The End of Sorrow (Revelation 21:1–5) - Radical

The End of Sorrow (Revelation 21:1–5)

Then I saw new heaven and the new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and the sea was no more. And I saw the Holy City, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And 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. He 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.”
– Revelation 21:1–5

Oh yes. What hope we have as followers of Jesus that there is coming a day when like a bride adorned for a husband, the imagery is just beauty and anticipation, as God will come back to us, will be with us, the dwelling place of God with man, we will dwell with him.

Revelation 21:1–5 reminds us that one day pain will be no more.

And he will wipe every tear from our eyes, and death will be gone forever and mourning will be gone forever. Crying will be gone forever. Pain will be gone forever. When you read that, don’t you just pray, come Lord Jesus, come quickly. And I just want to encourage anyone walking through mourning or crying or pain, anyone who is shedding tears at this point in this fallen world. Hold on to this hope. This day is coming and it’s coming very soon. One day, very soon, God himself is going to wipe those tears from your eyes and all those things, mourning, crying, pain, death itself will be gone.

Revelation 21:1–5 encourages us to praise God for his absolute upcoming redemption.

So God, we praise you for this hope. We praise you for Revelation 21, for this vision that you gave John, that you’re reminding us of right now in this moment that you’re coming back for us, that you’re going to dwell with us and us with you in perfect harmony and in perfect beauty and glory and grandeur and majesty and life. Oh Lord Jesus, we praise you for making this possible, for making this hope possible.

You are our living hope and we pray that you would help us just as we prayed in Revelation to endure with faith until this day, God, I do. I pray over those whose tears are fresh in their eyes right now, for those who are mourning, for those who are crying or in pain in any way in this fallen world, God, I pray fresh and full sense of hope over them today as they wait for the day when you’ll wipe those tears away from their eyes.

Prayer for the Gawli People

And oh God we know that every nation, tribe, tongue, and people is going to be gathered around your throne on that day. And so we pray that you would use our lives and even our prayers right now to bring that about. We pray for the Gawli people of India, 21,000 of them, no-known followers of Jesus. Oh God, we pray for the spread of this hope to the Gawli people of India that they might know this day is coming.

God, we pray for people who don’t have this hope because they’ve never even heard the gospel. God, we pray they would be reached with it and you would use our lives and our families and our churches toward that end. We love you God. We praise you for your word and we pray in anticipation of its fulfillment according to Revelation 2:1–5. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

David Platt

David Platt serves as a Lead Pastor for McLean Bible Church. He is also the Founder of Radical, an organization that makes Jesus known among the nations.

David received his B.A. from the University of Georgia and M.Div., Th.M., and Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Some of his published works include Radical, Radical Together, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Don’t Hold Back, and How to Read the Bible.

He lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area with his wife and children.

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