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Advice to Young Converts | Jonathan Edwards · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. It's good to be here.
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Today, we're doing something I, I really love.
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We are digging into the archives.
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We're blowing the dust off a historical text to see if we can
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find the roots of how we practice our faith today.
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And you know, this isn't just history for history's sake.
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It's about survival. That's a strong way to put it,
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but I think you're right. Looking back is often the only
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way to figure out how to move forward.
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We're not trying to reinvent anything here, are we?
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We're standing on the shoulders of giants and the text we have
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today, it really does address a survival issue that every single
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believer faces sooner or later. Right.
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And the giant we're looking at today is Jonathan Edwards.
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Now, I have to stop us right there because, you know, usually
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when people hear that name, they have a very specific, very
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intense reaction. Oh, yeah.
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They think sinners in the hands of an angry God.
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They think fire, brimstone, and you know that spider dangling
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over a pit? Which is fair to a point.
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I mean, he did preach that sermon.
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It's part of his ministry. But if you stop there, you miss
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the pastoral heart of the man. You miss the tenderness.
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And the source we're looking at today isn't a sermon shouted
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from a pulpit. It's a letter.
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It's personal. It was written to a young woman,
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a Deborah Hathaway, who was living in Suffield, CT.
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Suffield and the context here is just.
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It's everything, isn't it? Edwards starts the letter by
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mentioning the great things he's lately seen at her church.
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He's talking about a revival. He is absolutely.
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This is the Great Awakening. We're talking around 1741.
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Suffield had just been through this massive spiritual awakening
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and you have to picture it. This wasn't just, you know,
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polite Sunday morning church. This was emotional, disruptive,
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life altering stuff. So Deborah is probably a new
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convert. Likely, yes, someone who has
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just come to faith in the middle of all this, this excitement,
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and she's written Edwards of asking basically, OK, I believe
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this is amazing, but now what? How do I actually do this when
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the dust settles? It's the classic Monday morning
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problem. The conference is over, the
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emotions were high, but now you have to go do the laundry and
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deal with your family. Exactly so.
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Our mission for this deep dive is to unpack the 1717 specific
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points of advice Edwards gave her.
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And 17 might sound like, you know, a laundry list.
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It does. But they all hang together.
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The central question he's answering is how do you maintain
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spiritual vitality after that initial excitement is gone?
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How do you keep the fire burning?
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And I want to flag something you pointed out earlier.
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Even though the letter is often called advice to young converts,
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Edwards himself says this isn't just for for rookies.
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No, not at all, He explicitly says these are helpful reminders
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for the old in faith as well. I mean, if you've been a
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Christian for 30 years, this letter is just as much for you,
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maybe even more so. It's easy to forget the basics,
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isn't it? So let's get into it.
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The first segment. Let's call it the paradox of
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seeking. This is his first two points and
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honestly .1 throws me a curveball right away.
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OK, how so? Well, think about it.
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Usually when you're trying to achieve something, get into a
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good school, win someone over, you work really, really hard.
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You strive. Then once you're in, you can
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relax. You made it.
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The chase is over, but Edwards tells Deborah to keep up the
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same earnestness. As if she were still in a state
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of nature, You know, As if she were still unconverted.
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It's completely counterintuitive, isn't it?
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We tend to view conversion as the finish line.
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We think, OK, I'm saved, my ticket is punched, I can kind of
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coast now. And Edward sees that exact
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mentality as a huge danger. He uses pretty strong language.
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He says people grow cold and dark just a few months after
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conversion if they don't do this.
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He's seen it happen. I mean he's a pastor.
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The emotional high of the revival wears off and people
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drift. What he's arguing for is that
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the effort you need to grow in holiness is actually greater
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than the effort you used to 1st seek salvation.
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Even quotes the Apostle Paul in Philippians to back it.
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Up right, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to
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what lies ahead. That's the one Edwards uses this
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beautiful image of the shining light.
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He says the path should be a light that shines more and more
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until the perfect day. It's not supposed to dim.
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So because you now know what you have Christ, you should be more
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intense in your pursuit, not less.
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Exactly. You're under, in his words,
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infinitely greater obligations now.
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That word obligation, that's a heavy word for a lot of people
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today. That sounds like legalism.
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You know you better work hard or God's going to be mad.
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I can see that, but I think he flips the script.
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It's not I have to work hard to God will like me.
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It's God has already shown me this incredible, undeserved
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love. So of course I'm going to run
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this race with everything I have.
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It's a response of gratitude, not a labor of.
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Earning that makes sense. OK.
