Several Saturday nights ago I just was not satisfied with my preaching preparation. Somehow the message had not quite gelled, and I knew there were many improvements I needed to make before Sunday morning. But by then it was late, after a busy weekend, and I decided, hey, so what, it’ll be all right. Let me wrap this up, watch a little TV, and go to bed. I’ll fix it in the morning. I turned in about midnight.
But once I got to bed, I tossed and I turned, I squirmed and I fidgeted. Muffled grumbles came from somebody on the other side of the bed. Down on the floor just beyond my feet the dog growled. Obviously my restlessness was disturbing everyone else around me. I got up and drank some juice, then came back to bed. More tossing, more turning, more restlessness. I just could not get to sleep! Now let me inform you that not getting any sleep is not a good thing for pastors on Saturday nights. Pastors don’t get your privilege of rolling over in bed on Sunday morning and declaring that nobody down at that church cares whether I come or not! Pastors need to be alert and focused on Sunday. Got to get some sleep!
Well, the harder I tried to sleep the more my eyes stayed wide open. The more anxious I became about not sleeping, the more clear it became that I was not going to sleep. Actually, I did sleep just a little, but the next thing I knew it was three o’clock, and, awake again, I became aware of why this was happening: my mind was still working on that sermon. My brain was buzzing through the Bible, trying to get it together. There was to be no such thing as rest as long as there was a task not yet finished. No such thing as sleep as long as there was work yet to do.
In other words, if you have work to do, important work, there will be no more night for you. If you have important work yet to do, God’s work, the night is not a night of rest but a night of toil and restlessness until it is done. The night is long when the task is not finished.
By the way, I did get up, I did rewrite the sermon, and I did get through that Sunday. I will leave it to you to guess which Sunday that was!
If you have important work to do, God’s work, the night does not mean rest. It means anxious labor, restlessness, and feverish labor, until the night is over and the work is done.
That simple observation helps me understand why John speaks of the heavenly city as one in which there is no more night. There is no more night because earthly labors are finally complete, and the air is cleared of anxiety. No more night because that terrible incompleteness, that awful dissatisfaction that we feel, nearly every day of our mortal lives, is finally resolved. No more night. No more anxiety. No more struggling to do the impossible. No more battling with the limitations of the flesh. No more night.
Let’s work with that image, and see what we can find out about what it is going to mean to live eternally in the place of God’s eternal day. And let’s see if those we remember today might serve as guides from our restlessness into their rest, from our incompleteness into their wholeness.
I
First, I see that “no more night” means no more thrashing about, blind to what we are doing or where we are going. “No more night” means no more being blind about where our path is taking us.
Obviously, we are hampered at night because we don’t have enough light to see well. We stumble in semi-blindness. That Saturday night, when I got up to get my little glass of juice, not only did I wake the wife and stir the dog, I got myself pretty riled up when my bare foot came down on a doggie treat that was not supposed to be on the floor! I probably said some things that could not have been used in that as yet unfinished sermon! But because it was night, I hit the obstacle and caused myself pain.
But we are in the night. We cannot see the truth. We are blind to seeing ourselves. We live in the night; that means we are unable to see what our own issues are. Many of our most serious anxieties are born out of our inability to see our own selves. I become more aware every day that just because we have training and education and all sorts of skills, that does not mean that we understand ourselves. Not at all. The poet Robert Burns said it in familiar lines, “Oh, would some power the giftie gie us, to see ourselves as others see us.” But we don’t have that gift. We are blind to our own inner realities. We are in the blindness of night.
The Apostle Paul spoke about being unable to do the things he wanted to do, and about being equally unable to avoid the things he did not want to do, and then cried out, “I do not understand myself.” And neither do we. Neither do we. It is night.
But do you know that in Christ we begin to find out who we are? Do you know that in relationship with Christ we begin to do the work of discovering our own reality? When you know Jesus Christ, you not only know Him, you begin to see and to know yourself. Christ leads us to face both the awesome depths of our sin and, at the same time, the wonderful heights of our potential. In Christ we can see ourselves as we really are. In Christ our blindness is cured.
Arthur Capehart knew that and showed that to me. Arthur, as some of you will know, had become blind for a number of months before his death. I remember well the day he called me and told me that the eye surgeons said he was not a good candidate for surgery. He grieved for a while over that. All of us would. No one wants to be blind.
