(4.) Obedience. A Christian is not to die like a beast, to be merely passive ; his soul is not tnken away, but yielded up ; there is a resig- nation and consent on his part. A carnal man suffers death, but a Christian gives up the ghost. The scripture useth this distinctness of speech concerning them, as concerning the wicked. God takes away their souks, Luke xii. 19, Job xxvii. 8; they would fain keep them longer, but the Lord puts the bond in suit, and perforce they are dragged into his presence. But now death to the godly, it is a sweet dismission, Luke ii. 26. When they see the will of God, they hold out no longer; their souls are not taken away, but yielded up to God.
Thus you see grace stands by us when all things else fail ; it makes ns live with comfort, and die with comfort. When wealth fails, grace tails us not. So much of the first question.
2. How they are blessed. They are presently blessed upon the departure of the soul out of the body, but more blessed at the general resurrection of the just.
[1.] Presently the soul is where Christ is; carried by angels to Christ, and by Christ presented to God, as the fruit of his purchase. That the soul is where Christ is, appears by that of Phil. i. 23, ' I desire to
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be dissolved and be with Christ ;' to be with him in glory ; otherwise it were a loss, not a happiness, for St Paul to be dissolved. It is a sorry blessedness to lie rotting in the grave, and only to be eased of pre- sent labours ; for God's people are wont to reckon much of their pre- sent service and enjoyment of God, though it be accompanied with troubles and afflictions. Paul was in a strait, and he saith it was TToXXco ixaXkov Kpelaaov — much more better to be with Christ. A stupid sleep, without the enjoyment of God, is not much better than our present condition, but far worse. What happiness were that to be in such a condition, wherein we do nothing for God, enjoy nothing from God ? Surely Paul would never be in such a strait if this drowsy doctrine were true, that the soul lies in such an inactive state of sleep and rest till the resurrection. This is to be no more blessed than stones and inanimate creatures, that feel nothing. Again, Luke xxiii. 43, ' This day shalt thou be with me in paradise,' saith Christ to the good thief. Some, to evade that place, refer crrj^iepov to Xe/cu, as if it were, I say to thee this day ; but the pointing in the Greek copies contradicts it, as also the sense of the place : a-rjixepov, this day, answers to the thief s, ' when thou shalt come into thy kingdom.' Christ pro- misetli more than he asks, as God doth usually abundantly for us above what we can ask or think. He hath reference to Christ's words to the high priest : the Son of man shall come in his glory. Now, saith Christ, 1 will not defer thy desire so long, for presently shall heavenly joys attend thy soul. Others seek to evade it by the word ' paradise ;' it is a Persiac word, but used by the Hebrews for gardens and orchards, and by allusion for heavenly joys ; and possibly the allusion might be taken not from the delights of an ordinary garden, but from Eden, or that garden in which Adam was placed in innocency. That by para- dise is meant heaven, and not those secreta animarum receptacula et heake sedes, some secret places for the repose of souls departed, which some of the fathers fancied, appeared by Paul's expression in 2 Cor. xii. 4. Speaking of his rapture, ' I was,' saith he, ' caught up into the third heaven,' which he presently calls paradise. Well, then, out of the whole we may conclude, that the souls immediately upon their departure out of their bodies are with Clirist. Again it is said, Luke xvi. 22, ' The beggar died, and was carried into Abraham's bosom,' presently, in the twinkling of an eye, or turning of a thought. Thus it is with the saints, which is a great comfort. When you come to die, in a moment angels will bring you to Christ: agonies of death are terrible, but there are joys just ready ; and as soon as you are loosed from the prison of your body, you enter into your eternal rest, the soul flieth hence to Christ. Once more, as the wicked are in their final estate as soon as they die, and therefore they are called ' the spirits now in prison,' 1 Peter iii. 19 ; so do the godly enjoy their glorified estate as soon as they die : ' The spirits of just men are made perfect,' Heb xii. 24. How can their spirits be said to be perfect, if ihey lie only in a duU sleep without any light, life, joy, delight, or act of love to God ?
[2.] They are completelyblest at the resurrection. Whattheir blessed- ness shall be then, we cannot now know to the full. We shall understand it best when the great voice calls us to come up and see ; only because