Reformed Spirituality of Samuel Rutherford
Given at a church conference in England
By any standard Samuel Rutherford was a remarkable man. Adam Philip, in his book The Devotional Literature of Scotland, neatly summarises Rutherford when he says that ‘his life had many sides, and he worked in many spheres’. Born in 1600, Rutherford lived until 1661 and seemed to cram into his life the lives of several men. His contemporaries called him ‘that Flower of the Church, famous, famous, Mr Samuel Rutherford.’ Here are some features of his life in no particular order of importance that indicate why he had such a reputation.
First, Rutherford was a powerful preacher who delighted in commending Jesus Christ. Alexander Whyte, in his assessment of Marion McNaught, records her opinion of Rutherford: ‘I go to Anwoth so often because, though other ministers show me the majesty of God and the plague of my own heart, Mr. Samuel does both these things, but he also shows me, as no other minister ever does, the loveliness of Christ.’ Her assessment was shared by many others. There is the often-told story of the English merchant who visited Scotland and heard three famous preachers. At St. Andrews, he heard a sweet, majestic-looking man (Robert Blair) who showed him the majesty of God; at Irvine he heard David Dickson who showed the merchant his own heart; at Anwoth he heard a little fair man (Samuel Rutherford) who showed him the loveliness of Christ. Another who heard Rutherford preach wrote: ‘Many times I thought he would have flown out of the pulpit when he came to speak of Jesus Christ; but he was never in his right element but when he was commending Him.’ Concerning Jesus, Rutherford himself said that he ‘is the master-flower, the uncreated garland of heaven, the love and joy of men and angels…. For Christ cannot tire or weary from eternity to be Christ; and so, he must not, he cannot but be an infinite and eternal flowing sea, to diffuse and let out streams and floods of boundless grace…. Oh, what a happiness for a soul to lose its excellency in his transcendent glory!’
Second, Rutherford was a potential biblical commentator (Rutherford refers in letter 110 of the Bonar edition of his Letters to his intention to write a commentary on Hosea). Bonar also refers to a possible commentary on Isaiah [p. 17]), but there is no trace today of either volume. In any case, he was a capable Hebrew scholar. Of course, his academic abilities had been recognised before he became a Christian – he had been appointed a lecturer in humanities at Edinburgh University when he was twenty-three years of age.
Third, Rutherford was a political theorist (he was the author of Lex Rex, a volume which many commentators on forms of government regard as propounding principles that are regarded today as basic features of democratic rule). Marcus Loane in his book Makers of Religious Freedom examines the lives of four men from the seventeenth century who helped bring about religious freedom. Of them he says, that ‘they for freedom of truth and conscience, freedom for life and worship, freedom both as citizens and Christians.’ Two were English (John Bunyan and Richard Baxter) and two were Scottish (Alexander Henderson and Samuel Rutherford). Francis Schaeffer dedicated his Christian Manifesto (published in 1981) to Rutherford, claiming that the ideas of Rutherford influenced the opinions of the American founding fathers, particularly through the presence of John Witherspoon, the Scottish minister who was one of these leaders who signed the Declaration of Independence.
Fourth, Rutherford was a profound theologian. The fact that he was chosen as one of the Scottish delegates to the famous Westminster Assembly which produced the Westminster Confession and Catechisms tells us that he was a most capable scholar. James Walker, in his The Theology and Theologians of Scotland, refers to Rutherford’s scholastic tendency; in fact he calls Rutherford ‘the greatest scholastic of our Presbyterian Church’. He was a professor of theology at St. Andrews for many years. Loane’s assessment helps us understand something of the greatness of Rutherford: ‘No-one in Scotland ranked so high as preacher or scholar, and it was the home of both. No-one in England was his master in theology or controversy, and it was an age of giants. The world has seldom seen a union of scholastic genius and spiritual devotion equal to that which he displayed.’
Fifth, Rutherford was a notable author. He wrote thirteen works of theology, and someone has calculated a total collection of his works would produce a set comparable in length to the sixteen volumes of John Owen. In addition to his political work Lex Rex, he produced books on church practice defending Presbyterianism, books on theological issues such his study on the covenant of works and the covenant of grace or his work on the matter of issues of conscience, and books on the person and work of Christ and on Christian discipleship. In addition he wrote scholarly works in Latin on Arminianism.
A colleague in the ministry, James Urquhart of Kinloss, said of Rutherford: ‘For such a piece of clay as Mr. Rutherford, I never knew one like him. He seems to be always praying, always preaching, always visiting the sick, always teaching in the schools, always writing treatises, always reading and studying.’
What was Rutherford the pastor like? We can turn to Loane for a summary: ‘His early risings, his tireless studies, his constant labours, his patient vigils, all had this goal in view. He was possessed with the Shepherd’s watchful eye for those that were in trouble, and the Saviour’s tender heart for all who were yet out of the way. The herd-boys were not too humble for him to seek out and instruct; the high-born were not too lofty for him to wait on and rebuke. He yearned over those who were still unsaved with a love and longing which were akin to the passion for souls that wrung the heart of Christ himself…. His thoughts by day and dreams by night were all centred on the needs of his flock, and there were times when sleep fled from his eyes in his anxiety for the lambs of his fold.’
First, Rutherford was a powerful preacher who delighted in commending Jesus Christ. Alexander Whyte, in his assessment of Marion McNaught, records her opinion of Rutherford: ‘I go to Anwoth so often because, though other ministers show me the majesty of God and the plague of my own heart, Mr. Samuel does both these things, but he also shows me, as no other minister ever does, the loveliness of Christ.’ Her assessment was shared by many others. There is the often-told story of the English merchant who visited Scotland and heard three famous preachers. At St. Andrews, he heard a sweet, majestic-looking man (Robert Blair) who showed him the majesty of God; at Irvine he heard David Dickson who showed the merchant his own heart; at Anwoth he heard a little fair man (Samuel Rutherford) who showed him the loveliness of Christ. Another who heard Rutherford preach wrote: ‘Many times I thought he would have flown out of the pulpit when he came to speak of Jesus Christ; but he was never in his right element but when he was commending Him.’ Concerning Jesus, Rutherford himself said that he ‘is the master-flower, the uncreated garland of heaven, the love and joy of men and angels…. For Christ cannot tire or weary from eternity to be Christ; and so, he must not, he cannot but be an infinite and eternal flowing sea, to diffuse and let out streams and floods of boundless grace…. Oh, what a happiness for a soul to lose its excellency in his transcendent glory!’
Second, Rutherford was a potential biblical commentator (Rutherford refers in letter 110 of the Bonar edition of his Letters to his intention to write a commentary on Hosea). Bonar also refers to a possible commentary on Isaiah [p. 17]), but there is no trace today of either volume. In any case, he was a capable Hebrew scholar. Of course, his academic abilities had been recognised before he became a Christian – he had been appointed a lecturer in humanities at Edinburgh University when he was twenty-three years of age.
Third, Rutherford was a political theorist (he was the author of Lex Rex, a volume which many commentators on forms of government regard as propounding principles that are regarded today as basic features of democratic rule). Marcus Loane in his book Makers of Religious Freedom examines the lives of four men from the seventeenth century who helped bring about religious freedom. Of them he says, that ‘they for freedom of truth and conscience, freedom for life and worship, freedom both as citizens and Christians.’ Two were English (John Bunyan and Richard Baxter) and two were Scottish (Alexander Henderson and Samuel Rutherford). Francis Schaeffer dedicated his Christian Manifesto (published in 1981) to Rutherford, claiming that the ideas of Rutherford influenced the opinions of the American founding fathers, particularly through the presence of John Witherspoon, the Scottish minister who was one of these leaders who signed the Declaration of Independence.
Fourth, Rutherford was a profound theologian. The fact that he was chosen as one of the Scottish delegates to the famous Westminster Assembly which produced the Westminster Confession and Catechisms tells us that he was a most capable scholar. James Walker, in his The Theology and Theologians of Scotland, refers to Rutherford’s scholastic tendency; in fact he calls Rutherford ‘the greatest scholastic of our Presbyterian Church’. He was a professor of theology at St. Andrews for many years. Loane’s assessment helps us understand something of the greatness of Rutherford: ‘No-one in Scotland ranked so high as preacher or scholar, and it was the home of both. No-one in England was his master in theology or controversy, and it was an age of giants. The world has seldom seen a union of scholastic genius and spiritual devotion equal to that which he displayed.’
