‘I have learned’ – contentment in every condition is a great art, a spiritual mystery – but mystery more in the sense of art/skill – something that you can be trained in and something that you can master with lots of practice.
Contentment is about self-sufficiency – not of ourselves, but a sufficiency of satisfaction in our hearts, through the grace of Christ that is in us. That is, like Paul, we are able to say (and mean it) that though we don’t have outward comforts and worldly conveniences to supply our necessities, yet we have a sufficient portion between Christ and our soul abundantly to satisfy us in every condition – i.e. we have Christ and so we are satisfied.
Burrough’s doctrinal conclusion briefly is:
That to be well skilled in the mystery of Christian contentment is the duty, glory and excellence of a Christian. [p.19]
He then tried to explain and prove the above conclusion through his four points:
Burrough defined Christian contentment like this:
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. [p.19]
(maybe kind of a child-like trust in God)
He then tried to “break open” the description under many many points – all of which are great!
His reasoning: “I shall break open this description, for it is a box of precious ointment, and very comforting and useful for troubled hearts, in troubled times and conditions.” [20]
I. Contentment is a sweet, inward heart-thing.
It is more than just holding peace outwardly (refraining from discontented expression yet inwardly bursting with discontent), but it is an inward submission of the heart (Psalm 62).
II. It is the quiet of the heart.
This quiet, gracious frame of spirit is not in conflict with:
1. a due sense of affliction.
Christ does not say, ‘Do not count as a cross what is a cross’; he says, ‘Take up your cross daily’. – That is, quiet spirit does not mean that you can’t acknowledge your afflictions for what they really are – afflictions!
2. making in an orderly manner our moan and complaint to God, and to our friends.
“Though not with a tumultuous clamour and shrieking out in a confused passion, yet in a quiet, still, submissive way he may unbosom his heart to God. Likewise … to his Christian friends, showing them how God has dealt with him, and how heavy the affliction is upon him, that they may speak a word in season to his weary soul.” [p.21-22]
3. seeking and praying for help in different circumstances or deliverance from present afflictions ‘because we do not know but that it may be his will to alter my condition’. But we seek help with such submission and holy resignation of spirit, to be delivered when God wills, and as God wills, and how God wills, so that our wills are melted into the will of God…
BUT, this quietness of spirit is opposed to:
1. murmuring and repining at the hand of God, as the discontented Israelites often did.
2. vexing and fretting, which is a degree beyond murmuring.
3. tumultuousness of spirit (confused, violently agitated spirit)
4. an unsettled and unstable spirit, whereby the heart is distracted from the present duty that God requires in our several relationships, towards God, ourselves and others. We should prize duty more highly than to be distracted by every trivial occasion. Christians should not be diverted by small matters from doing things for God, but should answer every distraction and resist every temptation.
5. distracting, heart-consuming cares.
“A gracious heart so esteems its union with Christ and the work that God sets it about that it will not willingly suffer anything to come in to choke it or deaden it. ….. A Christian … would not allow the fear and noise of evil tidings to take such a hold in his soul as to make a division and struggling there…… So a well-tempered spirit may…suffer some ordinary cares and fears…, so as to touch lightly upon the thoughts. Yet it will not on any account allow an intrusion into the private room, which should be wholly reserved for Jesus Christ as his inward temple.” [p.23]
6. sinking discouragements.
“God would have us to depend on him though we do not see how the thing may be brought about; otherwise we do not show a quiet spirit. … So far as your heart sinks and you are discouraged under affliction, so much you need to learn this lesson of contentment.” [p.24]
7. sinful shiftings and shirkings to get relief and help.
Our sinful hearts would have a tendency to think, ‘I do not care how I am delivered, if only I may be freed from it’. But we are to learn to be content to await God’s time and use God’s mean, to trust God and follow him fully in all things and always.
8. desperate risings of the heart against God by way of rebellion.
Need to watch out especially when an affliction remains for a long time and is very severe and heavy, and strikes at it were, in the ‘master vein’.
Summary:
Now Christian quietness is opposed to all these things. When affliction comes, whatever it is, you do not murmur; though you feel it, though you make your cry to God, though you desire to be delivered, and seek it by all good means, yet you do not murmur or repine, you do not fret or vex yourself, there is not a tumultuousness of spirit in you, not an instability, there are not distracting fears in your hearts, no sinking discouragements, no unworthy shifts, no risings in rebellion against God in any way: This is quietness of spirit under an affliction, and that is the second thing, when the soul is so far able to bear an affliction as to keep quiet under it. [p.25]
PS: I wasn’t sure if I should post a very thorough summary online, but it seems that the book is actually available to be read online. And is noted in one of the sites as belonging to public domain. I’m not sure how copyright works with this summary etc, but if you think I’m breaching it, please let me know and I will take this summary down. =)
