The Fountain of Life
The Fountain of Life opened up: or, a display
of Christ in his essential and mediatorial glory
by John Flavel
The seventh and last Word with which Christ breathed out his
Soul
"And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said,
Father, into your hands I commend my spirit; and having said thus, he
gave up his spirit." Luke 23:46
These are the last of the last words of our Lord Jesus
Christ upon the cross, with which he breathed out his soul. They were
David's words before him, Psalm. 31:5. and for substance, Stephen's after
him, Acts 7:27. They are words full, both of faith and comfort; fit to be
the last breathing of every gracious soul in this world. They are resolved
into these five particulars:
First, The person depositing, or committing: The Lord
Jesus Christ, who in this, as well as in other things, acted as a common
person, as the head of the church. This must be remarked carefully, for
therein lies no small part of a believer's consolation: When Christ commends
his soul to God, he does as it were bind up all the souls of the elect in
one bundle with it, and solemnly presents them all with his, to his Father's
acceptance: To this purpose one aptly renders it.
"This commendation made by Christ, turns to the singular
profit and advantage of our souls; inasmuch as Christ, by this very prayer,
has delivered them into his Father's hand, as a precious treasure, whenever
the time comes that they are to be loosed from the bodies which they now
inhabit." Jesus Christ neither lived nor died for himself, but for
believers; what he did in this very act, refers to them as well as to his
own soul: You must look therefore upon Christ, in it is last and solemn act
of his life, as gathering all the souls of the elect together, and making a
solemn tender of them all, with his own soul to God.
Secondly, The depository, or person to whom he commits
this precious treasure, and that was to his own Father: "Father, into your
hands I commend my spirit." Father is a sweet encouraging, assuring title:
Well may a son commit any concernment, how dear soever, into the hands of a
father, especially such a son into the hands of such a father. "By the hands
of the Father into which he commits his soul, we are not to understand the
naked or mere power, but the fatherly acceptance and protection of God."
Thirdly, The depositum, or thing committed into this
hand, [my spirit] that is my soul, now instantly departing, upon the very
point of separation from my body. The soul is the most precious of all
treasures, it is called the darling, Psalm. 35:17. or, "the only ones," that
is that which is most excellent, and therefore most dear and precious: A
whole world is but a trifle, if weighed, for the price of one soul, Mat.
16:26. This inestimable treasure he now commits into his Father's hands.
Fourthly, The Act by which he puts it into that faithful
hand of the Father, "parathesomai", I commend. We rightly render it in the
present tense, though the word be future: For, with these words he breathed
out his soul. This word is of the same import with "sunhiemi" I present, or
tender it into your hands; It was in Christ an act of Faith, a most special
and excellent act intended as a precedent for all his people.
Fifthly, and Lastly, The last thing observable is, the
manner in which he uttered these words, and that was with a loud voice; he
spoke it that all might hear it, and that his enemies, who judged him now
destitute and forsaken of God, might be convinced that he was not so, but
that he was dear to his Father still, and could put his soul confidently
into his hands: "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." Talking then
these words, not only as spoken by Christ, the head of all believers, and so
commending their souls to God with his own, but also as a pattern, teaching
them what they ought to do themselves, when they come to die. We observe,
DOCTRINE. That dying believers are both warranted, and
encouraged, by Christ's example, believingly to commend their precious souls
into the hands of God.
Thus the apostle directs the faith of Christians, to
commit their souls to God's tuition and fatherly protection, when they are
either going into prisons, or to the stake for Christ, 1 Pet. 4:9. "Let them
(says he) that suffer according to the will of God, commit the keeping of
their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator."
This proposition we will consider in these two main
branches of it, namely, what is implied and carried in the soul's commending
itself to God by faith, when the time of separation is come. And what
warrant or encouragement gracious souls have for so doing.
First, What is implied in this act of a believer, his
commending or committing, his soul into the hands of God at death?
And if it be thoroughly weighed, you will find these six
things, at least, carried in it.
First, It implies this evidently in it, That the soul
outlives the body, and fails not, as to its being, when its body fails; it
feels the house in which it dwelt, dropping into ruins, and looks out for a
new habitation with God. "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." The
soul understands itself a more noble being than that corruptible body, to
which it was united, and is now to leave in the dust: it understands its
relation to the Father of spirits, and from him it expects protection and
provision in its unbodied state; and therefore into his hands it puts
itself. If it vanished, or breathed into air, and did not survive the body,
if it were annihilated at death, it were but a mocking of God to say, when
we die, "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit."
