The Letters of Samuel Rutherford (Part 1)

To a Christian Gentlewoman on the death of her daughter: Christ Shares Our Suffering

Dear Friend,

My love in Christ to you. I was genuinely grieved when I left you, especially knowing how heavy your heart was after your daughter’s death. Even so, I want to encourage you with this: the heaviest part of the cross you’re carrying rests on your strong Savior, not on you alone. As Isaiah writes, “In all your afflictions He is afflicted” (Isa 63:9). What a blessed companion you have in your suffering! Take heart that even in the fiery furnace, you walk alongside one like the Son of Man, who is also the Son of God. Courage! Lift your heart! When you grow weary, He will carry both you and your burden (Ps 55:22). The salvation of God is closer than it feels.

Consider your daughter’s age, and recognize that your time with her was always a lease, not a permanent possession. Whether she was eighteen, nineteen, or twenty years old, I cannot say with certainty, but her term had come and your lease had run its course. You cannot fairly accuse your great Landlord of injustice for reclaiming what was always His, any more than a tenant farmer can complain when his master takes back a portion of land once the lease has expired. Dear friend, if you would not want Christ to withhold from you the heavenly inheritance He purchased through His death, then surely that same Christ has reason to grieve when you refuse to give Him your daughter willingly. She is part of His inheritance, won at great cost. I pray the Lord gives you everything that is yours, and that He grants you the grace to give God what is His as well. A poor debtor is one who repays a loan with resentment. That long loan of such a good daughter, an heir of grace and a member of Christ (as I firmly believe), deserves gratitude toward your Creditor, not sullenness when He asks only for what was always His. You would rightly call a neighbor ungrateful who repaid a debt in that spirit.

But consider this: do you truly think she is lost, when she is only sleeping in the arms of the Almighty? Don’t think of her as absent when she is in such a Friend’s house. Is she lost to you when she has been found by Christ? If she were staying with a dear and trusted friend, even one you might never see again, your worry for her would be small. And is she not now with the dearest Friend of all? She has gone ahead, with the certain hope that you will see her again at the Resurrection, when (be sure of this) she will be neither wasting nor broken in body. You would be sorry to be an atheist, or even to be thought one; and yet it is not I but the Apostle who suggests that those who mourn excessively for the dead are living without hope, as those who have no God (1 Thess 4:13). I say this not as a rebuke, but out of concern for your weakness, because your daughter was a part of yourself, and nature, being cut in two, will grieve. Yet you also have reason to rejoice: while a part of you remains on earth, a great part of you is already glorified in heaven. Follow her, but don’t envy her, because it is really self-love that makes us mourn for those who die in the Lord. Think about it: we cannot truly mourn for them, since they are never more fully alive than in death. What we mourn is our own loss. Be careful, then, that in expressing your grief for your daughter, you are not really, at the root of it, mourning for yourself.

Consider what the Lord is doing through this. Your daughter has been plucked from the fire and now rests from her labors. Your Lord, in this same act, is testing you and refining you in the flame. Pass through every fire toward your rest. Remember that the eye of God is on the burning bush that is not consumed, and He is pleased to see a woman as seemingly fragile as you send Satan away empty-handed and defeated. Honor God now, and put the roaring lion to shame precisely when you appear weakest. Should someone like you give way in the day of adversity? Call to mind the faithfulness of former days. The Lord still lives. Trust Him, even if He should slay you. Faith is extraordinarily generous and thinks no evil of God. Right now the Lord is placing on one side of the scale your willingness to submit to His gracious will, and on the other, your love for your daughter. Which will you choose to honor? Be wise: if, as I trust, you love Christ more than any sinful attachment, then look past your daughter and kiss the Lord’s rod. A gardener cuts the branches from his trees so that they will grow tall and straight. The Lord has pruned your branches by taking many children from you, so that you might grow upward like one of His cedars, with your heart set on the things above, where Christ sits at the right hand of the Father. And what comes after the branches are cut? The tree itself is taken. Prepare yourself: you are closer to your daughter today than you were yesterday. Every hour you spend in grief is an hour spent moving swiftly toward her. Run your race with patience. Let God have what is His, and ask Him, in place of the daughter He has taken, for the daughter of faith, which is patience. In patience, possess your soul. Lift up your head: you do not know how near your redemption truly is.

