(_CHRIST'S KINGDOM TO BE EXALTED OVER ALL; AND MORE PAINS TO BE TAKEN
TO WIN FARTHER UNTO HIM._)
MUCH HONOURED SIR,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you.--It is like, if
ye, the gentry and nobility of this nation, be "men in the streets"
(as the word speaketh Jer. v. 1) for the Lord, that He will now
deliver His flock, and gather and rescue His scattered sheep, from the
hands of cruel and rigorous lords that have ruled over them with
force. Oh that mine eyes might see the moon-light turn to the light of
the sun! But I still fear that the quarrel of a broken covenant in
Scotland standeth before the Lord.
However it be, I avouch it before the world, that the tabernacle of
the Lord shall again be in the midst of Scotland, and the glory of the
Lord shall dwell in beauty, as the light of many days in one, in this
land. Oh, what could my soul desire more (next to my Lord Jesus),
while I am in this flesh, but that Christ and His kingdom might be
great among Jews and Gentiles; and that the isles, and amongst them
overclouded and darkened Britain, might have the glory of a noon-day's
sun! Oh that I had anything (I will not except my part in Christ) to
wadset or lay in pledge, to redeem and buy such glory to my highest
and royal Prince, my sweet Lord Jesus! My poor little heaven were well
bestowed, if it could stand a pawn for ever to set on high the glory
of my Lord. But I know that He needeth not wages nor hire at my hand;
yea, I know, if my eternal glory could weigh down in weight its lone,
all the eternal glory of the blessed angels, and of all the spirits of
just and perfect men, glorified and to be glorified, oh, alas! how far
am I engaged to forego it for, and give it over to Christ, so being He
might thereby be set on high above ten thousand thousand millions of
heavens, in the conquest of many, many nations to His kingdom! Oh that
His kingdom would come! Oh that all the world would stoop before Him!
O blessed hands that shall put the crown upon Christ's head in
Scotland! But, alas! I can scarce get leave to ware my love on Him. I
can find no ways to lay out my heart upon Christ; and my love, that I
with my soul bestow on Him, is like to die upon my hand. And I think
it no bairn's play to be hungered with Christ's love. To love Him and
to want Him, wanteth little of hell. I am sure that He knoweth now my
joy would swell upon me, from a little well to a great sea, to have
as much of His love, and as wide a soul answerable to comprehend it,
till I cried, "Hold, Lord! no more." But I find that He will not have
me to be mine own steward, nor mine own carver. Christ keepeth the
keys of Christ (to speak so), and of His own love; and He is a wiser
distributor than I can take up. I know that there is more in Him than
would make me run over like a coast-full sea. I were happy for
evermore to get leave to stand but beside Christ and His love, and to
look in; suppose I were interdicted of God to come near-hand, touch,
or embrace, kiss, or set to my sinful head, and drink myself drunk
with that lovely thing. God send me that which I would have! For now I
verily see, more clearly than before, our folly in drinking dead
waters, and in playing the whore with our soul's love upon running-out
wells, and broken sherds of creatures of yesterday, which time will
unlaw with the penalty of losing their being and natural ornaments.
Oh, when a soul's love is itching (to speak so) for God; and when
Christ, in His boundless and bottomless love, beauty, and excellency,
cometh and rubbeth up and exciteth that love, what can be heaven, if
this be not heaven? I am sure that this bit feckless, narrow, and
short love of regenerated sinners was born for no other end, than to
breathe, and live, and love, and dwell in the bosom and betwixt the
breasts of Christ. Where is there a bed or a lodging for the saint's
love, but Christ? Oh that He would take ourselves off our hand! for
neither we nor the creatures can be either due conquest, or lawful
heritage, to love. Christ, and none but Christ, is Lord and Proprietor
of it. Oh, alas, how pitiful is it, that so much of our love goeth by
Him! Oh, but we be wretched masters of our soul's love. I know it to
be the depth of bottomless and unsearchable providence, that the
saints are suffered to play the whore from God, and that their love
goeth a-hunting, when God knoweth that it shall roast nothing of that
at supper time (Prov. xii. 27). The renewed would have it otherwise;
and why is it so, seeing our Lord can keep us without nodding,
tottering, or reeling, or any fall at all? Our desires, I hope, shall
meet with perfection; but God will have our sins an office-house for
God's grace, and hath made sin a matter of an unlaw and penalty for
the Son of God's blood. And howbeit sin should be our sorrow, yet
there is a sort of acquiescing and resting upon God's dispensation
required of us, that there is such a thing in us as sin, whereupon
mercy, forgiveness, healing, curing, in our sweet Physician, may find
a field to work upon. Oh, what a deep is here, that created wit
cannot take up! However matters go, it is our happiness to win new
ground daily in Christ's love, and to purchase a new piece of it
daily, and to add conquest to conquest, till our Lord Jesus and we be
so near each other, that Satan shall not draw a straw or a thread
betwixt us.
And, for myself, I have no greater joy, in my well-favoured bonds for
Christ, than that I know time will put Him and me together; and that
my love and longing hath room and liberty, amidst my bonds and foes
(whereof there are not a few here of all ranks), to go to visit the
borders and outer coasts of the country of my Lord Jesus, and see, at
least afar off and darkly, the country which shall be mine
inheritance, which is the due of my Lord Jesus, both through birth and
conquest. I dare avouch to all that know God, that the saints know not
the length and largeness of the sweet earnest, and of the sweet green
sheaves before the harvest, that might be had on this side of the
water, if we would take more pains: and that we all go to heaven with
less earnest, and lighter purses of the hoped-for sum, than otherwise
we might do, if we took more pains to win further in upon Christ, in
this pilgrimage of our absence from Him.
Grace, grace and glory be your portion.
Yours, in his sweet Lord Jesus,