Samuel rutherford quotes

Let us be faithful and care for our own part, which is to do and suffer for Him, and lay Christ's part on Himself, and leave it there; duties are ours, events are the Lord's.

My dear friend, venture to take the wind on your face for Christ.

The cross of Christ is the sweetest burden that I ever bore; it is such a burden as wings are to a bird, or sails to a ship, to carry me forward to my harbor.

The devil is but a whetstone to sharpen the faith and patience of the saints.-

It is comfort to the believer that all things are possible.

I pray God that I may never find my will again. Oh, that Christ would subject my will to His, and trample it under His feet.

I have been benefited by praying for others; for by making an errand to God for them I have gotten something for myself.

Make not Christ a liar in distrusting His promise.

My Lord Jesus has fully recompensed my sadness with his joys, my losses with his own presence. I find it a sweet and rich thing to exchange my sorrows with Christ's joys, my afflictions with that sweet peace I have with himself.

Build your nest in no tree here...for the Lord of the forest has condemned the whole woods to be demolished.

You will not be carried to Heaven lying at ease upon a feather bed.

It is in some respect greater love in Jesus to sanctify than to justify, for He maketh us most like Himself, in His own essential portraiture and image in sanctifying us.

Verily, we know not what an evil it is to indulge ourselves, and to make an idol of our will.

I hang by a thread, but it is (if I may so speak) of Christ's spinning

Many are friends to the success of reformation, not to reformation.

Set not your heart upon the world, since God hath not made it your portion.

Why should I tremble at the plough of my Lord, that maketh deep furrows on my soul? I know He is no idle husbandman, He purposeth a crop.

After every storm, there comes clear open skies.

The great Master Gardener, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a wonderful providence, with his own hand, planted me here, where by his grace, in this part of his vineyard, I grow; and here I will abide till the great Master of the vineyard think fit to transplant me.

After winter comes the summer. After night comes the dawn. And after every storm, there comes clear, open skies.

Think it not hard if you get not your will, nor your delights in this life; God will have you to rejoice in nothing but himself.

Grace will ever speak for itself and be fruitful in well-doing; the sanctified, cross is a fruitful tree.

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.

The weightiest end of the cross of Christ that is laid upon you, lieth upon your strong Savior.

I urge you a nearer communion with Christ, and a growing communion. There are curtains to be opened in Christ that we have never seen before... Therefore dig deep, and sweat, and labor. Take pains for Him, and set aside as much time as you can in each day for Him.

The secret formula of the saints: When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord's choicest wines.

The hope of heaven under troubles is like wind and sails to the soul.

Welcome, welcome, cross of Christ, if Christ be with it.

Our little time of suffering is not worthy of our first night's welcome home to Heaven.

There is as much in our Lord's pantry as will satisfy all his children and as much wine in his cellar as will quench all their thirst. Hunger on, for there is meat in hungering for Christ; go never from him, but seek him who is yet pleased with the importunity of hungry souls until he fills you; if he delays, yet do not go away, even if you faint at his feet.

The bloom fell off my branches and joy did cast off its flower

Heaven is a house full of miracles; yea, of spectacles and images of free grace.

I find it most true that the greatest temptation outside of hell is to live without temptations; if water stands, it rots; faith is the better for the sharp winter storm in its face and grace withers without adversity. The devil is but God's master fencer to teach us to handle our weapons.

To believe Christ's cross to be a friend, as he himself is a friend, is also a special act of faith

I had but one joy, the apple of the eye of my delights , to preach Christ my Lord

When the race is ended, and the play is either won or lost, and ye are in the utmost circle and border of time, and shall put your foot within the march of eternity, all the good things of your short nightdream shall seem to you like ashes of a blaze of thorns or straw.

Millions of hells of sinners cannot come near to exhaust infinite grace.

Set no time to the Lord the creator of time, for His time is always best.

I live no more, but Christ liveth in me!

Well's them who are under crosses, and Christ says to them, "Half Mine."

It is impossible to be submissive and religiously patient, if ye stay your thoughts down among the confused rollings and wheels of second causes, as, O, the place! O, the time! O, if this had been, this had not followed! O, the linking of this accident with this time and place! Look up to the master motion and the first wheel.

See that you buy the field where the Pearl is; sell all, and make a purchase of salvation. Think it not easy: for it is a steep ascent to eternal glory: many are lying dead by the way, slain with security.

You shall by faith sustain yourself and comfort yourself in your Lord, and be strong in His power; for you are in the beaten and common way to heaven, when you are under our Lord's crosses. You have reason to rejoice in it, more than in a crown of gold; and rejoice and be glad to bear the reproaches of Christ.

I bless the Lord that all our troubles come through Christ's fingers, and that He casteth sugar among them and casteth in some ounce withts of heaven and of the spirit of glory in our cup.

I seldom made an errand to God for another but I got something for myself.

We take nothing to the grave with us, but a good or evil conscience... It is true, terrors of conscience cast us down; and yet without terrors of conscience we cannot be raised up again.

