Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-A Divine and Supernatural Light, IMMEDIATELY IMPARTED TO THE SOUL-1

 

A DIVINE AND SUPERNATURAL LIGHT, IMMEDIATELY IMPARTED TO THE SOUL BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD, IS SHOWN TO BE BOTH A SCRIPTURAL AND RATIONAL DOCTRINE.

Matt. xvi.—And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

Christ says these words to Peter upon the occasion of his professing his faith in him as the Son of God. Our Lord was inquiring of his disciples, who men said he was; not that he needed to be informed, but only to introduce and give occasion to what follows. They answer that some said he was John the Baptist, and some Elias, and others Jeremias, or one of the Prophets. When they had thus given an account of who others said he was, Christ asked them, who they said he was. Simon Peter, whom we find always zealous and forward, was the first to answer: he readily replied to the question, Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God.

Upon this occasion, Christ says as he does to him, and of him in the text: in which we may observe,

1. Peter is pronounced blessed on this account. Blessed art Thou. — “Thou art a happy man, that thou art not ignorant of this, that I am Christ, the Son of the living God. Thou art distinguishingly happy. Others are blinded, and have dark and deluded apprehensions, as you have now given an account, some thinking that I am Elias, and some that I am Jeremias, and some one thing, and some another; but none of them thinking right, all of them misled. Happy art thou, that art so distinguished as to know the truth in this matter.”

2. The evidence of this his happiness declared; viz., that God, and he only, had revealed it to him. This is evidence of his being blessed.

First, it shows how peculiarly favored, he was of God above others, q. d., “How highly favored art thou, that others that are wise and great men, the Scribes, Pharisees, and Rulers, and the nation in general, are left in darkness, to follow their own misguided apprehensions; and that thou should be singled out, as it were, by name, that my Heavenly Father should thus set his love on thee, Simon Barjona. This argues thee blessed, that thou should thus be the object of God’s distinguishing love.”

Secondly, it evidences his blessedness also, as it intimates that this knowledge is above any that flesh and blood can reveal. “This is such knowledge as my Father which is in heaven only can give: it is too high and excellent to be communicated by such means as other knowledge is. Thou art blessed, that thou know that which God alone can teach thee.”

The origin of this knowledge is here declared, both negatively and positively. Positively, as God is here declared the author of it. Negatively, as it is declared, flesh and blood had not revealed it. God is the author of all knowledge and understanding whatsoever. He is the author of the knowledge that is obtained by human learning: he is the author of all moral prudence, and of the knowledge and skill that men have in their secular business. Thus, it is said of all in Israel that were wise-hearted and skillful in embroidering, that God had filled them with the spirit of wisdom, Exod. xxviii. 3.

God is the author of such knowledge, but not so but that flesh and blood reveal it. Mortal men are capable of imparting the knowledge of human arts and sciences, and skill in temporal affairs. God is the author of such knowledge by those means flesh and blood are made use of by God as the mediate or second because of it; he conveys it by the power and influence of natural means. But this spiritual knowledge, spoken of in the text, is what God is the author of, and none else: he reveals it, and flesh and blood reveals it not. He imparts this knowledge immediately, not making use of any intermediate natural causes, as he does in other knowledge.

What had passed in the preceding discourse naturally occasioned Christ to observe this; because the disciples had been telling how others did not know him, but were generally mistaken about him, and divided and confounded in their opinions of him: but Peter had declared his assured faith, that he was the Son of God. Now it was natural to observe, how it was not flesh and blood that had revealed it to him, but God: for if this knowledge were dependent on natural causes or means, how came it to pass that they, a company of poor fishermen, illiterate men, and persons of low education, attained to the knowledge of the truth; while the Scribes and Pharisees, men of vastly higher advantages, and greater knowledge and sagacity in other matters, remained in ignorance? This could be owing only to the gracious distinguishing influence and revelation of the Spirit of God. Hence, what I would make the subject of my present discourse from these words is this viz., That there is such a thing as a Spiritual and Divine Light, immediately imparted to the soul by God, of a different nature from any that is obtained by natural means.

In what I say on this subject at this time I would

I. Show what this divine light is.

II. How it is given immediately by God, and not obtained by natural means.

III. Show the truth of the doctrine.

And then conclude with a brief improvement.

I. I would show what this spiritual and divine light is. And in order to do it, would show,

First, In a few things what it is not. And here,

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE - The USE

 

1. We may here observe the marvelous wisdom of God in the work of redemption. God hath made man’s emptiness and misery, his low, lost, and ruined state into which he sunk by the fall, an occasion of the greater advancement of his own glory, as in other ways, so particularly in this, that there is now a much more universal and apparent dependence of man on God. Though God is pleased to lift man out of that dismal abyss of sin and woe into which he was fallen, and exceedingly to exalt him in excellency and honor, and to a high pitch of glory and blessedness, yet the creature hath nothing in any respect to the glory of; all the glory evidently belongs to God, all is in a mere and most absolute and divine dependence on the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

And each person of the Trinity is equally glorified in this work: there is an absolute dependence of the creature on everyone for all: all are of the Father, all through the Son, and all in the Holy Ghost. Thus, God appears in the work of redemption as all in all. It is fit that he that is, and there is no one else, should be the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, all, and the only, in this work.