Fifth, Rutherford was a notable author. He wrote thirteen works of theology, and someone has calculated a total collection of his works would produce a set comparable in length to the sixteen volumes of John Owen. In addition to his political work Lex Rex, he produced books on church practice defending Presbyterianism, books on theological issues such his study on the covenant of works and the covenant of grace or his work on the matter of issues of conscience, and books on the person and work of Christ and on Christian discipleship. In addition he wrote scholarly works in Latin on Arminianism.
A colleague in the ministry, James Urquhart of Kinloss, said of Rutherford: ‘For such a piece of clay as Mr. Rutherford, I never knew one like him. He seems to be always praying, always preaching, always visiting the sick, always teaching in the schools, always writing treatises, always reading and studying.’
What was Rutherford the pastor like? We can turn to Loane for a summary: ‘His early risings, his tireless studies, his constant labours, his patient vigils, all had this goal in view. He was possessed with the Shepherd’s watchful eye for those that were in trouble, and the Saviour’s tender heart for all who were yet out of the way. The herd-boys were not too humble for him to seek out and instruct; the high-born were not too lofty for him to wait on and rebuke. He yearned over those who were still unsaved with a love and longing which were akin to the passion for souls that wrung the heart of Christ himself…. His thoughts by day and dreams by night were all centred on the needs of his flock, and there were times when sleep fled from his eyes in his anxiety for the lambs of his fold.’
Perhaps the words on his tombstone in St. Andrews gives us a picture of the man:
What tongue, what pen, or skill of men
Can famous Rutherford commend!
His learning justly rais’d his fame
True goodness did adorn his name.
He did converse with things above,
Acquainted with Immanuel’s love.
Most orthodox he was and sound,
And many errors did confound.
For Zion’s King, and Zion’s cause,
And Scotland’s covenanted laws,
Most constantly he did contend,
Until his time was at an end.
At last he won to full fruition
Of that which he had seen in vision.
His life
Born in 1600, Rutherford was to live through a tumultuous period in British national life. The union of the crowns of Scotland and England took place when he was a child, in 1607, but it would be another century before the Union of the Parliaments took place. While James VI was the legal successor to Elizabeth as monarch, it was also assumed that he would stabilise the Protestant cause in Britain. His departure from Edinburgh to London produced some important consequences, such as the appearance of the King James Version of the Bible. Nevertheless his reign, and the reign of his son Charles I, caused instability in the church, mainly because of his desire to have Episcopacy as the national religion.
Rutherford was born in the Scottish Borders, near to Jedburgh. His father was a farmer, able to afford a good education for his son. Rutherford entered Edinburgh University in 1617, and graduated in 1621. Two years later he was appointed regent of humanity (he taught Latin and literature); this ability in literature becomes obvious later on as one reads his graphic letters. In 1826, he was forced to resign from his position due to immorality. It was shortly after this embarrassing incident that he experienced conversion, and in the next year he was ordained to the Christian ministry and became minister of Anwoth, near Kirkcudbright.
In 1836, Rutherford wrote a book in Latin against Arminianism, and this work raised the ire of his ecclesiastical opponents. After a kind of church trial, he was banished to Aberdeen where he remained for about eighteen months. During this period he wrote 220 of the letters that are found in Bonar’s edition. In 1638, the year in which the National Covenant was signed, Rutherford was allowed to return to Anwoth. It was a short reunion, however, because in 1639 he was appointed Professor of Divinity in St. Andrews (later he became Principal of New College and Rector of the University there). He remained in St. Andrews for twenty years.
In 1660, the Stuart monarchy was restored after the death of Cromwell and Charles II became king. It was expected that those who opposed his family and his regime would be targeted. In the autumn of that year, Rutherford’s volume on political theory, Rex Lex, was condemned by the Scottish Parliament and copies of it were burned in Edinburgh and St Andrews. The following spring (1661), he was summoned to appear before Parliament on the charge of treason. When its representatives went to inform him, they discovered that Rutherford was dying. He responded to their message with words that have stirred thousands as they read them: ‘Tell them that I have a summons already before a superior judge and judicatory, and I behove to answer my first summons; and ere your day come, I will be where few kings and great folks come.’
Samuel Rutherford died on the morning of March 18, 1661. His final evening had been marked by wonderful expressions of faith pouring out of the lips of the dying Christian. Mr Blair, who was present, asked him: ‘What think ye now of Christ?’ Rutherford replied: ‘I shall live and adore Him. Glory! glory to my Creator and my Redeemer for ever! Glory shines in Immanuel’s land.’ Later that day he said: ‘Oh! that all my brethren in the land may know what a Master I have served, and what peace I have this day. I shall sleep in Christ, and when I awake I shall be satisfied with His likeness. This night shall close the door, and put my anchor within the veil; and I shall go away in a sleep by five of the clock in the morning.’ This is what happened.
His letters
Today Rutherford is best known for his letters. Various editions were published: the first was in Holland in 1664 by Rutherford’s former student Robert McWard under the title Joshua Redivivus, primarily for those who were facing or would face persecution. The title suggests that Rutherford functioned in a manner similar to Joshua when he went to spy out the land of Canaan. The letters are Rutherford’s report of the way God dealt with him. He alludes to this function in one of his letters: ‘But He would send me as a spy into this wilderness of suffering, to see the land and try the ford; and I cannot make a lie of Christ’s cross. I can report nothing but good both of Him and it, lest others should faint.’
This edition contained 284 letters. Other letters were added to subsequent editions. The letters number 365 in the Bonar edition, the edition that is available today: of them, 65 were written before Rutherford’s exile to Aberdeen (1627-36), 220 from exile in Aberdeen (1636-38), and the remainder after his release from exile (1638-61). Bonar’s edition, which was the thirtieth, seems to be the first to place the letters in chronological order. Other letters have been discovered as well.
Some have difficulty reconciling his Letters with several of his writings, such as Lex Rex, because his letters reveal a devotional life not seen in these other works. A. Taylor Innes argued that Rutherford’s self-description (‘but I am made of extremes’, made in his letter to David Dickson [168]) indicates that Rutherford was aware of a constitutional defect in his personality. But his awareness of that character trait does not justify extending the trait to his ecclesiastical and political writings as if they were its sinful expression and his Letters its sanctified expression. Rutherford may have been wrong in his political conclusions, but his writings were the practical expression of one who firmly believed that Scotland was in covenant with Christ, a relationship that demanded or justified certain national expressions. It was his love for Christ that motivated his actions, including his writings.
Others object to his letters because of his erotic language when describing the relationship between Christ and his church corporately or Christ and individual believers. For example, Rutherford writes: ‘I confidently believe there is a bed made for Christ and me, and that we shall take our fill of love in it’ (165); ‘I have a love-bed with Christ, and am filled with his love’ (264). Douglas quotes the comment of Law Mathieson regarding Rutherford’s spiritual raptures as being ‘of the grossest and most indecent kind’.
Yet this imagery was not unique to Rutherford; it is found in other writers of the seventeenth century. William Campbell states that this usage was technical, ‘springing from the conception of Church as the Bride of Christ and from an allegorical interpretation and use of the Song of Solomon’. John Macleod in his Scottish Theology says: ‘When exception is taken to them on the ground that they use so freely the language of nuptial love, the critics, to be justified in their fault-finding, ought first to expunge from Scripture the Song of Songs, the 45th Psalm, and much of the language in the Prophets and in the New Testament which speak of the Lord as espoused to His Church and of the Church as His Bride’.
It is worth noting that Rutherford also used other images, for example, from banking practices: ‘Dear brother, help me, a poor debtor, to pay the interest; for I cannot come nigh to pay the interest’ (110). He was also prepared to use his own physical frame to illustrate his spiritual situation: ‘My short legs could not step over this lair, or sinking mire; and, therefore, my Lord Jesus will bear me through’ (110).
Rutherford can produce imagery that summarise deep doctrines. Describing the incarnation of Jesus, Rutherford says this striking sentence: ‘Lovely in the womb, the Ancient of Days became young for me.’ Or concerning spiritual knowledge, he writes, ‘If you would be a deep divine, I recommend to you sanctification.’ Heaven is the land in which there are four summers in the year.
