Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God Jonathan Edwards
(1703-1758) Enfield, Connecticut July 8, 1741 --Their foot shall slide in due
time.-- Deuteronomy 32:35 In this verse is threatened the vengeance of God on
the wicked unbelieving Israelites, who were God's visible people, and who lived
under the means of grace; but who, notwithstanding all God's wonderful works
towards them, remained (as vers 28.) void of counsel, having no understanding
in them. Under all the cultivations of heaven, they brought forth bitter and
poisonous fruit; as in the two verses next preceding the text. -- The
expression I have chosen for my text, their foot shall slide in due time, seems
to imply the following things, relating to the punishment and destruction to
which these wicked Israelites were exposed. That they were always exposed to
destruction; as one that stands or walks in slippery places is always exposed
to fall. This is implied in the manner of their destruction coming upon them,
being represented by their foot sliding. The same is expressed, Psalm 72:18.
"Surely thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them down
into destruction."
1. It implies, that they were always exposed to sudden
unexpected destruction. As he that walks in slippery places is every moment
liable to fall, he cannot foresee one moment whether he shall stand or fall the
next; and when he does fall, he falls at once without warning: Which is also
expressed in Psalm 73:18,19. "Surely thou didst set them in slippery
places; thou castedst them down into destruction: How are they brought into
desolation as in a moment!"
2. Another thing implied is, that they are
liable to fall of themselves, without being thrown down by the hand of another;
as he that stands or walks on slippery ground needs nothing but his own weight
to throw him down. 3. That the reason why they are not fallen already and do
not fall now is only that God's appointed time is not come. For it is said,
that when that due time, or appointed time comes, their foor shall slide. Then
they shall be left to fall, as they are inclined by their own weight. God will
not hold them up in these slippery places any longer, but will let them go; and
then, at that very instant, they shall fall into destruction; as he that stands
on such slippery declining ground, on the edge of a pit, he cannot stand alone,
when he is let go he immediately falls and is lost. 4. The observation from the
words that I would now insist upon is this. -- "There is nothing that
keeps wicked men at any one moment out of hell, but the mere pleasure of
God." -- By the mere pleasure of God, I mean his sovereign pleasure, his
arbitrary will, restrained by no obligation, hindered by no manner of
difficulty, any more than if nothing else but God's mere will had in the least
degree, or in any respect whatsoever, any hand in the preservation of wicked
men one moment. -- The truth of this observation may appear by the following
considerations. There is no want of power in God to cast wicked men into hell
at any moment. Men's hands cannot be strong when God rises up. The strongest
have no power to resist him, nor can any deliver out of his hands. -- He is not
only able to cast wicked men into hell, but he can most easily do it. Sometimes
an earthly prince meets with a great deal of difficulty to subdue a rebel, who
has
1. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God found means to fortify himself, and has made himself strong by the numbers
of his followers. But it is not so with God. There is no fortress that is any
defence from the power of God. Though hand join in hand, and vast multitudes of
God's enemies combine and associate themselves, they are easily broken in
pieces. They are as great heaps of light chaff before the whirlwind; or large
quantities of dry stubble before devouring flames. We find it easy to tread on
and crush a worm that we see crawling on the earth; so it is easy for us to cut
or singe a slender thread that any thing hangs by: thus easy is it for God,
when he pleases, to cast his enemies down to hell. What are we, that we should
think to stand before him, at whose rebuke the earth trembles, and before whom
the rocks are thrown down? They deserve to be cast into hell; so that divine
justice never stands in the way, it makes no objection against God's using his
power at any moment to destroy them. Yea, on the contrary, justice calls aloud
for an infinite punishment of their sins. Divine justice says of the tree that
brings forth such grapes of Sodom, "Cut it down, why cumbereth it the
ground?" Luke 13:7. The sword of divine justice is every moment brandished
over their heads, and it is nothing but the hand of arbitrary mercy, and God's
mere will, that holds it back.
2. They are already under a sentence of
condemnation to hell. They do not only justly deserve to be cast down thither,
but the sentence of the law of God, that eternal and immutable rule of
righteousness that God has fixed between him and mankind, is gone out against
them, and stands against them; so that they are bound over already to hell.
