“But the point is we’re just passing through. Don’t get too comfortable here, and don’t try to make it all right. It isn’t all right. It’s a sin-cursed world.” – Andy Davis on Christian contentment.
Alright, why don’t we go ahead and get started. We have a new outline I hope you got at the back. We’re going to do a second week tonight in The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by Jeremiah Burroughs. Just by way, a brief way of outline or review from last week, the central text that Burroughs begins with is Philippians 4:12-13. Now the context in Philippians 4 at the end, he’s talking about the financial gift that the Philippian church had sent to him, and he said, I’m very grateful that at last you’ve renewed your concern for me. I’m glad that you sent the money. He said, “I’m not saying this because I’m in need, for I’ve learned to be content whatever circumstances I’m in.” He says. “I’ve learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength” (paraphrase). And so, Burroughs picks up on this concept here. The idea is that Christian contentment is a secret to be learned.
It’s not intuitively obvious. It’s not something that comes right at the beginning of the Christian life. Indeed, I think by experience you can look around and think that most of the Christians that you know really have never really learned the secret of contentment. And even more painfully, if you look at your own life, you could say, have I learned the secret of Christian contentment? And I don’t think there’s anyone that would say, “I’ve learned it sufficiently. I know how to be content no matter what happens to me.” So, there’s a lot of room for growth in this. And I’ll tell you just by way of just personal testimony, as I read through this book in preparation for tonight, I was so convicted by my own sin in this area, my own weakness, the murmuring spirit I have. Something that we would think very little of. When you talk about the great sins of the Christian life, you don’t think of murmuring or complaining. But it is a great sin, and it’s exactly the opposite of Christian contentment, what we’re talking about.
So tonight, what we’re going to do is we’re going to, after a brief review, we’re going to look at how Christ teaches contentment. How does he instruct us? If we could enroll in a school, what would he do to teach us Christian contentment? And then we’re going to look at the negative side. We’re going to look at the excellencies of Christian contentment. We’re going to make it very positive and very attractive so that you would see just what a beauty and what a glory it is to your soul to be content in any and every situation. It really is a great grace from God. It’s a display of God’s mercy if you can be content in any and every situation.
Burroughs argues, and I think I agree that to some degree it’s the way that we bring greatest glory to God of all. When you can be content in the middle of a very great suffering and affliction, it’d be hard to find a soul in a more honorable state in this world than that. And so, he’s going to put forward for us the beauty and the excellency of Christian contentment. Then he is going to go the other way and set before us, the ugliness and the repugnant of Christian, of murmuring in the Christian life, of repining, of complaining, of chafing against God, of talking about your problems endlessly, and working it over and grieving over it. This is how he’s going to make it repugnant so that you are attracted to the one and repelled from the other.
Then he is going to try to cut the ground out from under you in terms of the excuses that you make for your murmuring. He goes through I think something like 14 different excuses and then blows each one away like a clay pigeon; pull, and then poof, five or six arguments why yet that is unacceptable ground for complaint. One, after this typical Puritan seven reasons why that’s no good excuse. Alright, onto excuse number 16, 12 reasons why that’s not a good excuse. And after a while you just have no ground left to stand on. There’s just no reason for you ever to have this kind of murmuring or disputing or arguing spirit. And then he is going to conclude with a few other things. I don’t know how far we’re going to get. Again, our purpose tonight is not to go through every aspect of the book.
Not at all. I’m actually desiring to leave you a little frustrated, and say, well that was inadequate. And I’ll just say, great. Read the book. That’s all. That’s only meant to entice you, to allure you, not to give you a full synopsis of everything that he says. Alright, so we start with Philippians 4:12-13. And you should start by asking yourself the question, how does my life stack up against the lesson here of Philippians 4:12-13? Have I learned the secret of being content? Do I know what this is? Do I understand 1 Timothy 6:6 that “godliness with contentment is great gain?” Have I learned in Hebrews 13:5, “to keep my life free from the love of money and be content with what I have? Because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you'” (paraphrase).
Have I learned this secret? Now the book itself comes to us in a fourfold outline. We looked at the first two more or less last week. Really only got through halfway through the second one. The first is the nature of Christian contentment, what it is, and the second is the art and mystery of Christian contentment. He’s going to zero in on the fact that it’s a mystery. It’s kind of an art. It’s something you have to learn. First, he gives us a definition. This is by way of review. The definition of Christian contentment is that it is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition. And then what he does is having given that definition, he then breaks it apart and looks at each aspect of it. This was last time. And holds it up for consideration.
It is a quietness. It’s a spiritual state. It’s something inward. It’s nothing that can be faked or shown outwardly. It has outward fruit certainly, but the contentment he’s talking about is an inward state of the soul which gladly and freely submits to what God is providentially doing in your life. It’s a delight in God’s sovereignty, a delight in his providential rule, a trust in his plan. That’s what it is. That can’t be faked, now, can it? That’s something that is called really grace from God. It’s a great grace and a gift from God. It’s a mercy from God. Then he talks about the mystery of contentment, and he says, but you will object. What you speak of is very good if we could attain to it. I love that that’s typical Puritans. There he raises an objection. It all sounds very good, but is it really even possible?
And he says it is possible! If you get the skill of it, if you learn the mystery, you can do it. And then he goes through the mysterious aspects. Why is this contentment, Christian contentment, mysterious? In what sense is it mysterious? First, he talks about how a Christian is in a kind of a mysterious state concerning this. He is content and yet discontent. We talked about that last time. In one sense, content. And yet another sense, he’s not home yet, he’s not in heaven yet. He’s not fully and finely satisfied. And so, there’s a continual yearning and longing, longing, a pressing on for more. We want to know Christ even though we know him already, we want to know him more. Also, we saw that this Christian contentment comes to us by subtraction. Shall I quiz you and ask on what was subtracted? What was subtracted: desires for other things.
Contentment comes when the desires are taken away, when you put them to death in some cases. When you stop wanting them, put them out of your mind and realize that they really aren’t going to be part of your Christian life. They were never promised anyway by God. Such things as material success and prosperity and advancement in this world and fame and fortune and ease and comfort and all of these things that people want. They were never promised to you anyway in this world. And so, as little by little you put them to death, you find the secret of contentment. Not so much by adding to what we have but taking away desires. Also, by adding another burden. We’re going to talk more about this. This is again, a typical Puritan way of basically humbling and abasing yourself, and we’re going to talk about this in Christ’s school tonight.
One of the things that Christ does to make you content is to make you realize who you really are and what you really deserve. And if you understand who you really are and what you really deserve, the gateway is open for Christian joy and contentment. But if not, if you think more highly of yourself than you ought and think you deserve better than you’re getting, you’ll not be content. And so, there’s really kind of a paradox, a mystery there. As you go down, then you go up. As you’re willing to humble yourself, then you’ll find contentment and joy and ease. We’ll talk more about that later, but that’s what he says by adding a burden to yourself. The burden of thinking about your sin. By changing the affliction of something else, that it really is a master stroke from a craftsman. He’s working in your life.
It’s, it’s not some random misery that’s come to you. What goes around comes around. I guess it’s my turn. No, it’s not like that. It’s a special stroke from a sculptor of souls, the craftsman working on you. And by doing the work in the circumstance, beginning to ask what duties of me are required in this situation? What is God working on here, and what should I do about it? That’s what it is. And by melting your will into God’s will, not “Give me what I want Lord,” but “Make my will yours.” Not my will, but yours be done, said Jesus in Gethsemane. So, melting – a melting of yourself into what God’s will is. All this we covered last time. And then by purging out what is within those desires that battle within you. And that’s where we ended last time.
As he continues in the mystery of Christian contentment, he says that the Christian (I’m on page two, about two thirds of the way down) lives on the dew of God’s blessing. Now that’s an interesting way to put it, and let’s talk more about it. Dew is not rain, and yet it supplies the needs of the plants, right? For example, before, some people think, before the flood there was never a rain. I think you could support that. It’s debatable, but at least this much we know: that mist and dew came up from the earth and watered it. And it was sufficient. Nowadays we think of rain as the way that God provides the water that’s needed. But what it is is kind of a secret provision from God. He’s using an analogy, and he’s saying, I don’t know where these plants get their water, but they continue to thrive. It seems like a dry and a sterile environment here, a climate that would actually be completely hostile to life, and yet the plants are thriving. How can this be?
Well, it’s an invisible sustaining grace, something that comes from within that God supports. Christians are totally satisfied with whatever God provides because they can get food that the world knows not of. The Christian is fed in a secret way by the dew of blessing from God. There’s a secret sustaining grace. First of all, because in what he has, he has the love of God to him. This is very different than non-Christians. What do we mean by this? We all get provisions. We get food, we get clothing, we get various things that come, both the Christians and non-Christians. But the difference between a Christian and a non-Christian, and this is we see the love of God in the gift. It’s kind of come with the stamp of the King on it. And so, this meal comes from God. That’s why we bow and give thanks to him.
Christians are totally satisfied with whatever God provides because they can get food that the world knows not of.
We should before every meal, just as Jesus did in every case, always thanking God. But this gift is, even if it’s just a humble bowl of rice or something simple, it’s come to us from the hand of God. And so, everything we have in life comes with the stamp of the love of God. Never, except perhaps in the case of Job, is everything removed. And so, we still have something of God’s love in our lives. And that sustains us. We look and say, yes, I have these things that God has given me, and they are marked with the mark of personal love. Even common providences seen to be direct gifts from the King of the universe. Also, Christians, what they have is sanctified them to them for good. In other words, God has chosen the good things in your life, and they are to bring contentment to you, yes, but also to sanctify you.
And so, the good gifts you come, I’m not talking yet about the afflictions and the troubles, but the good things that God has left in your life, these things have come with wisdom behind them to sanctify you. Also, you realize that as a gracious heart you realize that what you have, all of the things you have are free of cost. You don’t have to pay for them. They’ve come to you as free gifts of grace. Now, in one sense they’re free, they’re free to you, but in another sense, they weren’t free at all. They were very expensive, but just somebody else paid the price. And so that’s what he says.
Fourthly, what little they do have are given by the purchase of Jesus Christ. You start to realize I don’t deserve anything but wrath. So, if I have anything, it’s come to me somehow. Why would God’s justice not be in the way of me getting this good thing? Why would his wrath not say no, you will not give this good thing to this sinner? Because somebody paid your price. Jesus Christ opened the way so that you could get this good thing, and not just for you, but for the whole world. Realize those common grace blessings, they come through Christ even though they never will acknowledge Jesus. Because God would’ve shut the world down long ago had it not been for the blood of Christ. They would never have even seen the sunrise or any of the beauties of this world. So, all of these good things come to us from Christ. But we realize as Christians in a very special way, each good thing we have has come by the purchase of Jesus Christ. They were bought for us at Calvary. Every one. And then every little benefit is seen to be a mere down payment on the full inheritance yet to come.
So, as you eat a meal, you say, yes, it’s a good meal, but it’s nothing like the wedding banquet of the Lamb. I can’t wait until we enjoy that. So even the small little things, they’re just see, to be down payments for the full amount. Alright, so that’s the Christian. He lives on the dew of God’s blessings. These things are coming as his specific grace from him. Also, he sees God’s love in his afflictions. I say, how can this be? Jerome said on top of page three, “He is a happy man who is beaten when the stroke is a stroke of love.” Is it a stroke of love? Yes, it is. It is a stroke of love. In Hebrews 12, it says that the disciplines that we get from God are evidence that we’re adopted children of God. If he doesn’t discipline you, you’re not a true child, but if he does discipline you, then he’s shaping you.
“No discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful. Later on, however, it yields a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:11). So, God has something in mind. And so even the afflictions that you have in your life are seen to be gifts of love and mercy from God. “This is a mystery,” says Burroughs, “but grace enables men to see the love of God in the very frown of God’s face and so come to receive contentment.” So not just those good gifts that we talked about a moment ago, but even the afflictions are coming to us as evidence of God’s love. His afflictions, next it says are sanctified in Christ. All the sting and venom and poison of them is taken out by the virtue of Jesus Christ, the mediator between God and man. They have no ultimate sting.
They’re not evidence of God’s condemning wrath against you, but rather they’re free of all of that and they’re just his loving strokes training you and preparing you, shaping you. The Christian learns also to compare all of his afflictions with those that Christ suffered in life and death on his behalf. And they always come up lightweight, don’t they? You could say, I have poverty. Christ had more, right? Do I have disgrace or dishonor before men? Christ had more. Am I misunderstood? Christ was more. Am I slandered and mocked and reviled and insulted and imposed? Christ was more. Do I have physical sufferings? Christ had more. Do I face imminent death? Christ faced a far worse death than you ever will. And so, these thoughts sweeten even the worst afflictions for Christians, and we’re able to be content.
Also, Christians get strength directly from Christ, and this is related to that dew from heaven. Alright? Not only do we see kind of the blessings that are still around in our lives as coming from God, but also, we have a sweet inward sustaining spiritual grace which can’t be explained any other way. How do they stand up under it? How do Paul and Silas sing in the Philippian jail? How do they do it? That’s not natural. That’s weird actually. You just got beaten. You’re in the middle of a horrible dungeon, and he may even be executed tomorrow. Who knows? And you’re singing praise. This is unnatural. Paul explains it. He talks about the Colossians (1:11-12) being strengthened. He prays for them being “strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience and joyfully giving thanks to the Father.” Well, great endurance and patience. Do you need to greatly endure and be patient when everything’s going well?
Of course not. Great endurance and patience only mean something in times of affliction and struggle. The time when your contentment is disappearing like a morning mist. And so, he prays that you may have a power within you. “Being strengthened,” he says, “with all power according to his glorious might,” so that you may have that great endurance in patience and joyfully give thanks in the middle of that circumstance. Paul says the same thing in Colossians 1:29 about his labor for the Lord, “To this end I labor struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.” So, there’s an energy, a strength, a power working within us that enables us to stand firm in the day of testing. You can’t have this kind of Christian contentment we’re talking about here alone. You can’t do it. Only as Christ and his life-giving sap flows through you. As you abide in the vinewill you find the ability to be truly content as Christ sustains you by his strength and his power.
