Jeremiah Burroughs :: Sermon Eleven

SERMON XI.

For I have learned, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content (Philippians 4:11).

Now we are coming to the close of this point of contentment that Jesus Christ does teach those that are in his school. We have opened the point to you, and showed you wherein the art, and skill, and mystery of Christian contentment lies, and many things in the way of application, rebuking the want of this. The last sermon, I finished that point of showing the several reasonings of a murmuring and discontented heart. I shall now, being desirous to make an end, leave what was said, and proceed to what remains. There are only these two things for the working of your hearts to this grace of Christian contentment:

First, the propounding of several considerations for the contenting of the heart in any afflicted condition.

Secondly, the propounding of directions what should be done for the working of our hearts to this.

Considerations to Work the Heart to Contentment

I. The Greatness of the Mercies We Have

We should consider, in all our wants and inclinations to discontent, the greatness of the mercies that we have, and the means of the things that we want. The things we want, if we be godly they are things of very small moment in comparison to the things we have, and the things we have are things of very great moment. For the most part, people are discontent and murmur for the want of, it is because they have not such things as reprobates have, or may have. Why shouldn’t you be troubled so much for the want of something a man or woman may have and yet be a reprobate? As that your wealth is not so great, your health not so perfect, your credit not so much, you may have all those things and yet be a reprobate. Now will you be discontent for something a reprobate may have?

I shall give you the example of a couple of godly men, meeting together, Anthony and Didymus: Didymus was blind, and yet a man of very excellent parts and graces; Anthony asked him if he was not troubled at this his want of sight. He confessed he was, ‘But,’ he said, ‘shall you be troubled at the want of what flies and dogs have, and not rather rejoice and be thankful that you have what angels have?’ God has given you those good things that makes angels glorious, is not that enough to you, though you want what thing a fly has? And so, a Christian should reason the case with himself, what am I discontented for? I am discontented for want of something a dog may have, that a devil may have, that a reprobate may have; shall I be discontent for not having that, when God has given me something that makes angels glorious? Blessed be God, said the Apostle in Ephesians 1:3, ‘that has blessed us with all Spiritual blessings in heavenly places.’ It may be you have not so great blessings in earthly places as some others have, but if the Lord has blessed you in heavenly places that should content you. There’s blessings in heaven, and he has set you here for the present as it were in heaven, in a heavenly place. The consideration of the greatness of the mercies that we have, and the littleness of the things that God has denied us, is a very powerful consideration to work this grace of contentment.

II. God is Beforehand with Us with His Mercies

The consideration that: God is beforehand with us with his mercies should content us. I spoke to this as an aggravation of our discontent, but now I shall use it as a consideration to help us to contentment. You lack many comforts now, but has not God been beforehand with you heretofore? Oh, you have had mercy enough already to make you spend all the strength you have and time you shall live, to bless God for what you have had already. I remember reading of a good man that had lived to fifty years of age and enjoyed his health for eight and forty years exceeding well, and lived in prosperity, but the two last years his body was exceedingly diseased, he had the strangury, and was in great pain. But he reasoned the case with himself therefore: ‘Oh Lord, you might have made all my life to have been a life of torment and pain, but you have let me have eight and forty years in health, I will praise your mercies for what I have had, and will praise your justice for what now I feel.’ Oh, it’s a good consideration for us to think that God is beforehand with us in the way of mercy. Suppose God should now take away your wealth from some of you that have lived comfortably a great while; you will say, ‘That aggravates our misery that we have had wealth.’ But it is through your unthankfulness that it does so. We should bless God for what we have had, and not think that we are worse because we have had this and that. We might have been always miserable, and certainly, that man’s condition is not very miserable that has no other great aggravation of his misery, but because once he was happy. If there be nothing else to make you miserable, then that is no aggravation that you may not bear it, for there is much mercy in that you had once. Therefore let that content you.

III. The Abundance of Mercies We Enjoy

The consideration of the abundance of mercies that God bestows and we enjoy. It is a saying of Luther: ‘The Sea of God’s mercies should swallow up all our particular afflictions.’ Name any affliction that is upon you: there’s a sea of mercy to swallow it up. If you power a pail full of water on the floor of your house it makes a great show, but if you throw it into the sea there is no appearance of it. So, afflictions considered in themselves, we think they are very great, but let them be considered with the sea of God’s mercies we do enjoy, then they are not so much, they are nothing in comparison.

