THE GLAD HOME-GOING
Isaiah 51:11. Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return, &c. [1569]
[1569] See Outlines on Isaiah 35:8-10, in vol. i. pp. 409–413.
The words of the text, fulfilled in the history of the return from captivity, are in our case awaiting the richer, fuller interpretation of death.
I. THOSE WHO ARE DESTINED TO THIS GLORIOUS HOME-GOING. “The redeemed of the Lord.”
The expression is one which grows out of the Levitical law, and means one set free by the payment of a price. The precise signification of the word is that of substitution. A man redeemed his first-born by substituting an animal for him. The first-born were also freed by the substitution of a special offering of equal value, made for all classes. The sons of Levi rendered substituted service for all the tribes. These were types and shadows of another Substitute, who, bearing the sins of many, guiltless but treated as guilty, should deliver from the curse and power of sin.
The deliverance of humanity from wilfulness and its woes was costly to Almighty love. This law of substitution, and painful substitution, runs through all human history. You find it everywhere (H. E. I. 393–395.) We must live for others and die for others. God has placed Himself under the same law. “He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.” By crucifixion of His own love; by self-sacrifice; by pain, and pang, and death, He breaks the bonds of moral slavery, condemns sin in the flesh, works a hatred of it which insures its extermination. What law could not do, God, sending His own Son in the flesh, did. The ransom was Himself. The redeemed compose “the Church of God, which He has purchased with His own blood.” Men who by faith have appropriated and rest upon this great wonder of suffering love, are placed in a new condition by means of it. The Redeemer is a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. The old Church was redeemed through Him. Nations unborn are included in the gracious purpose. The children, called to His embrace, share the benefit of His loving substitution, are numbered among the redeemed. Our loved ones who have tasted death, swell the gathering crowd of immortals redeemed. Bought with a price, faithful unto death, they escaped its sting and destructive energy, and are now triumphant, rejoicing spirits,—“the redeemed of the Lord.”
II. THEIR DESTINATION. “They shall return and come to Zion.”
After the woes and privations of the Captivity, a prosperous Church state was to be restored. Zion was the place of Divine, manifested grace. God recorded His name there. The Shekinah cloud rested there. There He met the people, and conferred the boons of His salvation.
The earthly Zion was a type of the heavenly. Two ideas are here suggested—nearness to God and holy association.
1. The redeemed on high are brought into nearer fellowship with God. There are easily conceivable visible manifestations of glory far beyond what are now possible. Emancipated from dependence upon sense, there will be a vast increase of spiritual capacity, and a corresponding enlargement of the means and opportunities of knowledge. Their acquaintance with the purposes and character of God, their feeling of His love, and grace, and tenderness, will be immeasurably greater and more intense than any known on earth. There is an infinite variety of Divine manifestations throughout the universe. There can be no dull uniformity in that higher life. No veil hides the eternal brightness. The beatific vision is face to face. The communications of the Divine mind are constant and familiar; the tokens of Divine grace are never withdrawn; the pledges of Divine fidelity are received and enjoyed without restriction. God is manifested in His highest glory, and humanity reaches its highest exaltation. Now in part—then, as also we are known.
2. The coming to Zion is expressive of personal association and fellowship. The return from the Captivity was that of a multitude. The words recall the joyous going up and assembling of the tribes to observe the solemn rites of their religion, and to enjoy social intercourse with each other. The heavenly state knows no loneliness. Every spirit forms one of a blissful company. Heaven is a social state. Lost loves are found, and broken relations are united, and interrupted fellowships are resumed. The mutual recognition of the faithful departed is one of the beliefs which nature suggests, and revelation implies and authenticates (P. D. 2926–2928). It does not so much rest upon single texts, as it is the keynote of the melody, and the uniting principle of the harmony of many. Every description implies it—every pictured scene discloses it. Love abides through death. Memory abides through death. We shall find what we have lost, and know we have found it. As the years pass how rich heaven becomes! Those who are there forbid the thought of it as a strange place (H. E. I. 470, 2739). It is our home—our Father’s house.
III. THEIR NEW CONDITIONS AND CIRCUMSTANCES. “Everlasting joy,” &c.
During the Captivity there were sore longings for freedom and home. The captives wept when they remembered Zion. They could not sing the Lord’s song in a strange land. Here all that is reversed. Inappeasable desire is gone. Heaven will contain much we have never imagined (H. E. I. 2714–2727).
