Latest / Reformed Thinking / Hypocrites Deficient in the Duty of Prayer (Job 27:10) | Jonathan Edwards

Transcript

Hypocrites Deficient in the Duty of Prayer (Job 27:10) | Jonathan Edwards · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  Welcome back to Reform Thinking. We are glad to have you with us
• 0:02
  for another session where we take serious theological works
• 0:05
  and try to understand what they demand of us today.
• 0:09
  It's good to be here. We're looking at a text today
• 0:11
  that is, to put it mildly, terrifying.
• 0:14
  But it's terrifying in that necessary surgical way that you
• 0:17
  want when you know something might be wrong with you.
• 0:20
  Yes. That's a good way to put it.
• 0:22
  We are opening up a sermon by Jonathan Edwards.
• 0:25
  And you know, when people hear the name Edwards, they have a
• 0:27
  certain picture in mind. Absolutely sinners in the hands
• 0:30
  of an angry God. Right.
• 0:32
  They picture him just shouting fire and brimstone from a
• 0:35
  pulpit, trying to, you know, scare people into submission.
• 0:38
  But the Edwards we meet in this sermon is quite different.
• 0:42
  So this one is titled Hypocrites deficient in the Duty of prayer.
• 0:47
  And here he's not really shouting.
• 0:48
  He's analyzing. He's like a master physician
• 0:51
  conducting a very quiet, very precise dismantling of the human
• 0:55
  heart to figure out what's actually beating inside it.
• 0:58
  Really does feel like a diagnostic test.
• 1:01
  The text he's preaching from is Job 27.90.
• 1:05
  It's a short verse asking a pretty simple question about the
• 1:08
  hypocrite. The question is, will he always
• 1:11
  call upon God? And it's one of those questions
• 1:14
  that already has the answer baked in, right?
• 1:15
  Exactly. In the Hebrew poetry of Job, the
• 1:18
  implied answer is a resounding no, and that's the central
• 1:22
  thesis Edwards is driving at here.
• 1:24
  Which is what exactly? He says that while a person who
• 1:26
  is not truly converted, what the Bible calls a hypocrite, might
• 1:30
  keep up the appearance of religion for a season, it is
• 1:33
  their manner eventually to leave it off.
• 1:35
  So they might pray, they might attend church, they might look
• 1:38
  the part for years. Even for years, but eventually
• 1:40
  they will abandoned the Dewey and specifically, Edwards
• 1:43
  argues, they will abandoned the duty of secret prayer.
• 1:47
  That distinction is so key. The difference between public
• 1:50
  prayer and secret prayer seems to be the hinge this whole
• 1:52
  argument turns on. It is.
• 1:54
  But before we even get to why they stop, Edwards starts
• 1:57
  somewhere that I think catches people off guard.
• 1:59
  He actually admits that hypocrites do pray.
• 2:01
  Yes, and not only that they pray, but that they often pray a
• 2:04
  lot for a short time. They might even seem more
• 2:07
  consistent than a true Christian, which seems.
• 2:10
  Counterintuitive. We tend to think of the
• 2:11
  hypocrite as the guy who's, you know, faking it by doing the
• 2:14
  bare minimum. But Edwards says no.
• 2:16
  A person with no true spiritual life can still be incredibly
• 2:20
  active in religious duties, and we have to ask why?
• 2:24
  If the Holy Spirit isn't the engine driving that activity,
• 2:27
  what is? So what does he point to?
• 2:29
  He points to what theologians call common illuminations.
• 2:33
  OK, let's unpack that term a little, because it sounds
• 2:35
  technical. What does he mean by common
• 2:38
  illumination? He's referring to a work of the
• 2:40
  spirit that falls short of actual regeneration.
• 2:43
  A person can be illuminated or awakened to the reality of
• 2:47
  judgment. They see very clearly that hell
• 2:50
  is real. So it's an intellectual
• 2:51
  awakening. It's more than just
• 2:53
  intellectual, it's a genuine fear.
