Chapter 6: The First Prerogative — To Come

But what are those things that are to come?

There are twelve things yet to come, the which I call twelve prerogatives royal, with which the believer shall be invested. The first is set down in the text which I will begin with. 1. Death is yours. Death in Scripture is called an enemy (1 Corinthians 15:26). Yet here it is put in a Christian's inventory: death is yours. It is an enemy to the mortal part, but a friend to the spiritual. It is one of our best friends next to Christ; death is a part of the jointure. When Moses saw his rod turned into a serpent, it did at the first affright him, and he fled from it; but when God bade him take hold of it, he found by the miraculous effects which it wrought, it did him and the people of Israel much good; so death at the first sight is like the rod turned into a serpent, it affrights; but when by faith we take hold of it, then we find much benefit and comfort in it. As Moses's rod divided the waters, and made a passage for Israel into Canaan; so death divides the waters of tribulation, and makes a passage for us into the land of promise. Death is called the King of Terrors, but it can do a child of God no hurt; the sting is pulled out. The bee by stinging loses its sting: while death did sting Christ upon the Cross, it has quite lost its sting to a believer: it can hurt the soul no more than David did King Saul, when he cut off the lap of his garment. Death to a believer is but like the arresting of a man for a debt, after the debt is paid; death, as God's Sergeant at Arms, may arrest us, and carry us before God's justice, but Christ will show our discharge; the debt book is crossed in his blood.

How is death ours?

Two ways.

- 1. It is the outlet to sin. - 2. It is the inlet to happiness.

1. Death to a believer is an outlet to sin. We are in this life under a sinful necessity; even the best saint: there is not a just man upon earth, that does good and sins not. Evil thoughts are continually arising out of our hearts, as sparks out of a furnace. Sin keeps house with us whether we will or no; the best saint alive is troubled with inmates; though he forsakes his sins, yet his sins will not forsake him. 1. Sin does indispose to good; how to perform that which is good I find not (Romans 7:18). When we would pray, the heart is as a [reconstructed: viol] out of tune: when we would weep, we are as clouds without rain. 2. Sin does irritate to evil; the flesh lusts against the Spirit: there needs no wind of temptation, we have tide strong enough in our hearts, to carry us to hell. Consider sin under this threefold notion.

1. Sin is a body of death, and that not impertinently. First, it is a body, for its weight. The body is a heavy and weighty substance: so is sin a body, it weighs us down. When we should pray, the weights of sin are tied to our feet that we cannot ascend. Anselm seeing a little boy playing with a bird, he let her fly up, and presently pulls the bird down again by a string: so, says he, it is with me, as with this bird; when I would fly up to heaven upon the wings of meditation, I find a string tied to my leg; I am overpowered with corruption: but death pulls off these weights of sin and lets the soul free. Secondly, sin is a body of death for its annoyance. It was a cruel torment that one used, he tied a dead man to a living, that the dead man might annoy and infest the living. Thus it is with a child of God, he has two men within him, flesh and Spirit, grace and corruption — here is the dead man tied to the living; a proud sinful heart is worse to a child of God than the smell of a dead corpse. Indeed, to a natural man sin is not offensive, for being dead in sin, he is not sensible of the body of death: but where there is a vital principle, there is no greater annoyance than the body of death. Insomuch that the pious soul often cries out, as David, 'Woe is me, that I dwell in Mesek, and sojourn in the tents of Kedar' (Psalm 120:5). So says he, woe is me, that I am constrained to abide with sin. How long shall I be troubled with inmates? How long shall I offend that God whom I love? When shall I leave these tents of Kedar?

2. Sin is a tyrant; it carries in it the nature of a law; the Apostle calls it the law in his members. There is the law of pride; the law of unbelief; it has a kind of jurisdiction, as Caesar over the Senate, perpetuam dictaturam. What I hate, that do I: the Apostle was like a man carried down the stream, and was not able to bear up against it. Sin takes us prisoners; from where come our carnal fears? From where our passions? From where does it come that a child of God does that which he allows not; yes, against knowledge? Only this, he is for a time sin's prisoner: the flesh often prevails (though in cool blood, the elder shall serve the younger;) from where does it come, that he who is born of God, should be so earthly? The reason is, he is captive under sin: but be of good cheer, where grace makes a combat, death shall make a conquest.