A great example again, 2 Timothy 4:16-17, “At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed, and all the Gentiles might hear it.” Paul is totally alone. He had it seems no possibility of Christian contentment while on trial for his life and expecting to die, no possibility whatsoever. And yet the Lord in a very secret way sustained him and gave him strength for contentment. So, this Christian contentment, this mystery we’re talking about comes from strength, and inner strength from Christ.
Also, the Christian makes up his wants in God. It’s a very important and vital principle. It says, “This is indeed an excellent art, to be able to draw from God what one had before in the creature,” that is in created things. Christian, how did you enjoy the comfort before? Was the creature anything to you but a conduit, a pipe that conveyed God’s goodness to you? The pipe is cut off, says, God, come to me the fountain and drink immediately or directly. You see what he’s saying? You had a conduit, a pipe of God’s grace to you that has now been shut down, but the one who gave the grace through that pipe is still there and still loves you just as much as he ever did. This is so vital when you lose a loved one. Realize that nothing is permanent in this world. Look around at your family, the ones you love the most, whether they’re children, parents or spouse. Look around at your friends, at your fellow church members. All of these people are mortal. None of them are permanently here. Praise God. Aren’t you glad you’re not permanently here?
I don’t want to be here the rest of my life, my eternity. I want to go and be with Jesus. Like he said, “For me to live is Christ.” And I’m willing to stay here for your benefit, said Paul to the Philippians, but I had just as soon’ed for myself, be out of here. Alright? I want to be with Christ. “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). I don’t want to be here eternally. Do you want always forever getting older and older? I mean, what a terrible thing, “Lest he reach out his hand and take from that tree and live forever” (Genesis 3:22). What a grace from God that was so that we’re not decrepit and all this kind of thing. No, I’d like to be on, but what I’m saying is that the people in our lives, they’re temporary.
And that’s hard, isn’t it, when a providence strikes down somebody that you love? And here is this big pipe, this big conduit of God’s love and grace. Through it so many blessings flowed through a spouse, a loving husband or wife, a child that brought you such joy, a parent, a godly Christian role model. And they’re shut down, and nothing more will flow through that pipe. And yet the very one who gave all those blessings is still there, hasn’t changed at all, and will just find another way to get those blessings to you as you need them here in this world. If you don’t think this way, it’s going to be very tough for you to be content in that circumstance. When that comes, you’ll say, this is one circumstance in which I cannot have that rare jewel of contentment. But I don’t think there’s any such circumstance. What you do is you say, you grieve, it hurts, but yet God is still faithful, and the one who loved me to give me all those blessings those many years through that person will now divert them as I need them a different way.
The very one who gave all those blessings is still there, hasn’t changed at all, and will just find another way to get those blessings to you as you need them here in this world.
And so, he will come. And so, he says, come to me then and drink from me directly. Drink from me directly, and you’ll get it. That is the happiness of heaven, to have God, to be your all in all.
All the saints in heaven do not have houses and lands and money and meet and drink and clothes. You’ll say they do not need them. Well, why not? It’s because God is all in all to them immediately. That means directly. Now while you live in this world, you may come to live on God, and you may have much of heaven.
That is so important. I really desire that you get this principle in while there’s no one at stake. Because it’s really hard for me as a pastor to come and tell you this when the person has just died. So, it’s good for you to get this in your mind now that God is just as gracious and just as loving when that pipe is blocked off for good. He’s just as gracious. And he will give you what you need and continue to sustain you.
Also, sometimes these trials come. And if we grieve inordinately, we grieve like the pagans do, those that have no hope. Even though 1 Thessalonians 4 says we should never grieve that way it shows there was something wrong in our affection for that person, whether child, adult, parent, spouse. Something a little too much there, depending on them too much. And I think in that way it is a grace from God to show us how we were not truly supported by Christ and by God in that relationship. There’s a little bit too much affection. Some people think that’s what was going on with Abraham and Isaac, although the text doesn’t say that. But that Abraham just loved and idolized Isaac a little too much, and that is possible. So, it’s good for us to realize that our wants can be made up by God.
Another thing he says that he gets contentment from the covenant, and then in the next chapter he develops that a little more fully. The covenant is God’s promise to you in Christ. Now, we as Baptists don’t talk as much about the covenant as our Presbyterian brothers and sisters do. But what it means is the promise, that God has made us a promise, a binding promise in Christ. And those promises, that promise generally is a source of great blessing and encouragement to us. And the particular aspects of the promise are a great blessing and encouragement. And they’re in no way connected to circumstances. They don’t come and go. They don’t wax and wane. And so, you can kind of rest and abide in that covenant and get what you need from it.
He talked about having the kingdom of God within you. In Luke 17:20-21, it says, “Once having been asked by the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, ‘The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, “here it is,” or “there it is,” because the kingdom of God is within you.'” Now, the NAS translates the Greek, the kingdom of God is in your midst, meaning it’s here now. But that doesn’t fit the context here, does it? It says the kingdom doesn’t come when you carefully observe and look for it because the kingdom is an internal kingdom at this point. The kingdom of God is something within you. He’s working it out within you.
And so therefore what Burroughs says is you have a kingdom inside you. And that is a great source of encouragement. To say, all right, I’ve got a whole kingdom inside of me. Well, what does that mean? Well, think about it. Kingdom’s a rich and powerful place where you have all of your needs met, where you have a great King who’s watching over you. And so, we can take other promises and start to click in. All things are yours, right? The thing that’s been stripped from you, you’re going to get it back, only better in the new heaven and the new earth.
So, all things are yours. You have a whole kingdom within you. And you can go inward with the Holy Spirit and get everything you need to sustain you during that time of trial. The kingdom of God is within you. And so, Burroughs says, “A Christian, then whatever he lacks can make it up. For he has a kingdom within himself. Before death there is a kingdom of God within the soul, before death. Something you can enjoy now within the soul. Such a manifestation of God in the soul as to content the heart of any godly man in the world, the kingdom that he now has within him. He need not wait till afterwards, till he goes to heaven. But certainly, there is a heaven in the soul of a godly man. He has heaven already. Many times, when you go to comfort your friends in their afflictions, you’ll say, ‘Heaven will pay for all.'”
Isn’t that wonderful? When you’re there, you’re not going to say, yeah, but there’s still this outstanding bill from back then. You remember that? Remember that time, Lord? You won’t think that at all. You’ll think heaven will pay for any suffering that you went through. The apostle Paul says, “I consider that the sufferings that we are going through now are not even worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18). When some men and women are complaining so much and always whining, it is a sign that there’s an emptiness in their hearts. He likens it to a bottle that you blow across the top. You know that whistling sound you get across when you blow an empty bottle? When the bottles totally filled, you don’t get any sound at all as you blow across the top. There’s no air that can reverberate in there. And so, if you’re whining, moaning, groaning, complaining, you’re kind of empty is what you’re showing. You’re whistling under the time of trial; you should be filled up. And so, if your heart, it says, if your heart it’s filled with grace, you won’t make such a noise. So, you’re going to get supply from the covenant. The covenant in general and the particular promises of the covenant.
Look at Hebrews 13:5. I learned something new on this I’d never noticed. It says, “Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have. Because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you.'” Now listen to what Burroughs writes, “To Joshua God said he will not leave him or forsake him, but in this place in the Greek, there are five negatives. I will not, not, not, not, and not again. That is the force of it in Greek.” I said, okay, I don’t believe it. So, I looked it up, and sure enough there is. There’s an ooh, there’s a May, there’s an Uday, another ooh and another maid that’s five. I counted them. I said, oh wow, that’s very strong. There are five negatives in a little sentence, as if God should say, I should have known better. The guy’s a Puritan writer. I mean of course he was right. And he looked it up, but I wanted to test it for myself.
And sure enough, there it was. It’s as if God should say, “I will not leave you. No, I won’t. I will not. I will not, no, I won’t. With such earnestness, five times together. So that not only have we the same promises that they had, but we have them even more enlarged and much more full. So, in the Hebrew it’s not as strong, in the Greek it’s even stronger. So, he says, okay, they had that. We have an even better promise. Hebrews 8:6, the ministry Jesus received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator superior to the old one. And it’s founded on what? Better promises. Isn’t that wonderful? So, God will never never forsake you.
I heard a story once, I don’t know if I’ll be able to recount it, but of a family that lost three children in four years. Three separate incidents, whether from accident or illness, I do not know. And their favorite song was How Firm A Foundation. And at the end you remember what it says, “That soul that on Jesus had leaned for repose I will not, I will not desert to his foes. At the end it says, “I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.” And they gave each one of their children’s names to one of those nevers. And how painful is that? Those of you who have children know what that would feel like to lose three children in three separate incidents. And you think, what kind of providence could that be from a loving God, and how severe a trial would that be? How severe, and would your Christian contentment survive? Would your faith survive? And God is going to sustain you through that. But what a terrible trial that was. And they were sustained. And God said, I’ll never, no, never, no never forsake you. And so, he sustains you through that time.
Also, page five, the Christian realizes the things of heaven. He has the kingdom of heaven as present. And the glory that is to come by faith, he makes it present. So, the martyrs had contentment in their sufferings. For some of them said, “Though we have had a hard breakfast, yet we shall have a good dinner for very soon we shall be in heaven.” What a great, great attitude. For them, they could just taste that heavenly meal. And they were ready to go. They were ready to suffer and ready to die. Because somehow their faith had made heaven so real to them, they could go with a good spirit to the stake or however they exited the world.
Heaven’s joys are very real to them by faith, and they can feed on them for constant contentment. A carnal heart has no contentment but from what he sees before him in this world. But a godly heart has a contentment from which he sees laid up for him in the highest heaven. So, we have a secret feast, we have an internal feast. It’s got to do with the promises of God. It’s got to do with spiritual things. You can see that they are not available for non-Christians. This is all faith stuff. It’s all the stuff of the soul. And so, the contentment we’re talking about here is utterly beyond the unbeliever. But it’s a secret delight in spiritual things that you trust and believe are going to be yours someday. Faith is the assurance of things hope for – you’re absolutely convinced that you’re going to have it someday, and so you can feast.
Faith is the assurance of things hope for – you’re absolutely convinced that you’re going to have it someday, and so you can feast.
That is the secret. Any questions about the mystery of Christian contentment? He’s gone through a variety of elements of the mysterious nature of Christian contentment. Before we get into how Christ teaches it, say, okay, sounds good. Teach it to me. Anything, any questions? Okay. Yeah, go ahead.
(audience) You mean content in reference to this trial but struggling in other areas? Well, I think it’s our experience that we’re not whole people. We’re not totally integrated yet. So that’s a great question. It reminds me of the bruised reed and the smoldering flax. And Sibbes said in every Christian at all times, there’s some light and heat, and there’s some smoldering and some smoke. And so even in this Christian contentment, we’re never perfectly content, never perfectly in this world. It’s something that we strive for just like perfection. That’s a great, great question. So yes, we can have in some way a strong measure of contentment in this big trial you’re going through. But meanwhile, some other things are irritating you along the way. and so it’s never quite perfect the way it should be.
That’s a great question. Alright, let’s look at how Christ, yes sure, Rick, (audience). That’s a good observation. I want to read something to you that is very interesting. This is the book. I xeroxed it so I could make lots of notes. I don’t like to write in the actual book itself. Then I could read it back years later and think, oh boy, what a strange note I wrote, and how wrong I was and all that. But I like to do this, I throw it away or whatever. But this is his very, very last statement here, Burrough’s final paragraph in the book. And it says, “Now there is in the text another lesson, which is a hard lesson. I have learned how to abound. I’ve learned how to feast. Of course I didn’t cover that,” he says in the book. “That does not so nearly concern us at this time because the times are afflicting times.” I don’t know what they were going through, but he was dealing with negative things, affliction, suffering, struggles. “And there is now more than ordinarily an uncertainty in all things in the world. In such times as these are few who have such an abundance that they need to be much taught that lesson. So, I’m not going to write on it.” But I’m saying this is kind of where we are. Do we know how to feast in Christ? Do we know how to prepare ourselves, how to receive good things from God and how to deal properly when there is an abundance? I think a whole other book’s needed. So that’s a very, very good question and I wrote next to it, oh, one more thing and that’s what he had at the end. Oh, one more thing we have to learn the secretive knowing how to abound in Christ too. And that’s a different art, really very good question.
That is, how could we be content and godly while everything’s going well? It says in scripture that fire and the furnace is for gold and silver, but a man is tested by the praise that he receives. When things are going well, that’s your test. So that’s a very good question.
Alright, let’s go on, page five, how Christ teaches contentment. “Paul needed to learn the secret of contentment and so must we. It is not basic Christianity but advanced. It’s time, then to enroll in Christ’s school of contentment. The first lesson is in fact the first lesson of the Christian life. And that is, take up your cross and follow me. That’s the beginning of the Christian life. If you don’t take up your cross and follow Jesus, you’re not a Christian.” And so, it is also the first step in the journey of true Christian contentment.
Take up your cross. It is the lesson of self-denial. Bradford, another writer said,
Whoever has not learned the lesson of the cross has not learned his A, B, C in Christianity. It is the first step in the Christian life. This is where Christ begins with his scholars, and those in the lowest grades must begin with this. If you mean to be Christians at all, you must buckle to this. This is the first lesson that Christ teaches any soul, self-denial which brings contentment, which brings down and softens a man’s heart. Such person has to learn to say these following things. Number one, I am nothing. Simply as a creature, I am nothing. Number two, I deserve nothing but hell. Number three, I can do nothing apart from Christ. Number four, I can receive nothing good apart from Christ. Number five, I can make use of nothing good that I receive. If I get a good thing, I’m going to waste it or use it badly. Number six, I am worse than nothing actually because of my sin. I’m not a morally neutral creature. I’m actually a sinner. And so therefore I’m actually worse than nothing. Number seven, if I perish, it will be of no insurmountable loss to God and his kingdom.