2. Hence those doctrines and schemes of divinity that are in any respect opposite to such an absolute and universal dependence on God, do derogate from God’s glory, and thwart the design of the contrivance for our redemption. Those schemes that put the creature in God’s stead, in any of the mentioned respects, that exalt man into the place of either Father, Son or Holy Ghost, in anything pertaining to our redemption; that, however they may allow of a dependence of the redeemed on God, yet deny a dependence that is so absolute and universal; that own an entire dependence on God for some things, but not for others; that own that we depend on God for the gift and acceptance of a Redeemer, but deny so absolute a dependence on him for the obtaining of an interest in the Redeemer; that own an absolute dependence on the Father for giving his Son, and on the Son for working out redemption, but not so entire a dependence on the Holy Ghost for conversion and a being in Christ, and so coming to a title to his benefits; that own a dependence on God for means of grace, but not absolutely for the benefit and success of those means; that own a partial dependence on the power of God for the obtaining and exercising holiness, but not a mere dependence on the arbitrary and sovereign grace of God; that own a dependence on the free grace of God for a reception into his favor, so far that it is without any proper merit, but not as it is without being attracted, or moved with any excellency; that own a partial dependence on Christ, as he through whom we have life, as having purchased new terms of life, but still hold that the righteousness through which we have life is inherent in ourselves, as it was under the first covenant; and whatever other way any scheme is inconsistent with our entire dependence on God for all, and in each of those ways, of having all of him, through him, and in him, it is repugnant to the design and tenor of the gospel and robs it of that which God accounts its luster and glory.

3. Hence, we may learn a reason why faith is that by which we come to have an interest in this redemption; for there is included in the nature of faith a sensibleness and acknowledgment of this absolute dependence on God in this affair. ’Tis very fit that it should be required of all, in order to their having the benefit of this redemption, that they should be sensible of, and acknowledge the dependence on God for it. ’Tis by this means that God hath contrived to glorify himself in redemption, and ’tis fit that God should at least have this glory of those that are the subjects of this redemption and have the benefit of it.

Faith is a sensibleness of what is real in the work of redemption; and as we do really wholly depend on God, so the soul that believes doth entirely depend on God for all salvation, in its own sense and act. Faith abases men and exalts God; it gives all the glory of redemption to God alone. It is necessary in order to save faith, that man should be emptied of himself, that he should be sensible that he is “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.” Humility is a great ingredient of true faith: he that truly receives redemption, receives it as a little child: Mark x. 15, “Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of heaven as a little child, he shall not enter therein.” It is the delight of a believing soul to abase itself and exalt God alone: that is the language of it, Psalm cxv. 1, “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to thy name give glory.”

4. Let us be exhorted to exalt God alone and ascribe to him all the glory of redemption. Let us endeavor to obtain an increase in a sensibleness of our great dependence on God, to have our eye on him alone, to mortify a self-dependent and self-righteous disposition. Man is naturally exceeding prone to be exalting himself and depending on his own power or goodness, as though he were he from whom he must expect happiness, and to have respect to enjoyments alien from God and his Spirit, as those in which happiness is to be found.

And this doctrine should teach us to exalt God alone, as by trust and reliance, so by praise. Let him be glory in the Lord. Hath any man hope that he is converted and sanctified and that his mind is endowed with true excellency and spiritual beauty, and his sins forgiven, and he received into God’s favor and exalted to the honor and blessedness of being his child, and an heir of eternal life: let him give God all the glory; who alone makes him differ from the worst of men in this world, or the most miserable of the damned in hell. Hath any man much comfort and strong hope of eternal life let not his hope lift him up but dispose of him the more to abase himself and reflect on his own exceeding unworthiness of such a favor, and to exalt God alone. Is any man eminent in holiness and abundant in good works, let him take nothing of the glory of it to himself, but ascribe it to him whose “workmanship we are, created in Christ Jesus unto good works.”

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE 5

 

Thus ’tis God that has given us the Redeemer, and ’tis of him that our good is purchased: so ’tis God that is the Redeemer and the price; and ’tis God also that is the good purchased. So that all that we have is of God, and through him, and in him: Rom. xi. 36, “For of him, and through him, and to him (or in him), are all things.” The same in the Greek that is here rendered to him is rendered in him, 1 Cor. vii. 6.

II. God is glorified in the work of redemption by this means, viz., by there being so great and universal a dependence of the redeemed on him.

1. Man hath so much the greater occasion and obligation to take notice and acknowledge God’s perfections and all-sufficiency. The greater the creature’s dependence is on God’s perfections, and the greater concern he has with them, so much the greater occasion has he to take notice of them. So much the greater concern anyone has with, and dependence upon, the power and grace of God, so much the greater occasion has he to take notice of that power and grace. So much the greater and more immediate dependence there is on the divine holiness, so much the greater occasion to take notice of and acknowledge that. So much the greater and more absolute dependence we have on the divine perfections, as belonging to the several persons of the Trinity, so much the greater occasion have we to observe and own the divine glory of each of them. That which we are most concerned with is surely most in the way of our observation and notice; and this kind of concern with anything, viz., dependence, does especially tend to commend and oblige the attention and observation. Those things that we are not much dependent upon, ’tis easy to neglect; but we can scarce do any other than a mind that which we have a great dependence on. By reason of our so great dependence on God and his perfections, and in so many respects, he and his glory are the more directly set in our view, which way soever we turn our eyes. 

