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Jeremiah Burroughs: “Your mercies are more than your afflictions”

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“I don’t say this out of need, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know both how to have a little, and I know how to have a lot. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being content—whether well fed or hungry, whether in abundance or in need. I am able to do all things through Him who strengthens me.”
(Philippians 4:11-13 HCSB)

Paul reminds us that the ability to be content in all things comes from the strengthening grace of Jesus. Consider Jeremiah Burroughs’ reflection on this:

“Let your afflictions be what they will, there is not one of you, but has more mercies than afflictions.

Objection: You will say, ‘Yes, but you do not know what our afflictions are such as you do not conceive of, because you do not feel them.’

Answer: Though I cannot know what your afflictions are, yet I know what your mercies are, and I know they are so great that I am sure there can be no afflictions in this world as great as the mercies you have. If it were only this mercy, that you have this day of grace and salvation is continued to you: it is a greater mercy than any affliction. Set any affliction beside this mercy and see which would weigh heaviest; this is certainly greater than any affliction.

That you have the sound of the Gospel still in your ears, that you have the use of your reason: this is a greater mercy than your afflictions. That you have the use of your limbs, your senses, that you have the health of your bodies; health of body is a greater mercy than poverty is an affliction. No man who is rich, if he is wise, and has a sickly body, would not part with all his riches that he might have his health.

Therefore your mercies are more than your afflictions.”

–Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment

Comments

  1. Wow! What a great insight. I am deeply blessed by this message as I learn to focus on the mercies I enjoy everyday. Hallelujah!

  2. I hear this a lot. “As long as you have your health.” Or, a parent-to-be: “As long as my baby is healthy.” But what if you don’t have your health? And what if your baby is born afflicted or your child becomes so? Are the afflicted still not rich in mercies? Does a physical or mental affliction mean God’s mercies have been taken from you? In this world that puts so much emphasis on it, it can easily feel like it. And when the prayers for healing go unanswered, at least as of yet, a struggle can ensue. It’s then that the long journey of the heart to meet the mind commences. That we can know, and believe, that the apostle Paul’s God is our God, too, and the same sufficient grace that He gave Paul – a sinner just like any of us – He will give us. And we find that we, too, can boast in our weaknesses so that Christ’s strength will be strong in and through us. This is God’s mercy.

    • Boy did you nail it there dew. The lack of critical thinking on almost any issue ILO a flush of Feel Good emotion has steadily been taking over HIS assembly of followers like a drug, even more so with Social Media making it all the easier to find a fix.

      J.

      P.s. through my life, I’ve dealt with similar misunderstandings concerning sin and health. It can place additional pitfalls in the road before us that need to be navigated by HIS guidance, HE alone is faithful and we’re all the better for it.

  3. The Book of Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 sums up the WHOLE duty of man is to fear God and keep His commandments because he will judge our actions. Simple task but yet I make it hard to perform sometimes because of focusing on the issues of life. That is why Proverbs 4:23 tells us to guard our hearts (emotions). When we learn that no matter what the afflictions or difficult situation are, our job is to trust God in reverent fear and obey Him! We are to endure hardness of this present life as good soldiers in Christ. Then we will truly value the mercies of God in health and in deep afflictions.

    Great Post!

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