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I. A DESCRIPTION OF HEAVEN.

1. A house, not a tent, put up today, and taken down to morrow; but the home we come to at the end of all our travels; fitted up for rest, security and enjoyment.

2. God's own house. Not merely the place where His people are to dwell, but the place where He Himself dwells, and enjoys His unutterable happiness and rest. It is not simply, "the kingdom" — it is "the palace of the great King." What, therefore, we may ask, may we not expect in heaven? We do not go there as strangers or foreigners; we go to the richest house in the universe as the children of the owner of it. The very best things it can afford will be ours. The astonished prodigal had the best provisions, and the best robe, brought forth for him, when he got home.

3. A house with "many mansions" in it, large, spacious, having many rooms, fitted up for the reception of many guests.

II. AN ASSURANCE OF ITS TRUTH.

1. Here is greatness. He speaks of heaven as none other: like One who had been familiar with it.

2. Here, too, is His love; "If it were not so, He would have told them." They had left all to follow Him, with some earthly expectations, perhaps, but yet chiefly in the expectation of a future recompense.

III. THE END OF OUR LORD'S DEPARTURE TO THE HEAVEN HE HAS BEEN DESCRIBING. And here is love again. Had we been asked what He was going to heaven for, we should have said — To get away from this evil world; to enter into His joy, etc. But He says, No; "I go there to prepare a place for you." He left His Father's house for us; He now returns to it for us. By this we must understand, not His creating heaven for us, or enlarging or adorning it, but removing out of the way all things which would prevent our entering into it. He goes there to prove our title to it; to show, in His wounded hands and pierced side, that He has paid for us its stipulated price. He goes to claim it on our behalf; to take possession of it in our name and stead. Hence He is said to have entered it as our Forerunner.

IV. THE WAY IN WHICH CHRIST WILL PUT US IN POSSESSION OF THE HEAVEN HE HAS PREPARED FOR US. "He will send death to us," you may say, "to summon us to His kingdom." No: "I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there ye may be also." It does not satisfy Him to snatch us from destruction, to open heaven for us, to bring us into the way to it, to make us meet for it; He will come Himself, and take us to it. And when we are there, He will not say — "There is the door of My Father's house open for you; you may now enter in;" He will not leave angels to welcome us, or our holy ministers and friends, who have gone before, to receive us; He Himself will come like a parent to his door to receive there his long expected and beloved child. He seems to regard this as the very summit of the heavenly happiness. And so every real believer feels that nothing higher can be promised him, than that he should "be ever with his Lord."

(C. Bradley, M. A.)

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KJV: Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.

WEB: "Don't let your heart be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me.