N03467:185
Discourses on various important subjects, nearly concerning the great affair of the soul's eternal…
Discourses on various important subjects, nearly concerning the great affair of the soul's eternal salvation, viz. I. Justification by faith alone. II. Pressing into the Kingdom of God. III. Ruth's resolution. IV. The justice of God in the damnation of sinners. V. The excellency of Jesus Christ. : Delivered at Northampton, chiefly at the time of the late wonderful pouring out of the spirit of God there. / By Jonathan Edwards, A.M. Pastor of the Church of Christ in Northampton. ; [Three lines from Deuteronomy]
Boston: printed by S. Kneeland and T. Green, 1738
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
And as the Congruity to a final Justification depends on Perseverance in Faith, as well as the first Act, so oftentimes the Manifestation of Justification in the Conscience, arises a great deal more from after Acts, than the first Act. And all the difference whereby the first Act of Faith has a Concern in this Affair that is peculiar, seems to be as it were only an accidental Difference, arising from the Circumstance of Time, or its being first in Order of Time; and not from any peculiar Respect that God has to it, or any Influence it has of a peculiar Nature, in the Affair of our Salvation.
And thus it is that a truly christian Walk, and the Acts of an evangelical, child like, believing Obedience, are concerned in the Affair of our Justification, and seem ⟨p. 83⟩to be sometimes so spoken of in Scripture, viz. as an Expression of a persevering Faith in the Son of God, the only Saviour. Faith unites to Christ, and so gives a Congruity to Justification, not merely as remaining a dormant Principle in the Heart, but as being, and appearing in its active Expressions.
And thus it is that a truly christian Walk, and the Acts of an evangelical, child like, believing Obedience, are concerned in the Affair of our Justification, and seem ⟨p. 83⟩to be sometimes so spoken of in Scripture, viz. as an Expression of a persevering Faith in the Son of God, the only Saviour. Faith unites to Christ, and so gives a Congruity to Justification, not meerly as remaining a dormant Principle in the Heart, but as being, and appearing in its active Expressions.
The Obedience of a Christian, so far as it is truly evangelical, and performed with the Spirit of the Son sent forth into the Heart, has all relation to Christ the Mediator, and is but an Expression of the Soul's believing Unition to Christ: All evangelical Works are Works of that Faith that worketh by Love; and every such Act of Obedience, wherein it is inward, and the Act of the Soul, is only a new effective Act of Reception of Christ, and Adherence to the glorious Saviour. Hence that of the Apostle, Gal 2. 20. I live, yet not I; but Christ liveth in me; and the Life that I now live in the Flesh, is by the Faith of the Son of God. And hence we are directed, in whatever we do, whether in Word or Deed to do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.