I’m not irreplaceable so to speak. And you say, wow, I mean do I really have to drink that? I mean those are seven seemingly very harsh statements. But my first question to you is are any of them untrue or unbiblical? If you look at them, are they untrue? No, they’re all true. But do we have to talk about them? Well, we’re talking about how to be content, right? Suppose you kind of imbibe the opposite, right? Suppose you say, I’m not nothing, I’m really something. I’m really something.
Therefore, God owes me much, right? And when you start buying into this kind of thing, Hey, aren’t I something? And I can do lots of things, and I’m very strong and able. And I deserve a good life, and I deserve contentment. And I deserve for you to recognize what a good job I did, and I deserve all of these things. Okay? You’re set up for discontent, aren’t you? Because you’re probably not going to get many of those things you think you deserve. And therefore, you will grumble and complain, and you’ll be discontent. So, the Puritan way I think is a biblical way. Humble yourself, drink this up, which is truth anyway. And then watch and see yourself freed from these desires able to be genuinely, truly content, genuinely and truly content. There was never any man or woman so contented as a self-denying man or woman.
No one ever denied himself as much as Christ did. He gave his cheeks to the smiters. He opened not his mouth. He was as a lamb when led to the slaughter. He made no noise in the street. He denied himself above all and was willing to empty himself. And so, he was the most contented man there ever was in this world. And the nearer we come to denying ourselves as Christ did, the more contented we shall be. The second way that Christ teaches contentment is to teach you the vanity of created things. What do we mean by that? The emptiness of created things. They were not made to fill you up. They were not made to satisfy you. I was talking to somebody about this earlier, and I said one of the things, one of the striking things about getting older, you start to see that the things of this world don’t taste that much to you anymore.
They’re really not all that thrilling. Whether all those things that you really loved when you were younger are not as exciting or stimulating anymore. And if you have nothing else, life itself will seem vanity of vanities. It’ll seem empty, it’ll seem dull. Nothing tastes. And I feel sorry therefore for non-Christians as they age. And they start to look around, and they’re ever searching for something to fill that void. The bottom line is created things cannot fill the void. That includes people, that includes material possessions, it includes positions of power and influence. It includes successes and victories and gold medals and trophies and all of the things that the world wants. They don’t ultimately satisfy because they don’t have the ability to fill your mind and your heart and your soul. The basic concept is nothing created can ultimately satisfy the soul. The soul was meant to feast itself on God.
Nothing created can ultimately satisfy the soul. The soul was meant to east itself on God.
When created things take God’s rightful place in our souls, we’ve become idolaters. And we are of necessity discontent. I like this quote. He says, “Many men think that when they are troubled and have not got contentment, it’s because they have so little of the world. And if they had more, they should be content. That’s just as if a man were hungry and to satisfy his craving stomach, he should gape and open his, hold open his mouth to take in the wind. And then think the reason why he is not satisfied and still hungry is he’s not got enough of the wind; he just needs more wind. No, the reason is because the thing is not suitable to a craving stomach. That’s not what it was made for. And if you’re just give me more wind, more wind, always taking in more and I’m still hungry and still yearning. Well, why do you think? It wasn’t made for that. God is for that. You were made for God. And so, this wind is not going to satisfy you. Very important. Christ teaches that lesson. You want to be content. Learn this lesson, the vanity of the creature.
Third, know the one thing needful. What do we mean by that? “‘Martha, Martha,’ the Lord answered. ‘You’re worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her'” (Luke 10:41). That’s the quote he gives. But really, actually what he zeroes in on is the one thing you need is salvation for your soul. That’s what you need. I mean this, I’ve always looked kind of as a quiet time verse. What you need is to sit at the feet of the Lord and learn from him. But where he goes and takes it, he says, the one thing needful is to have your sins forgiven on judgment day.
Now that’s what you need, okay?
Before the soul sought after this and that, but now it sees that it is not necessary for me to be rich, but it is necessary for me to make my peace with God. It is not necessary that I should live a pleasurable life in this world, but it is necessary that I should have pardon for my sin. It is not necessary that I should have honor and preferment, but it is necessary that I should have God as my portion and have my part in Jesus Christ. It is necessary that I should be saved in the day of Jesus Christ. The other things are fine, indeed. Fine house and income and clothes and advancement for my wife and children, but they are not necessary. One thing I need is salvation for my soul. I need Christ. I need forgiveness.
I like this illustration he gives us of the Roman general Pompey bringing a shipment of wheat to famine-stricken Rome, sailing through a severe storm, calming his men, saying, “We must go on. It is necessary that Rome should be relieved, but it is not necessary that we live.” Oh, that’s a striking attitude. How’d you like to be one of his soldiers, when it’s like. But that’s the attitude of a soldier, isn’t it? And you’re saying, I don’t have to have this, but Rome must have its wheat. And so, it’s a sense of priorities. And so also if we say, look, wait a minute, I have salvation already. Well, you have already gained the one thing you needed to get in this world. You have gained the salvation of your soul. You have received it as a gift. You have the faith, that is the victory that overcomes the world. You’ve got it already. What else is there? All the rest of the stuff you’re going to leave behind anyway. You’ve got it now. And so therefore you can be content. One thing is needful, says Jesus. That’s the thing you need.
Fourthly, you should know the relationship that you have to the world. Why did God leave you here? Do you ever wonder that I was saved over 20 years ago, justified by faith? What’s the point, right? I mean, why am I still here? What’s the answer? Why am I here, to glorify God? But how? I mean I can glorify God in heaven. I hope so, because heading there. Why did he leave me here? To witness? That’s one of the reasons. Anything else? He prepared works for us to do, good works, alright? And also, that I should work out my salvation with fear and trembling. He wanted to see me in a variety of circumstances glorify him and honor him.
And so, we do glorify God in a way we cannot in heaven. You realize that? You can give glory to God here on earth in a way you will never be able to do in heaven. And that is in the midst of suffering and trial and affliction, praise him and be content anyway. And so, in that way, we give a more perfect praise than the angels and the redeemed sinners in heaven do. It’s not perfect because nothing we do on earth is perfect, but we are in a perfect situation that they will never be in again. They were in while they were here on earth, but never again will they be able to do this. This is rather unique then, isn’t it? Our time on earth is short, and we don’t have all that many more big trials to go through. You say, oh, enough is enough. But God has measured them out, and there’s only so many you’re going to go through. And each one is a unique, special treasure, a jewel. A chance to glorify God in a way you will never get again, to say thank you Lord, I’m going to trust you through this. I praise you. I’m content. I’m going to stand firm and your promises, I’m going to do what I can to stay in you enough so that I can praise you from the heart through all this. And you’ll never get that chance again. That’s very unique, isn’t it? That’s a special time of praise. So, you should know your relation to the world. In Hebrews 11:13, they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. That’s what we are. “Dear friends. I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world to abstain from sinful desires which war against your soul” (1 Peter 2:11).
This is my own analogy here, but this picks up on what Burroughs says. One does not invest a lot of time redecorating or rearranging a hotel room that one’s staying in just for one night, right? I mean you get your flight nine in the morning, you kind of check in 10 at night. The picture frame’s crooked on the wall. What do I care? Brush your teeth and go to bed. Wake up in the morning, get your bag packed. Don’t even unpack; we don’t have time for that, right? And just go on and you don’t miss your flight, right? We don’t rearrange, say, boy, that bed would look better over there. You can’t move it anyway. But I mean, have you ever noticed about the headboards? They’re not real anymore. They just kind of screwed into the wall. They’re not actually part of the bed. But anyway, we don’t spend time redecorating the hotel room we’re going to spend one night in. Now for those of you that are very meticulous people, I said one night you say, if I’m here two nights now I’m going to fix that frame and I’m going to arrange it a little bit. I’m going to make it nice. Well, that’s you. At any rate, I don’t do that. But the point is we’re just passing through. Don’t get too comfortable here, and don’t try to make it all right. It isn’t all right. It’s a sin-cursed world. The creation’s groaning, waiting for us to be revealed. It’s not going to be perfect in this world.
Alright, fifth, E, top of page seven. Wherein the good of the creature is. He’s teaching us now. What are the lessons here? What is the good of the creature, the created things? Is there any good to it? We become just aesthetic people who don’t like anything in the world. We don’t eat any of the foods we like. We don’t wear any clothes we, we don’t like any people that we like because they might die. That’s not a way to live the world. Well then what is the right use of created things then?
And he says, Jesus teaches us contentment. We can use the world but not as though entranced by them. That’s part of that strange scripture that Paul gives us in 1 Corinthians 7:29, “Those who are married should act as if they were not married.” That’s an odd verse in 1 Corinthians 7 when he’s teaching clearly what God has joined together, let man not separate. What he’s saying is, don’t cling to her or to him as though you’ve got to have this person, or you can’t be alive. He says, in light of the present circumstances, don’t do that. They might actually be martyred next week. And so don’t hold on as though it’s something eternal. It isn’t eternal. And so, we’re moving through the world. And so, what is the proper use of the creature? The good of creature comforts or Christians is how they relate to God. That I may enjoy more of God and be made more serviceable for his glory in the place where he has set me.
This is the good of the creature. If God chooses to take them away for his glory and your growth, why should this be a cause of discontent? If discontent results, then did we not hold the earthly possessions? Did we hold them correctly to begin with and simply prove even more how much we needed to grow in this area? In other words, if it gets taken away, and you start to really struggle with it, you were holding onto it too tightly to begin with. And then he says, “God is most honored when I can turn from one condition to another according as he calls me to it.” Also, Christ says, you learn contentment by knowing your own heart. Know yourself. Study your heart. Discover where your discontent lies. If you’re discontent, probe in and find out why. What’s making you unhappy? What’s making you discontent? Learn about it.
Study your heart. Discover where your discontent lies.
Come to know what best suits your own spiritual condition. And learn what you’re able to manage and what you cannot. Sometimes wealth is removed because God felt you couldn’t properly manage it. So, if we come to understanding in the school of Christ we’ll not cry, “Why have I not got such wealth as others have?” But the Lord sees that I’m not able to manage it. And I see it myself by knowing my own heart.
In chapter six, he continues to teach contentment. He talks about the burden of a prosperous condition. So many of the things we set our hearts on in the world and that we want, when you get there, you find why did I want it? Why did I want that? Because with those things that people yearn for comes some additional earthly burdens that you would be free from if you didn’t have that, whether it’s wealth or a position of importance and honor and prestige.
Either way, you’ve got these four things facing you. You’ve got the burden of earthly trouble. More trouble comes because of these things. You’ve got the burden of danger. There’s more temptation. Satan has more to get at you with when you’re involved in more of the things of the world. The burden of greater responsibilities and duties. You just have more expected of you, “To him whom much is given, much is expected” (Matthew 13:12).
And that leads right to the fourth, the burden of a greater accountability on Judgment Day. I tell you for me, Hebrews 13:17, which says that, “Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They watch over you as men who must give an account, obey them so their work will be a joy, not a burden for that would be of no benefit to you.” I must give an account for all of you. In what sense do I have to give an account? I want out. And that kind of cuts off any kind of ladder climbing ambition that a pastor might have to go to a 10,000-member church. Why would I want to be accountable for 50 times more people than I’m accountable for now when I’m not sure at all, I’m going to be able to survive that accounting. How am I going to face that? The point is however, we don’t choose these things. God decides what will be, but there’s a cutting off of yearning for it.
Instead, Lord, make me equal to what you’ve already set me to. But this ambition, and forget the pastor, the whole angle, but there’s a lot of people in business that are yearning for an ever-bigger business. Or people materially yearning for bigger income, or people that perhaps want more children. That’s accountability. I mean, there’s all these things, and you yearn for them and want them. And with them come these four burdens every time. Could it be the Lord’s protecting you from the four burdens?
With Christ and the school of contentment. He also talks about the evil of being given up to one’s heart. Do you really want God to finally say yes to something he’s been saying no to all this time? To be given over to something that you wanted. No, I’d rather not. Let him wisely choose.
And then he talks about the right knowledge of God’s providence. The fact of the matter is that God is ruling over all things for his glory. Now, I’m not actually going to talk about this much. You can read it on page eight because the next book we’re studying, God willing next week, is The Mystery of Providence by Flavel. And so, we’re going to talk about providence. But I like this, “the efficacy of God’s providence.” Basically, God’s providence does what he means it to do, and you can’t stop it. And so, if you’re on a huge ship with big sails and that thing is really underway and it’s really moving, what good is your running around and trying to stop it by your running on deck? If you throw yourself against one railing or against the other, or stomp down on the deck, are you going to stop the ship of providence in any way, shape or form? No way.
And so, what’s the point in fretting and riling against what God is doing by his providence? He’s working out a big plan. And that big plan has big gears and little gears and little sprockets and all kinds of springs and you don’t understand it, but he does. And if you say, why do we need this? Throw it out. You can’t do that. It’s got to be there in its proper place at its right size, doing its thing. God knows what he’s doing. Trusting in God’s providence I think is a key to Christian contentment. Saying, there is a wise providence behind what I’m going through right now.
Then he talks about next the excellence of contentment. Now I already hinted at it, but you worship God more by this than when you come to hear a sermon or spend half an hour, an hour in prayer or any other thing you do. If you are in the midst of affliction and from your heart, praise him. this is a great honor to God. And it’s a great excellence of your own soul. Now, I kind of ruminate on this. Jeremiah Burroughs did not write about John Piper, or Jeremiah Burroughs did not, but I reflected on it.
