The Great
Controversy
Chapter XL- God’s
People Delivered
Continued…
Upon the heads of the overcomers, Jesus with
his own right hand places the crown of glory. For each there is a crown,
bearing his own “new name,”[Revelation2:17.] and the inscription , “Holiness to
the Lord.” In every hand are placed the victor’s palm and the shining harp.
Then , as the commanding angels strike the note, every hand sweeps the harp
strings with skillful touch, awaking sweet music in rich, melodious strains.
Rapture unutterable thrills every heart, and each voice is raised in grateful
praise: “Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and
dominion forever and ever.” [Revelation 1:5, 6.]
Before the ransomed
throng is the holy city. Jesus opens wide the pearly gates, and the nations
that have kept the truth enter in. There they behold the Paradise of God, the
home of Adam in his innocency. Then that voice, richer than any music that ever
fell on mortal ear, is heard, saying, “Your conflict is ended.” “Come, ye
blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation
of the world.” Now is fulfilled the Saviour’s prayer for his disciples, “I will
that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am.” “Faultless
before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,” [Jude 24.] Christ
presents to the Father the purchase of his blood, declaring, “Here am I, and
the children whom thou hast given me.” “Those that thou gavest me I have kept.”
Oh, the wonders of redeeming love! the rapture of that hour when the infinite
Father, looking upon the ransomed, shall behold his image, sin’s discord
banished, its blight removed, and the human once more in harmony with the divine!
With unutterable love, Jesus welcomes his faithful ones to the “joy of their
Lord.” The Saviour’s joy is in seeing, in the kingdom of glory, the souls that
have been saved by his agony and humiliation. And the redeemed will be sharers
in this joy, as they behold, among the blessed, those who have been won to
Christ through their prayers, their labors, and loving sacrifice. As they gather
about the great white throne, gladness unspeakable will fill their hearts, when
they behold those whom they have won for Christ, and see that one has gained
others, and these still others, all brought into the haven of rest, there to
lay their crowns at Jesus’ feet, and praise him through the endless cycles of
eternity.
As the ransomed ones
are welcomed to the city of God, there rings out upon the air an exultant cry
of adoration. The two Adams are about to meet. The Son of God is standing with
outstretched arms to receive the father of our race,—the being whom he created,
who sinned against his Maker, and for whose sin the marks of the crucifixion are
borne upon the Saviour’s form. As Adam discerns the prints of the cruel nails,
he does not fall upon the bosom of his Lord, but in humiliation casts himself
at his feet, crying, “Worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain!” Tenderly the
Saviour lifts him up, and bids him look once more upon the Eden home from which
he has so long been exiled. After his expulsion from Eden, Adam’s life on earth
was filled with sorrow. Every dying leaf, every victim of sacrifice, every blight
upon the fair face of nature, every stain upon man’s purity, was a fresh
reminder of his sin. Terrible was the agony of remorse as he beheld iniquity
abounding, and, in answer to his warnings, met the reproaches cast upon himself
as the cause of sin. With patient humility he bore, for nearly a thousand
years, the penalty of transgression. Faithfully did he repent of his sin, and
trust in the merits of the promised Saviour, and he died in the hope of a resurrection.
The Son of God
redeemed man’s failure and fall, and now, through the work of the atonement,
Adam is re-instated in his first dominion. Transported with joy, he beholds the
trees that were once his delight,—the very trees whose fruit he himself had
gathered in the days of his innocence and joy. He sees the vines that his own
hands have trained, the very flowers that he once loved to care for. His mind
grasps the reality of the scene; he comprehends that this is indeed Eden
restored, more lovely now than when he was banished from it. The Saviour leads
him to the tree of life, and plucks the glorious fruit, and bids him eat. He
looks about him, and beholds a multitude of his family redeemed, standing in
the Paradise of God. Then he casts his glittering crown at the feet of Jesus,
and, falling upon his breast, embraces the Redeemer. He touches the golden
harp, and the vaults of Heaven echo the triumphant song, “Worthy, worthy,
worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and lives again!”
The family of Adam
take up the strain, and cast their crowns at the Saviour’s feet as they bow
before him in adoration. This reunion is witnessed by the angels who wept at
the fall of Adam, and rejoiced when Jesus, after his resurrection, ascended to
Heaven, having opened the grave for all who should believe on his name. Now
they behold the work of redemption accomplished, and they unite their voices in
the song of praise. Upon the crystal sea before the throne, that sea of glass
as it were mingled with fire,—so resplendent is it with the glory of God,—are
gathered the company that have “gotten the victory over the beast, and over his
image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name.” [Revelation 15:2.]
With the Lamb upon
Mount Zion, “having the harps of God,” they stand, the hundred and forty and
four thousand that were redeemed from among men; and there is heard, as the
sound of many waters, and as the sound of a great thunder, “the voice of
harpers harping with their harps.” [Revelation 14:1-5; 15:3; 7:14-17]
And they sing “a new
song” before the throne, a song which no man can learn save the hundred and
forty and four thousand. It is the song of Moses and the Lamb,—a song of
deliverance. None but the hundred and forty-four thousand can learn that song;
for it is the song of their experience,—an experience such as no other company
have ever had. “These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth.”
These, having been translated from the earth, from among the living, are
counted as “the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb.”
