Aberdeen, June 16, 1637.
[CLXXXII.—To his honoured and dear Brother, Alexander Gordon of Knockgray.]
(JOY IN GOD—TRIALS WORK OUT GLORY TO CHRIST.)
D EAREST AND TRULY HONOURED BROTHER,—Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. I have seen no letter from you since I came to Aberdeen. I will not interpret it to be forgetfulness. I am here in a fair prison: Christ is my sweet and honourable fellow-prisoner, and I His sad and joyful lord-prisoner,[294] if I may speak so. I think this cross becometh me well, and is suitable to me in respect of my duty to suffer for Christ, howbeit not in regard of my deserving to be thus honoured. However it be, I see that Christ is strong, even lying in the dust, in prison, and in banishment. Losses and disgraces are the wheels of Christ's triumphant chariot. In the sufferings of His own saints, as He intendeth their good, so He intendeth His own glory, and that is the butt His arrows shoot at. And Christ shooteth not at rovers, He hitteth what He purposeth to hit; therefore He doth make His own feckless and weak nothings, and those who are the contempt of men, "a new sharp threshing instrument, having teeth, to thresh the mountains, and beat them small, and to make the hills as chaff, and to fan them" (Isa. xli. 15, 16). What harder stuff, or harder grain for threshing out, than high and rocky mountains? But the saints are God's threshing instruments, to beat them all into chaff. Are we not God's leem vessels? and yet when they cast us over a house we are not broken into sherds. We creep in under our Lord's wings in the great shower, and the water cannot come through those wings. It is folly then for men to say, "This is not Christ's plea, He will lose the wad-set; men are like to beguile Him:" that were indeed a strange play. Nay, I dare pledge my soul, and lay it in pawn on Christ's side of it, and be half-tiner, half-winner with my Master! Let fools laugh the fool's laughter, and scorn Christ, and bid the weeping captives in Babylon "sing us one of the songs of Zion, play a spring to cheer up your sad-hearted God!" We may sing upon luck's-head beforehand, even in our winter-storm, in the expectation of a summer sun, at the turn of the year. No created powers in hell, or out of hell, can mar the music of our Lord Jesus, nor spoil our song of joy. Let us then be glad, and rejoice in the salvation of our Lord; for faith had never yet cause to have wet cheeks, and hanging down brows, or to droop or die. What can ail faith, seeing Christ suffereth Himself (with reverence to Him be it spoken) to be commanded by it, and Christ commandeth all things? Faith may dance because Christ singeth; and we may come into the choir, and lift our hoarse and rough voices, and chirp, and sing, and shout for joy with our Lord Jesus. We see oxen go to the shambles, leaping and startling; we see God's fed oxen, prepared for the day of slaughter, go dancing and singing down to the black chambers of hell; and why should we go to heaven weeping, as if we were like to fall down through the earth for sorrow? If God were dead (if I may speak so, with reverence of Him who liveth for ever and ever), and Christ buried, and rotten among the worms, we might have cause to look like dead folks; but "the Lord liveth, and blessed be the Rock of our salvation" (Ps. xviii. 46). None have right to joy but we; for joy is sown for us, and an ill summer or harvest will not spill the crop. The children of this world have much robbed joy that is not well-come. It is no good sport they laugh at: they steal joy, as it were, from God; for He commandeth them to mourn and howl (James v. 1). Then let us claim our leal-come and lawfully conquessed joy.
My dear brother, I cannot but speak what I have felt; seeing my Lord Jesus hath broken a box of spikenard upon the head of His poor prisoner, and it is hard to hide a sweet smell. It is a pain to smother Christ's love; it will be out whether we will or not. If we did but speak according to the matter, a cross for Christ should have another name; yea, a cross, especially when He cometh with His arms full of joys, is the happiest hard tree that ever was laid upon my weak shoulder. Christ and His cross together are sweet company, and a blessed couple. My prison is my palace, my sorrow is with child of joy, my losses are rich losses, my pain easy pain, my heavy days are holy and happy days. I may tell a new tale of Christ to my friends. Oh, if I could make a love song of Him, and could commend Christ, and tune His praises aright! Oh, if I could set all tongues in Great Britain and Ireland to work, to help me to sing a new song of my Well-beloved! Oh, if I could be a bridge over a water for my Lord Jesus to walk upon, and keep His feet dry! Oh, if my poor bit heaven could go betwixt my Lord and blasphemy, and dishonour! (Upon condition He loved me.) Oh that my heart could say this word, and abide by it for ever! Is it not great art and incomparable wisdom in my Lord, who can bring forth such fair apples out of this crabbed tree of the cross? Nay, my Father's never-enough admired providence can make a fair face[295] out of a black devil. Nothing can come wrong to my Lord in His sweet working. I would even fall sound asleep in Christ's arms, and my sinful head on His holy breast, while He kisseth me; were it not that often the wind turneth to the north, and whiles my sweet Lord Jesus is so that He will neither give nor take, borrow nor lend with me. I complain that He is not social; I half call Him proud and lordly of His company, and nice of His looks, which yet is not true. It would content me to give, howbeit He should not take. I should be content to want His kisses at such times, providing He would be content to come near-hand, and take my wersh, dry, and feckless kisses. But at that time He will not be entreated, but let a poor soul stand still and knock, and never let-on him that He heareth; and then the old leavings, and broken meat, and dry sighs, are greater cheer than I can tell. All I have then is, that howbeit the law and wrath have gotten a decreet against me, I can yet lippen that meikle good in Christ as to get a suspension, and to bring my cause in reasoning again before my Well-beloved. I desire but to be heard, and at last He is content to come and agree the matter with a fool, and forgive freely, because He is God. Oh, if men would glorify Him, and taste of Christ's sweetness!
Brother, ye have need to be busy with Christ for this whorish kirk; I fear lest Christ cast water upon Scotland's coal. Nay, I know that Christ and His wife will be heard: He will plead for the broken covenant. Arm you against that time.
Grace be with you.