernment. Let me prove in my happy experience even now, that wifdom's ways are " ways of pleafantnefs" and wifdom's paths "paths of peace? So that at THE HEAVENLY FIRMAMENT. 225 laft, in the day when He " maketh up His jewels/' I may be " a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of my God!" (Isa. ii. 3.) This verfe further reminds us, that there will be pre-eminent rewards and bleffednefs in store for tliofe who have been energetic in the canfe and service of God on earth, I mufb seek to be "wise" firft, — to have my own soul deeply imbued with Divine things, — to have a perfonal and saving intereft in the great salvation. But if I be afpiring after Heaven's loftieft recompenfe, I muft "add" to my faith " fortitude," and the other exalted graces of the Chriftian character, (2 Pet. i. 5.) The privilege of shining as the fixed stars " for ever and ever," is referved for " thofe who tarn many unto righteotfnefs." There is a Chriftianity — a true and sincere life of faith — which, though we cannot call it selfifh, is more negative, and lefs influential and expanfive, than it ought to be. Like the quiet lake into which a stone has fallen, the centre of 226 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. the heart has been touched by a san6tified power ; but we see at beft only dim indications of the widening circles of beneficence and charity, self-denying love and holy deed. The nobler phafe which true religion affumes, is that which manifefts a diffufive influence : when the believer becomes an " epiftle of Chrift, known and read of all men;" — a living tree, not only deeply rooted in faith and love, but waving with the fruits of holy living and holy a6ling, — love towards God expanding into a sanctified love towards all mankind. Following the footfleps of the Great Exemplar, he delights in doing good, and in attracting sinners to that glorious righteoufnefs which is "unto all, and upon all them that believe," (Rom. iii. 22.) While the faithful ambaffador of Chrift, the honoured and self-denying miffionary, are thofe who are pre-eminently referred to in this ennob- ling promife, it dare not be limited or reftri6led to thefe. Thofe in humbler and lefs prominent spheres in the Church and the world, have an equal warrant to appropriate it. It is a bold and beautiful figure, intended to exprefs the re- THE HEAVENLY FIRMAMENT. 227 compenfe in store for earneft individual effort — whether by station, money, influence, or char- after — in the caufe of God. The pious parent, the faithful teacher, the diftri<5l visitor, the de- vout philanthropift, the generous giver for the sake of Chrift ; and, more than all, thofe who exhibit the hallowed power of a devout, un- selfifh, Chrift-like demeanour, the every-day and perpetual leffon of a holy walk and a holy life ; — thefe are hereafter to shine as the brighteft conftellations in the celeftial firma- ment. There are many stars invifible to us, which are exerting an important influence among the heavenly bodies. So there are many lowly believers whofe influence now is unknown — invifible — secret, — who are yet tell- ing upon others, often moft powerfully, when leaft conscious of it themfelves. The calm elo- quence of a Chriftian's life and a Chriftian's death has impreffed and convinced, when the moft laboured pulpit oratory has been of no avail. Remember the Bible pi6lure of the judg- ment-day. " What ! I saw Thee an hungered, or naked, or thirsty ! — I, who occupied no promi- 228 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. nent part in Thy Church on earth ! — I, a lowly believer who lived and died in obfcurity!" It is enough ! " Ye did it to the leaft of thefe my brethren" and in doing so, "ye did it unto Me!" (Matt. xxv. 40.) Be it mine to afpire after higher and higher manifeftations of Chriftian excellence. Let me take the lofty motto of the apoftle : "Not as though I had afready attained;" — "always abound- ing in the work of the Lord" (Phil. hi. 12; 1 Cor. xv. 58.) The more of praftical holinefs now, the more of tranfcendent bleffednefs hereafter. The original one pound depofit may, by diligent trad- ing, gain me ten pounds, (Luke xix. 18.) As " the sleep of the labouring man " is said to be " sweet," so, sweeter will be the reft of glory to thofe who have toiled bravely, and worked ear- neftly. Not one trifling seed of all I sow can be loft. It will spring up at laft, and yield an hundredfold of recompenfe, to the praife, and honour, and glory of God. Is there nothing I can do in the way of turn- ing some of my fellow-sinners to righteoufnefs ? THE HEAVENLY FIRMAMENT. 