• 2:55
  They see that their soul is in danger and that fear is an
• 2:57
  incredibly powerful motivator. Fear creates a lot of energy.
• 3:01
  If I wake up and realize my house is on fire, I'm going to
• 3:04
  move very, very fast. That's a perfect analogy.
• 3:08
  I don't need to be a good person to run out of a burning
• 3:10
  building. I just need to be a terrified
• 3:12
  person. That's it.
• 3:13
  When a natural man, someone not yet born again, sees the danger
• 3:18
  of hell, they will do anything to escape it.
• 3:21
  They will read their Bible, they will go to services, and they
• 3:24
  will be constant in secret prayer because they are trying
• 3:28
  to strike a bargain with God. A.
• 3:30
  Transaction. It is a transaction.
• 3:31
  They're thinking I will give God this duty, I will give him these
• 3:35
  prayers, and in exchange he will not throw me into the fire.
• 3:39
  So it's just self preservation masquerading as devotion.
• 3:42
  That's the first engine, but Edwards says it's not just fear.
• 3:45
  It can also be what he calls false affections.
• 3:48
  And this part is even trickier because it involves positive
• 3:51
  emotions. They might actually feel
• 3:53
  something that resembles joy or love.
• 3:55
  This is where Edwards really shows his skill as a well a
• 3:59
  psychologist of the soul. He was writing during the Great
• 4:01
  Awakening, you have to remember. Right, he saw it all first hand.
• 4:04
  He saw people weeping in the aisles, shouting for joy,
• 4:08
  appearing to be radically changed.
• 4:10
  He had to figure out what was real and what wasn't.
• 4:13
  So he argues that a person can hear about the mercy of God or
• 4:16
  the love of Christ and feel a massive wave of relief.
• 4:20
  They might think God has saved me, I'm safe, and that relief
• 4:23
  creates a kind of gratitude. I could see how that happens.
• 4:27
  It's like if a judge suddenly dismissed a huge case against
• 4:30
  you, you'd feel A rush of affection for that judge.
• 4:32
  You might say, what a great judge.
• 4:33
  I love that man. Precisely.
• 4:35
  But Edwards would ask, do you love the judge for his justice
• 4:38
  and his character, or do you love him simply because he let
• 4:41
  you off the hook? That's a sharp question.
• 4:44
  Edwards calls this transactional love.
• 4:46
  It is entirely self referential. They don't love God for who he
• 4:49
  is, for His Holiness, His glory, his attributes.
• 4:52
  They love him because they think he thinks highly of them.
• 4:55
  It's a form of narcissism wrapped up in religious
• 4:57
  language. So as long as they're feeling
• 4:59
  good or as long as they feel safe, the prayer continues.
• 5:02
  It just flows out of that emotional high.
• 5:05
  It's like a fire fueled by straw or dry leaves.
• 5:08
  It burns hot and bright. It might even be brighter than
• 5:12
  the steady coal fire of a true St. for a moment.
• 5:15
  But the fuel source is external and temporary.
• 5:18
  Once the straw burns up, the fire goes out.
• 5:21
  But here's where it gets interesting.
• 5:23
  Edwards notes that even when those feelings fade, the
• 5:26
  hypocrite usually doesn't stop praying immediately.
• 5:29
  No, there's a momentum to it. Right, because stopping cold
• 5:33
  Turkey would be a, well, a disaster for their self-image.
• 5:37
  It would be a psychological shock they can't handle.
• 5:39
  Just think about it. You've told your family you're
• 5:41
  converted. You've told your church, You've
• 5:43
  convinced yourself if you suddenly stop praying, the
• 5:46
  moment the emotion dies down, you have to admit to yourself
• 5:48
  I'm right back where I started. And that's too terrifying to
• 5:51
  face. So they run on fumes.
