Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1887 — THE FUTURE EXISTENCE [ARTICLE]

THE FUTURE EXISTENCE

What Shall OWr Employment Be? Newer and Parer Principle* May Come by Ceavercloa, but Man'* CbaracXArUlic* Follow Him Beyond the Grave. Rev. Dr. Talmage preached at “The Hamptons” last Sunday. Subject “Employments in Heaven.” Text: Ezekiel i., 1. He said: The question is often silently asked, though perhaps neveraudibly propounded: “What are our departed Christian friends doing now?” The question is more easily answered than you might, perhaps, suppoee. Though there has come no recent intelligence from the heavenly city, and we seem dependent upon the story of eighteen centuries ago, still I think we may from strongest inference decide what are the present occupations of our transferred kinsfold, After God has made a nature He never eradicates the chief characteristics of its temperament. You never knew a man phlegmatic in temperament to become sanguine in temperament. You never knew a man sanguine in temperament to become phlegmatic in teinpeiament. Conversion plants new principles in the soul, but Paul and John are just as’different from each other after conversion as they were different from each other before conversion. If conversion does not eradicate The prominent characteristics of the temperament, neither will death eradicate them. You have, then,only by a sum in subtraction and a sum in'addition to find what are the employments of your departed friends in the better world. You are to subtract from them all earthly grossnessand add all earthly goodness, and then you are to come to the conclusion that they are doing now in heaven what in their best moments they did on earth. The reakon that so many people never start for heaven is because they could not stand it if they got there if it should turn out to be the rigid and formal place some peoples photograph it. We like to come to church, but we would not want to stay her to next Christmas. We like to hear the Halelujah Chorus, but we would not want to hear it all the time for fifty centuries. It might be on some great occasion it would be possibly comfortable to wear a crown of gold weighing several pounds but it would be an affliction to wear such a crown forever. In other words, we run the description of heaveu into tbe ground, while we make that which was intended as especial and celebrative to be the exclusive employment of the heavenly, You might as well, if asked to describe the habits of American society, describe a Decoration Day, or a Fourth of July, or an autumnal Thanksgiving, as though it were all i afc»4faßie lam not going to speculate in regard to the future world, but I must by inevitable laws of inference and deduction and common sense conclude that in heaven we will be just as different from each other as we are now different, and hence that there will be at least as many different employments in the celestial world as there employments here. Christ is to be the great joy, the great rapture, the great worship of heaven; but will that abolish employment? No more than loves on earthpaternal, filial, fraternal,con jugal love — abolish earthly occupation. In the first place, I remark that all those of our departed Christian friends who on earth foundgreat joy in tbe fine arts are now indulging their tastes in the same direction. On earth they had their gladdest pleasures amid pictures and statuary, and in the study of the laws of light and shade perspective. Have you any idea that affluence of faculty at death collapsed and perished? Why so, when there is more for them to look at, and they have keener appreciation of the beautiful, and they stand amid the very looms where the sunsets and the rainbows and the sprin g mornings are woven? Are you so obtuse as to suppose because the painter drops his easeal and the sculptor his chisel and the engraver his knife, that therefore that taste,which he was enlarging and intensifying for forty or fifty years, is entirely obliterated? These artists, or these' friends of fcrttepn earth worked in coarse meterial, end with imperfect brain and with frail hand. Now they have carried their work into larger liberties and into wider circumference. They are at their old businegfc, yes, but without the fatigues,without the limitations, without, the hinderances of the terrestrial studio.

Do not, therefore, be melancholy among the tapestaies, and the bric-a-brac, and the embroideries, and the water-colors, and the works of art which your departed friends used to admire. Do not say: “lam sorry they had to leave all these things.” Rather say: “I am glad they have gone up to higher artistic opportunity and appreciation.” Our friends who found so much joy in the fine arts on earth are now luxuriating in Louvres and Luxembourgs celesI remark again that all our departed Christian friends who in this world were passionately fond of music are still regaling that taste in the- world celestial. The Bible says so much about the music of heaven that it can not all be figurative. The Bible over and over again speaks of the songs of heaven. If heaven had no songs of its own a vast number of those of earth would have been taken up by the earthly emigrants. Surely the“ Christian at death does not lose bis memory. Then there must be .millions oLsouik in heaved who know •‘Coronation,” and “Antioch,” and “Mount Pisgah,” and “Old Hundred.”. The leader-of the eternal orchestra need only once tap his baton and “a 11 Leaven; will be ready for the halh-lujah.' Can not the soul sing? How often we compliment some exquisite singer by saying: “There was so much soul in her music''’ In heaven it will beail sonl nntil the body after a while comes up in the reeun-setion, and then there will be an additional heaven. Can not the soul hear? If it can hear then it can hear J music. Do not, therefore, let it be in your house-hold when sonig member leaves for heaven, as it is in some households. that you close the piano and uhsting the harp for two years because the fingers that-used to play on them are still. You must remember that they have better instruments of music where ! they are. ■ I You ask me: ■■ Do thev have real harps and real trumpets and real organs o'’ 0 '’ I .do not know. Some iviseacres sav poaii tively there are no such things in heavIdo sot know, but I should not be

