The Mourners' Comforter -- Susannah Spurgeon
The Lord GOD will wipe away tears from off all faces. Isaiah 25:8
I have sometimes wondered if that glorious arch, encircling the very throne of God, can be typical of the transformation of earth's sorrows into heavenly joys - a lovely symbol of the shining of God's pardoning love upon the rain of tears from mortal eyes, for sin, and suffering, and death. There can be no rainbow without showers, you know, and certainly there can be no weeping in heaven; so, may it not be that the Lord has put this 'appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain' in his high and holy place, as a token to us that all the tears we shed on earth are reflected up in heaven, and gleam there in fair colours, as light of his love to us in Christ Jesus falls tenderly upon them? 'I have seen your tears', he says, 'they shall all be wiped away some day.'
The salt drops which steal down our cheeks through physical suffering - wrung from our eyes by mortal pain and weakness are all seen by our loving Lord; they are put into his bottle; his purpose concerning them shall be manifest when their mission is accomplished, and then the source from whence they sprang shall be forever dried up. 'God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.'
And with what inconceivable tenderness shall the bitter tears caused by bereavement be wiped away when we get home!