We have the greater occasion to take notice of God’s all-sufficiency when all our sufficiency is thus every way of him. We have more occasion to contemplate him as an infinite good and as the fountain of all good. Such dependence on God demonstrates God’s all-sufficiency. So much as the dependence of the creature is on God, so much the greater does the creature’s emptiness in himself appear to be; and so much the greater the creature’s emptiness, so much the greater must the fulness of the Being be who supplies him. Our having all of God shows the fulness of his power and grace: our having all through him shows the fulness of his merit and worthiness; and our having all in him demonstrates his fulness of beauty, love, and happiness. 

And the redeemed, by reason of the greatness of their dependence on God, hasn't only so much the greater occasion, but obligation to contemplate and acknowledge the glory and fulness of God. How unreasonable and ungrateful should we be if we did not acknowledge that sufficiency and glory that we do absolutely, immediately, and universally depend upon! 

2. Hereby is demonstrated how great God’s glory is considered comparatively, or as compared with the creature’s. By the creature’s being thus wholly and universally dependent on God, it appears that the creature is nothing and that God is all. Hereby it appears that God is infinitely above us; that God’s strength and wisdom and holiness are infinitely greater than ours. However great and glorious the creature apprehends God to be, yet if he is not sensible of the difference between God and him, so as to see that God’s glory is great, compared with his own, he will not be disposed to give God the glory due to his name. If the creature, in any respect, sets himself upon a level with God or exalts himself to any competition with him, however, he may apprehend that great honor and profound respect may belong to God from those that are more inferior, and at a greater distance, he will not be so sensible of its being due from him. So much the more men exalt themselves, so much the less will they surely be disposed to exalt God. ’Tis certainly a thing that God aims at in the disposition of things in the affair of redemption (if we allow the Scriptures to be a revelation of God’s mind), that God should appear full, and man in himself empty, that God should appear all, and man nothing. ’Tis God’s declared design that others should not “glory in his presence”; which implies that ’tis his design to advance his own comparative glory. So much the more man “glories in God’s presence,” so much the less glory is ascribed to God.

3. By its being thus ordered, that the creature should have so absolute and universal a dependence on God, provision is made that God should have our whole souls and should be the object of our undivided respect. If we had our dependence partly on God and partly on something else, man’s respect would be divided into those different things on which he had dependence. Thus it would be if we depended on God only for a part of our good, and on ourselves or some other being for another part: or if we had our good only from God, and through another that was not God, and in something else distinct from both, our hearts would be divided between the good itself, and him from whom, and him through whom we received it. But now there is no occasion for this, God being not only he from or of whom we have all good, but also through whom, and one that is that good itself, that we have from him and through him. So that whatsoever there is to attract our respect, the tendency is still directly towards God, all unite in him as the center.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE 4

 

1. The redeemed have all their objective good in God. God himself is the great good which they are brought to the possession and enjoyment of by redemption. He is the highest good and the sum of all that good which Christ purchased. God is the inheritance of the saints; he is the portion of their souls. God is their wealth and treasure, their food, their life, their dwelling-place, their ornament and diadem, and their everlasting honor and glory. They have none in heaven but God; he is the great good which the redeemed are received to at death, and which they are to rise to at the end of the world. The Lord God, he is the light of the heavenly Jerusalem; and is the “river of the water of life,” that runs, and “the tree of life that grows, in the midst of the paradise of God.” The glorious excellencies and beauty of God will be what will forever entertain the minds of the saints, and the love of God will be their everlasting feast. The redeemed will indeed enjoy other things; they will enjoy the angels and will enjoy one another; but that which they shall enjoy in the angels, or each other, or in anything else whatsoever that will yield them delight and happiness, will be what will be seen of God in them.

2. The redeemed have all their inherent good in God. Inherent good is twofold; ’tis either excellency or pleasure. These the redeemed not only derive from God, as caused by him, but have them in him. They have spiritual excellency and joy by a kind of participation of God. They are made excellent by a communication of God’s excellency: God puts his own beauty, i.e., his beautiful likeness, upon their souls: they are made partakers of the divine nature, or moral image of God, 2 Pet. i. 4. They are holy by being made partakers of God’s holiness, Heb. xii. 10. The saints are beautiful and blessed by a communication of God’s holiness and joy, as the moon and planets are bright by the sun’s light. The saint hath spiritual joy and pleasure by a kind of effusion of God on the soul. In these things the redeemed have communion with God; that is, they partake with him and of him. 

The saints have both their spiritual excellency and blessedness by the gift of the Holy Ghost, or Spirit of God, and his dwelling in them. They are not only caused by the Holy Ghost but are in the Holy Ghost as their principle. The Holy Spirit becoming an inhabitant is a vital principle in the soul: he, acting in, upon, and with the soul, becomes a fountain of true holiness and joy, as a spring is of water, by the exertion and diffusion of itself: John iv. 14, “But whosoever drink of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him, shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life,”—compared with chap. vii.  38, 39, “He that believes in me, as the Scripture had said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water; but this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe in him should receive.” The sum of what Christ has purchased for us is that spring of water spoken of in the former of those places, and those rivers of living water spoken of in the latter. And the sum of the blessings which the redeemed shall receive in heaven is that river of water of life that proceeds from the throne of God and the Lamb, Rev. xxii. 1,—which doubtless signifies the same with those rivers of living water explained John vii. 38, 39, which is elsewhere called the “river of God’s pleasures.” Herein consists the fulness of good which the saints receive by Christ. ’Tis by partaking of the Holy Spirit that they have communion with Christ in his fulness. God hath given the Spirit, not by measure unto him, and they do receive of his fulness, and grace for grace. This is the sum of the saints’ inheritance, and therefore that little of the Holy Ghost which believers have in this world is said to be the earnest of their inheritance. 2 Cor. i. 22, “Who hath also sealed us, and given us the Spirit in our hearts.” And chap. v. 5, “Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit.” And Eph. i. 13, 14, “Ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession.” 

