Samuel Rutherford (Christ Dying, and Drawing Sinners to Himself, p. 63):
Unbelief spinneth out new calumnies of Christ, addeth oil to the fire, and maketh desertion a thousand talent-weight heavier than it would be. This may be evidenced in all the complaints of the saints under desertion; in which more is laid on Christ’s name, than is true. Unbelief is a querulous thing. Isa. 49:14. But Sion said, unbelieving Sion said, The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me; this was an untruth, and is confuted in the next verses. Mary Magdalene thought they had taken away her Lord; and he was as near her, as the turning about of her body, and she within speaking to him face to face. And when unbelief doth raise such thoughts, as Christ hath forgotten to be merciful; Christ is changed, he loveth not to the end; what pain must be at the soul’s bottom, where such misjudging of Christ, and his love, is in the brim? And yet there is a coal of the love of Christ, smoaking in the bottom of the soul? A loving opinion of Christ is hardly expelled; especially, one particular misreport should not make me receive a misunderstanding of Christ. I never heard ill of Christ before, but much of his excellency and sweetness; and why should I admit of an untried impression, that the sun that giveth light to all, is dark; that fire is cold? ’tis not true like, that Christ is an enemy, if once a friend. Had we a storehouse, and a high bended habit of honourable, sublime, and high thoughts of Jesus Christ, his excellency, the weight of his preciousness, eminency, we should the more hardly give way to the lies that our unbelieving heart raiseth against him.
