In the sermon 'No More Suffering' by Scott Brown, the focus is on Revelation 21, which describes a new heaven and a new earth where suffering ceases to exist. The sermon emphasizes six things that are absent in heaven: tears, death, sorrow, crying, pain, and the former things. Brown discusses the purpose of suffering on earth, highlighting that suffering is part of God's redemptive plan and serves to mature believers, bring them closer to God, and glorify God. He outlines how suffering can teach endurance, build faith, and promote obedience, drawing parallels between earthly suffering and the concept of 'bringing heaven down.' Brown encourages believers to view suffering as an opportunity for spiritual growth and a foretaste of the joy and peace in heaven. The sermon challenges Christians to avoid letting earthly concerns overshadow the promise of heaven and to let their experiences on earth reflect the heavenly realm.

Please find Revelation 21, we'll be reading verses 1-6, Revelation 21, 1-6. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient sweeter than honey word of God verse 1 now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no more sea. Then I, John, 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 heaven saying, Behold the tabernacle of God is with men and he will dwell with them and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God.

And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away. Then he who sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me, Write, for these words are true and faithful.

Let's pray. Oh Lord, thank you for giving us visions of heaven and earth, of your intentions for mankind, for the goodness of your infinite mercy. Oh Lord help us to taste it today Amen Please be seated We've been speaking about things that are in heaven and today we'll be focusing on what is not in heaven. There are six things that are listed here. They're not in heaven.

No more tears, No more death, no more sorrow, no more crying, nor more pain. And the former things have passed away. Those six things are not in heaven. So we're working through the doctrine of heaven. We'll be spending the fall of 2022 in this marvelous section of scripture, most likely all the way to the end of the year in these two chapters, Revelation 21 and 22.

And why would we do such a thing? First of all, we are in Revelation. We are in the book of the unveiling and this is the most comprehensive section in the unveiling of heaven, the doctrine of heaven in the Bible. And so we're involved in an expository preaching on Sunday mornings, and we work through these texts as they come. We're going to be going slowly through this text.

A friend of mine was at a conference a couple of days ago and he texted me a statement by one of the preachers there. Heaven comes down when the word of God dominates. Heaven comes down. And that's what we really desire, to bring the words of heaven down to earth, into our hearts, to see those words working themselves out. Now of course, when we come to a passage of scripture, we ought to think one thing, we ought to say one thing, and that is that God is shepherding this flock.

God is leading this flock through the wilderness and God is leading us through this passage of scripture. God shepherds his people through his word and of course you know in the preaching of the Word of God, it's really designed to move a human heart from one position to another. It's designed to instruct the mind. It's designed to help the emotions operate properly according to heaven not earth and so the Word of God is meant to shepherd our souls and God is shepherding this church through this He's shepherding me through this as well. I've just recognized I haven't spent as much time really understanding heaven like I ought to.

And God wants to, I think, sweeten our journey together, the journey to heaven as a result of what we have here. We've been saying over and over again, we've been repeating the words of Jesus that he taught his disciples to pray on earth as it is in heaven. Earth is meant to reflect heaven and I've been thinking at hope as it is in heaven, at hope church as it is in heaven. That's really what the purpose of the word of God is. We've been saying that heaven is a magnet.

Heaven is a magnet to encourage us here and earth is a foretaste. Earth is a foretaste of what we will be experiencing in the perfected state. Everything on earth is a foretaste of heaven. It doesn't matter where you look, you're going to see some foretaste of heaven. God is so amazing to just lay before us hundreds and hundreds of images of things on earth that point to heaven.

And what a marvelous thing it is to know a God who gives you four tastes and tastes of heaven in this world. And that heaven is a magnet. And I'm just hoping that all of us would get magnetized even more magnetized to heaven than we have been now this passage speaks about the removal of suffering which implies that there is suffering on the earth. We all know that in God's redemptive plan as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. In the middle, he has ordained suffering.

It is God who has ordained suffering. It is actually suffering that is the source of our salvation, the suffering of Jesus Christ. To be mature in this world is to understand that we live in a world of suffering, but what do you do in a world of suffering? How do you interact with suffering? How do you think about it?