John 3:18. "He that believeth not is condemned already." So that
every unconverted man properly belongs to hell; that is his place; from thence
he is, John 8:23. "Ye are from beneath:" And thither he is bound; it
is the place that justice, and God's word, and the sentence of his unchangeable
law assign to him.
3. They are now the objects of that very same anger and
wrath of God, that is expressed in the torments of hell. And the reason why
they do not go down to hell at each moment, is not because God, in whose power
they are, is not then very angry with them; as he is with many miserable
creatures now tormented in hell, who there feel and bear the fierceness of his
wrath. Yea, God is a great deal more angry with great numbers that are now on
earth: yea, doubtless, with many that are now in this congregation, who it may
be are at ease, than he is with many of those who are now in the flames of hell.
So that it is not because God is unmindful of their wickedness, and does not
resent it, that he does not let loose his hand and cut them off. God is not
altogether such an one as themselves, though they may imagine him to be so. The
wrath of God bums against them, their damnation does not slumber; the pit is
prepared, the fire is made ready, the fumace is now hot, ready to receive them;
the flames do now rage and glow. The glittering sword is whet, and held over
them, and the pit hath opened its mouth under them.
4. The devil stands ready
to fall upon them, and seize them as his own, at what moment God shall permit
him. They belong to him; he has their souls in his possession, and under his
dominion. The scripture represents them as his goods, Luke 11:12. The devils
watch them; they are ever by them at their right hand; they stand waiting for
them, like greedy hungry lions that see their prey, and expect to have it, but
are for the present kept back. If God should withdraw his hand, by which they
are restrained, they would in one moment fly upon their poor souls. The old
serpent is gaping for them; hell opens its mouth wide to receive them; and if
God should permit it, they would be hastily swallowed up and lost.
5. 6. There
are in the souls of wicked men those hellish principles reigning, that would
presently kindle Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and flame out into hell fire, if it were not for God's restraints. There is
laid in the very nature of carnal men, a foundation for the torments of hell.
There are those corrupt principles, in reigning power in them, and in full
possession of them, that are seeds of hell fire. These principles are active
and powerful, exceeding violent in their nature, and if it were not for the
restraining hand of God upon them, they would soon break out, they would flame
out after the same manner as the same corruptions, the same enmity does in the
hearts of damned souls, and would beget the same torments as they do in them.
The souls of the wicked are in scripture compared to the troubled sea, Isa.
57:20. For the present, God restrains their wickedness by his mighty power, as
he does the raging waves of the troubled sea, saying, "Hitherto shalt thou
come, but no further;" but if God should withdraw that restraining power,
it would soon carry all before it. Sin is the ruin and misery of the soul; it
is destructive in its nature; and if God should leave it without restraint,
there would need nothing else to make the soul perfectly miserable. The
corruption of the heart of man is immoderate and boundless in its fury; and
while wicked me live here, it is like fire pent up by God's restraints, whereas
if it were let loose, it would set on fire the course of nature; and as the
heart is now a sink of sin, so if sin was not restrained, it would immediately
turn the soul into fiery oven, or a furnace of fire and brimstone. It is no
security to wicked men for one moment, that there are no visible means of death
at hand. It is no security to a natural man, that he is now in health, and that
he does not see which way he should now immediately go out of the world by any
accident, and that there is no visible danger in any respect in his
circumstances. The manifold and continual experience of the world in all ages,
shows this is no evidence, that a man is not on the very brink of eternity, and
that the next step will not be into another world. The unseen, unthought-of
ways and means of persons going suddenly out of the world are innumerable and
inconceivable. Unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a rotten covering,
and there are innumerable places in this covering so weak that they will not
bear their weight, and these places are not seen. The arrows of death fly
unseen at noon-day; the sharpest sight cannot discem them. God has so many
different unsearchable ways of taking wicked men out of the world and sending
them to hell, that there is nothing to make it appear, that God had need to be
at the expense of a miracle, or go out of the ordinary course of his
providence, to destroy any wicked man, at any moment. All the means that there
are of sinners going out of the world, are so in God's hands, and so
universally and absolutely subject to his power and determination, that it does
not depend at all the less on the mere will of God, whether sinners shall at
any moment go to hell, than if means were never made use of, or at all
concerned in the case.