There is, then, no loss in death. We are saved by hope. The future of the redeemed is assured by the Redeemer. Life is theirs. Death is theirs. Heaven is theirs. They shall go no more out for ever!—W. Hope Davison: The Preacher’s Monthly, vol. vii. pp. 25–27.
I. THE CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE WHO ARE GOING HOME TO HEAVEN.
“The redeemed of the Lord.”
1. They were once captives. Of Satan (2 Timothy 2:16). Slaves to their own depraved affections and desires—“sold under sin” (Romans 7:23). Prisoners to the Divine law—owing a debt which they could not discharge, and exposed to the righteous penalty.
2. They could not redeem themselves. The price was too great for such insolvents to pay, &c. (see on Isaiah 52:3).
3. It was the work of an Almighty Saviour to ransom the captives. He alone could pay the price, and deliver them from the grasp of Satan and the thraldom of sin, &c. He is emphatically called the “Redeemer,” and His people “the redeemed” (Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14; 1 Corinthians 6:19).
4. They are redeemed to be the Lord’s people. They are no longer slaves, but the Lord’s freemen—His property, servants, children, &c.; redeemed that they may share in the privileges and joys of the sons of God (Romans 14:9).
II. THE NATURE OF THEIR JOURNEY.
1. They are journeying heavenward. “Shall return and come to Zion.” Zion was the type of the heavenly city—one of its names (Hebrews 12:22; Revelation 14:1; Psalms 65:1; Psalms 84:7). Heaven the place of perfect worship, fellowship, &c. The object of the Christian pilgrims’ highest hope, around which their best affections centre, &c. Can never be fully at rest till they reach their Father’s home on high, and repose on His paternal bosom.
2. They are journeying heavenward in dependence upon God. They feel themselves weak, &c., but they rely upon the promised strength, &c. In Christ they have perfect strength, for perfect weakness. The homeward journey may be trying; they may have to tread on thorns, to shiver in the keen winds, &c.; but notwithstanding all, they advance under the benediction of heaven. God in all the Omnipotence of His might is with them, and therefore, “through winds and stormy seas,” “they shall return to Zion.”
3. They journey joyfully. “They come to Zion with singing. As the ransomed captives would return from Babylon, and as travellers commonly do now in the East; as a bird got loose out of a cage. They gratefully sing the praises of their great Deliverer and Conductor; they confidently sing of His loving care, &c.; of their glorious prospects, and of their ultimate triumph, “and find it nearer while they sing.”
III. THE BLISSFUL TERMINATION OF THE JOURNEY.
1. They shall finish their course with triumphant joy. “Everlasting joy,” &c. They reach home with difficulty (1 Peter 4:18), but certainly. Enemies conquered—beatific vision—exalted society, &c. What a blissful termination! What are other journeys compared with this? What sources of joy and gladness are here!
2. They shall receive an incorruptible crown. “Songs and everlasting joy upon their heads.” This may refer to the custom of wearing a wreath or chaplet of flowers in times of festivity, as is often done now, and as was commonly done among the ancients in triumphal processions.
3. They shall be eternally exempt from all that creates pain and uneasiness. “Sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” It must be so in the heavenly home (Revelation 21:4). No sigh was ever heaved there, no head ever ached there, &c. “In this world of changes it is a short step from joy to sorrow, but in that world sorrow and mourning shall flee away, never to return or come in view again.” Eternal health, wealth, purity, security, happiness, light, &c. “Eternal life!” Life in its highest forms and manifestations. Life with Christ—eternal and ineffable, ever developing in all perfection of strength, and beauty, and joy!
CONCLUSION:
1. The value of Christianity. No other religion can furnish such consolation amid human woes; and no other religion is, therefore, adapted to humanity. We are under infinite obligations to Christ, for from Him we derive all our present and future bliss. Let the prospect of such a home hearten us under the trials and difficulties of life. Press nobly on with assured confidence and eager desire.
2. The heavenly home belongs to “the redeemed of the Lord.” But there are some of you who are the bond-slaves of Satan, &c. “Repent and believe the Gospel” of freedom. Come to Christ, trust Him for emancipation from the thraldom of sin and Satan, and then let your ransomed life be one of praise and devotion to your great Deliverer.—Alfred Tucker.