Jonathan Edwards on the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins

                Three Jonathan Edwards scholars have done the church a great service by editing and releasing a series of 15 sermons the great New England pastor preached during the winter of 1737-38 on the topic of Jesus’ Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, recorded in Matthew 25:1-13.  You may be aware that the First Great Awakening, which the Lord used Edwards to lead, occurred in two phases: phase one in 1734-35 and phase two in 1740-41.  The first phase of this great work of revival seemed to end abruptly with the suicide of Edwards’ uncle in May of 1735, along with other events.  By the end of 1737, Edwards was deeply concerned that some of the conversions he thought he had witnessed during 1734-35 were not in fact genuine.  Some of the people of his hometown of Northampton (Massachusetts Bay Colony) were returning to their old ways and attitudes of sin.  Some of the people who had undergone emotional experiences during the first phase of the Awakening now gave every appearance of being unchanged from their prior spiritual lostness.  Edwards preached the series of sermons from Jesus’ Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins, among many other reasons, to call these “false professors” to genuine repentance and faith in Christ.  In typical Edwardsian fashion, the pastor held out before his lost hearers the spiritual beauty and excellence of Jesus Christ, suggesting that his glory should draw them to cleave to this Jesus as their spiritual husbands:

 

Consider how worthy and excellent Christ is, and how worthless [are others].  That glorious person that seeks your love is a divine person; he is one that is infinitely above all creatures, above the highest angels. . . . Christ is an heavenly one, yea, he is the king of heaven; he is infinitely above heaven itself. . . . [I]n Christ is real, substantial excellency.  The more acquaintance you have with him, the more excellency you will see in him, to delight and ravish your heart.

 

Jonathan Edwards, “True and False Christians (On the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins),” ed. Kenneth Minkema; Adriaan C. Neele, and Bryan McCarthy (Eugene, Oreg.: Cascade Books, 2012), 57.  May God grant that you and I, through the glorious word of the Lord, would indeed grow in our “acquaintance” with Jesus Christ, to the end that we would find our souls increasingly delighting in our Savior and Lord!