“These are they
which came out of great tribulation;” [Revelation 14:1-5; 15:3; Revelation
7:14-17.] they have passed through the time of trouble such as never was since
there was a nation; they have endured the anguish of the time of Jacob’s
trouble; they have stood without an intercessor through the final outpouring of
God’s judgments. But they have been delivered, for they have “washed their
robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” “In their mouth was found
no guile; for they are without fault” before God. “Therefore are they before
the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he that
sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.” [Revelation 14:1-5; 15:3;
Revelation 7:14-17.]
They have seen the
earth wasted with famine and pestilence, the sun having power to scorch men
with great heat, and they themselves have endured suffering, hunger, and
thirst. But “they shall hunger no more; neither thirst anymore; neither shall
the sunlight on them, nor any heat; for the Lamb which is in the midst of the
throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters;
and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.” [Revelation 14:1-5; 15:3;
7:14-17.]
In all ages the
Saviour’s chosen have been educated and disciplined in the school of trial.
They walked in narrow paths on earth; they were purified in the furnace of
affliction. For Jesus’ sake they endured opposition, hatred, calumny. They
followed him through conflicts sore; they endured self-denial and experienced
bitter disappointments. By their own painful experience they learned the evil
of sin, its power, its guilt, its woe; and they look upon it with abhorrence. A
sense of the infinite sacrifice made for its cure, humbles them in their own
sight, and fills their hearts with
gratitude and praise which those who have never fallen cannot
appreciate. They love much, because they have been forgiven much. Having been
partakers of Christ’s sufferings, they
are fitted to be partakers with him of his glory.
The heirs of God
have come from garrets, from hovels, from dungeons, from scaffolds, from
mountains, from deserts, from the caves of the earth, from the caverns of the
sea. On earth they were “destitute, afflicted, tormented.” Millions went down to
the grave loaded with infamy, because they steadfastly refused to yield to the
deceptive claims of Satan. By human tribunals they were adjudged the vilest of
criminals. But now “God is judge himself.” [Psalm 50:6.] Now the decisions of
earth are reversed. “The rebuke of his people shall he take away.”
[Isaiah25:8.] “They shall call them, The holy people, The redeemed of the
Lord.” He hath appointed “to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy
for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.” [Isaiah
62:12; 61:3.]
They are no longer
feeble, afflicted, scattered, and oppressed. Henceforth they are to be ever with
the Lord. They stand before the throne clad in richer robes than the most
honored of the earth have ever worn. They are crowned with diadems more
glorious than were ever placed upon the brow of earthly monarchs. The days of
pain and weeping are forever ended. The King of glory has wiped the tears from
all faces; every cause of grief has been removed. Amid the waving of
palm-branches they pour forth a song of praise, clear, sweet, and harmonious;
every voice takes up the strain, until the anthem swells through the vaults of
Heaven, “Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the
Lamb.” And all the inhabitants of Heaven respond in the ascription, “Amen:
Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honor, and power, and
might, be unto our God forever and ever.” [Revelation7:10, 12.]
In this life we can
only begin to understand the wonderful theme of redemption. With our finite
comprehension we may consider most earnestly the shame and the glory, the life
and the death, the justice and the mercy, that meet in the cross; yet with the
utmost stretch of our mental powers we fail to grasp its full significance. The
length and the breadth, the depth and the height of redeeming love are but
dimly comprehended. The plan of redemption will not be fully understood, even
when the ransomed see as they are seen and know as they are known; but through
the eternal ages, new truth will continually unfold to the wondering and
delighted mind. Though the griefs and pains and temptations of earth are ended,
and the cause removed, the people of God will ever have a distinct, intelligent
knowledge of what their salvation has cost. The cross of Christ will be the
science and the song of the redeemed through all eternity. In Christ glorified
they will behold Christ crucified. Never will it be forgotten that He whose
power created and upheld the unnumbered worlds through the vast realms of
space, the Beloved of God, the Majesty of Heaven, He whom cherub and shining
seraph delighted to adore,—humbled himself to uplift fallen man; that he bore
the guilt and shame of sin, and the hiding of his Father’s face, till the woes
of a lost world broke his heart, and crushed out his life on Calvary’s cross.
That the Maker of all worlds, the Arbiter of all destinies, should lay aside
his glory, and humiliate himself from love to man, will ever excite the wonder
and adoration of the universe. As the nations of the saved look upon their
Redeemer, and behold the eternal glory of the Father shining in his
countenance; as they behold his throne, which is from everlasting to
everlasting, and know that his kingdom is to have no end, they break forth in
rapturous song, “Worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed
us to God by his own most precious blood!”
The mystery of the
cross explains all other mysteries. In the light that streams from Calvary, the
attributes of God which had filled us with fear and awe appear beautiful and
attractive. Mercy, tenderness, and parental love are seen to blend with holiness,
justice, and power. While we behold the majesty of his throne, high and lifted
up, we see his character in its gracious manifestations, and comprehend, as
never before, the significance of that endearing title, our Father. It will be
seen that He who is infinite in wisdom could devise no plan for our salvation
except the sacrifice of his Son. The compensation for this sacrifice is the joy
of peopling the earth with ransomed beings, holy, happy, and immortal. The
result of the Saviour’s conflict with the powers of darkness is joy to the
redeemed, redounding to the glory of God, throughout eternity. And such is the
value of the soul that the Father is satisfied with the price paid; and Christ
himself, beholding the fruits of his great sacrifice, is satisfied.
(((Praise
God!))))
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