The Christians portion Wherein is unfolded the unsearchable riches he hath

Or Death.

As life is ours, So death ¹is ours. It is a strange thing that death should be ours, that is a destroying hostile thing to nature, The King of fears as the Scripture calls it ^aand that terrible of all terribles, as the Philosopher, the last enemy ^uas Paul saith; that death should be ours. Death is ours many ways, you see here it is a piece of our jointure, for these words contain the jointure of the Church. ⟨p. 15⟩The Church is Christs Spouse, all things are Christs, and therefore all things are the Spouses: and among other particular gifts given to the Church, death is ours. It is a strange thing ⁴that death should be given to the Church, and yet so it is, and we shall see this, if we consider how death in the Gospel is turned into another thing, it is a harmless thing in the Gospel the sting is pulled out, it hath lost all its venom in Christ. now death is a passage to ⁵another World, it is the gate of glory, death nothing but divests us of these raiments that we have here on our bodies, and puts us ⟨p. 16⟩into garments of glory, it puts off these rags, and puts us into a better condition, that is all the hurt it doth, it ends all that is ill, and all is determined in death, it is the last evil, and it is the beginning of all that is good, that is everlastingly good, that is spiritually good & eternally good, for by death we are freed, both from the labour of sin which is a labour irksome to Gods people, by reason of a principle of corruption which they have in them, that accompanies them till they be in their grave: death is the accomplishment of mortification, in death there is an end of the labour of