7. Natural men's prudence and care to preserve their own
lives, or the care of others to preserve them, do not secure them a moment. To
this, divine providence and universal experience do also bear testimony. There
is this clear evidence that men's own wisdom is no security to them from death;
that if it were otherwise we should see some difference between the wise and
politic men of the world, and others, with regard to their liableness to early
and unexpected death: but how is it in fact? Eccles. 2:16. "How dieth the
wise man? even as the fool."
8. All wicked men's pains and contrivande
which they use to escape hell, while they continue to reject Christ, and so
remain wicked men, do not secure them from hell one moment. Almost every
natural man that hears of hell, flatters himself that he shall escape it; he depends
upon himself for his own security; he flatters himself in what he has done, in
what he is now doing, or what he intends to do. Every one lays out matters in
his own mind how he shall avoid damnation, and flatters himself that he
contrives well for himself, and that his schemes will not fail. They hear
indeed that there are but few saved, and that the greater part of men that have
died heretofore are
9. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God gone to hell; but each one imagines that he lays out matters better for his
own escape than others have done. He does not intend to come to that place of
torment; he says within himself, that he intends to take effectual care, and to
order matters so for himself as not to fail. But the foolish children of men
miserably delude themselves in their own schemes, and in confidence in their
own strength and wisdom; they trust to nothing but a shadow. The greater part
of those who heretofore have lived under the same means of grace, and are now
dead, are undoubtedly gone to hell; and it was not because they were not as
wise as those who are now alive: it was not because they did not lay out
matters as well for themselves to secure their own escape. If we could speak
with them, and inquire of them, one by one, whether they expected, when alive,
and when they used to hear about hell, ever to be the subjects of misery: we
doubtless, should hear one and another reply, "No, I never intended to come
here: I had laid out matters otherwise in my mind; I thought I should contrive
well for myself -- I thought my scheme good. I intended to take effectual care;
but it came upon me unexpected; I did not look for it at that time, and in that
manner; it came as a thief -- Death outwitted me: God's wrath was too quick for
me. Oh, my cursed foolishness! I was flattering myself, and pleasing myself
with vain dreams of what I would do hereafter; and when I was saying, Peace and
safety, then sudden destruction came upon me." God has laid himself under
no obligation, by any promise to keep any natural man out of hell one moment.
God certainly has made no promises either of eternal life, or of any
deliverance or preservation from eternal death, but what are contained in the
covenant of grace, the promises that are given in Christ, in whom all the
promises are yea and amen. But surely they have no interest in the promises of
the covenant of grace who are not the children of the covenant, who do not
believe in any of the promises, and have no interest in the Mediator of the
covenant.
10. So that, whatever some have imagined and pretended about promises
made to natural men's earnest seeking and knocking, it is plain and manifest,
that whatever pains a natural man takes in religion, whatever prayers he makes,
till he believes in Christ, God is under no manner of obligation to keep him a
moment from eternal destruction. So that, thus it is that natural men are held
in the hand of God, over the pit of hell; they have deserved the fiery pit, and
are already sentenced to it; and God is dreadfully provoked, his anger is as
great towards them as to those that are actually suffering the executions of
the fierceness of his wrath in hell, and they have done nothing in the least to
appease or abate that anger, neither is God in the least bound by any promise
to hold them up one moment; the devil is waiting for them, hell is gaping for
them, the flames gather and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on them,
and swallow them up; the fire pent up in their own hearts is struggling to
break out: and they have no interest in any Mediator, there are no means within
reach that can be any security to them. In short, they have no refuge, nothing
to take hold of; all that preserves them every moment is the mere arbitrary
will, and uncovenanted, unobliged forbearance of an incensed God. Application
The use of this awful subject may be for awakening unconverted persons in this
congregation. This that you have heard is the case of every one of you that are
out of Christ. -- That world of misery, that take of burning brimstone, is
extended abroad under you. There is the dreadful pit of the glowing flames of
the wrath of God; there is hell's wide gaping mouth open; and you have nothing
to stand upon, nor any thing Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God to take hold of; there is nothing between you and hell but the air; it is
only the power and mere pleasure of God that holds you up. You probably are not
sensible of this; you find you are kept out of hell, but do not see the hand of
God in it; but look at other things, as the good state of your bodily
constitution, your care of your own life, and the means you use for your own
preservation. But indeed these things are nothing; if God should withdraw his
hand, they would avail no more to keep you from falling, than the thin air to
hold up a person that is suspended in it. Your wickedness makes you as it were
heavy as lead, and to tend downwards with great weight and pressure towards
hell; and if God should let you go, you would immediately sink and swiftly
