Samuel Rutherford Quotes & Sayings

Whether God come to his children with a rod or a crown, if he come himself with it, it is well. Welcome, welcome Jesus, what way soever thou come, if we can get a sight of thee. And sure I am, it is better to be sick, providing Christ come to the bed-side, and draw aside the curtains, and say 'Courage, I am thy salvation,' than to enjoy health, being lusty and strong, and never to be visited of God. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

I wonder many times that ever a child of God should have a sad heart, considering what the Lord is preparing for him. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

The figure of the passing-away world, 1 Cor. vii. 31. is like an old man's face, full of wrinkles, and foul with weeping: we are waiting when Jesus shall be revealed from heaven, and shall come and wipe the old man's face. — Samuel Rutherford

What is warranted by the direction of nature's light is warranted by the law of nature, and consequently by a divine law; for who can deny the law of nature to be a divine law? — Samuel Rutherford

[T]hose 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. — Samuel Rutherford

Many are friends to the success of reformation, not to reformation. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

Oh, what love! Christ would not intrust our redemption to angels, to millions of angels; but he would come himself, and in person suffer; he would not give a low and a base price for us clay. He would buy us with a great ransom, so as he might over-buy us, and none could over-bid him in his market for souls. If there had been millions of more believers, and many heavens, without any new bargain his blood should have bought them all, and all these many heavens should have smelled one rose of life; Christ should have been one and the same tree of life in them all. Oh, we under-bid, and undervalue that Prince of love, who did overvalue us; we will not sell all we have to buy him; he sold all he had, and himself too, to buy us. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

You must learn to make your evils your great good; and to spin comforts, peace, joy, communion with Christ, out of your troubles, which are Christ's wooers, sent to speak for you from Himself. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

This soul of ours hath love, and cannot but love some fair one. And oh what a fair One, what an only One, what an excellent, lovely ravishing One is Jesus! Put the beauty of ten thousand thousand worlds of paradises, like the garden of Eden in one, put all trees, all flowers, all smells, all colours, all tastes, all joys, all sweetness, all loveliness, in one: oh, what a fair and excellent thing would that be! And yet it would be less to that fair and dearest Well-beloved Christ, than one drop of rain to the whole seas, rivers, lakes, and fountains of ten thousand earths. Oh, but Christ is heaven's wonder and earth's wonder! — Samuel Rutherford

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

Beware of license to the flesh, under the coat of liberty of the Spirit; and let none thinke that law-curses, looseth us from all law-obedience; or that Christ hath cryed down the tenne commandments; and that Gospel-liberty is a dispensation for law-loosenesse; or that free grace is a lawless Pope. — Samuel Rutherford

Dashes and disappointments are not canonical Scripture. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

Dry wells send us to the fountain. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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 — Samuel Rutherford

Christ chargeth me to believe His daylight at midnight. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

They lose nothing who gain Christ. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

I exhort you and beseech you in the bowels of Christ, faint not, weary not. There is a great necessity of heaven; you must have it. All other things, as houses, lands, children, husband, friends, country, credit, health, wealth, honour, may be let go; 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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

Grace tried is better than grace, and more than grace; it is glory in its infancy. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

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

Christ has no velvet crosses. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

[T]he Papist and the Arminian on the one extremity, enthroneth Nature, and extolleth proud merit, and abaseth Christ and free grace. The Familist, libertine, and Antinomian, on a contrary extremity and opposition, turn man into a block, and make him into a mere patient in the way to heaven. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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!. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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 — Samuel Rutherford

He would be of blood to us: not only come to the sick, and to our bed-side, but would lie down and be sick, taking on him sick clay, and be, in that condition of clay, a worm and not a man, that he might pay our debts; and would borrow a man's heart and bowels to sigh for us, man's eyes to weep for us, his spouse's body, legs, and arms, to be pierced for us; our earth, our breath, our life, and soul, that he might breathe out his life for us; a man's tongue and soul to pray for us: and yet, he would remain God, that he might perfume the obedience of a High Priest with heaven, and give to justice blood that chambered in the veins and body of God, in whom God had a personal lodging. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

