Revelation 21:1 And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.… We must remember that, to the ancient Jews, the sea was an object of almost unmixed terror. Nearly all the allusions to it in the Bible tell of its destructive power and of its peril. The Jews were never a seafaring people. They dreaded the sea. An added element of terror is given to the solemn warning addressed to them (Deuteronomy 28:68), when it is said, in case of their sin, that not only should they be taken back to Egypt to their old bondage, but that they should go there in "ships." They had no seaport worth mentioning, Their histories of the sea were all associated with its terribleness: the Deluge; the Exodus; Jonah. The epithets they apply to the sea are none of them of a pleasing character, but all more or less forbidding and fearful. They tell of its being "troubled," of its "raging," "roaring," breaking ships, filling men with utter terror, making them "reel to and fro," "stagger like a drunken man," and be "at their wits' end" (Psalm 107). They noticed only its "noise," and they likened its waves to the wild, cruel, fierce "tumults of the people." It was "great and wide," vast and lonely. To be "far off upon the sea" was the summing up of all separateness and isolation. And besides what was the common feeling of the Jew, there was, in St. John's special circumstances, sufficient to account for the peculiar dislike of the sea which our text expresses. He was in exile, at Patmos, a lonely barren island, amid a proverbially tempestuous sea, and cut off by its waves from all he loved best. It is told how he was wont daily to ascend the hills, and wistfully look towards Ephesus and his own beloved land of Palestine. What wonder, then, that, in telling of the final, blessed, condition of the Church, in its new and eternal home, he should say, "And there was no more sea"? But we need not take his words literally. The surrounding Scriptures do not require it. How much of manifest metaphor there is in this chapter! Moreover, such expressions as "the sea," "heaven," "earth," "sun," etc., are figures for great moral and spiritual facts, and their being removed or changed tell only of what shall be done in regard to these facts of which they are the figures (cf. St. Peter's quotation, on the Day of Pentecost, of the prophecy of Joel as to the "sun" being "darkened," and the "moon turned into blood," - all which, he said, was fulfilled then). But, literally, this did not happen; only great moral changes typified by them. And so here, "the new heavens and the new earth" refer, not to literal facts, to the physical geography of the future world, but to a blessed new order of things in the moral and spiritual world. For this earth is to continue. How else shall the meek inherit it, and shall God dwell here with men? And the sea likewise, though it be typical of moral conditions which shall then cease to be. Moreover, in reality, though not in Jewish conception, the sea is one of God's most blessed gifts to man. Life would he impossible without it. It has been justly called "the lifeblood of the land," as the blood is the life of the body. "It is the vital fluid that animates our earth; and, should it disappear altogether, our fair green planet would become a heap of brown, volcanic rocks and deserts, lifeless and worthless as the slag cast out from a furnace." We remember, too, how God said of the sea that it was "very good;" and no mistaken Jewish ideas must be allowed to reverse that verdict. Think of: 1. Its vapours. The corn harvest is really the harvest of the sea. For the sea yields up her strength in the form of vapour. These create the clouds, which, touched and tinged by the sun, are so exquisite in their loveliness. And these discharge themselves upon the earth in varied form, and so come the rivers which water the earth and make it bring forth abundantly. 2. Its currents, bearing along the sun-heated waters of sub-tropical climes, far away northward and southward, and giving to regions like our own that mildness of climate which we enjoy; whereas, but for the warm waters of the sea, our shores would be bleak, inhospitable, barren, all but uninhabitable, like the shores of Labrador. 3. Its breezes, so health giving, imparting fresh life to the feeble and the sick. 4. Its beauty, ever presenting some fresh form of loveliness in colour, movement, outline, sound, fragrance. Oh, how beautiful is the bright, bounding sea! 5. Its tides, sweeping up the mouths of our great rivers and estuaries, and all along our shores, washing clean what else would be foul, stagnant, poisonous. 6. Its saltness, ministering to the life of its inhabitants; by its weight aiding in the transmission of those warm currents of which we have spoken; preventing corruption; and much more. But what we have said is sufficient to show that the sea is indeed a gift of God, "very good" and precious; and therefore, as the future shall preserve all that is good, we believe, notwithstanding our text, that there shall be still the blessed, beautiful sea. But we are glad and grateful to know that those facts, of which to the Jewish mind it was the emblem, will not be hereafter. Of those facts were - I. UNREST. The sea tells of that. Cf. "The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest" (Isaiah 57:20). "There is sorrow on the sea; it cannot be quiet" (Jeremiah 49:23). "Thou troubled sea, Oh, troubled, fretful sea! What can the causes be That thy soft, silvery breast So rarely is at rest? "E'en when there wind is none, And thou art let alone, Thy heart, self troubled, will Keep palpitating still. "Ah, well may thy unrest Emblem the human breast, Yea, the great world around, Where troubles so abound!" Yes; such is our life now. "Man is born to trouble;" and were it not that there is One who is able to hush the waves and say, "Peace, be still!" our hearts would know no rest. But yonder we shall rest. Quies in coelo. "There shall I bathe my weary soul In seas of heavenly rest, And not a wave of trouble roll Across my peaceful breast." II. PAINFUL MYSTERY. So was the sea to the Jew, though it be not so to us. Scripture so speaks of it. "Thy way, O Lord, is in the sea; Thy judgments are a great deep; Thy path is in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known." The "depths of the sea" tell of that which can never be discovered; hidden from all knowledge. Now, that there is much of such mystery here, we all know. It is part of our trial and discipline, designed to educate us in the blessed lessons of trust in God. So that, in view and in spite of such mysteries, we may be able to say, "I will trust, and not be afraid." But yonder we shall know even as we are known. Here "we see as through a glass, darkly; but then face to face." Therefore let us "rest in the Lord, and wait," etc. III. SEPARATION. The sea of old was a complete barrier to intercourse. It was to St. John, and, even now, it so separates that many shrink from emigration to lands where life would be far brighter for them. But of old, to be "far off upon the sea," to "dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea," was indeed to be cut off almost from the land of the living. Only God could make his "way in the sea, and his path in great waters." It was possible only to Christ to walk upon the sea that he might go and succour his disciples. But to men the sea was an impassable barrier, a separating wall. Therefore a fit emblem of separation. How many such barriers there are to our intercourse with Christ and with our fellow men! The power of this present world, the things seen and temporal, this body of flesh, - these, and yet others, separate between us and our Lord. And between man and man. Distance, time, diversity of language, habits of thought, position in life, uncongeniality, ignorance, and many more. But in Christ and with Christ we all shall be one. Drawn to him, we shall be drawn to one another also; and as nothing shall separate us from him, so nothing shall separate us from each other. "There shall be no more sea." IV. REBELLION AGAINST GOD. "The noise of their waves, the tumult of the people" (Psalm 65.). The one stands for the other. The same thought lies in the words in Psalm 93., "The floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves. The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea." The rebellious heart of man, therefore, is that which under this imagery is set forth. And here in this Book of Revelation: "The waters... are peoples," etc. (Revelation 17:15). The multitude of the ungodly and rebellious - these are likened to the sea. Now, in this sense, there shall be no more sea. No more ungodly people, no more rebellious hearts. And my heart, O my God, shall, then and there, rebel no more. - S. C. Parallel Verses KJV: And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. |
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