The Holy Spirit and good things are spoken of in Scripture as the same; as if the Spirit of God communicated to the soul comprised all good things: Matt. vii. 11, “How much more shall your heavenly Father give good things to them that ask him?” In Luke, it is chap. xi. 13, “How much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?” This is the sum of the blessings that Christ died to procure, and that are the subject of gospel promises: Gal. iii. 13, 14, “He was made a curse for us, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” The Spirit of God is the great promise of the Father: Luke xxiv. 49, “Behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you.” The Spirit of God, therefore, is called “the Spirit of promise,” Eph. i. 13. This promised thing Christ received, and had given into his hand, as soon as he had finished the work of our redemption, to bestow on all that he had redeemed: Acts ii. 33, “Therefore, being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye both see and hear.” So that all the holiness and happiness of the redeemed is in God. ’Tis in the communications, indwelling, and acting of the Spirit of God. Holiness and happiness are in the fruit, here and hereafter, because God dwells in them, and they in God.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE 3

 

Men are dependent on the power of God for every exercise of grace, for carrying on the work of grace in the heart, for the subduing of sin and corruption, and increasing holy principles, and for enabling them to bring forth fruit in good works, and at last bringing grace to its perfection, in making the soul completely amiable in Christ’s glorious likeness, and filling of it with a satisfying joy and blessedness; and for the raising of the body to life, and to such a perfect state, that it shall be suitable for habitation and organ for a soul so perfected and blessed. These are the most glorious effects of the power of God that are seen in the series of God’s acts with respect to the creatures. 

Man was dependent on the power of God in his first estate, but he is more dependent on his power now; he needs God’s power to do more things for him and depends on a more wonderful exercise of his power. It was an effect of the power of God to make man holy at the first; but more remarkably so now, because there is a great deal of opposition and difficulty in the way. ’Tis a more glorious effect of power to make that holy that was so depraved and under the dominion of sin, than to confer holiness on that which before had nothing of the contrary. It is a more glorious work of power to rescue a soul out of the hands of the devil, and from the powers of darkness, and to bring it into a state of salvation than to confer holiness where there was no prepossession or opposition. Luke xi. 21, 22, “When a strong man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace; but when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and overcome him, he taketh from him all his armor wherein he trusted and divided his spoils.” So ’tis a more glorious work of power to uphold a soul in a state of grace and holiness, and to carry it on till it is brought to glory when there is so much sin remaining in the heart resisting, and Satan with all his might opposing, than it would have been to have kept man from falling at first when Satan had nothing in man. 

Thus we have shown how the redeemed are dependent on God for all their good, as they have all of him. 

Secondly, They are also dependent on God for all, as they have all through him. ’Tis God that is the medium of it, as well as the author and fountain of it. All that we have, wisdom and the pardon of sin, deliverance from hell, acceptance in God’s favor, grace and holiness, true comfort and happiness, eternal life and glory, we have from God by a Mediator; and this Mediator is God, which Mediator we have an absolute dependence upon as he through whom we receive all. So that here is another way wherein we have our dependence on God for all good. God not only gives us the Mediator, and accepts his mediation, and of his power and grace bestows the things purchased by the Mediator, but he is the Mediator. 

Our blessings are what we have by purchase, and the purchase is made of God, the blessings are purchased of him, and God gives the purchaser; and not only so, but God is the purchaser. Yea, God is both the purchaser and the price; for Christ, who is God, purchased these blessings for us by offering up himself as the price of our salvation. He purchased eternal life by the sacrifice of himself: Heb. vii. 27, “He offered up himself;” and ix. 26, “He hath appeared to take away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” Indeed it was the human nature that was offered, but it was the same person with the divine, and therefore was an infinite price: it was looked upon as if God had been offered in sacrifice. 

As we thus have our good through God, we have a dependence on God in respect that man in his first estate had not. Man was to have eternal life than through his own righteousness; so that he had partly a dependence upon what was in himself; for we have a dependence upon that through which we have our good, as well as that from which we have it. And though man’s righteousness that he then depended on was indeed from God, yet it was his own, it was inherent in himself; so that his dependence was not so immediately on God. But now the righteousness that we are dependent on is not in ourselves but in God. We are saved through the righteousness of Christ: he is made unto us righteousness, and therefore is prophesied of, Jer. xxiii. 6, under that name of “the Lord our righteousness.” In that the righteousness we are justified by is the righteousness of Christ, it is the righteousness of God: 2 Cor. v. 21, “That we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” 

Thus in redemption, we hadn't only all things of God, but by and through him: 1 Cor. viii. 21, “But to us, there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.” 

Thirdly, The redeemed have all their good in God. We not only have it of him, and through him, but it consists in him; he is all our good. 