His Letters were regarded from the first as being of great spiritual benefit. According to Row, ‘‘Mr Samuell Rutherfoord wrot from Aberdene very many letters to his awin people, [and] to many others of all ranks; whilk, by the blessing of God, did great good not onlie to those to whom they were written, but to others to whose view in providence they came; so that sundrie begouth to gather them together, and have wholl books full of them, whilk if they were printed, I am confident, throw the Lord’s rich mercie and blessing, would not faill to do much good; for in them are handled many necessary cases of conscience, wherein perplexed souls might get resolution; also they speak much to the tymes and Bishops’ tyrannie.’
Some also regarded the Letters as containing a prophetic element. Row continues: ‘…also there are some prophecies, whilk the Lord caused his servant utter by pen, and now since that, has fulfilled by prooff and experience, concerning the downfall of the Bishops, the restoring of the Kirk of God, the work of Reformation, the League and Covenant of Scotland and England, whilk he compared to Judah and Israel, using the words of the prophet, Jer. l. 4, 5.’
In addition, they have been a manual for devotional exercises for many Christians. The fact that Bonar’s edition contains 365 letters points to its use as a daily devotional for a year. Philip comments regarding the Letters: ‘The whole circle of Christian life, its difficulties, its duties, its hopes, the heights and depths of faith and experience, everything that belongs to the Gospel and to its challenge, to holiness and its fruition to the rightful recognition of God and to the understanding of the unsearchable riches of Christ, are spoken of with insight and passion and with a force that is compelling.’
Therefore it is not surprising that many renowned and countless numbers of unknown Christians have revelled in Rutherford’s Letters. C. H. Spurgeon, for example, wrote: ‘When we are dead and gone, let the world know that Spurgeon held Rutherford’s Letters to be the nearest thing to inspiration which can be found in the writings of mere men.’
In the early days of his ministry, these letters, along with the writings of Jonathan Edwards, were very influential in the spiritual development of Robert Murray McCheyne. His biographer, Andrew Bonar, writes: ‘It was here, too, that he began to study so closely the works of Jonathan Edwards,—reckoning them a mine to be wrought, and if wrought, sure to repay the toil. Along with this author, the Letters of Samuel Rutherford were often in his hand.’ J. C. Philpot wrote that Rutherford was one ‘of the most forcible and original writers that has ever edified the church of God’.
In this paper, I will first detail some emphases of Reformation spirituality, before considering the features of spirituality found in Rutherford’s letters. The term ‘spirituality’ is taken to mean a holy lifestyle including communion with God; it involves both what a person believes (Reformed doctrine) and what he/she practices.
1. Reformed spirituality
Prior to the Reformation, spirituality meant the pursuit of perfection, and various means were suggested: sacraments, prayer, ascetic practices, vows of poverty, celibacy, images and monasticism. Spirituality was not for all believers but was associated with specialist groups such as monks or nuns. For the Reformers, spirituality involves a relationship with God, expressed in daily living, and not limited to those who detach themselves from interaction with others. They did not deny the necessity of means of grace but affirmed the value of those advocated in the Bible, such as the preaching of the word, prayer and the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
The key aspect of Reformed spirituality is that Christian living is based on justification. The Reformers’ rediscovery, that a person is forgiven by believing in Christ and given a standing before God, shattered the systems of merit of the pre-Reformation Church. Being justified, believers were now united to Jesus. This union with Christ is not the final achievement of Reformed spirituality; rather it is its foundation. Rutherford’s erotic language expresses that for him union with Christ was a spiritual marriage, a relationship to be developed by the two lovers.
2. Doctrinal emphases of Rutherford’s spirituality
In his Letters Rutherford alludes to many doctrines. I will mention six that indicate his spirituality was Reformed.
Firstly, Rutherford was committed to the sovereignty of God. His appreciation of this doctrine included divine sovereignty in salvation but in the Letters the main emphasis is God’s sovereignty in providence. He reminds David Dickson upon the death of his child: ‘Ye are taught to know and adore his sovereignty, which he exerciseth over you, which is yet lustred in mercy. The child hath but changed a bed in the garden, and is planted up higher, nearer the sun, where he shall thrive better’ (298).
Rutherford realised that it was important for a believer to submit to God’s chastisements. Marian McNaught was exhorted to ‘welcome every rod of God, for I find not in the whole book of God a greater note of the child of God, than to fall down and kiss the feet of an angry God’ (12). Lady Kenmure was reminded that ‘these many years the Lord hath been teaching you to read and study well the book of holy, holy, and spotless sovereignty, I suffering from some nigh-hand, and some far off. Whoever be the instruments, the replying of clay to the Potter, the Former of all, is unbeseeming the nothing-creature’ (347).
Rutherford personally experienced several trying providences, yet maintained his faith in God. When his first wife died, he wrote, ‘My wife now, after long disease and torment, for the space of a year and a month, is departed this life. The Lord hath done it; blessed be His name’ (11). He drew lessons from these experiences that he used when helping others in similar situations. To one of his parishioners, Mrs Taylor, who had lost her son, he wrote, ‘I was in your Condition. I had but two children, and both are dead since I came hither. The supreme and absolute Father of all things giveth not an account of any of his matters. The good husbandman may pluck his roses, and gather in his lilies in midsummer….and he may transplant young trees out of the lower ground to the higher…. What is that to you or me? The goods are his own’ (310). Or as he describes his own response to troubles: ‘When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines.’
Secondly, Rutherford was captivated by the person and work of Jesus Christ. Regarding his person, Rutherford seems to focus more on the humanity of Christ; regarding his work, Rutherford draws great comfort from Christ’s life and atoning death, from his activity in heaven in the present and from his interaction with his people, individually and corporately, at his second coming. Rutherford had a profound understanding of the person and work of Christ, and for all his use of dramatic imagery to describe Christ he does not fall into theological departure from the historic creedal statements regarding Christ. Yet his response to Christ was not merely at an intellectual level; it is clear from his letters that he was passionately in love with Jesus. And his relationship with Christ was a developing one. To David Dickson he wrote, ‘I never before came to that degree or pitch of communion with Christ that I have now attained to’ (110). To John Gordon of Rusco, Rutherford wrote: ‘Brother, I may, from new experience, speak of Christ to you. Oh, if ye saw in Him what I see! A river of God’s unseen joys has flowed from bank to brae over my soul since I parted with you’ (147).
Thirdly, the reality of heaven contributed to Rutherford’s spirituality. He regularly refers to heaven both as an encouragement and as a stimulus for dedication. Heaven will make up for the difficulties endured on earth. Heaven is God’s reward. But it is heaven with Christ (246, 247). Writing of heaven and Christ to one of his correspondents he says: ‘O for Eternity’s leisure to look on Him, to feast upon a sight of his face! O for the long summer day of endless ages to stand beside Him and enjoy Him! O time, O sin, be removed out of the way! O day, fairest of days, dawn.’
Fourthly, Rutherford constantly expresses a love for the Church of Scotland. He reminds his correspondents to pray for the Church (for example, he writes to Lady Kenmure: ‘I trust also, Madam, that ye will be careful to present to the Lord the present estate of this decaying kirk’ [3]). He can sound like an Old Testament prophet as he pictures the state of the church: ‘I see the Lord’s vineyard laid waste, and the heathen entered into the sanctuary: and my belly is pained, and my soul in heaviness, because the Lord’s people are gone into captivity, and because of the fury of the Lord, and that wind (but neither to fan or to purge) which is coming upon apostate Scotland’ (p. 156). Only a person who loved the Church could speak so sadly about it.
Yet he did not believe schism was an answer to the church’s defects (364), and he deals with this issue in great detail in his Against Separatism. Rutherford was committed to working out in corporate and individual life the implications of the headship of Christ over his church. Connected to this focus is his interest in the faithfulness of the church’s ministers, which can be seen in the letters he sent to such, and the Reformed expectation of Christ’s presence at the Lord’s Supper, which can be deduced from his descriptions of communion occasions (14, 18).
