The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11 by Thomas Watson. Excerpt 66

Watson points out that even unbelievers have grasped the idea that contentment does not depend on our possessions and position in society:

But let us descend a little lower, to heathen Zeno, of who Seneca speaks, who had once been very rich, hearing of a shipwreck, and that all his goods were drowned at sea: “Fortune,” saith he, (he spake in a heathen dialect) “hath dealt with me, and would have me now study philosophy.” He was content to change his course of life, to leave off being a merchant, and turn a philosopher. And if a heathen said thus, shall not a Christian much more say, when the world is drained from him, God would have me leave off following the world, and study Christ more, and how to get to heaven? Do I see an heathen contented, and a Christian disquieted? How did heathens vilify those things which Christians did magnify? Though they knew not God, or what true happiness meant; yet, they would speak very sublimely of a numen or deity, and of the life to come, as Aristotle and Plato; and for those elysian delights, which they did but fancy, they undervalued and condemned the things here below! It was the doctrine they taught their scholars, and which some of them practised, that they should strive to be contented with a little; they were willing to make an exchange, and have less gold, and more learning; and shall not we be content then to have less of the world, so we may have more of Christ? May not Christians blush to see the heathens content with a viaticum, so much as would recruit nature; and to see themselves so transported with the love of earthly things, that if they begin a little to abate, and the bill of provision grows short, they murmur, and are like Mich, Have ye taken away my gods, and do you ask me what aileth me? (Ju. 18. 24) Have heathens gone so far in contentation, and is it not sad for us to come short of heaven? These heroes of their time, how did they embrace death itself! Socrates died in prison; Herculus was burnt alive; Cato, who Seneca calls the lively image and portraiture of virtue, thrust through with a sword; but how bravely, and with contentment of spirit did they die? “Shall I (said Seneca) weep for Cato, or Regulus, or the rest of those worthies, that died with so much valour and patience?” Did not cross providence make them to alter their countenance? and do I see a Christian appalled and amazed? Did not death affright them? and doth it distract us? Did the spring-head of nature rise so high? and shall not grace, like the waters of the sanctuary, rise higher; We that pretend to live by faith, may we not go to school to them who had no other pilot but reason to guide them? Nay, let me come a step lower, to creatures void of reason; we see every creature is contented with its allowance; the beasts with their provender, the birds with their nests; they live only upon providence: and shall we make ourselves below them?

Let a Christian go to school to the ox and the ass to learn contentedness; we think we never have enough, and are still laying up: the fowls of the air do not lay up, they reap not, nor gather into barns. (Mat. 6. 26) It is an argument which Christ brings to make Christians contented with their condition; the birds do not lay up, yet they are provided for, and are contented; are ye not, saith Christ, “much better than they?” but if you are discontented, are you not much worse than they? Let these examples quicken us.

Thomas Watson lived from 1620-1686, in England. He wrote several books which survive. This blog, God willing, will post excerpts from his The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11, over a number of weeks, on Sundays.

My source for the text is here, and I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this text (and many others) available. The previous excerpt is here.
  
Philippians 4:11 Not that I speak because of lack, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content in it. (World English Bible, public domain.)

The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11 by Thomas Watson. Excerpt 30

Watson has been writing about excuses for not being contented. He continues:

The next apology is, the troubles of the church. Alas, my disquiet and discontent is not so much for myself, as the public! The church of God suffers.

I confess it is sad and we ought for this “to hang our harps upon the willows.” He is a wooden leg in Christ’s body, that is not sensible of the state of the body. As a Christian must not be proud flesh, so neither dead flesh. When the church of God suffers, he must sympathize; Jeremiah wept for the virgin daughter of Sion. We must feel our brethren’s hard cords through our soft beds. In music, if one string be touched, all the rest sound: when God strikes upon our brethren, our “bowels must sound like an harp”. Be sensible, but give not way to discontent. For consider, 

1. God sits at the stern of his church. (Ps. 46. 5) Sometimes it is a ship tossed upon the waves, “afflicted and tossed! (Is. 54. 11) but cannot God bring this ship to haven, though it meet with a storm upon the sea? This ship in the gospel was tossed because sin was in it; but it was not overwhelmed, because Christ was in it. Christ is in the ship of this church, fear not sinking; the church’s anchor is cast in heaven. Do not we
think God loves his church, and takes as much care of it as we can? The names of the twelve tribes were on Aaron’s breast, signifying how near to God’s heart his people are; they are his portion, (De. 27. 9) and shall that be lost? his glory, (Is. 46. 13) and shall that be finally eclipsed? No certainly. God can deliver his church, not only from, but by opposition; the church’s pangs shall help forward her deliverance.

