The Story of 5 Sermons

What prompted Jonathan Edwards to publish a collection of sermons during a period of spiritual decline? Today, Stephen Nichols looks at Edwards’ Discourses on Various Important Subjects and the pastoral concerns that shaped this influential book.

Welcome back to another episode of 5 Minutes in Church History. For our Christmas episode of last year, just a few weeks ago, we looked at Edward's sermon, “The Excellencies of Christ.” I mentioned then that his sermon was one of five sermons pulled together and published in his second book, Discourses on Various Important Subjects. Well, the first sermon that Edwards put in that book was preached in November 1734 in Northampton called “Justification by Faith Alone.” The second sermon is “Pressing into the Kingdom of God. It was preached in February of 1735. The third sermon is “Ruth's Resolution,” preached again in 1735. And let me just read some of the opening lines of that sermon to you.

He's commenting on why we have this book in Scripture. And he says, one, “Because Christ was of Ruth's posterity. The Holy Ghost thought fit to take particular notice of that marriage of Boaz with Ruth, from which sprang the Savior of the world. We observe that the Holy Spirit often takes notice of little things, minute occurrences that do but remotely relate to Jesus Christ.” And the second reason? Well, Edwards writes, “Ruth was not originally of Israel, but was a Moabitess, an alien from the commonwealth of Israel. But she foresook her own people and the idols of the Gentiles to worship the God of Israel and to join herself to that people. She seems to be a type of the Gentile church, and also,” Edwards writes, “of every sincere convert.” So the third sermon, “Ruth's Resolution.”

The fourth sermon, the “Justice of God and the Damnnation of Sinners” was preached in 1734, and then the final and fifth sermon, “The Excellencies of Christ.” Well, let's take a look at what's going on behind the scenes, not of the preaching of the sermons, but of Edwards publishing this book and why he did it.

Now, of course, these sermons were 1734 through 1735. This was a time of revival in Northampton, and Edwards is going to go on to write about this. He'll write his “A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God” in 1736, and it'll get published in 1737. And so the chatter on both sides of the Atlantic is about Jonathan Edwards and about this awakening and about these revivals. And everybody is thinking of Edwards and of the churches there in New England. But what is really going on behind the scenes is that Edwards is seeing his church go into spiritual decline. He speaks of the near blindness of his congregation to the spiritual realities. And there was also contention in the church. Of course, with all those converts in 1734 and 1735, they outgrew the church and the church was bursting at the seams. So, they voted to build a church in November of 1736.

But then there were all kinds of disputes. Disputes over the cost, dispute over the exact location of where the new building should go, and yet another controversy concerned the pew boxes. It was tradition to assign the pew boxes by age. That was out of respect for the elderly in the congregation, but also practical reasons being up there by the pulpit, they could hear better. But for this new church, the pew boxes were being assigned by wealth. Edwards chastised his congregation actually from the pulpit when he said, "those who seek a high seat in God's house above seeking eminent holiness." Well, Edwards was troubled by all of this, of course, and he wanted his church to get back to that moment of 1734, 1735. So, he pulled these sermons together, these particular sermons, because he wanted to remind the church of the outpouring of the spirit of God that was there.

In fact, he put that on the title page. After the list of sermons, on the title page, it says, "Delivered at Northampton, chiefly at the Time of the late, wonderful pouring out of the Spirit of God there." And then he quotes Deuteronomy 6:9, "Take heed to yourself and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things which the eyes have seen, unless they depart from your heart all the days of your life." So that's a bit of the story behind that book of five sermons. And I'm Steve Nichols, and thanks for listening to 5 Minutes in Church History.