“Fifth, let us consider that death to a godly man is but a change of place, not of company. We shall have the company of the same Father, Son, Spirit, and saints, and all the spirits of just men made perfect.
A believer in this world is not in his own place. Therefore, oh Christians, pull up your anchor, raise your sails, and be gone.
Death to a Christian will put an end to all unprofitable things here; we change joy for sorrow, health for sickness, strength for weakness, honor for dishonor, plenty for poverty, beauty for deformity, friends for foes, silver for brass, and gold for copper.
Now death puts an end to all these. And God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes. There shall be no more death or sorrow, neither shall there be any more pain (Rev. 21:4).
Therefore, blessed are the dead that die in the Lord (Rev. 14:13). Death also puts a change to our employment. Our employment in this world requires much in praying, groaning, sighing, mourning, wrestling, and fighting against the world, flesh, and the devil (Eph. 6:10).
But in the world to come, our employment will lie in praising and magnifying the Lord. Again, our enjoyment will be changed, as will our employment. We shall change our inconstant enjoyment for a more constant (1 Thess. 4:17-18).
We shall change our dark and obscure enjoyment for a brighter enjoyment. ‘For now, we see through a glass darkly but then face to face,’ here we receive grace for grace, there we shall receive glory for glory (1 Cor. 13:12).”
–Robert Purnell, A Body of Doctrinal and Practical Divinity from 1657; or A Little Cabinet (Greenbrier, AR: Free Grace Press, 1657/2026), 376-377.
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