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(c) 2008 Dr. Phil Corr

In my previous post I shared from Dr. David Larsen’s excellent work entitled The Company of Hope: A history of Bible Prophecy in the Church. I interacted with Larsen’s scholarship and set things in context for the section on Jonathan Edwards’ eschatology (view on the end times).

Something I would like to stress in this post is that I do not necessarily agree with Larsen and Edwards on every point. It is an impossibility since Larsen is pre-millennial and Edwards was post millennial.

I also want to indicate that there is one area I definitely do not agree on with Edwards. That has to do with his negative view of the Roman Catholic Church. We live in a post Vatican Two world–where and when the Catholic Church achieved many reforms–most of them very good and helpful.

Do you know who was in Cardinal Woytola’s pulpit in Warsaw when he was becoming John Paul the Second? Billy Graham. Do you know what organization he invited to Poland every summer to help with Bible and life training? Campus Crusade for Christ.

The following short section from Larsen’s book simply introduces Edwards’ life, starting with the setting of the eschatological context.

“Numerous factors account for the volcanic outbursts of apocalyptic interest among the Puritans on both sides of the Atlantic. The collapse of the Puritan Commonwealth when Cromwell’s heirs could not sustain it and the end of the English Civil War were undoubtedly critical. The Great Awakening in both the United Kingdom and New England added a special impetus as we shall now see in Jonathan Edwards and others at this time. Edwards (1703-1758) was undoubtedly the most powerful and effective preacher ever heard in America. We have 1100 of his sermons coming out of his thirteen hour study-time each day [PC note: see several Yale Press editions of some of Edwards’ sermons, as well as the rest going online.]. He was a key figure in the Great Awakening in New England where upwards of 50,000 were converted. But he was from all sides a serious candidate for being the greatest and most creative theologian in American history. [Richard] Lovelace calls him ‘the greatest mind produced in America.’ He served as pastor in Northampton, Massachusetts for 23 years years and then as a missionary to the Indians at Stockbridge and finally as all to briefly the president of New Jersey (later Princeton University).”

Related Links: Jonathan Edwards: A Life