• 5:52
  They run on the force of preconceived notions, as he puts
• 5:55
  it. They know that godly people
• 5:57
  persevere. So they force themselves to go
• 5:59
  through the motions to protect their own identity as a
• 6:02
  Christian. It becomes a performance for an
• 6:03
  audience of one themselves. Yes, they're acting out the role
• 6:07
  of a believer just to keep their own conscience quiet.
• 6:12
  But Edwards says this doesn't last forever.
• 6:14
  There's a gradual decline. It's not a Cliff, it's a slope.
• 6:18
  A slow erosion. That's the word.
• 6:20
  They begin to manage their conscience.
• 6:23
  They find loopholes. They might miss a day of secret
• 6:26
  prayer because they're busy. Then they miss two days.
• 6:28
  Then it becomes a weekly thing. And pretty soon, they've
• 6:30
  constructed a whole theology that allows them to feel safe
• 6:34
  while neglecting the closet entirely.
• 6:36
  They might tell themselves, well, you know, I'm not
• 6:38
  legalistic. I don't need a rigid schedule
• 6:40
  for prayer. And this brings us back to that
• 6:42
  critical distinction you mentioned earlier, public versus
• 6:45
  private prayer. Edwards seems to think the
• 6:47
  hypocrite can keep up the public stuff indefinitely.
• 6:50
  That is a chilling observation, he says.
• 6:52
  A man might attend family prayer, public worship, or small
• 6:55
  group meetings his entire life and still be a hypocrite.
• 6:58
  Why? What's the difference?
• 7:00
  Because public prayer has a social reward, it maintains your
• 7:03
  reputation. It keeps your spouse happy, your
• 7:06
  pastor off your back, and you're standing in the community
• 7:08
  intact. There is a horizontal benefit to
• 7:11
  being seen as a praying man. But the closet is different.
• 7:15
  The closet is the ultimate test. There's no applause in the
• 7:18
  closet. There's no social credit for
• 7:20
  closing the door and getting on your knees where only God sees.
• 7:24
  So that's the real test of the heart.
• 7:25
  That's what Edwards argues. If you only pray when others are
• 7:28
  watching, you're not worshiping God, you're worshiping your
• 7:31
  reputation. So when the hypocrite eventually
• 7:33
  drops the habit, it's the secret habit that goes first.
• 7:37
  That is a heavy diagnostic tool. Yeah, it forces every one of us
• 7:40
  to ask, what does my parental life look like when no one is
• 7:43
  looking? Yeah, But OK, let's move into
• 7:46
  the why. Edwards lists several reasons
• 7:48
  why this drop off happens. It's not accidental.
• 7:51
  It's theological. Right.
• 7:53
  The first reason is fundamental to our understanding of
• 7:56
  salvation. The hypocrite, he says, has no
• 7:59
  spirit of prayer. What does he mean by that?
• 8:01
  We have to remember what true prayer is.
• 8:04
  It's not just reciting words in a Reformed view.
• 8:07
  It's the Spirit of God dwelling within the believer, breathing
• 8:10
  back to the Father. It is a relational dynamic.
• 8:14
  It's a child talking to his father.
• 8:16
  And the hypocrite doesn't have that relationship.
• 8:18
  No, because they don't have the indwelling spirit.
• 8:21
  And Edwards contrasts this with the self-sufficiency of the
• 8:24
  false convert. The false convert thinks I'm.
• 8:27
  I'm saved, I'm rich, I have need of nothing.
• 8:29
  It's a paradox, isn't it? A false conversion leads to
• 8:32
  pride. I've got my ticket to heaven.
• 8:34
  I'm done. But a true conversion, it opens
• 8:37
  your eyes to how desperate you actually are.
• 8:40
  The true St. feels more needy after conversion than before.
• 8:43
  They see their remaining sin more clearly.
• 8:45
  They hunger and thirst for righteousness.
• 8:47
  So the true St. has, as Edwards puts it, business enough at the
• 8:51
  throne of grace. I like that phrase.
