552. Music in Heaven

Music in Heaven

Rev_5:9 : ’93And they sung a new song.’94

Nearly all the cities of Europe and America have conservatories of music, and associations, whose object it is, by voice and instrument, to advance the art of sweet sounds. On Thursday nights, Exeter Hall, of London, used to resound with the music of first-class performers, who gave their services gratuitously to the masses, who came in with free tickets, and huzzaed at the entertainment. In Berlin, at eleven o’92clock, daily, the military band, with sixty or one hundred instruments performs at the royal opera-house for the people. On Easter Sunday, in Dresden, the boom of cannon, and the ringing of bells, bring multitudes to the churches to listen to the organ peals, and the inspiring sounds of trumpet and drum. When the great fair-day of Leipsic comes, the bands of music, from far and near, gather in the street, and bewilder the ear with incessant playing of flute and horn, violin and bassoon. At Dusseldorf, once a year, the lovers of music assemble, and for three or four days wait upon the great singing festivals, and shout at the close of the choruses; and greet the successful competitors as the prizes are distributed’97cups and vases of silver and gold. All our American cities at times resound with orchestra and oratorio. Those who can sing well or play skilfully upon instruments are greeted with vociferation, and applauded by excited admirers.

There are many whose most ecstatic delight is to be found in listening to sweet melodies; and all the splendor of celestial gates and all the lusciousness of twelve manner of fruits and all the rush of floods from under the throne of God, would not make a heaven for them if there were no great and transporting harmonies. Passing along our streets in the hour of worship, you hear the voice of sacred melody, although you do not enter the building. And passing along the street of heaven, we hear, from the temple of God and the Lamb, the breaking forth of the magnificent jubilate. We may not yet enter in among the favored throng, but God will not deny us the pleasure of standing awhile on the outside to hear. John listened to it, a great while ago, and ’93they sung a new song.’94

Let none aspire to that blessed place who have no love for this exercise, for although it is many ages since the thrones were set and the harps were strung, there has been no cessation in the song, excepting once for about thirty minutes; and, judging from the glorious things now occurring in God’92s world, and the ever-accumulating triumphs of the Messiah, that was the last half-hour that heaven will ever be silent.

Mark the fact that this was a new song. Sometimes I have in church been floated away upon some great choral, in which all our people seemed to mingle their voices; and I have, in the glow of my emotions said, surely this is music good enough for heaven. Indeed I do not believe that ’93Luther’92s Hymn’94 or ’93Coronation’94 or ’93Old Hundred’94 or ’93Mount Pisgah’94 would sound ill if spoken by sainted lips, or struck from seraphic harps. There are many of our fathers and mothers in glory who would be slow to shut heaven’92s gate against these old-time harmonies. But this, we are told, is a new song. Some of our greatest anthems and chorals are adaptations of other tunes’97the sweetest parts of them gathered up into the harmony; and I have sometimes thought that this ’93new song’94 may be partly made up of sweet strains of earthly music mingled in eternal choral. But it will, after all, be a new song. This I do know, that in sweetness and power it will be something that ear never heard. All the skill of the oldest harpers of heaven will be poured into it. All the love of God’92s heart will ring from it. In its cadences the floods will clap their hands, and it will drop with the sunlight of everlasting day, and breathe with odors from the blossoms of the tree of life. ’93A new song’94’97just made for heaven.

Many earthly songs are written by composers just for the purpose of making a tune; and the land is flooded with note-books in which really valuable tunes are the exception. But once in a while a man is wrought up by some great spectacle or moved by some terrible agony or transported by some exquisite gladness, and he sits down to write a tune or a hymn in which every note or every word is a spark struck from the forge of his own burning emotions. So Mendelssohn wrote and so Beethoven and so Charles Wesley. Cowper, depressed with misfortunes until almost insane, but afterward comforted until he could write for himself and write for the ages,

God moves in a mysterious way,

His wonders to perform;

He plants his footsteps in the sea,

And rides upon the storm.

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,

The clouds ye so much dread

Are big with mercy, and shall break

In blessings on your head.

Mozart composed his own requiem, and said to his daughter Emily, ’93Play that’94; and while Emily was playing the requiem, Mozart’92s soul went up on the wave of his own music into glory. Emily looked around, and her father was dead.