Sin is a leprous spot. It makes everything we touch unclean: we read, when the leprosy did spread in the walls of the house, the priests commanded them to take away the stones in the wall, in which the plague was, and take other stones, and put in the place of those stones, and take other mortar (Leviticus 14:42). But when the plague spread again in the wall, then he must break down the house with the stones and timber thereof (verse 45). Thus in every man naturally, there is a fretting leprosy of sin, pride, impenitency, etc. These are leprous spots: now in conversion, here God does, as it were, take away the old stones and timber, and put new in the room; he makes a change in the heart of a sinner, but still the leprosy of sin spreads; then at last, death comes and pulls down the stones and timber of the house, and the soul is quite freed from the leprosy. Sin is a defiling thing, it makes us red with guilt, and black with filth; it is compared to a menstruous cloth; we need carry it no higher. Pliny tells us that the trees with touching of it, would become barren; and Jerome says, Nihil in lege menstruato immundius; there was nothing in the law more unclean, than the menstruous cloth; this is sin. Sin draws the devil's picture in a man; malice, is the devil's eye; oppression, is his hand; hypocrisy, is his cloven foot; but behold, death will give us our discharge, death is the last and best physician; which cures all diseases; the aching head, and the unbelieving heart. Peccatum erat obstetrix mortis, et mors erit sepulchrum peccati. Sin was the midwife that brought death into the world, and death shall be the grave to bury sin; O the privilege of a believer! he is not taken away in his sins; but he is taken away from his sins. The Persians had a certain day in the year, which they called vitiorum interitum, wherein they used to kill all serpents and venomous creatures: such a day as that will the day of death be to a man in Christ. This day the old serpent dies in a believer, that has so often stung him with his temptations: this day the sins of the godly, these venomous creatures shall all be destroyed; they shall never be proud more, they shall never grieve the Spirit of God more; the death of the body shall quite destroy the body of death.

Death to a believer, is an inlet to happiness: Samson found a honeycomb in the lion's carcass; so may a child of God suck much sweetness from death. Death is the gate of life; death pulls off our rags, and gives us change of clothing: all the hurt it does us, is to put us into a better condition. Death is called in Scripture a sleep (1 Thessalonians 4:14). Those that sleep in Jesus: as after sleep the spirits are exhilarated and refreshed: so after death, the times of refreshing come from the presence of the Lord. Death is yours. Death opens the portal into heaven, as Tertullian speaks: the day of a Christian's death, is the birthday of his heavenly life; it is his Ascension Day to glory; it is his marriage day with Jesus Christ. After our funeral begins our marriage; well then might Solomon say, Better is the day of a man's death, than the day of his birth. Death is the spiritual man's preferment, why then should he fear it? Death, I confess has a grim visage to an impenitent sinner, so it is ghastly to look upon; it is a pursuivant to carry him to hell: but to such as are in Christ, death is yours: it is a part of the jointure. Death is like the pillar of cloud, it has a dark side to a sinner; but it has a light side to a believer: death's pale face looks ruddy, when the blood of sprinkling is upon it; in short, faith gives us a property in heaven, death gives us a possession; fear not your privilege; the thoughts of death should be delightful. Jacob, when he saw the chariots, his spirits revived: death is a wagon or chariot, to carry us to our Father's house. What were the martyrs' flames but a fiery chariot to carry them up to heaven? How should we long for death? This world is but a desert we live in: shall we not be willing to leave it for paradise? We say, It is good to be here; we affect an earthly eternity: but grace must curb nature. Think of the privileges of death. The planets have a proper motion, and a violent; by their proper motion they are carried from the west to the east; but by a violent motion they are over-ruled by the Primum Mobile, and are carried from the east to the west: so though naturally we desire to live here, as we are made up of flesh; yet grace should be as the primum mobile, or master-wheel, that sways our will, and carries us in a violent motion, making us long for death. Saint Paul desired to be dissolved: and (2 Corinthians 5:2) in this we groan earnestly, desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: we would put off the earthly clothes of our body, and put on the bright robe of immortality; we groan, [illegible: Greek term]. It is a metaphor taken from a mother, who being pregnant, groans and cries out for delivery. Augustine longed to die, that he might see that head which was once crowned with thorns. We pray, Your Kingdom come: and when God is leading us into his kingdom, shall we be afraid to go? The times we live in should, I think, make us long for death: we live in dying times, we may hear as it were God's passing bell, ringing over these nations. Felix Nepotianus, qui haec non videt, as Jerome said in his time; Nepotian is a happy man, that does not see the evils which befall us: they are well that are out of the storm and are gotten already to the haven: to me to die is gain.