The good of the redeemed is either objective or inherent. By their objective good, I mean that intrinsic object, in the possession and enjoyment of which they are happy. Their inherent good is that excellency or pleasure which is in the soul itself. With respect to both of which the redeemed have all their good in God, or, which is the same thing, God himself is all their good.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE 2

 

And ’tis from mere grace that the benefits of Christ are applied to such and such particular persons. Those that are called and sanctified are to attribute it alone to the good pleasure of God’s goodness, by which they are distinguished. He is sovereign and hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will, he hardens.

Man hath now a greater dependence on the grace of God than he had before the fall. He depends on the free goodness of God for much more than he did then: then he depended on God’s goodness for conferring the reward of perfect obedience: for God was not obliged to promise and bestow that reward: but now we are dependent on the grace of God for much more: we stand in need of grace, not only to bestow glory upon us but to deliver us from hell and eternal wrath. Under the first covenant we depended on God’s goodness to give us the reward of righteousness, and so we do now. And not only so, but we stand in need of God’s free and sovereign grace to give us that righteousness; and yet not only so, but we stand in need of his grace to pardon our sin and release us from the guilt and infinite demerit of it.

And as we are dependent on the goodness of God for more now than under the first covenant, so we are dependent on a much greater, more free and wonderful goodness. We are now more dependent on God’s arbitrary and sovereign good pleasure. We were in our first estate dependent on God for holiness: we had our original righteousness from him, but then holiness was not bestowed in such a way of sovereign good pleasure as it is now. Man was created holy, and it became God to create holy all the reasonable creatures he created: it would have been a disparagement to the holiness of God’s nature if he had made an intelligent creature unholy. But now when a man is made holy, it is from mere and arbitrary grace; God may forever deny holiness to the fallen creature if he pleases, without any disparagement to any of his perfections.

And we are not only indeed more dependent on the grace of God, but our dependence is much more conspicuous because our own insufficiency and helplessness in ourselves is much more apparent in our fallen and undone state than it was before we were either sinful or miserable. We are more apparently dependent on God for holiness, because we are first sinful and utterly polluted, and afterward holy: so the production of the effect is sensible, and its derivation from God more obvious. If man was ever holy and always was so, it would not be so apparent, that he had not holiness necessarily, as an inseparable qualification of human nature. So, we are more apparently dependent on free grace for the favor of God, for we are first justly the objects of his displeasure and afterward are received into favor. We are more apparently dependent on God for happiness, being first miserable and afterward happy. It is more apparently free and without merit in us, because we are actually without any kind of excellency to merit if there could be any such thing as merit in creature excellency. And we are not only without any true excellency, but are full of, and wholly defiled with, that which is infinitely odious. All our good is more apparently from God, because we are first naked and wholly without any good, and afterward enriched with all good.

2. We receive all of the power of God. Man’s redemption is often spoken of as a work of wonderful power as well as grace. The great power of God appears in bringing a sinner from his low state, from the depths of sin and misery to such an exalted state of holiness and happiness. Eph. i. 19, “And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to usward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power.”

We are dependent on God’s power through every step of our redemption. We are dependent on the power of God to convert us and give us faith in Jesus Christ, and the new nature. ’Tis a work of creation: “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature,” 2 Cor. v. 17. “We are created in Christ Jesus,” Eph. ii. 10. The fallen creature cannot attain to true holiness, but by being created again: Eph. iv. 24, “And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” It is a raising from the dead: Col ii. 12, 13, “Wherein ye also are risen with him, through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.” Yea, it is a more glorious work of power than mere creation or raising a dead body to life, in that the effect attained is greater and more excellent. That holy and happy being and spiritual life which is reached in the work of conversion is a far greater and more glorious effect than mere being and life. And the state from whence the change is made, of such a death in sin, and total corruption of nature, and depth of misery, is far more remote from the state attained, than mere death or nonentity.

 ’Tis by God’s power also that we are preserved in a state of grace: 1 Pet. i. 5, “Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.” As grace is at first from God, so ’tis continually from him, and is maintained by him, as much as light in the atmosphere is all day long from the sun, as well as at first dawning or at sunrise.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE-DOCTRINE 1

 

God is glorified in the work of redemption in this, that there appears in it so absolute and universal a dependence of the redeemed on him.

Here I propose to show, I., That there is an absolute and universal dependence of the redeemed-on God for all their good. And II., That God hereby is exalted and glorified in the work of redemption. 

I. There is an absolute and universal dependence of the redeemed-on God. The nature and contrivance of our redemption are such, that the redeemed are in everything directly, immediately, and entirely dependent on God: they are dependent on him for all and are dependent on him in every way. 

The several ways wherein the dependence of one being may be upon another for its good, and wherein the redeemed of Jesus Christ depend on God for all their good, are these, viz., that they have all their good of him, and that they have all through him, and that they have all in him. That he is the cause and original whence all their good comes, therein it is of him; and that he is the medium by which it is obtained and conveyed, therein they have it through him; and that he is that good itself that is given and conveyed, therein it is in him. 

Now those that are redeemed by Jesus Christ do, in all these respects, very directly and entirely depend on God for their all. 

First, the redeemed have all their good of God; God is the great author of it; he is the first cause of it, and not only so, but he is the only proper cause. 