This new song of heaven was not composed because heaven had nothing else to do, but Christ, in memory of cross and crown, of manger and throne, of earth and heaven, and wrought upon by the raptures of the great eternity, poured this from his heart, made it for the armies of heaven to shout in celebration of victory, for worshipers to chant in their temple services, for the innumerable home circles of heaven to sing in the house of many mansions. If a new tune be started in church, there is only here and there a person who can sing it. It is some time before the congregation learns a tune. But not so with the new song of heaven. The children who went up today from the waters of the Ganges are now singing it. That Christian man or woman, who, a few minutes ago, departed from this very street, has joined it. All know it’97those by the gate, those on the river-bank, those in the temple. Not feeling their way through it or halting or going back, as if they had never before sung it, but with a full round voice they throw their soul into this new song. If some Sabbath-day a few notes of that anthem should travel down the air, we could not sing it. No organ could roll its thunder. No harp could catch its trill. No lip could announce its sweetness. Transfixed, lost, enchanted, dumb, we could not bear it’97the faintest note of the new song. Yet, while I speak, heaven’92s cathedral quakes under it, and seas of glory bear it from beach to beach, and ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, sing it’97’94the new song.’94

Further, it is a commemorative song. We are distinctly told that it makes reference to past deliverances. Oh! how much they have to sing about. They sing of the darkness through which on earth, they passed; and it is a night song. That one was killed in the seven days’92 fight before Richmond, and with him it is a battle song. That one was starved to death at Belle Isle, and with him it is a prison song. That was a Christian sailor-boy that had his back broken by falling from the ship’92s halyards, and with him it is a sailor’92s song. That one was burned at Smithfield, and with him it is a fire song. Oh! how they will sing of floods waded, of fires endured, of persecution suffered, of grace extended! Song of hail! song of sword! song of hot lead! song of ax! As, when the organ-pipes peal out some great harmony, there comes occasionally the sound of the tremulante, weeping through the cadences, adding exquisiteness to the performance; so, amidst the stupendous acclaim of the heavenly worshipers shall come tremulous remembrances of past endurance, adding a sweetness and glory to the triumphal strain. So the glorified mother will sing of the cradle that death robbed; and the enthroned spirit from the almshouse will sing of a lifetime of want. God may wipe away all tears, but not the memory of the grief that started them!

Further, it will be an accompanied song. Some have a great prejudice against musical instruments; and even among those who like them, there is an idea that they are unauthorized. I cannot share in such prejudices, when I remember how God has honored them. I love the cymbals, for Israel clapped them in triumph at the Red Sea. I love the harp, for David struck it in praising the Lord. I love the trumpet, for we are told that it shall wake the dead. I love all stringed instruments and organs; for God demands that we shall praise him on stringed instruments and organs. There is in such music much to suggest the higher worship; for I read that ’93when he had taken the book, the four-and-twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps’94; and ’93I heard the voice of the harpers harping with their harps,’94 and ’93I saw them that had gotten the victory from the beast standing on the sea of glass, having the harps of God.’94

Yes, the song is to be accompanied. You say that all this is figurative. Then I say, prove it. I do not know how much of it is literal, and how much of it is figurative. Who can say but that from some of the precious woods of earth and heaven there may not be made instruments of celestial accord. In that worship David may take the harp, and Habakkuk the lute, and when the great multitudes shall, following their own inclinations, take up instruments sweeter than Mozart ever fingered or Schumann ever dreamed of or Beethoven ever wrote for, let all heaven make ready for the burst of stupendous minstrelsy, and the roll of the eternal orchestra!

Further, it will be an anticipative song. Why, my friends, heaven has hardly begun yet. If you had taken the opening piece of music this evening for the whole service, you would not have made so great a mistake as to suppose that heaven is fully inaugurated. Festal choruses on earth last only a short while. The famous musical convocation at Dusseldorf ended with the fourth day. Our holidays last only eight or ten days; but heaven, although singing for so many years, has only just begun ’93the new song.’94 If the glorified inhabitants recount past deliverances, they will also enkindle at glories to come. If, at six o’92clock, when this church opened, you had taken the few people that were scattered through it as the main audience, you would not have made so great a mistake as if you supposed that the present population of heaven are to be its chief citizenship. Although when John saw them they were a multitude that could not be numbered, the inhabitants are only a handful compared with the future populations. All China is yet to be saved. All India is yet to be saved. All Borneo is yet to be saved. All Switzerland is yet to be saved. All Italy is yet to be saved. All Spain is yet to be saved. All Russia is yet to be saved. All France is yet to be saved. All England is yet to be saved. All America is yet to be saved. All the world is yet to be saved. After that there may be other worlds to conquer. I do not know but that every star that glitters to-night is an inhabited world, and that from all those spheres a mighty host are to march into our heaven. There will be no gate to keep them out. We will not want to keep them out. God will not want to keep them out.