How does it affect you? You know, it's also, it's very important that we teach our children how to suffer. And I hope this passage is helpful. I don't know how many times I've been with a man who was in a tough spot because he got fired from his job. And while it pains me that something like that might happen, I almost always lead that man in the same direction.

I said, brother, this is your finest hour. You get to teach your children how a man, how a holy man gets fired from a job. You lost all of your money. This is your finest hour, brother. You get to teach your children what it means and how to walk through losing everything that you had.

You're sick. You get to teach your children. This is your finest hour, brother, because God actually has ordained that we bring heaven down in the midst of our sufferings. I quoted Charles Spurgeon last week, I'll do it again. If we don't get to heaven before we die, we shall never get there afterwards.

Heaven ought to be found in us before we are found in heaven is, I think, one of the most critical things. You know, the things that we see on earth are pointers, they're landmarks, they're foretastes. I think that's why Charles Spurgeon called the day of rest the day the Lord's Day. He said these are the whisperings of heaven's melody born by winds from afar. What we have today is just a foretaste of the rest that we have in heaven because it's saying it's also true with pain and suffering and our pain points us to heaven And it's so important that we learn how to suffer from God, not from our own hearts.

We all grow up learning how to suffer from different instructors. Our own hearts are almost always the worst instructors, But we have other people that we learn from. We have fathers and mothers. Maybe they didn't suffer very well. Maybe we have friends who don't suffer in the way that God has ordained for them to suffer because they don't really understand the doctrine of the fall and suffering and this world that God has created for suffering.

Don't follow your heart when you're experiencing suffering. That's the worst thing you can do. Let the word of God guide you. God tells us that suffering is for our benefit. How about that?

God tells us that suffering is for our benefit. We are always on a journey to learn to think differently about our lives, differently than the way that we were brought up. Now, in this new heavens and new earth, God is making all things new. This is the endpoint of this trajectory. The trajectory toward no pain and no suffering is the trajectory that we experience on earth.

Earth is a foretaste because on earth God is drying your tears. On earth God is softening your sorrows. On earth God is walking with you. He is with you. And God saves us, and it is a little piece of heaven because God breaks the power of sin, and then he begins this process, this progress of the soul toward heaven.

As God deals with remaining sin in our lives, he's taking us toward heaven. He's giving us a little taste of heaven all along the way. And he's taking us to the place that there is no pain. This is why the new birth is a picture of heaven. In the new birth, you're cleansed.

In the new birth, you're forgiven. In the new birth, you have a new life. All things are made new, the power of sin is broken and you're new, but not in its perfected state. So this is the Christian doctrine of suffering. And it's very important that a church understands the doctrine of suffering.

And because how we think about suffering tells us how we think about the meaning of the universe and the meaning of life itself. And it's just so critical that we understand and that our children understand that God created the world and it was good. And yet sin entered into the world through Adam. And since Adam sinned, the world is under a sentence of death. It's normal to see the sentences of death that fall upon all in the human family.

But there will be a renewed earth and a new heaven. And the details are all laid out here in this passage of scripture. Now next week we'll get to this, but even in verse eight, we learn that God uses even the ungodly to point us to heaven, to give us another magnet to heaven. We'll get to that next week. The ungodly are a foretaste of fire and brimstone.

God wants to draw us away from that fire and brimstone and to say the kingdom of heaven is at hand and you can have it now And you can step into everlasting life now When a person becomes a Christian they have everlasting life and they have already entered into everlasting joy. And there'll be struggles with that joy on earth, but it will be fully consummated in heaven. And that Joy will be made fuller than it ever was Jesus says Your joy will be made full on earth, but it'll be even more full in heaven and So this past this section is like every section in Revelation. It's a revelation of Jesus Christ. What does it mean to have Jesus Christ?

What is he like? Because Revelation, the book of Revelation, is a revelation of Jesus Christ. It tells us of his majesty and his love and his goodness. And here we learn that your tears are wiped away and you have this theology of pain that's implied here. Now if we don't understand what God is doing through suffering, then we might spend our lives responding to suffering in a wrong way, in a harmful way.