’Tis of God that we have our Redeemer: it is God that has provided a Saviour for us. Jesus Christ is not only of God in his person, as he is the only begotten Son of God, but he is from God, as we are concerned in him and in his office of Mediator: he is the gift of God to us: God chose and anointed him, appointed him his work, and sent him into the world. 

And as it is God that gives, so ’tis God that accepts the Saviour. As it is God that provides and gives the Redeemer to buy salvation for us, so it is of God that salvation is bought he gives the purchaser, and he affords the thing purchased. 

’Tis of God that Christ becomes ours, that we are brought to him and are united to him: it is of God that we receive faith to close with him, that we may have an interest in him. Eph. ii. 8, “For by grace ye are saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.” ’Tis of God that we actually do receive all the benefits that Christ has purchased. ’Tis God that pardons and justifies, and delivers from going down to hell, and it is his favor that the redeemed are received into and are made the objects of when they are justified. So, it is God that delivers from the dominion of sin, and cleanses us from our filthiness, and changes us from our deformity. It is of God that the redeemed do receive all their true excellency, wisdom and holiness; and that two ways, viz., as the Holy Ghost, by whom these things are immediately wrought, is from God, proceeds from him and is sent by him; and also as the Holy Ghost himself is God, by whose operation and indwelling the knowledge of divine things, and a holy disposition, and all grace, are conferred and upheld. 

And though means are made use of in conferring grace on men’s souls, yet ’tis of God that we have these means of grace, and ’tis God that makes them effectual. ’Tis of God that we have the holy Scriptures; they are the word of God. ’Tis of God that we have ordinances, and their efficacy depends on the immediate influence of the Spirit of God. The ministers of the gospel are sent of God, and all their sufficiency is of him. 2 Cor. iv. 7, “We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.” Their success depends entirely and absolutely on the immediate blessing and influence of God. The redeemed have all. 

1. Of the grace of God. It was of mere grace that God gave us his only begotten Son. The grace is great in proportion to the dignity and excellency of what is given: the gift was infinitely precious because it was a person infinitely worthy, a person of infinite glory; and also because it was a person infinitely near and dear to God. The grace is great in proportion to the benefit we have given us in him: the benefit is doubly infinite, in that in him we have deliverance from an infinite because an eternal, misery; and do also receive eternal joy and glory. The grace in bestowing this gift is great in proportion to our unworthiness to whom it is given; instead of deserving such a gift, we merited infinitely ill of God’s hands. The grace is great according to the manner of giving or in proportion to the humiliation and expense of the method and means by which way is made for our having of the gift. He gave him to us dwelling amongst us; he gave him to us incarnate, or in our nature; he gave him to us in our nature, in the like infirmities in which we have it in our fallen state, and which in us do accompany and are occasioned by the sinful corruption of our nature. He gave him to us in a low and afflicted state; and not only so, but he gave him to us slain, that he might be a feast for our souls.  

The grace of God in bestowing this gift is most free. It was what God was under no obligation to bestow: he might have rejected fallen man, as he did the fallen angels. It was what we never did anything to merit. ’Twas given while we were yet enemies, and before we had so much as repented. It was from the love of God that saw no excellency in us to attract it, and it was without expectation of ever being requited for it.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-GOD GLORIFIED IN MAN’S DEPENDENCE

 

1 Cor. I. 29-31. — That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that according as it is written, He that gloried, let him glory in the Lord. 

Those Christians to whom the apostle directed this epistle dwelt in a part of the world where human wisdom was in great repute; as the apostle observes in the 22d verse of this chapter, “The Greeks seek after wisdom.” Corinth was not far from Athens, which had been for many years the most famous seat of philosophy and learning in the world. 

The apostle, therefore, observes to them how that God, by the gospel, destroyed and brought to naught their human wisdom. The learned Grecians and their great philosophers by all their wisdom did not know God: they were not able to find out the truth in divine things. But after they had done their utmost to no effect, it pleased God at length to reveal himself by the gospel, which they accounted foolishness. He “chose the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty, and the base things of the world, and things that are despised, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught the things that are.” And the apostle informs them why he thus did, in the verse of the text: That no flesh should glory in his presence, &c. 

In which words may be observed, 

1. What God aims at in the disposition of things in the affair of redemption, viz., that man should not glory in himself, but alone in God: That no flesh should glory in his presence,—that, according as it is written, He that gloried, let him glory in the Lord.

 2. How this end is attained in the work of redemption, viz., by that absolute and immediate dependence which men have upon God in that work for all their good. Inasmuch as, 

First, All the good that they have is in and through Christ; he is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. All the good of the fallen and redeemed creature is concerned in these four things and cannot be better distributed than into them, but Christ is each of them to us, and we have none of them any otherwise than in him. He is made of God unto us wisdom: in him are all the proper good and true excellency of the understanding. Wisdom was a thing that the Greeks admired, but Christ is the true light of the world, it is through him alone that true wisdom is imparted to the mind. ’Tis in and by Christ that we have righteousness: it is by being in him that we are justified, have our sins pardoned, and are received as righteous into God’s favor. ’Tis by Christ that we have sanctification: we have in him true excellency of heart as well as of understanding; and he is made unto us inherent, as well as imputed righteousness. ’Tis by Christ that we have redemption, or actual deliverance from all misery, and the bestowment of all happiness and glory. Thus, we have all our good by Christ, who is God. 