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Then he moves to .2, which is. I mean, it's even stranger on
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the surface. He tells her to pray for things
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she technically already he has. This is a key reformed idea that
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can trip people up. He tells her to pray for opened
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eyes, for sight, and to be raised from the dead.
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But wait a minute, if she's converted, isn't she already
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raised from the dead spiritually?
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Aren't her eyes already open? You know, if I buy a house, I
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don't keep asking the realtor to sell me the house I'm living in.
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Well, in terms of her legal standing before God, her
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justification, yes, she's alive. But Edwards is a realist about
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the human heart. He knows that even in a saved
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person there is what he calls blindness and hardness, pride
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and death remaining. We're not fully sanctified yet.
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Not even close. We have a new heart, but the old
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nature is still hanging around making a mess.
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So it's like we have the cure for the disease, but we still
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get flare ups of the symptoms. That's a great way to put it.
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The old man, as Paul calls it, is still there.
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So Edward suggests we need a continuous enlightening.
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He uses this phrase I find just fascinating.
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He calls it a new conversion. A new conversion that sounds
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confusing. Is he saying you get saved, you
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lose it, you get solved again like a cycle?
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No, not that you get justified again and again.
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That happens once it's a settled fact.
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But in your experience, in your day-to-day life, you need to be
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brought out of darkness into light over and over.
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You need that sense of resurrection daily.
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You have to wake up every single morning and realize I need grace
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just as much today as I did the day I first believed.
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You know, that actually takes the pressure off in a way.
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It means if I wake up and I feel spiritually dead, if I open my
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Bible and feel nothing, it doesn't mean I've lost my
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salvation, right? It just means I need to pray for
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that new conversion experience Edwards is talking about.
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It validates the struggle. It admits that the default mode
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of the human heart, even a saved one, is to drift back towards
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sleep. It keeps us desperate for God,
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which is a good thing. Speaking of staying awake, let's
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talk about listening to sermons. This is his Third Point and I
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feel like Edwards has been spying on me because I am so
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guilty of this. I think we all are.
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It's a common trap for anyone who's been in church for more
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than, what, a month? He says when you hear a sermon,
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hear it for yourself. It's so simple, but so hard.
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You're sitting in the Pew, pastor starts talking about,
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say, pride or anger, and your mind immediately goes somewhere
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else. Oh yeah, I really hope my
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husband is listening to this. This would be so good for my
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boss. If only so and so were here,
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this would fix him. Exactly.
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And Edward says that's a deflection, It's a defense
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mechanism. We use the sermon to critique
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other people so we don't have to face the music ourselves.
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The right posture, he says, is to ask in what respect is this
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applicable to me? Me.
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Even if I think I don't have a problem with pride, I need to
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hunt for the little bits of it in myself.
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You. Uses the word improvement.
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What improvement can I make for my own soul's good?
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It's about taking personal inventory, not auditing someone
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else's spiritual life. It forces you to be vulnerable.
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And that leads right into .4, which is about memory.
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Edward seems to think we're prone to spiritual amnesia.
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We are, and this point is really new, he says.
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God is forgiven and forgotten your past sins.
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Your record is clear. But, and this is the twist, you
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are not supposed to forget them. See, that sounds almost
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masochistic. If God forgot them, why should I
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keep dragging them up? Isn't that just wallowing in
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guilt? We hear so much today about
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moving on and forgiving yourself.
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It's not about wallowing for the sake of shame, it's about
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maintaining humility. Yeah, he uses the Egypt analogy,
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you know, from the Old Testament.
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Right. Remember, you were slaves, yes?
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Remember you were a wretched bond slave in the land of Egypt.
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Remember who you were before grace showed up.
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If you forget your past sin, you start to think you kind of
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earned your way here. You start to think you were a
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pretty decent person who just needed a little help instead of
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a dead person who needed to be resurrected.
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Exactly. He brings up Paul here too.
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Paul's the best example of this. He constantly called himself the
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chief of sinners, the least of the apostles.
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He never forgot that he was a blasphemer who haunted down
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Christians, Edwards says. Doing this keeps us confounded.
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It just it shuts our mouths. You can't boast when you
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remember where you came. From SO the memory of past sin
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is like ballast in a ship. It keeps it steady, so the winds
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of pride don't just tip it over. That's a great image.
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It keeps us low. It keeps us grateful.
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But then .5, if the last two are challenging, .5 is like a punch
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in the gut. Edwards talks about the weight
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of sin after conversion. This is where I think a lot of
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modern listeners might really push back.
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This is a heavy one. It's a very Edward Nagian
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argument. He tells Deborah.
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She should lament sins committed after conversion 1000 times more
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than those she committed before. 1000 times.
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That seems completely backwards. I mean, before I was a Christian
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my sins were, you know, bigger in a way.