It's easy for us to respond to our suffering sinfully. It's easy to respond to our suffering sinfully, angrily even, hopelessly, even resentfully. But it's actually meant for our good. Our suffering is meant for our good. This is what the Bible teaches.

You don't get this teaching in the self-help books, but you get realism from God. You know, I was reading in Isaiah this last week in Isaiah 38, when Hezekiah is on his deathbed, he is on his deathbed and God is making it very clear he's going to die. And he turns to the Lord and he prays. And I was reading Matthew Henry's commentary on that section. And this took me like a thunderstorm.

Matthew Henry said, afflictions are sent to bring us to our Bibles and to our knees. That's why afflictions are sent. To send us running to God. The sufferings of this world are really gateways. They're gateways to joy, gateways to intimacy with God.

You know, Job said it like this in Job 23 verse 10. He said, he knows the way that I take, and when he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold. When he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold. That's sort of the biblical doctrine of suffering jammed up into one sentence. All of our sufferings are meant to display the love of Jesus Christ and the work of the soul.

This is why it's so important that you turn to Jesus Christ, because you're able to drink of heaven's streams on earth in the midst of your sufferings. Thomas Brooks was speaking of the vast difference between the Christian and the non-Christian in suffering. And he says, He illustrates it by the difference between a bee and a fly. The difference between a Christian and a non-Christian in suffering is the difference between a bee and a fly. A bee can suck honey out of a flower, which a fly cannot.

And a Christian can experience great gain from his sufferings in a way that a non-Christian cannot. You've been to funerals, I've been to funerals. You can almost always tell the difference between the believers and the unbelievers. The unbelievers they suffer hard. The believers they suffer sweetly and humbly and dependently.

They do suffer but they suffer different. It's because they can suck honey out of the flower and the fly cannot. And so, you know, we are told to set our minds on the things above, not on the things that are on the earth. And the reason for that is that our hearts get so gummed up with the things of this earth that we can't see through the tears from our sufferings. You know, I'm reading a book with some of our young people by John Flavel and on Friday night we read about the heart clogged up with worldly things and there's this remarkable quote from John Flavel in his book, Keeping the Heart.

He says this, they shut out much of heaven from us at present. The things of this world are just preoccupation with ourselves and our pride and what we want to accumulate and who we want to be and all this. He says these things shut out much of heaven from us at present. So they're things that clog up earth coming to heaven. That's what he's saying.

They shut out much of heaven from us at present, though they may not shut us out of heaven at last. He's talking about the Christian, who because of his concerns about himself, heaven is sort of clogging, the things of the world are sort of clogging His sense of heaven and source of help in this world. So let's get into this text here. No more tears. Tears are wiped away.

And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Now the language that the Lord uses is striking. It means to blot out, to wash, to obliterate, to cover, to erase. They are no more. No more tears from the abandonments, no more tears from the losses, no more tears from the calamities in your family.

All of those tears will be wiped away. I was reading that women cry four times more than men. How about that? You already knew that, didn't you? Actually, female tear glands are constructed differently.

They're actually different physiologically. Women are supposed to cry. They cry more than men for some reason. They have the capacity for it. But in heaven, God will wipe away every tear from your eyes.

Spurgeon said, we may forget to laugh but we will always know how to weep on the earth. We'll always know how. But God will wipe every tear from your eye. Have you ever heard of tear bottles? Apparently in the ancient world, people would manufacture tear bottles and mourners would be hired and they would collect tears in the bottles.

Little bottles, you can, they find them in archeological digs in the Middle East today. The Victorian era did the same thing. In the Victorian era, they would put tears in the bottles and then they would plug them up, but eventually they'd dry out. And when they would dry out, then the morning would end. That was the principle in the Victorian era.

But God will wipe away every tear from your eye. Thomas Brooks, he wrote a book called Heaven on Earth. One of the young ladies in our church recommended this book to me just the other day and I couldn't help but read it. Heaven on Earth by Thomas Brooks. Here's what he says, all saints shall enjoy a heaven when they leave this earth.

