Small-group study
Revelation 21:4: No Sorrow That Heaven Cannot Heal
One page, about 45 minutes. Read it through before you meet, and feel free to skip a question if the conversation is already flowing.
He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; neither will there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more. The first things have passed away.
1. To begin
If you could ask God to put one thing right forever, what would it be?
2. Read it again, and look closely
Have someone read the verse aloud a second time, slowly.
- List everything this verse says will be "no more". What do they have in common?
- Who wipes away the tears? Notice that it is personal, not handed to someone else.
3. What does it mean?
- John is writing to Christians who were suffering for their faith. Why might this particular promise have meant so much to them?
- The verse says these things "have passed away", almost as if already done. Why speak of a future hope in the past tense?
- Does the promise that sorrow will end make present grief less real, or does it sit alongside it? (Remember that Jesus wept at a friend’s grave.)
4. What about us?
- What loss are you still carrying? How does it change things to know it has an end set by God himself?
- How might living towards this future shape the way we treat people who are grieving now?
5. To close, pray
Bring your tears, named honestly, to the God who promises to wipe them away. Ask him to hold you until that day comes.