Palms of Elim: Chapter 27 - The Return to Zion
By John MacDuff
"This is the resting place, let the weary rest; and this is the place of repose"--
"The ransomed of the Lord will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away." Isaiah 51:11
These words had doubtless a primary reference to Israel, seated, not under the old palms of the Sinai wilderness, but rather, at a later age, under the willow-trees of the streams of Babylon; on whose branches a poet of the Captivity so touchingly describes the captives as hanging their muffled harps, and weeping as they remembered Zion.
But they have a grander than local or temporary meaning. Every member of the true Israel of God, as he is seated under the figurative shadow, whether of palm or of willow, whether his experience be joyful or sorrowful, may take heart and courage from the description here given of travelers to a better than earthly Zion; Jehovah's own ransomed ones; whose captivity is turned "as streams in the south," and who are "more than conquerors through Him that loved them."
Taking the passage thus, in its highest spiritual interpretation, these Zionward travelers are beautifully represented, even in the course of their journey, as filled with peace and joy in believing, abounding in hope. Many, while they picture a coming heaven as a place of unmingled happiness and bliss, are apt to picture the way there as one of gloom--every pilgrim reaching it with the furrow on his brow and the tear in his eye; that if any chimes of gladness reach his ears, they come from bells inside the gates of the city, not outside. But these words tell differently and more truly. There are palm trees 'at Elim' as well as "beyond Jordan." The desert is resonant with song.
Gladness and joy are here represented as two attendants--sister spirits, accompanying all the way, hand in hand. Yes! the Christian is, or ought to be, a joyful man. Though it be a wilderness he treads, and though "sorrow and mourning" are also depicted as tracking his footsteps; yet he has elements of tranquil happiness within him, which make the smile, not the tear, the appropriate symbol of his thoughts and emotions. It would be strange, indeed, were it otherwise. At peace with God; sin forgiven; the heart changed; the affections elevated; grace molding, sustaining, quickening, sanctifying; and, rising above all, the assured hope of glory hereafter. He can say, "You have filled my heart with greater joy than when their grain and new wine abound" (Psalms 4:7).