But the way to overcome is by patience, forgiving and praying for your enemies, in doing whereof you heap coals upon their heads, and your Lord shall open a door to you in your trouble: wait upon Him, as the night watch waiteth for the morning. He will not tarry. Go up to your watch-tower, and come not down, but by prayer, and faith, and hope, wait on.

You must take a house beside the Physician. It will be a miracle if ye be the first sick that Christ hath put away uncured.

Christ chargeth me to believe His daylight at midnight.

The good Husbandman may pluck His rose & gather in His lily.

Be not cast down. If ye saw Him who is standing on the shore, holding out His arms to welcome you to land, ye would wade, not only through a sea of wrongs, but through hell itself to be with Him.

Ye have lost a child--nay, she is not lost to you, who is found to Christ; 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.

How soon would faith freeze without a cross!

Christ seeketh your help in your place; give Him your hand.

They lose nothing who gain Christ.

My faith has no bed to sleep upon but omnipotence.

It is the Lord's kindness that he will take the scum off us in the fire. Who know how needful winnowing is to us and what dross we have before we enter the kingdom of God? So narrow is the entry to heaven that our knots, lumps of pride, self-love, idol-love, and world-love must be hammered off us, that we may stoop low and creep through into that narrow entry.

My desire is that my Lord would give me broader and deeper thoughts, to feed myself with wondering at His love.

Howbeit your faith seeth but the black side of providence, yet it hath a better side, and God shall let you see it. ... “For we know that all things work together for good to them that love God,” ergo, shipwreck, losses, &c., work together for the good of them that love God: hence I infer, that losses, disappointments, ill tongues, loss of friends, houses, or country, are God's workmen, set on work to work out good to you, out of everything that befalleth you.

O my Lord Jesus Christ, if I could be in heaven without Thee, it would be hell; and if I could be in hell, and have Thee still, it would be heaven to me, for Thou are all the heaven I want.

Oh thrice fools are we who like new-born princes weeping in the cradle know not that there is a kingdom before them then let our Lord's sweet hand square us and hammer us and strike off the knots of pride self-love and world-worship and infidelity that He may make us stones and pillars in His Father's house.

Since He looked upon me my heart is not my own. He hath runaway to heaven with it.

I exhort you and beseech you in the bowels of Christ, faint not, weary not. There is a great necessity of heaven; ye must needs have it: all other things, as houses, lands, children, husband, friends, country, credit, health, wealth, honour, may be wanted ; but heaven is your one thing necessary, the good part that shall not be taken from you. See that you buy the field where the Pearl is; sell all and make a purchase of salvation. Think it not easy; for it is a steep ascent to eternal glory; many are lying dead by the way, that were slain with security.

Grow as a palm-tree on God's Mount Zion; howbeit shaken with winds, yet the root is fast.

If Christ Jesus be the periode, the end and the lodging-home at the end of your journey, there is no fear ye go to a friend . . . ye may look death in the face with joy.

Show yourself a Christian by suffering without murmuring. In patience possess your soul - they lose nothing who gain Christ.

When I look to my guiltiness, I see that my salvation is one of our Saviour's greatest miracles, either in heaven or earth.

I desire now to make no more pleas with Christ; verily, he hath not put me to a loss by what I suffer; he oweth me nothing; for in my bonds, how sweet and comfortable have the thoughts of him been to me, wherein I find a sufficient recompense of reward!.

Jesus Christ came into my prison cell last night, and every stone flashed like a ruby.

Faith's speculations to the worst and hardest, in point of resolution, are sweet.

There is no sweeter fellowship with Christ than to bring our wounds and our sores to him.

Take Christ in with you under your yoke, and let patience have her perfect work.

Grace grows best in winter.

My dear brother, let God make of you what He will, He will end all with consolation, and shall make glory out of your suffering.

Every man by nature is a freeman born; by nature no man cometh out of the womb under any civil subjection to king, prince, or judge.

I see Christ's love is so kingly, that it will not abide a marrow it must have a throne all alone in the soul.

I assure you by the Lord, your adversaries shall get no advantage against you, except you sin, and offend your Lord, in your sufferings.

Through many afflictions we must enter into the kingdom of God ... It is folly to think to steal to heaven with a whole skin.

I wonder many times that ever a child of God should have a sad heart, considering what their Lord is preparing for them.

Every day we may see some new thing in Christ. His love hath neither brim nor bottom.

You will not get to steal quietly into heaven, into Christ's company, without a conflict and a cross. I find crosses to be Christ's carved work that he marks out for us and that with crosses he portraits us to his own image, cutting away pieces of our ill and corruption. Lord cut - Lord carve - Lord wound - Lord do anything that may perfect thy Father's image in us and make us ready for glory.

Let your children be as so many flowers, borrowed from God. If the flowers die or wither, thank God for a summer loan of them.

Believe God's love and power more than you believe your own feelings and experiences. Your rock is Christ, and it is not the rock that ebbs and flows but the sea.

