Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-A Divine and Supernatural Light, IMMEDIATELY IMPARTED TO THE SOUL-12

 

2. This knowledge is that which is above all others sweet and joyful. Men have a great deal of pleasure in human knowledge, in studies of natural things; but this is nothing to that joy which arises from this divine light shining into the soul. This light gives a view of those things that are immensely the most exquisitely beautiful, and capable of delighting the eye of understanding. This spiritual light is the dawning of the light of glory in the heart. There is nothing so powerful as this to support people in affliction and to give the mind peace and brightness in this stormy and dark world. 

3. This light effectually influences the inclination and changes the nature of the soul. It assimilates nature to the divine nature, and changes the soul into an image of the same glory that is beheld: 2 Cor. iii. 18, “But we all, with open faces, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” This knowledge will wean us from the world and raise our inclination to heavenly things. It will turn the heart to God as the fountain of good and choose him for the only portion. This light, and this only, will bring the soul to a saving close with Christ. It conforms the heart to the gospel and mortifies its enmity and opposition against the scheme of salvation therein revealed. It causes the heart to embrace the joyful tidings, and entirely adhere to, and acquiesce in the revelation of Christ as our Saviour. It causes the whole soul to accord and symphonizes with it, admitting it with entire credit and respect, cleaving to it with full inclination and affection; and it effectually disposes the soul to give up itself entirely to Christ.

 This light, and this only, has its fruit in the universal holiness of life. No merely notional or speculative understanding of the doctrines of religion will ever bring to this. But this light, as it reaches the bottom of the heart, and changes nature, so it will effectually dispose to universal obedience. It shows God’s worthiness to be obeyed and served. It draws forth the heart in a sincere love for God, which is the only principle of true, gracious, and universal obedience. And it convinces them of the reality of those glorious rewards that God has promised to them that obey him.