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Now maybe I lose my temper in traffic.
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Surely the old stuff was worse? In terms of the outward action,
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maybe. But Edwards isn't looking at the
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action itself. He's looking at the relationship
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against which the sin is committed.
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OK, Before conversion, you sinned in ignorance.
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You were an enemy of God. Biblically speaking, you didn't
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know Him, but now, now your child of God.
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You've tasted his kindness. You know his love.
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So it's a betrayal factor. It's treason against love to sin
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against the unchangeably continuing, loving kindness of
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Christ. That's a whole different
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category of offense. Think of it this way.
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It's one thing for a stranger on the street to insult you.
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It's another thing entirely for your spouse, who you've loved
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and sacrificed for your whole life, to betray you.
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The relational closeness makes the sin infinitely more tragic.
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Wow. That really reframes how we look
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at our small sins, doesn't it? There are no small sins when
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they're committed against such great grace.
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But that realization, I mean, that could crush a person.
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If my sins now are worse than before, and I still sin every
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single day, which I do, then am I just hopeless?
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And that brings us perfectly to the next segment, .6 is the
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antidote. Edwards is a skilled physician
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of the soul. He doesn't leave her in despair.
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He says be greatly abased, feel the weight of it, but be never
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discouraged. That's a tightrope walk, isn't
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it? Abased but not discouraged.
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Low, but not hopeless. And the safety net is Christ.
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Edwards gives this incredible visual.
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He says Christ's blood and righteousness infinitely overtop
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the highest mountains of our sins.
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I love that mental picture you picture these massive jagged
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peaks of all your failures, your pride, your anger, your apathy,
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they look insurmountable. And then this flood, this ocean
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of Christ's righteousness, just completely submerges them.
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You can't even see the peaks anymore.
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The math there is important though.
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The mountains are finite. They're high, but they have a
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limit. And Christ's righteousness is
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infinite. It has no limit.
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So no matter how high your mountain of sin gets, the flood
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of grace is always higher. That's the Reformed assurance in
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a nutshell. You don't look at the mountain
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to find peace. You look at the flood.
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So in response to that overwhelming grace, how do we
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react? We don't just say thanks and
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move on, .7 gives us a model Mary Magdalene.
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From Luke Chapter 7, one of the most moving scenes in the
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Gospels, Edwards tells Deborah to copy Mary's posture.
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And it's very physical, isn't it?
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Casting yourself at his feet, kissing his feet.
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It's it's undignified in a way. It is and pouring out the sweet,
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perfumed ointment. But notice where the ointment
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comes from, Edwards says. It comes from a pure and broken
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heart. Just like the Alabaster box had
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to be broken to release the perfume.
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The heart has to be broken by that sense of sin we just talked
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about that realization of betrayal.
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But it's also made pure because of the overwhelming love for
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Christ that results. That's real worship.
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It's not just singing a song. It's lowliness mixed with
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adoration. But then there's the snake in
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the garden. Or as Edwards puts it, a Viper
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.8 is all about pride. He does not mince words here.
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He calls pride the worst Viper. Why the worst?
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I mean, there are some pretty terrible sins out there.
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Why is pride the boss level boss?
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Because it's the root, Edwards points out.
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It was the first sin ever committed.
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He's talking about the fall of Satan.
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He says it lies lowest in the foundation of Satan's whole
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building. Every other sin grows out of it.
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You steal because you think you deserve more.
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You get angry because you think you've been wronged.
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And he says it's the hardest one to root out.
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Because it's so deceitful, this is the really scary part.
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Edwards warns Deborah that pride often creates in under the
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disguise of humility itself. The humble brag or even just
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being proud of how humble you are.
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Look at me, I'm the most humble person in this room.
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That's it. You can be proud of your
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repentance. Wow, I really felt that sin
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deeply today. I must be very spiritual.
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Boom, that's pride. It's a shapeshifter.
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It will wear whatever clothes it needs to to stay in your heart.
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Edwards is clear this will be her greatest enemy because it
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destroys peace and ruins your communion with Christ.
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You can't wash Jesus feet if you're standing up straight
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looking at your own reflection. It sounds like a virus that just
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mutates every time you think you found a cure.
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So if pride is that tricky, how do we know if we're actually
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doing well? How do we know if a spiritual
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experience is real or just our ego .9 seems to be a diagnostic
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test for that. It is.
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Edward saw a lot of, let's say false fire during the awakening,
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so he was very concerned with the distinguishing marks of true
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faith. He gives 2 criteria here.
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First, a true discovery of God makes you least and lowest and
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most like a child. So if I have some spiritual
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experience that makes me feel powerful or special or better
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than other people, that's a huge red flag.