One of Piper’s big statements is, “God is most glorified in us when, what?, we’re most satisfied in him.” Well, I started to work on that and reflect on what Burroughs was giving me here. Okay, Burroughs is saying there’s much exercise of grace. Now here’s the deal. God is most glorified in human beings, over all creatures, right? We glorify him in a way that rocks and animals and other things can’t. Secondly, God is most glorified in us when we’re most satisfied in him. We just said that a moment ago. But now third, we demonstrate clearly to him and to ourselves and to others that we are most especially satisfied in him when we’re deeply content in the midst of great sufferings and deprivations. Do you see that? It’s a great opportunity to live out the whole ethos of desiring God because everything else has been stripped away from you, and yet there you are praising God.
That means God’s what you want. He’s your treasure. He’s your pleasure. Everything else is gone, and yet there you are, content and joyful. It’s a great, great opportunity. Now, we don’t ask for what we trust God to give us, that providence at the right time. But I’m just saying this is a way to think. When you’re going in, you’re saying, I can greatly honor God by showing my love for him. The excellence of contentment. Also, the soul is fitted to receive mercy. These are just summaries. I didn’t have time to go through all these things. The soul is prepared to do service and delivered from temptations brings about abundant comforts. You can read this. I want to get to the evils of a murmuring spirit briefly. It gets the comfort of things not possessed, has the great blessing on the soul. A contented man may expect great reward. And by it the soul comes nearest the excellence of God.
Let me say something about that last one. Burroughs says that you are most like God when you’re like this. Because in this way you are somewhat disconnected from the creaturely world and content in yourself, although connected to God. Certainly not by yourself, but in this way you most imitate God and his eternal blessedness no matter what’s going on, current events on earth. If the world were totally annihilated, would God cease being blessed and happy? No, he was totally blessed and happy within himself before the world ever began. He’s been that way all along and will continue that way through all eternity. And so also, if you are in that blissful way,somewhat disconnected from your circumstances, able to be content to trust him, to rejoice like Paul and Silas in the prison singing praise songs when it makes no sense at all, you are most like God at that time.
And that’s a beautiful thing. And the excellency of the soul that can be like this. So, he set this out and he’s enticing us saying, look how excellent is this? Now we turn around and say, look how ugly and how repugnant is the murmuring spirit. And this is where I got convicted. Very, very convicting. The evils of a murmuring spirit. It shows corruption left in the soul. It shows a worldliness, doesn’t it? It shows an immaturity. It shows a lack of faith and a lack of trust. In effect you’re saying to Christ, who is, you could say, the husband of your soul, the spouse of your soul, you are not enough for me. He talks about Elkana and Hannah was barren. And remember what Elkana, her husband said, am I not worth 10 sons to you?
Why are you so sad? Am I not a good husband to you? Am I not worth 10 sons? In effect, Jesus, says Burroughs, comes to you in the midst of your murmuring and complaining and said, am I not enough for you? I’m not enough? You’ve got to have me and the circumstance you’re yearning for? That’s great dishonor to Christ, isn’t it? Christ was just not enough for you. It’s a mark of an ungodly man. Murmuring is accounted rebellion. Have you not read the stories of the murmuring in the desert? How many times did the Israelites murmur against God? What’s the worst? It’s at the waters of Massah and Meriba (Exodus 17), right after they had crossed through the Red Sea. It was the first time up to that point they’ve been kind of gladly obeying and all that kind of thing going through the Red Sea. And then they go to the other side and Miriam has her big celebration, Exodus 15. They’re all dancing and celebrating and by the end of the chapter, they’re murmuring against God.
Oh, that’s disgusting. Where is all their faith and their celebration? The same God who led them through Red Sea is now “he brought them through the Red Sea so they could die of thirst in the desert.” It doesn’t make any sense. And there they were murmuring, and God never forgot it. And it gets mentioned many times in the Psalms after that in the Book of Hebrews. It’s a big moment in Israel’s history. But here’s what Burroughs says. He really kind of turns the screws on us. He says,
The sin is in direct proportion to the greatness of the deliverance. They were delivered from a physical army through a physical Red Sea. You were delivered from your sins and from hell. Your deliverance is infinitely greater than theirs was. And yet you murmur just like they do. And so, it’s even worse for us who have received an even greater mercy than the Israelites did.
Yeah, I know that you’re all cringing, but I was too. I was reading this, and it was painful to me. And I said, oh my goodness, why do I complain? Why do I murmur? Why do I argue against God and not trust his providence? Give me another chance. He said, I will. So, I said, oh, I didn’t mean it. Anyway, yes, murmuring is counted rebellion. It is contrary to grace. Especially in our conversion. I should say conversion, not conversation. One of the things Burrough says is that we should be continually walking in the graces of conversion all the time, constantly. Now, I’m not saying we’re born again every day. I’m not saying that we’re only born again once. But I’m saying we’re continually walking in that “trust and obey” from the very beginning of our Christian life.
And one last thing he says, and I talked about this with some of the staff today. Murmuring, complaining against God is greatly beneath the Christian. It, it’s too low for you. Basically, what happens is every affliction comes to you and tells you in effect, lay down and I’ll walk on your back. I’ll trample you. And you do. You just go down like a spineless weakling. And the affliction, the trial just tramples you and walks over you. Rather, you should carry yourself like a son or daughter of the King, like a lion. When the affliction comes, you say, lay down, and I’ll show that I’m more than a conqueror in front of you. You lay down, and I’ll walk on you, hatever the affliction. I’m not talking human beings, don’t misunderstand. I’m talking about our struggles, not against flesh and blood, but against these trials and these temptations that come. And you say, lay down and I will be more than a conqueror through this. I will walk through it by grace. It’s greatly dishonoring to God for a Christian to murmur and complain in the midst of the trial.
Alright, that’s the end of our time. You need to keep reading this book. Alright? Would you not love to have the Christian grace of contentment in all circumstances? To be delivered from a murmuring, complaining spirit? Would this not be a great delight to you? One little thing. I read this, and I said, oh boy. Yeah, that’s good. He specifically addresses spouses. He says, wives, if your husband comes in and begins to complain and murmur, pray for him because he’s sinning greatly. Pray that God, that your household will be delivered from the just punishment of his complaining spirit. Wow, that convicted me. And husbands, if you hear your wives complaining and murmuring, you should get down on your knees in front of them and pray that your household would be delivered from the just punishment that the Israelites and all the others got for their murmuring. It’s a serious matter, is it not? And I said, oh my goodness, I underestimated this sin. May I never do it again, God. “Do everything without complaining or arguing” (Philippians 2:14), the scripture says. Deliver me from it. Let’s close in prayer. (prays)
Philippians 4:12-13 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.
1 Timothy 6:6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
Hebrews 13:5 Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
Initial comments: Christian contentment is not a natural state, but a mystery whose secrets must be learned.
Four-fold Outline:
I. The Nature of Christian Contentment: What It Is
II. The Art and Mystery of Christian Contentment
III. What Lessons Must Be Learned to Achieve Christian Contentment
IV. The Glories and Excellence of Christian Contentment
Doctrine: To be well-skilled in the mystery of Christian contentment is the duty, glory, and excellence of a Christian.
I. Christian Contentment Described
Definition: Christian contentment is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition. II. The Mystery of Contentment
“But you will object: What you speak of is very good, if we could attain to it; but is it possible for anyone to attain to this? It is possible if you get skill in the art of it; you may attain to it and it will prove to be not such a difficult thing either, if you but understand the mystery of it…. There is a great mystery and art in what way a Christian comes to contentment.”
A. A Christian is content, yet unsatisfied
B. He comes to contentment by subtraction
“Not so much by adding to what he would have, or to what he has, not by adding more to his condition; but rather by subtracting from his desires, so as to make his desires and his circumstances even and equal.”
C. By adding another burden to himself
“… to labor to load and burden your heart with your sin; the heavier the burden of your sin is to your heart, the lighter will become your affliction to your heart, and so you shall be content.” D. By changing the affliction into something else
You make the affliction a positive good rather than a negative evil… a wise stroke from a master craftsman on your soul
E. By doing the work of his circumstances
God has done this for a purpose… ask “What duties are required of this condition? How can I make the most of this situation for the glory of God and His Kingdom?
F. By melting his will into God’s will
G. By purging out what is within
III. The Mystery of Contentment – continued
H. He lives on the dew of God’s blessing
“A Christian can get food that the world does not know of; he is fed in a secret way by the dew of the blessing of God.”
Christians are totally satisfied with whatever God provides, no matter how little
1. Because in what he has, he has the love of God to him
Even common providences are seen to be direct gifts from the King of the Universe
2. What they have is sanctified to them for good
3. A gracious heart has what he has free of cost: he is not likely to be called to pay for it
4. What little they do have are given by the purchase of Jesus Christ
5. Every little benefit is seen to be a mere down-payment on the full inheritance which God will give them in heaven
I. He sees God’s love in afflictions
Jerome: “He is a happy man who is beaten when the stroke is a stroke of love.” All God’s strokes are strokes of love and mercy.
“This is a mystery, but grace enables men to see love in the very frown of God’s face, and so comes to receive contentment.”
J. His afflictions are sanctified in Christ
“All the sting and venom and poison of them is taken out by the virtue of Jesus Christ, the Mediator between God and man.”
The Christian learns to compare all his afflictions with those Christ suffered in life and in death on his behalf… and they ALWAYS come up lightweight!
Do I have poverty? Christ had more!
Do I have disgrace or dishonor before men? Christ had more!
Am I misunderstood? Christ was more!
Am I slandered, mocked, reviled, insulted, opposed? Christ was more!
Do I have physical sufferings? Christ had more!
Do I face imminent death? Christ faced a worse death! K. He gets strength from Christ
Colossians 1:11-12 …being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father
Colossians 1:29 To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.
2 Timothy 4:16-17 At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it.
L. He makes up his wants in God
“This is indeed an excellent art, to be able to draw from God what one had before in the creature. Christian, how did you enjoy comfort before? Was the creature anything to you but a conduit, a pipe that conveyed God’s goodness to you? ‘The pipe is cut off,’ says God, ‘come to me, the fountain and drink immediately.’”
“That is the happiness of heaven to have God to be all in all. The saints in heaven do not have houses, and lands, and money, and meat, and drink, and clothes; you will say, they do not need them—why not? It is because God is all in all to them immediately. Now while you live in this world, you may come to live on God, you may have much of heaven…”
M. He gets contentment for the Covenant
IV. The Mystery of Contentment – concluded
1. He supplies wants by what he finds in himself
Luke 17:20-21 Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say,
‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.”
“A Christian, then, whatever he lack he can make it up, for he has a kingdom in himself.”
“Before death, there is a Kingdom of God within the soul, such a manifestation of God in the soul as to content the heart of any godly man in the world, the Kingdom that he now has within him. He need not wait till afterwards, till he goes to Heaven; but certainly there is a Heaven in the soul of a godly man, he has Heaven already.”
“Many times when you go to comfort your friends in their afflictions, you say ‘Heaven will pay for all’; indeed, you may assuredly say Heaven pays for all already.”
“When some men and women are complaining so much and always whining, it is a sign that there is an emptiness in their hearts. If their hearts were filled with grace, they would not make such a noise.”
2. He gets supply from the Covenant
The promises of God made to the Church in Christ are an infinite source of contentment, and not subject in any way to change based on the circumstances of life.
a. The Covenant in general
b. Particular promises in the Covenant
Hebrews 13:5 Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
“To Joshua God says, He will not leave him or forsake him; but in this place in the Greek there are five negatives, ‘I will not, not, not, not, not again.’ That is the force of it in the Greek. I say, there are five negatives in that little sentence; as if God should say, ‘I will not leave you, no I will not, I will not, I will not…’ with such earnestness five times together. So that not only have we the same promises that they had, but we have them much more enlarged and more full…”
Hebrews 8:6 But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises.
N. He realizes the things of Heaven
“He has the Kingdom of Heaven as present and the glory that is to come; by faith he makes it present. So the martyrs had contentment in their sufferings, for some of them said, ‘Though we have had a hard breakfast, yet we shall have a good dinner, for we shall very soon be in heaven.’”
Heaven’s joys are very real to them by faith, and they can feed on them for constant contentment.
“A carnal heart has no contentment but from what he sees before him in this world, but a godly heart has contentment from what he sees laid up for him in the highest heavens.” O. He opens his heart to God
Unbelievers face their trials with cursings and bitter words, words of anger and complaint; Christians face harder trials with words of prayer. They open their hearts to God and pour out their words before Him.
V. How Christ Teaches Contentment
Paul needed to learn the secret of contentment, and so must we. It is not basic Christianity but advanced.
Time to enroll in Christ’s school of contentment! A. The lesson of self-denial
Bradford: “Whoever has not learned the lesson of the cross has not learned his ABC in Christianity.”
“This is where Christ begins with His scholars, and those in the lowest grades must begin with this; if you mean to be Christians at all, you must buckle to this.”
“This is the first lesson that Christ teaches any soul, self-denial, which brings contentment, which brings down and softens a man’s heart.”
Such a person learns to say:
1. “I am nothing” (simply as a creature)
2. “I deserve nothing” (but Hell)
3. “I can do nothing” (apart from Christ)
4. “I can receive nothing good” (apart from Christ)
5. “I can make use of nothing good I receive” (apart from Christ’s help)
6. “I am worse than nothing” (because of my sin)
7. “If I perish it will be of no insurmountable loss to God”
These seemingly harsh attitudes are 1) all true Biblically; 2) the key to true contentment
“There was never any man or woman so contented as a self-denying man or woman. No-one ever denied himself as much as Christ did: he gave his cheeks to the smiters, he opened not his mouth, he was as a lamb when he was led to the slaughter, he made no noise in the street. He denied himself above all, and was willing to empty himself; and so, he was the most contented man there ever was in this world. And the nearer we come to denying ourselves as Christ did, the more contented we shall be.” B. The vanity of the creature
Ecclesiastes 1:2 “Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher, “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.”