Question: But who shall have this privilege? Answer: death is certain: but there are only two sorts of persons, to whom we may say, Death is yours. It is your preferment.

1. Such as die daily: We are not born angels, die we must; therefore we had need carry always a death's-head about us. The basilisk if it see a man first, it kills him; but if he see it first, it does him no hurt: the basilisk death, if it sees us first, before we see it, 'tis dangerous: but if we see it first by meditating upon it, it does us no hurt: study death, often walk among the tombs. It is the thoughts of death beforehand, that must do us good. In a dark night, one torch carried before a man, is worth many torches carried after him: one serious thought of death beforehand, one tear shed for sin before death, is worth a thousand shed after, when it is too late. 'Tis good to make death our familiar, and in this sense to be in death's oft: that if God should presently seal a lease of ejectment, if he should send us a letter of summons this night to surrender, we might have nothing to do but to die.

Alas, how do we adjourn the thoughts of death? 'Tis almost death to think of it. There are some that are in the very threshold of the grave, who have one leg in the earth and another leg in hell: yet put far from them the evil day. I have read of our Lysicrates, who in his old age dyed his gray hairs black, that he might seem young again. When we should be building our tombs, we are building our tabernacles: die daily, lest you die eternally. The holy patriarchs in purchasing for themselves a burying place, showed us what thoughts they still had of death. Joseph of Arimathea erected his sepulcher in his garden: we have many that set up the trophies of their victories; others that set up their escutcheons, that they may blaze their honor: but how few that set up their sepulchers? Who erect in their hearts, the serious thoughts of death? Oh, remember when you are in your gardens, in places most delicious and fragrant, to keep a place for your tombstone: die daily. There is no better way to bring sin into a consumption, than by often looking on the pale horse, and him that sits thereon. By thinking on death, we begin to repent of an evil life; and so we disarm death before it comes, and cut the lock where its strength lies.

2. Such as are in heaven before they die: death is yours. If we will needs be high-minded, let it be in setting our mind upon heavenly things. Heaven must come down into us before we go up there. A child of God breathes his faith in heaven; his thoughts are there: When I awake, I am still with you (Psalm 139:17). David awaked in heaven, his conversation is there (Philippians 3:20). For our conversation is in heaven. The believer often ascends Mount Tabor, and takes a prospect of glory. O that we had this celestial frame of heart! When Zacchaeus was in the crowd, he was too low to see Christ; therefore he climbed up into the sycamore tree: When we are in a crowd of worldly business, we cannot see Christ: Climb up into the tree by divine contemplation: If you would get Christ into your heart, let heaven be in your eye: Set your affections upon things above (Colossians 3:2). There needs no exhortation to set our hearts upon things below. How is the curse of the serpent upon most men? Upon your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. Those that feed only upon dust, golden dust, will be unwilling to return to dust: death will be terrible.

The tribes of Reuben and Gad desired Moses that they might stay on this side Jordan, and have their portion there; it being a place convenient for their cattle: it seems they minded their cattle more than their passage into the holy land: so many Christians, if they may have but a little grazing here in the world, in their shops, and in their farms, they are content to live on this side the river, and mind not their passage into the land of promise: you that are in heaven before you die, death is yours.

An earthly saint, is a contradiction. [illegible] signifies a man refined and separated from the earth: if an astronomer, instead of observing the planets, and the motions of the heavens, should take a reed in his hand, and fall to measuring of the earth, would not this be counted a solecism? And is it not as great a solecism in religion, when men that pretend to have Christ and heaven in their eye, yet mind earthly things (Philippians 3:19)? Our souls, I think, should be like a ship, which is made little and narrow downwards, but more wide and broad upwards: so our affections should be very narrow downwards to the earth, but wide and large upwards towards heavenly things. Thus we see death is a privilege to believers; death is yours: the heir, while he is under age, is capable of the land he is born to: but he has not the use or the benefit of it, till he comes of age; be as old as you will, you are never of age till you die: death brings us of age, and then the possession comes into our hands.