2. God hath always propagated religion by sufferings. The foundation of the church hath been laid in blood, and these sanguine showers have ever made it more fruitful. Cain put the knife to Abel’s throat, and ever since the church’s veins had bled: but she is like the vine, which by bleeding grows, and like the palm-tree, which the more weight is laid upon it, the higher it riseth. The holiness and patience of the saints, under their persecutions, hath much added both to the growth of religion, and the crown. Basil and Tertullian observe of the primitive martyrs, that divers of the heathens seeing their zeal and constancy turned Christians: religion is that Phoenix which hath always revived and flourished in the ashes of holy men. Isaiah sawn asunder, Peter crucified at Rome with his head downwards, Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, and Polycarp of Smyrna, both martyred for religion; yet evermore the truth hath been sealed by blood, and gloriously dispersed; whereupon Julian did forbear to persecute, not out of pity, but envy, because the church grew so fast, and multiplied, as Nazianzen well observes.

Thomas Watson lived from 1620-1686, in England. He wrote several books which survive. This blog, God willing, will post excerpts from his The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11, over a number of weeks, on Sundays.

My source for the text is here, and I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this text (and many others) available. The previous excerpt is here.
  
Philippians 4:11 Not that I speak because of lack, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content in it. (World English Bible, public domain.) 

The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11 by Thomas Watson. Excerpt 26

Watson has been writing about excuses for not being contented. He continues:

The next apology is, I meet with very great sufferings for the truth.
Consider, 
1. Your sufferings are not so great as your sins: put these two in the balance, and see which weighs heaviest; where sin lies heavy, sufferings lie light. A carnal spirit makes more of his sufferings, and less of his sins; he looks upon one at the great end of the perspective, but upon the other at the little end of the perspective.The carnal heart cries out, takeaway the frogs: but a gracious heart cries out, “take away the iniquity.” (2 Sa. 24. 10) The one saith, never any one suffered as I have done; but the other saith, never one sinned as I have done. (Mi. 7. 7)
2. Are thou under sufferings: thou hast an opportunity to show the valour and constancy of thy mind. Some of God’s saints would have accounted it a great favour to have been honoured with martyrdom. One said, “I am in prison till I be in prison”. Thou countest that a trouble, which others would have worn as an ensign of their glory. 
3. Even those who have gone only upon moral principles, have shown much constancy and contentment in their sufferings. Curtius, being bravely mounted and in armour, threw himself into a great gulf, that the city of Rome might, according to the oracle, be delivered from the pestilence; and we, having a divine oracle, “that they who kill the body cannot hurt the soul,” shall we not with much constancy and patience devote ourselves to injuries for religion, and rather suffer for the truth than the truth suffer for us? The Decii among the Romans, vowed themselves to death, that their legions and soldiers might be crowned with the honour of the victory. O what should we be content to suffer, to make the truth victorious!
 
Regulus having sworn that he would return to Carthage, though he knew there was a furnace heating for him there, yet not daring to infringe his oath, he did adventure to go; we then who are Christians, having made a vow to Christ in baptism, and so often renewed in the blessed sacrament, should with much contentation rather choose to suffer, than violate our sacred oath. Thus the blessed martyrs, with what courage and cheerfulness did they yield up their souls to God? and when the fire was set to their bodies, yet their spirits were not at all fired with passion or discontent. Though others hurt the body, let them not the mind through discontent; show by your heroic courage, that you are above those troubles which you cannot be without.
 
The next apology is, the prosperity of the wicked. I confess it is so often, that the evil enjoy all the good, and the good endure all the evil, that David, though a good man, stumbled at this, and had like to have fallen. (Ps. 73. 2)
Well, be contented; for remember,
1. These are not the only things, nor the best things; they are mercies without the pale; these are but acorns with which God feeds swine; ye who are believers have more choice fruit, the olive, the pomegranate, the fruit which grows on the true vine Jesus Christ; others have the fat of the earth, you have the dew of heaven; they have a south-land, you have those springs of living water which are clarified with Christ’s blood, and indulcerated with his love.
2. To see the wicked flourish is matter rather of pity than envy; it is all the heaven they must have; “woe to you that are rich, for ye have received your consolation.” (Lu. 6. 24) Hence it was that David made it his solemn prayer, “deliver me from the wicked, from men of the world, which have their portion in this life, and whose belly thou fillest with thy hid treasure. (Ps. 17. 15) The word (methinks) are David’s litany; from men of the world, which have their portion in this life, “good Lord, deliver me.” When the wicked have eaten of their dainty dishes, there comes in a sad reckoning which will spoil all. The world is first musical and then tragical; if you would have a man fry and blaze in hell, let him have enough of the fat of the earth. O remember, forever sand of mercy that runs out of the wicked, God puts a drop of wrath into his vial! Therefore as that soldier said to his fellow, “do you envy my grapes? they cost me dear, I must die for them;” so I say, do you envy the wicked? alas their prosperity is like Haman’s banquet before execution. If a man were to be hanged, would one envy to see him walk to the gallows through pleasant fields and fine galleries, or to see him go up the ladder in clothes of gold? The wicked may flourish in their bravery a while; but, when they flourish as the grass, “it is, that they shall be destroyed for ever; (Ps. 92. 7) the proud grass shall be mown down. Whatever a sinner enjoys, he hath a curse with it, (Mal. 2. 2) and shall we envy? What if poisoned bread be given the dogs? The long furrows in the backs of the godly have a seed of blessing in them, when the table of the wicked becomes a snare, and their honour their halter.

