Christ Dying and Drawing Sinners to Himselfe

Samuel Rutherford wrote this treatise in 1647 during his most productive period as a Westminster Assembly divine and professor at St. Andrews. The work emerged from Rutherford's deep engagement with debates over the extent and efficacy of Christ's atonement, particularly against Arminian positions that were gaining influence in some Reformed circles. Writing with the precision of a scholastic theologian yet the heart of a pastor, Rutherford sought to demonstrate how Christ's death both accomplishes redemption and irresistibly draws the elect to salvation.

Rutherford argues that Christ's death serves a dual function: it satisfies divine justice as a penal substitution and simultaneously exerts a magnetic spiritual force that draws sinners to faith. He carefully distinguishes between the sufficiency of Christ's death for all and its efficient application only to the elect, but his distinctive contribution lies in showing how the cross itself becomes the means of spiritual attraction. The work systematically addresses how Christ's death removes legal obstacles to salvation while also creating the spiritual dynamics that bring the elect to conversion. Rutherford weaves together federal theology, scholastic distinctions, and biblical exegesis to demonstrate that the same death that satisfies God's wrath also awakens spiritual desire in the hearts of those chosen for salvation.

The treatise has endured as one of the most sophisticated explorations of how substitutionary atonement and effectual calling work together in Reformed soteriology. Rutherford's ability to hold together the objective and subjective aspects of salvation has made this work valuable for understanding how high Calvinist theology addresses both the legal and experiential dimensions of redemption. This work should be read by students of Reformed theology seeking to understand the connection between atonement and application, and by pastors wanting to grasp how the cross both accomplishes and enables salvation. It is not suitable for those looking for devotional material or basic introductions to Christian doctrine.