The Independent God

"It is evident, by both Scripture and reason, that God is infinitely, eternally, unchangeably, and independently glorious and happy: that He cannot be profited by, or receive any thing from, the creature." -- Jonathan Edwards

I have a new gadget on my iGoogle page, that is Christian Quotes Past and Present. This one came on there today, and I thought I would comment on it. I love Jonathan Edwards, ever since I did a report on him in an Institute class a while ago. My thoughts on this quote:

The principle of what he is saying is that God is not made better by anything that we do for Him. God does not become more powerful if He has more people serving Him. God does not become less powerful if He has fewer people doing His will. He does not learn or know more things when we pray to Him. He does not improve when we praise Him more. He does not need us. God is already perfect in every way!

Here's the thing, we can take that idea and throw everything away, knowing that our actions aren't going to make God any better. Or, we can look at His independence, and realize that in spite of it, He still loves us and works through us! What a privilege that we can serve this absolutely perfect God, even though He doesn't need us to. He wants us to.

I will disagree with Edwards in a point. He says that God does is "independently glorious and happy." That is true, in that He does not need us to be happy. However, it is not true, in that, our actions do bring joy or bring sorrow to God. He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked; we can grieve the Holy Ghost; He is pleased when children obey their parents. Our actions do affect the happiness or grief of God - for the Bible tells me so.

It is true that God does not need us in order to be happy. However, He has chosen to tie His happiness with His creation's actions. We have the ability to bring pleasure or to bring grief to the Almighty, Independent, Eternal, Creator God of the Universe.

I think we ought to work on the bringing Him pleasure part. He is so worth it!

Just a thought...

December 21, 1722

Romans 7:18
(18) For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

I am so thankful for this post is Jonathan Edwards' diary. It is short, just one line:

"Dec. 21, Friday. This day, and yesterday, I was exceedingly dull, dry and dead."

I read so much about the holiness of this man in his humility and following hard after God, that when I read this, I was at least encouraged in that there is hope. I do not see perfection as apprehensible in this life, but then I realize that Jonathan Edwards, and the Apostle Paul, both had the same struggles - to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good, I find not.

This is not an excuse to continue being dull, dry and dead. The next day Edwards writes about how the Spirit quickened him that day and he had a great time with the Lord. I recognize that Jonathan Edwards and the Apostle Paul still had flesh, they both strove for holiness and an increase in their sanctification. So, let's work on getting better.

Just a thought...

All His. No Right to Myself

1 Corinthians 6:20: For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.

On January 12, 1723, I made a solemn dedication of myself to God, and wrote it down; giving up myself, and all that I had to God; to be for the future, in no respect, my own; to act as one that had no right to himself, in any respect. And solemnly vowed, to take God for my whole portion and felicity; looking on nothing else, as any part of my happiness, nor acting as if it were; and his law for the constant rule of my obedience: engaging to fight, with all my might, against the world, the flesh, and the devil, to the end of my life.

But I have reason to be infinitely humbled, when I consider, how much I have failed, of answering my obilgation.

- You probably did not realize that I was that old, huh? Now, that you read through that once, I would encourage you to read through it again a little bit slower, taking a minute to think about what is really being said.

Jonathan Edwards was regretful that it took him so long to come to his recognition of this type of spiritual commitment to God. I mean it wasn't until he was 19 years old that he wrote that down.
Just a thought

Latin at 6? Writing?

I have been assigned to write a Research Paper for 2 of my classes this semester, and the topic is Jonathan Edwards. It is safe to assume that for the next few weeks my blog readers will be hearing about him from time to time.

My first post about him is the education that he received from his parents. At age 6, his father, the Rev. Timothy Edwards, began teaching him Latin. Now, I'm not so impressed with the idea of learning Latin. It would be fun to do that some day (this is the part where all of you start making fun of me), but imagine starting with Greek with your 6 year old. I mean, my Timothy is 5. I guess he better watch out when September comes around and he turns 6! Sure, he can't read a whole lot of English yet, but that's ok!

Something else I learned about Jonathan Edwards' education was that his parents made him write. He would write letters to his sisters (poor guy was the only boy with 10 sisters!). He even wrote an essay on spiders at the request of his father who wanted it to send to a friend of his over in England. This English friend was interested in learning more about America, and so Mr. Edwards sent him this boy's work on spiders. They suppose that Jonathan was only about 12 when he wrote it.

I guess the moral of the story: Go ahead and teach them real stuff while they're still young - I suppose less video games and movies would be a good idea for everyone. And make them write! That's something I hadn't thought about before.

Oh, and lastly, the benefits of a godly home. Jonathan Edwards' dad was a pastor. And his mom was a pastor's daughter. It was a large family with godly parents directing their children to Christ early. It figures that Edwards would go on to be one of the most respected American theologians of all time.

Anyway, just a thought...

Sinners

Yesterday marked the 266th anniversary of Jonathan Edwards' preaching his sermon: Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. That is important because 2 + 6 + 6 = 14 which is the number of completion times two!

Anyway, a major component of that sermon is that it is of God's mercies that we are not consumed (or maybe that was a major part of Jeremiah's sermon in Lam. 3...). And, that is the truth. We truly are sinners in the hands of an angry God, but God be praised that Jesus has become sin for us, that He has reconciled us to God in order to avoid God's wrath!

So, I had gone online to search for Edwards' sermon to look at it, and came across The Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University. In introducting that sermon, they have written, "For better or worse, the sermon for which Edwards is probably most famous—or infamous—is the one preached to the congregation of Enfield, Massachusetts (later Connecticut) in July 1741." Immediately, I sensed a negative tone towards it: "better or worse" "famous-or infamous..." So, I continued reading, "Sinners, represents in many persons' minds the bleak, cruel, and hell-bent outlook of Edwards and his Puritan predecessors." Now, what would make them think that Edwards was 'hell-bent?'

The observation from the words that I would now insist upon is this. "There is nothing that keeps wicked men at any one moment out of hell, but the mere pleasure of God." By the mere pleasure of God, I mean his sovereign pleasure, his arbitrary will, restrained by no obligation, hindered by no manner of difficulty, any more than if nothing else but God's mere will had in the least degree, or in any respect whatsoever, any hand in the preservation of wicked men one moment.

We find it easy to tread on and crush a worm that we see crawling on the earth; so it is easy for us to cut or singe a slender thread that any thing hangs by: thus easy is it for God, when he pleases, to cast his enemies down to hell. What are we, that we should think to stand before him, at whose rebuke the earth trembles, and before whom the rocks are thrown down?

I wonder if Edwards was too hard for some of them and they wanted to present a softer picture of him...

Free Audiobook

A website that sells audio books is offering one free audio book each month. This month is:

The Best of Jonathan Edwards Sermons (Unabridge)

the site is: http://christianaudio.com/free_download.php