TEXT: Psalm 39:9

SUBJECT: Mute Christian #8

Tonight, with the Lord’s blessing, we’ll continue our Puritan study. The title is The Mute Christian Under the Smarting Rod. The author is Thomas Brooks. The topic is Suffering with Grace.

To suffer with grace means to accept the hardships of life without murmuring. Murmuring—please recall—is not the same as sighing, groaning, weeping, or talking about your problems. These are all natural and even good. No, murmuring, is the voice of ingratitude, resentment or self-pity.

The best example of it is Israel in the Wilderness. For forty years, they never let up. They griped about the food; they grumbled about the water; they bellyached about the leadership. Their example was put down in the Bible for us! So we’d learn,

All sins are bad, but not all sins are equally bad. Is murmuring a bad one? Or a really bad one? On this, the Puritan leaves no doubt. He calls it one of the worst sins. Last week, we noted four reasons why. Murmuring is a horrible sin because,

• It is full of other sins and leads to many more.

• Provokes God.

• Pleases the devil.

• Despises mercy.

Four pretty good reasons to stop murmuring. Here’s four more.

MURMURING IS VERY BAD BECAUSE IT UNFITS YOU FOR YOUR DUTY.

Murmuring makes some Christian duties impossible to perform. Let me give you a short list. Think about the duties and tell me any way they can be done while murmuring.

1. The duty of praising God, Psalm 150:6.
2. The duty of thanking God, I Thessalonians 5:18.
3. The duty of being content, Hebrews 13:5.
4. The duty of delighting in the Lord, Psalm 37:4.

Try to think of a four-sided triangle. Can you do it? No you can’t—nobody can. Because a triangle, by definition, is three-sided. A four-sided triangle is not a triangle! The most brilliant argument cannot make it so. It may fool a stupid person, but it will never persuade someone who knows what a triangle is.

In the same way, you cannot conceive of a pouting praise of God, of a resentful giving of thanks, of a discontented contentment, or delighting in the Lord while at the same time griping about how He’s done you wrong. Murmuring—by its very nature—makes some duties impossible to perform.

Others may be done while murmuring. You can go to church with a bad attitude, for example. Every Sunday millions of people do just that. But going to church full of bitterness does not please the Lord or do yourself or others any good. Murmuring may not keep you out of church, but it does keep you from receiving the blessings of church or being a blessing to others. Here’s the quote,

Why is murmuring so bad? Because it unfits you for serving the Lord and other people. That’s Number One.

Can you think of anything less productive than bellyaching? Does pouting make you holier? Does nagging your husband and kids make them happier? Does picking people apart at church increase our love for each other? Does wringing your hands about the government make things better?

Murmuring is a big, fat, hairy, waste of time! The good you might have done in the hours you were griping, have been lost. Lost forever. The money you spend on stupid things may be regained. But the time you spend on them cannot be.

If the Lord wants us to "Number our days" and to "Redeem the time", He must think very ill of the hours, days, and years we spend in self-pity. Your time is your life. Don’t throw it away with useless and sinful murmuring. Here’s the quote,

If nothing is more wasteful than murmuring, then murmuring is very bad indeed. That’s Number Two.

Is it good to talk about your problems? It depends on why you’re doing it. If you tell me your problem so I can pray for you or advise you or help you in some way, then it’s good. The words are after something good.

But murmuring isn’t. The complainer doesn’t want help half as much as he wants agreement. Years ago, a girl gave me a call. I’d never met her; I think she found my number in the phone book. She explained that she had gotten married at 16, her husband was a couple of years older. The young couple lived with his mother. The man sided with her more often than with his wife. She asked me what she should do. I told her the husband’s first loyalty is to his wife, not his mom. "I told him that" she said. I then gave her the Bible reference for it. "I told him that too" she replied. "But now what do I do?" Pray for your husband and submit to him I said. What do you think she said?

She hung up on me. She didn’t want advice or help or prayer, even. She wanted agreement. She wanted me to tell her what she wanted to hear: Leave him. I suspect she called around till she got the answer she was looking for.

Murmuring, therefore, does you no good. But that’s not all. It does you a lot of harm. The more you gripe about a problem, the worse it seems and becomes.

It seems worse because you’re going into detail. An unhappy or angry man might say of his wife, "She treats me like dirt". But the complainer won’t leave it there. He digs up every example of her treating him like dirt for the last twenty years! The more he thinks about her sins or shortcomings, they worse they seem to be.

Also, murmuring about the problems of life compounds them. What if a man won’t make a living for his family? That creates problems. But what if his wife pouts all the time? Or nags him day and night? Or tells everyone what a no-good, rotten bum he is? Will these things reduce the problems? Or, add to them?

Murmuring makes things worse. Always. Here’s the quote,

If complaining were like a bitter pill that made you healthier it might be worth doing. But it isn’t. It’s like a bitter pill that makes you sicker. Why make things worse? Why torture yourself with self-pity? Psalm 37:8,

Murmuring is very bad because it always makes things worse. That’s Number Three.

Genesis 33:9 may be the Bible’s most convicting verse. It says, "I have enough". The man who said it was not griping about what he had lost, but was satisfied with what he had. What makes it so convicting, of course, is that the man who said it was Esau, whom the Bible calls "a fornicator and profane man".

If any man ever had a right to murmur, it was Esau. Twice, he had been cheated by his own brother. Yet, after some time of bitterness, he had gotten over it, and was now happy.

If Esau could be happy with what he had, how much happier should the believer be with what he has? Esau had cattle and sheep and four hundred servants. But what does the believer have?

At the moment, he has,

Some day, he’ll have,

If Esau had enough, so do you. If he didn’t feel cheated, you shouldn’t either. Here’s the Puritan,

Having all these things, the believer has enough. And no reason to murmur.

Because murmuring unfits you for duty, wastes your time, makes your problems worse, and forgets what you have in Christ, it is a very great sin.

That means: If you’re a complainer, you ought to confess your sins to the Lord, and pray for the grace to stop being that way.

It also means: If you’re not a complainer, you have a lot to be thankful for. By nature, everyone is unhappy and discontented. If the Lord has satisfied your soul, you ought to thank Him for it.

If He hasn’t, you ought to read His Word and pray until He does.