But then came another day and another call, and Arthur told me that tests had discovered cancer; it was well advanced; treatment might give him three or four extra months. Arthur said he didn’t want that. He said he’d rather have quality of life and live less time than to have a few more months, but nothing but misery. At that moment it was clear to me that Arthur, blind as he was, was not living in the night. Arthur saw. Arthur saw himself. There was no more night for him. No more night, for he saw his own reality as clearly as if his eyes were twenty-twenty.
On one of my visits with Arthur, then, he reached out his hand and found mine, and said, “Pastor, do you think the Lord will forgive me. I’ve done so many things wrong.” My first reaction was to protest: “done so many things wrong? Arthur, you are one of the finest, gentlest most spiritual men I know.” I didn’t want to hear Arthur Capehart call himself a sinner. I didn’t want to listen to this blithe spirit name his harsh reality. And why didn’t I? Why wouldn’t I feel comfortable about Arthur’s plaintive cry? Because I didn’t want to see the sin in me! Because I didn’t feel comfortable with the blindness in my own heart! Because when you live in the night you will not see the truth about yourself and your own spiritual need.
But when there is no more night, you will no longer be blind, though your eyes may not see. You will no longer be blind, for the Lord God will be your light. No light of lamp or sun, for God Himself will lead you into all truth.
I thank God today for the memory of Arthur Capehart, who, in his blindness, leads us into the light of self-understanding. Some day we will have self-understanding fully, as he does now. Some day no more night. No more night means no more blindness to our own issues.
II
Second, will you see with me that “no more night” also means no more mistrust? “No more night”, life in eternity with God, means no more mistrust, no more confused identity, no more uncertainty about who’s out there in the dark? What is it that is frightening about the night? One of the scary things is that if you are out at night, you do not know who that is that’s coming toward you. You don’t know whether it be friend or foe. A whole lot of you tell me you are just not coming out at night, for prayer meeting or choir practice or anything else, because you are afraid of who is out there and what they might be up to. You cannot see their faces, you cannot read their intentions, and so you are afraid. You do not trust them.
But do you know that life in Christ means discernment about others? Have you discovered that when you are in fellowship with Christ, not only do you learn about Him, and not only do you learn about yourself, but also you learn about others? In Christ you begin to discern the shape of others’ lives, you begin to perceive their needs, their motives. Have you found that out? The more you discover of the mind of Christ, the more you discover and understand about others around you. The more you know the Lord, the more you know others and the more you love others. The more you know the Lord, the more you want to reach out and touch other lives and make a difference instead of running from them. Outside of Christ, in the night, you are afraid of others and what they are up to. You avoid them. You stay away. But in the light of Christ others become not the objects of your fear but the subjects of your love.
What a fascinating image here in the Scripture! The image is that the residents of the heavenly city, where there is no more night, will see the face of Christ, and His name will be on their foreheads. “Belonging to Christ” stamped on the forehead of everybody, and you’ll know whose they are. You’ll know to whom they belong. “No more night” means that we need not be afraid of anybody, because we’ll be able to see that they are children of God. We’ll be able to see that they belong to Christ, and we won’t mistrust them. “No more night.”
Margaret Hurd had for many years lived a quiet but graceful life on Domer Street in Takoma Park. There she and her husband had raised a family, pursued their interests, done their work, and lived in dignity. Such a long time in such a supportive environment. After Mr. Hurd died, some of us wondered how Margaret would do alone, but she did well. She adjusted. We should have known. Old habits of composure and beauty and warmth were well ingrained and would not die.
But then came serious illness. I can recall visiting with Margaret in the hospital, and she said, “The family wants me to move to Hagerstown. I guess I have to go. But I don’t want to leave my house. It’s all I’ve known, all these years. I don’t know where I’ll be going. I’m sure Aileen will find a nice place, but I still don’t want to go.” Every bit of that we can understand. Why would anyone want to unsettle themselves late in life?
