What Events in this World Echo in Eternity?
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00:00:05.000 | Marilynne Robinson, the modern day novelist, wrote a beautiful book titled Gilead, which
00:00:10.000 | won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
00:00:13.000 | And in one place in the book, she makes a striking statement.
00:00:15.000 | I want your thoughts on this, Pastor John.
00:00:17.000 | She writes this on page 52, "In eternity, this world will be Troy, I believe, and all
00:00:23.000 | that has passed here will be the epic of the universe, the ballad they sing in the streets,
00:00:27.000 | because I don't imagine any reality putting this one in the shade entirely, and I think
00:00:31.000 | piety forbids me to try."
00:00:34.000 | So what do you think?
00:00:35.000 | Will this life be a ballad of eternity?
00:00:37.000 | Obviously, there will be no tears, no regrets in heaven, but are there any biblical clues
00:00:42.000 | on the place of world history in eternity?
00:00:46.000 | I would love to know what she means by "piety forbids me to try."
00:00:51.000 | I know what I mean when I say yes to your question, because I agree with her, at least
00:00:59.000 | insofar as I understand her, I agree with her.
00:01:02.000 | When Troy is mentioned, not everybody might get that.
00:01:05.000 | Troy was the city that the Greek states were attacking to try to capture, and it was a
00:01:13.000 | ten-year conquest, and Homer wrote the Iliad about it, and the Iliad, I think, focuses
00:01:20.000 | pretty much on the last several weeks of that conquest, and Troy is captured, and so the
00:01:27.000 | bravery is heralded for generations to come, and the Odyssey is about the coming home of
00:01:35.000 | Odysseus, and so in other words, it's a great historical exploit that is told and written
00:01:43.000 | in poems for generations to come, and she's saying, "In the age to come, after Christ
00:01:49.000 | returns, and the kingdom is established, and the new heavens and the new earth are in place,
00:01:53.000 | the last thousands of years of church history that we are living in right now are going
00:01:59.000 | to be that, that balladry.
00:02:02.000 | They're going to be that, that, and I think that's right, so here's my reason.
00:02:07.000 | What is history for?
00:02:09.000 | What is history for?
00:02:11.000 | All your—this is Psalm 145—all your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord.
00:02:17.000 | All your saints shall bless you.
00:02:20.000 | They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom and tell of your power to make known to the
00:02:26.000 | children of man your mighty deeds and the glorious splendor of your kingdom."
00:02:30.000 | And I want to say, "What?
00:02:32.000 | They're just going to stop?
00:02:34.000 | All of that is magnificently worth heralding now, and it won't be magnificently worth heralding
00:02:40.000 | then?
00:02:41.000 | I don't think so."
00:02:45.000 | What does Christ's work mean?
00:02:50.000 | When I read in Revelation 5 that they are singing, "In heaven worthy are you to take
00:03:01.000 | the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed
00:03:06.000 | people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation."
00:03:10.000 | They're singing that ages after the event.
00:03:15.000 | In heaven, they're singing about the cross.
00:03:18.000 | Now, what meaning could the cross possibly have in heaven if the history of redemption
00:03:25.000 | is forgotten?
00:03:26.000 | Nothing.
00:03:27.000 | It will be meaningless.
00:03:29.000 | In other words, if you say, "What will be celebrated about Jesus Christ?"
00:03:34.000 | Surely, he will be celebrated for having fulfilled all the promises of the Old Testament.
00:03:40.000 | Surely, he will be celebrated in ways we've never seen by fulfilling everything the history
00:03:45.000 | of redemption was all about.
00:03:47.000 | Surely, he will be celebrated by being the ground and cause of every good thing that
00:03:51.000 | happened after him in the world.
00:03:54.000 | And so, if Christ really is the center, the apex of redemptive history, for that apex
00:04:00.000 | to have its meaning, then the rest of history of which it is the apex has to be known and
00:04:07.000 | understood and celebrated as well.
00:04:09.000 | And here's another pointer.
00:04:11.000 | Revelation 15.3, they sing in heaven, they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God
00:04:19.000 | and of the Lamb.
00:04:20.000 | Now, the song of Moses is Exodus 15, where they're singing about the triumphs of the
00:04:27.000 | people of God over Pharaoh.
