MISTRESS, -- Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. -- I am sorry that ye
take it so hardly that I have not written to you.
I am judged to be that which I am not. I fear that if I were put into
the fire, I should melt away, and fall down in shreds of painted
nature; for truly I have little stuff at home that is worth the eye of
God's servants. If there 'be anything of Christ's in me (as I dare not
deny some of His work), it is but a spunk of borrowed fire, that can
scarce warm myself, and has little heat for standers-by. I would fain
have that which ye and others believe I have; but ye are only witnesses
to my outer side, and to some words on paper. Oh that He would give me
more than paper-grace or tongue-grace! But if I have any love to Him,
Christ has both love to me, and wit to guide His love. And I see that
the best thing I have has as much dross beside it as might curse me and
it both; and, if it were for no more, we have need of a Savior to
pardon the very faults, and diseases, and weakness of the new man, and
to take away (to say so) our godly sins, or the sins of our
sanctification, and the dross and scum of spiritual love.
I would have you and myself helping Christ mystical to weep for His
wife. And oh that we could mourn for Christ buried in Scotland, and for
His two slain witnesses, killed because they prophesied! If we could so
importune and solicit God, our buried Lord and His two buried witnesses
should rise again. Earth and clay and stone will not bear down Christ
and the Gospel in Scotland. I know not if I shall see the second temple
and the glory of it; but the Lord has deceived me if it be not to be
reared up again. I would wish to give Christ His welcome Home again. My
blessing, my joy, my glory and love be on the Home-comer.
I know that your heart and Christ are married together; it were not
good to make a divorce. Rue not of that meeting and marriage with such
a Husband. Pray for me, His prisoner. Grace, grace be with you.
ABERDEEN, 1637
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Rutherford was also known for his spiritual and devotional works, such as Christ Dying and drawing Sinners to Himself and his Letters. Concerning his Letters, Charles Spurgeon wrote: "When we are dead and gone let the world know that Spurgeon held Rutherford's Letters to be the nearest thing to inspiration which can be found in all the writings of mere men". Published versions of the Letters contain 365 letters and fit well with reading one per day.
Rutherford was a strong supporter of the divine right of Presbytery, the principle that the Bible calls for Presbyterian church government. Among his polemical works are Due Right of Presbyteries (1644), Lex, Rex (1644), and Free Disputation against Pretended Liberty of Conscience.
Samuel Rutherford was a Scottish Presbyterian theologian and author. He was one of the Scottish Commissioners to the Westminster Assembly.
Born in the village of Nisbet, Roxburghshire, Rutherford was educated at Edinburgh University, where he became in 1623 Regent of Humanity (Professor of Latin). In 1627 he was settled as minister of Anwoth in Galloway, from where he was banished to Aberdeen for nonconformity. His patron in Galloway was John Gordon, 1st Viscount of Kenmure. On the re-establishment of Presbytery in 1638 he was made Professor of Divinity at St. Andrews, and in 1651 Rector of St. Mary's College there. At the Restoration he was deprived of all his offices.
Rutherford's political book Lex, Rex (meaning "the law [and] the king" or "the law [is] king") presented a theory of limited government and constitutionalism. It was an explicit refutation of the doctrine of "Rex Lex" or "the king is the law." Rutherford was also known for his spiritual and devotional works, such as Christ Dying and drawing Sinners to Himself and his Letters.