Originally preached in Northampton in 1735, and then preached again in 1752, The Most High, a Prayer Hearing God was preached on a fast appointed on the account of epidemical sickness at the eastward of Boston. In this sermon, Edwards focuses on the benefit of prayer as a blessing of the redemption that we have in Christ. Edwards develops the idea that God delights to hear and answer prayer.
Participants: Craig Biehl, David Filson, Jeff Waddington, Nick Batzig
Originally preached in Northampton in the fall of 1730, and later preached at Boston for the Harvard convocation week Thursday lecture on 8 July 1731, God Glorified in Man’s Dependence was Jonathan Edwards’ first published writing. In it, Edwards issued a clarion call for a biblical and Calvinistic understanding of redemption. Specifically Edwards shows the Trinitarian basis of salvation. Man depends upon God the Father for the initiation of redemption, on the Son for the accomplishment of redemption, and on the Holy Spirit as the one who works faith in him, thereby uniting him to Christ. In other words, believers have all their salvific good from God, through God, and in God.
Participants: Craig Biehl, David Filson, Jeff Waddington, Nick Batzig
The podcast East of Eden: The Biblical and Systematic Theology of Jonathan Edwards inaugurates the series with a close reading of the sermon “East of Eden” which Edwards preached in the summer of 1731 to his congregation in Northampton, MA. In this sermon Edwards expounds on Adam, the covenant of works, and the Fall. Here we see Edwards the covenant and biblical theologian at his best. Notable is the clear presence of the idea, later expressed by Geerhardus Vos, that “eschatology precedes soteriology.” God offered to Adam a glorious Sabbath rest of confirmed righteousness if only he would be obedient to God’s command that he and Eve not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Especially memorable is the conclusion that the only way back into paradise with God would be for the second Adam to pass under the flaming sword God set to bar the way of the first Adam from gaining access to the tree of life.
Participants: Craig Biehl, David Filson, Jeff Waddington, Nick Batzig
Dr. Craig Biehl shares his work on Jonathan Edwards’ views pertaining to Christ’s merit. Biehl’s dissertation has been published as a book titled The Infinite Merit of Christ: The Glory of Christ’s Obedience in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards. Biehl and Jeff Waddington speak of the current state of Edwards scholarship and the need for a thorough analysis of Edwards own writings as opposed to studies treating primarily the secondary literature. What a thorough-going study yields is Edwards’s covenant theology and rich understanding of Christ’s work for his people.
As an added bonus toward the end of the episode, Dr. Biehl discusses a short booklet titled What’s in the Box?: The Unreasonable Faith of Atheism and Agnosticism.
Participants: Camden Bucey, Craig Biehl, Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy
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