Secondly, It implies the soul's true rest to be in God.
See which way its motions and tendencies are, not only in life, but in death
also. It bends to its God: It reposes, it even puts itself upon its God and
Father; "Father, into your hands." God is the center of all gracious
spirits. While they tabernacle here, they have no rest but in the bosom of
their God: when they go hence, their expectation and earnest desires are to
be with him. It had been working after God by gracious desires before, it
had cast many a longing look heaven-ward before; but when the gracious soul
comes near its God (as it does in a dying hour) "then it even throws itself
into his arms;" as a river, that after many turnings and windings, at last
is arrived to the ocean; it pours itself with a central force into the bosom
of the ocean, and there finishes its weary course. "Nothing but God can
please it in this world, and nothing but God can give it content when it
goes hence." It is not the amenity of the place, where the gracious soul is
going, but the bosom of the blessed God, who dwells there, that it so
vehemently pants after; not the Father's house, but the Father's arms and
bosom: "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit: Whom have I in heaven
but you? And on earth there is none that I desire in comparison of you,
Psalm. 73:24,25.
Thirdly, It also implies the great value believers have
for their souls. That is the precious treasure; and their main solicitude
and chief care, is to see it secured in a safe hand: "Father, into your
hands I commit my spirit:" They are words speaking the believer's care for
his soul, that it may be safe, whatever becomes of the vile body. A believer
when he comes near to death, spends but few thoughts about his body, where
it shall be laid, or how it shall be disposed of: He trusts that in the
hands of friends; but as his great care all along was for his soul, so he
expresses it in these his very last breathing, in which he commends it into
the hands of God: It is not, Lord Jesus receive my body, take care of my
dust, but receive my Spirit: Lord, secure the jewel, when the casket is
broken.
Fourthly, These words imply the deep sense that dying
believers have of the great change that is coming upon them by death; when
all visible and sensible things are shrinking away from them, and failing.
They feel the world and the best comforts of it failing: Every creature and
creature comfort failing: For, at death we are said to fail, Luke 16:9.
Hereupon the soul clasps the closer about its God, cleaves more close than
ever to him: "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." Not that a mere
necessity puts the soul upon God; or that it cleaves to God, because it has
then nothing else to take hold on: No, it chose God for its portion, when it
was in the midst of all its outward enjoyments, and had as good security as
other men have for the long enjoyment of them: but my meaning is, that
although gracious souls have chosen God for their portion, and do truly
prefer him to the best of their comforts; yet in this compounded state, it
lives not wholly upon its God, but partly by faith, and partly by sense;
partly upon things seen, and partly upon things not seen. The creatures had
some interest in their hearts; alas, too much: but now all these are
vanishing, and it sees they are so. I shall see man no more, with the
inhabitants of the world, (said sick Hezekiah;) hereupon it turns itself
from them all, and casts itself upon God for all its subsistence, expecting
now to live upon its God entirely, as the blessed angels do; and so, in
faith, they throw themselves into his arms: "Father, into your hands I
commend my spirit."
Fifthly, It implies the atonement of God, and his full
reconciliation to believers, by the blood of the great Sacrifice; else they
dared never commit their souls into his hands: "For it is a fearful thing to
fall into the hands of the living God," Heb. 12:29. that is of an absolute
God, a God unatoned by the offering up of Christ. The soul dare no more cast
itself into the hand of God, without such an atoning sacrifice, than it
dares approach to a consuming fire; And, indeed, the reconciliation of God
by Jesus Christ, as it is the ground of all our acceptance with God; for we
are made accepted in the beloved: So it is plainly carried in the order or
manner of the reconciled soul, committing itself to him: For, it first casts
itself into the hands of Christ, then into the hands of God by him. So
Stephen, when dying, "Lord Jesus receive my spirit:" And by that hand it
would be put into his Father's hands.
