"Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" first preached by
Jonathan Edwards, in Enfield, Connecticut in 1741.
Deuteronomy 32:35 says "Their foot shall slide in due time," which was the main focus of the introduction of the sermon. As was customary in 18th-century
New England, the sermon was printed and copies were distributed to a wide audience. It was the first and most enduring expression of the uncompromising Calvinist theology of the
First Great Awakening.
After its initial presentation, the audience was so moved that many attendees were found openly weeping. There were also a number of reports of swooning, outcries and convulsions from audience members. It was also reported that, unlike the stereotype of fire and brimstone preaching, Edwards read the sermon in a monotone voice, and actually asked the audience to quiet down so he might finish his sermon.
This is an excerpt. Read the entire sermon at the
Bible Bulletin Board.
The wrath of God burns against them, their damnation does not slumber; the pit is prepared, the fire is made ready, the furnace is now hot, ready to receive them; the flames do now rage and glow... 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 discern 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... 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...
This week on our daily radio program we discussed the resurgence in the interest of and the commitment to reformed theology. On Monday we featured clips from the discussion between Albert Mohler and Paige Patterson at the 2006 Pastors Conference; On Tuesday we visited with Pastor Scott Reiber of Westminster Presbyterian in Vicksburg, Mississippi; on Wednesday Dr. Thomas Ascol from Founders Ministries joined us, and on Thursday we wrapped it with an interview with Pastor Thomas Winn of Grace Baptist Church in Jackson, Mississippi.
