N03467:541
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.
What is it that you would make of God? Must the great God be tied up to that, that he must not use his own Pleasure in bestowing his own Gifts, but if he bestows them on one, must be looked upon obliged to bestow them on another? Is not God worthy to have the same Right, with Respect to the Gifts of his Grace, that a Man has to his Money or Goods? Is it because God is not so great, and should be more in Subjection than Man, that this can't be allowed him? If any of you see Cause to show Kindness to a Neighbour, do all the Rest of your Neighbours come to you, and tell you that you owe them so much as you have given to such a Man? But this is the Way that you deal with God! as though God were not worthy to have as absolute a Property in his Goods, as you have in your's!
What is it that you would make of God? Must the great God be tied up to that, that he must not use his own Pleasure in bestowing his own Gifts, but if he bestows them on one, must be looked upon obliged to bestow them on another? Is not God worthy to have the same Right, with Respect to the Gifts of his Grace, that a Man has to his Money or Goods? Is it because God is not so great, and should be more in Subjection than Man, that this can't be allowed him? If any of you see Cause to shew Kindness to a Neighbour, do all the Rest of your Neighbours come to you, and tell you that you owe them so much as you have given to such a Man? But this is the Way that you deal with God! as though God were not worthy to have as absolute a Property in his Goods, as you have in your's!
At this Rate God can't make a Present of any Thing; he has nothing of his own to bestow; if he has a Mind to show peculiar Favour to some, or to lay some particular Persons under peculiar Obligations to him, he can't do it; because he has no special Gift, that his Creatures stand in great need of, and that would tend greatly to their Happiness, at his own Dispose.—If this be the Case, why do you pray to God to bestow saving Grace upon you? If God don't do fairly to deny it you, because he bestows it on others, then 'tis not worth your while to pray for it, but you may go and tell him that he has bestowed it on these and those, as bad or worse than you, and so demand it of him as a Debt.—And at this Rate Persons never need to thank God for Salvation, when it is bestowed; for what Occasion is