Consolation.
Consolation is the dropping of a gentle dew from heaven on desert hearts beneath; it is one of the choicest gifts of divine mercy.
Self-Examination.
"If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious." "If"—then there is a possibility that some may not have tasted that the Lord is gracious, and it is needful to inquire whether we are amongst the number who know the grace of God by heart-experience. There is no spiritual revelation which may not be a matter of heart-searching. At the very summit of holy delight we meet the challenge of sentinel "If"—"If ye then be risen with Christ;" and at the very bottom of the hill, even at Repentance-gate itself, He meets us with a warrant of arrest, until He sees whether our sorrow is the godly sorrow which needeth not to be repented of. "If thou be the Son of God," is not always a temptation of the devil, but often a very healthy inquiry, most fittingly suggested by holy anxiety to men who would build securely upon the Rock of Ages. At the Lord's Table itself it is proper for us to pray, "Lord, is it I?" when there is a Judas in the company; and after the most intimate fellowship, Christ exclaimed, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?" Let no enjoyment of ordinances, let no high and rapt fellowship which we may have known, exempt us from the great duty of proving ourselves whether we be in the faith. Examine yourselves then in this matter, and rest not satisfied until you can say, "There is no 'if' about it; I have tasted that the Lord is gracious."
Heaven an Inheritance.
"The inheritance of the saints." So then, heaven, with all its glories, is an inheritance. Now, an inheritance is not a thing which is bought with money, earned by labor, or won by conquest. If any man hath an inheritance, in the proper sense of that term, it came to him by birth. And thus it is with heaven. The man who shall receive this glorious heritage, will not obtain it by the works of the law, nor by the efforts of the flesh; it will be given to him as a matter of most gracious right, because he has been "begotten again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead;" and has thus become an heir of heaven by blood and birth. They who come unto glory are sons; for is it not written, "The Captain of our salvation bringeth many sons unto glory?" They come not there as servants; no servant has any right to the inheritance of his master. Be he never so faithful, yet is he not his master's heir. But because ye are sons—sons by the Spirit's regeneration—sons by the Father's adoption—because by supernatural energy ye have been born again, ye become inheritors of eternal life, and ye enter into the many mansions of our Father's house above. Let us always understand, then, when we think of heaven, that it is a place which is to be ours, and a state which we are to enjoy as the result of birth—not as the result of work. "Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." That kingdom being an "inheritance," until ye have the new birth ye can have no claim to enter it.