Sixthly, and lastly, It implies both the efficacy and
excellency of faith, in supporting and relieving the soul at a time when
nothing else is able to do it; Faith is its conductor, when it is at the
greatest loss and distress that ever it met with: it secures the soul when
it is turned out of the body; when heart and flesh fail, this leads it to
the rock that fails not: it sticks by that soul until it sees it safe
through all the territories of Satan, and safe landed upon the shore of
glory; and then is swallowed up in vision: many a favor it has shown the
soul while it dwelt in its body. The great service it did for the soul was
in the time of its espousals to Christ. This is the marriage knot, the
blessed bond of union between the soul and Christ. Many a relieving sight,
secret and sweet support it has received from its faith since that; but,
surely, its first and last works are its most glorious works. By faith it
first ventured itself upon Christ; threw itself upon him in the deepest
sense of its vileness and utter unworthiness, when sense, reason, and
multitudes of temptations stood by, contradicting and discouraging the soul:
by faith it now casts itself into his arms, when it is launching out into
vast eternity.
They are both noble acts of faith; but the first no
doubt, is the greatest and most difficult: for, when once the soul is
interested in Christ, it is no such difficulty to commit itself into his
hands, as when it has no interest at all in him. It is easier for a child to
cast himself in the arms of his own father, in distress, than for one that
has been both a stranger and an enemy to Christ, to cast itself upon him,
that he may be a father and a friend to it.
And this brings us upon the second enquiry I promised to
satisfy, namely,
Secondly, What warrant or encouragement have gracious
souls to commit themselves at death into the hands of God? I answer, Much
every way; all things encourage and warrant its so doing: For,
First, This God, to whom the believer commits himself at
death, is its Creator: the Father of its being; he created and inspired it,
and so it has the relation of a creature to a Creator: yes, of a creature
now in distress, to a faithful Creator, 1 Pet. 4:19. "Let them that suffer
according to the will of God, commit the keeping of their souls to him in
well doing; as to a [faithful Creator]." It is very true, this single
relation, in itself, gives little ground of encouragement, unless the
creature had conserved that integrity in which it was originally created.
And they that have no more to plead with God for acceptance, by their
relation to him as creatures to a Creator, will doubtless find that word
made good to their little comfort, Isa. 27:11. "It is a people of no
understanding, therefore he that made them, will not have mercy on them; and
he that formed them, will show them no favor." But now, grace brings that
relation into repute: holiness ingratiates us again, and revives the
remembrance of this relation; so that believers only can plead this.
Secondly, As the gracious soul is his creature, so it is
his redeemed creature; one that he has bought, and that with a great price,
even with the precious blood of Jesus Christ, 1 Pet. 1:18. This greatly
encourages the departing soul, to commit itself into the hands of God; so
you find, Psalm. 31:5. "Into your hands do I commend my spirit, you have
redeemed it, O Lord God of truth." Surely this is mighty encouragement, to
put itself upon God in a dying hour. Lord, I am not only your creature, but
your redeemed creature; one that you have bought with a great price: O, I
have cost you dear! for my sake Christ came from your bosom, and is it
imaginable, that after that you have in such a costly way, even by the
expense of the precious blood of Christ, redeemed me, you should at last
exclude me? Shall the ends both of creation and redemption of this soul be
lost together? will God form such an excellent creature as my soul is, in
which are so many wonders of the wisdom and power of its Creator? will he be
content, when sin has marred the frame, and defaced the glory of it, to
recover it to him self again, by the death of his own dear Son, and after
all this, cast it away, as if there were nothing in all this? "Father, into
your hands I commend my spirit:" I know you will have a respect to the work
of your hands; especially to a redeemed creature, upon which you best
expended so great sums of love, which you have bought at so dear a rate.
Thirdly, Nay, that is not all; the gracious soul may
confidently and securely commit itself into the hands of God, when it parts
with its body at death; not only because it is his creature, his redeemed
creature, but because it is his renewed creature also: and this lays a firm
ground for the believer's confidence and acceptance; not that it is the
proper cause, or reason of its acceptance, but as it is the soul's best
evidence, that it is accepted with God, and shall not be refused by him,
when it comes to him at death: for, in such a soul, there is a double
workmanship of God, both glorious pieces, though the last exceeds in glory.