descend and plunge into the bottomless gulf, and your healthy constitution, and
your own care and prudence, and best contrivance, and all your righteousness,
would have no more influence to uphold you and keep you out of hell, than a
spider's web would have to stop a falling rock. Were it not for the sovereign
pleasure of God, the earth would not bear you one moment; for you are a burden
to it; the creation groans with you; the creature is made subject to the
bondage of your corruption, not willingly; the sun does not willingly shine
upon you to give you light to serve sin and Satan; the earth does not willingly
yield her increase to satisfy your lusts; nor is it willingly a stage for your
wickedness to be acted upon; the air does not willingly serve you for breath to
maintain the flame of life in your vitals, while you spend your life in the
service of God's enemies. God's creatures are good, and were made for men to
serve God with, and do not willingly subserve to any other purpose, and groan
when they are abused to purposes so directly contrary to their nature and end.
And the world would spew you out, were it not for the sovereign hand of him who
hath subjected it in hope. There are the black clouds of God's wrath now
hanging directly over your heads, full of the dreadful storm, and big with
thunder; and were it not for the restraining hand of God, it would immediately
burst forth upon you. The sovereign pleasure of God, for the present, stays his
rough wind; otherwise it would come with fury, and your destruction would come
like a whirlwind, and you would be like the chaff of the summer threshing
floor. The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present;
they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is
given; and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its
course, when once it is let loose. It is true, that judgment against your evil
works has not been executed hitherto; the floods of God's vengeance have been
withheld; but your guilt in the mean time is constantly increasing, and you are
every day treasuring up more wrath; the waters are constantly rising, and waxing
more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, that
holds the waters back, that are unwilling to be stopped, and press hard to go
forward. If God should only withdraw his hand from the flood-gate, it would
immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and wrath of God,
would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with
omnipotent power; and if your strength were ten thousand times greater than it
is, yea, ten thousand times greater than the strength of the stoutest,
sturdiest devil in hell, it would be nothing to withstand or endure it. The bow
of God's wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice
bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the
mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or
obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with
your blood. Thus all you that never passed under a great change of heart, by
the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon your souls; all you that were never
born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in sin, to a
state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light and life, are in the
Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God hands of an angry God. However you may have
reformed your life in many things, and may have had religious affections, and
may keep up a form of religion in your families and closets, and in the house
of God, it is nothing but his mere pleasure that keeps you from being this
moment swallowed up in everlasting destruction. However unconvinced you may now
be of the truth of what you hear, by and by you will be fully convinced of it.
Those that are gone from being in the like circumstances with you, see that it
was so with them; for destruction came suddenly upon most of them; when they
expected nothing of it, and while they were saying, Peace and safety: now they
see, that those things on which they depended for peace and safety, were
nothing but thin air and empty shadows. The God that holds you over the pit of
hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire,
abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire;
he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he
is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand
times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in
ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his
prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the
fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to
hell the last night; that you was suffered to awake again in this world, after
you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be given, why
you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning, but that God's
hand has held you up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not
gone to hell, since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his pure
eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn worship. Yea, there
is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you do not this very moment
drop down into hell. O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a
great fumace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath,
that you are held over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and
incensed as much against you, as against many of the damned in hell. You hang
by a slender thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it, and
ready every moment to singe it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest
in any Mediator, and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep
off the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have done,
nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment. -- And consider
here more particularly, Whose wrath it is: it is the wrath of the infinite God.