Fifthly, Rutherford stresses the significance of Covenant theology. He reminds one correspondent: ‘Ye come hither to treat with God, and to tryst with Him in His Christ for salvation to your soul, and to seek reconciliation with an angry, wrathful God, in a covenant of peace made to you in Christ’ (191). He writes to Christians in Ireland: ‘Is it not our comfort, that Christ, the Mediator of the New Covenant, is come betwixt us and God in the business, so that green and young heirs, the like of sinners, have now a Tutor that is God!’ (284) For Rutherford, the blessings of the Christian life were the outcome of a covenant relationship with Christ.
Sixthly, Rutherford had a deep interest in the anticipated conversion of the Jews. In one letter he says, ‘O to see the sight, next to Christ’s Coming in the clouds, the most joyful! our elder brethren the Jews and Christ fall upon one another’s necks and kiss each other! They have been long asunder; they will be kind to one another when they meet. O day! longed-for and lovely day-dawn! O sweet Jesus, let me see that sight which will be as life from the dead, Thee and Thy ancient people in mutual embraces.’
3. Practical elements of Rutherford’s spirituality
The letters reveal a wide range of practices associated with spirituality. Firstly, letter writing was itself a spiritual practice. Rutherford was not the first Christian leader to realise the benefits of correspondence as a means of stimulating spirituality. John Calvin wrote letters of spiritual counsel to a wide variety of people: monarchs, the aristocracy, prisoners and martyrs. Martin Luther wrote letters to monarchs, theologians, painters, poets and soldiers, as well as to family and lifelong friends, offering spiritual counsel. John Knox too used correspondence to provide comfort and direction, as can be seen from his Select Practical Writings. An example from Rutherford’s own time is John Owen, and from later years there is the example of John Newton.
Rutherford probably helped himself, especially when he wrote when he felt low in spirit, because in doing so he reasoned with himself regarding these situations. The Letters indicate that Rutherford could not write a letter without including spiritual counsel. He expected some letters to be read in public for the benefit of others. To John Gordon of Cardoness he wrote, ‘Sir, show the people this; for when I write to you, I think I write to you all, old and young’ (180). The letters sent to the parishioners in Anwoth (225, 269) and Kilmacolm (286) were also for corporate instruction.
Of course, it should not be forgotten that Rutherford appreciated receiving letters. Many examples of this could be given. To Alexander Henderson he says, ‘I received your letters. They are as apples of gold to me’ (115); to Hugh MacKail, he says, ‘I bless you for your letter’ (118); twice he tells John Gordon that his letters have refreshed his soul (123, 124); he says the same to Marion McNaught (126). Indeed he complains when in Aberdeen that he has not received any (80).
Many of his letters were written to women. This points to a second aspect of Rutherford’s spirituality – he was able to relate to Christian women as well as to Christian men. There is no hint of impropriety in his letters to them. Indeed, in many of them Rutherford is careful to ask after their husbands. Some of his female correspondents had high rank in society and could influence their husbands. But that was not his only reason for corresponding with them. Rather he appreciated the intensity of their commitment to Christ. One example is his description of Marion McNaught to Lady Kenmure: ‘Blessed be the Lord! that in God’s mercy I found in this country such a woman, to whom Jesus is dearer that her own heart, when there be so many that cast Christ over their shoulder’ (22). His letters also reveal his concern for their spiritual growth. For example, in his letters to Marion McNaught, he often indicates his interest in the spiritual development of her children; he refers several times to her concern over who would become the next pastor of her church; he often asks her to pray for him. In addition to these personal areas, he also informs her of his concerns for the national Church.
This close relationship with Christian women indicates that Rutherford’s spirituality had the elements of gentleness and tenderness. Yet his spirituality was not marked by an effeminateness that would have caused males to withdraw from him. In his Christian living Rutherford also revealed a robust and tenacious boldness. He wrote to several of the gentry to remind them of the important role they should play in promoting and defending the cause of Christ in Scotland. He reminded John Ewart to ‘keep your garments clean, and stand for the truth of Christ which you profess…. Worthy Sir, I beseech you, make sure work of salvation’ (134).
Where did Rutherford get his boldness? No doubt, he was a brave man naturally. Further, he was the kind of man who would complete a task he had commenced. Yet his strength of conviction primarily comes from his awareness of God. Writing to the provost of Ayr, he urges, ‘Serve Christ; back him; let His cause be your cause; give not an hair’s-breadth of truth away, for it is not yours but God’s.’
Thirdly, for Rutherford, personal holiness was important. He suggested that Christ should be loved more for giving sanctification than for giving justification because in the former he is remaking his people in his likeness (170). He wrote to one correspondent, ‘I recommend mortification to you above everything’ (92). To another he wrote, ‘I recommend to you holiness and sanctification, and that you keep yourself clean from this present evil world’ (213). Yet Rutherford was careful not to be legalistic, for a legal spirit results in pride. He reminded his correspondent that ‘the New Covenant seeketh not full measure, nor stented obedience, as the condition of it; because forgiveness hath always place’ (249).
A fourth aspect of Rutherford’s spirituality was his evangelistic zeal. He exhorted Margaret McNaught, ‘Take as many to heaven with you as ye are able to draw. The more ye draw with you, ye shall be the welcomer yourself’ (10). A common theme in the Letters is his appeal to the young to give themselves to Christ (e.g. 142). A connected element to evangelism was encouraging personal covenanting with God. (This was a prominent emphasis in pastoral work at the time, as can be seen from William Guthrie’s endorsement of the practice in his The Christian’s Great Interest.) For example, John Kennedy was reminded by Rutherford: ‘Ye contracted with Christ, I hope, when first ye began to follow Him, that ye would bear His cross. Fulfill your part of the contract with patience, and break not to Jesus Christ’ (22). He told Marion McNaught to show her children his letter in which he advises them ‘to covenant with Jesus Christ to be His’ (24).
Fifthly, the Letters reveal the importance of prayer for spirituality. When he was a pastor in Anwoth, it was his practice to rise at three in the morning to begin the day with study and prayer. In one letter, Rutherford mentions several features of his prayer life: (1) he benefitted by riding alone a long journey, in giving that time to prayer; (2) he set aside days for prayer and fasting; (3) in praying for others, he got something for himself; (4) because he had experienced God’s answers to prayer many times, he used to pray for anything, of how little importance soever. Yet he confesses, ‘That the experiences I had of God’s hearing me in this and the other particular, being gathered, yet in a new trouble I had always, (once at least,) my faith to seek, as if I were to begin at A B C again’ (159). Prayer was also to be made for the ingathering of the Jews into the Church (14).
In addition to personal prayer, Rutherford stressed the value of special seasons of united prayer when ‘all who love the truth should join their prayers together, and cry to God with humiliation and fasting’ (31). In this letter to Lady Kenmure, he gives several reasons for one such season of prayer: distresses of God’s churches abroad, sins and divine judgement in the land, the lamentable and pitiful state of the church, the low spiritual condition of ministers and professing Christians, that the leaders of the nation and the people turn from evil ways. Such times for prayer may be for several days at a time (31) or on a particular weekday (he urges the Laird of Moncrieff to join a union for prayer that met regularly on Wednesdays if possible [171]). He was confident in the usefulness of this activity: ‘‘Though the particular day be not observed, yet, where many are on work, some salvation from the Lord’s arm is to be expected’ (365). He also valued the prayers of others for himself: ‘As for myself, I do esteem nothing out of heaven, and next to a communion with Jesus Christ, more to be in the hearts and prayers of the saints’ (319). With some believers Rutherford had a prayer-covenant: he wrote to George Gillespie, asking him to ‘remember our old covenant and pray for me, and write to me your case’ (144).
Rutherford’s spirituality also included difficult experiences. He wrote of spiritual desertion. Writing to James Guthrie, he requests prayer, for he is ‘at low ebb, as to any sensible communion with Christ; yea, as low as any soul can be, and do scare know where I am’ (319). He does not know how to describe his condition but requests that Guthrie and others would pray for him. To another correspondent, he complains, ‘All that I now do is hold out a lame faith to Christ, like a beggar holding out a stump, instead of an arm or leg, and cry, “Lord Jesus, work a miracle!” ’ (92).
