“To him that overcometh, I will give a crown of life. To him that overcometh, I will make a pillar in the temple of my God and they shall go out no more.” Our abiding place there will be as permanent as the pillars of the temple. We cannot be removed. Surely we will not want to go out any more. We will be satisfied to dwell in the temple of God forever. Then it is called an inheritance. Our children inherit our possessions. There is no law to prevent them from coming into what has belonged to us. It is their own when we leave it by every right of human and Divine law.
II. Our Saviour is the faithful witness of this promised land.
Moses, you remember, sent spies into Canaan that they might bring back a report of the land which God had promised to Abraham and his descendants. These spies returned. Only two, Caleb and Joshua, brought back a good report. The majority report was very discouraging indeed, so much so, that the Israelites turned back again.
There are many in this world who have a bad report of the Promised Land which the text tells us, is to be our rest and our inheritance. Will you listen to them? If so, you will also turn back and continue wandering in the wilderness of sin. Do not forget that Satan is one of these spies. He will tell you false things regarding your religion, your brethren, your Saviour, your God and Heaven. This is his business. He is always at it. You find many Christians who do not think much about Heaven, they consider it a dream, they contend that this is their Heaven, hence they place little value on all the reports in the Bible concerning this land. But we have a true witness, our Joshua, our Jesus. He came from that country. He knows its hills and dells, its clime, its fruits, its joys, its eternal delights. He has left us His report. It is absolutely true. He has seen and heard and tasted and He speaks as a true witness. He said to His disciples on the eve of His departure, “I go to prepare a place for you, that where I am, there ye may be also. In my Father’s house are many mansions, if it were not so I would have told you.” “If ye believe in God, believe also in me.”
God liberated His people from Egypt. He raised the iron heel of oppression from the necks of His people. He led them forth. He brought them into Canaan. His omniscience guided them. His omnipresence was ever with them. He brought them to an end of the toil, labor, dust, pains, weariness of the wilderness journey. The same God is leading us to a much better country. In this country there are no enemies, as there were in Canaan. No battles will be fought, no sickness will be endured, no trials to pass through, no fading sunsets and following dark nights, no losses, no crosses, for “All the former things are passed away, behold, I make all things new.”
Jesus says, “I am the living bread of which if any man eat, he shall nevermore hunger.” He has broken down the middle wall or partition, so that we can enter into the very presence of God. Paul speaks of His work when he says, “By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.” Yes, the glory of God, that glory which shall be reflected from our hearts and faces when we stand complete before God. John says, “It doth not appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And every one that hath this hope in him, purifieth himself even as He is pure.” We shall be like Him! These are not misty descriptions of our rest and inheritance! They are real photographs. We need not doubt, we need not fear. It doth not appear what we shall be, but in that beautiful habitation of the soul, we will be more beautiful than the beautiful home which God has prepared.
III. But this rest and inheritance will be the reward of the faithful.
We should not deceive ourselves for not every one will enter. There are many in this world who confidently expect to enter this Heavenly Canaan, but they have no passport. If you were to take a trip through Europe and Asia, it would be necessary for you to procure from the proper officials of this country a passport, for without this you would not be permitted to go through these countries. You would be looked upon as some kind of an enemy. The passports to Heaven are goodness and faithfulness. Not the goodness, however, which this world creates and loves and prizes. Christ said to the young nobleman who came to Him and wanted to know what good thing he could do to enter the kingdom of Heaven, “Why callest thou me good, there is none good but God.” This young man said that he had kept all the commandments from his youth up, now if he had done that and we have no reason to doubt it, for Christ looked on him and loved him, then this young man was really good as this world calls goodness; but mark you he did not enter the “Kingdom of God,” for he went away very sorrowful, for he was very rich. Oh! he was very rich!
He had his own little heaven, he had his own little bundle of goodness, he had his own passport, but these did not suffice, for the Kingdom of God. These were of no value in this Kingdom.
I was born in a slave state. When I was a little boy, my mother being very poor, sent me out on a very cold day to the river bank to gather up a bundle of wood. I gathered up the wood and tied it into a bundle and placed it on my head. I started home. It was a large bundle and grew very heavy as I walked along. It was painful to my head and I became tired. I staggered under the burden, I thought that I could not reach the house, but I kept on. At last I got home and almost fainted. But what a relief it was to me and what a comfort it became to my mother. As we sat that night by the crackling fire, I thought, well it was worth all it cost me. The pleasure it gave my mother, the family, and satisfaction it gave me to know that I had done this and all were now enjoying it, was my reward, my rest. But mark you, it was the reward of goodness and faithfulness. If I had been a disobedient boy, would I have had that reward? Would I have had that enjoyment? Would I have had the approval and the love of my mother? Never, never! So it is with us today. We must carry our burdens, and the burdens of others. We have always a double load on our shoulders, this makes it doubly heavy. Sometimes we nearly faint under it, the road seems to have no end, we are almost tempted to throw down the load, but can we? If we really desire to enter that beautiful city beyond the river of death, the load which God has given us, must be carried to the very end. We can drop that load when we come to the river, when the death angel tells us that it is enough and that our Father wants us to come home.