With this, I commend you to the Lord, who is fully able to establish and sustain you. I remain your loving and affectionate friend in the Lord Jesus.

ANWOTH, April 23, 1628.

S. R.

To Lady Kenmure, during illness and spiritual depression: Trusting God Through Illness and Doubt

MADAM, All dutiful obedience in the Lord remembered. I have heard of your Ladyship’s illness with grief, yet I trust you have learned to say, “It is the Lord; let Him do whatever seems good in His eyes.” For many years now, the fallen angels have been contesting whether their will or their Creator’s will should prevail, and since that time, rebellious humanity has joined that same dispute, siding with them against God in daily complaint against His will. But since the Lord is both the opposing party and the judge, He has already secured the verdict, declaring, “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure” (Isa 46:10). It is therefore best for us, in the obedience of faith and in holy submission, to give God what His almighty and just power requires of us. Therefore, Madam, your Lord calls you, in every season of life, to say, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” And here you will find comfort: He who sees perfectly through all your suffering, who knows the makeup and constitution of your nature and what is most beneficial for your soul, holds every cup of affliction to your lips with His own gracious hand. Never doubt that your tender-hearted Savior, who knows the limits of your strength, would mix that cup with even a trace of poison. Drink it then with the patience of the saints, and may the God of patience bless your medicine.

I have heard your Ladyship speak of spiritual deadness, of feeling none of that stirring, animating power that marks the life of God within a soul. But take courage. The One who walked in the garden and made enough noise that Adam heard His voice will also, at certain moments, walk through your soul and let you hear something far sweeter. Even so, you will not always catch the sound of His footsteps when He moves. At such times, you are like Jacob weeping over the supposed death of Joseph, while Joseph was very much alive. The new creature, the image of the second Adam, is living in you, and yet you mourn as though the life of Christ within you had died. Ephraim laments and weeps, thinking God is far away and not listening (Jer 31:18), and yet God is like the bridegroom in the Song, standing just behind a thin wall with His ear pressed close (Song 2:9), for He says Himself, “I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself.” I am fully confident, Madam, that Christ Jesus, whom your soul has been seeking through forests and over mountains, is already within you. And yet I say this not to place a comfortable pillow beneath your head, nor to talk you out of a holy fear of losing your Christ, or of provoking and “stirring up the Beloved before He please” through sin. I know that in matters of spiritual confidence, the devil will push his way in, as he does with every good work, and cry out that half of it belongs to him, working to pull you into a fearful sleep until the One your soul loves has stepped away from the door and stopped knocking. It is therefore the work of the Spirit of God to hold your soul’s feet on the golden middle path, between resting confidently in the arms of Christ on one side and presumptuous, drowsy slumber in the bed of fleshly security on the other. So then, worthy lady, think humbly of yourself on account of your own wretchedness and sinful drowsiness, but be careful that in doing so you do not also think little of God and the course of His unchangeable mercy. Many Christians are very much like young sailors who believe the shore and all the land is moving, when in fact it is the ship and themselves that are in motion. In just the same way, more than a few people imagine that God is the one moving, shifting, and changing places, simply because their own unsteady souls are under sail and subject to change, to ebbing and flowing. But “the foundation of the Lord stands sure.” God knows that you are His own. So wrestle, fight, press forward, watch, fear, believe, and pray, and in doing so you will find within yourself every unmistakable mark of one of Christ’s elect.

You now face a season of sickness, Madam, and after that, death. Gather your provisions for the journey while you still can. May God give you eyes to see through both sickness and death, and to glimpse something that lies beyond them. I have no doubt that even if hell itself stood between you and Christ like a river you had to cross before reaching Him, you would willingly step in and wade through it, trusting that He would meet you in the deepest current and extend His hand. But I believe your hell has already been dried up, and you have only these two shallow streams, sickness and death, left to cross. And you have a promise that Christ will do more than simply meet you on the other side; He will come to you Himself and walk with you every step of the way, and yes, carry you in His arms. So then, for the joy set before you, and for love of the Man who is also “God over all, blessed forever” (Rom 9:5), who stands on the far shore ready to welcome you, run your race with patience. May the Lord go with you. Your Lord will not allow you, nor any of His servants, to trade down. Death in its fullest sense encompasses both the death of the soul and the death of the body; but for God’s children, the reach of death is cut short and narrowed considerably. When you die, only a portion of death will claim you, and only the smallest part of you will actually die, which is the dissolving of the body. In Christ you are already delivered from the second death, and so, as one born of God, do not give yourself over to sin (though you cannot live without sinning entirely), and that ancient serpent will feed only on your earthly part. Your soul stands above the law of death. Even so, it is a fearful and dangerous thing to be a debtor and slave to sin, because you will never be able to settle that account before God on your own. You need Christ both to reckon it and to pay it for you.