Thomas Watson lived from 1620-1686, in England. He wrote several books which survive. This blog, God willing, will post excerpts from his The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11, over a number of weeks, on Sundays.
 
My source for the text is here, and I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this text (and many others) available. The previous excerpt is here.
 
Philippians 4:11 Not that I speak because of lack, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content in it. (World English Bible, public domain.) 

Sunspots 658

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Relevant lists five things we shouldn't say to our pastors.

Relevant also offers, and rebuts, several reasons why we don't volunteer.

Christianity Today reports that the government of Egypt is claiming that, for a Muslim, dying to protect a Christian church is worthy of martyrdom.


Computing: Wired has listed, with explanation, the most dangerous people (or groups) on the internet.

Health: (sort of) Listverse describes strange objects that have been removed from people's bodies. Very strange objects.

Humor: (or something) National Public Radio reports on Vanna White's 35th anniversary on Wheel of Fortune.


Politics: National Public Radio analyzes the number, and significance, of the laws signed by President Donald Trump, and compares them to laws signed by previous Presidents in a comparable period.

Science: Undark has posted an annotated list of misleading claims about science, by various politicians, during 2016,

Listverse gives summaries of the histories of 10 interesting numbers. I learned a number of things while reading this one.

I thank one of my brothers for suggesting some of these items!

Thanks for looking!

Image source (public domain)

Sunspots 649

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Christianity Today says that a Chinese pastor, of an unregistered church, has been arrested, with some of her family, for publicly proclaiming the gospel.

A Relevant writer has some good advice for those attracted, or hooked on, pornography, and other sexual sins.

Relevant discusses martyrdom, which is all too real for hundreds of Christians (almost all in other countries than the US) every year.

A Relevant writer explains the benefits of not agreeing with everything your pastor believes.

And another Relevant writer says that US Christians are NOT under attack.

(And Politics) Michael Gerson, himself a political conservative and a Christian, blasts those who sympathize with the Family Research Council's Values Voter Summit, for straying from Christian values. Writes Gerson: "Now, according to [Steve] Bannon, 'economic nationalism' is the 'centerpiece of value voters.' I had thought the centerpiece was a vision of human dignity rooted in faith." Bannon spoke at the Summit, and was apparently acclaimed.


Computing: Gizmo's Freeware mentions a program that converts Office files to .PDF. It apparently also converts Word files to epub files, too.
 
Health: National Public Radio reports that medical eye drops are bigger than they need to be, or than you actually absorb, and users are paying more because of their size.

History: (or something) Sojourners reports on the Samaritans of today. A tiny group, less than 1,000.

Politics: Scientific American documents how several appointees in the Trump administration are working to set aside scientific findings which show how industries of various kinds are hurting the public.

(and gender) A Pew Research poll finds that Democrats and Republicans have different views of how hard men have it.

Science: According to Scientific American, dodder, a parasitic plant -- you may have seen it, it looks like skinny spaghetti -- passes warning signals between plant hosts, allowing plants that may soon be attacked by insect pests to be better prepared.

Listverse shows us, and describes, 10 newly discovered species of animals.

Image source (public domain) 

Impressions, by Martin Wells Knapp, 50

In a previous excerpt, Knapp stated that there are four features of "impressions" from God. These are Scriptural; Right (consistent with good morals); Providential (in harmony with God's will); and Reasonable. His discussion of the result of living by "Convictions from Above" continues:

They Please God. Like Enoch, they walk with God, and have the testimony that they please Him because they "keep His commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in His sight." Even when they make mistakes, which through infirmity they are liable to, He does not frown upon them, because He knows they did not mean to, and judges the action by the intention. They prize His smile of approbation more than the plaudits of a universe without it, and this they have. They feel:

"Let the world despise and leave me,
They have left my Savior, too,
Human hearts and looks deceive me,
Thou art not like man, untrue;
And while Thou shalt smile upon me,
God of wisdom, love and might,
Foes may hate and friends may shun me,
Show Thy face and all is bright."