I have sometimes thought that all the millions of earth that go into glory are but a very small colony compared with the influx from the whole universe. God could build a heaven large enough not only for the universe, but for ten thousand universes. I do not know just how it will be, but this I know, that heaven is to be constantly augmented; that the song is swelling by the intonation of more voices; that the song of glory is rising higher and higher, and the procession is being multiplied. If heaven sang when Abel went up’97the first soul that ever left earth for glory’97how must it sing now when souls go up in flocks from all Christendom, hour by hour, and moment by moment.

Our happy gatherings on earth are chilled by the thought that soon we must separate. Thanksgiving and Christmas days come, and the rail-trains flying hither and thither are crowded. Glad reunions take place. We have a time of great enjoyment. But soon it is ’93good-by’94 at the door, ’93good-by’94 on the street, ’93good-by’94 at the rail-train, ’93good-by’94 at the steamboat wharf. We meet to-night in church. It is good to be here. But soon it will be nine o’92clock. The doxology will be sung, the benediction pronounced, the lights will lower, and the audience will be gone. But there are no separations, no goodbies in heaven. At the door of the house of many mansions, no ’93good-by.’94 At the pearly gate, no ’93good-by.’94 The song will be more pleasant, because we are always to sing it. Mightier song as our other friends come in. Mightier song as other garlands are set on the brow of Jesus. Mightier song as Christ’92s glories unfold.

If the first day we enter heaven we sing well, the next day we will sing better. Song anticipative of more light, of more love, of more triumphs. Always something new to hear, something new to see. Many good people suppose that we shall see heaven the first day we get there. No! You cannot see London in two weeks. You cannot see Rome in six weeks. You cannot see Venice in a month. You cannot see the great city of the New Jerusalem in a day. No; it will take all eternity to see heaven, to count the towers, to examine the trophies, to gaze upon the thrones; to see the hierarchies. Ages on ages roll, and yet heaven is new. The streets new! The Temple new! The joy new! The song new!

I staid a week at Niagara Falls, hoping thoroughly to understand and appreciate it. But on the last day they seemed newer and more incomprehensible than on the first day. Gazing on the infinite rush of celestial splendors, where the oceans of delight meet, and pour themselves into the great heart of God’97how soon will we exhaust the song? Never! Never! The old preachers, in describing the sorrows of the lost, used to lift up their hands and shout, ’93The wrath to come!’94 ’93The wrath to come!’94 To-day I lift up my hands, and looking toward the great future, cry, ’93The joy to come!’94 ’93The joy to come!’94 Oh, to wander on the banks of the bright river, and yet to feel that a little farther down we shall find still brighter floods entering into it! Oh, to stand a thousand years, listening to the enchanting music of heaven, and then to find out that the harpers are only tuning their harps.

Finally, I remark, that it will be a unanimous song. There will, no doubt, be some to lead, but all will be expected to join. It will be grand congregational singing. All the sweet voices of the redeemed! Grand music will it be, when that new song arises. Luther sings it. Charles Wesley sings it. Lowell Mason sings it. Our voices now may be harsh and our ears uncultivated, but, our throats cleared at last, and our capacities enlarged, you and I will not be ashamed to raise our voices as loudly as any of them.

Those nations that have always been distinguished for their capacity in song will lift up their voices in that melody. Those who have had much opportunity to hear the Germans sing will know what idea I mean to give, when I say that the great German nation will pour their deep, full voices into the new song. Everybody knows the natural gift of the Africans for singing. No singing on this continent like that of the colored churches in the South. Everybody going to Richmond or to Charleston wants to hear the Africans sing. But when not only Ethiopia, but all that continent of darkness, lifts up its hands, and all Africa pours her great volume of voice into the new song’97that will be music for you. Added to this are all the sixteen thousand millions of children that are estimated to have gone into glory, and the hosts of young and old that hereafter shall people the earth and inhabit the stars.

Oh! the new song! Gather it all up! Multiply it with every sweetness! Pour into it every harmony! Crown it with every gladness! Belt it with every splendor! Fire it with every glory! Toss it to the greatest height of majesty! Roll it to the grandest cycle of eternity!’97and then you have but the faintest conception of what John experienced when, amidst the magnificence of apocalyptic vision, he heard it’97the new song! God grant that at last we may all sing it. But if we do not sing the praise of Christ on earth, we will never sing it in heaven. Be sure that your hearts are now attuned for the heavenly worship. On this day, I foresee the time when the whole earth shall be brought in accord with the Gospel’97’94Glory to God in the highest; on earth peace, good-will to men!’94

There is a cathedral in Europe with an organ at each end. Organ answers organ, and the music waves backward and forward with indescribable effect. Well, my friends, the time will come when earth and heaven will be but different parts of one great accord. It will be joy here and joy there! Jesus here and Jesus there! Trumpet to trumpet! Organ to organ. Hosanna to hosanna! ’93Until the day break and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether!’94

Autor: T. De Witt Talmage