"It is he [the Holy Spirit] alone who enables them to subordinate all their desires unto God's glory. Without his especial aid and assistance we should aim at self only and ultimately in all we do. Our own profit, ease, satisfaction, mercies, peace, and deliverance, would be the end whereunto we should direct all our supplications; whereby they would be all vitiated and become abominable. … He keeps them unto this also, that the issue of their supplications may be the improvement of holiness in them, and thereby their conformity unto God, with their nearer access unto him."
— John Owen
Source: A Discourse of the Work of the Holy Spirit in Prayer (1682), ch. V (Works, ed. Goold, vol. 4)
Views: 385
"Who will deny that true religion consists in a great measure, in vigorous and lively actings of the inclination and will of the soul, or the fervent exercises of the heart? ... He that has doctrinal knowledge and speculation only, without affection, never is engaged in the business of religion."
— Jonathan Edwards
Source: A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections (1746), Part I
Spiritual Life
Views: 445
"Their excellency and happiness is nothing, but the emanation and expression of God's glory: God, in seeking their glory and happiness, seeks himself: and in seeking himself, i.e. himself diffused and expressed, (which he delights in, as he delights in his own beauty and fullness,) he seeks their glory and happiness."
— Jonathan Edwards
Source: The End for Which God Created the World, ch. 1, sect. 4
Theological Thought
Views: 425
"So is God's will, through his wonderful grace, that the prayers of his saints should be one great and principal means of carrying on the designs of Christ's kingdom in the world. When God has something very great to accomplish for his church, it is his will that there should precede it the extraordinary prayers of his people."
— Jonathan Edwards
Source: Some Thoughts Concerning the Present Revival of Religion in New England (1742), Part V
Revival
Views: 371
"God himself is the great good which they are brought to the possession and enjoyment of by redemption. He is the highest good, and the sum of all that good which Christ purchased. God is the inheritance of the saints; he is the portion of their souls. God is their wealth and treasure, their food, their life, their dwelling-place, their ornament and diadem, and their everlasting honour and glory. They have none in heaven but God."
— Jonathan Edwards
Source: God Glorified in Man's Dependence (sermon, 1731)
Spiritual Fulfillment
Views: 473
"The unrepentant walk on the top of the pit of hell, supported only by a rotting covering. At any given moment, there is nothing to prevent the wicked from falling into hell, only the simple providence of God to temporarily sustain them."