I trust, my Lady, that you will take care to bring before the Lord the present condition of this declining church. What Parliament will ultimately decide about her, only God knows. But I am certain that the decree of a most fearful heavenly parliament is on the very verge of being issued, because of the sins of this land. For “we have cast away the law of the Lord, and despised the words of the Holy One of Israel” (Isa 5:24). “Judgment is turned away backward, and justice stands far off; truth has fallen in the streets, and equity cannot enter” (Isa 59:14). Notice how the prophet, as though he had witnessed our own situation and our own church, pictures Justice as someone treated like an enemy and barred from the city gates (so thoroughly has she been banished!), and Truth as a sick and weakened person who collapses in a deadly faint on the streets before ever reaching shelter. “The priests have caused many to stumble at the law, and have corrupted the covenant of Levi” (Mal 2:3). But what will they do in the end? Therefore, give the Lord no rest on behalf of Zion. Urge your husband, your brother, and all those who hold you in esteem and trust, to take their stand on the Lord’s side against Baal. I have every reason to hope that your husband loves the peace and prosperity of Zion. May the peace of God rest on him for his intended efforts toward establishing a strong and faithful ministry in this land. Not wishing to tire your Ladyship any further, I commend you now and always to the grace and mercy of that God who is able to keep you from falling. May the Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

Your Ladyship’s servant in all dutiful obedience in Christ,

ANWOTH, July 27, 1628.

S. R.

To Lady Kenmure, on the death of her infant daughter: How Suffering Detaches Us from the World

Madam, I greet you with grace and mercy from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ. I was sorry to leave you in such grief when we parted, and I would still be troubled by it, were I not certain that you have One with you in the furnace whose face is like that of the Son of God. I am glad that you have known the wrestlings of God from your youth, and that you are given barely a moment’s rest, being moved from one furnace to the next. For consider: if you were not precious to God, and if your soul did not require so much of Him, He would not spend such care on you. Every brother and sister of Christ must be shaped into His likeness through suffering (Rom 8:29), and some bear a closer resemblance to that pattern than others. Consider it part of your glory, Madam, to be counted among those whom one of the elders pointed out to John: “These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Look to your Forerunner, who left this world in a flood of blood, and know that there are worse ways to die than as He did. Fulfill with joy what remains of “the afflictions of Christ” in your body (Col 1:24). You have lost a child, but she is not lost to you, for she is found in Christ. She has not been taken away; she has only gone on ahead, like a star that passes from our sight but does not die or disappear, only shines in another sky. You cannot see her, yet she shines in another country. If her glass held only a short hour, whatever she lacked in time she has gained in eternity, and you have reason to rejoice that you now have some treasure stored up in heaven. Build your nest on no tree here, for God has sold the forest to death, and every tree on which we might rest is ready to be cut down, so that we may fly upward and build upon the Rock, and dwell in the clefts of the Rock. Whatever you love besides Jesus, your husband, is an adulterous lover. And it is God’s particular blessing to Judah that He will not let her find her way back to her strange lovers: “Therefore, behold I will hedge up her way with thorns, and make a wall that she shall not find her paths. And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them” (Hos 2:6-7). How blessed is Judah when God builds a double stone wall between her and the fire of hell! The world and its pleasures, Madam, are the lover you naturally reach for beside your own husband, Christ. The hedge of thorns and the wall that God builds across your path, to keep you from that lover, is the thorny hedge of daily grief: the loss of children, weakness of body, the corruption of the age, uncertain circumstances, the absence of worldly comfort, and the fear of God’s anger over old and unrepented sins. What do you lose if God twists that hedge daily thicker? God be blessed, the Lord will not let you find your paths. Return to your first husband. Do not grow weary, and do not imagine that death walks toward you slowly. You must be riper before you are shaken. Your days are no longer than Job’s, which were “swifter than a post, and passed away as the ships of desire, and as the eagle that hasteth for the prey” (Job 9:25-26). There is less sand in your glass now than there was yesterday. This brief, rushing span of time will soon be over. But the greater mercy of God is this: the more years He gives you, the more time you have to consider on what terms and under what conditions you will cast your soul into the vast gulf of never-ending eternity. The Lord has told you what you should be doing until He comes. “Wait and hasten,” says Peter, “for the Coming of our Lord.” Everything here is night, in the sense of ignorance and daily troubles that follow one upon another, each making way for the next as the ninth wave of the sea gives way to the tenth. So sigh and long for the dawning of that morning, for the breaking of that day when the Son of Man comes and the shadows flee away. Persuade yourself that the King is coming; read the letter He has sent ahead: “Behold, I come quickly” (Rev 3:11). Wait like a weary night watchman for the first light of the eastern sky, and live as though you have no tomorrow. As the wise man once said, when invited to dine with a friend the following day, “For many days now I have had no tomorrow at all.” I am reluctant to wear you out. Show yourself a Christian by suffering without murmuring, for that very sin cost fourteen thousand seven hundred their lives (Num 16:49). In patience, possess your soul. Those who gain Christ lose nothing. With this, I pass along the humble regards of my brother and my wife to your Ladyship, and I commend you to the mercy and grace of our Lord Jesus, assuring you that your day is coming and that God’s mercy is waiting for you. The Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

