For whom did [the Father] smite [Jesus Christ]? For sinners, for straying sheep, for covenant-breakers, for such as had gone a-whoring from God, and were bent to sin against him, I mean the elect.
—James Durham (1622–1658), Christ Crucified, 165.
For the best Christians are not those “who are very learned and read much and own many books. But they are the best who most freely do what they read in books and teach others. However, they are not able to act freely unless they possess love through the Holy Spirit.” Therefore, in our age they are most to be feared who become very rich in book learning but remain unlearned as Christians.
– Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 4, Holy Spirit, Church, and New Creation, ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008), 195; citing Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, ed. H. C. Oswald (St. Louis: Concordia, 1972), 25:326.
To Lady Gaitgirth(Her husband, to whom Rutherford expresses his obligations at the close of the letter, was Sheriff of Ayrshire and represented it in the Scottish Parliament. He was one of three commissioners sent by Parliament on behalf of the Covenant to Newcastle in 1641. In 1649 he commanded a troop of Horse.)
Mistress,
I long to know how matters stand betwixt Christ and your soul. Time cannot change Him in His love. Ye yourself may ebb and flow, rise and fall, wax and wane; but your Lord is this day as He was yesterday. And it is your comfort that your salvation is not rolled upon wheels of your own making, neither have ye to do with a Christ at your own shaping.
God has singled out a Mediator, strong and mighty: if ye and your burdens were as heavy as ten hills or hells, He is able to bear you, and to save you to the uttermost. Your often seeking to Him cannot make you a burden to Him. I know that Christ compassioneth you, and maketh a moan for you, in all your dumps, and under your down castings; but it is good for you that He hideth Himself sometimes.
It is not niceness, dryness, nor coldness of love, that causeth Christ to withdraw, and slip in under a curtain and a vail, that ye cannot see Him; but He knoweth that ye could not bear with upsails, a fair gale, a full moon, and a high spring-tide of His felt love, and always a fair summer-day and a summer-sun of a felt and possessed and embracing Lord Jesus. His kisses and His visits to His dearest ones are thin-sown. He could not let out His rivers of love upon His own, but these rivers would be in hazard of loosening a young plant at the root; and He knoweth this of you. Ye should, therefore, frist Christ’s kindness, as to its sensible and full manifestations, till ye and He be above sun and moon. That is the country where ye will be enlarged for that love which ye dow not now contain.
Cast the burden of your sweet babes upon Christ, and lighten your heart, by laying your all upon Him: He will be their God. I hope to see you up the mountain yet, and glad in the salvation of God.
Frame yourself for Christ, and gloom not upon His cross. I find Him so sweet, that my love, suppose I would charge it to remove from Christ, would not obey me: His love has stronger fingers than to let go its grips of us bairns, who cannot go but by such a hold as Christ. It is good that we want legs of our own, since we may borrow from Christ; and it is our happiness that Christ is under an act of cautionary for heaven, and that Christ is booked in heaven as the principal debtor for such poor bodies as we are.
I request you, give the laird, your husband, thanks for his care of me, in that he has appeared in public for a prisoner of Christ. I pray and write mercy, and peace, and blessings to him and his.
Grace, grace be with you for ever.
Aberdeen, 1637
To Mr. William DalgleishReverend and Well-Beloved Brother,
Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you. I have heard somewhat of your trials in Galloway. My witness is above, my dearest brother, that ye have added much joy to me in my bonds, when I hear that ye grow in the grace and zeal of God for your Master. Our ministry, whether by preaching or suffering, will cast a smell through the world both of heaven and hell (II Cor. 2.15, 16). I persuade you, my dear brother, that there is nothing out of heaven, next to Christ, dearer to me than my ministry.
And, let me speak to you now, how kind a fellow prisoner is Christ to me! Believe me, this kind of cross (that would not go by my door, but would needs visit me) is still the longer the more welcome to me. It is true, my silent Sabbaths have been, and still are, as glassy ice, whereon my faith can scarce hold its feet, and I am often blown on my back, and off my feet, with a storm of doubting; yet truly, my bonds all this time cast a mighty and rank smell of high and deep love in Christ. I cannot, indeed, see through my cross to the far end; yet I believe I am in Christ’s books, and in His decree (not yet unfolded to me), a man triumphing, dancing, and singing, on the other side of the Red Sea, and laughing and praising the Lamb, over beyond time, sorrow, deprivation, prelates’ indignation, losses, want of friends, and death.