A natural workmanship, in the excellent frame of that noble creature, the
soul; and a gracious workmanship upon that again; a new creation upon the
old; glory upon glory. "We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus,"
Eph. 2:10. The Holy Spirit came down from heaven on purpose to create this
new workmanship; to frame this new creature; and indeed, it is the top and
glory of all God's works of wonders in this world; and must needs give the
believer encouragement to commit itself to God, whether at such a time, it
shall reflect either upon the end of the work, or upon the end of the
workman; both which meet in the salvation of the soul so wrought upon, the
end of the neck is our glory. By this "we are made meet to be partakers of
the inheritance of the saints in light," Col. 1:12. It is also the design
and end of him that wrought it, 2 Cor. 5:5. "Now he that has wrought us for
the self same thing, is God." Had he not designed your soul for glory, the
Spirit should never have come upon such a sanctifying design as this: surely
it shall not fail of a reception into glory, when it is cast out of this
tabernacle: such a work was not wrought in vain, neither can it ever perish:
when once sanctification comes upon a soul, it so roots itself in the soul,
that where the soul goes, it goes; gifts indeed, they die: all natural
excellency and beauty, that goes away at death, Job 4 ult. but grace ascends
with the soul; it is a sanctified, when a separate sent. And can God shut
the door of glory upon such a soul, that by trace is made meet for the
inheritance? O, it cannot be!
Fourthly, As the gracious soul is a renewed soul, so it
is also a sealed soul; God has sealed it in this world for that glory, into
which it is now to enter at death. All gracious souls are sealed
objectively, that is they have those works of grace wrought on their souls
which do, (as but now was said,) ascertain and evidence their title to
glory; and in many are sealed formally; that is, the Spirit helps them
clearly to discern their interest in Christ, and all the promises. This both
secures heaven to the soul in itself, and becomes also an earnest or pledge
of that glory in the unspeakable joys and comforts that it produces in the
soul: So you find, 2 Cor. 1:22. "Who has sealed us, and given us the earnest
of the Spirit in our hearts." God's sealing, us gives his security; his
objective seal makes it sure in itself, its formal seal makes it so to us.
but, if over and above all this, he will please, as a fruit of that his
sealing, to give us those heavenly inexpressible joys and comforts which are
the fruit of his formal sealing-work, to be an earnest, a foretaste and
hansel of that glory, how can the soul that has found all this, fear in the
least at a rejection by its God, when at death it comes to him? Surely, if
God have sealed, he will not refuse you; if he have given his earnest, he
will not shut you out; God's earnest is not given in jest.
Fifthly, Moreover, every gracious soul may confidently
cast itself into the arms of its God, when it goes hence, with "Father, into
your hands I commit my spirit." Forasmuch as every gracious soul; is a soul
in covenant with God; and God stands obliged by his covenant and promise to
such, not to cast them out, when they come unto him. As soon as ever you
became his, by regeneration, that promise became your, Heb. 13:5. "I will
never leave you, nor forsake you." And will he leave the soul at a time when
it never had more need of a God to stand by it, than it has then? Every
gracious soul is entitled to that promise, John 14:3. "I will come again,
and receive you to myself." And will he fail to make it good when the time
of the promise is come, as at death it is? It cannot be. multitudes of
promises; the whole covenant of promises, give security to the soul against
the fears of rejections, or neglect by God. And the soul's dependence upon
God and his promise; its very casting itself upon him, from the
encouragement the word gives it, add to the engagement upon God. When he
sees a poor soul that he has made, redeemed, sanctified sealed, and by
solemn promise engaged himself to receive, coming to him at death, firmly
depending upon his faithfulness that has promised, saying, as David, 2 Sam.
23:5, Though Lord, there be many defects in me, yet you have made a covenant
with me, well ordered in all things, and sure; and this is all my salvation,
and all my hope." Lord, I am resolved to send out my soul in an act of
faith; I will venture it upon the credit of your promise. How can God refuse
such a soul? How can he put it off, when it so puts itself upon him?
Sixthly, But this is not all; the gracious soul sustains
many intimate and dear relations to that God into whose hands it commends
itself at death. It is his spouse, and the consideration of such a day of
espousals, may well encourage it to cast itself into the bosom of Christ,
its head and husband: it is a member of his body, flesh and bones, Eph.
5:30. It is his child, and he its everlasting Father, Isa. 9:6. It is his
friend. "Henceforth (says Christ,) I call you not servants, but friends,"
John 15:15. What confidence may these, and all other the dear relations
Christ owns to the renewed soul, beget, in such an hour as this is! that
husband can throw off the dear wife of his bosom; Who in distresses casts
herself into his arms! What father can shut the door upon a dear child that
comes to him for refuge, saying, Father, into your hands I commit myself!
