A30598:482
The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment
The rare jewel of Christian contentment wherein is showed, I. What contentment is, II. The holy art or mystery of it, III. Several lessons that Christ teacheth, to work the heart to contentment, IV. The excellencies of it, V. The evils of murmuring, VII. The aggravations of the sin of murmuring / by Jeremiah Burroughs.The rare jewel of Christian contentment wherein is shewed, I. What contentment is, II. The holy art or mystery of it, III. Several lessons that Christ teacheth, to work the heart to contentment, IV. The excellencies of it, V. The evils of murmuring, VII. The aggravations of the sin of murmuring / by Jeremiah Burroughs.
London: printed for Peter Cole, 1649
THE RARE JEWEL OF CHRISTIAN Contentment. › Sermon 11 › Consideration 10: The Tenth Consideration.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
The Tenth Consideration.
Yea lastly, Consider all the experience that you have had of Gods doing good unto 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 hath said he will ⟨p. 194⟩work good out of your afflictions, but we can say to you, that you your selves have found it so by experience, that God hath 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 thus with thy self, Lord, why may not this affliction work as great a good upon me as afflictions have done heretofore? Perhaps you may find many other considerations besides in your own meditations, these are the principal ones that I have thought upon: I'll one add one word more to this, of one that once was a great merchant and trades-man, and it happened one a time that he suffered ship-rack, and saith he, I never made a better voyage and sailed better than at that time that I suffered ship-rack: this was a strange speech (his name war Zeno) that he should never make a better voyage: it would be a strange paradox to you that are mariners, to say, that that's a good voyage when you suffer ship-rack: 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 unto his soul by it, so much soul-riches that he made account it was the best voyage that ever he had: and 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 hath 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;