Contentment - The Opposite of Our Natural Inclinations

As we continue our discussion of contentment, perhaps the most helpful insight in Jeremiah Burroughs’ The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment is that contentment is actually found in the opposite direction we would normally look.

Our instinct and inclinations tell us to satisfy our desires to find contentment. But Burroughs, leaning on the testimony of the Bible’s wisdom literature, knows that there is only more desire at the end of that path. So, instead of running towards our instincts, he teaches us to run from them.

Here is an extended quotation from chapter 2 of The Rare Jewel:

There is this Mysterie in Christian Contentation: A Christian comes to Contentment, not so much by way of Addition, as by way of Substraction, that is his way of Contentment, and that is a way that the world hath no skill in. I open it thus, Not so much by the adding to what he would have, or to what he hath, not by adding more to his condition, but rather by substracting of his desires, and so to make his desires and condition to be even and equal.

A carnal heart knows no way to be contented but this, I have such and such an estate, and if I had this added to it, and the other comfort added that now I have not, then I should be contented; it may be I have lost my estate, if I could have but that given to me so as to make up my loss, then I should be a contented man: But now contentment doth not come in that way, it comes not in (I say) by the adding to what thou wantest, but by the substracting of thy desires; it is all one to a Christian, either that I may get up unto what I would have, or get my desires down to what I have; either that I may attain to what I do desire, or bring down my desires to what I have alreadie attained; my estate is the same, for it is as sutable to me to bring my desire down to my condition, as it is to raise up my condition to my desire.

Now I say, a heart that hath no grace, and is not instructed in this Mysterie of Contentment, knows no way to get Contentment, but to have his estate raised up to his desires; but the other hath another way to Contentment, that is, He can bring his desires down to his estate, and so he doth attain to his Contentment.

So the Lord fashions the hearts of the children of men: Now if the heart of a man be fashioned to his condition, he may have as much Contentment, as if his condition be fashioned to his heart; some men have a mightie large heart, but they have a strait condition, and they can never have Contentment, when their hearts are big, and their condition is little; but now though a man cannot bring his condition to be as big as his heart, yet if he can bring his heart to be as little as his condition, to bring them even, from thence is Contentment. The world is infinitely deceived in this, To think that Contentment lies in having more than they have; here lies the bottom and root of all Contentment, when there is an evenness and proportion between our hearts and our conditions; and that is the reason that many, that are godly men that are in a low condition, live more sweet and comfortable lives than those that are richer: Contentment is not always cloathed with silk, and purple, and velvets, but Contentment is sometimes in a russet suit, in a mean condition as well as in a higher; and many men that sometimes have had great estates, and God hath brought them into a lower condition, they have had more Contentment in that condition than the other: Now how can that possible be? Thus easily, For if you did but understand the root of Contentment, it consists in the sutableness and proportion of the spirit of a man to his estate, and the evenness, when one end is not longer and bigger than another, the heart is contented, there is comfort in that condition

Jeremiah Burroughs, “Sermon II,” in The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment (London: W. Bentley, 1651), 20–21. (emphasis added)