Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 July 1890 — GREAT HOME CIRCLE. [ARTICLE]

GREAT HOME CIRCLE.

'IALL we meet in heaven AND BE KNOWN? No Theory or Surmise,but a Positive Certainty— Heaven is Not a btately Formal Abode—Dr. Tal mage’s Ber- " ■ • Dr. ‘ijm&ge preached at Waseca, Minn., Sunday.. Subject: “Meeting Our Friends in Heaven.” Text: II Sam. xii: 23. He said: There is a very sick child on the abode of David the King. Disease, which stalks up the dark lane of. the poor, and puts its smothering hand on the lip and nostril of the wan and wasted, also mounts the palace stairs, and, bending over the pillow, blows into the face of a young Prince the frosts of pain and death. Tears are wine to the King.of Terrors. Alas! for David the King. He can neither sleep nor eat, and lies prostrate on his face, weeping imd wailing until the palace rings with the outcry of woe. “Is the child dead ?” “Yes, he is dead.” David rouses himself up, washes himself, puts on new apparel and sits down to food. What power hushed that tempest ? What strength was it that lifted up that King whom grief had dethroned P Oh, it was the thought that he would come again into the possession of that darling child. No grave-digger’s spade could Ride him. The wintry blasts of death could .not put out the bright light. There would be a forge somewhere that, with silver hammer, would weld the broken links. In a city where the hoofs ot the pale horse never strike the pavement he would clasp his lost treasure. He wipes awav the tears from his eyes, and he clears the choking grief from his throat, and exclaims: “I shall go to him.” Was David right or wrong ? If we part on earth will we meet again in the next world ? “Well,” says some one, “that seems to be impossibility. Heaven is so large a place we never could find our kindred there.” Going into some city, without having appointed a time and place for meeting, you might wondet around for weeks and for months, and perhaps for. years, and never see each other; and heaven is vaster than all earthly cities together, and how are you going to find your departed friends in that country ? It is" so vast a’ realm. Now, I ask, how are you going to find your friends in such a throng as that? Is not this idea we have been entertaining after all a falsity? Is this doctrine of future recognition of friends in heaven a guess, a myth, a whim, or is it a granite foundation upon which the soul-pierced of all ages may build a glorious hope? Intense queation? Every heart in this audience throbs right into it. There is in every heart hero the tomb of a lost one dead. The object of this sermon is to take this theory out of the region of surmise and speculation into the region of positive certainty. I believe that I can bring an accumulation of argument to bear upon this matter which will prove the doctrine of future recognition as plainly as that there is any heaven at all, and that the kiss of reunion at the celestial gate willbe as certain as the dying kiss at the door of the sepulcher. The doctrine of- futura recognition Is lot so often positively stated in the Word of God as implied, and you know, my friends, that that is, after all, the strongest mode of affirmation. Your friend travels in foreign lands. He eomes home. He does not begin by arguing with you to prove that there are such places as London, and Stockholm, and Paris, and Dresden and Berlin, but his conversation implies it. And so this Bible does not so positively state this theory as, all up and down its chapters, take it for granted. What does my textimply? “I shall go to him.” What consolation would it be to David to go to his child if he would not know him? Would David have been allowed to record this anticipation for the inspection of all ages if it were a groundless anticipation? We read in the first book of the Bible, Abraham died and was gathered to his people, Jacob died and was gathered to his people, Moses died and was gathered to his people. What people? Why, their friends, -their comrades, their old companions. Of course it means that. It can not mean anything else. So in the very begin*, ning of the Bible four times that is taken for granted. The whole New Testament is an arbor over which this doctrine creeps like a luxuriant vine full of the purple clusters of consolation. James, John«snd Peter followed Christ into the mountain. A light falls from heaven on that mountain and lifts it into the glories of the celestial. Christ's garments glow and His face ihines like the sun. The door of aeaven swings open. Two spirits come down and alight on that mountain. The disciples look at them and recognize them as Moses and Elias. Now, if those disciples, standing on the earth, pould recognize these two tpirits who had been for years in heaven, do you tell me that we, with our heavenly eyesight, will not be able to recognize those who have gone out from among us only five, ten, twenty, thirty years ago? The Bible indicates, over and over again, that the angels know each other; and then the Bible says that we are to be higher than the angels, and if the.angels have the power of recognition, shall not we, who are to be higher than they in the next realm, have as good eyesight and as good capacity? What did Christ mean, in His conversation with Mary and Martha, when He said, “Thy brother shall rise again?” It was as much as to say. “Don’t cry. Don’t wear yourselves out with this trouble. You will see him again. Thy brother shall rise again. The Bible describes heaven

& a great home circle. Well, now, that would be a very queer home circle where the members did not know each other. The Bible describes death as a sleep. If we know each other before we go to sleep, shall we know each other after we wake up? Oh, yes. We will know each other a great deal better then than now, “for now,” says the apostle, “we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face.” It will be my purified, enthroned and glorified body gazing on your purified, enthroned and glorified body.

