No More Sorrow

Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their head: they shall obtain gladness and joy; and sorrow and mourning shall flee away.~ Isaiah 51:11 (KJV)

I have to confess, there are times when a really 'justified' bout of self-pitying sadness can bring me a twisted sense of pleasure.

'I have a right to feel this way'. 'No one else understands my pain?' and 'If you knew how this felt you would be sad too!'.

These are some of the kind of examples of the way I might occasionally think.

But I do like to wallow in self indulgence. Sadness can be an excuse for bad behaviour and for not playing by the rules.

And a heaven where there is some sort of Stepford-like homogenised happiness sounds more like my version of a nightmare, to be honest.

Have you ever been to a church where it seems that happiness is like some sort of enforced prerequisite emotional dress code and sadness is akin to the unforgivable sin?

But ultimately, is there any more real hell than being consigned to pretend you are happy forever?

There might be, but It would be hard to think of one, personally.

He will wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain. All of that has gone forever.” 

 But imagine it wasn't a pretence? What a staggering thought.

You see, here on earth, on this side of eternity, pain and sadness are like a warning system that something is wrong and needs addressing.

C.S. Lewis said that 'Pain is God's megaphone to a deaf world'. Sadness tells us that something is wrong.

In the kingdom, in it's fullness, there will be no need for it.

My Mother died ten years ago, after a very short battle with cancer and I soon discovered then that I had never known true grief before.

Wave upon wave of it rocked me, over and over. The waves would always be present, lapping around my  legs, but then every so often there would be a swell of a wave that would cause me to have to find my balance again. And then there were waves that simply swept me away, and there was nowhere to plant my feet. Indeed I was barely able to swim.

I remember one particular time when my loss hit me so hard, maybe even 2 years after the event, that I literally fell to the floor not crying but howling.

Yeah. My mothers death ripped the heart out of me.

Some translations use the word 'mourning' rather than sorrow.

And sorrow is about the emotion, but mourning is about the loss.

I think what God wants us to understand about dwelling ultimately in his presence in this way is that there will be no loss, and no sense of loss. We will have all our hearts desire, because we will be with Jesus.

No more death and no more crying or pain.

You see these things have served their purpose in the old order.

But the old order is passing away.

There we will be complete and our God will be our all in all.

We shall obtain gladness and joy,

And sorrow and sadness shall flee away.


Lord, in this reality or the next,
You are our true source of joy, and there is no true joy outside of you,
In you we are complete,

This day,
And all days.

Amen