“There are representatives here today of many classes and conditions of society,” said the speaker, “the high and the low, the rich and the poor, the learned and the ignorant; but there is no eye that has not shed bitter tears, no life unacquainted with death, sorrow, crying, or pain.  Thank God for that glad coming day when He will wipe away all tears, when there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, nor pain; for these things shall have passed away!”

He spoke of the glimpse the Scripture gives of the city itself, the New Jerusalem, with its walls and gates.  “There is no language of earth by which its glories can be fully described,” he continued; “where our idea of beauty leaves off, there heaven begins!  Even its foundations are made of the rarest jewels we know.

“But heaven’s happiness consists not in mere outward things.  God is there, and the Lamb!  In God’s presence is fulness of joy, and at His right hand are to be found the truest pleasures for evermore.  There the redeemed out of every nation shall serve Him, and they shall see His face with no veil of time or sense between.

“This holy city will never be marred by the entering in of anything that defileth, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life shall behold and enjoy its splendor and happiness.

“I think I hear some poor soul say:  ‘Then there is no hope for me!’

“Yes, there is hope!

“‘But I have sinned!’

“That is true.  All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.  There is none righteous, no, not one.  We are by nature and practice strangers to God, even the new-born babe having wrapped up within its tiny bosom a sinful heritage and bias.  And the soul that sinneth shall die.  But sin can be put away, and its dreadful penalty escaped.  Shall I not tell you how?

“It is by the love and grace of our heavenly Father that we can be justified freely through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.  God loved us in our sin and rebellion, and sent His only-begotten Son to bring earth’s inhabitants back to Himself, that they might share the joys of the heavenly home.  Ere He came to earth, an angel of the Lord appeared and said His name should be called Jesus, for He should save His people from their sins.  When at length He was born, the angel appeared to the wondering shepherds on the hillside near Bethlehem, and said:  ’Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people:  for unto you is born this day a Saviour.’  He came to seek and save the lost.  For thirty years He lived a secluded but holy life at Nazareth.  Then for three years He went about doing good, working marvelous miracles and saying wonderful words.  At length they took Him, and crucified Him on Calvary!  ‘Behold,’ John had said, ’the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world!’ Do you not see how it is?  Christ died—­not for His own sins, for He was holy, harmless, undefiled, but for your sins and mine.  He bore our sins in His body on the cross.  Believe on Him, and you are saved!