In Isaiah, chapter twenty-four, verse fourteen, “They shall lift up their voice, they shall sing for the majesty of the LORD, they shall cry aloud from the sea.” The righteous who remain faithful to God will rejoice and give Him glory when they see the destruction of this corrupt world system. They will delight in the defeat of sin and evil. The angels and believers are commanded to rejoice in God’s righteous judgment against Satan’s system and the wickedness of humankind. The exuberant celebration of the saints in heaven is described in Revelation nineteen, verses one to ten.
The true children of God will be distressed by the immoral conduct and injustices of evil around them day after day, by the lawless deeds they see and about what they hear, as in Second Peter two, verses seven through eight.
There shall be a remnant preserved from the general ruin, and it shall be a devout and pious remnant. These few are dispersed like the gleanings of the olive tree, hidden under the leaves. The Lord knows those who are His; the world does not. When the mirth of carnal worldlings ceases, the joy of the saints is as lively as ever, because the covenant of grace, the fountain of their comforts, and the foundation of their hopes, never fails. Those who rejoice in the Lord can rejoice in tribulation, and by faith may triumph when all about them are in tears. They encourage their fellow-sufferers to do likewise, even those who are in the furnace of affliction, in the valleys, low, dark, miry places. In every fire, even the hottest, in every place, even the remotest, let us keep up our good thoughts of God. If none of these trials move us, then we glorify the Lord in the fires.