If it were only the wrath of man, though it were of the most potent prince, it
would be comparatively little to be regarded. The wrath of kings is very much
dreaded, especially of absolute monarchs, who have the possessions and lives of
their subjects wholly in their power, to be disposed of at their mere will.
Prov. 20:2. "The fear of a king is as the roaring of a lion: Whoso
provoketh him to anger, sinneth against his own soul." The subject that
very much enrages an arbitrary prince, is liable to suffer the most extreme
torments that human art can invent, or human power can inflict. But the
greatest earthly potentates in their greatest majesty and strength, and when
clothed in their greatest terrors, are but feeble, despicable worms of the
dust, in comparison of the great and almighty Creator and King of heaven and
earth. It is but little that they can do, when most enraged, and when they have
exerted the utmost of their fury. All the kings of the earth, before God, are
as grasshoppers; they are nothing, and less than nothing: both their love and
their hatred is to be despised. The wrath of the great King of kings, is as
much more terrible than theirs, as his majesty is greater. Luke 12:4,5.
"And I say unto you, my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body,
and after that, have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom you
shall fear: fear him, which after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell:
yea, I say unto you, Fear him."
1. 2. It is the fierceness of his wrath
that you are exposed to. We often read of the fury of God; as in Isa. Sinners
in the Hands of an Angry God "According to their deeds,
accordingly he will repay fury to his adversaries." So Isa. 66:15.
"For behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots like a
whirlwind, to render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of
fire." And in many other places. So, Rev. 19:15, we read of "the wine
press of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God." The words are
exceeding terrible. If it had only been said, "the wrath of God," the
words would have implied that which is infinitely dreadful: but it is "the
fierceness and wrath of God." The fury of God! the fierceness of Jehovah!
Oh, how dreadful that must be! Who can utter or conceive what such expressions
carry in them! But it is also "the fierceness and wrath of almighty
God." As though there would be a very great manifestation of his almighty
power in what the fierceness of his wrath should inflict, as though omnipotence
should be as it were enraged, and exerted, as men are wont to exert their
strength in the fierceness of their wrath. Oh! then, what will be the
consequence! What will become of the poor worms that shall suffer it! Whose
hands can be strong? And whose heart can endure? To what a dreadful,
inexpressible, inconceivable depth of misery must the poor creature be sunk who
shall be the subject of this! Consider this, you that are here present, that
yet remain in an unregenerate state. That God will execute the fierceness of
his anger, implies, that he will inflict wrath without any pity. When God
beholds the ineffable extremity of your case, and sees your torment to be so
fastly disproportioned to your strength, and sees how your poor soul is
crushed, and sinks down, as it were, into an infinite gloom; he will have no
compassion upon you, he will not forbear the executions of his wrath, or in the
least lighten his hand; there shall be no moderation or mercy, nor will God
then at all stay his rough wind; he will have no regard to your welfare, nor be
at all careful lest you should suffer too much in any other sense, than only
that you shall not suffer beyond what strict justice requires. Nothing shall be
withheld, because it is so hard for you to bear. Ezek. 8:18. "Therefore
will I also deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity;
and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear them."
Now God stands ready to pity you; this is a day of mercy; you may cry now with
some encouragement of obtaining mercy. But when once the day of mercy is past,
your most lamentable and dolorous cries and shrieks will be in vain; you will
be wholly lost and thrown away of God, as to any regard to your welfare. God
will have no other use to put you to, but to suffer misery; you shall be
continued in being to no other end; for you will be a vessel of wrath fitted to
destruction; and there will be no other use of this vessel, but to be filled
full of wrath. God will be so far from pitying you when you cry to him, that it
is said he will only "laugh and mock," Prov. 1:25,26,&c. How
awful are those words, Isa. 63:3, which are the words of the great God. "I
will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and their
blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my
raiment." It is perhaps impossible to conceive of words that carry in them
greater manifestations of these three things, viz. contempt, and hatred, and
fierceness of indignation. If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far
from pitying you in your doleful case, or showing you the least regard or
favour, that instead of that, he will only tread you under foot. And though he
will know that you cannot bear the weight of omnipotence treading upon you, yet
he will not regard that, but he will crush you under his feet without mercy; he
will crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled on his
garments, so as to stain all his raiment. He will not only hate you, but he
will have you in the utmost contempt: no place shall be thought fit for you,
but under his feet to be trodden down as the mire of the streets.
