[310] To be attended to at a leisure moment.
CXCII.--_To the_ LADY CARDONESS.
(_GRACE--THE NAME OF CHRIST TO BE EXALTED--EVERYTHING BUT GOD FAILS
US._)
MISTRESS,--I beseech you in the Lord Jesus to make every day more and
more of Christ; and try your growth in the grace of God, and what new
ground ye win daily on corruption. For travellers are day by day
either advancing farther on, and nearer home, or else they go not
right about to compass their journey.
I think still the better and better of Christ. Alas! I know not where
to set Him, I would so fain have Him high! I cannot set heavens above
heavens till I were tired with numbering, and set Him upon the
highest step and storey of the highest of them all; but I wish I could
make Him great through the world, suppose my loss, and pain, and shame
were set under the soles of His feet, that He might stand upon me.
I request that you faint not; because this world and ye are at yea and
nay, and because this is not a home that laugheth upon you. The wise
Lord, who knoweth you, will have it so, because He casteth a net for
your love, to catch it and gather it in to Himself. Therefore, bear
patiently the loss of children, and burdens, and other discontentments,
either within or without the house: your Lord in them is seeking you,
and seek ye Him. Let none be your love and choice, and the flower of
your delights, but your Lord Jesus. Set not your heart upon the world,
since God hath not made it your portion; for it will not fall to you
to get two portions, and to rejoice twice, and to be happy twice, and
to have an upper heaven, and an under heaven too. Christ our Lord, and
His saints, were not so; and, therefore, let go your grip of this
life, and of the good things of it: I hope that your heaven groweth
not hereaway. Learn daily both to possess and miss Christ, in His
secret bridegroom-smiles. He must go and come, because His infinite
wisdom thinketh it best for you. We shall be together one day. We
shall not need to borrow light from sun, moon, or candle. There shall
be no complaints on either side, in heaven. There shall be none there,
but He and we, the Bridegroom and the bride; devils, temptations,
trials, desertions, losses, sad hearts, pain, and death, shall be all
put out of play; and the devil must give up his office of tempting.
Oh, blessed is the soul whose hope hath a face looking straight out to
that day. It is not our part to make a treasure here; anything, under
the covering of heaven, which we can build upon, is but ill ground and
a sandy foundation. Every good thing, except God, wanteth a bottom,
and cannot stand its lone; how then can it bear the weight of us? Let
us not lay a load on a windlestraw. There shall nothing find my
weight, or found my happiness, but God. I know that all created power
would sink under me, if I should lean down upon it; and, therefore, it
is better to rest on God, than to sink or fall; and we weak souls must
have a bottom and a being-place, for we cannot stand our lone. Let us
then be wise in our choice, and choose and wale our own blessedness,
which is to trust in the Lord. Each one of us hath a whore and idol,
besides our Husband Christ; but it is our folly to divide our narrow
and little love; it will not serve two. It is best then to hold it
whole and together, and to give it to Christ; for we get double
interest for our love, when we lend it to, and lay it upon Christ; and
we are sure, besides, that the stock cannot perish.
Now I can say no more. Remember me. I have God's right to that people;
howbeit by the violence of men, stronger than I, I am banished from
you, and chased away. The Lord give you mercy in the day of Christ. It
may be that God will clear my sky again; howbeit there is small
appearance of my deliverance. But let Him do with me what seemeth good
in His own eyes. I am His clay; let my Potter frame and fashion me as
He pleaseth. Grace be with you.
Your lawful and loving pastor,