THIS SERMON LIT ME ON FIRE.
Most writing is awful and boring. (No, those adjectives aren’t the same thing.) But some authors excavate trenches in your mind — foxhole paragraphs where their voice takes cover from the drudgery firing all around you. You can’t dislodge them.
Almost a year ago, it was a very cold night and I was supposed to be asleep. But the student lounge didn’t close until 1am, and it was 10pm. The night had only just begun. Outside, evening lay etherized across the landscape (to use Eliot’s phrase). Students scurried to their dorms, arms tight around their bodies.
Inside, warm, I had a small book with me. Its hard cover was etched with the portrait of a man named Jonathan Edwards — his face was cool and dispassionate, like cream of broccoli soup forgotten on the counter. He wore a fake wig and looked silly. He was also possibly the most brilliant mind that has ever existed on this side of the Pacific.
The book was an edited collection of his sermons and shorter writings. (I foolishly thought it contained all his short works — I later discovered Yale University has published 15 volumes worth of such material. This is over 4,500 pages and would cost you more than $1,500 to own. And this is just his short works.) This volume included essays on spiders, rainbows, the mind, and sermons on Christian living, original sin, and hell. One sermon enraptured me: A Divine and Supernatural Light.
From the text of Matthew 16:17 (And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.”), Edwards explained how a Christian is born again (although he never uses that language). He uses the picture of a divine light that God causes to shine in the dark mind of an unbeliever, which illuminates God to show the unbeliever how lovely He is. Sounds simple enough, right? But Edwards had landed there within a few paragraphs. He still had an entire sermon to explain, defend, and apply this doctrine. And that sermon changed my life.
I’d like to describe how his words quickened my heart — how strangely dry my mouth became — how I began to pace the empty room, reading all the while. But consider two of his applications:
First, This doctrine may lead us to reflect on the goodness of God, who has so ordered it, that a saving evidence of the truth of the gospel is attainable by persons of mean capacities and advantages, as well as those that are of the greatest learning. If the evidence of the gospel depended only on such reasonings as learned men are capable of, it would be above the reach of far the greatest part of mankind. But persons with but an ordinary degree of knowledge, are capable, without a long train of reasoning, to see the divine excellency of the things of God: they are capable of being taught by the Spirit of God.
Secondly, This doctrine may well put us upon examining ourselves, whether we have ever had this divine light let into our souls. If there be such a thing indeed, and it be not only a notion or whimsy of persons of weak and distempered brains, then doubtless it is a thing of great importance, whether we have thus been taught by the Spirit of God; whether the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, has shined unto us, giving us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ; whether we have seen the Son, and believed on him, or have that faith of gospel-doctrines which arises from a spiritual sight of Christ.
These two facts — that God alone gives this saving knowledge, and that I must examine myself to see if I had received it — horrified me. Because if I discovered that I had none of this divine light, then I wasn’t able to fix the problem. No matter how hard anyone might try, we can’t spontaneously cause this light to appear.
But then, I thought, my breath short as I clutched the book, that would mean I have never had control over my salvation! That would mean I’m only able to receive it from God and beg him to save me!
Ah, yes. Almost as if I don’t deserve it. Almost as if I can’t earn it. Almost as if salvation is by grace alone.
Edwards’ sermon drives me in two ways. First — to pursue every day a clear sight of God. I was a Christian when I read A Divine and Supernatural Light. But following Jesus is not a one-time emotional, “Yes!” to an altar call. It’s rolling out of bed to carry that cross a little further than you got it the last day. And the nuclear fission powering that task is the light of God’s glory shining in Jesus’ face. I must ask for that light every day.
Secondly — he gave me a passion to share the light with others. Yes, only God can give this light. But I will do my part of holding up Jesus Christ and crying out for others to look. And yes, all Christians know we have our evangelistic duties. But some evangelism is being half-ready to hint I go to church “when the moment is right.” Edwards’ flavoured evangelism is lighting myself on fire to draw attention to the one hope of joy for the world — Jesus Christ. Because I have seen Jesus. A light has been shone into my heart to see him clearly. How can I not do all I can to spread that light around?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHASE HALL is the oldest of nine. He is obsessed with his future wife, Jonathan Edwards, and anything theological.