3. The misery
you are exposed to is that which God will inflict to that end, that he might
show what Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God that wrath of Jehovah is. God hath had it on his heart to show to angels
and men, both how excellent his love is, and also how terrible his wrath is.
Sometimes earthly kings have a mind to show how terrible their wrath is, by the
extreme punishments they would execute on those that would provoke them.
Nebuchadnezzar, that mighty and haughty monarch of the Chaldean empire, was
willing to show his wrath when enraged with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego;
and accordingly gave orders that the burning fiery furnace should be heated
seven times hotter than it was before; doubtless, it was raised to the utmost
degree of fierceness that human art could raise it. But the great God is also
willing to show his wrath, and magnify his awful majesty and mighty power in
the extreme sufferings of his enemies. Rom. 9:22. "What if God, willing to
show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much long-suffering
the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction?" And seeing this is his
design, and what he has determined, even to show how terrible the unrestrained
wrath, the fury and fierceness of Jehovah is, he will do it to effect. There
will be something accomplished and brought to pass that will be dreadful with a
witness. When the great and angry God hath risen up and executed his awful
vengeance on the poor sinner, and the wretch is actually suffering the infinite
weight and power of his indignation, then will God call upon the whole universe
to behold that awful majesty and mighty power that is to be seen in it. Isa.
33:12-14. "And the people shall be as the burnings of lime, as thorns cut
up shall they be burnt in the fire. Hear ye that are far off, what I have done;
and ye that are near, acknowledge my might. The sinners in Zion are afraid;
fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites, " &c. Thus it will be with
you that are in an unconverted state, if you continue in it; the infinite
might, and majesty, and terribleness of the omnipotent God shall be magnified
upon you, in the ineffable strength of your torments. You shall be tormented in
the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb; and when you
shall be in this state of suffering, the glorious inhabitants of heaven shall
go forth and look on the awful spectacle, that they may see what the wrath and
fierceness of the Almighty is; and when they have seen it, they will fall down
and adore that great power and majesty. Isa. 66:23,24. "And it shall come
to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another,
shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go
forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me;
for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they
shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." It is everlasting wrath. It would
be dreadful to suffer this fierceness and wrath of Almighty God one moment; but
you must suffer it to all eternity. There will be no end to this exquisite
horrible misery. When you look forward, you shall see a long for ever, a
boundless duration before you, which will swallow up your thoughts, and amaze
your soul; and you will absolutely despair of ever having any deliverance, any
end, any mitigation, any rest at all. You will know certainly that you must
wear out long ages, millions of millions of ages, in wrestling and conflicting
with this almighty merciless vengeance; and then when you have so done, when so
many ages have actually been spent by you in this manner, you will know that
all is but a point to what remains. So that your punishment will indeed be
infinite. Oh, who can express what the state of a soul in such circumstances
is! All that we can possibly say about it, gives but a very feeble, faint
representation of it; it is inexpressible and inconceivable: For "who
knows the power of God's anger?"
4. How dreadful is the state of those
that are daily and hourly in the danger of this great wrath and infinite
misery! But this is the dismal case of every soul in this congregation that has
not been born again, however moral and strict, sober and religious, they may
otherwise be. Oh that you would consider it, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry
God whether you be young or old! There is reason to think, that there
are many in this congregation now hearing this discourse, that will actually be
the subjects of this very misery to all eternity. We know not who they are, or
in what seats they sit, or what thoughts they now have. It may be they are now
at ease, and hear all these things without much disturbance, and are now
flattering themselves that they are not the persons, promising themselves that
they shall escape. If we knew that there was one person, and but one, in the
whole congregation, that was to be the subject of this misery, what an awful
thing would it be to think of! If we knew who it was, what an awful sight would
it be to see such a person! How might all the rest of the congregation lift up
a lamentable and bitter cry over him! But, alas! instead of one, how many is it
likely will remember this discourse in hell? And it would be a wonder, if some
that are now present should not be in hell in a very short time, even before
this year is out. And it would be no wonder if some persons, that now sit here,
in some seats of this meeting-house, in health, quiet and secure, should be
there before tomorrow morning. Those of you that finally continue in a natural
condition, that shall keep out of hell longest will be there in a little time!