229 What a tranfcendent honour to hear through eternity from the lips of some glorified saint, " You were the means of leading me firft to think of my soul ! You were the firft to unfold to me the beauty and glory of the Saviour's chara6ter, and His infinite adaptation to all the wants and neceffities of my tried and suffering and tempted nature !" How bleffed the thought, that as "jewels" set in Immanuel's crown, we shall, (like the gems of earth when placed in the same diadem) enhance by mutual reflec- tion each other's brightnefs, — all redounding to the glory of Jefus, at whofe feet each gem and each crown w T ill be caft. Reader! let not the poor engroffments of earth out-peer and eclipfe the brightnefs of this glorious heritage. Seek to be able to say, with one who had heaven ever in his eye, (i We look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are NOT seen!" (2 Cor. iv. 18.) He seems to say, So glorious and out-dazzling are the profpe6ls of coming glory, that they are like the sun extinguifhing the taper. The things of 23O GRAPES OF ESHCOL. earth are not worth looking at, — they pale into nothing, when brought side by side with the grandeur of the future. Hear your Lord's voice saying, " Occupy till I come" (Luke xix. 13.) Make the moft of fleet- ing opportunities. The night of earth is "far spent," the day of eternity is clofe "at hand." Forget not, it is now or never. In moft other earthly things, there are new chances, — new experiments; in familiar language, "we can try again." But, once acrofs yonder boundary of time, and an irrevocable seal is stamped on the tranfaftions of the paft. The star takes its immutable place in the spiritual firmament: " Where the tree falleth there it shall be." XXVII. ^L\)t S!iictor'0 S>ong;. " Who are thefe in bright array, This innumerable throng Round the altar night and day, Tuning their triumphant song ? " Thefe through fiery trials trod, Thefe from great affliction came ; Now, before the throne of God, Seal'd with His eternal name. " Clad in raiment pure and white, Victor-palms in every hand, Through their great Redeemer's might More than conquerors they stand. " Hufh'd all sadnefs and all sighs, Perfect love difpels their fears, And for ever from their eyes God has wiped away their tears." " And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne, and the beafls, and the elders : and the number of them was ten thoufand times ten thoufand, and thoufands of thoufands ; saying with a 232 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to re- ceive power, and riches, and wifdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and bleffmg." — Rev. v. ii, 12. f ERE is the Song of Heaven ! It is sung by a mighty chorus, — concentric ranks of redeemed and unredeemed, — angels, archangels, cherubim, seraphim. The seer of Patmos gets only a diflant glimpfe of the vaft multitude, — he sees a few twinkling lights, as it were, in the suburbs of the eternal city. But the voice borne to his ear is "as the noife of many waters J" It is one section of that myriad throng on which the eye is moll: intently fixed — " THE ELDERS ;" — i.e., the ranfomed from the earth. How diverfe and varied their antecedent hiftories ! Some are there, who had died in in- fancy. Some, who on earth had grown gray in the service of their heavenly Mailer. Some, who had been arrayed in worldly greatnefs, but who were yet "clothed with humility " — into whofe lap had been poured the full cup of profperity, but whofe lives had been confecrated as a per- petual thank-offering of praife to the Giver, THE VICTOR'S SONG. 233 Others again, whofe only earthly heritage was the beggar's hovel, — whofe path had been strewn with thorns, and their eyes dimmed with tears, — yet who had borne all with unmurmuring submiffion. Some, who were champions of the faith — their names in all the churches. Others, " the Lord's hidden ones," — their deeds of faith, and love, and charity, unknown to all save to Him who seeth in secret. (1.) This Vifeon speaks of the UNITY pervading the vajl multitude. All unite in one song, " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain f" No one worfhipper will look with supercilious eye on another. The angels great in might, — the cherubim burning with devotion, — the seraphim soaring in intellectual power, — will be bound to the lowlieft saint in heaven by the one cementing principle of love! Thefe " redeemed from the earth " may have lived in diverfe periods of the world, different epochs of the Church ; — they may have dwelt in different climes, — they may have lifped the name of Jefus in different tongues, — they may 234 