Is it likely that a modern reader of? Resolutions Jonathan Edwards thinks: what about diet?And didn’t 18th-century New England have gyms that it might decide to attend?Today, losing weight and exercising more are almost all of our purposes. We join our willpower, self-examination and self-discipline to try to look better. Edwards was involved in an attempt to be better.
However, Edwards’ effort to self-overcome, exhausting enough to involve all power, strength, vigour, and vehemence, including violence, of what I am capable of, is that of a man completely educated by the Word of God and the gospel of salvation. through grace through faith in Jesus Christ; Edward exercised his will, knowing that his will was in captivity; He decided to be righteous, knowing that his righteousness did not obtain his salvation; he was examining himself, knowing that his spiritual safety was beyond his reach. in the objective fact of Christ’s Atonement for his sins.
- Many of the puritanical habits and habits of the mind (their work ethic.
- Self-discipline and serious morality) persisted long after the eclipse of their theology.
- Being assumed by the laity of the Enlightenment.
- By the liberals of society.
- Gospel and by Victorian materialists.
- Shortly after Edwards’s time.
- Benjamin Franklin began a similar program of resolutions and self-examination.
- Did Franklin submit thirteen resolutions.
- As opposed to Edwards’ seventies.
- Which were based on rational virtues.
- Such as frugality.
- Moderation.
- And chastity.
While Edwards’ resolutions focused on the glory of God, the scriptures, heaven, and hell, and Jesus Christ, Franklin’s resolutions were secular, pragmatic, and worldly, focused on becoming a good citizen and a successful businessman. Although Franklin mentions prayer, Christ is reduced, to a good example to follow, quoted in a similar way to Socrates.
Franklin kept a painting in which he made marks indicating his progress. When he discovered that he was struggling to keep them all at once, he tried to focus on one virtue at a time. When he found out he wasn’t making progress yet, he finally abandoned the whole plan.
Paying so much attention to oneself, when separated from a biblical self-examination designed to promote repentance, can generate another kind of fruit: romanticism.
American literature courses today study Jonathan Edwards not for his theology or even for his sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” with his terrifying illustrations, but as a precursor to transcendentalists.
Edwards realized the spiritual meaning of nature, which, as God’s creation, saw as an expression of the divine personality. Literary historians ” do not grasp the point of Edwards’ distinctly Christian worldview, interpreting it as a step towards the deification of nature by transcendentalists. .
Edwards also examined his inner life, as he did in his “Resolutions,” and dealt with his inner emotions, which he associated with his spiritual state, as he did in his “personal narrative. “This is seen as a step towards the deification of the transcendentalist self.
In fact, Edwards was very different from fellow New England Ralph Waldo Emerson, the unitary mystic who invented nature rhapsodys. Nor did he look like Walt Whitman, the great American poet who wrote an epic poem called “Song About Me. “Instead, Edwards illustrates the integrated Christian sensibility in which mind, intellect, and emotions take place. Later, in TSEliot’s words, would these human powers dissociate the most from the conflicting movements of enlightenment, Romanticism, and Modernism?
Certainly, Edwards is not to blame for the obsession on his own that characterizes American culture and even the many tensions of American Christianity. Our bestseller lists attest to our values of mutual help, autonomy and personal development. Many of our chairs resonate with the slogans “Be true to yourself, ” “Do you trust yourself?”and even” trust yourself. ” If Edwards were to hear such things, he would certainly preach a sermon he would make: sinners in the hands of an angry God?Looks like a devotion to bible school on vacation.
However, even conservative Christians can often fall into the trap of paying too much attention to themselves. “I am truly saved,” we can sometimes meditate, looking at our inner lives and hidden sins and finding little evidence of our holiness.
We have to admit that our own resolutions of improving our lives, however sincere and well-intentioned, often have little effect. We can’t even keep our weight loss or exercise resolutions in the gym, let alone eliminate our sins of lust and cruelty.
Certainly Edwards would agree with Martin Luther, who, in his spiritual counsel, would urge tormented souls to stop looking at themselves; instead, they should look out of themselves, at Christ on the cross.
Salvation, both would insist, is an advantage for us (outside of us), based on God’s unwavering grace and Christ’s objective work. When we look inward, we see our sin and weakness, which only lead us to despair. when we look outside at the promises of God’s Word, we can find joy, trust, and security.