To the Suffering
Puritan: Samuel Rutherford
Source: Letters of Samuel Rutherford
Originally Delivered: 1636-38, Aberdeen, Scotland (written in exile)
The Lord’s Day: October 11, 2026
“In all their affliction He was afflicted.” – Isaiah 63:9
“Isaiah says that in all your afflictions He is afflicted. O blessed Second, who suffers with you! And glad may your soul be, even to walk in the fiery furnace, with one like unto the Son of man, Who is also the Son of God. Courage up your heart; when you tire, He will bear both you and your burden (Psa. 55:22). Yet a little while, and you will see the salvation of God.
Should such a one as you faint in the day of adversity? Call to mind the days of old; the Lord yet lives; trust in Him, although He should slay you. Faith is exceedingly charitable and believes no evil of God. Men lop of their trees round about, to the end they may grow up high and tall. The Lord has this way lopped your branch to the end that you should grow upward, like one of the Lord’s cedars, setting your heart above, where Christ is at the right hand of the Father. Run your race with patience. Lift up your head; you do not know how near your redemption does draw.
You cannot, you must not have a more pleasant or more easy condition here, than He had, who ‘through afflictions was made perfect’ (Heb. 2:10). We may indeed think, cannot God bring us to heaven with ease and prosperity? Who doubts but He can? But His infinite wisdom thinks and decrees the contrary; and though we cannot see a reason for it, yet He has a most just reason. When you come to the other side of the water, and have set down your foot on the shore of glorious eternity, and look back again to the waters and to your wearisome journey, and shall see in that clear glass of endless glory nearer to the bottom of God’s wisdom, you shall then be forced to say, “If God had done otherwise with me than He had done, I would never have come to enjoying this crown of glory.’ It is your part now to believe, and suffer, and hope, and wait on. Whether God comes to His children with a rod or a crown, if He comes Himself with it, it is well. Welcome, welcome Jesus, what way soever You come, if we can get a sight of You. 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 Your salvation,’ than to enjoy health, being lusty and strong, and never to be visited of God.
You are now alone, but you may have, for the seeking, three always in your company, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I trust they are near you. You are now deprived of the comfort of a lively ministry; so were Israel in their captivity; yet hear God’s promise to them: “Therefore say, Thus saith the Lord God, although I have cast them far off among the heathen, and although I have scattered them among the countries, yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary in the countries where they shall come’ (Ezek. 11:16). Behold a sanctuary! For a sanctuary, God Himself, in the place and room of the temple of Jerusalem: I trust in God, that carrying this temple about with you, you shall see Jehovah’s beauty in His house.
You contracted with Christ, I hope, when first you began to follow Him, that you would bear His cross. Fulfill your part of the contract with patience and break not to Jesus Christ. Forward then and lose not your grips. Hold fast the truth. Your Lord never thought this world’s vain painted glory a gift worthy of you; and therefore, would not bestow it on you, because He is to provide you with a better portion. What have you to do here? This world never looked like a friend upon you; you owe it little love; it looked ever sour-like upon you: howbeit you should woo it, it will not match with you; and, therefore, never seek warm fire under cold ice. This is not a field where your happiness grows; it is up above, where there are ‘a great multitude which no man can number, of all nations and kindreds, and people, and tongues, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands’ (Rev. 7:9). What you could never get here you shall find there. And consider how, in all these trials (and truly they have been many), your Lord has been loosing you at the root from perishing things, and hunting after you to grip your soul. For the Son of God’s sake, let Him not miss His grip, but stay and abide in the love of God (Jude 21).