Rutherford was aware of his personal sinfulness. He knew from experience ‘that known, discovered, and revealed sins, that are against the conscience, be eschewed, as most dangerous preparatives to hardness of heart’. He confessed that ‘sudden stirrings of pride, lust, revenge, love of honours, were not resisted and mourned for’. He also regretted that ‘my grace and gifts bring forth little or no thankfulness’ (159). He also experienced the disappointing discovery that ‘Temptations, that I supposed to be stricken dead and laid upon their back, rise again and revive upon me’ (92).
Rutherford was astonished that others spoke well of him and suggested they did so because they did not know his sins. He wrote to David Dickson: ‘I fear that ye have never know me well. If you saw my inner side, it is possible that you would pity me, but you would hardly give me either love or respect: men mistake me the whole length of the heavens. My sins prevail over me, and the terror of their guiltiness. I am put often to ask, if Christ and I did ever shake hands together in earnest’ (168).
Rutherford’s spirituality took into account the likelihood of opposition for the sake of Christ. Suffering for Jesus was not something about which to be ashamed, rather it is ‘the professor’s golden garment’ (177). To Marian McNaught, Rutherford wrote, ‘Take part with Jesus of His sufferings, and glory in the marks of Christ’ (13). Concerning her husband, who seemed not to be so committed as her, Rutherford said, ‘I will be obliged to him, if he will be willing to suffer for my dear Master’ (177). In a letter to John Ewart, he writes, ‘I bless His high and glorious name, that the terrors of great men have not affrighted me from openly avouching the Son of God’ (134). He regarded his own banishment to Aberdeen as a high honour. He informed Lady Kenmure that the ‘honour that I have prayed for these sixteen years, with submission to my Lord’s will, my kind Lord has now bestowed upon me, even to suffer for my royal and princely King Jesus, and for His kingly crown, and the freedom of His kingdom that His Father has given Him’ (61). Indeed, he regarded his exile for the sake of Christ as liberating (‘His cross is the sweetest burden that ever I bare; it is such a burden as wings are to a bird, or sails are to a ship, to carry me forward to my harbour’ [134]). A possible criticism of Rutherford is that similar strength in facing opposition is not always found in others, and his letters should have indicated so.
A prominent feature of Rutherford’s spirituality is preparation for death. He refers to this several times, especially in times of illness. He writes to Lady Kenmure, he writes, ‘Ye have now, Madam, a sickness before you; and also after that a death. Gather then now food for the journey’ (3).Yet death is not to be feared. Dying was an opportunity for exercising faith; he encouraged George Gillespie on his deathbed to look to justification, and not to sanctification, for comfort (324).
Conclusion
The Letters raise the question, Was Rutherford a mystic? Some authors have suggested he was. T. Radcliffe Barnett in his chapter on Rutherford in The Makers of the Kirk refers to Rutherford as a mystic: ‘a practical mystic’ (p. 192); ‘the mystic minister of the love of Jesus’ (p. 194). There were mystical movements, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, at that time. While there were differences between various mystical ideas, to be a mystic usually involved the absorption of the human personality into the divine. In this sense of the term Rutherford was not a mystic. Wakefield writes of Rutherford: ‘But for Rutherford, communion with Christ is not active annihilation, or a ceasing from acts of the will, or an end of prayer, meditation, love, and desire. He sees perfect communion only in the bliss of the marriage supper of the Lamb – a scriptural figure at once eschatological and corporate. We must continue in preparation and yearning, above all in the ordinances, until Christ come.’ For Rutherford, the spiritual life was based on justification, involved the process of sanctification, and found its fulfilment in glorification. But in each of these relationships with God in Christ, Rutherford knew he would retain his own personality.
His personality affected the way his spirituality showed itself. I would suggest his spirituality was marked by three important qualities that are essential for Reformed spirituality.
First, his spirituality included his resolute realism. He knew that opposition was possible and that life would not be easy. Yet he determined to be loyal to Christ wherever God providentially placed him.
A second feature of Rutherford’s spirituality is his humility. Although he had wonderful experiences as well as a disciplined lifestyle, his exhortations to others to proceed to know Christ are not presented as the advice of an expert but as a fellow-scholar, with much still to learn and experience, in the school of Christ.
Thirdly, Rutherford’s spirituality was Christ-centred. The letters indicate that Rutherford entered into the love of Christ more than most believers. His concept of his relationship with Christ was not limited to understanding Christ’s activities in heaven. In addition Rutherford experienced the loving and felt presence of Christ, although this presence was not a permanent experience. He writes to Lady Cardoness, ‘Learn daily both to possess and miss Christ in his sacred bridegroom-smiles. He must go and come, because his infinite wisdom thinketh it best for you’ (192). To David Dickson, he wrote, ‘Sometimes, while I have Christ in my arms, I fall asleep in the sweetness of his presence, and he, in my sleep, stealeth away out of my arms, and when I wake I miss him’ (259).
Rutherford’s Letters bear testimony that humility, resolve and Christ-centredness do not breed a passionless spirituality; rather they result in a Reformed spirituality that is marked by passion for Christ, by vibrancy in the spiritual disciplines, that affects every area of life, that loves Christ’s church, and looks forward to heaven.
Can famous Rutherford commend!
His learning justly rais’d his fame
True goodness did adorn his name.
He did converse with things above,
Acquainted with Immanuel’s love.
Most orthodox he was and sound,
And many errors did confound.
For Zion’s King, and Zion’s cause,
And Scotland’s covenanted laws,
Most constantly he did contend,
Until his time was at an end.
At last he won to full fruition
Of that which he had seen in vision.
His life
Born in 1600, Rutherford was to live through a tumultuous period in British national life. The union of the crowns of Scotland and England took place when he was a child, in 1607, but it would be another century before the Union of the Parliaments took place. While James VI was the legal successor to Elizabeth as monarch, it was also assumed that he would stabilise the Protestant cause in Britain. His departure from Edinburgh to London produced some important consequences, such as the appearance of the King James Version of the Bible. Nevertheless his reign, and the reign of his son Charles I, caused instability in the church, mainly because of his desire to have Episcopacy as the national religion.
Rutherford was born in the Scottish Borders, near to Jedburgh. His father was a farmer, able to afford a good education for his son. Rutherford entered Edinburgh University in 1617, and graduated in 1621. Two years later he was appointed regent of humanity (he taught Latin and literature); this ability in literature becomes obvious later on as one reads his graphic letters. In 1826, he was forced to resign from his position due to immorality. It was shortly after this embarrassing incident that he experienced conversion, and in the next year he was ordained to the Christian ministry and became minister of Anwoth, near Kirkcudbright.
In 1836, Rutherford wrote a book in Latin against Arminianism, and this work raised the ire of his ecclesiastical opponents. After a kind of church trial, he was banished to Aberdeen where he remained for about eighteen months. During this period he wrote 220 of the letters that are found in Bonar’s edition. In 1638, the year in which the National Covenant was signed, Rutherford was allowed to return to Anwoth. It was a short reunion, however, because in 1639 he was appointed Professor of Divinity in St. Andrews (later he became Principal of New College and Rector of the University there). He remained in St. Andrews for twenty years.
In 1660, the Stuart monarchy was restored after the death of Cromwell and Charles II became king. It was expected that those who opposed his family and his regime would be targeted. In the autumn of that year, Rutherford’s volume on political theory, Rex Lex, was condemned by the Scottish Parliament and copies of it were burned in Edinburgh and St Andrews. The following spring (1661), he was summoned to appear before Parliament on the charge of treason. When its representatives went to inform him, they discovered that Rutherford was dying. He responded to their message with words that have stirred thousands as they read them: ‘Tell them that I have a summons already before a superior judge and judicatory, and I behove to answer my first summons; and ere your day come, I will be where few kings and great folks come.’
Samuel Rutherford died on the morning of March 18, 1661. His final evening had been marked by wonderful expressions of faith pouring out of the lips of the dying Christian. Mr Blair, who was present, asked him: ‘What think ye now of Christ?’ Rutherford replied: ‘I shall live and adore Him. Glory! glory to my Creator and my Redeemer for ever! Glory shines in Immanuel’s land.’ Later that day he said: ‘Oh! that all my brethren in the land may know what a Master I have served, and what peace I have this day. I shall sleep in Christ, and when I awake I shall be satisfied with His likeness. This night shall close the door, and put my anchor within the veil; and I shall go away in a sleep by five of the clock in the morning.’ This is what happened.