Yours in the Lord Jesus, in all dutiful obedience,

S. R.

To Lady Kenmure, on her removal from Anwoth: Losing Friends and Finding No Home Here

MADAM, I greet you in Jesus Christ. It is with genuine grief that I write what may be my final farewell to you, perhaps forever, since I have little confidence we will ever see each other again until that last great assembly, where the whole universal church will gather as one. Yet I give you my promise that, by His grace, I will bring your Ladyship and all your burdens before Him who is fully able to save you and grant you an inheritance among the saints, with a depth and intentionality I have never brought to that prayer before.

You are heading to a country where the Sun of righteousness does not shine as clearly through the Gospel as it does here. But if you want to know where the One your soul loves rests, and where He feeds at the noon hour of the day, then wherever you find yourself, follow the footsteps of the flock and feed yourself beside the shepherds’ tents (Song 1:7-8). In other words, seek out the watchmen of the Lord’s city, those who will tell you truly and honestly where you can find the One your soul loves. I trust you are so firmly betrothed to the true Christ that you will not give your love to any false one. You don’t know how soon your wedding day will come; and isn’t eternity pressing close upon you even now? It is time, then, to have your wedding garment ready. Don’t be found sleeping when your Lord arrives. I pray that you will be on your feet, alert and standing, when He knocks. Don’t be discouraged about leaving this country for another part of the Lord’s earth: “The earth is His, and everything in it.” This world is the Lord’s lower house, and while we are lodged here, we have no guarantee of staying in one room forever. We must be content to move from one corner of our Lord’s earthly house to another, resting in the hope that when we arrive at the Lord’s upper city, “Jerusalem that is above,” we will move no more, because at last we will be home. And wherever you go, if your Lord goes with you, you are already home. Your lodging is always secured before nightfall, as long as He who is Israel’s dwelling place is your home (Ps 90:1). Believe me, my sense is that you are well lodged, and that within your house there are rooms of real comfort and pleasant light, if only you can lean your head in faith upon the breast of Jesus Christ. Until you do, you will never find a truly sound sleep. May Jesus be your shadow and your covering. It is a sweet sleep for the soul to lie in the arms of Christ, for His breath is very sweet.

Please pray for poor, friendless Zion. No one will speak up for her now, though back in her own country she has faithful friends: her husband Christ, and His Father, who is her Father-in-law. Ask your husband to be a friend to Zion, and pray for her.