IV. All Creatures Are in a Vicissitude

Consider the way of God towards all creatures. God carries on all creatures in a mutability of several conditions: as therefore, we have not always summer, but winter succeeds summer; we have not always day, but day and night; we have not always fair weather, but fair and foul; the vegetative creatures do not always flourish, but the sap is in the root and they seem as if they were dead. There’s a mutability of all things in the world, the sun does not shine always to us here, but darkness comes after light, now seeing God has so ordered things with all creatures that there is a mixture of conditions, why should we think it much that there should be a mutability of conditions with us, sometimes in a way of prosperity, and sometimes in a way of affliction?

V. The Creatures Suffer for Us

A further consideration is this: the creatures do suffer for us, why should not we be willing to suffer, to be serviceable to God? God subjects other creatures, they are glad to lose their lives for us, to lose whatever beauty and excellency they have to be serviceable to us; why should not we be willing to part with anything in way of service for God? Certainly, there is not so great a distance between other creatures and mankind, as there is between mankind and God. It’s an expression of that martyr, Master Hooper, that we read of in the Book of Martyrs: in laboring to work his own heart, and the hearts of others to contentedness in the midst of his sufferings, he has this comparison, and you may be put in mind of it every day: he said, ‘I look upon the creature, and see what it suffers to be useful to me. Therefore, the brute beasts must die, must be roasted in the fire, and boiled, must come upon the plate, be hacked all in pieces, must be chewed in the mouth, and in the stomach turned to that which is loathsome, if one should behold it; and all to nourish me, to be useful to my body, and shall not I be willing to be made anything for God, for his service? What abundance of alterations the creature comes under to be made useful for me, to preserve me. Then, if God will do so with me for his use, as he does subject the creatures to me for my use, why should not I rest contented? If God will take away my wealth, and make me poor, if God will take away my life, hack me in pieces, put me in prison, whatever he does, yet I shall not suffer more for God than the creature does for me. And surely I am infinitely more bound to God than the creature is to me, and there is not so much difference between me and the creature as between me and God.’ Such considerations as these wrought the heart of that martyr to contentedness in his sufferings. And every time the creature is upon your plates you may think, what! Does God make the creature suffer for my use? Not only for my nourishment, but for my delight? What am I then in respect of the infinite God?

VI. We Have Little Time in the World

Another consideration for the working of contentment is: to consider that we have but a little time in this world. If you be godly you shall never suffer but only in this world. Why, do but shut your eyes and soon another life is come, as that martyr said to his fellow martyr, ‘Do but shut your eyes,’ he said, ‘and the next time they are opened you shall be in another world.’ When he was banished, Athanasius said, ’it is but a little cloud and it will be over, notwithstanding, soon.’ These afflictions they are but for a moment. A mariner when he is abroad does not think it much if a storm arises, especially if he can see the heavens clear beyond it; he says, ‘It will be over soon.’ Consider, we have not long to live, it may be over before our days be at an end, but suppose it should not, death will put an end to all, all afflictions and troubles will soon be at an end by death.

VII. It Has Been the Condition of Our Betters

Consider the condition that others have been in, that have been our betters. We made some use of this before to show the evil of discontentment. But, further, to work this upon our hearts, it is a mighty argument to work upon our hearts a contentedness in any condition. You many times consider who are above you, but consider who are under you.

Jacob, who was the heir both of Abraham and Isaac, for the blessing was upon him and the promise ran along in him, yet was in a poor, mean condition. Abraham, that was his grandfather, was able to make a kind of army of his own household, three hundred, to fight with a king, yet Jacob his grandchild he goes over Jordan with a staff, and lives in a very poor and mean condition for a long time. Moses might have had all the treasures in Egypt, and as some historians say of him, Pharaoh’s daughter adopted him for her son, because Pharaoh had no heir for the crown, and so he was likely to have come to the crown. Yet what a low condition did he live in when he went to live with Jethro his father-in-law forty years together. Afterward when he returned to Egypt, he and his wife and children, and all that he had, and yet he had but one beast to carry him to Egypt; he went in a mean condition when he went from his father-in-law to Egypt back again.

And Elijah, we know how he was fed with ravens, and how he was pleased to shift his life from time to time, and run into the wilderness up and down; and so did Elisha, he was many times in a very low condition; the prophets of God they were to be hid in a cave by Obadiah, and there to be fed with bread and water; and the prophet Jeremiah put into a dungeon, and oh, how was he used! And it would be an endless thing to name the particulars of the great sufferings of the people of God. In former time, we have sometimes made use of this argument other ways, the great instruments of God in the first Reformation they lived in great straights, in a very low condition. Even Luther himself when he was to die, though he were a man of such public use, and was a great man in the courts of princes, he said, ‘Lord, I have neither house nor lands, nor estate, to leave anything to wife or children, but I commit them to you.’ And so Musculus who was a very choice instrument of God in his time, though he were a man that was worth even a kingdom for the excellence of his spirit, and learning, for he was one of the learned men of his time, yet sometimes he was forced to dig in the common ditch to get bread for his family. What would we do if we were in such a condition as these men were?

