One of the greatest allegories of the Christian life is Pilgrim’s Progress. In it, John Bunyan deals with nearly every aspect of Christianity, including assurance of salvation. In fact, Bunyan ends his book in a most unusual fashion with the story of one named Ignorance.
Ignorance had met Christian and Hopeful earlier in the story. There they tried to converse with him about the nature of true faith and the need to examine himself honestly. But Ignorance would not listen to them. After Christian and Hopeful receive a grand entrance to the Celestial City, Bunyan turns the reader’s attention back to the character of Ignorance. Rather than crossing the River of Death as do the others, Ignorance finds a ferry-man named Vain-Hope to take him across the River. When he reaches the gate of the city, he expects to be granted entrance, but he is denied. In fact, the King commands two shining ones to bind him hand and foot, carry him to a door in the side of the hill, and put him in it. Then Bunyan ends with the most solemn of warnings: “Then I saw that there was a Way to Hell, even from the Gates of Heaven….”
Assurance of eternal life is important. Jesus reminded His disciples that on the last day, “many will say unto me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ but I will say to them, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity.’” Obviously many will experience the same surprise that Ignorance received when he discovered “that there was a Way to Hell, even from the Gates of Heaven.”
In Puritan theology, the doctrine of assurance was of vital importance.[1] “Of all doctrines preached by the Puritans, their instructions concerning the assurance of salvation may have prompted the greatest joy as well as the greatest misunderstanding.”[2] The Puritans believed that God had provided a certain revelation of Himself in the Scriptures and that revelation provided the means sufficient for one to know the certainty of his eternal destination. While one might think that the Puritan doctrine of election would lead to a carefree attitude toward good deeds, in Puritan theology, it often led to the opposite. The diligence with which the Puritans encouraged their listeners to make sure their calling and election, especially through the doing of good works, has often led many to wrongly conclude that the Puritans taught a salvation by works.
Indeed, many of these same accusations have been leveled against those, like John MacArthur, Jr., who have sought to return to a more biblical understanding of salvation and assurance.[3] In fact, D. A. Carson even frames the current “Lordship Controversy” in terms of a battle over the issue of assurance. He suggests that one of the primary concerns of Zane “Hodges and his colleagues is to make Christian assurance absolutely certain. To accomplish this, they tie assurance exclusively to saving faith, and divorce it from any support in a transformed life.”[4]
Jonathan Edwards, the Puritans, and those representing the “Lordship” camp have been certainly been misunderstood on the doctrine of assurance. However, rightly understood, the Puritan view of assurance would benefit believers today by giving them a more firm foundation upon which to base their assurance.
In their teaching on assurance, Edwards and the Puritans had two major concerns. First, their teaching on assurance was concerned with warning their listeners about the delusion of a false faith. In other words, their first task was not to give assurance to their hearers, but to cause them to honestly examine themselves to see if true faith was their experience. As an old spiritual says, “Everybody talkin’ bout heaven ain’t goin’ there.” In fact, a recent survey discovered that 99% of Americans believe that they are going to heaven!
This is because the Puritans understood what many evangelicals today ignore: that many who profess Christ have no real evidence of true faith in Christ. Thus, many of their sermons and writings were designed to awaken the unconverted parishioners within their churches. Their goal was basically two-fold: “to overthrow the confidence of the ‘legalist’ who based his assurance on his own good works and to demonstrate to the ‘professor’ how inadequate was his assurance which relied only on doctrine.”[5] They did this by encouraging professors to examine their lives to see if the fruits or evidences of salvation were present in them.[6] To the Puritan, a faith that did not manifest itself actively in life was no true faith but deception and death.[7] Thus, through many sermons and writings, they sought to call professors within the church to an honest examination of their faith.
Second, their preaching on assurance was concerned with helping listeners discover the genuineness of their faith. Their goal was not to shake up the faith of true believers, but rather to give true believers some biblical grounds for having assurance. They understood what modern evangelicals ignore: that some who are true believers lack assurance. Many of these lack assurance because they have never been properly taught about nature of biblical assurance. Others lack assurance because they have been taught to rely upon subjective feelings that are constantly changing and shifting. Most lack assurance because they have been taught that it is dangerous to examine their faith, when the Scriptures plainly tell us the opposite.
The Puritans helped their listeners to a greater assurance because they taught that the best evidence of a saving faith was found in the works of believers. Since true believers had the Spirit of God in them, they reasoned that there ought to be some evidence of His holiness in them also. However, they did not teach that a person’s works added anything to salvation itself. That was purchased and secured solely by work of Christ on their behalf. In fact, many of the Puritans warned against reliance on works as a reason for salvation and even encouraged believers to find assurance and the desire to do good deeds from their meditation on who Christ is and what He had done for them. Indeed, many of their writings and sermons sought to provide healing to “those who, in their pursuit of assurance, had fallen into a legalistic obedience.”[8] According to J. I. Packer, “A study of Puritan sermons will show that the preachers’ constant concern, in all their detailed detecting of sins, was to lead their hearers into the life of faith and a good conscience; which, they said, is the most joyous life that man can know in this world.”[9] The Puritans preached often about the doctrine of assurance because they were especially concerned that their listeners might be able to discern the differences between a true and a false faith and have confidence that theirs was a true and saving faith.