I have received many heavy blows since the Lord first called me to ministry, but I count your departure from us among the most painful. Yet I can see that God will strip us of whatever we make into an idol, so that He alone may have His rightful place. I see very little fruit from my ministry, and I would be glad to know of even one soul who might be my crown and joy on the day of Christ. Though I spend my strength and seem to gain nothing, my labor is still with my God (Isa 49:4). I pray that the Lord would steel my face against all opposition and teach me to press forward even into the storm. Once more, I commit you, body and spirit, to Him who has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood. Grace, grace forever be with you. Pray without ceasing.

Your Ladyship’s, in all dutiful obedience in Christ,

ANWOTH, Sept. 14, 1629.

S. R.

For Marion M’Naught, during his wife’s illness: Inward Conflict Arising from Outward Trial

Loving and Dear Sister,

If you have ever wanted to do something for me, please pray on my behalf right now. I am so utterly without comfort, so weighed down with grief, that I can no longer bear the burden. God has multiplied His blows against me, for my wife suffers such terrible torment day and night that I have found myself wondering why the Lord delays so long. My life has become bitter to me, and I fear that God has become my adversary. I know now, through hard experience, how difficult it is to keep sight of God in the middle of a storm, especially when He hides Himself to test His children. If He would only lift His hand, I am resolved to seek Him far more earnestly than I have. Blessed are those who can carry their souls through such trials. I am afraid of His judgments. Yet I thank God that death exists, and that heaven awaits. I would dread having to start the Christian life over again, so bitter is it to drink from the cup that Christ drank, if I did not know there is no poison in it. God does not give us more than we can bear, though our souls grow sick when His medicine seems not to work. Pray that God would not lead my wife into temptation. It grieves my heart deeply that I have done so little against the kingdom of Satan in my calling, for Satan is eager to make me blaspheme God to His face. Yet I believe, in the strength of the One who placed me in His service, that Satan will fail in what he seeks. I find comfort in this: my Captain, Christ, has declared that I must fight and overcome the world, and that against a weakened, stripped, and weaponless devil, “the prince of this world comes, and has nothing in me” (John 16:33; 14:30). Please ask Mr. Robert to remember me in prayer, if he cares for me at all. Grace be with you and all who are yours.

Remember Zion. A letter has been obtained from the King by Mr. John Maxwell, pressing for conformity and the observance of communion at Christmas in Edinburgh. Hold fast to what you have, so that no one takes your crown from you. The Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

Yours in the Lord,

Anwoth, November 17, 1629.

S. R.

To Lady Kenmure: The Spirit’s Earnest, Communion with Christ, and Faith in His Promises

Madam, I have been longing deeply to hear news of your health and your growth in God’s grace. I missed the chance to write sooner because I didn’t know the last messenger was leaving so quickly, and so I couldn’t send a letter with him. Please, Madam, write me even two lines about how you are doing. I know you are living with grief and heaviness of heart, and honestly, if you weren’t, you should be worried, because a life free of sorrow looks nothing like the road our Lord says leads to the New Jerusalem. I’m certain that if you could see what lies ahead of you, or even catch a brief glimpse of it, you would gladly swim through these present floods of sorrow, arms outstretched, eager to reach the shore. If God has given you the Earnest of the Spirit as a down payment on what He owes you in full, then you have real reason to rejoice, because our Lord will not forfeit His deposit, and He will not walk back or regret the bargain He has made. If you find yourself, at certain moments, longing to see God, take joy in the assurance of that sight, even if such a feast comes around only as rarely as the Passover. Peace of conscience, freedom in prayer, the doors of God’s treasury thrown open to the soul, and a clear vision of Him looking out with a smiling face and saying, “Welcome to Me, afflicted soul”: this is the earnest He sometimes gives, the gift that gladdens the heart and serves as proof that the bargain will hold. To receive this earnest, it would do you great good to come often into conversation with God, both in prayer and in hearing His word. This is the house of wine where you meet your Beloved. It is here that He kisses you with the kisses of His mouth, and here that you breathe in the fragrance of His garments, a scent that is truly glorious beyond description. You must, I say, wait on Him and spend time in His company, for His lips are like lilies dropping sweet-smelling myrrh, and through His speaking He will ease your grief. The Christ who saves you is a speaking Christ; the church knows Him by His voice (Song 2:8) and can pick out His voice among a thousand others. I say this so that you will not grow attached to those silent, lifeless masks of antichristian ceremony that the church you currently attend has draped over the Christ your soul loves. To offer you such things is to set a mute Christ before you. But when our Lord truly comes, He speaks directly to the heart in the simplicity of the Gospel.