But, above all, set Christ before us, who professes that the birds of the air had nests, and the foxes had holes, yet the son of man had no place to hide his head in, what low condition he was in. The consideration of such things as these are very useful. It is likewise useful for men and women of wealth to go to poor people’s houses and see how they live, to go to hospitals, and to see the wounds of soldiers and others, and to see the lamentable condition that people live in who live in some alms–houses, and what poor fare they have, and what straights they are put to. You hear sometimes of them, but if you went to see them it would not only stir up charity in yourselves towards them, but stir up thankfulness in your hearts towards God, it would be a special means to help you against any discontent. You would go away and see cause to bless God and say, ‘If I were in such a condition as they are in what should I do? How could I bear it? And yet what reason is there that God does so order and dispose of things that they should be so low in their estates and I so high? I know no reason but free grace: God will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy.’ These are some good considerations for the furtherance of contentment.

VIII. We Were Content with the World without Grace, and Should Be Now with Grace without the World

A further consideration may be this: that before your conversion, before God wrought upon your souls, you were contented with the world without grace, though you had no interest in God nor Christ, why cannot you now be contented with grace and spiritual things without the world? If you yourselves were content with the world without grace, there’s reason you should be content with grace without the world? Certainly there’s infinitely more reason. Yea, you see that many men of the world have a kind of contentment, do not murmur nor repine when the world comes, though they have no interest in God and Christ. Then cannot you have as much contentment with God and Christ without the world, as they can with the world without God and Christ? It is an infinite shame that this should be so.

IX. We Did Not Give God the Glory When We Had Our Desires

Yea, consider when God has given you such contentment, you have not given him the glory. When God has let you have your heart’s desire, what have you done with your heart’s desire? You have not been the better for it, it may be you have been the worse many times. Therefore let that satisfy you: I meet with crosses, but when I had contentment and all things coming in, God had but little or no glory from me, and therefore let that be a means now to quiet me in my discontented thoughts.

X. The Experience of God Doing Us Good in Afflictions

Yea lastly, consider all the experience that you have had of God’s doing good to you in the want of many comforts. When God crosses you, have you never had experience of abundance of good in afflictions? It’s true, when a minister only tells men that God will work good out of their afflictions, they hear them speak, and think they speak like good men, but they feel little or no good; they feel nothing but pain. But when we cannot only say to you that God has said he will work good out of your afflictions, but we can say to you, that you yourselves have found it so by experience, that God has made former afflictions to be great benefits to you, and that you would not have been without them, or without the good that came by them for a world, such experiences will exceedingly quiet the heart and work it to contentment. Therefore think therefore with yourself: Lord, why may not this affliction work as great a good upon me as afflictions have done before? Perhaps you may find many other considerations, besides, in your own meditations; these are the principal ones that I have thought upon.

I’ll add one word more to this, of one who once was a great merchant and tradesman, and it happened once that he suffered shipwreck, and he said, ‘I never made a better voyage and sailed better than at that time that I suffered shipwreck.’ This was a strange saying, his name war Zeno, that he should never make a better voyage. It would be a strange paradox to you who are mariners, to say that it’s a good voyage, when you suffer shipwreck. But he meant because he got so much good by it; God was pleased to bless it so far to him that he gained so much to his soul by it, so much soul–riches that he made account it was the best voyage that ever he had. Truly, sometimes it is so, yea, to you that are godly I make no question but you find it so, that your worst voyages have proved your best, when you have met with the greatest crosses in a voyage, God has been pleased to turn them to a greater good to you in some other way. It is true, we may not desire crosses that they may be turned to other advantages; but when God in his providence does so order things, that you meet with bad voyages, you may expect that God will turn them to a greater good, and those that have been exercised in the ways of godliness any long time, I make no question, but they have abundance of experiences that they have gained by them. You know sometimes it’s better to be in a little ship, for they have advantage of greater ones in storms many times, in a storm a little ship can thrust into a shallow place and so be safe, but your great ships cannot, they must be abroad and tossed up and down in the storm and tempest, and so many times split against the rocks. And so, it may be, God sees there is a storm coming, and if you are in your great ship you may be split upon rocks and sands. God, therefore, does put you into a lesser vessel that you may be safer. We will lay aside the speaking of those considerations now, but I would not have you lay them aside and put them out of your thoughts, but labor (those especially that most concern you) to make use of them in the needful time, when you find any discontentedness of spirit to arise in you.