• 8:53
  It's a great phrase. It implies they have things to
• 8:56
  get done. They have things to discuss with
• 8:57
  God. They have sins to confess,
• 8:59
  mercies to ask for, gratitude to express, friends to intercede
• 9:02
  for. The plate is full.
• 9:05
  Whereas the hypocrite runs out of things to say.
• 9:07
  They run out of things to say because they don't really know
• 9:10
  God and deep down they don't think they need him anymore.
• 9:14
  It's like if you're stuck in an elevator with a stranger, you
• 9:17
  run out of things to say in 2 minutes, right?
• 9:19
  Weather. Sports, then silence.
• 9:22
  But if you're with your closest friend, you can talk all night.
• 9:25
  The hypocrite is stuck in the elevator with God.
• 9:27
  That is a really helpful way to frame it.
• 9:30
  If you run out of things to say to God, it might be because you
• 9:33
  don't realize how much you need Him.
• 9:35
  That's the first reason. And the second reason Edwards
• 9:38
  gives is false security. We touched on this, but it's
• 9:41
  this idea that hope can actually be a trap.
• 9:44
  A very dangerous trap. The hypocrite uses their hope of
• 9:47
  salvation as a shield against the commands of God.
• 9:50
  Christ says watch and pray. The hypocrite says I don't need
• 9:53
  to watch, I'm already safe. So the very thing that drove
• 9:57
  them to pray in the 1st place, fear, is now gone and it's
• 10:01
  replaced by a security that allows them to stop.
• 10:03
  Exactly. The irony is staggering.
• 10:07
  Fear drove them to pray, but false security leads them to
• 10:10
  stop. They become bold enough to
• 10:12
  ignore the plainest commands of Scripture because they think
• 10:15
  their insurance policy is all paid up.
• 10:17
  And then there's the third reason, which I found to be
• 10:19
  maybe the most practical and convicting the return to sin.
• 10:23
  Yes, Edwards has this blunt, unforgettable line.
• 10:28
  Sinning and praying agree. Not well together.
• 10:31
  It's a psychological and spiritual impossibility to
• 10:33
  maintain both for long. Isn't it?
• 10:35
  It is. Think about the analogy of Adam
• 10:37
  in the garden. After he sinned, what was his
• 10:40
  first instinct? He hid.
• 10:41
  He hid among the trees. He did not want to be in the
• 10:43
  presence of God. Because the presence of God is
• 10:45
  light, and sin loves darkness. Precisely.
• 10:49
  If a man is secretly nursing a sin, whether it's lust or greed
• 10:53
  or pride or resentment, he will find the prayer closet
• 10:55
  intolerable. To go into secret prayer is to
• 10:58
  step into the immediate presence of the Holy One.
• 11:00
  And if you're holding on to sin, your conscience will just fly in
• 11:03
  your face. It's painful.
• 11:05
  So the hypocrite has a choice, give up the sin or give up the
• 11:10
  prayer. And Edwards says they inevitably
• 11:12
  give up the prayer. He uses that vivid imagery from
• 11:15
  Scripture. The dog returning to its vomit,
• 11:19
  the false affections fade away, the old lusts revive, and the
• 11:23
  prayer life just dies. And that leads directly to the
• 11:25
  fourth reason, laziness and calculation.
• 11:28
  Edwards argues that hypocrites never truly counted the cost.
• 11:32
  They wanted the prize heaven, but they never actually agreed
• 11:34
  to the war. They wanted the crown without
• 11:36
  the cross. Yes, perseverance is hard work.
• 11:39
  It involves fighting the world, the flesh and the devil.
• 11:42
  The hypocrite views religion as a means to an end which is
• 11:45
  escaping hell, not a life of service and battle.
• 11:47
  So when they realized that prayer is a lifelong labor of
• 11:50
  watchfulness, they just quit. They quit.
