The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1873-06-14

y
aay morning to the outer doors. Mr..
Reecher preached from the last clause OF |
the fourth verse OF the twcnty-iirst chapter |
Of Revelations "For the former things are |
nassed away" This, he said, was con-
summaton OF what had been written be-
FIRE -" And I, John, saw the holy city, |
New Jerusalem, coming down from God |
ont of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned |
tor her husband. And | heard a great |
voice out of heaven saying. behold the tab
crnacle of the Lord is with men, and he
will dwell with them, and they shall be his |
neople, and God himself shall be with |
them. and be their God. And God shall |
wine away all tears from their eyes; and |
there shall be no more death, neither
sorrow nor crying, neither shall there
he any more pain" And then comes
IN the declaration, /" For the former things
are passed away As if, he said, u new
J;spensation shonld now reign that the
economy BY which men were brought into
he and developed through certain stages
Of growth; in fact, the great economy OF
life. where various experiences, sorrow
and suffering and disappointment and as
niration and faith, familiar to all, was an
era of a former world. This world groans
The future in which this will all pass away,
and in the CLEAN of new experience we
arc fearless, painless, sorrowless. We are
lifted up into sphere in which we have
personal knowledge of God and are in his
presence, and in that presence experience
The utmost ioy. The revelation of John
was full of figures and examples borrowed
from the Old Testament, and so it has been
,x,l,i oh 1artl
,ure has drawn its grandest illustra-
tions, Jesus though common man stand
ing solid on the firm earth, seems to me to
have eyermore risen IN thought above the
terrestrial; and as he drew near to his last
DAYS the spiritual element developed itself
more and more. Ii is not to be looked foi in
the formal conversations about the other
life. but it seems as if il had descended
upoi1 him and clothed him, and that he
was in thought trauscending above
shis world, and that when he taught men
he came out of reverie as it were. And
notably in Johns gospel this is appar-
ent; as Jesus talked he grew more and more
ethereal. AS the sky-lark rises from the
ground and wings its way, rising higher and
higher in circles, until he is lost to the eye,
SO Jesus rises till far beyond our mortal
comprehension. This is agood day to talk
about heaven; the very light of it seems to
spread over all the earth, and the deep tran
guilty seems like that rest which remains
tor the people of God. There is no storm
ON the deep, no wind in the air to harm;
new life has come to the whole kingdom
of earth, and all things are sprlnging fresh,
and the air smells sweet with the blossom
q ing. A day as bright as this tells US Of Q
brighter one that is coming, where The fields
are transcendently more beautiful; sweet
as is the air, there is fragrance infinitely
sweeter; joyous as these balmy days
make q. our homes, there are homes
infinitely higher, nobler, and better
On this day | will speak first OF tn
transition by which we rise from thu
sphere into a higher existence. Do be
lieving souls at death pass Immediately t
A state of blessedness, OF do they lie Stun
bering in some vast receptacle, waiting 70
the disclosure of another era? 1t canno
he said that the New Testament is ALSO
iutely explicit on this theme, nor tina
there cannot be ingenious arguments t
prove that there Is a probationary state
but to my mind the implication is, throug
the New Testament, that at death, beiey
iny souls rise Immediately into conscious
ness of the divine presence-lnto ney
spiritual life. That this was Paul's feelin
ia to me sure. First, he never alludes t
an intermediary state, and though there
constant references to the condition OF tn
emancipated soul do not recall a slngl
instance in which either directly or md
rectly he intimates that there is watin
period where men lie useless, tormles'
CONSCIOUSNESS, waiting for some general Il
gathering into the spiritual sphere, nor ha
there been single reason gwen why the
should be such nor is there a single Year,
,ng for such state, nor Is there any NOR
instinct Of feeling that this is SO. If theI
was vast intermediate period where I'll
souls of believers lie there would be show
some wisdom in it, some reason in it, SON
explicit testimony for it; [ know Of none
eycept the mere fact that the Day Of Jnd,
ment is described as TIE bringing togeth'
of all of Gods people, as If they came i
the first time. In the fifteenth of Fir
Corinthians, 1 read it all the way throus
40 find point at which he stops, gulf
leaps, as if it were gulf in which waltz
shirts are, On the other hand | find
the closing part an ecstatic rendering OF Il
fact that when the dead shall rise, all u
living shall rise with them and be in I
presence of their God. Mr.. Beecher he
quoted many other passages from the W
tings of the inspired apostle, and contln
ing said: This was not the language OF
who believed in an inter mediate sta
The teaching evidently was tn
whatever there might be for the dea
for the living there was no such sti
of suspense for them thu
was no kind of pause, not even SO long
seed-planting and seed-sprouting.
while we do not undertake to affirm pc
lively this fact, we believe that dying
entrance into heaven at once, and ey'
person may feel that the Scripture warra
The belief. Secondly, the entrance ]
heaven does not forbid the idea OF
unfolding process; but on this point
we would avoid postlveness. Take
testimony of Christ as shown in the tw
ty-second chapter of Matthew; the az
ton arose from an attempt OF his enen
= to entrap him--as to whose wife
woman should be in heaven which had
seven husbands. and Jesus said, In
resurrection they neither marry, nor
given in marriage, but are as the angel
God.n This showed that we shall disc
in the other life many of the functions
the mind that we will then have
necessity for. There will he no need
passions and appetites, and so they viii
Invested from the mind. The souls
emerge from death in heaven will emf
along degree of lie and power
glory. and the state Of progress will