Seventhly, and lastly, The unchangeableness of God's love
to his people, gives confidence they shall in no wise be cast out. They know
Christ was the same to them at last as he was at first: the same in the
pangs of death, as he was in the comforts of life: having loved his own
which were in the world, he loved them to the end, John 13:1. He does not
love as the world loves, only in prosperity; but they are as dear to him
when their beauty and strength are gone, as when they were in the greatest
flourishing. If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the
Lord; so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's, Rom. 14:8. Take in
all these things, and weigh them both apart, and together, and see whether
they amount not to a full evidence of the truth of this point, that dying
believers are both warranted and encouraged to commend their souls into the
lands of God; whether they have not everyone of them cause to say as the
apostle did, 2 Tim. 1:12 "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that
he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day." The
improvements of all this you have in the following practical deductions.
Deduction I. Are dying believers only warranted and
encouraged thus to commend their souls into the hands of God? What a sad
strait then must all dying unbelievers be in about their souls? Such souls
will fall into the hands of God, but that is their misery, not their
privilege: they are not put by faith into the hands of mercy, but fall by
sin into the hands of justice: not God, but the devil is their father, John
8:4. Where should the child go but to its own father? They have not one of
those aforementioned encouragements to cast themselves into the hands of
God, except the naked relation they have to God as their Creator, and that
is as good as none, without the new creation. If they have nothing but this
to plead for their salvation, the devil has as much to plead as they. It is
the new creature that brings the first creation into repute again with God.
O dismal! O deplorable case! A poor soul is turning out
of house and home, and knows not where to go; it departs, and immediately
falls into the hands of justice. The devil stands by, waiting for such a
soul (as a dog for a crust) whom God will throw to him. Little! ah little,
do the friends of such a one think, while they are honoring his dust by a
splendid and honorable funeral, what a case that poor soul is in that lately
dwelt there; and what fearful straits and extremities it is now exposed to!
He may cry, indeed, Lord! Lord! open to me, as in Mat. 7:22. But to how
little purpose are these vain cries! Will God hear him when he cries? Job
27:9. It is a lamentable case!
Deduction 2. Will God graciously accept, and faithfully
keep what the saints commit to him at death? How careful then should they be
to keep what God commits to them, to be kept for him while they live? You
have a great trust to commit to God when you die, and God has a great trust
to commit to you while you live: you expect that he should faithfully keep
what then you shall commit to his keeping, and he expects you should
faithfully keep what he now commits to your keeping. O keep what God commits
to you, as you expect he should keep your souls when you commit them unto
him. If you keep his truths, he will keep your souls. "Because you have kept
the word of my patience, I also will keep you, etc." Rev. 3:10. Be faithful
to your God, and you shall find him faithful to you. None can pluck you out
of his hand; see that nothing wrest his truths out of your hands. "If we
deny him, he also will deny us," 2 Tim. 2:12. Take heed lest those estates
you have gotten as a blessing, attending the gospel, prove a temptation to
you to betray the gospel. "Religion (says one) brings forth riches, but the
daughter devours the mother." How can you expect acceptance with God, who
have betrayed his truth, and dealt perfidiously with him.
Deduction 3. If believers may safely commit their souls
into the hands of God, how confidently may they commit all lesser interests
and lower concernments into the same hand? Shall we trust him with our
souls, and not with our lives, liberties or comforts. Can we commit the
treasure to him and not a trifle? Whatever you enjoy in this world, is but a
trifle to your souls. Sure, if you can trust him for eternal life for your
souls, you may much more trust him for the daily bread for your bodies. I
know it is objected, that God has made over temporal things to his people
upon conditional promises, and an absolute faith can never be grounded upon
conditional promises.
