On earth, here and now, those who die in the Lord have attentively listened to His kind remonstrances, concerning reconciliation and entire renunciation of every false hope of heaven only through faith in the name of Jesus. They realize that God's methods of mercy are peculiarly calculated to impart peace in the hour of sickness and death. They see the city which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God, where the inhabitants say, "I am sick, I am weary no more." They know that their Redeemer liveth, and though worms may destroy the body, yet in their flesh they shall see God. They know there are realms where
The voices of song never cease 'neath a burden of tears,
And the music falls sweet from those radiant spheres.
God's children on earth are remarkable for their love to Christ and His Church, and delight to meditate on the glories of heaven. Hence when death comes they are prepared to enter upon their purchased possessions, for which they habitually awaited with bright anticipations, knowing full well that He that had promised is able also to perform.
"Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but He that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven." "For to be carnally minded is death (death eternal), but to be spiritually minded is life and peace."
Henry says, "The Providence that removes God's saints has a loved voice which crieth in the city to the survivors. The death of the saints speaketh the evil of sin." It is owing to that they die, for "the body is dead because of sin." It speaks the vanities of life, and of all its delights and enjoyments; for if the favorites of heaven are dying daily, and going out of this world it is a sign that the things of this world are not the best things, else those whom God loves best would not be taken soonest from them. It speaks that all things come alike to all, and that one event happeneth to the righteous and to the wicked, "so that none knows love or hatred by all that is before him in this world." But he that would know it must look before him into the invisible world. Lay your ears this day to the coffins and graves of departed saints, who though they do not pray for us, yet preach to us in the words of Christ, "Be ye also ready." (Matt. xxiv. 44.) They are gone, and we are going; their glass is run out, and ours is running; and therefore it concerns us to daily die unto sin, and be alive to holiness, standing on the watchtower, like the sentinel, with "loins girt," and "lamps burning," knowing that it is not the stroke, but the sting of death from which the imputed righteousness of the Redeemer delivers.
God's saints are like a green olive-tree, in the house of God, because they trust in His manifold mercy. They are like trees planted by the rivers of water, and whose leaf shall never fade. While death can lay his cold and icy hand upon the Christian's body, yet his soul he can never touch. While God destroys the wicked at death, and plucks him out of his dwelling-place, and roots him out of the land of the living, yet to die in the Lord is to sing with the Psalmist, "I will not be afraid," "I will render praises unto thee, for thou hast delivered my soul from death," "and thou shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth."
Heaven is propitious. Streaming love flows from the fountain of Divine compassion. "God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Oh, this constant untiring love of our kind heavenly father. "Scarcely," says Paul, "for a righteous man will one die: yet, peradventure, for a good man some would even dare to die; but God commendeth his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us." If we would die in the Lord, we must get a sight of Calvary. He has died that we might live. We must behold His pierced hands and feet and side. It is this sight that saves.
Not all the blood of goats and bulls,
On Jewish altars slain,