• 11:52
  And the terrifying theological point Edwards adds here is that
• 11:55
  they have no promise from God to keep them wait.
• 11:57
  Unpack that for a second. We believe in the perseverance
• 12:00
  of the Saints, right? That God keeps his people.
• 12:02
  We absolutely do. But the keyword there is Saints.
• 12:06
  God has promised to uphold His children.
• 12:09
  He has promised that He will put His fear in their hearts so they
• 12:12
  will not depart from Him. But He has made no such promise
• 12:15
  to the hypocrite. So the hypocrite is on his own.
• 12:17
  If a man is relying on his own strength or a false hope, God is
• 12:21
  under no obligation to provide the grace for him to persevere.
• 12:25
  So when the emotional high wears off, the hypocrite is left to
• 12:29
  his own resources, and his own resources are completely
• 12:32
  insufficient. He falls away because there is
• 12:34
  no hand holding him up. Wow, that is a sobering thought.
• 12:38
  It shifts the conversation from am I trying hard enough to am I
• 12:42
  actually relying on his promises?
• 12:44
  It does, and this leads us right into the application section of
• 12:47
  the sermon. Edwards does not pull any
• 12:49
  punches here. He speaks directly to the person
• 12:51
  who knows deep down that they have abandoned secret prayer.
• 12:55
  And his advice is radical. It is, he says.
• 12:57
  Throw away your hope. That sounds so harsh.
• 13:00
  Usually, pastors are trying to encourage people to build up
• 13:02
  their hope. Edwards is telling them to
• 13:04
  destroy it. He's acting like a surgeon
• 13:07
  moving a tumor. If your hope is allowing you to
• 13:10
  live in disobedience to God, it is a cancer.
• 13:13
  It needs to be cut out. His logic is that if the fruit
• 13:16
  is dead, if there's no prayer life, then the tree must be
• 13:19
  dead. That's it.
• 13:21
  It doesn't matter what happened five years ago at a revival
• 13:23
  meeting. It doesn't matter if you cried
• 13:25
  tears of joy once, if you are living a prayerless life now,
• 13:30
  your hope is false. He deals with the excuses people
• 13:32
  make, too. I could just hear someone
• 13:34
  saying, but my pastor thinks I'm saved.
• 13:37
  My wife thinks I'm a Christian. I lead the Bible study.
• 13:39
  And Edwards cuts right through all of that.
• 13:41
  He says essentially, what does it matter?
• 13:44
  You can be approve it by every minister and St. in the world,
• 13:47
  but if you are living in a way that Scripture condemns, you are
• 13:50
  condemned. God sees The Secret Life.
• 13:52
  Yes, the verdict of Scripture outweighs the opinion of men
• 13:56
  every time. He has an analogy about
• 13:58
  friendship that really struck me.
• 14:00
  He says if you claim to love a friend but you avoid their
• 14:03
  company, you avoid talking to them, you avoid visiting them.
• 14:06
  It proves your heart is cold. It exposes the lie.
• 14:09
  You cannot claim to love God supremely while actively
• 14:12
  avoiding all contact with Him. It makes no sense.
• 14:15
  And he takes it a step further with the analogy of breathing.
• 14:18
  That one is so powerful. Prayer is to the new nature what
• 14:23
  breathing is to the body. If you saw a body that wasn't
• 14:26
  breathing, you wouldn't say, oh, he's just taking a break from
• 14:28
  breathing. You'd say it's dead.
• 14:29
  O To claim you're a Christian without prayer is just as absurd
• 14:34
  as claiming to be a living man without breath.
• 14:36
  It is, he even calls, a prayerless life a profane life.
• 14:40
  He says it's essentially the life of a heathen.
• 14:42
  That's the logical conclusion, isn't it?
• 14:44
  It. Is if you live without asking
• 14:47
  for God's help, without thanking him, without acknowledging Him
• 14:49
  in secret, you are living as a practical atheist.