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. have belonged to varied denominations, — wear- ing on earth different livery, and though looking to one Shepherd, may have clung to separate sheepfolds. Now, they are drawn into holy unity by the sweet attraction of the same crofs. Hav- ing no longer any separate interefts, each mem- ber of the glorified throng is a£tively employed in promoting the interefts and happinefs of his fellows. " Whether there be tongues, they shall ceafe," (i Cor. xiii. 8.) Language is now a greater barrier between church and church, than are mountains and rivers, continents and oceans ; but thefe different dialects of earth shall then be merged into the one sublime language of eternity. Well may the gifted author of the " Saint's Reft" say, "What a bleffed society will the family of heaven be, and thofe peaceful inhabi- tants of the new Jerufalem, where there is no divifion, nor differing judgments, nor difaffec- tion, nor strangenefs ; no deceitful friendfhip — no, not one unkind expreffion, nor an angry look or thought ; but all are one in Chrift, who is one with the Father, and all live in the love of Him who is love itfelf." THE VICTOR'S SONG. 235 (2.) The sublime vifion of John seems further to indicate, that the Church triumphant will then be complete. Not one heir of glory will be miffing, — not one stone of the stupendous temple want- ing, — not one sheaf of the glorious harveft loft. The number is " ten thou/and times ten tlwufand, and thoufands of thoufands !" That was an hour of deep intereft in the paft, when the spirit of Abel entered Heaven, and stooped solitary and alone before the throne of God. He sung his song alone ; he was the sole reprefentative of the redeemed Church, — the firft sheaf in the future teeming harveft of ranfomed immortals ! But now the Great Husbandman gathers the wheat into His garners, and, lo ! it is " a multitude which no man can number!" (Rev. vii. 9.) How gladdening to think that vafh con- vocation is every day, every year increafing. When John was on earth it was a feeble band. He said, " We are of God and the whole zuorld lieth in wickednefs!" (1 John v. 19.) The Church then was like a spark in chaos — a tiny ark toffed on a great flood of evil ; but ere long, the number of His elect will be " as the sand on 236 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. the sea-shore." " The children of God " now " scattered abroad " will be brought in ; — " the whole building, fitly framed together," will stand complete and glorious — a " holy temple in the Lord," (Eph. ii. 21.) But (3.) the "top-stone" will be brought forth "with shoutings," and the cry will be "Grace, grace unto it? (Zech. iv. 7.) The song of this great multitude is an afcription of praife to a Redeeming God — "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain /" Yes ! this will be the sweet bond of union — " all one in Chrijl Jefus." The hallelujah chorus of eternity will be the glorifying of His ador- able Perfon and Name ! How painful on earth it is to a generous heart, to see a kind and de- voted friend unjuftly calumniated and scorned. The believer is in this world conftantly com- pelled to see his adorable Redeemer defpifed, rejected, slighted, blafphemed. Then, he will behold Him, honoured, lauded, " crowned Lord of all !" J ef its glorified! — we shall be " eye-wit- neffes of His majefty." If, even here, we delight THE VICTOR'S SONG. 237 to see honour conferred on thofe we love, — how shall we exult in joining our feeble afcriptions with thofe of the great multitude, in celebrating the glory of Him w T hofe love will there shine forth in all its peerlefs and tranfcendent magni- tude ! "The Lamb" — "the Lamb that zvas slain!' It seems, at firft, a strange name and a strange theme, in a place where suffering is unknown and where pain never enters ! But it signifi- cantly tells, that the work of Chrift is to be the theme of eternity ; that it is the heights of Re- deeming Love the saints are to be engaged in scaling ; — the depths of grace they are to be engaged in fathoming. They will ever have the wondrous truth recalled, " But for that dying, bleeding Lamb, w T e muft have been eternally loft; — but for that wondrous grace of His, ours muft now, and for ever, have been a portion in the reftlefs surges of that fiery burning lake ! " Doubtlefs," says Baxter, " this will be our everlafting admiration, that so rich a crown should fit the head of so vile a sinner. . . . Let DESER FED be written on the door of 238 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. Hell ; but on the door of Heaven