00:04:29.000 | So, if we're singing about the Lamb and we're singing the song of Moses, surely that is
00:04:34.000 | symptomatic of singing the songs of the triumphs of God in world history right down to the
00:04:41.000 | salvation of Tony Ranke.
00:04:43.000 | Surely, right?
00:04:44.000 | Why would your story not be told and not be remembered to the praise and the glory of
00:04:49.000 | God?
00:04:50.000 | You're a trophy of grace.
00:04:51.000 | Well, I think those trophies are going to be walking around in the kingdom.
00:04:55.000 | And if you see a trophy on somebody's shelf, you say, "What's that?"
00:04:59.000 | And he tells you about the game, right?
00:05:01.000 | The game and the season when the trophy was won.
00:05:06.000 | Or here's another clue.
00:05:09.000 | "We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ," Paul says, "so that each one may
00:05:13.000 | receive his due from the body, what is good and what is evil."
00:05:17.000 | Well, if you're going to receive something for what was good, though the good is going
00:05:23.000 | to be remembered and something is going to happen to you that will constantly call to
00:05:27.000 | mind the good.
00:05:29.000 | So there's another evidence.
00:05:30.000 | Or the ten talents.
00:05:31.000 | You know, you're going to be serving over ten cities.
00:05:33.000 | I'll be serving over five cities.
00:05:35.000 | And there will be some explanation for that.
00:05:37.000 | And the explanation is it has roots back in this age.
00:05:42.000 | Now, I think you asked also, "Well, wait a minute.
00:05:46.000 | There's a lot of sad stuff in this age and he's going to wipe away every tear."
00:05:51.000 | Okay, here's my take.
00:05:54.000 | And you can say this is speculative maybe, but I don't think Jesus is going to wipe away
00:06:01.000 | tears of joy.
00:06:03.000 | When he says every tear will be wiped away, he means painful tear, tear that is destructive
00:06:09.000 | and hurtful and paralyzing.
00:06:12.000 | And it makes my life miserable to have these tears and these memories.
00:06:16.000 | But if my -- I mean, I'm sure most of our listeners will agree that the deepest joys
00:06:25.000 | have sometimes brought tears rather than laughter.
00:06:29.000 | Tears of stunned amazement that we've been treated so well and those tears aren't going
00:06:36.000 | to be wiped away.
00:06:37.000 | They're beautiful.
00:06:38.000 | You can see the sparkle of grace in those tears.
00:06:42.000 | And if you would ask me, "Well, will there be regrets?"
00:06:47.000 | Hmm.
00:06:49.000 | You know, for years, I have tried to put together two texts that I think gives an answer to
00:06:55.000 | this.
00:06:56.000 | One is Philippians 3 where it says, "Forgetting what lies behind."
00:07:00.000 | We strain forward to the goal.
00:07:02.000 | So you're supposed to forget what lies behind.
00:07:04.000 | And the other is Ephesians 2 that says, "Remember that you were once separated from Christ."
00:07:10.000 | So you've got a command to forget and a command to remember.
00:07:13.000 | How do you put those together?
00:07:14.000 | I put them together like this.
00:07:17.000 | "Every regret and every memory will be done away with that cannot serve your greater joy."
00:07:27.000 | Cannot serve your greater love for Jesus, your greater valuing of grace.
00:07:34.000 | So he will wipe away every way of remembering, every way of regretting that ruins your joy
00:07:43.000 | in heaven and minimizes his mercy and minimizes his glory.
00:07:50.000 | But I think, Tony, that Marilyn Robinson is right that we have a great Troy in redemptive
00:08:00.000 | history, and God will see to it that all the mighty works of grace done in the thousands
00:08:06.000 | of years leading up to the second coming will not be forgotten.
00:08:10.000 | And yes, she's probably right that piety should prevent us from wanting it to be forgotten.
00:08:17.000 | Yes. Thank you, Pastor John.
00:08:18.000 | And thank you for listening to this podcast.
00:08:20.000 | Email your questions to us at AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org.
00:08:23.000 | You can visit us online at DesiringGod.org to find thousands of books, articles, sermons,
00:08:26.000 | and other resources from John Piper, all free of charge.
00:08:29.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke.
00:08:30.000 | Thanks for listening.
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