Tuesday 20 September 2011

REFLECTIONS

 Christ The Excellent Savior

“All the saints have their own measure of winter before the eternal summer. O! for the long day, and the high sun, and the fair garden, and the King’s great city up above these visible heavens!

What God layeth on, let us suffer, for some have one cross, some seven, some ten, some half a cross-yet all the saints have whole and full joy, and seven crosses have seven joys.

Glorify the Lord in your sufferings, and take his banner of love, and spread it over you. Others will follow you, if they see you strong in the lord; their courage shall take life from your Christian carriage.

The weightiest end of the cross of Christ that is laid upon you, lieth upon your strong Saviour.
O, if I could be master of that house-idol myself, my own, mine, my own will, wit, credit, and ease, how blessed were I! O, but we have need to be redeemed from ourselves rather than from the devil and the world; learn to put out yourselves, and to put in Christ for yourselves.

Christ all the seasons of the year, is dropping sweetness; if I had vessels I might fill them, but my old riven, holey, and running out dish, even when I am at the well, can bring little away. Nothing but glory will make tight and fast our leaking and rifty vessels...How little of the sea can a child carry in his hand; as little do I take away my great sea, my boundless and running-over Christ Jesus.

Sure I am he is the far best half of heaven; ye he is all heaven, and more than all heaven.

Ye may yourself ebb and flow, rise and fall, wax and wane; but your Lord is this day as he was yesterday; and it is your comfort that your salvation is not rolled upon wheels of your own making, neither have ye to do with a Christ of your own shaping.

Put your hand to the pen, and let the cross of your Lord Jesus have your submissive and resolute Amen.

The floods may swell and roar; but our ark shall swim above the waters; it cannot sink, because a Saviour is in it.

Let not salvation be your by-work, or your holiday’s task only, or a work by the way: for men think, this may be done in three days’ space on a feather-bed, when death and they are fallen in hands together, and that with a word or two they shall make their souls right. Alas, this is to sit loose and unsure in the matters of our salvation.
How soon will some few years pass away, and then when the day is ended, and this life’s lease expired, what have men of the world’s glory, but dreams and thoughts? O happy soul for evermore, who can rightly compare this world life with that long-lasting life to come, and can balance the weighty glory of the one with the light golden vanity of the other.

Lay no more on the creatures than they are able to carry. Lay your soul and your weights upon God: make him your only, only best Beloved-your errand to this life is to make sure and eternity of glory to your soul and to match your soul with Christ: your love, if it were more than all the love of angels in one, is Christ’s due...I know not what ye have if ye want (lack) Christ.

It is not our part to make a treasure here: anything under the covering of heaven we can build upon is but ill ground and a sandy foundation: every good thing, except God, wanteth (lacks) a bottom, and cannot stand its alone: how can it bear the weight of us?”

-From The Loveliness Of Christ  Extracts from the Letters of Samuel Rutherford by Samuel Rutherford (1600-1661)  Selected by Ellen Lister  Published by The Banner Of Truth Trust  Carlisle, PA  2007 

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