Basic concept: nothing created can ultimately satisfy the soul. The soul was meant to feast itself on God. When created things take God’s rightful place in our souls, we have become idolaters, and we are of necessity discontent.
“Many men think that when they are troubled and have not got contentment, it is because they have so little of the world, and if they had more they should be content. That is just as if a man were hungry, and to satisfy his craving stomach he should gape and hold open his mouth to take in the wind, and then should think that reason why he is not satisfied is because he has not got enough of the wind! No, the reason is because the thing is not suitable to a craving stomach.”
C. To know the one thing needful
Luke 10:41-42 “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
“Before the soul sought after this and that, but now it sees that it is not necessary for me to be rich, but it is necessary for me to make my peace with God; it is not necessary that I should live a pleasurable life in this world, but it is necessary that I should have pardon for my sin; it is not necessary that I should have honor and preferment, but it is necessary that I should have God as my portion and have my part in Jesus Christ, it is necessary that I should be saved in the day of Jesus Christ. The other things are fine indeed: fine house and income, and clothes, and advancement for my wife and children… but they are not necessary.”
Roman general Pompey, bringing a shipment of wheat to famine-stricken Rome, sailing through a severe storm: “We must go on; it is necessary that Rome should be relieved, but it is not necessary that we should live.” D. To know one’s relation to the world
Hebrews 11:13 they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth.
1 Peter 2:11 Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul.
One doesn’t invest a lot of time redecorating a hotel room in which one is staying for one night!
One sailing for home port isn’t too troubled about the bunk accommodations or the stormy sea.
E. Wherein the good of the creature is
The good of creature comforts for Christians is how they relate to God: “That I may enjoy more of God, and be made more serviceable for His glory in the place where He has set me: this is the good of the creature.”
If God chooses to take them away for His glory and your growth, why should this be a cause of discontent? If discontent results, then we did not hold the earthly possessions correctly to begin with, and simply prove even more how much we needed to grow in this area!
If the goal was to honor God anyway, now you have the chance to do it by suffering well and being put on display for the world.
“God is most honored when I can turn from one condition to another, according as he calls me to it.” F. The knowledge of one’s own heart
Know yourself… study your own heart
1. Discover where your discontent lies
2. Come to know what best suits your own spiritual condition
3. Learn what you are able to manage, and what you cannot
Sometimes wealth is removed because God felt they couldn’t properly manage it. “So, if we come to
understanding in the school of Christ we will not cry, ‘Why have I not got such wealth as others have?’ but ‘The Lord sees that I am not able to manage it and I see it myself by knowing my own heart.’”
VI. How Christ Teaches Contentment – concluded
G. The burden of a prosperous condition
Wealth is actually a very great burden… so also are positions of influence and power
1. The burden of trouble
2. The burden of danger: more temptations
3. The burden of greater responsibilities
4. The burden of accountability… especially on Judgment Day
H. The evil of being given up to one’s heart’s desires
Psalm 81:11-12 “But my people would not listen to me; Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts to follow their own devices.”
In some cases, “There is nothing that God conveys His wrath more through than a prosperous condition.”
I. The right knowledge of God’s providence
1. The universality of God’s providence
Matthew 10:29-31 Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. 30 And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31 So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.
2. The efficacy of God’s providence: it does what He means it to do
So what’s the point in fretting over something so much larger than yourself
“When you are in a ship at sea which has all its sails spread with a full gale of wind, and is swiftly sailing, can you make it stand still by running up and down in the ship? No more can you make the providence of God alter and change its course with your vexing and fretting.”
3. The infinite variety of works of providence… yet the order of things all working towards God’s purpose
Lots of tiny and large gears, all turning this way and that… accomplishing the Designer’s ultimate purpose, none of them disposable . Learn to trust the Providence of God!
4. Learn to know God’s usual ways of dealing with His people
i) using affliction and suffering ii) giving them His greatest mercies when they are in their lowest condition iii) turning the greatest evil into the greatest good
VII. The Excellence of Contentment
A. By it we give God his due worship
“You worship God more by this than when you come to hear a sermon, or spend half an hour or an hour in prayer, or when you come to receive a sacrament.”
B. In it is much exercise of grace
John Piper: 1) God is most glorified in human beings over all creatures. 2) God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. 3) We demonstrate clearly to Him, ourselves, and others that we are most especially satisfied in Him when we are deeply content in the midst of great sufferings.
C. The soul is fitted to receive mercy
D. It is fitted to do service
E. It delivers from temptation
F. It brings abundant comforts
G. It gets the comfort of things not possessed
H. It is a great blessing on the soul
I. A contented man may expect reward
J. By it the soul come nearest the excellence of God
VII. The Evils of a Murmuring Spirit
A. It argues much corruption in the soul
B. It is the mark of an ungodly man
C. Murmuring is accounted rebellion
D. It is contrary to grace, especially in conversation
E. It is below a Christian
IX. The Evils of a Murmuring Spirit – concluded
F. By murmuring we undo our prayers
G. The evil effects of murmuring
H. Discontent is a foolish sin
I. It provokes the wrath of God
J. The is a curse on it
K. There is much of the spirit of Satan in it
L. It brings an absolute necessity of disquiet
M. God may withdraw his protection
X. Aggravations of the Sin of Murmuring
A. The greater the mercies the greater the sin of murmuring
B. When we murmur for small things
C. When men of gifts and abilities murmur
D. The freeness of God’s mercy
E. When we have the things for the want of which we were discontented
F. When men are raised from a low position
G. When men have been great sinners
H. When men are of little use in the world
I. When God is about to humble us
J. When God’s hand is apparent in a an affliction
K. When God has afflicted us for a long time
XI. The Excuses of a Discontented Heart
A. ‘It is a sense of my condition’
B. ‘I am troubled for my sin’
C. ‘God withdraws himself from me’
D. ‘It is men’s bad treatment that troubles me’
E. ‘I never expected this affliction’
F. ‘My affliction is so great’
G. ‘My affliction is greater than others’
H. ‘If the affliction were any other, I could be content’
I. ‘My afflictions make me unserviceable to God’
J. ‘My condition is unsettled’
K. ‘I have been in a better condition’
L. ‘I am crossed after taking great pains’
M. ‘I do not break out in discontent’
XII. How to Attain Contentment
A. Considerations to content the hear in any afflicted condition
1. The greatness of the mercies we have
2. God is beforehand with us with his mercies
3. The abundance of mercies God bestows
4. All creatures are in a vicissitude
5. The creatures suffer for us
6. We have but little time in the world
7. This has been the condition of our betters
8. We were content with the world with grace, and should now be with grace without the world
9. We did not give God the glory when we had our desires
10. The experience of God doing us good in afflictions
XIII. How to Attain Contentment – concluded
B. Directions for attaining contentment
1. There must be grace to make the soul steady
2. Do not grasp too much of the world
3. Have a call to every business
4. Walk by rule
5. Exercise much faith
6. Labour to be spiritually-minded
7. Do not promise yourselves great things
8. Get hearts mortified to the world
C. Directions for attaining contentment – continued
9. Do not pore too much on afflictions
10. Make a good interpretation of God’s ways to you
11. Do not regard the fancies of other men
12. Do not be inordinately taken up with the comforts of the world
Alright, why don’t we go ahead and get started. We have a new outline I hope you got at the back. We’re going to do a second week tonight in The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by Jeremiah Burroughs. Just by way, a brief way of outline or review from last week, the central text that Burroughs begins with is Philippians 4:12-13. Now the context in Philippians 4 at the end, he’s talking about the financial gift that the Philippian church had sent to him, and he said, I’m very grateful that at last you’ve renewed your concern for me. I’m glad that you sent the money. He said, “I’m not saying this because I’m in need, for I’ve learned to be content whatever circumstances I’m in.” He says. “I’ve learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength” (paraphrase). And so, Burroughs picks up on this concept here. The idea is that Christian contentment is a secret to be learned.
It’s not intuitively obvious. It’s not something that comes right at the beginning of the Christian life. Indeed, I think by experience you can look around and think that most of the Christians that you know really have never really learned the secret of contentment. And even more painfully, if you look at your own life, you could say, have I learned the secret of Christian contentment? And I don’t think there’s anyone that would say, “I’ve learned it sufficiently. I know how to be content no matter what happens to me.” So, there’s a lot of room for growth in this. And I’ll tell you just by way of just personal testimony, as I read through this book in preparation for tonight, I was so convicted by my own sin in this area, my own weakness, the murmuring spirit I have. Something that we would think very little of. When you talk about the great sins of the Christian life, you don’t think of murmuring or complaining. But it is a great sin, and it’s exactly the opposite of Christian contentment, what we’re talking about.
So tonight, what we’re going to do is we’re going to, after a brief review, we’re going to look at how Christ teaches contentment. How does he instruct us? If we could enroll in a school, what would he do to teach us Christian contentment? And then we’re going to look at the negative side. We’re going to look at the excellencies of Christian contentment. We’re going to make it very positive and very attractive so that you would see just what a beauty and what a glory it is to your soul to be content in any and every situation. It really is a great grace from God. It’s a display of God’s mercy if you can be content in any and every situation.
Burroughs argues, and I think I agree that to some degree it’s the way that we bring greatest glory to God of all. When you can be content in the middle of a very great suffering and affliction, it’d be hard to find a soul in a more honorable state in this world than that. And so, he’s going to put forward for us the beauty and the excellency of Christian contentment. Then he is going to go the other way and set before us, the ugliness and the repugnant of Christian, of murmuring in the Christian life, of repining, of complaining, of chafing against God, of talking about your problems endlessly, and working it over and grieving over it. This is how he’s going to make it repugnant so that you are attracted to the one and repelled from the other.
Then he is going to try to cut the ground out from under you in terms of the excuses that you make for your murmuring. He goes through I think something like 14 different excuses and then blows each one away like a clay pigeon; pull, and then poof, five or six arguments why yet that is unacceptable ground for complaint. One, after this typical Puritan seven reasons why that’s no good excuse. Alright, onto excuse number 16, 12 reasons why that’s not a good excuse. And after a while you just have no ground left to stand on. There’s just no reason for you ever to have this kind of murmuring or disputing or arguing spirit. And then he is going to conclude with a few other things. I don’t know how far we’re going to get. Again, our purpose tonight is not to go through every aspect of the book.
Not at all. I’m actually desiring to leave you a little frustrated, and say, well that was inadequate. And I’ll just say, great. Read the book. That’s all. That’s only meant to entice you, to allure you, not to give you a full synopsis of everything that he says. Alright, so we start with Philippians 4:12-13. And you should start by asking yourself the question, how does my life stack up against the lesson here of Philippians 4:12-13? Have I learned the secret of being content? Do I know what this is? Do I understand 1 Timothy 6:6 that “godliness with contentment is great gain?” Have I learned in Hebrews 13:5, “to keep my life free from the love of money and be content with what I have? Because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you'” (paraphrase).
Have I learned this secret? Now the book itself comes to us in a fourfold outline. We looked at the first two more or less last week. Really only got through halfway through the second one. The first is the nature of Christian contentment, what it is, and the second is the art and mystery of Christian contentment. He’s going to zero in on the fact that it’s a mystery. It’s kind of an art. It’s something you have to learn. First, he gives us a definition. This is by way of review. The definition of Christian contentment is that it is that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition. And then what he does is having given that definition, he then breaks it apart and looks at each aspect of it. This was last time. And holds it up for consideration.
It is a quietness. It’s a spiritual state. It’s something inward. It’s nothing that can be faked or shown outwardly. It has outward fruit certainly, but the contentment he’s talking about is an inward state of the soul which gladly and freely submits to what God is providentially doing in your life. It’s a delight in God’s sovereignty, a delight in his providential rule, a trust in his plan. That’s what it is. That can’t be faked, now, can it? That’s something that is called really grace from God. It’s a great grace and a gift from God. It’s a mercy from God. Then he talks about the mystery of contentment, and he says, but you will object. What you speak of is very good if we could attain to it. I love that that’s typical Puritans. There he raises an objection. It all sounds very good, but is it really even possible?
And he says it is possible! If you get the skill of it, if you learn the mystery, you can do it. And then he goes through the mysterious aspects. Why is this contentment, Christian contentment, mysterious? In what sense is it mysterious? First, he talks about how a Christian is in a kind of a mysterious state concerning this. He is content and yet discontent. We talked about that last time. In one sense, content. And yet another sense, he’s not home yet, he’s not in heaven yet. He’s not fully and finely satisfied. And so, there’s a continual yearning and longing, longing, a pressing on for more. We want to know Christ even though we know him already, we want to know him more. Also, we saw that this Christian contentment comes to us by subtraction. Shall I quiz you and ask on what was subtracted? What was subtracted: desires for other things.
Contentment comes when the desires are taken away, when you put them to death in some cases. When you stop wanting them, put them out of your mind and realize that they really aren’t going to be part of your Christian life. They were never promised anyway by God. Such things as material success and prosperity and advancement in this world and fame and fortune and ease and comfort and all of these things that people want. They were never promised to you anyway in this world. And so, as little by little you put them to death, you find the secret of contentment. Not so much by adding to what we have but taking away desires. Also, by adding another burden. We’re going to talk more about this. This is again, a typical Puritan way of basically humbling and abasing yourself, and we’re going to talk about this in Christ’s school tonight.
One of the things that Christ does to make you content is to make you realize who you really are and what you really deserve. And if you understand who you really are and what you really deserve, the gateway is open for Christian joy and contentment. But if not, if you think more highly of yourself than you ought and think you deserve better than you’re getting, you’ll not be content. And so, there’s really kind of a paradox, a mystery there. As you go down, then you go up. As you’re willing to humble yourself, then you’ll find contentment and joy and ease. We’ll talk more about that later, but that’s what he says by adding a burden to yourself. The burden of thinking about your sin. By changing the affliction of something else, that it really is a master stroke from a craftsman. He’s working in your life.
