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The Promise of the Spirit
That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. [Gal 3:14]
The sum of the blessings Christ sought by what He did and suffered in the work of redemption was the Holy Spirit. So is the affair of our redemption constituted: the Father provides and gives the Redeemer, the price of redemption is offered to Him, and He grants the benefit purchased. The Son is the Redeemer who gives the price, and also is the price offered; and the Holy Spirit is the grand blessing obtained by the price offered and bestowed on the Redeemed.
The Holy Spirit,in His indwelling, His influences and fruits, is the sum of all grace, holiness comfort and joy; or in one word, of all the spiritual good Christ purchased for men in this world. He is also the sum of all perfection, glory, and eternal joy that He purchased for them in another world.
The Holy Spirit is that great benefit who is the subject matter of the promises of both the eternal covenant of redemption and also of the covenant of grace; the grand subject of promises of the Old Testament in the prophecies of the blessings of the Messiah's kingdom, the chief subject of the promises of the New Testament, and particularly of the covenant of grace delivered by Jesus Christ to HIs disciples as His last will and Testament in John 14-16. He is the grand legacy that He bequeathed to them in His last and dying discourse with them. Therefore the Holy Spirit is so often called "the Spirit of Promise," the promise of the Father.
---Jonathan Edwards from "A humble attempt to promote explicit Agreement."
The Work of Redemption
For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool: but my righteousness shall be for ever, and my salvation from generation to generation. [Isa 51:8]
This work is a word that God carries on from the fall of man to the end of the world. The work of redemption and the work of salvation are the same thing. What is sometimes in Scripture called God's saving His people is in other places called the his redeeming them. So Christ is called both the Savior and the Redeemer of his people.
I would show how I would be understood when I use the word "redemption." The work of Redemption is sometimes understood, in a more limited sense, for the purchase of salvation; for so the word strictly signifies a purchase of deliverance. And if we take the word in this restrained sense, the work of redemption was not so long in doing. But it was begun and finished with Christ's humiliation. It was all wrought while Christ was upon earth. It was begun with Christ's incarnation, carried on through Christ's life, and finished with his death, which ended in his resurrection.
But sometimes the work of redemption is taken more largely, including all that God works or accomplishes tending to this end; not only the purchasing of redemption, but also all God's works that are properly preparatory to the purchase, or as applying the purchase and accomplishing the success of it. All that Christ does in this affair as Mediator, in any of his offices---either of Prophet, Priest, or King, either when he was in this world in his human nature, before or since---is all but one work, one design.
---Jonathan Edwards, from "The History of the Work of Redemption."
The Majesty and Grace of God
Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen. [1 Tim 1:17]
As I read these words, there came into my soul and was, as it were, diffused through it a sense of the glory of the Divine Being, a new sense, quite different from anything I ever experienced before. The sense I had of divine things would often of a sudden kindle up, as it were, a sweet burning in my heart, and ardor of soul, that I know not how to express.
Not long after I first began to experience these things, I walked abroad alone, in a solitary place in my father's pasture, for contemplation. And as I was walking there, and looking up on the sky and clouds, there came into my mind so sweet a sense of the glorious majesty and grace of God that I know not how to express it. I seemed to see them both in a sweet conjunction, majesty and meekness joined together; it was a sweet, gentle and holy majesty; and also a majestic meekness; an awful sweetness, a high, and great, and holy gentleness.
After this my sense of divine things gradually increased and became more and more lively, and had more of that inward sweetness. The appearance of everything was altered; there seemed to be, as it were, a calm, sweet cast or appearance of divine glory in almost everything. God's excellency, His wisdom, His purity and love, seemed to appear in everything: in the sun, moon, and stars; in the clouds and blue sky; in the grass, flowers, trees; in the water, and all nature.
---Jonathan Edwards, Taken from "The memoirs of Jonathan Edwards."
The Nature of True Virtue
"But now abideth...love" [1 Cor 13:13]
Whatever controversies and variety of opinions there are about the nature of virtue, yet all mean by it something beautiful, or rather some kind of beauty or excellency.
It is not all beauty that is called virtue; for instance, not the beauty of a building, but some beauty belonging to beings that have perception and will.
It is not all beauty of mankind that is called virtue; for instance not the external beauty or the countenance--but it is a beauty that has its original seat in the mind. Yet perhaps not everything that may be called a beauty of the mind is properly called virtue. There is a beauty of understanding and speculation.