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A massive red flag. True contact with God shrinks
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your ego. It doesn't inflate it.
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It makes you feel small in the best possible way.
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And the second criterion is that it fixes your heart to deny
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yourself for God. It leads to action.
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It has to. It results in sacrificial
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living. If your theology doesn't lead to
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self denial, Edwards would seriously question its validity.
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If your faith is all about what God can do for you instead of
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what you can surrender to God, it might be counterfeit.
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That's helpful, but what about when we don't feel anything?
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I mean, we all go through those dry seasons, .10 is about that,
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about darkness and doubt. The dark and dull frames of
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mind, we all know them, and Edward's advice here is very
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practical and again, a little bit counterintuitive, he says.
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When you're in the dark, don't spend all your time rummaging
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through your old experiences to prove you're saved.
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But that's what we do, isn't it? We look at old journals.
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We try to remember that feeling we had at that retreat 10 years
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ago. We try to talk ourselves into
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believing it was real. Edward says that's a waste of
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time and energy. It's like trying to find a
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breadcrumb in a dark room. Instead, he says, pursue new
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light. I love his quote here.
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He says, 1 New discovery of the glory of Christ's face will do
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more towards scattering clouds of darkness in one minute than
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examining old experience through a whole year.
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It's the difference between looking at a photograph of the
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sun and actually walking outside into the sunlight.
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If you're cold, don't just look at pictures of fire, Go find a
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real fire. He's pushing her to seek fresh
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encounters with God, not to rely on stale mana.
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Look outward at Christ now, not inward at your past.
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And he expands on that in .11 with this idea of displacing the
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negative. He talks about fear.
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The physics of grace, you could call it, he says.
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When corruption prevails, fear prevails.
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When we're distant from God, we get scared, but you can't just
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chase the fear out. You can't just tell yourself
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stop being afraid. That never ever works.
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It doesn't. He uses the analogy of a dark
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room. You can't scoop darkness out
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with a bucket. You can try all day, but the
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room will still be dark. The only way to get rid of
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darkness is to let in the light. The pleasant beams of the sun.
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Right. And for Edwards, that sun is
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love. He says fear is expelled by the
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reviving and prevailing of love. When you're filled with love for
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God, there just isn't any room left for fear.
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Perfect love casts out fear. It's a displacement method, not
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an extraction method. That's such a healthier way to
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see it. Don't fight the dark, turn on
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the light. Don't fight the fear, chase the
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love. That's it.
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So Edward shifts gears a little bit.
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After that, he moves from the internal life to the external
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community. Points 12 and 13 are about how
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Deborah should interact with other people.
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He tells her to warn others. You know the evangelism, but
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notice the tone, He says to do it earnestly and affectionately.
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And when she's talking to her peers, she should mix her
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warnings with expressions of her own unworthiness.
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There's that humility again. It's not.
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I have it all figured out and you don't.
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No, it's I was drowning and someone threw me a life raft.
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Please get in. She has to acknowledge that
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sovereign grace is the only thing that separates her from
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the unconverted. She isn't better than them.
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She's just been rescued. That changes the entire tone of
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evangelism. It kills self righteousness.
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And then he gives her a specific assignment in .13.
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He tells her to set up religious meetings for young women.
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Which is pretty significant. We sometimes have this idea that
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in the 18th century, women were just told to be quiet.
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But here's the most prominent theologian of the day,
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empowering a young woman to lead in her own context.
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He says it would be very proper and profitable.
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He gets the value of communal, of peer-to-peer discipleship.
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He knows she can't walk this path alone.
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Then we get to .14, and this one is.
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This one's intense. It's about fasting and secret
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prayer. This is for special difficulties
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or great longings. It's the spiritual nuclear
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option, you might say. He advises setting aside a whole
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day for. It and he's really specific
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about what to do in that prayer. It's not just a general Lord
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forgive me for my sins. No, not at all.
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He calls for a very particular rehearsal.
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A rehearsal that sounds like you're reading from a script.
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It's a detailed inventory, he says, to go from childhood all
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the way to the present day, confess sins with the
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circumstances and aggravations attending them.
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So not just I lied, but I lied to my brother last Tuesday
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because I was too proud to admit I was wrong and I knew he
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trusted me, so I took advantage of that trust.
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Exactly. Spreading all the abominations
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of your heart, very particularly before God.
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But why? Why so much detail?
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It's not how like God needs the information.
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It's not for God's information He already knows.
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It's for our realization. A general confession, like I'm a
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Sinner lets us hide. It's a vague label, but specific
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confession forces us to confront the actual ugliness in our
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hearts. When you lay it all out piece by
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piece, it breaks your pride going back to .8.