and life, The Free Gift!' Reader! prepare for this lofty society, — the jprefence of angels — the prefence of Jefus. Oh surpaffing honour ! the profpe6l of being linked through everlafting ages with every glorious Being in the univerfe, — a brotherhood with sera- phim, ■ cherubim, saints, martyrs ;— yea, union and communion with God Himfelf ! If there be "joy in heaven among the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth;" what will be that lofty burft of jubilee refounding from a ransomed Church, when all its mem- bers shall be gathered in ; and when the crowns of " ten thoufand times ten thoufand, and thou- sands of thoufands," shall be caft at the feet of " Him who sitteth upon the throne " and " the Lamb, for ever and ever!" XXVIII. " Sweetefl strains from soft harps stealing ; Trumpets, notes of triumph pealing ; Radiant wings and white stoles gleaming. Up the steps of glory streaming ; Where the heavenly bells are ringing. Holy, holy, holy ! singing To the mighty Trinity ! Holy, holy, holy ! crying ; For all earthly care and sighing In that city ceafe to be." Thomas a Kempis, 1380. a Clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands." — Rev. vii. 9. |HAT a tranfition ! from earth to heaven, — from the mortal to the immortal, — from partial sanftification to complete and everlafting purity. The beggar " lifted from the dunghill," " set among princes," and caufed to inherit "a throne of glory !" (1 Sam. ii. 8.) " Clothed with white robes, and palms in their /lands. 91 It is a figurative reprefentation of glo- 240 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. rified saints, as " priejls and kings unto God." The " white robe " is the sacerdotal emblem — the " palm " is the kingly. They are to have cenfers as well as crowns. They are to be em- ployed as confecrated Levites in the Heavenly Temple, as well as to reign inverted with regal dignity. As in all the Bible pictures of Heaven, so, here, there is a beautiful union of a<5tive service with royal honour. " His servants shall SERVE him" — "They shall reign for ever and ever," (Rev. xxii. 3, 5.) The expreffion, " standing before the throne," denotes boldnefs, confidence, acceptance. They are " accepted in the Beloved." They could have no other boldnefs but in Jefus. Their robes derive all their whitenefs, their palms all their greennefs, from Him, before whom every palm is waved, and at whofe feet every crown is caft. They sung by anticipation in their mili- tant state, and they may love to repeat it still as "a song of remembrance" — " Bold shall I stand at that great day ; For who aught to my charge shall lay ? While by Thy blood abfolved I am, From sin's tremendous guilt and shame ! 5> THE VICTOR'S DRESS. 241 Have / this boldnefs and confidence now? Am I now clothed in the imputed righteoufnefs of Immanuel ? And do I look forward to the time when I shall stand arrayed alfo in the stainlefs robe of/^/2?//tf/holinefs — that " raiment clean and white, which is the righteoufnefs of the saints ;/V (Rev. xix. 8.) Do I love to think of Heaven as a place of a6live employment ; where, as a member of the glorified priefthood> I shall mini- ster at God's altar, and be emulous with zeal for His honour and glory ? Jefus comes down now to earth to " sup " with me, (Rev. iii.) Then I shall sit down at His everlafting banquet, and hold uninterrupted fellowfhip with Him. " THEY shall walk with ME in white, for they are worthy" (Rev. iii. 4.) But I shall be a KING too. I shall stand with a palm-branch in my hand! The weapons "of earthly toil and warfare will then be laid afide ; the emblems of triumph and vi6lory take their place. The Roman conqueror afcending to the Capitol of old, with the laurel on his brow, and the palm waving above his head, was a feeble type of the sinner saved by grace, paffing 242 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. through the triumphal arch of glory, to receive " the crown of life " which his Lord has pro- mised ! " The kings of the earth" we read, " do bring their glory and honour unto it" (Rev. xxi. 24), — that is to say, all the pomp and splen- dour of earthly sovereignty is taken to typify and image forth the transcendent greatnefs of Heaven. We may well paufe and wonder at thefe royal honours in referve for us ! " KINGS unto God!" All the splendours of sovereignty, without its haraffments and burdens ! No thorn in the crown ; no "sufpended sword" from the "fretted ceil- ing," dimming the sparkling jewels with its shadow ; and painfully reminding that the crown is " corruptible," often " defiled," always fading!" In Rev. iv. 4 we read, that