But virtue is the beauty of those qualities and acts of the mind that are of a moral nature, i.e., such as are attended with desert or worthiness of praise or blame. Things of this sort, belong to the disposition and will, or the heart.
Therefore, I shall not depart from the common opinion when I say that virtue is the beauty of the qualities and exercises of the heart, or those actions which proceed from them. So then when it is inquired what it is which renders any habit, disposition, or exercise of the heart truly beautiful, what I mean by true virtue is that which belongs to the heart of an intelligent being.
It is plain by the Holy Scriptures that virtue most essentially consists in love.
Jonathan Edwards, taken from "A dissertation of True Virtue."
Man's Natural Blindness in the Things of Religion
Understand, ye brutish among the people: and ye fools, when will ye be wise?
He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see?
He that chastiseth the heathen, shall not he correct? he that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?
The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity. [Psalm 94:8-11]
This blindness is not merely negative ignorance. There is no fault to be found with man's natural faculties. There is a principle in the heart that hinders the exercises of his faculties about the things of religion. God will make all men know the truth of those things which he speaks of in his Word one way or another; for he will vindicate his own truth. God will make them know that he he is the Lord. And he will make them know that he bears rule. (Psalm 59:13).
What great care we all need to have so that we are not deceived in matters of religion. Let us, therefore, be warned to take heed that we are not deceived about our duty, our hearts, our ways, our state, or our opportunities. How foolish a thing it is for men to lean on their own understanding and trust their own hearts. They are fools who trust their own wisdom, and will not trust the infinite wisdom of God. Let us therefore become fools and be sensible of our own natural blindness and folly. Seeing your own ignorance and blindness is the first step towards having true knowledge. Let us ask wisdom of God. We have nowhere else to go for it but to the Fountain of light and wisdom. True wisdom is a precious jewel, and none of our fellow creatures can give it to us, nor can we buy it with any price we have to give. It is the Sovereign gift of God.
Jonathan Edwards, taken from "Men's Natural Blindness in Religion." The Works of Jonathan Edwards
Men Naturally God's Enemies
"For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son,.."[Romans 5:10]
The apostle, from the beginning of the epistle to the beginning of the chapter, has insisted on the doctrine of Justification by faith alone. Christ dying for us is here spoken of as a much greater thing than actually bestowing life on two accounts: (1) This is all that has any difficulty in it ;(2) When God did this for us, He did it for as sinners and enemies.
In actually bestowing salvation on us after we are justified, we are not looked upon as sinners. After we are justified, God does not look on us any longer as sinners, but as perfectly righteous persons. He beholds no iniquity in us. We are no longer enemies, for then we are reconciled. When God gave Christ to die for the elect, He looked on them as they are in themselves; but in actually bestowing eternal life, He does not look on them as they are in themselves but as they are in Christ.
There are three epithets used in the text as pertaining to sinners as they are in themselves:
- They are without strength and cannot help themselves.
- They are ungodly, or sinners.
- They are enemies.
If natural men are God's enemies, then we may learn how much we are indeed indebted to God for His restraining grace. We may learn how wonderful the love is that is manifested in giving Christ to die for us. For this love is love for enemies. How wonderful was the love of Christ in exercising dying love for His enemies?
---Jonathan Edwards---Taken from "Men Naturally God's Enemies" in the works of Jonathan Edwards.
Justification by aith Alone
But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. [Romans 4:5]
We are justified only by faith in Christ and not by any manner of virtue of our own.
To be justified is to be approved and accepted; but a man may be said to be approved and accepted in two respects: the one is to be approved really and the other to be approved declaratively. Justification is two-fold: it is either the acceptance and approbation of the judge itself or the manifestation of that approbation by a sentence or judgment declared by the judge, either to our own consciences or to the world. If justification is understood in the former sense, for the approbation itself, that is only that by which we become fit to be approved; but if understood in the latter sense, for the manifestation of this approbation, it is by whatever is a proper evidence of that fitness. In the former, faith alone is concerned, because it is by that only in us that we become fit to be accepted. In the latter, whatever is an evidence of our fitness is alike concerned.
The great and most distinguishing difference between the covenant of grace and that of works is that by the covenant of grace we are we are not thus justified by our own works, but only by faith in Jesus Christ> It is on this account, chiefly, that the new covenant deserves the name of a covenant of grace, as is evident by Romans 4:16..."therefore it is of faith that it might be of grace." Therefore justification by works (Gal 1;6-7) is not an evangelical doctrine, but a legal one; it is no gospel at all.
---Johnathan Edwards, "Justification Faith by Alone"
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