But, you know, after the move, I began to get some very interesting reports. I heard from Aileen that Mom had become the life of the party at the home where she was staying. I heard from someone else who went to visit her that she had blossomed, she was reaching out to this patient and that patient, trying to help. Somebody even said that Margaret Hurd seemed not to know that she was a patient; she acted like she was the activities director or the social coordinator or the chaplain. She became somebody who in Jesus Christ and in His love, could trust and love those around her. She became somebody who, in Christ and in His embrace, could embrace strangers and care for them. I say there was “no more night” for Margaret Hurd. “No more night”, because she found in Jesus Christ a friend above all others. Safe in Him, therefore safe with others, able to love. “No more night” means no more confused identity, no more uncertainty about who’s out there. “No more night” means the capacity to trust and to love. Praise God for Margaret Hurd and for the witness of her final days, rapt in joy at serving others. “No more night”; no more mistrust.
III
And finally, would you see with me that “no more night” means no more incompleteness? No more shortcomings, no more limitations, no more struggle, no more of the frustrations with which every human life is bounded. I don’t know about you, but I feel frustrated by never having enough. Whatever it is, I don’t have enough. I don’t have enough time to work with all the people I want to touch; I don’t have enough energy to do all the tasks I need to do; I don’t have enough knowledge to answer all the questions put to me; I don’t have enough strength to carry every burden that is presented to me. I don’t have enough money to pay the taxes you government workers want this week! I just don’t have enough. It’s frustrating, isn’t it? When the night comes and we can’t work any more, or we get tired, or our energies burn out, and there’s not enough of us to go around, then we get bent out of shape.
Some of the saddest people I know are people with great gifts and lots of talent, but they cannot feel satisfied. They are perfectionists; they are obsessed with getting everything just right. They can never give themselves permission to succeed. Did you hear that? That’s right. I said permission to succeed. We talk a lot about giving children permission to fail; we say that if a child doesn’t try something and maybe fail at it, he won’t learn. And that’s true. But when we are adults we sometimes do not give ourselves permission to succeed. We put ourselves down. We wallow in our shortcomings. We grovel in our failures. But whenever we do that, whenever we tell ourselves that we are no good, not up to snuff, what we are really doing is denying the work of God. When all you can say about yourself is that you don’t measure up, then you have a problem. You are denying the abundant grace of a redemptive God.
But when you are in fellowship with Jesus Christ, He draws you on toward completeness. When you are in Christ, in His love He does not put you down. He builds you up and leads you toward what He wants you to become. As the old T-shirt slogan put it, “God don’t make no junk.” In Christ, we are not junk. We are not incomplete. We are works in progress. But living in the night means we feel nothing but frustration about being incomplete. Living in the night means feeling that we are just not what we ought to be and that’s that.
If you ever saw Diane Gregory, you might have thought at first that God did too make junk. Diane’s body would not cooperate. Her disease had dealt her a most difficult blow. Huntingdon’s Chorea is not a pretty sight. Arms and legs are largely out of control. Speech is slurred. The body just doesn’t work well.
But, great God, what an indomitable spirit inhabited that painfully misshapen body! What a soul was in there! Diane wanted to take care of herself. She would not let you carry her tray at Wednesday Club. She would not permit you to assist her up the steps. She was not about to become somebody’s burden, somebody’s problem. Diane was going to be Diane. She was going to be somebody. No, I can say it better than that. She was going to be a child of God. She was determined to demonstrate that she was a person, not the object of our pity, not something to be fussed over, but a person, made in the image of God and after His likeness.
For Diane, now that there is no more night, there is no more incompleteness. Now she is fully a child of God. And better than that, listen, “they will reign for ever and ever.” “No more night, no need of light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.” I praise God for having put Diane Gregory here with us; none of us would wish this or any other difficult disease on anyone, but Diane helped us to face the truth that we are all incomplete in one fashion or another. We are all less than what we want to be in one aspect or another. But in the light and love of Jesus Christ, we are promised no more night, no more pain, no more incompleteness. We are given personhood and somebodiness. Thanks to the work of Christ, we come to know that we are children of God, made to reign forever and ever. No more night. No more incompleteness.
Wake up now, children. Wake up now. The night of death is over. It’s Easter time. Christ is risen, very early in the morning on the first day of the week. Wake up now, wake with Him. For you live where it is endless day. You live where neither blindness nor anxiety nor incompleteness dog your footsteps. You live where the light of God shines and there is no more night. Not now, not ever. Grant them peace, O Lord, and in light perpetual shine upon them and through them on us. No more night.