I have neither the words nor the ability to fully express the happiness of those who are in Christ. When you have sold everything you own and bought the field where this pearl is hidden, you won’t regret the trade. If you are in Him, then everything that is His belongs to you, and because you are in Him, “because He lives, you will live also” (John 14:19). What does that mean, if not that the Son was saying, “I will not have heaven unless My redeemed ones are with Me: they and I cannot live apart. Abide in Me, and I in you.” What a sweet communion it is, when Christ and we are so intertwined that we are no longer two! “Father, I desire that those whom You have given Me may be with Me where I am, to see My glory that You have given Me” (John 17:24). Amen, dear Jesus, let it be exactly as You have said. I marvel that your heart could ever be cast down, if you truly believe this. Neither I nor anyone else deserves Jesus Christ if we won’t endure forty years of trouble for Him, given the glorious promises we have been given. But we fools receive those promises the way a man once read Plato’s arguments for the immortality of the soul: as long as the book was in his hands, he believed every word and was convinced the soul could never die. The moment he set the book down, he began to imagine that the soul was nothing more than smoke or a wisp of air that vanishes with the last breath. In the same way, we occasionally assent to God’s sweet and precious promises, but the moment we set His book aside, we begin to question everything. True faith means believing without a guarantee, holding the heart steady at that work, and when doubt comes, running back to the Law and to the Testimony and staying there. Madam, hold your ground here: your Father’s testament is before you, so read it. In it He has left you the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life. If everything you have in this life is crosses and troubles, discouragement, frequent seasons of spiritual dryness, and the felt absence of the Lord who is courting you, take heart! The One who is your suitor and wooer should not yet be a settled presence in your home until you and He go up to His Father’s house together. He intends to do you good in the end (Deut 8:16), and to give you rest from your days of adversity (Ps 94:13). “It is good to bear the yoke of God in your youth” (Lam 3:27). “Return to your stronghold, O prisoner of hope” (Zech 9:12). “For the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end and will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay” (Hab 2:3). Listen to Him speaking directly to you: “Come, My people” (rejoice, He is calling you!), “enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourself for a little while until the fury has passed” (Isa 26:20). Believe, then, believe and be saved. Don’t think it too hard a thing if you don’t get your own way or find your pleasures in this life. God intends for you to rejoice in nothing but Himself. God forbid that you should ever rejoice in anything except the cross of Christ (Gal 6:14).

Our church, Madam, is in decay. She is like Ephraim’s half-baked cake (Hos 7:9): “grey hairs are here and there upon her, and she knows it not.” She is old and grey-headed, near the grave, and no one takes it to heart. Her wine has turned sour and spoiled. If the wife of Phinehas were alive today, she might well go into labor and die at the sight of it: the ark of God taken, and the glory departed from our Israel. The power and life of true religion are gone. “Woe to us! for the day is fading, and the shadows of evening stretch long across the land” (Jer 6:4). Madam, Zion is the ship carrying you to Canaan; if she goes down, you will be thrown overboard into the deep, left to swim for shore on broken planks. It is past time for us to press our case in prayer before our master-pilot, Jesus, and cry out, “Master, save us; we are perishing.” Grace be with you. We would count it a blessing to our church to see you here, but our sins withhold good things from us. May the great Messenger of the Covenant keep you in body and spirit.

Yours in the Lord,

ANWOTH, Feb. 1, 1630.