It’s, it’s not some random misery that’s come to you. What goes around comes around. I guess it’s my turn. No, it’s not like that. It’s a special stroke from a sculptor of souls, the craftsman working on you. And by doing the work in the circumstance, beginning to ask what duties of me are required in this situation? What is God working on here, and what should I do about it? That’s what it is. And by melting your will into God’s will, not “Give me what I want Lord,” but “Make my will yours.” Not my will, but yours be done, said Jesus in Gethsemane. So, melting – a melting of yourself into what God’s will is. All this we covered last time. And then by purging out what is within those desires that battle within you. And that’s where we ended last time.
As he continues in the mystery of Christian contentment, he says that the Christian (I’m on page two, about two thirds of the way down) lives on the dew of God’s blessing. Now that’s an interesting way to put it, and let’s talk more about it. Dew is not rain, and yet it supplies the needs of the plants, right? For example, before, some people think, before the flood there was never a rain. I think you could support that. It’s debatable, but at least this much we know: that mist and dew came up from the earth and watered it. And it was sufficient. Nowadays we think of rain as the way that God provides the water that’s needed. But what it is is kind of a secret provision from God. He’s using an analogy, and he’s saying, I don’t know where these plants get their water, but they continue to thrive. It seems like a dry and a sterile environment here, a climate that would actually be completely hostile to life, and yet the plants are thriving. How can this be?
Well, it’s an invisible sustaining grace, something that comes from within that God supports. Christians are totally satisfied with whatever God provides because they can get food that the world knows not of. The Christian is fed in a secret way by the dew of blessing from God. There’s a secret sustaining grace. First of all, because in what he has, he has the love of God to him. This is very different than non-Christians. What do we mean by this? We all get provisions. We get food, we get clothing, we get various things that come, both the Christians and non-Christians. But the difference between a Christian and a non-Christian, and this is we see the love of God in the gift. It’s kind of come with the stamp of the King on it. And so, this meal comes from God. That’s why we bow and give thanks to him.
Christians are totally satisfied with whatever God provides because they can get food that the world knows not of.
We should before every meal, just as Jesus did in every case, always thanking God. But this gift is, even if it’s just a humble bowl of rice or something simple, it’s come to us from the hand of God. And so, everything we have in life comes with the stamp of the love of God. Never, except perhaps in the case of Job, is everything removed. And so, we still have something of God’s love in our lives. And that sustains us. We look and say, yes, I have these things that God has given me, and they are marked with the mark of personal love. Even common providences seen to be direct gifts from the King of the universe. Also, Christians, what they have is sanctified them to them for good. In other words, God has chosen the good things in your life, and they are to bring contentment to you, yes, but also to sanctify you.
And so, the good gifts you come, I’m not talking yet about the afflictions and the troubles, but the good things that God has left in your life, these things have come with wisdom behind them to sanctify you. Also, you realize that as a gracious heart you realize that what you have, all of the things you have are free of cost. You don’t have to pay for them. They’ve come to you as free gifts of grace. Now, in one sense they’re free, they’re free to you, but in another sense, they weren’t free at all. They were very expensive, but just somebody else paid the price. And so that’s what he says.
Fourthly, what little they do have are given by the purchase of Jesus Christ. You start to realize I don’t deserve anything but wrath. So, if I have anything, it’s come to me somehow. Why would God’s justice not be in the way of me getting this good thing? Why would his wrath not say no, you will not give this good thing to this sinner? Because somebody paid your price. Jesus Christ opened the way so that you could get this good thing, and not just for you, but for the whole world. Realize those common grace blessings, they come through Christ even though they never will acknowledge Jesus. Because God would’ve shut the world down long ago had it not been for the blood of Christ. They would never have even seen the sunrise or any of the beauties of this world. So, all of these good things come to us from Christ. But we realize as Christians in a very special way, each good thing we have has come by the purchase of Jesus Christ. They were bought for us at Calvary. Every one. And then every little benefit is seen to be a mere down payment on the full inheritance yet to come.
So, as you eat a meal, you say, yes, it’s a good meal, but it’s nothing like the wedding banquet of the Lamb. I can’t wait until we enjoy that. So even the small little things, they’re just see, to be down payments for the full amount. Alright, so that’s the Christian. He lives on the dew of God’s blessings. These things are coming as his specific grace from him. Also, he sees God’s love in his afflictions. I say, how can this be? Jerome said on top of page three, “He is a happy man who is beaten when the stroke is a stroke of love.” Is it a stroke of love? Yes, it is. It is a stroke of love. In Hebrews 12, it says that the disciplines that we get from God are evidence that we’re adopted children of God. If he doesn’t discipline you, you’re not a true child, but if he does discipline you, then he’s shaping you.
“No discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful. Later on, however, it yields a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:11). So, God has something in mind. And so even the afflictions that you have in your life are seen to be gifts of love and mercy from God. “This is a mystery,” says Burroughs, “but grace enables men to see the love of God in the very frown of God’s face and so come to receive contentment.” So not just those good gifts that we talked about a moment ago, but even the afflictions are coming to us as evidence of God’s love. His afflictions, next it says are sanctified in Christ. All the sting and venom and poison of them is taken out by the virtue of Jesus Christ, the mediator between God and man. They have no ultimate sting.
They’re not evidence of God’s condemning wrath against you, but rather they’re free of all of that and they’re just his loving strokes training you and preparing you, shaping you. The Christian learns also to compare all of his afflictions with those that Christ suffered in life and death on his behalf. And they always come up lightweight, don’t they? You could say, I have poverty. Christ had more, right? Do I have disgrace or dishonor before men? Christ had more. Am I misunderstood? Christ was more. Am I slandered and mocked and reviled and insulted and imposed? Christ was more. Do I have physical sufferings? Christ had more. Do I face imminent death? Christ faced a far worse death than you ever will. And so, these thoughts sweeten even the worst afflictions for Christians, and we’re able to be content.
Also, Christians get strength directly from Christ, and this is related to that dew from heaven. Alright? Not only do we see kind of the blessings that are still around in our lives as coming from God, but also, we have a sweet inward sustaining spiritual grace which can’t be explained any other way. How do they stand up under it? How do Paul and Silas sing in the Philippian jail? How do they do it? That’s not natural. That’s weird actually. You just got beaten. You’re in the middle of a horrible dungeon, and he may even be executed tomorrow. Who knows? And you’re singing praise. This is unnatural. Paul explains it. He talks about the Colossians (1:11-12) being strengthened. He prays for them being “strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience and joyfully giving thanks to the Father.” Well, great endurance and patience. Do you need to greatly endure and be patient when everything’s going well?
Of course not. Great endurance and patience only mean something in times of affliction and struggle. The time when your contentment is disappearing like a morning mist. And so, he prays that you may have a power within you. “Being strengthened,” he says, “with all power according to his glorious might,” so that you may have that great endurance in patience and joyfully give thanks in the middle of that circumstance. Paul says the same thing in Colossians 1:29 about his labor for the Lord, “To this end I labor struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.” So, there’s an energy, a strength, a power working within us that enables us to stand firm in the day of testing. You can’t have this kind of Christian contentment we’re talking about here alone. You can’t do it. Only as Christ and his life-giving sap flows through you. As you abide in the vinewill you find the ability to be truly content as Christ sustains you by his strength and his power.
A great example again, 2 Timothy 4:16-17, “At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed, and all the Gentiles might hear it.” Paul is totally alone. He had it seems no possibility of Christian contentment while on trial for his life and expecting to die, no possibility whatsoever. And yet the Lord in a very secret way sustained him and gave him strength for contentment. So, this Christian contentment, this mystery we’re talking about comes from strength, and inner strength from Christ.
Also, the Christian makes up his wants in God. It’s a very important and vital principle. It says, “This is indeed an excellent art, to be able to draw from God what one had before in the creature,” that is in created things. Christian, how did you enjoy the comfort before? Was the creature anything to you but a conduit, a pipe that conveyed God’s goodness to you? The pipe is cut off, says, God, come to me the fountain and drink immediately or directly. You see what he’s saying? You had a conduit, a pipe of God’s grace to you that has now been shut down, but the one who gave the grace through that pipe is still there and still loves you just as much as he ever did. This is so vital when you lose a loved one. Realize that nothing is permanent in this world. Look around at your family, the ones you love the most, whether they’re children, parents or spouse. Look around at your friends, at your fellow church members. All of these people are mortal. None of them are permanently here. Praise God. Aren’t you glad you’re not permanently here?
I don’t want to be here the rest of my life, my eternity. I want to go and be with Jesus. Like he said, “For me to live is Christ.” And I’m willing to stay here for your benefit, said Paul to the Philippians, but I had just as soon’ed for myself, be out of here. Alright? I want to be with Christ. “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). I don’t want to be here eternally. Do you want always forever getting older and older? I mean, what a terrible thing, “Lest he reach out his hand and take from that tree and live forever” (Genesis 3:22). What a grace from God that was so that we’re not decrepit and all this kind of thing. No, I’d like to be on, but what I’m saying is that the people in our lives, they’re temporary.
And that’s hard, isn’t it, when a providence strikes down somebody that you love? And here is this big pipe, this big conduit of God’s love and grace. Through it so many blessings flowed through a spouse, a loving husband or wife, a child that brought you such joy, a parent, a godly Christian role model. And they’re shut down, and nothing more will flow through that pipe. And yet the very one who gave all those blessings is still there, hasn’t changed at all, and will just find another way to get those blessings to you as you need them here in this world. If you don’t think this way, it’s going to be very tough for you to be content in that circumstance. When that comes, you’ll say, this is one circumstance in which I cannot have that rare jewel of contentment. But I don’t think there’s any such circumstance. What you do is you say, you grieve, it hurts, but yet God is still faithful, and the one who loved me to give me all those blessings those many years through that person will now divert them as I need them a different way.
The very one who gave all those blessings is still there, hasn’t changed at all, and will just find another way to get those blessings to you as you need them here in this world.
And so, he will come. And so, he says, come to me then and drink from me directly. Drink from me directly, and you’ll get it. That is the happiness of heaven, to have God, to be your all in all.
All the saints in heaven do not have houses and lands and money and meet and drink and clothes. You’ll say they do not need them. Well, why not? It’s because God is all in all to them immediately. That means directly. Now while you live in this world, you may come to live on God, and you may have much of heaven.
That is so important. I really desire that you get this principle in while there’s no one at stake. Because it’s really hard for me as a pastor to come and tell you this when the person has just died. So, it’s good for you to get this in your mind now that God is just as gracious and just as loving when that pipe is blocked off for good. He’s just as gracious. And he will give you what you need and continue to sustain you.
Also, sometimes these trials come. And if we grieve inordinately, we grieve like the pagans do, those that have no hope. Even though 1 Thessalonians 4 says we should never grieve that way it shows there was something wrong in our affection for that person, whether child, adult, parent, spouse. Something a little too much there, depending on them too much. And I think in that way it is a grace from God to show us how we were not truly supported by Christ and by God in that relationship. There’s a little bit too much affection. Some people think that’s what was going on with Abraham and Isaac, although the text doesn’t say that. But that Abraham just loved and idolized Isaac a little too much, and that is possible. So, it’s good for us to realize that our wants can be made up by God.
Another thing he says that he gets contentment from the covenant, and then in the next chapter he develops that a little more fully. The covenant is God’s promise to you in Christ. Now, we as Baptists don’t talk as much about the covenant as our Presbyterian brothers and sisters do. But what it means is the promise, that God has made us a promise, a binding promise in Christ. And those promises, that promise generally is a source of great blessing and encouragement to us. And the particular aspects of the promise are a great blessing and encouragement. And they’re in no way connected to circumstances. They don’t come and go. They don’t wax and wane. And so, you can kind of rest and abide in that covenant and get what you need from it.
He talked about having the kingdom of God within you. In Luke 17:20-21, it says, “Once having been asked by the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, ‘The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, “here it is,” or “there it is,” because the kingdom of God is within you.'” Now, the NAS translates the Greek, the kingdom of God is in your midst, meaning it’s here now. But that doesn’t fit the context here, does it? It says the kingdom doesn’t come when you carefully observe and look for it because the kingdom is an internal kingdom at this point. The kingdom of God is something within you. He’s working it out within you.
And so therefore what Burroughs says is you have a kingdom inside you. And that is a great source of encouragement. To say, all right, I’ve got a whole kingdom inside of me. Well, what does that mean? Well, think about it. Kingdom’s a rich and powerful place where you have all of your needs met, where you have a great King who’s watching over you. And so, we can take other promises and start to click in. All things are yours, right? The thing that’s been stripped from you, you’re going to get it back, only better in the new heaven and the new earth.
So, all things are yours. You have a whole kingdom within you. And you can go inward with the Holy Spirit and get everything you need to sustain you during that time of trial. The kingdom of God is within you. And so, Burroughs says, “A Christian, then whatever he lacks can make it up. For he has a kingdom within himself. Before death there is a kingdom of God within the soul, before death. Something you can enjoy now within the soul. Such a manifestation of God in the soul as to content the heart of any godly man in the world, the kingdom that he now has within him. He need not wait till afterwards, till he goes to heaven. But certainly, there is a heaven in the soul of a godly man. He has heaven already. Many times, when you go to comfort your friends in their afflictions, you’ll say, ‘Heaven will pay for all.'”
