From Letters of Samuel Rutherford, by Samuel Rutherford
There are curtains to be drawn by in Christ, that we never saw, and new foldings of love in Him. I despair that ever I shall win to the far end of that love, there are so many plies in it.
The loss of life is gain to you. If Christ Jesus be the period, the end, and lodging home, at the end of your journey, there is no fear; ye go to a friend.
The sanctified cross is a fruitful tree, it bringeth forth many apples.
He has sealed my sufferings with His own comforts, and I know that He will not put His seal upon blank paper.
Love Him dearly. Win in to see Him; there is in Him that which you never saw. He is aye nigh; He is a tree of life, green and blossoming, both summer and winter. There is a nick in Christianity, to the which whosoever cometh, they see and feel more than others can do.
Duties are ours, events are the Lord’s.
She is not sent away, but only sent before, like unto a star, which going out of our sight doth not die and vanish, but shineth in another hemisphere.
It is faith’s work to claim and challenge loving-kindness out of all the roughest strokes of God. Do that for the Lord which ye will do for time: time will calm your heart at that which God has done, and let our Lord have it now. What love ye did bear to friends now dead, seeing they stand now in no need of it, let it fall as just legacy to Christ.
Wrestle, fight, go forward, watch, fear, believe, pray; and then ye have the infallible symptoms of one of the elect of Christ within you.
I have neither tongue nor pen to express to you the happiness of such as are in Christ.
Those who can take that crabbed tree handsomely upon their back, and fasten it on cannily, shall find it such a burden as wings unto a bird, or sails to a ship.
Oh that I might but stand in Christ’s out-house, or hold a candle in any low vault of His house!
Death is but an awesome step, over time and sin, to sweet Jesus Christ, who knew and felt the worst of death, for death’s teeth hurt Him.
Do nothing but that which ye may and would do if your eye-strings were breaking, and your breath growing cold.
Nothing, nothing, I say, nothing, but sound sanctification can abide the Lord’s fan.
Your wants and falls proclaim that ye have nothing of your own but what ye borrow; nay, yourself is not your own, but Christ has given Himself to you.
His wind shaketh no corn.
When my faith was asleep, Christ was awake; and now, when I am awake, I say He did all things well.
Oh, but we have need to be redeemed from ourselves, rather than from the devil and the world!
I thought it had been an easy thing to be a Christian, and that to seek God had been at the next door; but O, the windings and turnings that He has led me through!
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