PHILIPPIANS. 4.11.1For I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.
I Shall only adde one lesson more in the learning of Contentment, & then I shal come to the Fourth Head, The excellency of Contentment.
The Ninth and last lesson that Christ teaches those that he doth instruct in this Art of Contentment, It is the right knowledge of Gods providence, and therein are these Four things.
1 The universality of providence, that the Soul must be throughly instructed in to come to this Art, to understand the universality of providence, that is; how the providence of God goes through the whole world, extends it’s self to every thing: Not only that God by his providence doth rule the world, and govern all things in generall, but that it reaches to every particular, not only to Kingdoms, to order the great affairs of Kingdoms, but it reaches to every mans family, it reaches to every person in the family, it reaches to every condition, yea to every passage, to every thing that fals out concerning thee in every particular, not one hair falleth from thy head, not a Sparrow to the ground without the providence of God. There’s nothing befals thee good or evill, but there is a providence of the infinite eternal First-Being in that thing, and therein indeed is Gods infinitnesse, that it reaches to the least things, to the least worm that is under thy feet: Then much more it reaches unto thee that art a rationall creature, the providence of God is more special towards rational creatures than any others: The understanding in a spiritual way the universality of providence in every particular passage from morning to night every day; that there’s not any thing that doth befall thee but there’s a hand of God in it, it is from God, it is a mighty furtherance to Contentment. Every man will grant the truth of the thing that it is so, but as the Apostle saith in Heb. 11.3. By faith we understand that the worlds were made, by faith we understand it: why by faith? we can understand by reason that no finit thing can be from it selfe, And therefore that the world could not be of it’s self, but we can understand it by faith in another manner than by reason. So whatsoever we understand of God in way of providence, yet when Christ doth take us into his School we come to understand it by faith in a better manner than we do by reason.
2 The efficacy that there is in providence; that is, That the providence of God goes on in all things with strength and power, and it is not to be altered by our power; let us be discontented and vext and troubled, and fret, and rage, yet we must not think to alter the course of providence by our discontent. Some of Jobs friends said to him, Shall the earth be forsaken for thee, and shall the rock be removed out of his place? Job, 18.4. when they saw him to be impatient. So I may say to every discontented impatient heart, what shall the providence of God change it’s course for thee? Do’st thou think it such a weak thing that because it doth not please thee it must alter it’s course? be thou content or not content, the providence of God will go on, it hath an efficacie of power, of vertue, to carry all things before it: Canst thou make one hair black or white with all the stir that thou keepest? When you are in a ship at Sea that hath all her sails spread with a full gale of wind, and swiftly sailing; can you make it stand still with running up and down in the ship? No more can you make the providence of God to alter and change it’s course with your vexing and fretting, but it will go on with power do what thou canst. Do but understand the power and efficacie of providence and it will be a mighty means for the helping to learn this lesson of Contentment.
3 The infinite variety of the works of providence, and yet the order of things, one working towards another; there is infinite variety of the works of God in an ordinary providence, and yet all work in an ordinary way; we put these two together; for God in the way of his providence causes a thousand thousand things one to depend upon another, there are infinite several wheels (as I may so say) in the works of providence, all the works that ever God did from all eternity or ever will do, put them all together, and all make up but one work, and they have been as several wheels that have had their orderly motion to attain the end that God from all eternity hath appointed: We indeed look at things by pieces, we look at one particular and do not consider the reference that one thing hath to another, but God he looks at all things at once, and sees the reference that one thing hath to another: As a child that looks upon a clock, looks first upon one wheel, and then upon another wheel, he looks not at all together or the dependance that one hath upon another, but the workman hath his eyes upon all together and sees the dependance of all one upon another, and the art that there is in the dependance of one upon another; so it is in Gods providence. Now observe how this works to Contentment; where there is such a passage of providence befalls me, that’s one wheel, and it may be if this wheel should be stopt, there might a thousand other wheels come to be stopt by this: as in a clock, stop but one wheel and you stop every wheel, because they have dependance one upon another: so when God hath ordered a thing for the present to be thus and thus, how do’st thou know how many things do depend upon this thing? God may have some work that he hath to do twenty yeers hence that may depend upon this passage of providence, that fals out this day, or this week. And here (by the way) we may see a great deal of evil that there is in discontent, for thou wouldest have Gods providence altered in such and such a particular, indeed if it were only in that particular, and that had reference to nothing else it were not so much, but by thy desire to have thy will in such a particular, it may be thou wouldest crosse God in a thousand things that he hath to bring about, because it’s possible there may be a thousand things depend upon that one thing that thou wouldest fain have to be otherwise than it is, just as if a child should cry out and say, let but that one wheel stop, though he saith but one wheel, yet if that stop, it is as much as if he should say they must all stop; so in providence, let but this one passage of providence stop, it is as much as if a thousand stopt: Let me therfore be quiet and content, for though I be crost in some one particular God attains his end, at least his end may be furthered in a thousand things by this one thing that I am crost in; therefore let a man consider this is an act of providence, and how do I know what God is about to do, and how many things depend upon this providence? Now we are willing to suffer our friends will to be crost in one thing, so that our friend may attain to what he desires in a thousand things; if thou hast a love and friendship to God, be willing to be crost in some few things, that the Lord may have his work go on in the universal, in a thousand of other things. Now that’s the Third thing to be understood in Gods providence, that Christ doth learn those that he teacheth in the Art of Contentment.