23 August 2009

The Genius of the Gospel

Jonathan Edwards in a sermon on peace from Luke 2:14 ('Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace . . .'):

We shall never find any rest anywhere in the world till we come to Christ. Wherever we go, we carry our guilty, accusing consciences with us. Men may still the cries of a condemning conscience by stupefying them and hardening themselves in sin, but that is curing the distemper by killing the man. But in Christ the cause malady is removed. The guilt of sin is forever abolished, and the soul is restored to a rational and well-grounded peace. . . .

It is the nature and genius of the whole frame and construction of the gospel that it is peaceable.

--'A Glorious Foundation for Peace,' in The Glory and Honor of God: VOl 2 of the Previously Unpublished Sermons of Jonathan Edwards (ed. M. McMullen; 2004), 187-88

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