Some saints enjoy heaven while they are here on the earth that saints might enjoy two heavens. He says that's what this book is about. Enjoy two heavens. You can enjoy two heavens here and there. I really do think that's one reason why Jesus said that we should pray for his kingdom to be done on earth as it is in heaven.

We can experience two heavens. You don't have to be stuck with hell on earth. That's one of the beautiful powers of the gospel of Jesus. That's how good he is. No more tears.

We already understand the impulse to wipe away a tear. It happens all the time. Someone begins to weep, and you give them a handkerchief. You want to dry their tears. We all know that.

Every parent knows that. Every parent has dried tears this week already many times. You want to dry the tears of your children. That's what good fathers and mothers do. They want to dry tears.

This is God, God wants to dry your tears on earth as it is in heaven. You know, our family was taking a walk one evening last week and I challenged some of the little ones to race as I often do. I can still beat the little ones. So I challenged them to a race and we took off. But in the race, somehow, I don't know how this happened in the race was a wagon with another child.

That well, this or their 18 of us taking this walk. I mean, no, I mean, 18 children, 18 children under 12 are taking a walk. And so the race begins. And coming down the line was this wagon. And the one, you know, pulling the wagon didn't see the child ahead and just slammed that child right down on the ground on the asphalt, started crying, tears.

I jumped over there as fast as I could, I picked her up, and I'm telling her, her daddy was there in a nanosecond. Why? Why? To dry the tears. Every good father wants to dry the tears of his children on earth as it is in heaven.

You can experience two heavens, one on earth and then way, way far superior in heaven. David said weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning. Don't wallow in your tears. God wants to dry your tears. Some people they glory in wallowing in their tears, and they wallow in their tears their entire life long.

It's a very sad thing. Thomas More in a poem said, Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal. Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal because his kingdom can come on earth as it is in heaven David with all of his troubles with all of his sorrows in Psalm 116 his soul is talking to his soul. Return to your rest, oh my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you, for you have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, and my feet from falling. David knew what it was like to have his tears dried and so can all of us because the Lord is near to those who are brokenhearted and he saves those who are of a contrite spirit.

That's why Jesus said, blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. Because you can experience two heavens, one here and one on earth. No more tears, no more death, no more death. Well, the Bible says that you already have died and your life is hidden with Christ and God, but he's talking about physical death here. And you know, people around us have died, will die of cancer.

Diabetes is the ninth leading cause of death. Heart diseases, lung diseases, they kill 41 million people. They're called NCDs, non-communicable diseases. They kill an enormous amount of people. But even death, even death points to heaven.

Death points to the death of the Son of God and the rescue of sinners. John 11 26, Jesus said, you'll never die. I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die it's Christ that makes the dead man live in first Corinthians 15 21 for since by man came death By man also came the resurrection of the dead for as in Adam all die even so in Christ all shall be made alive Why because death is swallowed up in victory Death is swallowed up in the victory of the resurrection.

And you can have the victory over death in this life. You can experience two heavens. The Bible says that when you're converted, you are immediately transferred into everlasting life. And it's like you just kind of step over a line when you die. No more sorrow.

No more grieving, no more mourning, no more mourning the losses, the loss of material things, the loss of reputation. Mourning something that somebody did to you. Mourning for something that you did, and you're so sorry for it. You know, I've known people who, they just can't get over what they did. And it often grieves me because they've been forgiven, they've been set free.

They've been set free from the law of sin and death. Jesus said, blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. God, God heals sorrows. He sets himself to do such a thing. No more crying.

The word that the Lord uses here is a really strong guttural term. It means to croak, to utter a loud guttural sound like the croaking of ravens. It's a loud cry of distress. And the same terminology is used of the cries of the children of Israel in Egypt because the famine was so severe they cried out and in Exodus 5 8 the same word is used for the Israelites in Egypt under Pharaoh and their harsh taskmasters they were Pharaoh's demanding more bricks with less straw. And Pharaoh complains of their cry to go and worship God.