Directions to Contentment

The main thing that I intended for this exercise, is propounding directions what to do for the helping of our hearts to contentment. For, as for any further considerations, we have prevented the speaking largely of them, because we have opened the most things in showing what the lessons are that Christ teaches men, when he brings them into his school, to teach them this art. I say there we have spoken of the particular things that are most considerable for the helping of us to this grace of contentment. Therefore now all that I shall further do about this point, shall be the giving of some directions, what course to take that we may come to attain this grace of contentment.

I. There Must Be Grace to Make the Soul Steady

The first is this, all the rules and helps in the world will do us little good unless we get a good temper within in our hearts. You can never make a ship go steady by propping it outside. You know there must be ballast within the ship, that must make it go steady. And so there is nothing outside us that can keep our hearts in a steady constant way but that which is within us: grace is within the soul and that will do it.

II. Do not Grasp Too Much of the World

Secondly, if you would get a contented life, do not grasp too much of the world, do not take in more of the business of the world than God calls you to. Be not greedy of taking in a great deal of the world, for if a man will go among thorns when he may go in a simpler way, there is no reason that this man should complain that he is pricked with them. You go among thorns, is it your way? Must you of necessity go among them? Then it’s another matter, but if you will electively choose that way when you may go another, then you have no cause to complain. So for men and women that will put themselves upon things of the world that they need not, then no wonder they be pricked, and meet with that which does distress them. For such is the nature of all things here in the world, that everything has some prick or other in it. We are likely to meet with disappointments, and discontentment in everything we meddle with, and therefore those that have least to do in the world, that is, unless when God calls them to it, we must put in that, they are likely to meet with many things that will discontent them.

III. Have a Call in Every Business

Thirdly, be sure of your call to every business you go about. Though it be in the least business be sure of your call to it; then, whatever you meet with you may quiet your heart with this: I know I am where God would have me. There’s nothing in the world will quiet the heart so much as this: when I meet with any cross, I know I am where God would have me in my place and calling. I am about the work that God has set me. Oh, this will quiet and content you when you meet with trouble. What God calls a man to with that he may have comfort in whatever befalls him. God is to look to you, and to see you blessed if you be in the work God calls you to.

IV. Walk by Rule

And especially if I add a fourth rule, and that is: That I walk by rule in that work I am called to. I am called to such a business, but I must manage this work that I am called to by rule. I must walk by the Word, order myself in this business according to God’s mind so far as I am able. Then add this to the other, and then the quiet and peace of that soul may be made even perfect in a kind. When I know it is not the work I put myself upon but God has called me to it, and I walk by the rule of the Word in it, then let come what will come, God he is to take care of me there. It was a saying of a heathen: ‘If you will subject all things to yourself, do you subject yourself to reason, and by that you will make all things to be under you.’ I may add a little more to it: if you will subject all things under you, subject yourself to God, and then the truth is all things are under you.

It has been many times that we have hinted, the reason why many of our gentry have been so malignant among us is, because they are willing to be slaves themselves under some above them at court, so they may keep their neighbors under to be slaves to them, for, you know, any man heretofore that was great at the court, could crush any countryman that he was angry with. If there were an arbitrary–government, then all those that would be willing to be vassals and slaves to the Prince could make all other vassals and slaves to them. Now be you willing to be a vassal to God, to be absolutely under God’s command, and then I say all things in the world are under you. ‘All are yours,’ says the Apostle, ‘life and death,’ everything is yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s. All things in the world are serviceable to that man or woman that is serviceable to God. It is a mighty commendations of God’s service, be you willing to be serviceable to God and God makes all things in the world to be your servants, for so they are. You will say, ‘How are they my servants? I cannot command them.’ They are servants in this, that God does order them all to work for your good, there’s nothing in the world but, says God, it shall work for your good, and be serviceable to you, if you will be serviceable to me. Who would not be now God’s servant? Subject yourself to God, and all things shall be subjected to you.

