We are continuing season 12—the season of preparing for physical death—with three more helps from Flavel. Last time we looked at the first two: (1) death is harmless to the people of God, and (2) death is necessary to prepare His own for the full benefits of heaven. We also saw that our lives, as believers, are bound-up in Christ’s resurrection, and that when a believer passes from death to life, it is something to be celebrated. Here is Flavel on help three:
3. Consider that the happiness of heaven commences immediately after death. That happiness will not be deferred till the resurrection; but as soon as death has passed upon you, your soul will be swallowed up in life. When you have once loosed from this shore, you shall be quickly wafted to the shore of a glorious eternity. And can you not say, I desire to be dissolved, and to be with Christ? Did the soul and body die together, or did they sleep till the resurrection, as some have fancied, it would have been folly for Paul to desire a dissolution for the enjoyment of Christ; because he would have enjoyed more in the body than he could have enjoyed out of it.
The Scripture speaks of but two ways in which the soul can properly live: viz. by faith and sight. These two comprehend its present and future existence. Now, if when faith fails, sight should not immediately succeed, what would become of the soul? But the truth on this subject is clearly revealed in Scripture. See Luke 23:3; John 14:3, &c. What a blessed change then will death make in your condition! Rouse up, dying saint, and rejoice; let death do his work, that the angels may conduct your soul to the world of light.
What happens between our physical death and resurrection is left largely undeveloped in the Bible. What we can know is that human beings were designed to be embodied souls. In other words, something is missing when we do not have our bodies. Nonetheless, we will be without our desire and inclination to sin, and we will be with the Lord. In the exact capacity of this, we do not know. But we can trust that, as Jesus said to the thief dying beside Him: Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise. The ways of the world will forever be left behind.
4. It may increase your willingness to die, to reflect that by death God often removes his people out of the way of great troubles and temptations. When some extraordinary calamity is coming upon the world, God sometimes removes his saints out of the way of the evil. Thus Methuselah died the year before the flood; Augustine a little before the sacking of Hippo; Pareus just before the taking of Heidelburg. Luther observes that all the apostles died before the destruction of Jerusalem; and Luther himself died before the wars broke out in Germany. Now it may be that by death you will escape some grievous trial, which you could not and need not endure. But if no extraordinary trouble would come upon you in case your life were prolonged, yet God, designs by death to relieve you from innumerable evils and burdens which are inseparable from the present state. Thus you will be delivered from indwelling sin, which is the greatest trouble; from all temptations from whatever source; from bodily tempers and embarrassments; and from all the afflictions and sorrows of this life. The days of your mourning will be ended, and God will wipe away all tears from your eyes. Why then should you not hasten to depart?
Death itself serves to preserve us from sin and other suffering that would have otherwise come upon us in life. In this, death is a divine providence. Praise be to God that we can die and thus do not need to forever bear with our weaknesses and with the perversions of the world! Death itself was introduced into creation for the very purpose of restraining evil. Without our death, we can have no life. Perhaps this is one reason why the fallen angels cannot be saved? Yes, death has come to us as a blessing in light of our own wickedness. It is a way in which we can be made by God to overcome the wickedness of our own hearts. Death, for the Christian alone, is the release from all that is wrong with the world, and this will come in God’s perfect timing. He has fixed the day and the hour of this passage.
5. If you still linger, like Lot in Sodom, what are your pleas and pretences for a longer life? Why are you unwilling to die? Are you concerned for the welfare of your relations? If so, are you anxious for their temporal support? Then let the word of God satisfy you: “Leave thy fatherless children to me, I will keep them alive, and let thy widows trust in me.” Luther says, in his last will, “Lord, thou hast given me a wife and children, I have nothing to leave them, but I commit them unto thee. O Father of the fatherless and Judge of widows, nourish, keep and teach them.”
But are you concerned for the spiritual welfare of your relations? Remember that you cannot convert them, if you should live; and God can make your prayers and counsels effectual when you are dead.
Perhaps you desire to serve God longer in this world. But if he has nothing further for you to do here, why not say with David, “Here am I, let him do what seemeth him good.” He is calling you to higher service in heaven, and can accomplish by other hands what you desire to do further here.—Do you feel too imperfect to go to heaven? Consider that you must be imperfect until you die; your sanctification cannot be complete until you get to heaven.
‘But, you say, ‘I want assurance; if I had that I could die easily.’ Consider, then, that a hearty willingness to leave all the world to be freed from sin, and to be with God, is the direct way to that desired assurance; no carnal person was ever willing to die upon this ground.
Thus I have shown how the people of God, in the most difficult seasons, may keep their hearts with all diligence.
When we are nearing death, one of the greatest sorrows can be the idea that we will not be there to help our loved ones or to continue fighting for our Lord. However, we need to remember that God is sovereign over all things. He prepared in advance what we are to do, and when those things have been completed, then so is all that we can do on earth. We can add nothing to what He has for us. Indeed, to continue desiring to live beyond what God desires of us is to not trust in His providence: it is to act as though everything were up to us, as if we need to be in control. Such thinking is sheer foolish. Do we not know who empowered us to be effective in any work? Do we know who enables others to love God and neighbour? This is all purely the work of God. We are only a mere tool or vessel for that work. God has at His disposal all that He needs to accomplish His good pleasure. He does not need us to continue living beyond His perfect and sovereign plan for our lives. When our service is complete, then we will go to meet the Lord. He will continue working on our loved ones even after our deaths.
Next time we will be looking at help one for how Flavel applies keeping the heart.