Letters in Two Parts, Part 2 · LETTER 38 – LETTER 40
To AGNES MCMATH. (38)
Dear Sister.
IF our Lord hath taken away your childe, your lease of him is expired, & seeing Christ would want him no longer, it is your part to hold your peace, & worship & adore the soveraignty & liberty that the potter hath over the clay & pieces of clay-nothings that he gave life unto: And what is man to call & summond the Almighty to his lower Court down here? For he giveth account of none of his doings: And if ye will take a loan of a childe & give him back again to our Lord, laughing, as his borrowed goods should return to him, beleeve he is not gone away, but sent before, & that the change of the countrey should make you think, he is not lost to you who is found to Christ, & that he is now before you, & that the dead in Christ shall be raised again: A going down star is not annihilat, but shall appeare again: If he have casten his bloom & flower, the bloom is fallen in heaven in Christ's lap; And as he was lent a while to Time, so is he given now to Eternity, which will take yourself: And the difference of your shipping & his, to heaven & Christ's shore, the land of life, is onelyonly in some few years, which weareth every day shorter, & some short & soon-reckoned summers will give you a meeting with him; but what? with him? …y, with better company, with the chief & leader of the heavenly troups that are riding on white horses, that are triumphing in glory. If Death were a sleep that had no wakening, we might sorrow: But our Husband shall quickly be at the bed-sides of all that lie sleeping in the grave, & shall raise their mortal bodies. Christ was Death's Cautioner, who gave his word to come & loose all the clay-pawnes & set them at his own right hand, & our Cautioner, Christ, hath an Act of Law-surety upon Death to render back his captives: And that Lord Jesus, who knoweth the turnings & windings that is in that black trance of Death, hath numbered all the steps of the stair up to heaven; he knoweth how long the turnpike is or how many pair of stairs high it is, for he ascended that way himself. Rev. 1: 18. I was dead & am alive. & now he liveth at the right hand of God, and his garments have not so much as a smell of death. Your afflictions smell of the childrens case, the bairns of the house are so nurtured, & Suffering is no new life, it is but the rent of the sons, bastards have not so much of the rent: take kindly & heartsomly with his cross, who never yet slew a ehilde with the cross: He breweth your cup, therefore drink it patiently & with the better will: Stay & wait on, till Christ loose the knot that fasteneth his cross on your back, for he is coming to deliver: & I pray you, Sister, learn to be worthy of his pains who correcteth, & let him wring, & be ye wa…hen, for he hath a father's heart & a father's hand who is training you up & making you meet for the high hall. This School of Suffering is a preparation for the King's higher house: & let all your visitations speak all the letters of your Lord summonds: they cry. 1. O vain World! 2. O bitter Sin! 3 O short & uncertain Time! 4. O fair Eternity; that is above sickness & Death! 5. O Kingly & Princely Bridegroom! Hasten Glorie's Marriage, shorten Time's short-spun & soonbroken threed, & conquer Sin! 6. O happy & blessed Death, that golden bridge laid over by Christ my Lord betwixt Time's clay-banks & heaven's shore! & the Spirit & the Bride say Come, & answer ye with them, Even so, come Lord …esus! Come quickly! Grace be with you.
St Andrews. Octob. 15. 1640. Your brother in his sweet Lord Iesus, S. R.
To Mr MATHEW MOWAT. (39)
Reverend & dear Brother.
WHat am I to answer you? Alas! my books are all bare & shew me little of God: I would fain goe beyond books in to his house of love, to see himself. Dear Brother, neither ye nor I, are parties worthy of his love or knowledge. Ah! how hath sin bemisted & blinded us that we cannot see him? But for my poor s…lf, I am pained & like to burst, because he will not take down the wall, & fetch hi… uncreated beauty, & bring his matchless, white & ruddy face out of heaven one's errand, that I may have heaven meeting me ere I goe to it, in such a wonderfull sight: ye know that Majesty & Love doe humble, because homely love to sinners dwelleth in him with Majesty: Ye should give him all his own court-stiles, his high & heaven-names. What am I to shape conceptions of my highest Lord? How broad & how high & how deep he is above & beyond what these conceptions are, I cannot tell: but for my own weak practice [which alas! can be no rule to one so deep in love-sickness with Christ as ye are] I would fain adde to my thoughts & esteem of him, & make him more high, & would wish an heart & love ten thousand times wider then the outmost circle & curtain that goeth about the heaven of heavens, to entertain him in that heart & with that love. But that which is your pain, my dear Brother, is mine also, I am confounded with the thoughts of him: I know God is casten [if I may speak so] in a sweet mould & lovely image, in the person of that heaven's jewel, the man Christ, & that the steps of that steep ascent… stair to the Godhead is the flesh of Christ, the new & living way; & there is footing for faith in that curious Ark of the humanity: therein dwelleth the Godhead married upon our Humanity. I would be in heaven, suppose I had not another errand, but to see that dainty golden Ark & God personally looking out at ears & eyes & a body such as we sinners have, that I might wear my sinfull mouth in kisses on him for evermore: & I know all the Three blessed Persons should be well pleased, that my piece of faint & created love should first coast upon the man Christ; I should see them all through him. I am called from writing by my great imployments in this town, & have said nothing: but what can I say of him: Let us goe & see.
St Andrews. 1640. Yours in his sweet Lord Iesus, S. R.
To my Lady KENMURE. (40)
MADAM.
GRace, mercy & peace be to your La: I am heartily sorry that your La: is deprived of such an husband, & the Lord's Kirk of so active & faithfull a friend. I know your La: long agoe made acquaintance with that wherein Christ will have you joyned in a fellowship with himself, even with his own Cross, & hath taught you to stay your soul upon the Lord's goodwill, who giveth not account of his matters to any of us: When he hath led you through this water that was in your way to glory, there are fewer behinde: & his order in dismissing us, & sending us out of the market, one before another, is to be reverenced. One year's time of heaven shall swallow up all sorrows, even beyond all comparison: What then will not a duration of blessedness so long as God shall live fully and abundantly recompense? It is good that our Lord hath given a debter obliged by gracious promises, for more in Eternity then Time can take from you: & I beleeve, your La: hath been now many years advising & thinking what that Glory will be which is abiding the pilgrims & strangers on the earth, when they come home, & which we may think of, love & thirst for, but we cannot comprehend it, nor conceive of it as it is, far less can we over-think or over-love it. O so long a Chapter, or rather, so large a Volume, as Christ is in that Divinity of Glory! There is no more of him let down now to be seen & enjoyed by his children, but as much as may feed hunger in this life, but not satisfie it. Your La: is a debter to the Son of God's Cross, that is wea…ing out love and affiance in the creature, out of your heart by degrees: or rather, the obligation standeth to his free grace, who careth for your La: in this gracious dispensation, and who is preparing & making ready the garments of Salvation for you, & who calleth you with a new name that the mouth of the Lord hath named, & purposeth to make you a crown of glory & a royal diadem in the hand of your God. Isa. 62. 2. 3. Ye are obliged to frist him more then one heaven, & yet he craveth not a long day, it is fast coming & is sure payment. though ye gave no hire for him, yet hath he given a great price & ransom for you: & if the bargain were to make again, Christ would give no less for you then what he hath already given; he is far from ruing. I shall wish you no more till Time be gone out of the way, then the earnest of that which he hath purchased & prepared for you, which can never be fully preached, written or thought of, since it hath not entered into the heart to consider it. So recommending your La: to the rich grace of our Lord Jesus, I am & rests
St Andrews Your La: at all respective observance in Christ Iesus, S, R.