Secondly, another instance wherein our dependence on God for all our good appears, is this, that it is God that has given us Christ, that we might have these benefits through him; he of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, &c. 

Thirdly, ’Tis of him that we are in Christ Jesus, and come to have an interest in him, and so do receive those blessings which he is made unto us. It is God that gives us faith whereby we close with Christ. 

So that in this verse is shown our dependence on each person in the Trinity for all our good. We are dependent on Christ the Son of God, as he is our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. We are dependent on the Father, who has given us Christ and made him be these things to us. We are dependent on the Holy Ghost, for ’tis of him that we are in Christ Jesus; ’tis the Spirit of God that gives faith in him, whereby we receive him and close with him.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-INTRODUCTION 6/6

 

The above six sermons were selected independently of the fact that they are among the ten published by their author; but this circumstance confirms the choice and, moreover, serves to authenticate the text. Edwards has suffered not a little at the hands of his editors, particularly Dwight, who seems to have been possessed by the idea that his author would appear to better advantage in a style and language more elegant and refined. “Don’t do as Orpah did,” pleads Edwards in the Ruth sermon; “Do not as Orpah did,” is the feeble refinement of his editor. But even the generally accurate Worcester or First American Edition (1809) is not to be implicitly trusted; for instance, two whole pages are omitted at the end of the Enfield sermon, giving to that sermon a startling and bizarre close, wholly out of keeping with Edwards’s habitual manner. Later editions import other errors and, even while professing to follow the Worcester edition, sometimes, in fact, follow not that edition, but Dwight’s (e.g., in the Ruth sermon). 

The present text is based upon a careful comparison of the original editions, now very scarce, in the Boston Athenæum. The original expressions, ’tis, won’t, don’t, etc., as Edwards himself printed them, have been restored, a number of verbal errors in the later editions corrected and several omitted lines recovered, besides the long passage already mentioned, which is, however, in Dwight, at the end of the Enfield sermon. 

No attempt, however, has been made to give a facsimile reproduction of the first editions with all their printer’s errors, capricious spelling, antiquated punctuation, and uncouth use of capitals and italics. These externalities could distract the modern reader while adding nothing essential to accuracy. In these respects, therefore, more modern usage has been followed. The aim has simply been to give the exact words of the originals and to preserve their spirit, treating the sermons as sermons to be preached and not as essays to be read. Accordingly, while avoiding the extremes of the first editions, italics have been used where Edwards used them to mark divisions, or for special emphasis, somewhat more freely than would be customary now. This edition also follows his, and the Biblical, use of ordinary type in personal pronouns referring to divine beings, the verbal reverence in the modern use of capitals being regarded as needless to enhance the real reverence of Edwards’s thought and possibly a little out of place. Added words are enclosed within square brackets.

Besides the six sermons mentioned, the present collection includes one, the interesting if not exactly great sermon on the Many Mansions, which has not before been published. A copy of this sermon made for the late Professor Edwards A. Park, of Andover, was kindly put at the disposal of the editor by his son, the Rev. Dr. William E. Park, of Gloversville, N.Y.; but it has also been carefully collated with the original manuscript. The editor has also examined the original manuscripts of all the other sermons in this volume, except that of the Farewell Sermon, which could not be discovered. These manuscripts are all in the collection of between eleven and twelve hundreds of Edwards’s sermons now in the Yale University Library. Most of these manuscripts are written in an exceedingly minute hand, with many abbreviations and occasionally with insertions in shorthand, on sheets of paper about 3⅝ × 4⅛in. in size, stoutly stitched together. The facsimile of the first page of the sermon on Spiritual Light given in this volume opposite p. 21 is representative; a relatively small number is slightly larger. Of the particular manuscripts some account will be found in the notes. The handling and deciphering of these manuscripts give one a curious sense of intimacy with the working of Edwards’s brain and heart: one is with him in his workshop and sees, as it were, the very thing in the making. One seems to feel the intensity of the excitement as, with his audience present in imagination, and with keen delight in the activity of literary creation, he works out his theme. 

One observes how alternative forms of expression, alternative lines of development, suggest themselves, and how now whole paragraphs, whole pages are struck off at white heat, while now, oftenest towards the end, the barest outlines are jotted down, to be filled out in delivery. But the manuscripts of the sermons which Edwards himself published afford no help in the fixing of the text. The sermons as he printed them are invariably expanded and often greatly altered in other respects, and the copy prepared for the printer is no longer extant. This circumstance should not be overlooked in judging of sermons printed directly from the manuscripts. In the Yale collection, there are sermons that were written out pretty fully; others are only fairly fully written out in parts, and others again are mere skeletons. The majority of those of the Northampton period are of the second sort. Among the hundreds of Edwards’s unpublished sermons, there are doubtless many that it would be interesting to have in print just as they stand; it is doubtful if there are any which would add materially to his reputation as a preacher in comparison with the great sermons already published.

The portrait of Edwards in this volume is from a recent photograph of the original painting of 1740. The photograph was kindly furnished by the present owner of the painting, Mr. Eugene P. Edwards, of Chicago, to whom the editor takes this opportunity of expressing his obligations. He also desires to express his thanks to Dr. William E. Park for the use of the copy of the sermon on the Many Mansions; to the publishers for allowing the extra space required for printing this new sermon; to Professor Franklin B. Dexter for generous help in the study of the manuscripts and for permission to photograph the sermon on Spiritual Light, to Mr. Charles K. Bolton, Librarian of the Boston Athenæum, for courtesies in the use of the first editions; and to Mr. George N. Whipple of Boston, for verifying a number of references.

