2 Samuel 12:23 But now he is dead, why should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. If we part on earth shall we meet in Heaven? Two men are going to London or New York, and, not having appointed a special moment and a special place of meeting, they might wander about for months and years and never find each other; and how is it possible that we are going to find our departed friends in heaven when that city is larger than all the Londons and New Yorks and Cantons on earth put together? St. John went up on a mount of inspiration, and he, looked off upon that city, and he said, "Thousands and thousands." Then he went up on a higher altitude of inspiration, and he looked off again, and he said, "Ten thousand times ten thousand." Then he came on a greater height of inspiration and he looked off and said, "A hundred and forty-four thousand and thousands of thousands." And then coming to a still greater height of inspiration, he looked off again and he said, "a great multitude that no man can number." Now, how are we going to find our departed loved ones in such a city as that, so vast, so infinite? Is this hope of meeting our departed friends in heaven a whim, a guess, a falsity, or is it a granitic foundation on which the soul may come and build a glorious hope? Now, when you are going to build a ship, you want the best timber, you want good stanchions, and planks and timber counter-knee, all of solid oak. You may build a ship out of lighter material, and may get along very well while the sea is smooth; but when the cyclone comes the ship will founder. And we may build a great many ideas of heaven out of our own fancy, and they will do very well while everything is smooth in life; but when the disasters of death come, and the hurricanes of the last hour, then we shall want a theory of future recognition built out of the solid oak of God's Word. 1. Now this theory of future recognition is not so positively asserted as it is implied; and you know that is the strongest kind of affirmation. Your friends come from travel in foreign parts; they tell you there is such a place as St. Petersburg. or Madras, or New York, or San Francisco. They do not begin by telling you of the existence of these cities; but all their conversation implies the existence of these cities. And so the doctrine of future recognition in the Bible is not so positively asserted as it is implied. What did David mean when he said in my text. "I shall go to him?" What was the use of going to his child if he would not know him? 2. In addition to the Bible argument, there are other reasons. I admit this theory of future acquaintanceship in heaven, because the rejection of it implies the entire obliteration of our memory. John Evans, the quaint Scotch minister, was seated in his study one day, and his wife came and said, "My dear, do you think we shall know each other in heaven? "Why, yes," said he. "Do you think we shall be greater fools there than we are here?" 3. Again, I admit this doctrine of future recognition, because we don't in this world have sufficient opportunity of telling to those to whom we are indebted how much we owe them. You who have prayed for the salvation of souls, you who have contributed to the great charities of the day, will never know in this world the full result of your work; there must be some place where you will find it out. Years ago there was a minister by the name of John Brattenberg, who preached the Gospel in Somerville, New Jersey. He was a faithful, godly man, but a characteristic of his ministry was no conversions, and when he came to die he died in despondency, because, though he had tried to serve the Lord, he had seen hardly any brought into the kingdom. But scarcely had the grass begun to grow on John Brattenberg's grave than the windows of heaven opened, and there came a great revival of religion, so that one day in the village church two hundred souls stood up and took the vows of the Christian — among them my own father and my own mother — and the peculiarity about it was that nearly all those souls dated their religious impressions back to the ministry of John Brattenberg. And shall he never know them? 4. Again, I accept this doctrine of future recognition, because there are so many who, in their last moments, have seen their departed friends. (T. De Witt Talmage.) Parallel Verses KJV: But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. |
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