His letters
Today Rutherford is best known for his letters. Various editions were published: the first was in Holland in 1664 by Rutherford’s former student Robert McWard under the title Joshua Redivivus, primarily for those who were facing or would face persecution. The title suggests that Rutherford functioned in a manner similar to Joshua when he went to spy out the land of Canaan. The letters are Rutherford’s report of the way God dealt with him. He alludes to this function in one of his letters: ‘But He would send me as a spy into this wilderness of suffering, to see the land and try the ford; and I cannot make a lie of Christ’s cross. I can report nothing but good both of Him and it, lest others should faint.’
This edition contained 284 letters. Other letters were added to subsequent editions. The letters number 365 in the Bonar edition, the edition that is available today: of them, 65 were written before Rutherford’s exile to Aberdeen (1627-36), 220 from exile in Aberdeen (1636-38), and the remainder after his release from exile (1638-61). Bonar’s edition, which was the thirtieth, seems to be the first to place the letters in chronological order. Other letters have been discovered as well.
Some have difficulty reconciling his Letters with several of his writings, such as Lex Rex, because his letters reveal a devotional life not seen in these other works. A. Taylor Innes argued that Rutherford’s self-description (‘but I am made of extremes’, made in his letter to David Dickson [168]) indicates that Rutherford was aware of a constitutional defect in his personality. But his awareness of that character trait does not justify extending the trait to his ecclesiastical and political writings as if they were its sinful expression and his Letters its sanctified expression. Rutherford may have been wrong in his political conclusions, but his writings were the practical expression of one who firmly believed that Scotland was in covenant with Christ, a relationship that demanded or justified certain national expressions. It was his love for Christ that motivated his actions, including his writings.
Others object to his letters because of his erotic language when describing the relationship between Christ and his church corporately or Christ and individual believers. For example, Rutherford writes: ‘I confidently believe there is a bed made for Christ and me, and that we shall take our fill of love in it’ (165); ‘I have a love-bed with Christ, and am filled with his love’ (264). Douglas quotes the comment of Law Mathieson regarding Rutherford’s spiritual raptures as being ‘of the grossest and most indecent kind’.
Yet this imagery was not unique to Rutherford; it is found in other writers of the seventeenth century. William Campbell states that this usage was technical, ‘springing from the conception of Church as the Bride of Christ and from an allegorical interpretation and use of the Song of Solomon’. John Macleod in his Scottish Theology says: ‘When exception is taken to them on the ground that they use so freely the language of nuptial love, the critics, to be justified in their fault-finding, ought first to expunge from Scripture the Song of Songs, the 45th Psalm, and much of the language in the Prophets and in the New Testament which speak of the Lord as espoused to His Church and of the Church as His Bride’.
It is worth noting that Rutherford also used other images, for example, from banking practices: ‘Dear brother, help me, a poor debtor, to pay the interest; for I cannot come nigh to pay the interest’ (110). He was also prepared to use his own physical frame to illustrate his spiritual situation: ‘My short legs could not step over this lair, or sinking mire; and, therefore, my Lord Jesus will bear me through’ (110).
Rutherford can produce imagery that summarise deep doctrines. Describing the incarnation of Jesus, Rutherford says this striking sentence: ‘Lovely in the womb, the Ancient of Days became young for me.’ Or concerning spiritual knowledge, he writes, ‘If you would be a deep divine, I recommend to you sanctification.’ Heaven is the land in which there are four summers in the year.
His Letters were regarded from the first as being of great spiritual benefit. According to Row, ‘‘Mr Samuell Rutherfoord wrot from Aberdene very many letters to his awin people, [and] to many others of all ranks; whilk, by the blessing of God, did great good not onlie to those to whom they were written, but to others to whose view in providence they came; so that sundrie begouth to gather them together, and have wholl books full of them, whilk if they were printed, I am confident, throw the Lord’s rich mercie and blessing, would not faill to do much good; for in them are handled many necessary cases of conscience, wherein perplexed souls might get resolution; also they speak much to the tymes and Bishops’ tyrannie.’
Some also regarded the Letters as containing a prophetic element. Row continues: ‘…also there are some prophecies, whilk the Lord caused his servant utter by pen, and now since that, has fulfilled by prooff and experience, concerning the downfall of the Bishops, the restoring of the Kirk of God, the work of Reformation, the League and Covenant of Scotland and England, whilk he compared to Judah and Israel, using the words of the prophet, Jer. l. 4, 5.’
In addition, they have been a manual for devotional exercises for many Christians. The fact that Bonar’s edition contains 365 letters points to its use as a daily devotional for a year. Philip comments regarding the Letters: ‘The whole circle of Christian life, its difficulties, its duties, its hopes, the heights and depths of faith and experience, everything that belongs to the Gospel and to its challenge, to holiness and its fruition to the rightful recognition of God and to the understanding of the unsearchable riches of Christ, are spoken of with insight and passion and with a force that is compelling.’
Therefore it is not surprising that many renowned and countless numbers of unknown Christians have revelled in Rutherford’s Letters. C. H. Spurgeon, for example, wrote: ‘When we are dead and gone, let the world know that Spurgeon held Rutherford’s Letters to be the nearest thing to inspiration which can be found in the writings of mere men.’
In the early days of his ministry, these letters, along with the writings of Jonathan Edwards, were very influential in the spiritual development of Robert Murray McCheyne. His biographer, Andrew Bonar, writes: ‘It was here, too, that he began to study so closely the works of Jonathan Edwards,—reckoning them a mine to be wrought, and if wrought, sure to repay the toil. Along with this author, the Letters of Samuel Rutherford were often in his hand.’ J. C. Philpot wrote that Rutherford was one ‘of the most forcible and original writers that has ever edified the church of God’.
In this paper, I will first detail some emphases of Reformation spirituality, before considering the features of spirituality found in Rutherford’s letters. The term ‘spirituality’ is taken to mean a holy lifestyle including communion with God; it involves both what a person believes (Reformed doctrine) and what he/she practices.
1. Reformed spirituality
Prior to the Reformation, spirituality meant the pursuit of perfection, and various means were suggested: sacraments, prayer, ascetic practices, vows of poverty, celibacy, images and monasticism. Spirituality was not for all believers but was associated with specialist groups such as monks or nuns. For the Reformers, spirituality involves a relationship with God, expressed in daily living, and not limited to those who detach themselves from interaction with others. They did not deny the necessity of means of grace but affirmed the value of those advocated in the Bible, such as the preaching of the word, prayer and the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
The key aspect of Reformed spirituality is that Christian living is based on justification. The Reformers’ rediscovery, that a person is forgiven by believing in Christ and given a standing before God, shattered the systems of merit of the pre-Reformation Church. Being justified, believers were now united to Jesus. This union with Christ is not the final achievement of Reformed spirituality; rather it is its foundation. Rutherford’s erotic language expresses that for him union with Christ was a spiritual marriage, a relationship to be developed by the two lovers.
2. Doctrinal emphases of Rutherford’s spirituality
In his Letters Rutherford alludes to many doctrines. I will mention six that indicate his spirituality was Reformed.
Firstly, Rutherford was committed to the sovereignty of God. His appreciation of this doctrine included divine sovereignty in salvation but in the Letters the main emphasis is God’s sovereignty in providence. He reminds David Dickson upon the death of his child: ‘Ye are taught to know and adore his sovereignty, which he exerciseth over you, which is yet lustred in mercy. The child hath but changed a bed in the garden, and is planted up higher, nearer the sun, where he shall thrive better’ (298).
Rutherford realised that it was important for a believer to submit to God’s chastisements. Marian McNaught was exhorted to ‘welcome every rod of God, for I find not in the whole book of God a greater note of the child of God, than to fall down and kiss the feet of an angry God’ (12). Lady Kenmure was reminded that ‘these many years the Lord hath been teaching you to read and study well the book of holy, holy, and spotless sovereignty, I suffering from some nigh-hand, and some far off. Whoever be the instruments, the replying of clay to the Potter, the Former of all, is unbeseeming the nothing-creature’ (347).