They were crying out to go worship God. No more crying. Samuel Rutherford speaks of the meaning of the crying that we have in this world. It's the Lord's kindness that he will take the scum off us in the fire. Who knows how needy we are for God to winnow us?

Who knows how much dross there is? He says, so narrow is the entry to heaven that our knots, our bunches, our lumps of pride and self-love and idle love must be hammered off of us. And then he says, oh, what I owe to the file, to the hammer, to the furnace of my Lord Jesus Christ. Because suffering is meant to give you actually a foretaste of heaven. Suffering is a foretaste in God's plan for suffering.

Now there's No more pain, there shall be no more pain. No more pain in childbirth. No more headaches, how about that? No more ringing in the ears. No more injuries from accidents.

No more back pain, no more inflammation. No more abdominal pain. No more arthritis, no more strokes, no more heart attacks, no more kidney diseases. But there's also emotional pain. Emotional pain may feel worse.

And we, you know, we manage pain in our era like no other time in history. All of the antidepressants, the aspirin, the ibuprofen, the Tylenol, the hydrocodone, the acupuncture, the nerve blockers, the nerve blockers, electrical shock, the psychotropic drugs. We manage pain here. We're going to manage pain here in this world. Mood stabilizers, anti-anxiety drugs.

I mean, broken hearts are sometimes just the worst pains. And then finally, the former things, the sixth thing that was not in heaven. The former things have passed away. All of the effects of the fall. I think that's like a summary statement, the former things.

And the groanings of the fall, all the groanings of the fall, whatever they might be are gone. So that's what's not in heaven. But earth is a foretaste of heaven. Earth is is, earth points us to heaven. And heaven is that magnet to draw us into heaven on earth.

Now, let's drop back a little bit and talk about suffering. Suffering comes for four reasons. The first reason is the general curse of the fall. The whole creation groans and our bodies groan under the weight. The second reason for suffering is it's the result of sinful behavior.

Some of our pains are inflicted because of disobedience could have to do with taking poor care of our bodies, lack of self-control, sexual sins can have tremendous effect on your body because they are actually sins against the body, so the apostle Paul says. In 1 Corinthians 11, we learn that some are in pain because they've been taking the Lord's Supper in an unworthy manner. They're fake. In Acts chapter five, verses one through 11, there is the death of Ananias and Sapphira, who lied to the church. In Psalm 32, David tells us that our physical condition can be weakened by our lack of honestly dealing with sin, our own sin.

He says, when I kept silent about my sin, my bones grew old through all my groaning all the day long for your hand was heavy upon me my vitality was turned into the drought of summer so the second reason may be our own sin the third reason for refinement for our own refinement the Bible makes us very clear for our chastening Hebrews 12 4 through 7 says that for whom the Lord loves, he chastens, and he scourges every son whom he receives. It's for refinement, it's for turning. The fourth reason, and this is the all-encompassing reason for suffering, that is for the glory of God. Suffering is designed to glorify God. If you're in suffering, God designed it to glorify God.

You would find how you might glorify God in your suffering. You know, in John nine, verses one through 38, we read of the man who was born blind, he was blind, and people wanted to know why he was blind, and they said, who sinned, this man or his parents? This was a question of Jesus. Okay, somebody sinned, or else this man wouldn't be blind. And Jesus said, neither.

In order that the works of God might be displayed in him. He was born blind so that the glory of God would be manifested in him, that the works of God would be manifested in him. That's why he was born blind. I read a book a couple of weeks ago called viewing sickness biblically The author says this our sickness is not out of control It is not random. It is not purposeless our loving Lord uses sickness in our lives for good He uses sickness to progressively sanctify and conform us to his image.

So as it turns out there are there are two heavens and suffering on earth brings glory to God and points us to God. And the Bible actually tells us that there is a benefit to sickness. It's beneficial to the believer. It's Suffering draws the Christian closer to God into deeper intimacy. How so?

I'll give you seven ways the Bible teaches this. Seven ways. First of all, the Bible teaches that suffering is helpful, is good, because He deals with our pride in our suffering. In St. Corinthians 12, seven, the apostle teaches us that suffering was designed for dampening his pride to humble him.