Christ is a well of life, but who knoweth how deep it is to the bottom? This soul of ours hath love, and cannot but love some fair one; and O, what a fair One, what an only One, what an excellent, lovely, ravishing One is Jesus. — Samuel Rutherford

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

Welcome, welcome, cross of Christ, if Christ be with it. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

Your heart is not the compass that God steers by. — Samuel Rutherford

If you knew particularly what to do, it were not a spiritual exercise. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord's choicest wines. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

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

When the sun riseth first, the beams over-gild the tops of green mountains that look toward the east, and the world cannot hinder the sun to rise: some are so near heaven, that the everlasting Sun hath begun to make an everlasting day of glory on them; the rays that come from his face that sits on the throne, so over-goldeth the soul, that there is no possibility of clouding peace, or of hindering daylight in the souls of such. — Samuel Rutherford

Do not focus your thoughts among the confused wheels of secondary causes, as -'O if this had been, this had not followed!' Look up to the master motion of the first wheel. In building, we see hewn stones and timbers under hammers and axes, yet the house in this beauty we do not see at the present, but it is in the mind of this builder. We also see unbroken clods, furrows, and stones, but we do not see the summer lilies, roses, and the beauty of a garden. Even so we do not presently see the outcome of God's decrees with his blessed purpose. It is hard to believe when his purpose is hidden and under the ground. Providence has a thousand keys to deliver his own even when all hope is gone. 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. — Samuel Rutherford

Make not Christ a liar in distrusting His promise. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

We would either have a silent, a soft, a perfumed cross, sugared and honeyed with the consolations of Christ, or we faint; and providence must either brew a cup of gall and wormwood, mastered in the mixing with joy and songs, else we cannot be disciples. But Christ's cross did not smile on him, his cross was a cross, and his ship sailed in blood, and his blessed soul was sea-sick, and heavy even to death. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford

It is our Lord's wisdom, that His kirk should ever hang by a thread; and yet the thread breaketh not, being hanged upon Him who is the sure Nail in David's house (Isa. xxii. 23), upon whom all the vessels, great and small, do hang; and the Nail (God be thanked) neither crooketh nor can be broken. Jesus, — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

[M]ake much of the written word, and pray to God to copy his Bible in your conscience, and write a new book of his doctrine in your hearts. — Samuel Rutherford

I see not the time of the fulfilling the promise; yet "Though the vision tarry, wait for it, because it will surely come and not tarry." (Hab. 2:3) We are to remember, God can trail his promise, in our seeming, through hell, and the devil's black hands, (as he led Christ through death, the curse, and hell,) and yet fulfill it. When Christ is under a stone, and buried, the gospel seems to be buried. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford

When either grace is turned into painted, but rotten nature, as Arminians do, or into wantonness, as others do, the error to me is of a far other and higher elevation, than opinions touching church government. Tenacious adhering to Antinomian errors, with an obstinate and final persistence in them, both as touching faith to, and suitable practice of them, I shall think, cannot be fathered upon any of the regenerated; for it is an opinion not in the margin and borders, but in the page and body, and too near the centre and vital parts of the gospel. — Samuel Rutherford

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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

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

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

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

The disciples are physicians of no value to a soul crying, and not heard of Christ. Oh! Moses is a meek man, David a sweet singer, Job and his experience profitable, the apostles God's instruments, the Virgin Mary is full of grace, the glorified desire the church to be delivered; but they are all nothing to Jesus Christ. There is more in a piece of a corner of Christ's heart (to speak so) than in millions of worlds of angels and created comforts, when the conscience hath gotten a back-throw with the hand of the Almighty. — Samuel Rutherford

Howbeit your faith seeth but the black side of Providence, yet it hath a better side, and God shall let you see it. We know that all things work together for good to 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. — Samuel Rutherford

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

The thorn is one of the most cursed, and angry, and crabbed weeds that the earth yieldeth, and yet out of it springeth the rose, one of the sweetest-smelled flowers, and most delightful to the eye, that the earth hath. Your Lord shall make joy and gladness out of your afflictions; for all His roses have a fragrant smell. Wait for the time when His own holy hand shall hold them to your nose ... — Samuel Rutherford

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

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. — Samuel Rutherford