surprised if the God who made all the,, mountains and all the hills and all tbe forests and all the mOtals of the earth and all the growths of the universe—l should not be surprised if He could, if He bad a mind to, make a few harpsand trumpets and organs. ?. ' ' .. ■ < . Music was bora in heaven and it will ever have its highest throne in heaven; and I want you to understand that our departed friends who were passionately fond of music here are now at the headquarters of harmony. I think that the grand old chsrch tunes that died when your grandfathers died have gone witn them to heaven. Again, I remark that those of our departed Christian friends who in this world had very strop? military spiritsare now in armies celestial and Out on bloodless battle. There are hundreds of people born soldiers. They can not help it. They belong to rigiments in time of peace. They can not hear a drum or fife without trying to keep step to the music. They are Christians, and when they fight they fight on the right side. Now when these, our Christian friends who had natural and powerful military spirit, entered heaven they entered the celestial army. The door of heaven hardly opens but you hear a military demonstration. Dayid cried out: “The chariots of God are twenty thousand ” Elisha saw the mountains filled with celestial cavalry. St. John said: “The armies which are in heaven followeo him on white horses.” Now, when those who had the military spirit on earth eanctitied entered glory I suppose they right away enlisted in some heavenly campaign; they volunteered right away. There must needs be in heaven soldiers with a soldierly Spirit. There are grand parade days when the king reviews the troops. There must be armed escorts sent out to bring up from earth to heaven those who were more than conquerors. There must be crusades ever being fitted out for some part of God’s dominion—battles, bloodless, groanless, painless. Angels of evil to be fought back. Other rebellious to be conquered. Worlds to be put to the torch. Worlds to be saved. . Worlds to be demolished. Worlds to be sunk. Worlds to be hoisted. Beside that, in our own world there are battles for the right and against the wrong where we must have the heavenly military. That is what keeps us Christian reformers so buoyant. So few good men against so many bad men; so few churches against so many grogshops; so few pure printing-nresees against so many polluted printingpresses; and yet we are buoyant and courageous, because we know that while the armies of evil in the world are larger in numbers than the army of the truth, there are celestial colonies in the air fighting on our side. I have not so-much faith in the army on the ground as I have in the army in the air. O, God! open our eyes that we may see them. The military spirits that went up from earth to join the military spirits before the throne—Joshua, and Caleb, and Gideon, and David, and Samson, and the hundreds of Christian warriors who on earth fought with fleshly arm, and now having gone upon high are coming down the hills of heaven ready to fight among the invisibles Yonder they are—coming, coming. Did you not hear them as they swept by? ° But what are our mathematical friends to do in the next world? They found their joy and their delight in mathematics. There was more poetry for them in Euclid than in John Milton. They were as passionately fond of mathematics as Plato, who wrote over his door: “Let no one enter here who is not acquainted with geometry.” What are they doing now? They are busy with figures, yet. No place in all the universe like heaven for figures. Numbers infinite, distances infinite, calculations infinite. The didactic. Dr. Dick said- he really thought the redeemed in heaven spent some of their time with the higher branches of mathematics. Some of our transferred and transported metaphysicians. What are they doing now? studying the human hind, only under better circumstances than they used to study it. They used to study the mind sheathed in the dull human body. Now the spirit unsheathed—now they are studying the sword outside the scabbard. Have you any doubt about what Sir William Hamilton is doing in heaven, or what Jonathan Edwards is doing in heaven, cr the multitudes on earth who had a passion for metaphysics sanctified by the grace of God? No difficulty in guessing. Metaphysics, glorious metaphysics, everlasting metaphysics.

What are our departed Christian friends who are explofersdoing now? Exploring yet, but with lightning locomotion, with vision microscopic and telescopic at the same time. A continent at a glance. A world in a second. A planetary system in a day. Christian John Frauklin no more in disable “Erebus” dashing toward the North Pole; Christian De Longno moretryingtofreeblockaded “Jeannette” from the'fce;Christian Liyingstone no more amid African malarias trying to make revelation of- a dark continent; but all of them in the twinkling of an eye taking in that which was unapproachable. Mont Blanc scaled without alpenstock. The coral depths of the ocean explored without . a diving bell. The mountains unbarred and opened without Sir Hunphrey Davy’s safety-lamp. What are our departed friends who found their chief joy in study doing now? Studying yet, but instead of a few thouI sand volumes on a few shelves, all the I volumes of the Universe open before r them—geologic, ornitholbgic, eoncholo- ■ eic, botanic, philosophic. : No more iieed of Ley den-jars, or voltaic j piles, or electric batteries, standing as they do face to face with the facts of the universe. M hat are the historians doing now? Studying history yet, but not the history of a few centuries of our planet only, but the history of the eternities—whole millenniums before Xenophon, or Herodotus, or I Moses, or Adam was born. History of i one world, history of all worlds. i W hat are our departed astronomers doing? Studying astronomy yet, but not through the dull lens of earthly observatory, but with one stroke of wing going right out to Jupiter, and Mara, and Mercury, and Saturn, and Orion, and the Pleiades —overtaking and passing swiftest comets in their flight. Herschel died a Christian. Have vou ffny i doubt about what Herschel is doing? ■ Isaac Newton died a Christian. Have you any doubt about what Isaac Newton is doing? Joseph Henry died a Christian. Have you any doubt about what Joseph Henry as doing’ 3 They were in discussion all these astronomers of earth, about