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And it makes the grace of Christ we saw in .6 that much more
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stunning. You can't appreciate the
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cleaning if you don't realize just how filthy you are.
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It's painful, but it leads to freedom and that leads into the
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final section, points 15 through 17.
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This is about the public walk and the Witness .15 is all about
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reputation. Do not let the adversaries of
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the cross have occasion to reproach religion on your
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account. This is the burden of being an
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ambassador. If you call yourself a
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Christian, people are watching. You're wearing the jersey if you
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claim to be a child of the light.
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You have to walk like a child of the light.
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And he lists the virtues. Meekness, lowliness, counting
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others better than yourself. If Christians are arrogant,
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rude, or greedy, it gives the world a valid reason to rock
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God. We're the only diable some
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people will ever read. That's high stakes, but then .16
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gives us the most beautiful, tender image in the whole
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letter. I think this might be my
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favorite part. It balances out that pressure.
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It's certainly the most moving part.
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He describes how to walk with God every day.
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He says to follow Christ as a little poor helpless child.
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Taking hold of Christ's hand. That image just changes
20:25
everything. It's not a soldier marching into
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battle, it's not an employee trying to earn a paycheck.
20:30
It's a toddler holding their parents hand.
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And where's the child looking? Yeah, Edwards is so specific, he
20:36
says, keeping your eye on the marks of the wounds in his hands
20:40
inside. That's so vivid.
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You're holding the very hand that was pierced for you.
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And you're hiding your nakedness under the white shining robes of
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his righteousness. It's a picture of total
20:51
dependence and total coverage. You are weak, he is strong.
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You're exposed. He covers you.
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You're likely to wander off. He holds your hand tight.
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It basically summarizes the entire Reformed view of
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salvation, doesn't it? We contribute nothing but the
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empty hand that reaches out to grasp his.
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And even the strength to reach out as a gift from him.
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It strips away all the striving and earning and just leaves
21:14
trust. And finally, .17 intercession.
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He asked her to pray, pray for ministers, pray for the church.
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He wants the glorious work God has begun to continue until the
21:24
whole world is full of God's glory.
21:26
He lifts her eyes from her own spiritual struggles to the
21:29
global mission of God. And he ends with a personal
21:32
request which I find so touching.
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He asks Deborah, this young woman, to pray for him.
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It's incredible, the great theologian, the giant of the
21:41
faith, asking this teenage convert for her prayers.
21:45
It just shows he really believed everything you just wrote that
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in the end we're all just beggars showing other beggars
21:51
where to find bread. He needed Grace just as much as
21:54
she did. So let's try to bring this all
21:56
together. We've walked through 17 points
21:58
from seeking like an unbeliever to walking like a child.
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What's the big picture here? What's the synthesis?
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I think the synthesis is that the Christian life for Edwards
22:09
is a paradox. You have to be both a wretched
22:12
bond slave when you look at your own merit and a beloved child
22:16
when you look at Christ. You have to hold both of those
22:18
truths in your mind at the same time.
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If you only see the Wretch, you despair.
22:21
You just drown in guilt. Right.
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But if you only see yourself as the beloved child, you can get
22:26
presumptuous. You get lazy.
22:28
You start to think your sin doesn't really matter that much.
22:30
So Reformed thinking holds those two intention.
22:34
It emphasizes our total reliance on sovereign grace.
22:37
You need Christ's righteousness to cover you every single second
22:40
of every single day. It's not a one time transaction.
22:43
It's a moment by moment dependence.
22:46
Which brings us all the way back to that idea of new conversion
22:49
that we started with. It does.
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And you know, that's the thought I want to leave our listeners
22:52
with. Go on.
22:54
If the Christian life requires constantly being raised from the
22:57
dead in a spiritual sense. If we need that daily
23:00
resurrection, what does that say about the danger of relying on a
23:04
memory of a past event? It's the critical question,
23:08
isn't it? So many of us are coasting on a
23:10
spiritual experience we had 5-10, maybe 20 years ago.
23:14
We have the memory, but the fire is out.
23:16
Edwards is challenging all of us.
23:17
Are you alive today? Are you seeing the light of
23:20
Christ today, or you just trying to warm yourself by the memory
23:23
of a fire that burned out a long time ago?
23:25
That's a provocative question. It demands a fresh look at our
23:28
daily walk. It does.
23:29
We can't live on yesterday's grace.
23:31
Yeah, new mana for today. Well, on that note, we have a
23:34
lot to think about. Thank you for joining us on
23:37
Reformed Thinking. It's been a pleasure.