THE EVILS OF A MURMURING SPIRIT
5. MURMURING AND DISCONTENT IS EXCEEDINGLY BELOW A CHRISTIAN
covenant. Now if this were but daily continued, there would be no space nor time for murmuring to work upon your heart: that is the fourth point.
5. MURMURING AND DISCONTENT IS
up and down. What! you are matched with Christ and are his spouse, and will you murmur now, and be discontented in your spirit? You will observe that with those who are newly married, when there is
discontent between the wife and the husband, their friends will shake their heads say, ‘They are not meeting with what they expected; you see ever since they were married together how the man looks, and the woman looks, they are not so cheery as they used to be. Surely it is likely to prove an ill match.’ But it is not so here, it shall not be so between you and Christ. Oh, Jesus Christ does not love to see his spouse with a scowling countenance; no man loves to see discontent in the face of his wife, and surely Christ does not love to see discontent in the face of his spouse.
iii. You stand in relation to Christ, not only as a spouse, but as a member. You are bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh; and to have a member of Jesus Christ in a condition of discontent exceedingly
unworthy.
i v . He is your elder brother likewise, and so you are a co-heir with him.
v . The relation in which you stand to the Spirit of God. You are the temple of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost is your Comforter. It is he who is appointed to convey all comforts from the Father and the Son, to the souls of his people. And are you the temple of the Holy Ghost, and does he dwell in you, and yet for all that you murmur for every little thing?
v i . The relation in which you stand to the angels. You are made one body with them, for so Christ has joined principalities and powers with his Church: they are ministering spirits for the good of his people, to supply what they need, and you and they are joined together, and Christ is the head of you and angels.
vii. The relation in which you stand to the saints. You are of the same body with them, they and you make up but one mystical body with Jesus Christ, and if they are happy you must needs be happy.
Oh, how beneath a Christian is a murmuring spirit, especially when he considers the relations in which he stands!
2 . A Christian should consider, That murmuring and discontentedness is below the high dignity which God has put upon him. Do but consider the high dignity which God has put upon you: the meanest Christian in the world is a lord of heaven and earth. he has made us kings unto himself, kings to God, not kings to men to rule over them; and yet I say, every Christian is lord of heaven and earth, yea of life and death. That is, as Christ is Lord of all, so he has made those who are his members lords of
all. ‘All are yours’, says the Apostle, ‘even life and death, every thing is yours.’ It is a very strange expression, that death should be theirs, death is yours, that is, you are, as it were, lords over it, you have what shall make death your servant, your slave, even death itself, your greatest enemy is turned to be your slave. Faith makes a Christian as lord over all, lifted up in excellence above all creatures that ever God made, except the angels, and in some respect above them.
I say the poorest Christian who lives is raised to a position above all
creatures in the world except angels, and above them in many respects too−
and yet discontented! That you who were as a firebrand of hell, and might have been scorching and yelling and roaring there to all eternity, yet that God should raise you to have a higher excellence in you than there is in all the works of creation that ever he made except angels, and other Christians, who are in your position! Indeed, you are nearer the Divine nature than the angels, because your nature is joined in a hypostatical union to the Divine nature, and in that respect your nature is more honored than the nature of the angels. And the death of Christ is yours. He died for you and not for the angels, and therefore you are likely to be raised above the angels in many respects. You who are in such a position as this, you who are set apart to the end that God might manifest to all eternity what the infinite power of a Deity is able to raise a creature to−for that is the position of a saint, a believer: his position is that he is set apart to the end that God might manifest to all eternity what his infinite power is able to do to make a creature happy.
Are you in such a position? Oh, how low and beneath this position is a murmuring and discontented heart for want of some outward comforts here in this world! How unseemly it is that you should be a slave to every cross, that every affliction shall be able to say to your soul, ‘Bow down to us’!
We accounted it a great slavery, when men said to our souls, ‘Bow down’, as the cruel prelates were wont to do, in imposing things upon men’s consciences: in effect they said, ‘Let your consciences, your souls, bow down to us, that we may tread upon them’. That is the greatest slavery in the world, that one man should say to another, ‘Let your consciences, your souls, bow down, that we may tread upon them’; but will you allow every affliction to say, ‘Bow down that we may tread upon you’? Truly it is so, when your heart is overcome with murmuring and discontent; know that those afflictions which have caused your to murmur have said to you, ‘Bow down that we may tread upon you.’ Nay, not afflictions, but the very Devil prevails against you in this. Oh! how this is beneath the happy position to which God has raised a Christian! What! will the son of a King let every base fellow come and bid him bow down, that he may tread upon his neck?
That is what you do in every affliction: the affliction, the cross and trouble that befalls you, says, ‘Bow down that we may come and tread upon you.’