Verse seven, St. Corinthians 12, and lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. Why would God give the Apostle Paul what he called a thorn in the flesh and we don't even know what it is? And he cried out to God to take it away and God didn't take it away. And why didn't God take it away?

Because God wanted to sweeten Saul's spirit by keeping him from exalting himself. Here's the question. How is, think about your own suffering. I don't know how you're suffering, but if you are, here's a question. How is my suffering humbling me and bringing heaven down?

How is my suffering bringing heaven down? Here's the second, the second way that God uses suffering. God, in Romans five verses three through four, Romans five, three through four. In Romans five, three through four, we learn that suffering is very helpful to the soul. It's good for the soul because it teaches endurance and it exposes the love of God.

And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations knowing that tribulation produces perseverance. That's the first thing tribulation is good for and Perseverance character and Character hope Now hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit that was given to us. So here's the question, if you're suffering, how is my suffering growing hope and reminding me of the love of God? How is my suffering growing hope and bringing down the love of God. Suffering was designed to bring heaven down.

Third, the third way that God describes suffering is helpful, is because God uses suffering to call you into greater obedience. Suffering can change your life by increasing your desire for obedience. Sometimes suffering makes us more disobedient and more resentful and more hurt and everything like that, but it wasn't meant for that. David says in Psalm 1, 1967, before I was afflicted, I went astray. But now, since I've been afflicted, I keep your word.

Affliction is designed to make us more obedient. In fact, in Hebrews 5, 8, we're told that Christ learned obedience through suffering. Christ learned obedience through suffering, and so does the Christian. William Grinnell, the English Puritan, he wrote this. He said, God would not rub so hard if it were not to fetch out the dirt that is ingrained in our natures.

God loves purity so well that he would rather see a hole than a spot in his child's garments. He's rubbing out disobedience through suffering. The fourth way that suffering is helpful. It builds faith, suffering builds faith. Isn't this amazing?

The Bible has such unusual things to say about suffering. You know, the world will tell you, feel your pain, Tell me about it. God says, this is actually gonna be really good for you. James 1 verse 2, speaks that suffering builds our faith, makes us complete. My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials.

How about that? Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience, but patience, but let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. God is using suffering to build your faith. You know, Thomas Watson, he said, The more you cut a diamond, the more it sparkles. Here's the question.

How is your suffering that you in this church today, how is your suffering growing your faith and bringing heaven down. It was meant to grow your faith and bring heaven down. That's why God sent it. He didn't send it to hurt you, he sent it to help you. Fifth, 1 Peter 4, 12 and 13.

Suffering is making you more like Christ. Suffering teaches about Christ's sufferings. First Peter 412, beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery ordeal which is to try you as though some strange thing happened to you but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings that when his glory is revealed you may also be glad with exceeding joy when you suffer your sharing in the sufferings of Christ you you I hate to say it this way, but you're connecting with Him in your sufferings. Suffering unifies us with Christ in a way that prosperity never can. And our Lord experienced the whole range of suffering.

Some of you are experiencing these things now. Hunger, thirst, betrayal, mockery. He was belittled, he was beaten up. Although I don't think anybody's been flogged in our church lately or nails driven or they haven't been stabbed by spears. They haven't been stripped naked before a gaping crowd.

These were Christ's sufferings. You know, just yesterday, I was working around our farm and I was very frustrated with the machine. And I was walking back to my house, just gnashing my teeth at this stupid machine. And I thought, You're gnashing your teeth at a machine? I'm thinking, you don't even know what suffering is.

You know, this is suffering to you? Jesus Christ suffered. And we enter into the fellowship of his sufferings. You know, often we complain in our suffering and we're so shallow, just like I was yesterday. So ridiculously shallow, thinking that this is suffering when it isn't.

Here's the question. Well, I don't know what you're suffering with, but how is your suffering making you closer to the Lord Jesus and bringing heaven down? How is the suffering increasing your communion with the Lord? Sixth, suffering makes you more resilient, it's good. Makes you way more resilient.