Now so long as we keep within our bounds we are under protection, but if once we break our bounds we must expect it should be with us as it is with the deer in the park. While the deer keeps within the pale, there are no dogs come upon them, but they can feed quietly, but let the deer be got outside the pale, and then every dog in the country will be hunting after them. So it is with men, let men and women keep within the bounds of the command of God, of the rule that God has set them in his Word, and then they are protected by God, and they may go about their business with peace and never be troubled for anything, but cast all their care upon God. God provides for them, but if they will go beyond the pale, if they will pass their bounds then they may expect to meet with troubles, and afflictions, and discontent. And therefore this is a fourth direction: walk by rule.

V. Exercise Much Faith

A fifth rule is this, exercise much faith, that is the way for contentedness. After you have done with all considerations that reason may suggest to you, if you find that these do not do it, oh then, call for grace of faith. A man may go very far with the use of reason alone to help him to contentment, but when reason is at a non–plus then set faith a work. It was a saying of the reverend divine, Master Perkins, that God made so instrumental in his time: ‘The life of faith,’ he said, ‘it is a true life indeed, the only life.’ Exercise faith not only in that promise that all shall work together for good to them that fear God, but likewise exercise faith in God himself; as well as in his Word, in the attributes of God. It was a saying of Socrates a heathen: he said, ‘Since God is so careful for you, what need you be careful for anything yourselves?’ It was a strange saying of a heathen.

Oh Christian, if you have any faith, in the time of extremity think: this is the time that God calls for the exercise of faith, what can’t you do with your faith if you cannot quiet your heart in discontent. It was the saying of one Theodosius that had been a king, and afterwards was brought to such a low condition to get his living by being a school–master, one comes and asks him, ‘What have you got by your philosophy from Plato and others?’ ‘What have I got,’ he said, ‘I have got this, that though my condition be changed from so high a condition to so low, yet I have got this, I can be content.’ So, what does you get by being a believer, a Christian? What can’t you do by your faith? I can do this, I can in all estates cast my care upon God, cast my burden upon God, I can commit my way to God in peace, faith can do this. Therefore when reason can go no higher, let faith get upon the shoulders of reason and say, ‘I see land though reason cannot see it, I see good that will come out of all this evil.’

Exercise faith by often resigning yourself to God, in giving of yourself up to God and his ways. The more you in a believing way surrender up yourself to God, the more quiet and peace will you have.

VI. Labor to Be Spiritually-Minded

The sixth direction for contentment is, to labor to be spiritually minded. That is, be often in meditation of the things that are above. ‘If we be risen with Christ,’ say the Scriptures, ‘let us seek the things that are above, where Christ is that sits at the right hand of God.’ Be much in spiritual thoughts, in conversing with things above. Many Christians that have an interest in the things of heaven yet converse but very little with them, their meditations are not much upon heavenly things. It is that which some give as the reason why Adam did not see his nakedness, they think that he had so much converse with God and with things above since, that he did not so much mind or think of what nakedness was. Whether that were so or no I will not say, but this I say, and am certain of, the reason why we are so troubled with our nakedness, with any wants that we have, is because we converse so little with God, so little with spiritual thing; the conversing with spiritual things would lift us above the things of the world. Those that are bit or stung with a snake, it is because they tread upon the ground, if they could be lifted up above the earth they need never fear to be stung with the snakes that are crawling underneath. So I may compare the sinful disorder of murmuring, and the temptations and evils that comes from that to be like snakes that crawl up and down below; but if we could get higher we should not be stung by them. A heavenly conversation is the way for contentment.

VII. Promise Not Yourselves Great Things

A seventh rule is, do not promise to yourselves too much beforehand, do not make account of too great things. It is good for us to take hold very low, and not think to pitch too high. Do not soar too high in your thoughts beforehand, to think, oh if I had this and this, and imagine great matters to yourselves; but be as good Jacob: you know he was a man that lived a very contented life in a mean condition, he said, Lord if I may but have clothes to put on, and meat to eat. He looked no higher, he was content with that. So if we would not pitch our thoughts high and think that we might have what others have, so much and so much, when we meet with disappointments we would not be so much troubled. So Paul says, If we have but meat and drink and clothing, let us be therewith content. He did not soar too high aloft. Those that look at high things in the world they meet with disappointments and so they come to be discontent. Be as high as you will in spiritual meditations; God gives liberty there to any one of you to be as high as you will, above angels. But for your outward estate God would not have you aim at high things; ‘Seeketh thou great things?’ said the Lord to Baruch, ‘seek them not, you shall have your life for a prey’ (Jeremiah 45:5). In these times especially, it were a very great evil for any to aim at great things; ‘seek them not,’ be willing to take hold low, and to creep low, and if God does raise you, you shall have cause to bless him, but if you should not be raised there would not be much trouble. One that creeps low cannot fall far, but it is those that are on high whose fall does bruise them most. That is a good rule. Promise not yourselves great matters, neither aim at any great things in the world.

VIII. Get Hearts Mortified to the World

Labor to get your hearts mortified to the world, dead to the world. We must not content ourselves that we have gotten some reasoning about the vanity of the creature, and such kind of things as these are, but we must exercise mortification, and be crucified to the world. Paul said, I die daily, we should die daily to the world. We are baptized into the death of Christ, that is to signify that we have taken such a profession as to profess to be even as dead men to the world. Now there’s no crosses that fall out into the world that troubles those that are dead; if our hearts were dead to the world we should not be much troubled with the changes of the world, nor the tossings about of worldly things. As it is very observable in those soldiers that came to break the bones of Christ, they broke the legs of one that was crucified with him, and of the other, but when they came to Christ they found he was dead, and so they did not break his legs. There was a providence in it, to fulfill a prophesy, but because they found he was dead they did not break his bones. Let afflictions and trouble find you with a mortified heart to the world and they will not break your bones; the bones of those that are broken by crosses and afflictions are those that are alive to the world, who are not dead to the world. But one that has a mortified heart and dead to the world, no afflictions or troubles will break the bones of such a one, that is, they will not be very grievous or painful to such a one as is mortified to the world. This, I fear, is a mystery and riddle to many, for one to be dead to the world, to be mortified to the world. Now it is not my work to open to you what mortification is, or death to the world is, but only, to have our hearts so taken off from the things of the world, as to use them as if one used them not, not to make account that our lives, our comforts, our happiness does consist in these things. They are things that are of another nature that our happiness does consist in, and we may be happy without these: this is a kind of deadness to the world.

IX. Pore Not Too Much on Afflictions

Let not men and women pore too much upon their afflictions, that is, busy their thoughts too much to look down into their afflictions. You shall have many people where their thoughts are taken up about what their crosses and afflictions are, they are altogether thinking and speaking of them. It’s just with them as with a child that has a sore: his finger is always upon the sore; and so men and women’s thoughts are always upon their afflictions. When they awake in the night their thoughts are upon their afflictions, and when they converse with others, nay it may be when they are praying to God, they are thinking of their afflictions. Oh! No marvel though you live a discontented life, if your thoughts be always poring upon such things. You should rather labor to have your thoughts upon those things that may comfort you. You shall have many that, if you propound any rule to them to do them good, they take it well while they are with you, and thank you for it, but when they are gone they soon forget it. It is very observable of Jacob, that when his wife died in child–birth, his wife called the child Ben–oni, that is, a son of sorrows. Now Jacob, he thought with himself, if I should call this child Ben–oni, every time that I name him it will put me in mind of the death of my dear wife, and of that affliction, and that will be a continued affliction to me. Therefore, I will not have my child have that name; and so the text said, Jacob called his name Benjamin, and that was, the son of my right hand. Now this is to show us much, that when afflictions befalls us we should not give way to have our thoughts continually upon them, but rather upon those things that may stir up our thankfulness to God for mercies.

There is comparison of Basil, a learned man, faith he: It is in this case as it is with men and women that have sore eyes: now it’s not fit for those to be always looking upon the fire, or upon the beams of the sun. ‘No’, said he, ‘one that has sore eyes must get things that are suitable to him, and such objects as are fit for one that has such weak eyes.’ Therefore they will get green colors, as that being a more easy color and better for weak eyes, and they will hang green garnets before their eyes because it is more suitable to them. So weak spirits it’s the very same, a man or woman that has a weak spirit, they must not be looking upon the fire of their afflictions, upon those things that deject, that cast them down, but they are to be looking rather upon that which may be suitable for the healing and helping of them. They should be considering of those things rather than the other. It will be of very great use and benefit to you if you do lay it to heart, not to be poring always upon afflictions, but upon mercies.

X. Make A Good Interpretation of God’s Ways to You

I beseech you observe this, though you should forget many others: Make a good interpretation of God’s ways towards you. If there can be any good interpretation made of God’s ways towards you, make it. You think it much if you have a friend that should always make bad interpretations of your ways towards him; you would take that badly. If you should converse with people that you cannot speak a word, but they are ready to make an bad interpretation of it, and take it in an ill sense, you would think their company to be very tedious to you. It is very tedious to the Spirit of God when we make such bad interpretations of his ways towards us. When God deals with us otherwise than we would have him do, if there can be any sense worse than another made of it, we will be sure to do it. Therefore, when an affliction does befall you, there may be many good senses made of God’s works towards you. You should think therefore: ‘It may be, God intends only to try me by this, it may be, God saw my heart was too much set upon the creature, and so intends to show me what is in my heart, it may be, that God saw that if my wealth did continue, I should fall into sin, that the better my estate were the worse my soul would be, it may be, God intended only to exercise some grace, it may be, God intends to prepare me for some great work which he has for me’: therefore you should reason.

But we, on the contrary make bad interpretations of God’s therefore dealing with us, and say, ‘God does not mean this, surely the Lord means by this to manifest his wrath and displeasure against me, and this is but a furtherance of further evils that he intends towards me.’ Just as they did in the wilderness: God hath brought us hither to slay us. This is the worst interpretation that possibly you can make of God’s ways; oh, why will you make these worst interpretations when there may be better? In 1 Corinthians 13:5, when the Scripture speaks of love, it says, ‘Love thinketh no evil.’ Love is of that nature that if there may be ten interpretations made of a thing, nine of them be bad and one good, love will take that which is good and leave the other nine. So though there might be ten interpretations presented to you concerning God’s ways towards you, and if but one be good and nine bad, you should take that one that is good and leave the other nine.

I beseech you consider, God does not deal by you as you deal with him. Should God make the worst interpretation of all your ways towards him, as you do of his towards you it would be very ill with you. God is pleased to manifest his love therefore to us, to make the best interpretations of what we do, and therefore it is, that God puts a sense upon the actions of his people that one would think could hardly be. Therefore, God is pleased to call those perfect that have but any uprightness of heart in them, he accounts them perfectly, ‘Be ye perfect as your heavenly father is perfect’: uprightness in God’s sense is perfection. Now alas when we look into our own hearts, we can scarce see any good at all there, and yet God is pleased to make such an interpretation as to say, it is perfect. When we look into our own hearts we can see nothing but uncleanness; God calls you his saints, he calls the meanest Christian that has the least grace under the greatest corruption his saint. You say, we cannot be saints here, but yet in God’s esteem we are saints. You know the usual title the Holy Ghost gives, in several of the Epistles, to those that had any grace, any uprightness, is, to the Saints in such a place; you see what an interpretation God puts upon them, they are saints to him. And so I might name in many other particulars, God makes the best interpretation of things, if there be abundance of evil and a little good, God rather passes by the evil and takes notice of the good.

Sometimes I have made use of a very observable place in Peter, concerning Sarah, Sarah had a saying to her husband in Genesis 18:12, she called her husband ‘lord.’ There was only that one good word in an bad, unbelieving saying; but yet when the Apostle mentions that saying in 1 Peter 3:6, the Holy Ghost leaves all the bad, and commends her for calling her husband ‘lord,’ for putting a reverent title upon her husband. Thus how graciously does God deal with us! If there be but one good word among a great many bad, what an interpretation God makes! So should we do, if there be but any one good interpretation that we can make of a thing we should rather make use of the good one than of the bad. Oh my brethren, (I would I could now speak only to such as are godly), retain good thoughts of God, take heed of judging God to be a hard master, make good interpretations of his ways, and that’s a special means to help you to contentment in all your courses.

XI. Do Not Regard the Fancies of Other Men

Do not so much regard the fancies of other men, as what indeed you feel yourselves. For the reason of our discontentment many times, is rather from the fancies of other men than from what we find we want ourselves. We think poverty to be such a great evil, why? Because it is so esteemed by others, more than what people feel in it themselves unless they be in extremity of poverty: I’ll give you an evident demonstration that almost all the discontent in the world is rather from the fancies of others than from the evil that is upon themselves. You that think your wealth to be low and you are thereupon discontent, and it is a grievous affliction to you, but if all men in the world were poorer than you, then you would not be discontent. You would rejoice in your wealth though you had not a penny more than you have. Take a man that can get but his twelve pence a day, and you will say, ‘This were but a poor thing to maintain a family.’ But suppose there were no man in the world that had more than this, yea that all other men but yourselves had somewhat less wages than you, then you would think your condition pretty good. You should have no more then than you have now; therefore it appears by this that it’s rather from the fancies of other men than what you feel that makes you think your condition to be so grievous, for if all the men in the world looked upon you as happy, more happy than themselves then you would be contented. Oh, let not your happiness depend upon the fancies of other men. There is a saying of Chrysostom I remember in this very case: ‘Let us not make the people in this case to be our lords, as we must not make men to be the lords of our faith, so not the lords of our comforts.’ That is, that our comfort should depend more upon their imaginations, than upon what we feel in ourselves. It may be, others think you to be in an afflicted condition, yea but I thank God, for myself I do not so apprehend it. Were it not for the disgrace, disesteem and slighting of other men, my condition would not be so bad to me as it is now. This is that which makes my condition afflictive.