• 14:52
  You might have the theological label of Christian, but your
• 14:55
  actual day-to-day existence is godless.
• 14:58
  OK, so Edwards has effectively dismantled the false hope.
• 15:02
  He's stripped away the excuses. Now let's pivot to the positive
• 15:05
  side of this. For the listener who is hearing
• 15:08
  this and thinking, I don't want to be that person.
• 15:10
  I want to stand fast. What is the path to
• 15:14
  perseverance? This is where we have to be very
• 15:16
  careful with our Reform distinctions.
• 15:18
  Edwards is not saying that our perseverance earns us salvation.
• 15:21
  We are justified by faith alone in Christ alone.
• 15:25
  But perseverance is the necessary evidence of that
• 15:28
  salvation. So it's not I pray so that I can
• 15:30
  be saved. It's I pray because I am being
• 15:32
  saved. The prayer flows from the new
• 15:34
  heart. Correct.
• 15:36
  But, and this is a big C, but Edward emphasizes that this
• 15:39
  doesn't happen on autopilot. He talks about the need for
• 15:42
  watchfulness. Not passive.
• 15:44
  No, there's this modern tendency to think, let go and let God, as
• 15:47
  if we are passive observers of our own sanctification, Edward
• 15:51
  says. No, the promise that God will
• 15:53
  keep us includes the promise that we will be watchful.
• 15:55
  We cannot simply drift. We have enemies, the world, the
• 15:59
  flesh and the devil. You can't walk through a
• 16:01
  battlefield sleepwalking. He uses the analogy of a child
• 16:05
  in a howling wilderness. I love that image because it
• 16:09
  combines that sense of danger with a sense of dependence.
• 16:13
  It is a perfect picture of the Christian life.
• 16:15
  A child lost in a wilderness cannot survive on their own.
• 16:18
  They need a guide. They need protection.
• 16:21
  If that child let's go of the guide's hand, they are lost.
• 16:24
  And we are that child. We are that child.
• 16:26
  Edwards is saying that our soul is in constant danger.
• 16:29
  We are pray for the roaring lion, Satan.
• 16:32
  Without fresh supplies of grace every single day, what He called
• 16:36
  Our Daily Bread, we cannot not resist sin, we cannot understand
• 16:39
  truth, and we cannot bring forth fruit.
• 16:42
  That really highlights the necessity of prayer.
• 16:44
  It isn't just a duty, it's a lifeline.
• 16:46
  If I am that child in the wilderness, I'm going to be
• 16:48
  shouting for help constantly. And that's the difference
• 16:51
  between the hypocrite and the Saint.
• 16:52
  The hypocrite thinks he knows the way out of the woods on his
• 16:55
  own. The Saint knows he is utterly
• 16:57
  helpless without the guide. So let's get practical.
• 17:00
  Edwards gives some very specific directions for the listener who
• 17:03
  wants to ensure they don't fall away.
• 17:05
  His first strategy is about watching the beginnings of
• 17:08
  neglect. This is wisdom for the ages
• 17:10
  really. Nobody wakes up 1 morning and
• 17:13
  decides to become an apostate. It starts with just this once.
• 17:17
  You're too tired on a Tuesday night, so you skip secret
• 17:20
  prayer. Then you're busy on Thursday
• 17:22
  morning. The conscience gets a little
• 17:24
  less sensitive each time you do it.
• 17:25
  The habit starts to erode. He uses a military analogy here
• 17:29
  about the retreat. Yes, he says that beginning to
• 17:31
  retreat in battle weakens the soldier and emboldens the enemy.
• 17:35
  The moment you give an inch, Satan takes a mile.
• 17:39
  His advice is do not give that first inch.
• 17:42
  Guard the habit of secret prayer with your life.
• 17:44
  So if you catch yourself making excuses, stop immediately and
• 17:48
  repent. Don't let that gap whiten.