It teaches you to be content in all circumstances. You can get through anything. You can get through prosperity, you can get through loss, you can get through everything. With God, you can get through everything. You don't have to worry about anything because with God, He will get you through everything.

I hope you believe that. I'm so thankful for God and his word to teach me things like that. Philippians 411, not that I speak in regard to need, but I have learned in whatever state I am to be content. I know how to be abased and I know how to abound everywhere and in all things, all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. So often The things that we call sufferings are just Not We are so prosperous we're so comfortable in this world that the slightest thing throws us down But Paul says I can get through everything Here's the question. I don't know what your suffering is. How is your suffering making you more resilient to bring heaven down? How is it making you able to prevail in all things?

Like the Lord Jesus. Number seven, the goodness of suffering according to God, God teaches you how to comfort others in your suffering. It's good because it helps you, it helps you know how to comfort other people. St. Corinthians one verses three through 11, verse three.

Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and God of all comfort who comforts us in our tribulation. That's heaven coming down. He comforts us in our tribulation. Why? Why does he do that?

Why did God send that tribulation into your life? That we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble With the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God for as the sufferings of Christ abound in us so our consolation also abounds through Christ okay question I don't know what you're suffering with, but is your suffering making you better able to comfort? Maybe God sent you suffering today for a sufferer tomorrow that you can be a blessing to. That's bringing heaven down. Spurgeon suffered from so many painful conditions of gout.

He had burning, kidney inflammation. He was sick from his early 30s all the way to the end of his life till he died. He had a lifelong battle with depression. He was out of the pulpit about one third of the time because he was sick. He writes.

When the gold knows why and wherefore it's in the fire, it will thank the refiner for putting it into the crucible and will find a sweet satisfaction even in the flames. He says, the good I've received from my sorrows and pains and griefs is altogether incalculable. Affliction is the best bit of furniture in my house. It is the best book in a minister's library. In a minister's library.

So there are many things that are not in heaven that are now on earth. Those things that are not in heaven are meant to come to earth in the midst of our sufferings. There will be no more tears there, but God has also said that he will dry your tears here. There will be no more death there, but Jesus says you will never die here There'll be no sorrow In heaven and God has set himself to come for you in your sorrows and he wants to send your fellow believers to you to do the same. And there's no more crying in heaven, but God will help you not to cry your whole life long over one thing that happened.

And there'll be no more pain because God will comfort you in your pains here. And you'll rejoice with exceeding joy in heaven Because all these things will be protected, perfected in heaven. Okay, so the former things will pass away. In the meantime, Bring heaven down. In the meantime, let your sufferings bring glory to God.

Don't wallow in them. See the good in them. Take the advantage. Take the greatest advantage of your sufferings. Somebody said, don't waste your cancer.

Don't waste your pain. Don't waste your tears. Don't waste your crying. Don't waste the slanders and the losses of this world, don't waste them. You know, there's really only one thing that matters, and that is to bring heaven down.

There's only one thing that matters and that's the way to put away the frivolous things of our lives. The roots of bitterness. Put them away. The wrong responses to the hand of God. Anything that corrupts, put them away.

Don't clog heaven. Don't clog heaven out. You might go to heaven, but you can clog it out while you're on earth at this time. A Christian, a Christian can clog out heaven by filling his mind with all kinds of silly, ridiculous things. Fill your mind with things of heaven.

Set your mind on the things above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Bring heaven down. One last time, Spurgeon. If we don't get to heaven before we die, we shall never get there afterwards. Let's pray.

Oh Lord, you are our rock, you are our redeemer. The streams on earth we taste, will taste even more above. Lord, we're just so thankful that you are a deliverer and you deliver us in our tears and our crying. You deliver us from our sorrows. You deliver us from our pains.

You're such a kind deliverer. You dry tears. You soften our sorrows. You forget our sins. You are so kind, Lord.

What a joy it is to be in your kingdom. What a beautiful kingdom. And Lord, I pray that this church, that I, all of us together would be more heavenly minded so that we might be more earthly good, that in this church, everyone would be downloading heaven. Amen.