Jonathan Edwards on Worship

Public and Private Devotion to God

Rivera

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2010
• eBook ISBN: 9781630879747
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Religión

The great American pastor-theologian Jonathan Edwards remains undeniably relevant today, more than 250 years after his death, as attested by the unending flurry of articles, books, and dissertations treating him. Despite this, virtually nothing has been written concerning Edwards's views on worship, a subject central to the Christian faith, and certainly to Edwards himself. This volume explores Edwards's perspective on both public and private dimensions of worship, aspects of which rise from well-understood Puritan categories, and proposes the practice of self-examination as a bridge between public and private devotion. As Ken Minkema, of the Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale, writes in the foreword, Ted Rivera's study is the first that systematically attempts to show us Edwards's views of worship, and so represents an important resource for scholars and religious practitioners alike who are interested in liturgy, 'the practice of piety,' and spiritual growth. Through an engagement with Edwards's own words--in letters, notebooks, and sermons--we learn of Edwards's own spiritual life, and of the nature of private and corporate devotion.

one

Introduction

What part did worship play in Jonathan Edwards’s thought and in his preaching? How central a concern was worship to Edwards? Was worship even in some way an organizing principle or an essential motif for him? The answers to such questions will offer potentially profound insights into what drove Edwards. Such considerations have remained virtually unexplored in Edwardsean scholarship, and Edwards himself never devoted a full treatise to the topic. And yet, for Edwards, worship was that end for which man is created, that lofty purpose that must fill both the present life and eternity. He writes, “all things are from God as their first cause and fountain; so all things tend to him, and in their progress come nearer and nearer to him through all eternity: which argues that he who is their first cause is their last end.”1 At some point between the summer of 1722 and the spring of 1723, Edwards, still shy of twenty years of age, settled on the text of Psalm 89:6 for his message entitled “God’s Excellencies,” which reads, “For who in the heaven can be compared unto the Lord, and who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the Lord?” In his message, with words that in retrospect form something of a purpose statement for his ministry, Edwards preached, “My design . . . [is] to endeavor, by God’s help, to exhibit and set forth the greatness, gloriousness, and transcendent excellency of that God who made us, and whom we worship and adore.”2

As poignant as that might be, a key objection to be faced is that of irrelevance. How can Edwards, the preacher of such sermons as “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” “The Eternity of Hell Torments,” and “The Justice of God in the Damnation of Sinners,” be relevant in any contemporary theological discussion, much less a discussion of worship, a topic that has begun to enjoy such freedom and variety of expression? Despite this, the value of a study of Edwards’s approach to worship appears evident. Given Edwards’s strong biblical orientation, at a minimum, two primary constituencies would appear to benefit from his insights on the subject. First, those who share Edwards’s view of the Bible, and who therefore are likely to esteem his insights relating to other matters, will likely be interested in taking seriously his counsel on matters relating to public and private worship. Second, students of Christian worship may well be spurred to renewed reflection and consideration, and to potentially consider the possibility that Edwards’s views may positively inform contemporary dialogue. As such, Jonathan Edwards, by virtue of his thoroughgoing dependence on Scripture and his unique insight, offers counsel that may prove perceptive with respect to Christian worship today, through his preaching and teaching on public and private devotion to God.

In this introductory chapter, representative background will be provided on the different positions held with regard to the value of Edwards’s contributions, as there are widely divergent estimations now prevalent, with seemingly little middle ground. Next, the Puritan pattern for worship will be reviewed in order to identify the elements of public and private worship that were customary, given the likely connection between the Puritans and Edwards in this crucial respect. Finally, an initial glimpse into Edwards’s view of worship will be provided by means of the review of a key sermon, and some preliminary implications will be observed. In the chapters that follow, Edwards’s insights into the components of public and private worship will be considered in turn, focusing first on public worship, next on self-examination as the bridge between public and private worship, and then on private worship itself. Last, some tentative conclusions will be noted, and potential areas for further study will be highlighted.

Background

At one extreme end of the critical spectrum, with all of the extraordinary effort that has been expended to analyze and psychoanalyze Edwards, one wonders why one simple word has not more consistently been used by his detractors to describe him—neurotic. Patricia Tracy, for example, speaks of Edwards’s “Resolutions”3 as “the urgent gropings of a depressed man toward some sense of emotional stability.”4 Consider just a few easily observed details from the vast warehouse of oddities that could be brought to bear in order to build a portrait of Edwards that would forever cast him as history’s archetypical neurotic. Edwards was the introverted only son of a strong mother and controlling father—not to mention grandson of the so-called “pope” of New England, Solomon Stoddard—and fifth in birth order amidst a slew of ten doting sisters. The case can plausibly be made that he had few if any meaningful relationships with any man throughout his life. Possible exceptions to this contention might be David Brainerd, a much younger man some might think was easily manipulated, with personal habits similar to Edwards’s that might be labeled excessive; or perhaps Samuel Hopkins, a man we would say was mentored by Edwards, and also arguably easily influenced. Edwards, for his own part, referred to Joseph Bellamy as “one of the most intimate friends I have in the world.”5

That compulsions ravaged Edwards seem readily evident; while many would point to his lifelong habit of thirteen hours of study a day as evidence of incomparable devotion, others could easily see in such behavior a pattern of obsessive compulsion that bordered on self-destructiveness. In a related vein, Edwards’s celebrated gauntness, a near walking cadaver in the eyes of some, can either be explained away as a man preoccupied with spiritual matters to the point of self-neglect, or perhaps as evidence of anorexia to a more jaundiced eye. Consider this diary entry by Edwards:

I find that when eating, I cannot be convinced in the time of it, that if I should eat more, I should exceed the bounds of strict temperance, though I have had the experience of two years of the like; and yet, as soon as I have done, in three minutes I am convinced of it. But yet, when I eat again, and remember it, still, while eating, I am fully convinced that I have not eaten what is but for nature, nor can I be convinced that my appetite and feeling is as it was before. It seems to me that I shall be somewhat faint if I leave off then; but when I have finished, I am convinced again, and so it is from time to time.6

Given the more dark and extreme characterizations of Edwards that have been set forth, one marvels that even more sensationalistic theories, such as that Edwards was perhaps as a sufferer of Munchausen syndrome—or worse, Munchausen by proxy, lived out through his daughter Jerusha or even his protégé Brainerd—have not seriously been proposed. In one of the more spectacular examples of dark characterization, Struthers Burt “blamed Edwards for the violent gangsterism of the Prohibition Era.”7 In “The Anachronism of Jonathan Edwards,” H. Richard Niebuhr adds, “A highly popular, widespread impression of Jonathan Edwards is the one expressed in verse by Phyllis McGinley: ‘Whenever Mr. Edwards spake / In church about Damnation, / The...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Public Worship
• Chapter 3: The Practice of Self-Examination
• Chapter 4: Private Devotion
• Conclusion
• Bibliography