“God hath called you to Christ’s side,” wrote the saintly Rutherford, “and the wind is now in Christ’s face in this land; and seeing ye are with Him, ye cannot expect the leeside or the sunny side of the brae.”
With that beautiful feeling for words that characterized Samuel Rutherford’s most casual utterance he here crystallizes for us one of the great radical facts of the Christian life. The wind is in Christ’s face, and because we go with Him we too shall have the wind in our face. We should not expect less.
The yearning for the sunny side of the brae is natural enough, and for such sensitive creatures as we are it is, I suppose, quite excusable. No one enjoys walking into a cold wind. Yet the church has had to march with the wind in her face through the long centuries.…
To accept the call of Christ changes the returning sinner indeed, but it does not change the world. The wind still blows toward hell and the man who is walking in the opposite direction will have the wind in his face. And we had better take this into account when we ponder on spiritual things. If the unsearchable riches of Christ are not worth suffering for, then we should know it now and cease to play at religion.
John 15:18–21; John 16:33; 1 Corinthians 4:10–13
That Incredible Christian, 141, 144.