Rutherford personally experienced several trying providences, yet maintained his faith in God. When his first wife died, he wrote, ‘My wife now, after long disease and torment, for the space of a year and a month, is departed this life. The Lord hath done it; blessed be His name’ (11). He drew lessons from these experiences that he used when helping others in similar situations. To one of his parishioners, Mrs Taylor, who had lost her son, he wrote, ‘I was in your Condition. I had but two children, and both are dead since I came hither. The supreme and absolute Father of all things giveth not an account of any of his matters. The good husbandman may pluck his roses, and gather in his lilies in midsummer….and he may transplant young trees out of the lower ground to the higher…. What is that to you or me? The goods are his own’ (310). Or as he describes his own response to troubles: ‘When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines.’
Secondly, Rutherford was captivated by the person and work of Jesus Christ. Regarding his person, Rutherford seems to focus more on the humanity of Christ; regarding his work, Rutherford draws great comfort from Christ’s life and atoning death, from his activity in heaven in the present and from his interaction with his people, individually and corporately, at his second coming. Rutherford had a profound understanding of the person and work of Christ, and for all his use of dramatic imagery to describe Christ he does not fall into theological departure from the historic creedal statements regarding Christ. Yet his response to Christ was not merely at an intellectual level; it is clear from his letters that he was passionately in love with Jesus. And his relationship with Christ was a developing one. To David Dickson he wrote, ‘I never before came to that degree or pitch of communion with Christ that I have now attained to’ (110). To John Gordon of Rusco, Rutherford wrote: ‘Brother, I may, from new experience, speak of Christ to you. Oh, if ye saw in Him what I see! A river of God’s unseen joys has flowed from bank to brae over my soul since I parted with you’ (147).
Thirdly, the reality of heaven contributed to Rutherford’s spirituality. He regularly refers to heaven both as an encouragement and as a stimulus for dedication. Heaven will make up for the difficulties endured on earth. Heaven is God’s reward. But it is heaven with Christ (246, 247). Writing of heaven and Christ to one of his correspondents he says: ‘O for Eternity’s leisure to look on Him, to feast upon a sight of his face! O for the long summer day of endless ages to stand beside Him and enjoy Him! O time, O sin, be removed out of the way! O day, fairest of days, dawn.’
Fourthly, Rutherford constantly expresses a love for the Church of Scotland. He reminds his correspondents to pray for the Church (for example, he writes to Lady Kenmure: ‘I trust also, Madam, that ye will be careful to present to the Lord the present estate of this decaying kirk’ [3]). He can sound like an Old Testament prophet as he pictures the state of the church: ‘I see the Lord’s vineyard laid waste, and the heathen entered into the sanctuary: and my belly is pained, and my soul in heaviness, because the Lord’s people are gone into captivity, and because of the fury of the Lord, and that wind (but neither to fan or to purge) which is coming upon apostate Scotland’ (p. 156). Only a person who loved the Church could speak so sadly about it.
Yet he did not believe schism was an answer to the church’s defects (364), and he deals with this issue in great detail in his Against Separatism. Rutherford was committed to working out in corporate and individual life the implications of the headship of Christ over his church. Connected to this focus is his interest in the faithfulness of the church’s ministers, which can be seen in the letters he sent to such, and the Reformed expectation of Christ’s presence at the Lord’s Supper, which can be deduced from his descriptions of communion occasions (14, 18).
Fifthly, Rutherford stresses the significance of Covenant theology. He reminds one correspondent: ‘Ye come hither to treat with God, and to tryst with Him in His Christ for salvation to your soul, and to seek reconciliation with an angry, wrathful God, in a covenant of peace made to you in Christ’ (191). He writes to Christians in Ireland: ‘Is it not our comfort, that Christ, the Mediator of the New Covenant, is come betwixt us and God in the business, so that green and young heirs, the like of sinners, have now a Tutor that is God!’ (284) For Rutherford, the blessings of the Christian life were the outcome of a covenant relationship with Christ.
Sixthly, Rutherford had a deep interest in the anticipated conversion of the Jews. In one letter he says, ‘O to see the sight, next to Christ’s Coming in the clouds, the most joyful! our elder brethren the Jews and Christ fall upon one another’s necks and kiss each other! They have been long asunder; they will be kind to one another when they meet. O day! longed-for and lovely day-dawn! O sweet Jesus, let me see that sight which will be as life from the dead, Thee and Thy ancient people in mutual embraces.’
3. Practical elements of Rutherford’s spirituality
The letters reveal a wide range of practices associated with spirituality. Firstly, letter writing was itself a spiritual practice. Rutherford was not the first Christian leader to realise the benefits of correspondence as a means of stimulating spirituality. John Calvin wrote letters of spiritual counsel to a wide variety of people: monarchs, the aristocracy, prisoners and martyrs. Martin Luther wrote letters to monarchs, theologians, painters, poets and soldiers, as well as to family and lifelong friends, offering spiritual counsel. John Knox too used correspondence to provide comfort and direction, as can be seen from his Select Practical Writings. An example from Rutherford’s own time is John Owen, and from later years there is the example of John Newton.
Rutherford probably helped himself, especially when he wrote when he felt low in spirit, because in doing so he reasoned with himself regarding these situations. The Letters indicate that Rutherford could not write a letter without including spiritual counsel. He expected some letters to be read in public for the benefit of others. To John Gordon of Cardoness he wrote, ‘Sir, show the people this; for when I write to you, I think I write to you all, old and young’ (180). The letters sent to the parishioners in Anwoth (225, 269) and Kilmacolm (286) were also for corporate instruction.
Of course, it should not be forgotten that Rutherford appreciated receiving letters. Many examples of this could be given. To Alexander Henderson he says, ‘I received your letters. They are as apples of gold to me’ (115); to Hugh MacKail, he says, ‘I bless you for your letter’ (118); twice he tells John Gordon that his letters have refreshed his soul (123, 124); he says the same to Marion McNaught (126). Indeed he complains when in Aberdeen that he has not received any (80).
Many of his letters were written to women. This points to a second aspect of Rutherford’s spirituality – he was able to relate to Christian women as well as to Christian men. There is no hint of impropriety in his letters to them. Indeed, in many of them Rutherford is careful to ask after their husbands. Some of his female correspondents had high rank in society and could influence their husbands. But that was not his only reason for corresponding with them. Rather he appreciated the intensity of their commitment to Christ. One example is his description of Marion McNaught to Lady Kenmure: ‘Blessed be the Lord! that in God’s mercy I found in this country such a woman, to whom Jesus is dearer that her own heart, when there be so many that cast Christ over their shoulder’ (22). His letters also reveal his concern for their spiritual growth. For example, in his letters to Marion McNaught, he often indicates his interest in the spiritual development of her children; he refers several times to her concern over who would become the next pastor of her church; he often asks her to pray for him. In addition to these personal areas, he also informs her of his concerns for the national Church.
This close relationship with Christian women indicates that Rutherford’s spirituality had the elements of gentleness and tenderness. Yet his spirituality was not marked by an effeminateness that would have caused males to withdraw from him. In his Christian living Rutherford also revealed a robust and tenacious boldness. He wrote to several of the gentry to remind them of the important role they should play in promoting and defending the cause of Christ in Scotland. He reminded John Ewart to ‘keep your garments clean, and stand for the truth of Christ which you profess…. Worthy Sir, I beseech you, make sure work of salvation’ (134).
Where did Rutherford get his boldness? No doubt, he was a brave man naturally. Further, he was the kind of man who would complete a task he had commenced. Yet his strength of conviction primarily comes from his awareness of God. Writing to the provost of Ayr, he urges, ‘Serve Christ; back him; let His cause be your cause; give not an hair’s-breadth of truth away, for it is not yours but God’s.’
Thirdly, for Rutherford, personal holiness was important. He suggested that Christ should be loved more for giving sanctification than for giving justification because in the former he is remaking his people in his likeness (170). He wrote to one correspondent, ‘I recommend mortification to you above everything’ (92). To another he wrote, ‘I recommend to you holiness and sanctification, and that you keep yourself clean from this present evil world’ (213). Yet Rutherford was careful not to be legalistic, for a legal spirit results in pride. He reminded his correspondent that ‘the New Covenant seeketh not full measure, nor stented obedience, as the condition of it; because forgiveness hath always place’ (249).