Northampton, Mass.,

March, 1904.

Selected Sermons of Jonathan Edwards-INTRODUCTION 5

 

But Edwards’s interest in these seems never merely verbal. He is not a maker of phrases. He makes use of striking metaphor and startling antithesis, his style is often picturesque, and he well knows the rhetorical value of iteration, when the repeated phrase is employed in a varied context; but he never seeks to produce his effects by literary indirection. He can be easy, familiar, colloquial even, on occasion, if that suits his purpose; but he is never undignified, never vulgarly sensational, nor does he seem ever to be intentionally humorous. The construction of his sentences is often such as the pedantry of modern standards would condemn; but however old-fashioned, it is seldom indeed that the expression can be called whimsical or quaint. The most determining external influence on his style was unquestionably the old, so-called King James version of the English Bible. His language is saturated with its thought and phraseology. And as he is intimately acquainted with it in all its parts, so he is continually quoting it and constantly surprising us with fresh discoveries, in novel collocations, of its variety, beauty, and impressiveness. He was influenced also doubtless by his too exclusively theological and philosophical reading. But it is, in the end, the originality of his own genius, the depth and subtlety and force of his mind, and the richness of his spiritual experiences, which we must regard as setting the stamp upon his style. Edwards’s sermons are hall-marked: they have not only interest as historical memorials of the religious conditions of their time; as the personal expressions of an original mind, working in traditional material, indeed, but animating and so refashioning it with the unique form of a great personality, they have also the value of literature.

Largely to the union of the intellectual and emotional elements mentioned—the definiteness of the message, the logical unity of the thought, the singleness and sincerity of the aim, the intensity of the conviction, the thorough knowledge of Scripture, the profound acquaintance, through personal experience, of the religious movings of the human heart—must be attributed, in connection with the state of religious thought and feeling of the time and the respect aroused by the character of the preacher, the power which he exercised on his contemporaries. Of his manner of preaching, we have from his pupil, Hopkins, the following authentic testimony. “His appearance at the desk was with good grace, and his delivery easy, natural, and very solemn. He had not a strong, loud voice, but appeared with such gravity and solemnity, and spoke with such distinctness, clearness, and precision, his words were so full of ideas, set in such a plain and striking light, that few speakers have been so able to demand the attention of an audience as he. His words often discovered a great degree of inward fervor, without much noise or external emotion, and fell with great weight on the minds of his hearers. He made but little motion of his head or hands on the desk but spoke as if to discover the motion of his own heart, which tended in the most natural and effectual manner to move and affect others.

“As he wrote his sermons out at large for many years, and always wrote a considerable part of most of his public discourses, so he carried his notes into the desk with him, and read the most that he wrote; yet he was not so confined to his notes when he wrote at large, but that, if some thoughts were suggested, while he was speaking, which did not occur when writing, and appeared to him pertinent and striking, he would deliver them; and that with as great propriety, and oftener with greater pathos, and attended with a more sensible good effect on his hearers, than all he had written.”

The sermons in the present volume have been selected as representative of Edwards the preacher rather than of Edwards the theologian. Any such collection must include at least the following four: the sermon on Man’s Dependence, the sermon on Spiritual Light, the Enfield Sermon, and the Farewell Sermon. These are classic. Moreover, they represent Edwards in four of his most distinguishing aspects: as the powerful champion of a theology resting ultimately on the principle of a transcendent, righteous, sovereign Will; as the equally convinced advocate of the mystical principle of an immediate, intuitive apprehension, through supernatural illumination, of divine truth; as the flaming revivalist, with pitiless logic and terrible realism of description, arousing, startling, overwhelming the sinner with the sense of impending doom; finally, as the rejected minister appealing, without rancor or bitterness, from the judgment of this world to the judgment of an infallible tribunal and displaying what must ever make him more interesting, more precious as a heritage to the Church and the world, than any of his opinions or his works, the dignity and repose, the patience, strength and depth of a great character, perfected through suffering and apparent defeat, in what was virtually the Apologia of his ministerial life. These sermons alone would suffice to justify Edwards’s reputation as the foremost preacher of his age.

Still, they cannot, of course, be taken as adequately representing the whole range and power of his discourses. In particular, the Enfield sermon, which has loomed so large in the popular imagination of Jonathan Edwards, and which, in fact, is but one—to be sure, the most extreme—of a number of the same type, cannot be taken as fairly representative even of Edwards’s revival sermons. There has, therefore, been added, in this reference, a revival sermon of another type, the sermon on Ruth’s Resolution. This sermon was chosen, not because it is better than some others, but because, while being an excellent sermon of its kind, it is also brief, and so better adapted to the scope of this volume. There has been further added, as representing a type distinctly different from any of the others, the funeral sermon entitled A Strong Rod Broken and Withered, which is certainly one of the noblest, in thought and expression, of Edwards’s discourses, and which is probably unique among his writings as dealing with the subject of civil government and the management of affairs. Had space permitted, the picture of the Christian statesman in this sermon might have been matched by the picture of the Christian minister in one of the ordination sermons; but the omission is less serious since the conception is so largely realized in Edwards himself.