I once got into a debate with a young man in my church about the kingdom of heaven. He said there would be sadness in heaven. I said no way.

Jesus said He would return one day to destroy the current heaven and earth to make way for a new heaven and earth, which He called the kingdom of heaven. He gave a long speech in which He described the kinds of people that would be there.

In our society, we tend to allow only the wealthy, beautiful, powerful, and famous into all the exclusive resorts and fancy clubs.

This is the opposite of Jesus’s guest list for the kingdom of heaven. Jesus said those who enter His kingdom are those who are humble, merciful, peacemakers, pure and poor in spirit. They hunger for righteousness, and they are mourning.

This last bit was the focus of our little disagreement. This young man said there will be sadness in heaven because Jesus invited mourners into His kingdom.

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Matthew‬ ‭5‬:‭4,‬ ‭CSB)‬‬

Clearly Jesus invites those who mourn into His kingdom, but my friend was forgetting the second part of this verse.

The mourners who Jesus is referring to are those who look around this world, see all the pain, injustice, and death, and are heart-broken by it. They can’t ignore the despair of others, especially those who don’t know Jesus. Wealth and fame are meaningless to them in the face of such suffering. They are mourning over the same things that break God’s heart.

These are the mourners that Jesus welcomes into His kingdom. But then, a miracle happens. In the kingdom of heaven, those mourners are comforted. Their weeping stops and is replaced by overwhelming and irrepressible joy.

When this dark world is destroyed, all the evil will go with it. There will be no more pain, death, injustice, suffering, or hatred. There will be nothing left to mourn. All the tears will be wiped away. For good. Forever.

The mourners are invited, but their tears are turned to eternal delight. There’s no crying in Heaven.

Dear God, there is a lot of suffering in this world. I don’t know how you can stand it since you see every last bit of it. I only see a tiny fraction, and it brings me to my knees. Thank you for your promise of a new kingdom without any cause for mourning. Teach me what I can do to speed its arrival.