But what means this objection? Let your faith be but
suitable to these conditional promises, that is believe they shall be made
good to you so far as God sees them good for you: do you but labor to come
up to those conditions required in you, and thereby God will have more
glory, and you more comfort: If your prayers for these things proceed from
pure ends, the glory of God, not the satisfaction and gratification of your
lusts: If your desires after them be moderate as to the measure, content
with that proportion the Infinite Wisdom sees fittest for you: If you take
God's way to obtain them, and dare not strain conscience, or commit a sin,
though you should perish for want: If you can patiently wait God's time for
enlargements from your straits, and not make any sinful haste, you shall be
surely supplied; and he that remembers your souls will not forget your
bodies. But we live by sense, and not by faith; present things strike our
affections more powerfully than the invisible things that are to come. The
Lord humble his people for this.
Deduction. 4. Is this the privilege of believers, that
they can commit their souls to God in a dying hour? Then how precious, how
useful a grace is faith to the people of God, both living and dying?
All the graces have done excellently, but faith excels
then all: faith is the Phoenix grace, the queen of graces: deservedly it is
stiled precious faith, 2 Pet. 1:1. The benefits and privileges of it in this
life are unspeakable: and as there is no comfortable living, so no
comfortable dying without it.
First, While we live and converse here in the world, all
our comfort and safety is from it; for all our union with Christ, the
fountain of mercies and blessings, is by faith, Eph. 3:17. "that Christ may
dwell in your hearts by faith." No faith, no Christ: all our communion with
Christ is by it: he that comes to God must believe, Heb. 11:6. The soul's
life is enrapt up in this communion with God, and that communion in faith.
All communications from Christ depend upon faith; for look, as all communion
is founded in union, so from our union and communion are all our
communications. All communications of quickening, comforts, joy, strength,
and whatever serves to the well-being of the life of grace, are all through
that faith which first knits us to Christ, and still maintains our communion
with Christ; believing we rejoice, 1 Pet. 1:8. The inner man is renewed,
while we look to the things that are not seen, 2 Cor. 4:18.
Secondly, And as our life, and all the supports and
comforts of it here, are dependent on faith, so you see our death, as to the
safety and comfort of our souls then, depends upon our faith: he that has no
faiths cannot commit his soul to God, but rather shrinks from God. Faith can
do many sweet offices for your souls upon a death-bed, when the light of
this world is gone, and all joy ceases on earth: it can give us sights of
things invisible in the other world, and those sights will breathe life into
your souls, amidst the very pangs of death.
Reader, do but think what a comfortable foresight of God,
and the joys of salvation, will be to you, when your eye-strings are
breaking; faith can not only see that beyond the grave, which will comfort,
but it can cleave to its God, and clasp Christ in a promise, when it feels
the ground of all sensible comforts trembling, and sinking under your feet:
"My heart and my flesh fails, but God is the strength (or rock) of my heart,
and my portion forever." Reeds fail, but the rock is firm footing; yes, and
when the soul can no longer tabernacle here, it can carry the soul to God,
cast it upon him, with "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit." O
precious faith!
Deduction 5. Do the souls of dying believers commend
themselves into the hands of God? Then let not the surviving relations of
such sorrow as men that have no hope. A husband, a wife, a child, is rent by
death out of your arms: well, but consider into what arms, into what bosom
they are commended. Is it not better for them to be in the bosom of God,
than in yours? Could they be spared so long from heaven, as to come back
again to you but an hour, how would they he displeased to see your tears,
and hear your cries and sighs for them: They would say to you as Christ said
to the daughters of Jerusalem, "Weep not for me, but weep for yourselves,
and for your children." I am in a safe land, I am out of the reach of all
storms and troubles. O did you but know what their state is, who are with
God, you would be more than satisfied about them.
Deduction 6. Lastly, I will close all with a word of
counsel. Is this the privilege of dying believers, to commend their souls
into the hands of God.? Then as ever you hope for comfort, or peace in your
last hour, see that your souls be such, as may be then fit to be commended
into the hands of an holy and just God: See that they be holy souls; God
will never accept them if they be not holy, "Without holiness no man shall
see God," Heb. 12:24. "He that has this hope, (namely, to see God) purifieth
himself even as he is pure," 1 John 3:3. Endeavors after holiness are
inseparably connected with all rational expectations of blessedness. Will
you put an unclean, filthy, defiled thing into the pure hand of the most
holy God? O see they be holy, and already accepted in the beloved, or use to
them when they take their leave of those tabernacles they now dwell in. The
gracious soul may confidently say then, Lord Jesus! into your hand I commend
my spirit. O let all that can say so then, now say, Thanks be to God for
Jesus Christ!