Woe is me, my dear brother, that I say often, ‘I am but dry bones, which my Lord will not bring out of the grave again’; and that my faithless fears say, ‘Oh, I am a dry tree, that can bear no fruit: I am a useless body, who can beget no children to the Lord in His house!’ Hopes of deliverance look cold and uncertain and afar off, as if I had done with it. If my sufferings could do beholders good and edify His kirk and proclaim the incomparable worth of Christ’s love to the world, then would my soul be overjoyed and my sad heart be cheered and calmed!
Dear brother, I cannot tell what is become of my labours among that people! If all that my Lord builded by me be casten down, and the bottom be fallen out of the profession at that parish, and none stand by Christ, whose love I once preached as clearly and plainly as I could (though far below its worth and excellence) to that people; if so, how can I bear it! And if another make a foul harvest, where I have made a painful and honest sowing, it will not soon digest with me. But I know that His ways pass finding out.
Yet my witness, both within me and above me, knoweth. And my pained breast upon the Lord’s Day at night, my desire to have had Christ awful, and amiable, and sweet to that people, is now my joy. It was my desire and aim to make Christ and them one; and, if I see my hopes die in the bud, see they bloom a little, and come to no fruit, I die with grief.
But, my dear brother, go on in the strength of His rich grace, whom ye serve. Stand fast for Christ. Deliver the Gospel off your hand, and your ministry to your Master with a clean and undefiled conscience. Let us make our part of it good, that it may be able to abide the fire, when hay and stubble shall be burned to ashes. Nothing, nothing, I say, nothing, but sound sanctification can abide the Lord’s fan.
Now, remember my love to all my friends, and to my parishioners, as if I named each one of them particularly. I recommend you, and God’s people, committed by Christ to your trust, to the rich grace of our all-sufflcient Lord. Remember my bonds. Praise my Lord, who beareth me up in my sufferings. As you find occasion, according to the wisdom given you, show our acquaintance what the Lord has done for my soul. This I seek not, verily, to hunt my own praise, but that my dearest Master may be magnified.
Aberdeen, 17 June 1637
There is not, nor cannot be any colour at all to say, that God doth love sinners extra Christum, or destinate Eternal life to them without a mediator. When God in free Election resolves with himself, such individual persons shall by an effectual Call be united to Christ as members of his Body, and being such, shall be washed in his blood, filled with his Spirit, and at last crowned with his everlasting Salvation; when he resolves, every grain shall come through Joseph’s hands, every particle of Grace, every income of the holy Spirit, every glimpse of Divine Favour, every beam of glory in Heaven, shall pass through Jesus Christ’s hands; nay, through his very Heart-blood and crucified Flesh unto the Elect, Doth he now love them extra Christum? Doth he yet destinate them to Eternal life without a Mediator? Undoubtedly he doth not. If therefore you ask me, what necessity there is of Christ’s merits, I must answer, That all Grace and Glory, Sanctity and Salvation, Faith and Fruition are thereby purchased and procured for the Elect. The pure fountain of Election rises of itself in the Will of God, but the gracious streams thereof issue forth through the bleeding Wounds of Christ.
– Polhill, Edward. The divine will considered in its eternal decrees and holy execution of them by Edward Polhill … Esquire (London: Printed for Henry Eversden, 1673), 81-82. (Click on the book for info on the modern re-print edition of Polhill’s works.)
– Polhill, Edward. The divine will considered in its eternal decrees and holy execution of them by Edward Polhill … Esquire (London: Printed for Henry Eversden, 1673), 55-56. (Click on the book for info on the modern re-print edition of Polhill’s works.)
Always to be a theist in the full and true sense of the word, that is, to see God’s counsel and hand and work in all things and simultaneously, indeed for that very reason, to develop all available energies and gifts to the highest level of activity–that is the glory of the Christian faith and the secret of the Christian life.
– Herman Bavinck, God and Creation, vol. 2 of Reformed Dogmatics, 4 vols., ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2004), 605.
To John Gordon of Cardoness, the ElderMuch Honored and Dearest in My Lord,
Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.
My soul longeth exceedingly to hear how matters go betwixt you and Christ; and whether or not there be any work of Christ in that parish, that will bide the trial of fire and water. Let me be weighed of my Lord in a just balance, if your souls lie not weighty upon me. Ye go to bed and ye rise with me: thoughts of your soul, my dearest in our Lord, depart not from me in my sleep. Ye have a great part of my tears, sighs, supplications, and prayers. Oh, if I could buy your soul’s salvation with any suffering whatsoever, and that ye and I might meet with joy up in the rainbow, when we shall stand before our Judge!
Sir, show the people this; for when I write to you, I think I write to you all, old and young. Fulfill my joy and seek the Lord. Sure I am, that once I discovered my lovely, royal princely Lord Jesus to you all. Woe, woe shall be your part of it for evermore, if the Gospel be not the savor of life to you. Believe me, I find heaven a city hard to be won.