I think it is possible on earth to build a young, new Jerusalem, a little, new heaven of this surpassing love. God, either send me more of this love, or take me quickly over the water, where I may be filled with his love.

Faint not; the miles to heaven are but few and short.

Christ and His cross are not separable in this life, howbeit Christ and His cross part at heaven's door, for there is no house-room for crosses in heaven. One tear, one sigh, one sad heart, one fear, one loss, one thought of trouble cannot find lodging there.

I perceive we postpone all our joys of Christ, till He and we be in our own house above, thinking that there is nothing of it here to be sought or found, but only hope and fair promises; and that Christ will give us nothing here but tears, sadness, crosses; and that we shall never feel the smell of the flowers of that high garden of paradise above, till we come there. Nay, but I find it possible to find young glory, and a young green paradise of joy even here. We dream of hunger in Christ's house, while we are here, although He alloweth feasts to all the bairns within God's household.

Praise God for the hammer, the file, and the furnace. The hammer molds us, the file sharpens us, and the fire tempers us.

No pen, no words, no image can express to you the loveliness of my only, only Lord Jesus.

There is nothing left to us but to see how we may be approved of Him, and how we may roll the weight of our weak souls in well-doing upon Him, who is God omnipotent.

It is no small comfort that God hath written some Scriptures to you which He hath not to others. Read these, and think God is like a friend who sendeth a letter to a whole house and family, but who speaketh in His letter to some by name that are dearest to Him in the house.

No created powers can mar our Lord Jesus' music, nor spill our song of joy. Let us then be glad and rejoice in the salvation of our Lord

In our fluctuations of feelings, it is well to remember that Jesus admits no change in His affections; your heart is not the compass Jesus saileth by.

Grace tried is better than grace, and more than grace; it is glory in its infancy

Your heart is not the compass that God steers by.

Live on Christ's love while ye are here, and all the way.

Desires going before conversion are not such as can calm a storming conscience.

Humility is a strange flower; it grows best in winter weather, and under storms of affliction.

If ye never had a sick night and a pained soul for sin, ye have not yet lighted upon Christ.

I find my Lord Jesus cometh not in the precise way that I lay wait for Him. He hath a manner of His own. Oh, how high are His ways above my ways

Consider, it is impossible that your idol sins and you can go to heaven together; and that those who will not part with these do not indeed love Christ at the bottom, but only in word and show, which will not do the business.

When the supreme magistrate will not execute the judgment of the Lord, those who made him supreme magistrate, under God, who have under God, sovereighn liberty to dispose of crowns and kingdoms, are to execute the judgment of the Lord, when wicked men make the law of God of none effect.

The night will close the door & fasten my anchor within the veil and I shall go away to sleep.

We are as near to heaven as we are far from self, and far from the love of a sinful world.

Christ has no velvet crosses.

When we shall come home, and enter into the possession of our Brother's fair kingdom, and when our heads shall find the weight of the eternal crown of glory, then we shall look back to pains and sufferings and then we will see life and sorrow to be less than one step or stride from a prison to glory. Our little inch of time-suffering is not worthy of our first night's welcome-home to heaven.

O, what I owe to the file, the hammer, and the furnace of the Lord Jesus! I know that he is no idle husbandman - he purposes a crop.

Christ's enemies are but breaking their own heads in pieces, upon the Rock laid in Zion; and the stone is not removed out of its place. Faith hath cause to take courage from our very afflictions; the devil is but a whetstone to sharpen the faith and patience of the saints. I know that he but heweth and polisheth stones, all this time, for the new Jerusalem.

He who duly esteemeth Christ, is a noble bidder, and so a noble and liberal buyer.

Keep God's covenant in your trials; hold you by His blessed word, and sin not; flee anger, wrath, grudging, envying, fretting; forgive a hundred pence to your fellow-servant, because your Lord hath forgiven you ten thousand talents: for, I assure you by the Lord, your adversaries shall get no advantage against you, except you sin, and offend your Lord, in your sufferings.

I know that, as night and shadows are good for flowers, and moonlight and dews are better than a continual sun, so is Christ's absence of special use, and that it hath some nourishing virtue in it, and giveth sap to humility, and putteth an edge on hunger, and funisheth a fairfield to faith to put forth itself, and to exercise its fingers in gripping it seeth not what.

There is nothing that will make you a Christian indeed, but a taste of the sweetness of Christ.

If so be that freewill were our tutor, and we had our heaven in our own keeping, then we would lose all. But because we have Christ for our tutor, and He has our heaven in His hand, therefore the covenant it must be perpetual.

I know you are in grief and heaviness; and if it were not so, you might be afraid, because then your way would not be so like the way that our Lord saith leadeth to the New Jerusalem. Sure I am, if you knew what were before you, or if you saw some glances of it, you would, with gladness, swim through the present floods of sorrow, spreading forth your arms out of desire to be at land.

It is certain that this is not only good which the Almighty has done, but that it is best; He hath reckoned all your steps to heaven.