S. R.

For Marion M’Naught, during his wife’s illness: Wrestlings with God

Dear Marion,

My love in Jesus Christ to you. I am in good health, praise God, but my wife’s illness grows worse by the day, bringing her great torment and pain at all hours. She has not been to church since our last communion, nor has she left her bed. I have sent a man to Edinburgh to see Doctor Jeally and John Hamilton. I can hardly believe this is an ordinary illness, for her life has become a misery to her. She cannot sleep, but cries out like a woman in the agony of labor. As for how this will end, only He who holds the keys of the grave can say. Many times since I last saw you, I have begged the Lord to release her from this body and bring her to her rest. I believe the tide of the Lord’s afflictions will eventually recede, but right now I am wrestling deeply with God, and what I fear most is that He has allowed the tempter to be unleashed upon my household. May God rebuke him and all his instruments. Since Satan is not driven out except by fasting and prayer, I ask you to bring our situation before the Lord, and to urge every faithful Christian you know, especially your pastor, to do the same. It is right that we keep knocking and lying at the Lord’s door until we die still knocking. If He will not open it, that would be more than His word has ever promised. But He is faithful. I do not expect to reach my heavenly home without wounds and suffering along the way. Welcome, cross of Christ, if Christ comes with it. I have not had a calm spirit in my calling here, being daily chastened; yet God has not put out my candle, as He does for the wicked. Grace be with you and all who are yours.

Yours in the Lord,

ANWOTH.

S. R.

For Marion M’Naught, recommending a friend: Prayers Asked

Mistress, my love in Christ to you. At the request of this letter’s bearer, whom I care for deeply, I want to ask whether you can help his wife with your counsel, as she is in a most dangerous and seemingly fatal condition. I have noticed a change in her conduct and way of life over these past months, and had hoped that God would bring her home to Himself; but now it appears she may depart this life and leave a number of children behind her. If you can be persuaded to help her, it would be a true act of mercy. My own wife remains in excruciating pain, night and day. Please pray for us, for life has never felt so heavy to me. God has filled me with bitterness and grief; yet I hold on to this, which keeps my head above water: “It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth” (Lam 3:27).

I think of you often. I urge you to be humble and to keep believing; and I beg you in the name of Jesus Christ, pray for John Stuart and his wife, and ask your husband to do the same. Please give my warmest regards to Jean Brown. Ask her to pray for me and my wife; I think of her too. Don’t forget Zion. Grace and peace to all who pray for her. She is the ship that carries us to Canaan. If she breaks on a rock, we will be thrown overboard, left to swim to shore somewhere between life and death. The grace of Jesus be with your husband and children.

Yours in Christ,

ANWOTH.

S. R.

For Marion M’Naught: Submission, Perseverance, and Zeal Recommended

Well-beloved and dear sister in Christ, I could not get a reply written to your letter until now, because of my wife’s illness; and she is still suffering greatly. I trust that all of this will end in God’s mercy. I know that a life marked by suffering looks very much like the road that leads to the kingdom; for the Apostle has traced that road clearly, describing it as passing “through much tribulation, to the kingdom” (Acts 14:22; 1 Thess 3:4). May the Lord grant us the full armor of God.

You write to me about your congregation’s disposition, and how their hearts are inclined toward the man you have in mind, the one you yourself most earnestly desire to see there. He would gladly welcome the Lord’s clear call to make that move, because he knows that every plant God sets by His own hand will thrive. And if the work truly comes from God, He can turn even the devil himself into a stepping stone to advance it. As for you personally, I would urge you to ask God for a submissive heart. Your reward will rest with the Lord even if the people are never fully gathered, as the prophet speaks of it. And even if the word does not seem to prosper, God will still count you “a repairer of the breaches.” Take Christ as your guarantee: your reward will not be lost. Hold your grip fast. If you could only see into the minds of the glorified saints in heaven, you would find that they consider heaven a bargain, even after sixty or eighty years of wrestling with God to get there. When you arrive, you will think to yourself, “Everything I did, measured against this rich reward now enjoyed by free grace, was far too little.” So then, for the love of the Prince of your salvation, who stands at the end of your road holding up the prize and the crown for those who finish the race, press forward and do not give up. Bring as many people to heaven with you as you can possibly draw along. The more you bring, the more welcome you yourself will be. Don’t be stingy or tight-fisted with the grace of God. Pour every effort into establishing a faithful ministry in your town, especially now, when you have so few people willing to speak a good word on your behalf. I carry many a grieved heart daily in my own calling. I would be utterly undone if I did not have access to the King’s chamber of presence, where I can lay all the business before Him. The devil rages and is furious to see the water drawn away from his own mill. But God grant that we might be His instruments to build the house of the Son of God.