Isn’t that wonderful? When you’re there, you’re not going to say, yeah, but there’s still this outstanding bill from back then. You remember that? Remember that time, Lord? You won’t think that at all. You’ll think heaven will pay for any suffering that you went through. The apostle Paul says, “I consider that the sufferings that we are going through now are not even worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Romans 8:18). When some men and women are complaining so much and always whining, it is a sign that there’s an emptiness in their hearts. He likens it to a bottle that you blow across the top. You know that whistling sound you get across when you blow an empty bottle? When the bottles totally filled, you don’t get any sound at all as you blow across the top. There’s no air that can reverberate in there. And so, if you’re whining, moaning, groaning, complaining, you’re kind of empty is what you’re showing. You’re whistling under the time of trial; you should be filled up. And so, if your heart, it says, if your heart it’s filled with grace, you won’t make such a noise. So, you’re going to get supply from the covenant. The covenant in general and the particular promises of the covenant.
Look at Hebrews 13:5. I learned something new on this I’d never noticed. It says, “Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have. Because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you. Never will I forsake you.'” Now listen to what Burroughs writes, “To Joshua God said he will not leave him or forsake him, but in this place in the Greek, there are five negatives. I will not, not, not, not, and not again. That is the force of it in Greek.” I said, okay, I don’t believe it. So, I looked it up, and sure enough there is. There’s an ooh, there’s a May, there’s an Uday, another ooh and another maid that’s five. I counted them. I said, oh wow, that’s very strong. There are five negatives in a little sentence, as if God should say, I should have known better. The guy’s a Puritan writer. I mean of course he was right. And he looked it up, but I wanted to test it for myself.
And sure enough, there it was. It’s as if God should say, “I will not leave you. No, I won’t. I will not. I will not, no, I won’t. With such earnestness, five times together. So that not only have we the same promises that they had, but we have them even more enlarged and much more full. So, in the Hebrew it’s not as strong, in the Greek it’s even stronger. So, he says, okay, they had that. We have an even better promise. Hebrews 8:6, the ministry Jesus received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator superior to the old one. And it’s founded on what? Better promises. Isn’t that wonderful? So, God will never never forsake you.
I heard a story once, I don’t know if I’ll be able to recount it, but of a family that lost three children in four years. Three separate incidents, whether from accident or illness, I do not know. And their favorite song was How Firm A Foundation. And at the end you remember what it says, “That soul that on Jesus had leaned for repose I will not, I will not desert to his foes. At the end it says, “I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.” And they gave each one of their children’s names to one of those nevers. And how painful is that? Those of you who have children know what that would feel like to lose three children in three separate incidents. And you think, what kind of providence could that be from a loving God, and how severe a trial would that be? How severe, and would your Christian contentment survive? Would your faith survive? And God is going to sustain you through that. But what a terrible trial that was. And they were sustained. And God said, I’ll never, no, never, no never forsake you. And so, he sustains you through that time.
Also, page five, the Christian realizes the things of heaven. He has the kingdom of heaven as present. And the glory that is to come by faith, he makes it present. So, the martyrs had contentment in their sufferings. For some of them said, “Though we have had a hard breakfast, yet we shall have a good dinner for very soon we shall be in heaven.” What a great, great attitude. For them, they could just taste that heavenly meal. And they were ready to go. They were ready to suffer and ready to die. Because somehow their faith had made heaven so real to them, they could go with a good spirit to the stake or however they exited the world.
Heaven’s joys are very real to them by faith, and they can feed on them for constant contentment. A carnal heart has no contentment but from what he sees before him in this world. But a godly heart has a contentment from which he sees laid up for him in the highest heaven. So, we have a secret feast, we have an internal feast. It’s got to do with the promises of God. It’s got to do with spiritual things. You can see that they are not available for non-Christians. This is all faith stuff. It’s all the stuff of the soul. And so, the contentment we’re talking about here is utterly beyond the unbeliever. But it’s a secret delight in spiritual things that you trust and believe are going to be yours someday. Faith is the assurance of things hope for – you’re absolutely convinced that you’re going to have it someday, and so you can feast.
Faith is the assurance of things hope for – you’re absolutely convinced that you’re going to have it someday, and so you can feast.
That is the secret. Any questions about the mystery of Christian contentment? He’s gone through a variety of elements of the mysterious nature of Christian contentment. Before we get into how Christ teaches it, say, okay, sounds good. Teach it to me. Anything, any questions? Okay. Yeah, go ahead.
(audience) You mean content in reference to this trial but struggling in other areas? Well, I think it’s our experience that we’re not whole people. We’re not totally integrated yet. So that’s a great question. It reminds me of the bruised reed and the smoldering flax. And Sibbes said in every Christian at all times, there’s some light and heat, and there’s some smoldering and some smoke. And so even in this Christian contentment, we’re never perfectly content, never perfectly in this world. It’s something that we strive for just like perfection. That’s a great, great question. So yes, we can have in some way a strong measure of contentment in this big trial you’re going through. But meanwhile, some other things are irritating you along the way. and so it’s never quite perfect the way it should be.
That’s a great question. Alright, let’s look at how Christ, yes sure, Rick, (audience). That’s a good observation. I want to read something to you that is very interesting. This is the book. I xeroxed it so I could make lots of notes. I don’t like to write in the actual book itself. Then I could read it back years later and think, oh boy, what a strange note I wrote, and how wrong I was and all that. But I like to do this, I throw it away or whatever. But this is his very, very last statement here, Burrough’s final paragraph in the book. And it says, “Now there is in the text another lesson, which is a hard lesson. I have learned how to abound. I’ve learned how to feast. Of course I didn’t cover that,” he says in the book. “That does not so nearly concern us at this time because the times are afflicting times.” I don’t know what they were going through, but he was dealing with negative things, affliction, suffering, struggles. “And there is now more than ordinarily an uncertainty in all things in the world. In such times as these are few who have such an abundance that they need to be much taught that lesson. So, I’m not going to write on it.” But I’m saying this is kind of where we are. Do we know how to feast in Christ? Do we know how to prepare ourselves, how to receive good things from God and how to deal properly when there is an abundance? I think a whole other book’s needed. So that’s a very, very good question and I wrote next to it, oh, one more thing and that’s what he had at the end. Oh, one more thing we have to learn the secretive knowing how to abound in Christ too. And that’s a different art, really very good question.
That is, how could we be content and godly while everything’s going well? It says in scripture that fire and the furnace is for gold and silver, but a man is tested by the praise that he receives. When things are going well, that’s your test. So that’s a very good question.
Alright, let’s go on, page five, how Christ teaches contentment. “Paul needed to learn the secret of contentment and so must we. It is not basic Christianity but advanced. It’s time, then to enroll in Christ’s school of contentment. The first lesson is in fact the first lesson of the Christian life. And that is, take up your cross and follow me. That’s the beginning of the Christian life. If you don’t take up your cross and follow Jesus, you’re not a Christian.” And so, it is also the first step in the journey of true Christian contentment.
Take up your cross. It is the lesson of self-denial. Bradford, another writer said,
Whoever has not learned the lesson of the cross has not learned his A, B, C in Christianity. It is the first step in the Christian life. This is where Christ begins with his scholars, and those in the lowest grades must begin with this. If you mean to be Christians at all, you must buckle to this. This is the first lesson that Christ teaches any soul, self-denial which brings contentment, which brings down and softens a man’s heart. Such person has to learn to say these following things. Number one, I am nothing. Simply as a creature, I am nothing. Number two, I deserve nothing but hell. Number three, I can do nothing apart from Christ. Number four, I can receive nothing good apart from Christ. Number five, I can make use of nothing good that I receive. If I get a good thing, I’m going to waste it or use it badly. Number six, I am worse than nothing actually because of my sin. I’m not a morally neutral creature. I’m actually a sinner. And so therefore I’m actually worse than nothing. Number seven, if I perish, it will be of no insurmountable loss to God and his kingdom.
I’m not irreplaceable so to speak. And you say, wow, I mean do I really have to drink that? I mean those are seven seemingly very harsh statements. But my first question to you is are any of them untrue or unbiblical? If you look at them, are they untrue? No, they’re all true. But do we have to talk about them? Well, we’re talking about how to be content, right? Suppose you kind of imbibe the opposite, right? Suppose you say, I’m not nothing, I’m really something. I’m really something.
Therefore, God owes me much, right? And when you start buying into this kind of thing, Hey, aren’t I something? And I can do lots of things, and I’m very strong and able. And I deserve a good life, and I deserve contentment. And I deserve for you to recognize what a good job I did, and I deserve all of these things. Okay? You’re set up for discontent, aren’t you? Because you’re probably not going to get many of those things you think you deserve. And therefore, you will grumble and complain, and you’ll be discontent. So, the Puritan way I think is a biblical way. Humble yourself, drink this up, which is truth anyway. And then watch and see yourself freed from these desires able to be genuinely, truly content, genuinely and truly content. There was never any man or woman so contented as a self-denying man or woman.
No one ever denied himself as much as Christ did. He gave his cheeks to the smiters. He opened not his mouth. He was as a lamb when led to the slaughter. He made no noise in the street. He denied himself above all and was willing to empty himself. And so, he was the most contented man there ever was in this world. And the nearer we come to denying ourselves as Christ did, the more contented we shall be. The second way that Christ teaches contentment is to teach you the vanity of created things. What do we mean by that? The emptiness of created things. They were not made to fill you up. They were not made to satisfy you. I was talking to somebody about this earlier, and I said one of the things, one of the striking things about getting older, you start to see that the things of this world don’t taste that much to you anymore.
They’re really not all that thrilling. Whether all those things that you really loved when you were younger are not as exciting or stimulating anymore. And if you have nothing else, life itself will seem vanity of vanities. It’ll seem empty, it’ll seem dull. Nothing tastes. And I feel sorry therefore for non-Christians as they age. And they start to look around, and they’re ever searching for something to fill that void. The bottom line is created things cannot fill the void. That includes people, that includes material possessions, it includes positions of power and influence. It includes successes and victories and gold medals and trophies and all of the things that the world wants. They don’t ultimately satisfy because they don’t have the ability to fill your mind and your heart and your soul. The basic concept is nothing created can ultimately satisfy the soul. The soul was meant to feast itself on God.
Nothing created can ultimately satisfy the soul. The soul was meant to east itself on God.
When created things take God’s rightful place in our souls, we’ve become idolaters. And we are of necessity discontent. I like this quote. He says, “Many men think that when they are troubled and have not got contentment, it’s because they have so little of the world. And if they had more, they should be content. That’s just as if a man were hungry and to satisfy his craving stomach, he should gape and open his, hold open his mouth to take in the wind. And then think the reason why he is not satisfied and still hungry is he’s not got enough of the wind; he just needs more wind. No, the reason is because the thing is not suitable to a craving stomach. That’s not what it was made for. And if you’re just give me more wind, more wind, always taking in more and I’m still hungry and still yearning. Well, why do you think? It wasn’t made for that. God is for that. You were made for God. And so, this wind is not going to satisfy you. Very important. Christ teaches that lesson. You want to be content. Learn this lesson, the vanity of the creature.
Third, know the one thing needful. What do we mean by that? “‘Martha, Martha,’ the Lord answered. ‘You’re worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her'” (Luke 10:41). That’s the quote he gives. But really, actually what he zeroes in on is the one thing you need is salvation for your soul. That’s what you need. I mean this, I’ve always looked kind of as a quiet time verse. What you need is to sit at the feet of the Lord and learn from him. But where he goes and takes it, he says, the one thing needful is to have your sins forgiven on judgment day.
Now that’s what you need, okay?
Before the soul sought after this and that, but now it sees that it is not necessary for me to be rich, but it is necessary for me to make my peace with God. It is not necessary that I should live a pleasurable life in this world, but it is necessary that I should have pardon for my sin. It is not necessary that I should have honor and preferment, but it is necessary that I should have God as my portion and have my part in Jesus Christ. It is necessary that I should be saved in the day of Jesus Christ. The other things are fine, indeed. Fine house and income and clothes and advancement for my wife and children, but they are not necessary. One thing I need is salvation for my soul. I need Christ. I need forgiveness.
I like this illustration he gives us of the Roman general Pompey bringing a shipment of wheat to famine-stricken Rome, sailing through a severe storm, calming his men, saying, “We must go on. It is necessary that Rome should be relieved, but it is not necessary that we live.” Oh, that’s a striking attitude. How’d you like to be one of his soldiers, when it’s like. But that’s the attitude of a soldier, isn’t it? And you’re saying, I don’t have to have this, but Rome must have its wheat. And so, it’s a sense of priorities. And so also if we say, look, wait a minute, I have salvation already. Well, you have already gained the one thing you needed to get in this world. You have gained the salvation of your soul. You have received it as a gift. You have the faith, that is the victory that overcomes the world. You’ve got it already. What else is there? All the rest of the stuff you’re going to leave behind anyway. You’ve got it now. And so therefore you can be content. One thing is needful, says Jesus. That’s the thing you need.
Fourthly, you should know the relationship that you have to the world. Why did God leave you here? Do you ever wonder that I was saved over 20 years ago, justified by faith? What’s the point, right? I mean, why am I still here? What’s the answer? Why am I here, to glorify God? But how? I mean I can glorify God in heaven. I hope so, because heading there. Why did he leave me here? To witness? That’s one of the reasons. Anything else? He prepared works for us to do, good works, alright? And also, that I should work out my salvation with fear and trembling. He wanted to see me in a variety of circumstances glorify him and honor him.
