N13259:50
Sermons, on the following subjects
Sermons, on the following subjects; The manner in which salvation is to be sought. The unreasonableness of indetermination in religion. Unbelievers contemn the glory of Christ. The folly of looking back in fleeing out of Sodom. The warnings of Scripture in the best manner adapted to the awakening and conversion of sinners. Hypocrites deficient in the duty of prayer. The future punishment of the wicked unavoidable and intolerable. The eternity of hell-torments. The peace which Christ gives his true followers. The perpetuity & change of the Sabbath. / By the late Reverend Mr. Jonathan Edwards, president of the College of New-Jersey.
Hartford: printed by Hudson and Goodwin, 1780
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.
4. SOMETIMES the fear, trouble and exercise of mind, which are undergone respecting this business, and the salvation of the soul, are great and long continued, before any comfort is obtained. Sometimes persons in this situation labour long in the dark, and sometimes, as it were, in the very fire, they having great distress of conscience, great fears, and many perplexing temptations, before they obtain light and comfort to lighten their business, and make their care and labour more easy to them. They sometimes earnestly and for a long time seek comfort, but find it not, because ⟨p. 21⟩they seek it not in a right manner, nor in the right objects. GOD therefore hides his face. They cry, but GOD doth not answer their prayers. They strive, but all seems in vain. They seem to themselves not at all to get forward, or nearer to a deliverance from sin; but •o go backward rather than forward. They see no glimmerings of light: things rather appear darker and darker. Insomuch that they are often ready to be discouraged, and to si••k under the weight of their present distress, and under the prospect of future misery. In this situation, and under these views, some are almost driven to despair.
MANY after they have obtained some saving comfort, are again involved in darkness and trouble. It is with them as it was with the christian Hebrews, of whom we read Heb. x. 32. After the were illuminated ye endured, a great fight of afflictions. Some through a melancholy habit and distemper of body, together with satan's temptations, spend a great part of their lives in distress and darkness, even after they have had some saving comfort.
MANY after they have obtained some saving comfort, are again involved in darkness and trouble. It is with them as it was with the christian Hebrews, of whom we read