A fourth aspect of Rutherford’s spirituality was his evangelistic zeal. He exhorted Margaret McNaught, ‘Take as many to heaven with you as ye are able to draw. The more ye draw with you, ye shall be the welcomer yourself’ (10). A common theme in the Letters is his appeal to the young to give themselves to Christ (e.g. 142). A connected element to evangelism was encouraging personal covenanting with God. (This was a prominent emphasis in pastoral work at the time, as can be seen from William Guthrie’s endorsement of the practice in his The Christian’s Great Interest.) For example, John Kennedy was reminded by Rutherford: ‘Ye contracted with Christ, I hope, when first ye began to follow Him, that ye would bear His cross. Fulfill your part of the contract with patience, and break not to Jesus Christ’ (22). He told Marion McNaught to show her children his letter in which he advises them ‘to covenant with Jesus Christ to be His’ (24).
Fifthly, the Letters reveal the importance of prayer for spirituality. When he was a pastor in Anwoth, it was his practice to rise at three in the morning to begin the day with study and prayer. In one letter, Rutherford mentions several features of his prayer life: (1) he benefitted by riding alone a long journey, in giving that time to prayer; (2) he set aside days for prayer and fasting; (3) in praying for others, he got something for himself; (4) because he had experienced God’s answers to prayer many times, he used to pray for anything, of how little importance soever. Yet he confesses, ‘That the experiences I had of God’s hearing me in this and the other particular, being gathered, yet in a new trouble I had always, (once at least,) my faith to seek, as if I were to begin at A B C again’ (159). Prayer was also to be made for the ingathering of the Jews into the Church (14).
In addition to personal prayer, Rutherford stressed the value of special seasons of united prayer when ‘all who love the truth should join their prayers together, and cry to God with humiliation and fasting’ (31). In this letter to Lady Kenmure, he gives several reasons for one such season of prayer: distresses of God’s churches abroad, sins and divine judgement in the land, the lamentable and pitiful state of the church, the low spiritual condition of ministers and professing Christians, that the leaders of the nation and the people turn from evil ways. Such times for prayer may be for several days at a time (31) or on a particular weekday (he urges the Laird of Moncrieff to join a union for prayer that met regularly on Wednesdays if possible [171]). He was confident in the usefulness of this activity: ‘‘Though the particular day be not observed, yet, where many are on work, some salvation from the Lord’s arm is to be expected’ (365). He also valued the prayers of others for himself: ‘As for myself, I do esteem nothing out of heaven, and next to a communion with Jesus Christ, more to be in the hearts and prayers of the saints’ (319). With some believers Rutherford had a prayer-covenant: he wrote to George Gillespie, asking him to ‘remember our old covenant and pray for me, and write to me your case’ (144).
Rutherford’s spirituality also included difficult experiences. He wrote of spiritual desertion. Writing to James Guthrie, he requests prayer, for he is ‘at low ebb, as to any sensible communion with Christ; yea, as low as any soul can be, and do scare know where I am’ (319). He does not know how to describe his condition but requests that Guthrie and others would pray for him. To another correspondent, he complains, ‘All that I now do is hold out a lame faith to Christ, like a beggar holding out a stump, instead of an arm or leg, and cry, “Lord Jesus, work a miracle!” ’ (92).
Rutherford was aware of his personal sinfulness. He knew from experience ‘that known, discovered, and revealed sins, that are against the conscience, be eschewed, as most dangerous preparatives to hardness of heart’. He confessed that ‘sudden stirrings of pride, lust, revenge, love of honours, were not resisted and mourned for’. He also regretted that ‘my grace and gifts bring forth little or no thankfulness’ (159). He also experienced the disappointing discovery that ‘Temptations, that I supposed to be stricken dead and laid upon their back, rise again and revive upon me’ (92).
Rutherford was astonished that others spoke well of him and suggested they did so because they did not know his sins. He wrote to David Dickson: ‘I fear that ye have never know me well. If you saw my inner side, it is possible that you would pity me, but you would hardly give me either love or respect: men mistake me the whole length of the heavens. My sins prevail over me, and the terror of their guiltiness. I am put often to ask, if Christ and I did ever shake hands together in earnest’ (168).
Rutherford’s spirituality took into account the likelihood of opposition for the sake of Christ. Suffering for Jesus was not something about which to be ashamed, rather it is ‘the professor’s golden garment’ (177). To Marian McNaught, Rutherford wrote, ‘Take part with Jesus of His sufferings, and glory in the marks of Christ’ (13). Concerning her husband, who seemed not to be so committed as her, Rutherford said, ‘I will be obliged to him, if he will be willing to suffer for my dear Master’ (177). In a letter to John Ewart, he writes, ‘I bless His high and glorious name, that the terrors of great men have not affrighted me from openly avouching the Son of God’ (134). He regarded his own banishment to Aberdeen as a high honour. He informed Lady Kenmure that the ‘honour that I have prayed for these sixteen years, with submission to my Lord’s will, my kind Lord has now bestowed upon me, even to suffer for my royal and princely King Jesus, and for His kingly crown, and the freedom of His kingdom that His Father has given Him’ (61). Indeed, he regarded his exile for the sake of Christ as liberating (‘His cross is the sweetest burden that ever I bare; it is such a burden as wings are to a bird, or sails are to a ship, to carry me forward to my harbour’ [134]). A possible criticism of Rutherford is that similar strength in facing opposition is not always found in others, and his letters should have indicated so.
A prominent feature of Rutherford’s spirituality is preparation for death. He refers to this several times, especially in times of illness. He writes to Lady Kenmure, he writes, ‘Ye have now, Madam, a sickness before you; and also after that a death. Gather then now food for the journey’ (3).Yet death is not to be feared. Dying was an opportunity for exercising faith; he encouraged George Gillespie on his deathbed to look to justification, and not to sanctification, for comfort (324).
Conclusion
The Letters raise the question, Was Rutherford a mystic? Some authors have suggested he was. T. Radcliffe Barnett in his chapter on Rutherford in The Makers of the Kirk refers to Rutherford as a mystic: ‘a practical mystic’ (p. 192); ‘the mystic minister of the love of Jesus’ (p. 194). There were mystical movements, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, at that time. While there were differences between various mystical ideas, to be a mystic usually involved the absorption of the human personality into the divine. In this sense of the term Rutherford was not a mystic. Wakefield writes of Rutherford: ‘But for Rutherford, communion with Christ is not active annihilation, or a ceasing from acts of the will, or an end of prayer, meditation, love, and desire. He sees perfect communion only in the bliss of the marriage supper of the Lamb – a scriptural figure at once eschatological and corporate. We must continue in preparation and yearning, above all in the ordinances, until Christ come.’ For Rutherford, the spiritual life was based on justification, involved the process of sanctification, and found its fulfilment in glorification. But in each of these relationships with God in Christ, Rutherford knew he would retain his own personality.
His personality affected the way his spirituality showed itself. I would suggest his spirituality was marked by three important qualities that are essential for Reformed spirituality.
First, his spirituality included his resolute realism. He knew that opposition was possible and that life would not be easy. Yet he determined to be loyal to Christ wherever God providentially placed him.
A second feature of Rutherford’s spirituality is his humility. Although he had wonderful experiences as well as a disciplined lifestyle, his exhortations to others to proceed to know Christ are not presented as the advice of an expert but as a fellow-scholar, with much still to learn and experience, in the school of Christ.
Thirdly, Rutherford’s spirituality was Christ-centred. The letters indicate that Rutherford entered into the love of Christ more than most believers. His concept of his relationship with Christ was not limited to understanding Christ’s activities in heaven. In addition Rutherford experienced the loving and felt presence of Christ, although this presence was not a permanent experience. He writes to Lady Cardoness, ‘Learn daily both to possess and miss Christ in his sacred bridegroom-smiles. He must go and come, because his infinite wisdom thinketh it best for you’ (192). To David Dickson, he wrote, ‘Sometimes, while I have Christ in my arms, I fall asleep in the sweetness of his presence, and he, in my sleep, stealeth away out of my arms, and when I wake I miss him’ (259).
Rutherford’s Letters bear testimony that humility, resolve and Christ-centredness do not breed a passionless spirituality; rather they result in a Reformed spirituality that is marked by passion for Christ, by vibrancy in the spiritual disciplines, that affects every area of life, that loves Christ’s church, and looks forward to heaven.
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