Thomas Brooks was an English Puritan preacher and author in the 1600s. Though he's best known for his many books and theological treatises, we have several of his sermons in print, some of which are funeral sermons. In one funeral sermon, Brooks reminds his listeners that for the believer, death not only ceases to be our conqueror; death actually becomes God's meek helper. He wrote: "Death is another Moses: it delivers believers out of bondage, and from making bricks in Egypt." He continued:
Remember this—death does that in a moment, which no graces, no duties, nor any ordinances could do for a man all his lifetime! Death frees a [person] from those diseases, corruptions, temptations … that no duties, nor graces, nor ordinances could do …. Every prayer then [when we die] shall have its answer; all hungering and thirsting shall be filled and satisfied; every sigh, groan, and tear that has fallen from the saints' eyes shall then be recompensed. That is not death but life, which joins the dying man to Christ!