3 . Murmuring is below the spirit of a Christian. The spirit of every
Christian should be like the spirit of his Father: every father loves to see his spirit in his child, loves to see his image, not the image of his body only, to say, here is a child for all the world like his father, but he has the spirit of his father too. A father who is a man of spirit loves to see his spirit in his child, rather than the features of his body. Oh, the Lord who is our Father loves to see his Spirit in us. Great men love to see great spirits in their children, and the great God loves to see a great spirit in his children. We are one spirit with God and with Christ, and one spirit with the Holy Ghost;
therefore, we should have a spirit that might manifest the glory of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost in our spirits: that is the spirit of a Christian.
The spirit of a Christian should be a lion-like spirit; as Jesus Christ is the Lion of the tribe of Judah (so he is called) so we should manifest something of the lion-like spirit of Jesus Christ. He manifested his lion-like spirit in passing through all afflictions and troubles whatsoever without any murmuring against God. When he came to drink that bitter cup, and even the dregs of it, he prayed indeed to God that if it were possible it might pass from him, but immediately: ‘Not my will, but thy will be done.’ As soon as ever he mentioned the passing of the cup from him, though it was the most dreadful cup that ever was drunk since the world began, yet at the
mentioning of it: ‘Not my will, but thy will be done.’ Here Christ showed a lion-like spirit in going through all kinds of afflictions whatsoever, without any murmuring against God in them. Now a murmuring spirit is a base, dejected spirit, cross and contrary to the spirit of a Christian, and it is very base.
I remember that the Heathens accounted it very base. Plutarch reports of a certain people, who used to manifest their disdain to men who were overmuch dejected by any affliction, and condemned them to this
punishment: to wear women’s clothes all their days, or for a certain space of time at least, they should go in women’s clothes I token of shame and disgrace to them because they had such effeminate spirits. They thought it against a manly spirit, and therefore, seeing they did un-man themselves, they should go as women. Now, shall they account it an unmanly spirit, to be overmuch dejected in afflictions? and shall not a Christian account it an unchristianlike spirit to be overmuch dejected by any affliction whatsoever?
I remember someone else compares murmuring spirits to children, when they are weaning: what a great deal of stir you have with your children when you wean then! how perverse and vexing they are! So, when God would wean you from some outward comforts in this world, oh, how fretting and discontented you are! Children will not sleep themselves nor let their mothers sleep when they are weaning; and so, when God would wean us from the world, and we fret, vex, and murmur, this is a childish spirit.
4 . It is below the profession of a Christian. The profession of a Christian−
what is that? A Christian’s profession is to be dead to the world and to be
alive to God, that is his profession, to have his life hid with Christ in God, to satisfy himself in God. What! is this your profession? And yet if you have not everything you want, you murmur and are discontented. In that you even deny your profession.
5 . It is below that special grace of faith. Faith is what overcomes the world;
it makes all the promises of God ours. Now when you look upon you the profession of religion did God ever promise you that you would live at ease, and quiet, and have no trouble? I remember Augustine has a similar expression: ‘What! is this your faith? Did I ever promise you (he says) that you should flourish in the world? Are you a Christian to that end? And is this your faith? I never made any such promise to you when you took upon you to be a Christian.’ Oh, it is very contrary to your profession. You have no promise for this, that you should not have such an affliction upon you.
And a Christian should live by his faith. It is said that the just live by faith;
now you should not look after any other life but the life that you have by faith. You have no ground for your faith to believe that you should be delivered out of such an affliction, and then why should you account it such a great evil to be under this affliction? Certainly the good that we have in the ground for our faith is enough to content our hearts here, and to all eternity.
A Christian should be satisfied with what God has made the object of his faith. The object of his faith is high enough to satisfy his soul, were it capable of a thousand times more than it is. Now if you may have the object of your faith you have enough to content your soul. And know that when you are discontented for want of certain comforts, you should think thus:
God never promised me that I should have these comforts, at this time, and in such a way as I would have. I am discontented because I have not these things which God never yet promised me, and therefore I sin much against the Gospel, and against the grace of faith.
6 . It is below a Christian because it is below those helps that a Christian has more than others have. They have the promises to help them, which others have not. It is not so much for the heart of a Nabal to sink, because he has nothing but the creature to uphold him. But it is much for a
Christian, who has the promises and ordinances to uphold his spirit, which others have not.
7 . It is below the expectation that God has of Christians, for God expects not only that they should be patient in afflictions, but that they should rejoice and triumph in them. Now, Christians, when God expects this from you, and you have not even attained to contentedness under afflictions! Oh, this is beneath what God expects from you.
8 . It is below what God has had from other Christians. Others have not only been contented with little trials, but they have triumphed over great afflictions, they have suffered the spoiling of their goods with joy. Read the latter part of the eleventh of the Hebrews, and you will find what great
things God has had from his people. Therefore not to be content with smaller crosses must needs be a great evil.
6. THE SIXTH EVIL IN A MURMURING SPIRIT IS,