what the aurora boreallis was, and none of them could guess. They know now; they have been out there togge for themaeives. What are our departed Christian chemists doing? Following out their own science, following out and following out forever. Since they died they solved ten thousand questions which once puzzled them in the earthly laboratory. But w hat are our friends who found their chief joy in conversation and inl sociality doing now? In brighter conversation there and in grander sociality. What a place to visit in, where your next door neighbors are kings and queens. You, yourselves, kingly and queenly. If they want to know more particularly about the first Paradise, they have only to go over and ask Adam. If they want to know how the sun and the moon baited, they have only to go over and ask Joshua. If they want to know how the storm pelted I Sodom, they have only to go over and I ask Lot. If they want to know more I about the arrogance of Haman, they have only to go over and ask Mordecai. If they want to know how tbe Red Sea boiled when it was cloven they have only to go over and ask Moses. If thev want to know the particulars about the Bethlehem advent, they have only to go over and ask the serenading angels who stood that Christmas night in the balconies-of crystal. If they want to know more of the crucifiction, they have only to go over and ask those who were personal spectators while the mountains crouched and the heavens got black in the face at the spectacle. If they want to know more about the sufferings of the Scotch Covenanters, they have only to go over and ask Andrew Melville. If they want to know more about the old time revivals, they have only to go over and ask Whitefield, and Wesley, and Livingston, and Fletcher, and Nettleton, and Finney. Oh, what a place to visit in! If eternity were one minute shorter it would not be long enough for such sociality. Think of our friends who in this world were passionately fond of flowers turned into Paradise. Think of our friends who were very fond of raising supurb fruit turned into the orchard where each tree has twelve kinds of fruit at once, and bearing the fruit all the year round! Wfiat are our departed Christian friends doing in heaven, those who on earth found their chief joy in the Gospel ministry? They are visiting there old congregations. Most of those ministers have got their people around them already. When I get to heaven—as by the grace of God lam destined to go to that place —I will come and see you all. Yea, I will come to all the people to whom I have administered in the Gospel, and to the millions of souls to whom through the kindness of the printingpress lam permitted to preach every week in thia land and in other lands—leters coming from New Zealand and Australia and uttermost parts of the earth, as well as from near stations, teilins me of the souls I have helped— I will visit them all. I give them fair notice. Our departed friends of the ministry are engaged in that delectable enterfainment now. But what are our departed Christian friends who in all departments of usefulness were busy, finding their chief joy in doing good—what are they doing now? Going right on with the work. John Howard visiting the dungeons; the dead women of Northern and Southern battle-fields still abroad looking for the wounded; George Peabody still watching the poor; Thomas Clarkson still looking after the enslaved — all of those who did good on earth busier since death than before. The tombstone is not the terminus but the starting post. . What are our departed Christian friends who found their chief joy in studying God doing now? Studying God yet. No need of revelation now, for unblanched they are face to face. Now they can handle the omnipitant thunderbolts just as a child handles the sword of a father come back from victorious battle.

They have no sin, nor fear consequentiy. Studying Christ, not through a revelation, save revelation of the scars, that deep lettering.which brings it all up quicK enough. Studying the Christ of the Bethlehem caravansary, the Christ of the awful massacre, with its hemorrhage of the head and hand and foot and side —the Christ of the shattered mausoleum—Christ of the sacrifice, the star, the sun, the man, the God, the God-man, tbe man-God. But hark! the bell of the cathedral rings—the cathedral-bell of heaven. What is the matter now? There is going to be a great meeting in the temple. Worshipers all coming through the aisles. Make room for the Conqueror. Christ standing in the temple. All heaven gathering around Him. Those who Loved the beaut if uL come to look at the Rose of Sharon. Those who loved’music come to hear His voice. Those who were mathematicians come to count the years of His reign. All different and different forever in many respects, yet all alike in admiration for Christ, end all alike in the doxology: “Unto Him who washed us from our sins in His own blood, and made us kings and priests unto God, to Him be glory in the Church throughout all ages, world without endl” Amen!