• 17:50
  Exactly. His second strategy is what I
• 17:52
  would call a lifestyle audit, and this is where he gets very
• 17:56
  specific about the culture of his day, which honestly sounds a
• 17:59
  lot like the culture of our day. He talks about young company and
• 18:02
  frolics. Right.
• 18:03
  In modern terms, we're talking about the party scene, endless
• 18:06
  entertainment, spending all your time with people who have no
• 18:08
  regard for God at all. And Edwards challenges the
• 18:11
  listener to look at cause and effect.
• 18:13
  He asks a simple question. What happens to your prayer life
• 18:16
  after a night out with that group of friends?
• 18:19
  What happens after you spend 3 hours on that particular
• 18:21
  diversion? It's a simple test really.
• 18:24
  Does this activity make me want to pray, or does it make the
• 18:27
  idea of prayer feel boring and distasteful?
• 18:30
  And if the answer is that it kills your prayer life, Edwards
• 18:33
  says you have to cut it off. It's the Jesus principle.
• 18:36
  If your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off.
• 18:39
  Even if it's a lawful activity. Even then, there's nothing
• 18:43
  inherently sinful about a dinner party or a hobby, but if for you
• 18:46
  it consistently leads to a neglect of God, it has to go.
• 18:49
  He poses that ultimate value judgment.
• 18:52
  Do you value a little worldly diversion more than heaven?
• 18:56
  Because at the end of the day, that's the trade you're making.
• 18:59
  It's a stark choice. He is asking us to be ruthless
• 19:02
  with our own schedules and our own affections.
• 19:05
  We cannot nurture a love for the world and a love for the closet
• 19:08
  at the same time. One will choke out the other.
• 19:11
  As we wrap this up, we have to acknowledge Edward's own
• 19:14
  skepticism. He ends the sermon with a
• 19:16
  warning that is, frankly, a bit depressing, but it's probably
• 19:19
  realistic. He knows human nature.
• 19:21
  He predicts that many people will hear the sermon or you
• 19:24
  know, this deep dive, and they will be convicted.
• 19:28
  They'll pray tonight. They.
• 19:28
  Will they might even pray for a whole week.
• 19:31
  But he warns that without a new heart, without a true work of
• 19:34
  the Spirit, they will eventually return to their old ways.
• 19:38
  The world will crowd in again. He.
• 19:40
  Leaves us with one final haunting image from the Book of
• 19:44
  Job, The Snow Waters. It's such a powerful metaphor.
• 19:49
  Imagine a stream in the springtime.
• 19:51
  It's roaring. It's violent.
• 19:53
  It's full of water. It looks like a mighty river.
• 19:55
  Looks real. It looks real.
• 19:57
  But where does the water come from?
• 19:58
  It comes from melting snow. It's just a reaction to the
• 20:01
  sun's heat. It's surface level.
• 20:02
  There's no spring, no groundwater feeding it.
• 20:04
  So when the summer heat comes. It dries up completely.
• 20:07
  It just vanishes. And Edwards asks us, is your
• 20:11
  religion like that? Is it a flash flood caused by
• 20:13
  fear, or a temporary emotional melt?
• 20:16
  Or is it a spring of living water welling up from within?
• 20:19
  Because the summer heat is coming.
• 20:20
  The summer heat, the trials of life, or just the simple passage
• 20:23
  of time will reveal the difference.
• 20:25
  And that really is the question we want you to sit with today.
• 20:29
  Are you a spring or are you just melting snow?
• 20:31
  It's the most important question you can ask yourself.
• 20:34
  And if you suspect you might be the snow water, the solution
• 20:38
  isn't just to do better. It's to go to Christ.
• 20:41
  Ask for that living water. Ask for the new heart that
• 20:44
  naturally breathes prayer. Amen to that.
• 20:47
  Thank you for joining us on this deep dive into Jonathan Edwards.
• 20:51
  It is tough medicine, but it's good medicine.
• 20:53
  Indeed it is. We will catch you next time on
• 20:56
  reformed thinking.