“He Will Wipe Away Every Tear”

John 16:20–22 ²¹When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. ²²So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

Birth pain explained by women is something that men will never experience.  I considered it a blessing to watch the birth of both of my children.  That experience was very special as I saw the miracle that God created through His creation of man and woman.  Though I could not imagine what their mother had gone through, I watched as her pain grew until I heard the cry of our child.  After hearing that cry my attention went straight to the miracle that the doctor was placing into my arms.  WOW! 

I can’t see how or why anyone who has witnessed the birth of his or her child takes new life for granted.  It is part of you and when you look back at the mother you can see she too was in awe of that miracle of life.  Whatever great pain she had suffered didn’t seem to leave any sign in her being as she also witnessed a closer connection to that miracle.

          The sorrow and pain a mother suffers, most mothers would say was worth every bit of the pain to bring into this world a precious innocent child of God’s miracle.  Then the child grows up…, we won’t say anymore about that.

          Though we all were born an innocent child, we were still born with a sinful nature.  It is the curse of the fall that Adam and Eve plunged us into because they did not like the censorship God put into place concerning the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. (Genesis 2:17).  From this time on all we live in the pains of birth, for now we must be born again, (John 3:3).  This new birth still has birth pains because we still live in this world. 

Where a mother nurtures her child through all of their hurts and pains, our pains after our rebirth is nurtured through the gospel of God.  We continue to live in the pains of this world.  This world’s misguidance and influence keeps us in our sinful nature playing on our desires to please ourselves.  And, strangely enough our sinful nature keeps this world in its sinful desires too.  What if we compared this world as being the new womb  and we are to be reborn to a new life?

Revelation 21:1–4 ¹Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ²And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

          We say we die when this life in this world is over.  If we are a believer in Christ’s resurrection instead of looking at our dying as an end we can look at it as life starting anew.  Life in a new world different than anything we had ever experienced before. 

In this new life we find ourselves looking at a new heaven that does not seem as far away as the stars of the old heaven and an earth that seems like heaven embracing us.  Now instead of being a child of a sinful world gone and no more, we are adults of a new relationship married to God with the vows of God’s care and love forever and ever.  We are now mature in our relationship with God leaving our childish ways in what has passed away.

Revelation 21:1–4 ³And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. ⁴He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

          Immanuel, God is with us, He will not just be an unseen thought or feeling.  We will see our Lord Jesus Christ and be with Him.  Christ walks with us now, but in the new world Christ will walk with us in His and our resurrection as we are all reborn to a new life.  All former things, all sin, sinful natures, worldly views, as well as mourning, crying, pain, sickness, and disease will have passed away.  But, our relationship with Yahweh will be greater as Yahweh wipes away our tears.

John 16:20–22 ²⁰Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.

          And as Christ our God and Lord wipes away our tears He will turn all of our sorrows into an eternal joy of life and relationship with Him for the rest of all eternity.  Amen.

Written by: Pastor Curtis A. May

Let us go forth in the Peace of our Lord and Serve the Lord who loved us first.