your damnation does not slumber; it will come swiftly, and, in all probability,
very suddenly upon many of you. You have reason to wonder that you are not
already in hell. It is doubtless the case of some whom you have seen and known,
that never deserved hell more than you, and that heretofore appeared as likely
to have been now alive as you. Their case is past all hope; they are crying in
extreme misery and perfect despair; but here you are in the land of the living
and in the house of God, and have an opportunity to obtain salvation. What
would not those poor damned hopeless souls give for one day's opportunity such
as you now enjoy! And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein
Christ has thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and crying
with a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and
pressing into the kingdom of God. Many are daily coming from the east, west,
north and south; many that were very lately in the same miserable condition
that you are in, are now in a happy state, with their hearts filled with love
to him who has loved them, and washed them from their sins in his own blood,
and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. How awful is it to be left behind at
such a day! To see so many others feasting, while you are pining and perishing!
To see so many rejoicing and singing for joy of heart, while you have cause to
mourn for sorrow of heart, and howl for vexation of spirit! How can you rest
one moment in such a condition? Are not your souls as precious as the souls of
the people at Suffield, where they are flocking from day to day to Christ? Are there
not many here who have lived long in the world, and are not to this day born
again? and so are aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and have done nothing
ever since they have lived, but treasure up wrath against the day of wrath? Oh,
sirs, your case, in an especial manner, is extremely dangerous. Your guilt and
hardness of heart is extremely great. Do you not see how generaity persons of
your years are passed over and left, in the present remarkable and wonderful
dispensation of God's mercy? You had need to consider yourselves, and awake
thoroughly out of sleep. You cannot bear the fierceness and wrath of the
infinite God. -- And you, young men, and young women, will you neglect this
precious season which you now enjoy, when so many others of your age are
renouncing all youthful vanities, and flocking to Christ? You especially have
now an extraordinary opportunity; but if you neglect it, it will soon be with
you as with those persons who spent all the precious days of youth in sin, and
are now come to such a dreadful pass in blindness and hardness. -- And you,
children, who are unconverted, do not you know that you are going down to hell,
to bear the dreadful wrath of that God, who is now angry with you every day and
every night? Will you be content to be the children of the devil, when so many
other children in the land are converted, and are become the holy and happy
children of the King of kings? And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and
hanging over the pit of hell, whether they be old men and Sinners in the Hands
of an Angry God women, or middle aged, or young people, or little
children, now hearken to the loud calls of God's word and providence. This
acceptable year of the Lord, a day of such great favour to some, will doubtless
be a day of as remarkable vengeance to others. Men's hearts harden, and their
guilt increases apace at such a day as this, if they neglect their souls; and
never was there so great danger of such persons being given up to hardness of
heart and blindness of mind. God seems now to be hastily gathering in his elect
in all parts of the land; and probably the greater part of adult persons that
ever shall be saved, will be brought in now in a little time, and that it will
be as it was on the great out-pouring of the Spirit upon the Jews in the
apostles' days; the election will obtain, and the rest will be blinded. If this
should be the case with you, you will eternally curse this day, and will curse
the day that ever you was born, to see such a season of the pouring out of
God's Spirit, and will wish that you had died and gone to hell before you had
seen it. Now undoubtedly it is, as it was in the days of John the Baptist, the
axe is in an extraordinary manner laid at the root of the trees, that every
tree which brings not forth good fruit, may be hewn down and cast into the
fire. Therefore, let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from
the wrath to come. The wrath of Almighty God is now undoubtedly hanging over a
great part of this congregation. Let every one fly out of Sodom: "Haste
and escape for your lives, look not behind you, escape to the mountain, lest
you be consumed."
Resouces: http://jesus.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/documents/books/others/edwards_select_sermons.pdf
http://www.ccel.org/e/edwards/sermons/sinners.html (2 of 10)
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar