What Does the Scripture Say?

Jeremiah Burroughs (A Puritan from the 1600s) preached eleven sermons on contentment. They have been compiled into an excellent book called The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. In this highly recommended book (you can read online HERE) Burroughs takes us through the definition, implications and application of Christian contentment. It was a blessing to read through and I thought I would post the same portion of text that I gave as a handout when I preached on 1 Timothy 6:6-8 a week ago.

Burroughs offers the following description: 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. That is the description, and in it nine distinct things have been opened up which we summarize as follows: First, that contentment is a heart-work within the soul; Secondly, it is the quieting of the heart; Thirdly, it is the frame of the spirit; Fourthly, it is a gracious frame; Fifthly, it is the free working of this gracious frame; Sixthly, there is in it a submission to God, sending the soul under God; Seventhly, there is a taking pleasure in the hand of God; Eighthly, all is traced to God’s disposal; Ninthly, in every condition, however hard it be and however long it continue.

The following is from the last section of The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by Jeremiah Burroughs called “How to attain contentment: Considerations to content the heart in any afflicted condition”

1. We should consider, in all our wants and inclinations to discontent, the greatness of the mercies that we have, and the meanness of the things we lack. I will 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 gifts and graces: Anthony asked him if he was not troubled at his want of sight. He confessed he was, ‘But’, he said, ’should 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 make angels glorious; is not that enough for you, though you lack what a fly has? And so a Christian should reason the case with himself: what am I discontented for? I am discontented for want of what a dog may have, what a devil may have, what a reprobate may have; shall I be discontented for not having that, when God has given me what makes angels glorious? ‘Blessed be God,’ says the Apostle in Ephesians 1:3 ‘ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places.’ It may be you have not such great blessings in earthly places as some others have, but if the Lord has blessed you in heavenly places, that should content you.

2. The consideration that God is beforehand with us with his mercies should content us.
I remember reading of a good man who had lived to fifty years of age and enjoyed his health for eight and forty years exceedingly well, and lived in prosperity, but the last two years his body was exceedingly diseased, he had the strangury, and was in great pain. But he reasoned the case with himself thus: ‘Oh, Lord, you might have made all my life a life of torment and pain, but you have left 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.’

3. 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 is a sea of mercy to swallow I up. If you pour a pailful of water on the floor of your house, it make a great show, but if you throw it into the sea, there is no sign of it. So, afflictions considered in themselves, we think are very great, but let them be considered with the sea of god’s mercies we enjoy, and then they are not so much, they are nothing in comparison.
4. The creatures suffer for us; why should not we be willing to suffer, to be serviceable to God?
This is an expression of the martyr, Master Hooper, which 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. Thus, the brute beasts must die, must be roasted in the fire, and boiled, must come on to 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 an abundance of alterations the creature undergoes to be made useful to me, to preserve me! Then, if God will do so with me for his use, as he subjects the creatures to me for my use, why should I not reset contented? If God will take away my wealth, and make me poor, if God will take away life, hack me to 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 distance between me and the creature, as between me and God!’
5. Consider that we have but a little time in this world.
If you are godly you will never suffer except 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.’
6. Consider the condition that others have been in, who have been our betters.
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, such a low condition was he in. The consideration of such things as these is 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 straits 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 so orders and disposes of things that they should be so low in their conditions and I so high? I know no reason but free grace: God will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy.’
7. Consider all the experience that you have had of God’s doing good to you in the want of many comforts.
It is true, when ministers only tell 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 bring it to contentment. Therefore think thus with yourself: Lord, why may not this affliction work as great a good upon me as afflictions have done before?
8. Be sure of your call to every business you go about.
Though it is 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. 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, in that he may have comfort whatever befalls him. God will look to you, and see you blessed if you are in the work God calls you to.
9. 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 lack ourselves. We think poverty to be such a great evil-Why? because it is so esteemed by others, rather then that people feel it so themselves, unless they are in an extremity of poverty. I will give you a clear demonstration that almost all the discontent in the world is rather from the fancies of others than from the evil that is on themselves. You may think your wealth to be small and you are thereupon discontented, and it is a grievous affliction to you; but if all men in the world were poorer than you, then you would not be discontented, then you would rejoice in your estates though you had not a penny more than you have. Take a man who can get but his twelve pence a day, and you will say, This is 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 would have no more then than you have now; therefore it appears by this that it is 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, do not let 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, our comfort should not 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.
10. Be not inordinately taken up with the comforts of this world when you have them.
When you have them, do not take too much satisfaction in them. It is a certain rule: however inordinate any man or woman is in sorrow when a comfort is taken from them, so were they immoderate in their rejoicing in the comfort when they had it. 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 are 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 mood because of such and such a cross, certainly your hearts were immoderately set upon the world. So, likewise, for your reputation, if you hear others report this or that ill of you, and you hearts are dejected because you think you suffer in your name, your hearts were inordinately set upon your name and reputation. Now, therefore, the way for you not to be immoderate in your sorrow for afflictions is not to be immoderate in your love and delights when you have prosperity.
11. My brethren, to conclude 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 doubt but then we should have much flocking to such a sermon, when a man should undertake to manifest to people how they should never be in want any more. But what I have been preaching to you now comes to as much.

You may have heard of the thesis called “Christian Hedonism” conjured up by John Piper. Folks who subscribe to this philosophy call themselves “Christian Hedonists”. Notice what is the main subject and what is the modifier in that phrase.

First and foremost the subject of the term is hedonist. That is, one can primarily be described as a hedonist (a person who pursues self-pleasure as their highest aim in life). Secondarily the adjective Christian is used. That is, “Christian” is the specific type of hedonist that one is. This type of hedonist has found that the one object that gives him the most pleasure is God. In other words, one is essentially a hedonist first and foremost with the term Christian simply being a modifier.

This can be shown to be true by simply turning the words around, i.e. if you were a “hedonistic Christian” you would first and foremost be identifying yourself as a Christian, the term ‘hedonistic’ is simply the type of Christian you are. In this instance, you could say you follow after or pursue Christ first, and the way you pursue Christ is hedonisticly.

But Dr. Piper has seen fit to say that he wants all men to be Christian Hedonists, i.e. become hedonists first and foremost (pursue your own happiness as your goal in life) and the best way to accomplish the goal of getting the most pleasure for yourself is to maximize your self-pleasure in God (now he gets to call it “Christian”).

In other words, Christian Hedonism is real hedonism at the core, foundational, heart-motive level. It becomes Christian because he has found that the best object to be happy in is God. To me that sounds like self using God as an object from a self-centered motive to achieve the goal of satisfying self’s desire for self-happiness.

Listen to John Piper’s description, “Those who know me best know that I am a Christian Hedonist. That means that I think my desire to be happy is a proper motive for everything I do. I do what I do because I think it will make me happier in the long run. In fact, I think that if I abandon this pursuit of joy, I will become incapable of worshiping and obeying God.”

Of course a Biblical Christian (or just plain old-fashioned ‘Christian’) is not pursuing his own self-pleasure at all, but rather makes it his ambition to please the Lord.

Rom 15:1-3 Now we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength and not please ourselves. Each of us is to please his neighbor for his good, to his edification. For even Christ did not please Himself; but as it is written, “The reproaches of those who reproached You fell on Me.”

2 Cor 5:9 Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him.

A plain vanilla ‘Christian’ is not concerned about his own happiness, yet generally receives tons of joy as a gift from the Lord, as a by-product of obedience and service to Him.

Let us endeavor to please God in all respects ( Col 1:10) and abandon the pursuit of our own pleasure with no fear of Piper’s man-made condemnation that we’ll be “incapable of worshiping and obeying God”.