Quote 1717
God is the highest good of the reasonable creature. The enjoyment of him is our proper; and is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Better than fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of any, or all earthly friends. These are but shadows; but the enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams; but God is the sun. These are but streams; but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean.
Jonathan Edwards
Works of Jonathan Edwards Volume 17 Sermons and DiscoursesOther Quotes from the Author & Topic
Resolved, never to do anything which I should be afraid to do if it were the last hour of my life.Resolutions
Resolved, when I am most conscious of provocations to ill nature and anger, that I will strive most to feel and act good-naturedly; yea, at such times, to manifest good nature, though I think that in other respects it would be disadvantageous, and so as would be imprudent at other times.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
The resurrection of Christ is the most joyful event that ever came to pass.
Resolved, never to do anything out of revenge.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
Whether God has decreed all things that ever come to pass or not, all that own the being of a God, own that He knows all things beforehand. Now, it is self-evident that if He knows all things beforehand, He either doth approve of them or doth not approve of them; that is, He either is willing they should be, or He is not willing they should be. But to will that they should be is to decree them.
Resolution One: I will live for God. Resolution Two: If no one else does, I still will.Resolutions
Either I must lay hold of Christ or the devil will lay hold of me and drag me to the pit of misery.
God is a perfectly happy Being, in the most absolute and highest sense possible; in strict propriety of speech, there is no such thing as any pain, grief or trouble in God.
It is God's way to let ministers try all their strength first, and then He Himself comes and subdues the hearts they cannot.
If true religion lies much in the affections, we may infer, that such a way of preaching the word . . . as has a tendency deeply to affect the hearts of those who attend . . . is much to be desired.Religious Affections
God hath appointed . . . preaching . . . as a fit means . . . to stir up the pure minds of the saints, quicken their affections by often bringing the great things of religion to their remembrance, setting them in their proper colours, though they know them, and have been fully instructed in them.
Resolved, not only to refrain from an air of dislike, fretfulness, and anger in conversation, but to exhibit an air of love, cheerfulness and benignity.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
I frequently hear persons in old age say how they would live, if they were to live their lives over again: Resolved, that I will live just so as I can think I shall wish I had done, supposing I live to old age.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
Resolved, never to do anything, which I should be afraid to do, if it were the last hour of my life.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
Resolved, to live with all my might, while I do live.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
Resolved, that I will do whatsoever I think to be most to God's glory, and my own good, profit and pleasure, in the whole of my duration, without any consideration of the time, whether now, or never so many myriad's of ages hence. Resolved to do whatever I think to be my duty and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general. Resolved to do this, whatever difficulties I meet with, how many and how great soever.https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-resolutions-of-jonathan-edwards
God's purpose for my life was that I have a passion for God's glory and that I have a passion for my joy in that glory, and that these two are one passion.
Tis inexpressible, and almost inconceivable, how strong a self-righteous, self-exalting disposition is naturally in man; and what he will not do and suffer, to feed and gratify it.Religious Affections
the will (without any metaphysical refining) is plainly, that by which the mind chooses any thing. The faculty of the will is that faculty or power, or principle of mind, by which it is capable of choosing: an act of the will is the same as an act of choosing or choice.Part I Sect I, Freedom of the Will
Of all kinds of knowledge that we can ever obtain, the knowledge of God, and the knowledge of ourselves, are the most important.Preface, Freedom of the Will
Man has a universal tendency to disregard God and to disobey His law.Preface to Freedom of the Will
Be advised to consider what others say of you and improve it to this end, to know whether you do not live in some way of sin...And though the imputation may seem to us to be very groundless and we think that they, in charging us so, are influenced by no good spirit; yet if we act prudently, we shall take so much notice of it as to make an occassion of examining ourselves ... it is most imprudent as well as most unchristian, to take it amiss, and resent it, when we are thus told of our faults: we should rather rejoice in it, that we are shown our spots ... we should improve what our enemies say of us. If they from an ill spirit reproach and revile us to our faces, we should consider it, so far as to reflect inward upon ourselves and inquire whether it not be so, as they charge us ... they are likely to fix on real faults, they are likely to fall upon us where we are weakest and most defective.The Necessity of Self Examination
How can you expect to dwell with God forever, if you so neglect and forsake him here?
Truth is the agreement of our ideas with the ideas of God.
How far less [are] the greatest afflictions that we meet with in this world...than we have deserved! The Works of Jonathan Edwards (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997), (Page 321)
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