Sometimes the Father calls His children to a course which brings censure from worldings and chiding from friends, and then soothes the pain thus caused by loving caresses which He lavishes upon them when they are all alone with Him. A million fold repaid for their sacrifice, they exclaim:

"Blest Savior, what delightful fare!
How sweet Thine entertainments are!"

They are Inflexible, and Walk by Faith. In nonessentials they are as yielding as air, but in matters where God's will is clearly known they are as firm as granite. They belong to the class of whom it is said: "These are the men of whom martyrs are made. When the day of great tribulation comes, when dungeons are ready and fires are burning, then God permits His children, who are weak in the flesh, to stand aside; then the illuminated Christians, those who live in the region of high emotion rather than of quiet faith, who have been conspicuous in the world of Christian activity, and have been as a pleasant and loud song, and in many things have done nobly, will unfold to the right and to the left, and let this little company of whom the world is ignorant and whom it can not know, come up from their secret places to the great battle of the Lord. To them the prison is as acceptable as the throne; a place of degradation as a place of honor. Ask them how they feel and they will perhaps be startled, because their thoughts are thus turned from God to themselves, and they will answer by saying 'what God wills.' They have no feeling separate from the will of God. . . . Hence, chains and dungeons have no terrors; a bed of fire is as a bed of down."

Excerpted from Impressions, by Martin Wells Knapp. Original publication date, 1892. Public domain. My source is here. The previous post in the series is here.

Sunspots 607

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Relevant reports that a Christian is martyred for his/her faith about every six minutes.


Food: Listverse reports on 10 strange ways to make, and/or serve, ice cream.

Health: National Public Radio reports on a study that found that being the mother of a middle-schooler is more stressful than being the mother of a newborn or a teenager.

NPR also has a report on the state of knowledge of Alzheimer's.

NPR on how poor eating habits can impair your ability to think.

History: Listverse posts on 10 beautiful ancient maps.

Politics: Relevant reports that nearly 30,000 people have been the victims of violence in Venezuela this year.

Science: A simple, almost free solution to defrosting a car window quickly.

Listverse reports on 10 amazing inventions, inspired by structures and processes in living things.
Sports:


Image source (public domain)

Sunspots 584

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: “A man cannot live one hour a godly life unless by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Andrew Murray, Absolute Surrender, public domain.

Ken Schenck has a post (which does not refer to any particular person or situation) on the pitfalls that may beset church leaders.

Schenck also has an important post on issues Christians disagree on.

A Relevant writer says that it's no wonder that pastors of mega-churches often fall spectacularly, explains why, and says that it's also the fault of the rest of that church.

Relevant says that more Christians were killed for their faith last year than in any year in modern history.

Education: (And computing) NPR reports that students who use computers (and tablets) in college classrooms get somewhat lower grades on tests. (The test grading was automated, so there wasn't teacher bias during grading.)

Health: Listverse reports on 10 facts about the human skeleton.

Wired reports that experiencing racism threatens health.

History: Archaeologists are learning more about the Philistines (Goliath and Delilah were Philistines), but still don't know where they came from, according to National Public Radio.

Do you think that pink has always been a girl's color? Think again.

Politics: Wired says that some areas are un-paving roads, as a way of saving money, and of making terrible paved roads into not-so-bad un-paved ones.

Relevant says that the new UK Prime Minister is a committed Christian. God help her.



Image source (public domain)  

Excerpts from Orthodoxy, by Gilbert K. Chesterton, 23

Grave moderns told us that we must not even say “poor fellow,” of a man who had blown his brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and philosophic truth in the burial at the crossroads and the stake driven through the body, than in Mr. Archer’s suicidal automatic machines. There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man’s crime is different from other crimes—for it makes even crimes impossible.
Obviously a suicide is the opposite of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the universe. And then I remembered the stake and the crossroads, and the queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the crossroads to show what Christianity thought of the pessimist. This was the first of the long train of enigmas with which Christianity entered the discussion. And there went with it a peculiarity of which I shall have to speak more markedly, as a note of all Christian notions, but which distinctly began in this one. The Christian attitude to the martyr and the suicide was not what is so often affirmed in modern morals. It was not a matter of degree. It was not that a line must be drawn somewhere, and that the self-slayer in exaltation fell within the line, the self-slayer in sadness just beyond it. The Christian feeling evidently was not merely that the suicide was carrying martyrdom too far. The Christian feeling was furiously for one and furiously against the other: these two things that looked so much alike were at opposite ends of heaven and hell. One man flung away his life; he was so good that his dry bones could heal cities in pestilence. Another man flung away life; he was so bad that his bones would pollute his brethren’s. I am not saying this fierceness was right; but why was it so fierce?

Orthodoxy, first published in 1908, by G. K. Chesterton, is in the public domain, and available from Project Gutenberg. The previous post in this series is here.  Thanks for reading! Read Chesterton.