Now, I demand, if you believe the Bible, that you take this theory of future reoogaition out of the realm of speculation and surmise into the region positive certainty, and no more keep saying. “I hope it is so; I have an idea it is so; I guess it is so.” Be able" to Bay, with all the concentrated energy of body, mind and soul, “I know it is so.” There are, in addition to these Bible arguments, other reasons why I accept this theory. In the first place, because no rejection of it implies the entire obliteration of our memory. Can it be possible that we shall forget forever those with whose walk, look, manner, we have been so long familiar? Will death coma and with a sharp, keen blade hew away this faculty of memory? Abraham said to Dives: “Son, remember.” If the exiled and loßt remember, will not the enthroned remember? You know very well that our joy in any circumstance is augmented by the companionship of our friends. We can not boo a picture with less than four eyes, or hear a song with less than four ears. We want some one beside us with whom to exchange glances and sympathies; and I suppose the joy of heaven is to be augmented by the fact that we are to have our friends. with us when there rise before us the thrones of the blessed, and when there surges up before us the jubilate of the saved. Heaven is not a contraction, it is an expansion. If I know you here, I will know you better there. Here I see you with only two eyes, blit there the soul shall have a million eyes. It will be immortality gazing on immortality —ransomed spirit in colloquy with ransomed spirit—victor beside viotor. When John Evans, the Scotch minister, was seated in his study, his wife came in and said to him: “My dear, do you think we will know each other in heaven?” He turned to her and said: “My dear, do you think we i Till he bigger fools In heaven than we aro here?”

Again: I accept this doctrine of future recognition because the world’s expectancy affirms it. In all lands and ages this theory is received. What form of religion planted it? No form of religion, for it is received under all forms of religion. Then, I argue, a sentiment, a feeling, an anticipation, universally planted, must have been God-implanted, and if God-im-planted, it is rightfully implanted. The Norwegian believes it. The Indian believes it. The Greenlander believes it The Swiss believes it. The Turk believes it. Under every sky, by every river, in every zone, the theory is adopted; and so I say a principle universally implanted must be God-implanted, and hence a right belief. The argument .is irresistible. Again: I adopt this theory because there are features of moral temperament, and features of the soul that will distinguish us forever. How do we know each other in this world? Is it merely by the color of the eye, or the length of the hair, or the facial proportions? Oh. no. It is by the disposition as well, by natural affinity, using the word in the very best sense and not in the bad sense; and if in the dust our body should perish and lie there forever, and there should be no resurrection, still the soul has enough features and the disposition enough features to make us distinguishable. I can understand how in sickness a man will become so delirious that he wil not know his own friends; hut will we he blasted with such insufferable idiocy that, standing beside our best friends for all eternity, we will never guess who they are? The Bible says nations are to be horn in a day. When China comes to God will it not know Dr. Abeel?. When India comes will it not know Dr. John Scudder? When the Indians come to God will they not know David Brainard. One more reason why I am disposed to accept this doctrine of the future recognition is that so many in their last hour on earth have confirmed this theory. I speak not of persons who have been delirious in their last moment and knew not what they were about, but of persons who died in calmness and placidity. And who were not naturally superstitious. Often the glories of heaven have struck the dying pillow, and the departed man has said he saw and heard those who had gone awaf from him. How often it is in the dying moments par ents see their departed children and children see their departed parents! I came down to the banks of the Mohawk River. It was evening, and I wanted to go over the river, and so I waved my bat and shouted, and after awhile I saw some one waving on the opposite bank, and I heard him shout, and the boat came across and I got in and was transported. And so I suppose it wfll be In the evening of our life. We will come down to the River of Death' and give a signal to our friends on other shore, and they will give a signal hack to ns, and the boat comes, and our departed kindred are the oarsmen, the fires of the setting day tinging the tops of the paddles, j Why, we are to be taken to heaven at last by ministering spirits. Who ’ are they*to be? Bouls that went up from Madras, or Antioch, or Jerusalem? Qh, no; our glonued kindred ape going to troop around us. 1 Heaven is not a stately, formal

[place, as I sometimes hsiar It described,’ a very frigidity ol splendor where peo-j ! pie stand on cold formalities and go ‘ around with heavy crowns of gold on | their heads. No, that is not my idea jof heaven. My idea of heaven is more like this: You are seated in the even-ing-tide by the fire-place, your whole? family there, or nearly all of them there, While you are seated talking? and enjoying the evening hour, there is a knock at the door and the door is opened, and there comes in a brother that has been long absent He has been absent for years, you have not seen him, and no sooner do you make up your mind that it is certainly he, than you leap up, and the question is who shall give him the first embrace. That is my idea of heaven. A great home circle where they are waiting, for us. Oh. will you not know your mothers voice there? She who always called you by your first name long after others had given you the formal! * ‘Mister ?” You were never any thing but James, or John, or George, oil Thomas, or, Mary, or Florence to feev. Will you not know your child’s vokUL? She of the bright eye, and the ruddy cheek, • and the quiet step, who camq in from play and flung herself into your lap, a very shower of mirth and beauty? Why, the picture is graven in your soul. It cannot wear out If that little one should stand on the, other side of some heavenly hill and call to you, you would hear her voicej above Hie burst of heaven’s great' orchester. Know it? You could not help but know it. Now I bring you this glorious con-, solation of future recognition. If you could get this theory Into your heart it would lift a great many shadows that are stretching across iL Oh, ye whose hearts are down under the sod of the cemetery, cheer up at j the thought of this reunion! Oh! how: much you will have to tell them when! once you meet them. How much you] have been through since you saw them last! On the shining shore you will talk it all over. The heartaches. The loneliness. The sleepless nights. Talking it all over, and then, hand in hand, walking up and down in the' light. ■ , No sorrow, no tears, no death. Oh,, heaven! beautiful heaven! Heaven! where our friends are. Heaven where' we expect to be