On August 22, 1683, at his home in Ealing, Owen dictated his last surviving letter to his long-time friend, Charles Fleetwood:
I am going to him whom my soul hath loved, or rather hath
love me with an everlasting love; which is the whole ground of all my
consolation. The passage is very irksome and wearisome through strong
pain of various sorts which are all issued in an intermitting fever. All
things were provided to carry me to London today attending to the
advice of my physician, but we were all disappointed by my utter
disability to understand the journey. I am leaving the ship of the
church in a storm, but while the great Pilot is in it the loss of a
poore under-rower will be inconsiderable. Live and pray and hope and
waite patiently and doe not despair; the promise stands invincible that
he will never leave thee nor forsake thee. (Toon, The Correspondence of John Owen, 174)
Two days later Owen’s friend William Payne, who was overseeing the printing of
The Glory of Christ, paid him a visit, assuring him that all was going well with the publication. Owen responded:
I am glad to hear it; but O brother Payne! The long
wished-for day is come at last, in which I shall see the glory in
another manner than I have ever done, or was capable of doing in the
world.
Justin Taylor
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