XII. No Not Be Inordinately Taken up with the Comforts of the World

Be not inordinately taken up with the comforts of this world when you have them. When you have them do not take too much content in them: that’s a certain rule that, look how inordinate any man or woman is in sorrow when a comfort is taken from them, so much immoderate were they in their rejoicing in the comfort when they had it: as now for instance, God takes away a child and you are inordinately sorrowful, beyond what God allows in a natural or Christian way, now though I never knew before how your heart was towards the child, yet when I see this, (though you be a mere stranger to me) I may without breach of charity conclude that your heart was immoderately set upon your child or husband, or upon any other comfort that I see you grieving for when God has taken it away. If you hear ill tidings about your estates, and your hearts are dejected immoderately, and you are in a discontented way because of such and such a cross, certainly your hearts were immoderately set upon the world. So, likewise, for your credit, if you hear others report this or that ill of you, and your hearts are dejected because you think you suffer in your name, your hearts were inordinately set upon your name and credit. Now therefore the way for you not to be immoderate in your sorrows for afflictions, it is not to be immoderate in your love and delights when you have prosperity. And these are the principal directions for our help that we may live quiet and contented lives.

My brethren, to conclude all for this point, if I were to tell you that I could show you a way never to be in want of anything, I do not question but then we should have much flocking to such a sermon, when a man should undertake to manifest to people that they should never be in want any more. But what I have been preaching to you now comes to as much. It countervails this, that is in effect all one. Is it not almost all one, never to be in want, or never to be without contentment? That man or woman who is never without a contented spirit, truly can never be said to want much. Oh, the Word holds forth a way full of comfort and peace to the people of God even in this world. You may live happy lives in the midst of all the storms and tempests in the world. There is an ark that you may come into, and no men in the world may live such comfortable, cheerful, and contented lives as the saints of God. Oh, that we had learned this lesson.

I have given many sermons about this lesson of contentment, but I am afraid that you will be longer in learning it than I have been preaching of it; it is a harder thing to learn it than it is to speak or preach of it. I remember I have read of one man reading of that place in the 39th Psalm [Psalm 39:1], ‘I will take heed that I offend not with my tongue’: he said, ‘I have been these thirty–eight years a learning this lesson and have not learned it thoroughly.’ The truth is, there are many, I am afraid, who have been professors near thirty–eight years, who have hardly learned this lesson. It would be a good lesson, for young professors to begin to learn this early. But this lesson of Christian contentment is as hard, and perhaps you may be many years in learning it. I am afraid there are some Christians who have not yet learned not to offend grossly with their tongues. The Scripture says that all a man’s religion is vain if he cannot bridle his tongue; therefore one would think that those who make any profession of godliness should quickly learn this lesson, such a lesson that, unless learned, makes all their religion vain. But this lesson of Christian contentment may take more time to learn, and there’s many who are learning it all the days of their lives and yet are not proficient. But God forbid that it should be said of any of us concerning this lesson, as the Apostle says of widows, in Timothy, That they were ever learning, and never came to the knowledge of the truth. Oh let us not be ever learning this lesson of contentment and yet never come to have skill in it. You would think it much if you had been at sea twenty years, and yet have attained to no skill in your art of navigation; you will say, I have used the sea twenty or thirty years and I hope I may know by this time what belongs to the sea. Oh, that you would but say so in respect of the art of Christianity! When anything is spoken concerning the duty of a Christian, oh, that Christians could but say, I have been a Christian so long, and I hope I am not wanting in a thing that is so necessary for a Christian. Here is a necessary lesson for a Christian, that Paul said, ‘he had learned in all estates therewith to be content.’ Oh, do not be content with yourselves till you have learned this lesson of Christian contentment, and have obtained some better skill in it than heretofore.

Now there is in the text another lesson, which is a hard lesson: ‘I have learned to abound.’ That does not so nearly concern us at this time, because the times are afflictive times, and there is now, more than ordinary, an uncertainty in all things in the world. In such times as these are, there are few who have such an abundance that they need to be taught in that lesson.

FINIS.