Human nature in its fourfold state ... In several practical discourses

CASE VIII. "I am afraid of sudden death." ANSW. Thou may indeed die so. Good Eli died suddenly, 1 Sam. iv. 18. Yet death found him watching, ver. 12. Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour the Lord doth come, Matth. xxiv. 42. But be not afraid, it is an unexpressible comfort, that death, come when it will, can never catch thee out of Christ; and therefore can never seize thee, as a jailer, to hurry thee into the prison of hell. Sudden death may hasten and facilitate thy passage to heaven, but can do thee no prejudice.

CASE VIII. "I am afraid of sudden death." ANSW. Thou may indeed die so. Good Eli died suddenly, 1 Sam. iv. 18. Yet death found him watching, ver. 12. Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour the Lord doth come, Matth. xxiv. 42. But be not afraid, it is an unexpressible comfort, that death, come when it will, can never catch thee out of Christ; and therefore can never seize thee, as a jailor, to hurry thee into the prison of hell. Sudden death may hasten and facilitate thy passage to heaven, but can do thee no prejudice.

CASE IX. I am afraid it may be my lot to die wanting the exercise of reason. ANSW. I make no question but a child of God, a true Christian, may die in this case. But what harm? There is no hazard in it, as to his eternal state: a disease, at death, may divest him of his reason, but not of his religion. When a man going a long voyage, has put his affairs in order, and put all his goods aboard; he himself may be carried aboard the ship sleeping: all is safe with him, although he knows not where he is, till he awaken in the ship. Even so the godly man, who dies in this case, may die uncomfortably but not unsafely.