Letters of Samuel Rutherford: (Third Edition)Rutherford, Samuel
Religion
Letters of Samuel Rutherford: (Third Edition)
Rutherford, Samuel
Rutherford, Samuel, 1600?-1661 -- Correspondence
MISTRESS,--My love in Christ remembered. Having appointed a meeting
with Mr. David Dickson, and knowing that B. will not keep the
Presbytery, I cannot see you now. Commend my journey to God. My soul
blesseth you for your last letter. Be not discouraged; Christ will not
want the Isles-men. "The Isles shall wait for His law." We are His
inheritance, and He will sell no part of His inheritance. For the sins
of this land, and our breach of the covenant, contempt of the Gospel,
and our defection from the truth, He hath set up a burning furnace in
our Mount Zion; but I say it, and will bide by it, the grass shall yet
grow green on our Mount Zion. There shall be dew all the night upon
the lilies, amongst which Christ feedeth, until the day break, and the
shadows flee away. And the moth shall eat up the enemies of Christ.
Let them make a fire of their own, and walk in the light thereof, it
shall not let them see to go to their bed; but they shall lie down in
sorrow (Isa. l. 11). Therefore, rejoice and believe. This in haste.
Grace, grace be with you and yours.
Yours in Christ,
S. R.
ANWOTH.
LIV.--_For_ MARION M'NAUGHT.
(_PUBLIC WRONGS--WORDS OF COMFORT._)
LOVING AND DEAR SISTER,--I fear that you be moved and cast down,
because of the late wrong that your husband received in your Town
Council. But I pray you comfort yourself in the Lord; for a just cause
bides under the water only as long as wicked men hold their hand
above it; their arm will weary, and then the just cause shall swim
above, and the light that is sown for the righteous shall spring and
grow up. If ye were not strangers here, the dogs of the world would
not bark at you. You may see all windings and turnings that are in
your way to heaven out of God's Word; for He will not lead you to the
kingdom at the nearest, but you must go through "honour and dishonour,
by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as
unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as
chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, and yet always rejoicing" (2
Cor. vi. 8, 10). The world is one of the enemies that we have to fight
with, but a vanquished and overcome enemy, and like a beaten and
forlorn soldier; for our Jesus hath taken the armour from it. Let me
then speak to you in His words: "Be of good courage," saith the
Captain of our salvation, "for I have overcome the world." You shall
neither be free of the scourge of the tongue, nor of disgraces (even
if it were buffetings and spittings upon the face, as was our
Saviour's case), if you follow Jesus Christ. I beseech you in the
bowels of our Lord Jesus, keep a good conscience, as I trust you do.
You live not upon men's opinion; gold may be gold, and have the king's
stamp upon it, when it is trampled upon by men. Happy are you, if,
when the world trampleth upon you in your credit and good name, yet
you are the Lord's gold, stamped with the King of heaven's image, and
sealed by the Spirit unto the day of your redemption.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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