I know your accounts are many, and will take telling and laying, and reckoning betwixt you and your Lord. Fit your accounts, and order them. Lose not the last play, whatever ye do, for in that play with death your precious soul is the prize: for the Lord’s sake spill not the play, and lose not such a treasure. Ye know that, out of love which I had to your soul, and out of desire which I had to make an honest account of you, I testified my displeasure and disliking of your ways very often, both in private and public. I am not now a witness of your doings, but your Judge is always your witness. I beseech you by the mercies of God, by the salvation of your soul, after the sight of this letter to take a new course with your ways and now, in the end of your day, make sure of heaven.
I never knew so well what sin was as since I came to Aberdeen, howbeit I was preaching of it to you. To feel the smoke of hell’s fire in the throat for half an hour; to stand beside a river of fire and brimstone broader than the earth; and to think to be bound hand and foot, and casten into the midst of it quick, and then to have God locking the prison door, never to be opened to all eternity! O how it will shake a conscience that has any life in it!
Look up to Him and love Him. O, love and live! It were life to me if you would read this letter to the people and if they did profit by it. My dearest in the Lord, stand fast in Christ, keep the faith, contend for Christ. Wrestle for Him and take men’s feud for God’s favor; there is no comparison betwixt them. O that the Lord would fulfill my joy and keep the young bride that is at Anwoth to Christ!
Now, worthy Sir, now my dear people, my joy and my crown in the Lord, let Him be your fear. Seek the Lord, and His face: save your souls. Doves! flee to Christ’s windows. Pray for me, and praise for me. The blessing of my God, the prayers and blessing of a poor prisoner, and your lawful pastor, be upon you.
Your lawful and loving pastor.
Aberdeen 16 June 1637
To Ninian Mure, a parishionerLoving Friend,
I received your letter. I entreat you now, in the morning of your life, to seek the Lord and His face. Beware of the follies of dangerous youth, a perilous time for your soul. Love not the world. Keep faith and truth with all men in your covenants and bargains. Walk with God, for He seeth you. Do nothing but that which ye may and would do if your eye-strings were breaking, and your breath growing cold.
Ye heard the truth of God from me, my dear heart, follow it, and forsake it not. Prize Christ and salvation above all the world. To live after the guise and course of the rest of the world will not bring you to heaven; without faith in Christ, and repentance, ye cannot see God. Take pains for salvation; press forward toward the mark for the prize of the high calling. If ye watch not against evils night and day, which beset you, ye will come behind.
Beware of lying, swearing, uncleanness, and the rest of the works of the flesh; because ‘for these things the wrath of God cometh upon the children of disobedience’. How sweet soever they may seem for the present, yet the end of these courses is the eternal wrath of God, and utter darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Grace be with you.
Your loving pastor.
Aberdeen, 1637
To John Stuart, Provost of AyeMuch Honored and Dearest in Christ,
Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ, be upon you.
I expected the comfort of a letter to a prisoner from you, see now. I am here, Sir, putting off a part of my inch of time; and when I awake first in the morning (which is always with great heaviness and sadness), this question is brought to my mind, ‘Am I serving God or not? Not that I doubt of the truth of this honorable cause wherein I am engaged; I dare venture into eternity, and before my Judge, that I now suffer for the truth — because that I cannot endure that my Master, who is a freeborn King, should pay tribute to any of the shields or potsherds of the earth.
Oh that I could hold the crown upon my princely King’s head with my sinful arm, howbeit it should be struck from me in that service, from the shoulder-blade. But my closed mouth, my dumb Sabbaths, the memory of my communion with Christ, in many fair, fair days in Anwoth, whereas now my Master getteth no service of my tongue as then, has almost broken my faith in two halves. Yet in my deepest apprehensions of His anger, I see through a cloud that I am wrong. And beside, He has visited my soul and watered it with His comforts.
The great men, my friends that did for me, are dried up like winter-brooks of water. All say, ‘No dealing for that man; his best will be to be gone out of the kingdom.’ So I see they tire of me. But, believe me, I am most gladly content that Christ breaketh all my idols in pieces. It has put a new edge upon mv blunted love to Christ; I see that He is jealous of my love, and will have all to Himself.
In a word, these six things are my burden:
Sir, write to me. Commend me to your wife. Mercy be her portion. Grace be with you.
Yours, in his dearest Lord Jesus.
Aberdeen, 1637
Inheriting considerable property from his father, Stuart was lavishly generous in support of those suffering persecution for conscience’ sake. Later, owing to the ravages of plague he lost much of his money. He joined with Blair (Letter XVI) in the frustrated attempt to emigrate to America, which is referred to in the next letter.
