It may be truly said of the hour when a good man dies, that it is the hour when he enters into life. And this is because Jesus destroyed "him that had the power of death." He did not annihilate him, the word does not mean that, but He neutralized, counteracted, stripped him of his power. The whole design and effect of death, when in the power of the devil, has been defeated and reversed by the death of Christ. Though the bodies of his people be consigned to the grave, it is in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to everlasting life. That melancholy seed-time in which we cast the dust of our beloved into the earth, is the prelude to a glorious harvest; that when "He giveth his beloved sleep," is preparatory to their awaking to glory and immortality. "It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body." This is what Christ's death has done for the bodies of his people; and is it not an entire breaking of the power of the devil over death? As to their souls, death delivers them from the burden of the flesh, that they may be in joy and felicity with God. "Absent from the body," they are for ever "present with the Lord." Death is no longer a dark and dreadful phantom, rising from the abyss, to drag down his victims and gorge himself upon them. He is an angel, pure and bright, sent to summon God's beloved to their Father's house above. That which men naturally dread as the crown and climax of all evils, becomes an object of wistful longing, for God's servants have "a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better." This stripping away of Satan's power, this destruction of "him that had the power of death," is due to the death of Jesus. He thus redeemed us from the debt of death, "acknowledging the debt in the manner in which he removed it." "Christ, by giving himself up to death, has acknowledged the guilt, and truly atoned for it; He has, in one act, atoned for the sinner and judged the sin." By dying for sins, He expiated that which gives to death its "sting," its power to injure and to terrify. He "Entered the grave in mortal flesh, And dwelt among the dead,"