And so, we do glorify God in a way we cannot in heaven. You realize that? You can give glory to God here on earth in a way you will never be able to do in heaven. And that is in the midst of suffering and trial and affliction, praise him and be content anyway. And so, in that way, we give a more perfect praise than the angels and the redeemed sinners in heaven do. It’s not perfect because nothing we do on earth is perfect, but we are in a perfect situation that they will never be in again. They were in while they were here on earth, but never again will they be able to do this. This is rather unique then, isn’t it? Our time on earth is short, and we don’t have all that many more big trials to go through. You say, oh, enough is enough. But God has measured them out, and there’s only so many you’re going to go through. And each one is a unique, special treasure, a jewel. A chance to glorify God in a way you will never get again, to say thank you Lord, I’m going to trust you through this. I praise you. I’m content. I’m going to stand firm and your promises, I’m going to do what I can to stay in you enough so that I can praise you from the heart through all this. And you’ll never get that chance again. That’s very unique, isn’t it? That’s a special time of praise. So, you should know your relation to the world. In Hebrews 11:13, they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. That’s what we are. “Dear friends. I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world to abstain from sinful desires which war against your soul” (1 Peter 2:11).
This is my own analogy here, but this picks up on what Burroughs says. One does not invest a lot of time redecorating or rearranging a hotel room that one’s staying in just for one night, right? I mean you get your flight nine in the morning, you kind of check in 10 at night. The picture frame’s crooked on the wall. What do I care? Brush your teeth and go to bed. Wake up in the morning, get your bag packed. Don’t even unpack; we don’t have time for that, right? And just go on and you don’t miss your flight, right? We don’t rearrange, say, boy, that bed would look better over there. You can’t move it anyway. But I mean, have you ever noticed about the headboards? They’re not real anymore. They just kind of screwed into the wall. They’re not actually part of the bed. But anyway, we don’t spend time redecorating the hotel room we’re going to spend one night in. Now for those of you that are very meticulous people, I said one night you say, if I’m here two nights now I’m going to fix that frame and I’m going to arrange it a little bit. I’m going to make it nice. Well, that’s you. At any rate, I don’t do that. But the point is we’re just passing through. Don’t get too comfortable here, and don’t try to make it all right. It isn’t all right. It’s a sin-cursed world. The creation’s groaning, waiting for us to be revealed. It’s not going to be perfect in this world.
Alright, fifth, E, top of page seven. Wherein the good of the creature is. He’s teaching us now. What are the lessons here? What is the good of the creature, the created things? Is there any good to it? We become just aesthetic people who don’t like anything in the world. We don’t eat any of the foods we like. We don’t wear any clothes we, we don’t like any people that we like because they might die. That’s not a way to live the world. Well then what is the right use of created things then?
And he says, Jesus teaches us contentment. We can use the world but not as though entranced by them. That’s part of that strange scripture that Paul gives us in 1 Corinthians 7:29, “Those who are married should act as if they were not married.” That’s an odd verse in 1 Corinthians 7 when he’s teaching clearly what God has joined together, let man not separate. What he’s saying is, don’t cling to her or to him as though you’ve got to have this person, or you can’t be alive. He says, in light of the present circumstances, don’t do that. They might actually be martyred next week. And so don’t hold on as though it’s something eternal. It isn’t eternal. And so, we’re moving through the world. And so, what is the proper use of the creature? The good of creature comforts or Christians is how they relate to God. That I may enjoy more of God and be made more serviceable for his glory in the place where he has set me.
This is the good of the creature. If God chooses to take them away for his glory and your growth, why should this be a cause of discontent? If discontent results, then did we not hold the earthly possessions? Did we hold them correctly to begin with and simply prove even more how much we needed to grow in this area? In other words, if it gets taken away, and you start to really struggle with it, you were holding onto it too tightly to begin with. And then he says, “God is most honored when I can turn from one condition to another according as he calls me to it.” Also, Christ says, you learn contentment by knowing your own heart. Know yourself. Study your heart. Discover where your discontent lies. If you’re discontent, probe in and find out why. What’s making you unhappy? What’s making you discontent? Learn about it.
Study your heart. Discover where your discontent lies.
Come to know what best suits your own spiritual condition. And learn what you’re able to manage and what you cannot. Sometimes wealth is removed because God felt you couldn’t properly manage it. So, if we come to understanding in the school of Christ we’ll not cry, “Why have I not got such wealth as others have?” But the Lord sees that I’m not able to manage it. And I see it myself by knowing my own heart.
In chapter six, he continues to teach contentment. He talks about the burden of a prosperous condition. So many of the things we set our hearts on in the world and that we want, when you get there, you find why did I want it? Why did I want that? Because with those things that people yearn for comes some additional earthly burdens that you would be free from if you didn’t have that, whether it’s wealth or a position of importance and honor and prestige.
Either way, you’ve got these four things facing you. You’ve got the burden of earthly trouble. More trouble comes because of these things. You’ve got the burden of danger. There’s more temptation. Satan has more to get at you with when you’re involved in more of the things of the world. The burden of greater responsibilities and duties. You just have more expected of you, “To him whom much is given, much is expected” (Matthew 13:12).
And that leads right to the fourth, the burden of a greater accountability on Judgment Day. I tell you for me, Hebrews 13:17, which says that, “Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They watch over you as men who must give an account, obey them so their work will be a joy, not a burden for that would be of no benefit to you.” I must give an account for all of you. In what sense do I have to give an account? I want out. And that kind of cuts off any kind of ladder climbing ambition that a pastor might have to go to a 10,000-member church. Why would I want to be accountable for 50 times more people than I’m accountable for now when I’m not sure at all, I’m going to be able to survive that accounting. How am I going to face that? The point is however, we don’t choose these things. God decides what will be, but there’s a cutting off of yearning for it.
Instead, Lord, make me equal to what you’ve already set me to. But this ambition, and forget the pastor, the whole angle, but there’s a lot of people in business that are yearning for an ever-bigger business. Or people materially yearning for bigger income, or people that perhaps want more children. That’s accountability. I mean, there’s all these things, and you yearn for them and want them. And with them come these four burdens every time. Could it be the Lord’s protecting you from the four burdens?
With Christ and the school of contentment. He also talks about the evil of being given up to one’s heart. Do you really want God to finally say yes to something he’s been saying no to all this time? To be given over to something that you wanted. No, I’d rather not. Let him wisely choose.
And then he talks about the right knowledge of God’s providence. The fact of the matter is that God is ruling over all things for his glory. Now, I’m not actually going to talk about this much. You can read it on page eight because the next book we’re studying, God willing next week, is The Mystery of Providence by Flavel. And so, we’re going to talk about providence. But I like this, “the efficacy of God’s providence.” Basically, God’s providence does what he means it to do, and you can’t stop it. And so, if you’re on a huge ship with big sails and that thing is really underway and it’s really moving, what good is your running around and trying to stop it by your running on deck? If you throw yourself against one railing or against the other, or stomp down on the deck, are you going to stop the ship of providence in any way, shape or form? No way.
And so, what’s the point in fretting and riling against what God is doing by his providence? He’s working out a big plan. And that big plan has big gears and little gears and little sprockets and all kinds of springs and you don’t understand it, but he does. And if you say, why do we need this? Throw it out. You can’t do that. It’s got to be there in its proper place at its right size, doing its thing. God knows what he’s doing. Trusting in God’s providence I think is a key to Christian contentment. Saying, there is a wise providence behind what I’m going through right now.
Then he talks about next the excellence of contentment. Now I already hinted at it, but you worship God more by this than when you come to hear a sermon or spend half an hour, an hour in prayer or any other thing you do. If you are in the midst of affliction and from your heart, praise him. this is a great honor to God. And it’s a great excellence of your own soul. Now, I kind of ruminate on this. Jeremiah Burroughs did not write about John Piper, or Jeremiah Burroughs did not, but I reflected on it.
One of Piper’s big statements is, “God is most glorified in us when, what?, we’re most satisfied in him.” Well, I started to work on that and reflect on what Burroughs was giving me here. Okay, Burroughs is saying there’s much exercise of grace. Now here’s the deal. God is most glorified in human beings, over all creatures, right? We glorify him in a way that rocks and animals and other things can’t. Secondly, God is most glorified in us when we’re most satisfied in him. We just said that a moment ago. But now third, we demonstrate clearly to him and to ourselves and to others that we are most especially satisfied in him when we’re deeply content in the midst of great sufferings and deprivations. Do you see that? It’s a great opportunity to live out the whole ethos of desiring God because everything else has been stripped away from you, and yet there you are praising God.
That means God’s what you want. He’s your treasure. He’s your pleasure. Everything else is gone, and yet there you are, content and joyful. It’s a great, great opportunity. Now, we don’t ask for what we trust God to give us, that providence at the right time. But I’m just saying this is a way to think. When you’re going in, you’re saying, I can greatly honor God by showing my love for him. The excellence of contentment. Also, the soul is fitted to receive mercy. These are just summaries. I didn’t have time to go through all these things. The soul is prepared to do service and delivered from temptations brings about abundant comforts. You can read this. I want to get to the evils of a murmuring spirit briefly. It gets the comfort of things not possessed, has the great blessing on the soul. A contented man may expect great reward. And by it the soul comes nearest the excellence of God.
Let me say something about that last one. Burroughs says that you are most like God when you’re like this. Because in this way you are somewhat disconnected from the creaturely world and content in yourself, although connected to God. Certainly not by yourself, but in this way you most imitate God and his eternal blessedness no matter what’s going on, current events on earth. If the world were totally annihilated, would God cease being blessed and happy? No, he was totally blessed and happy within himself before the world ever began. He’s been that way all along and will continue that way through all eternity. And so also, if you are in that blissful way,somewhat disconnected from your circumstances, able to be content to trust him, to rejoice like Paul and Silas in the prison singing praise songs when it makes no sense at all, you are most like God at that time.
And that’s a beautiful thing. And the excellency of the soul that can be like this. So, he set this out and he’s enticing us saying, look how excellent is this? Now we turn around and say, look how ugly and how repugnant is the murmuring spirit. And this is where I got convicted. Very, very convicting. The evils of a murmuring spirit. It shows corruption left in the soul. It shows a worldliness, doesn’t it? It shows an immaturity. It shows a lack of faith and a lack of trust. In effect you’re saying to Christ, who is, you could say, the husband of your soul, the spouse of your soul, you are not enough for me. He talks about Elkana and Hannah was barren. And remember what Elkana, her husband said, am I not worth 10 sons to you?
Why are you so sad? Am I not a good husband to you? Am I not worth 10 sons? In effect, Jesus, says Burroughs, comes to you in the midst of your murmuring and complaining and said, am I not enough for you? I’m not enough? You’ve got to have me and the circumstance you’re yearning for? That’s great dishonor to Christ, isn’t it? Christ was just not enough for you. It’s a mark of an ungodly man. Murmuring is accounted rebellion. Have you not read the stories of the murmuring in the desert? How many times did the Israelites murmur against God? What’s the worst? It’s at the waters of Massah and Meriba (Exodus 17), right after they had crossed through the Red Sea. It was the first time up to that point they’ve been kind of gladly obeying and all that kind of thing going through the Red Sea. And then they go to the other side and Miriam has her big celebration, Exodus 15. They’re all dancing and celebrating and by the end of the chapter, they’re murmuring against God.
Oh, that’s disgusting. Where is all their faith and their celebration? The same God who led them through Red Sea is now “he brought them through the Red Sea so they could die of thirst in the desert.” It doesn’t make any sense. And there they were murmuring, and God never forgot it. And it gets mentioned many times in the Psalms after that in the Book of Hebrews. It’s a big moment in Israel’s history. But here’s what Burroughs says. He really kind of turns the screws on us. He says,
The sin is in direct proportion to the greatness of the deliverance. They were delivered from a physical army through a physical Red Sea. You were delivered from your sins and from hell. Your deliverance is infinitely greater than theirs was. And yet you murmur just like they do. And so, it’s even worse for us who have received an even greater mercy than the Israelites did.
Yeah, I know that you’re all cringing, but I was too. I was reading this, and it was painful to me. And I said, oh my goodness, why do I complain? Why do I murmur? Why do I argue against God and not trust his providence? Give me another chance. He said, I will. So, I said, oh, I didn’t mean it. Anyway, yes, murmuring is counted rebellion. It is contrary to grace. Especially in our conversion. I should say conversion, not conversation. One of the things Burrough says is that we should be continually walking in the graces of conversion all the time, constantly. Now, I’m not saying we’re born again every day. I’m not saying that we’re only born again once. But I’m saying we’re continually walking in that “trust and obey” from the very beginning of our Christian life.
And one last thing he says, and I talked about this with some of the staff today. Murmuring, complaining against God is greatly beneath the Christian. It, it’s too low for you. Basically, what happens is every affliction comes to you and tells you in effect, lay down and I’ll walk on your back. I’ll trample you. And you do. You just go down like a spineless weakling. And the affliction, the trial just tramples you and walks over you. Rather, you should carry yourself like a son or daughter of the King, like a lion. When the affliction comes, you say, lay down, and I’ll show that I’m more than a conqueror in front of you. You lay down, and I’ll walk on you, hatever the affliction. I’m not talking human beings, don’t misunderstand. I’m talking about our struggles, not against flesh and blood, but against these trials and these temptations that come. And you say, lay down and I will be more than a conqueror through this. I will walk through it by grace. It’s greatly dishonoring to God for a Christian to murmur and complain in the midst of the trial.
Alright, that’s the end of our time. You need to keep reading this book. Alright? Would you not love to have the Christian grace of contentment in all circumstances? To be delivered from a murmuring, complaining spirit? Would this not be a great delight to you? One little thing. I read this, and I said, oh boy. Yeah, that’s good. He specifically addresses spouses. He says, wives, if your husband comes in and begins to complain and murmur, pray for him because he’s sinning greatly. Pray that God, that your household will be delivered from the just punishment of his complaining spirit. Wow, that convicted me. And husbands, if you hear your wives complaining and murmuring, you should get down on your knees in front of them and pray that your household would be delivered from the just punishment that the Israelites and all the others got for their murmuring. It’s a serious matter, is it not? And I said, oh my goodness, I underestimated this sin. May I never do it again, God. “Do everything without complaining or arguing” (Philippians 2:14), the scripture says. Deliver me from it. Let’s close in prayer. (prays)