Please pray for me. If the Lord does not supply fresh timber from Lebanon to build the house, the work will come to nothing. I look to Him who has already begun well with me. I have His written word, and He will not change. Your daughter is well and longs for a Bible. May the Lord establish you in peace. May the Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

Yours in all power through Christ,

ANWOTH.

S. R.

To Lady Kenmure: God’s Mysterious Ways, Lack of Ordinances, and the Death of Rutherford’s Wife

Madam, grace, mercy, and peace be multiplied upon you. I received your letter, and I can see from it that your situation in this world carries the mark of fellowship and communion with the Son of God in His sufferings. You cannot, and must not, expect a more pleasant or comfortable condition here than He had, who “through afflictions was made perfect” (Heb 2:10). We may well ask: can’t God bring us to heaven through ease and prosperity? Who doubts that He can? But His infinite wisdom thinks and decrees otherwise, and even if we can’t see the reason for it, He has a perfectly just one. We have never seen our own soul with our eyes, yet we have a soul. We see many rivers, but we don’t know their original source or first spring, yet they have a beginning. Madam, when you have crossed to the other side of the water and set your foot on the shore of glorious eternity, when you look back at the waters and your wearisome journey, you will see in that clear glass of endless glory something closer to the depths of God’s wisdom, and you will be compelled to say: “If God had dealt with me any differently than He did, I would never have come to enjoy this crown of glory.” Your part now is to believe, to suffer, to hope, and to keep waiting. I declare, in the presence of that all-seeing eye who knows what I write and what I think, that I would not trade the sweet experience of God’s consolations for all the bitterness of affliction. Indeed, whether God comes to His children with a rod or a crown, if He comes Himself with it, that is enough. Welcome, Jesus, whatever way You come, if only we can catch a glimpse of You! And I am certain it is better to be sick, provided Christ comes to the bedside, draws back the curtain, and says, “Take courage, I am your salvation,” than to enjoy robust health and never be visited by God at all.

Worthy and dear lady, in the strength of Christ, fight and overcome. You are now alone, but you may have, simply for the asking, three always in your company: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. I trust they are near you. You are now deprived of the comfort of a living ministry; so was Israel in their captivity; yet hear God’s promise to them: “Therefore say, Thus says the Lord God, although I have cast them far off among the heathen, and although I have scattered them among the countries, yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary in the countries where they shall come” (Ezek 11:16). Consider what this means: in place of a sanctuary, God Himself stands in the place of the temple of Jerusalem! I trust in God that, carrying this temple within you, you will see the beauty of Jehovah in His house.

We are deeply afraid that a great and terrible trial is coming upon the church of God. Those who would build their homes and nests on the ashes of a grieving Jerusalem have pushed our King toward harsh and dangerous measures against those called Puritans, with the aim of rooting them out entirely. Our prelates (may the Lord take the keys of His house from these unworthy gatekeepers!) assure us that those who refuse to conform face nothing but imprisonment and removal from their positions. The bride of Christ will always pass through fire, but I trust in my God that she will not be consumed, because of the goodwill of Him who dwelt in the burning Bush, for He dwelt in it with goodwill. Every kind of crying sin runs unchecked and unchallenged throughout our land. The glory of the Lord is departing from Israel, and the Lord looks back over His shoulder to see if anyone will say, “Lord, stay,” yet no one asks Him to remain. Corrupt and false doctrine is preached openly by the worthless shepherds of this land. As for myself, I carry daily grief over the disobedience toward and contempt of the word of God. I was summoned before the High Commission by a corrupt person in this parish who had been convicted of incest. In that matter, Mr. Alexander Colvill was a great friend to me, out of his respect for your Ladyship, and he wrote me a most kind letter. May the Lord show him mercy on that day. On the day of my appearance before the court, the sea and winds refused to allow the Bishop of St. Andrews safe passage. I ask your Ladyship to thank Mr. Alexander Colvill with a brief note.

My wife has now departed this life, after a long illness and much suffering lasting a year and a month. The Lord has done it; blessed be His name. I have been ill with a recurring fever for thirteen weeks and am still unwell, so that I preach only once on the Sabbath, and even that with great difficulty. I am not able to visit or examine the congregation. May the Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

Your Ladyship’s in all obedience,

ANWOTH, June 26, 1630.

S. R.