Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1888-02-22
@eadinqtur the Sabbath.
CONDUCTED BY
REV. ROBERT LATHAM.

REV. ROBERT LATHAM.
[Original.]
HEAVEN.
1t is a strange thingthat Christians think
so little and talk so little about Heaven.
There are many in every community,
who are fully aware of the solemn TACT
that in a short time--a few tieeting
wears at farthest-they will bid an eternal
farewell to everything by which they are
now surrounded. In fact, there is no one
who is not aware of the fact that he is soon
to close his eyes on all earthly scenes.
Startlingly true as this fact is, none of us
are preparing, as we ought, for the move.
How differently we would act, if we had
disposed of our earthly effects with the in
tention of emigrating to some other sec
ton of the country. We would be until
ring in our efforts to learn everything
possible to be learned about that country.
We.Would examine maps OF that country,
read everything we could obtain, which
would be likely to give us any information
respecting the soil, the climate, the pro-
duction, the advantages and the dlsad-
vantages of the country which we pro-
posed making our future home. we
would talk about that country around the
Preside. We would talk with our neigh
bors about it. All our plans would be
made with reference to the move. Every
person in the community would know that
we were preparing to leave our old home
for our new one. All over Christendom
there are a vast number of persons, who,
professedly, have disposed of their world
ly effects rather, who have profeSsedly
turned their backs on the world, n have
in good earnest set out for the New Jerusa-
lem-the heavenly Canaan. Do we look
like travellers? How many are in sober
earnestness inquiring the way which leads
to Heaven? How often does a household
parents and children-gather around the
family freside and talk of Heaven? How
often do we, as members of the same con-
g~regation, sit down and quietly talk about
our future home, which we are soon to
reach? How often do ministers of the
gospel describe Heaven as it is described
in the Bible?' These are practical ques-
tions, the asking of which contains the
answer.
In the nature of things, there is nothing
better calculated to stir the devotional feel
ings of the human heart than the descrip-
tions of Heaven which are contained in
the Bible. In the Scriptures Heaven is
described as a place. 1t is not a visionary
state. It must be a place. Moses and
Elijah, soul and body, are in Heaven, and
our Saviour assembled to Heaven with the
same body which was nailed to the cross
and which lay in the sepulchre of Joseph
of Arimathea. Our Saviour calls Heaven
his Fathers house. SIN my Fathers
house there are many mansions" How
suggestive are these words! How full
they are encouragement! Repeat them
over, and mediate upon them for a mo-
ment, and the tear of heartfelt joy begins
to flow. Is it possible that believers are
on their way to the paternal home OF the
Lord of glory and yet are indifferent :?
From the Scriptures we learn that Jesus
Christ is the elder brother of all believers.
Such being the case they are going home.
Heaven is their Fathers house, because
Jesus Christ is their brother. A fathers
house, no matter how humble, is the most
attractive place on earth. The most at
t~ractive place in the universe to the believ-
er is Heaven. His maker, preserver, re-
deemer and sanctifier is there. There, in
a particular sense, God the Father is, who
loved him when he was most unlovely ;
there, in q particular sense, Jesus, who
gave himself a ransom for his people, is
and there the Holy Spirit, the sanctifer of
his peopleis.
To encourage his early disciples, and to
encourage his people in all time, our Sa-
viour says that there are many mansions
in his Fathers house. There are multi
tudes of the best people in the world, who
have no home here. They have lived in
miserable huts, and these not their own, all
their days. They have been on a journey.
Night and day they have been on the
road to their new home. When they reach
that new home they will find it a large
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the weary traveller gets to his journeys
end, that there will be no room for him in
that mansion. No danger that all the
places will be occupied or engaged. Jesus
has gone to prepare a place for each and
all of his people. Often in this world the
DOOR are crowded out of the land. No such
thing as that will occur in Heaven. When
the beggar, Lazarus, died angels carried
him to Abraham's bosom. His body,
while on earth, was covered with sores
which dogs licked, but when he closed his
eyes in death, he opened them in glory,
in the house of the God and Father of our
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. The land
of Canaan was too small for Abraham and
Lot, but there is room in Heaven for all
that will accept of Jesus Christ.
The description of Heaven contained in
the Scripturesis exquisitely beautiful, and
incomprehensibly grand. 1t is called the
New Jerusalem, the holy Jerusalem and
the holy City. The streets of the city are
pure gold, as it were, transparent as glass.
1t is literally the city of God. No sun by
day nor moon or stars by night shine in it.
light thereof. There is no city on earth
like the city in which the redeemed are
to spend an endless eternity of bliss. In
all the large cities on our globe there is a
vast amountof wealth and a great amount
of poverty, but in the saints eternal home
there are none whose wealth causes them
burning anxiety; nor any whose faces are
pale, and whose eyes are deep set in their
sockets and present a CHASTITY appearance,
because of the heavy load of poverty
which they have borne so long. Wealth
and poverty are words not found in the
language of Heaven. There is no anxious
care, no sorrow, no sickness, no hunger,
no thirst, no tears, NJ aching hearts, no
bitter signs, no death, no graves in Heav-
en-. None of those things which make
our lives, in this vale Of tears, so sad have
any existence in Heaven.
What the positive enjoyments of Heav-
en- are no language can picture: 10 be
free-absolutely free from the ills which
sin has brought into the world, is bliss,
but it is only negative bliss. The bliss Of
Heaven, however, is real positive bliss.
This positive bliss will consist in part that
the redeemed will be satisfied. I, says
the inspired Psalmist, will behold thy face
in righteousness l shall be satisfied, when
l awake, with thy likeness. The meaning
of the Psalmist is that when he awakes
from the slumbers of the grave, when soul
and body are admittedinto Heaven, he will
be satisfied, perfectly satisfied, with every
thing in the universe. and perfectly salts
we experience in this world, not because