Edwards and Modern Evangelicals on Assurance
As we place the Doctrine of Assurance under the microscope of Jonathan Edwards, a few essential differences between Edwards and modern evangelicals on the theology of assurance emerge.
First, Edwards and the Puritans were careful to distinguish between salvation and assurance. They distinguished between the nature of saving faith, which was grounded in Christ’s work alone, and the nature of assurance, which could be discovered by examining the evidence of the Spirit’s work in one’s life.
To them, the ground of assurance was not a person’s faith, but the work of Christ. This may seem like a minor distinction, but to Edwards and the Puritans, it was major. While modern evangelicals place the emphasis upon believing as the basis for assurance, the Puritans placed the emphasis upon discerning whether one had truly believed. They were not adding anything to the finished work of Christ. Their question was not: Was faith in Christ alone sufficient for salvation? Their question was: Do I have that kind of faith?
They believed that salvation came to individuals, not because of what the person had done (i.e., believing) but upon what the Spirit had done in regeneration. They concluded that, if the Holy Spirit had truly regenerated a person, then there ought to be some evidence of the Spirit’s working in that person’s life.
This distinction is most evident especially in Edwards’s reply to the questions raised by a series of letters from Thomas Gillespie of Scotland. Gillespie had suggested that Edwards was dangerously close to leading his readers into doubt rather than into faith by his emphasis on the need to examine one’s faith for evidences of salvation. He replied, “I don’t take faith, and a person’s believing that they have faith, to be the same thing. Nor do I take unbelief, or being without faith and doubting whether they have it, to be the same thing, but entirely different.” In other words, a person may think they have faith and yet not be saved; while another may struggle with assurance and truly be saved. Modern evangelicals, like Mr. Gillespie, tend to confuse the doctrine of salvation which depends on God’s grace alone with the doctrine of assurance which depends on the evidence of the Spirit’s life within the believer. Jonathan Edwards’s careful distinction between salvation and assurance did not allow professors to rest in their profession if it had no works to confirm it.
Second, Edwards and the Puritans viewed the Christian life as a life of faith, not an instance of faith. Because modern evangelicals conceive of faith as “only a static decision of one instant,” there is a tendency to ignore any proper place for continuing obedience in the evangelical experience.[10] The Puritan view of faith differs. They considered faith as a journey or as a pilgrimage through which one could discover the direction of their life. A life of obedience confirmed to the believer that he was indeed on the narrow road that leads to life.
However, the Puritans did not deny the immediacy of salvation, as they are often accused. They believed that when a person was saved, he was saved immediately and forever. But faith, true faith, was not evidenced by any one decision but rather by a manner of life that indicated that the person was truly regenerated. Conversely, modern evangelicals put so much confidence in the immediacy of faith that they are quick to assure new believers of their salvation, not on the basis of any evidence in them, but solely on the basis of their making some one-time decision, whether it is praying a prayer or “walking the aisle.” Such ideas were considered “antinominian” by the Puritans. They believed that such an approach to assurance not only led to a life of sin, but also led many into an eternally damning deception.
This was certainly true in the theology of Jonathan Edwards. He clearly taught that salvation was by faith alone. But in an unpublished sermon on Galatians 5:6, Edwards clarifies this: “For tho’ it is only faith [that] justifies yet there is no faith that justifies but a working faith.”[11] Likewise, in his sermon on “Of the Perseverance of the Saints,” he makes it clear that justification by faith in the Scriptures was always a persevering faith.[12] The great question, according to Edwards, was not whether faith alone justified, but whether a person had a justifying faith. That could only be seen through the evidences of a person’s life. Thus, many of the Edwards’s sermons included explaining the Christian life as a pilgrimage or journey in which the person discovers whether he is truly on the road to life or not.[13] This is the same view of assurance was taught by other Puritans such as Richard Baxter who noted: “You may believe immediately …, but getting assurance of it may be the work of a great part of your life.”[14]
Edwards was also highly critical of an attitude that was gaining acceptance in revivalist America, which has gained predominance in modern evangelicalism: that a person can be given assurance based upon passages in the Bible. For example, some modern evangelists provide assurance immediately to professors by asking them to read a passage such as John 6:47: “Whoever believes in me has eternal life.” Then they ask the professor, “Have you believed?” If they answer, “yes,” then they are asked, “Then what do you have?” “Eternal life” is usually the reply. “Then never doubt it,” the inquirer is told. Even in his day, Edwards was especially concerned that some misused the word of God in trying to give assurance to new believers: “There is such a testimony given us in the word of God that he that believes shall be saved: But there is no such testimony in the word of God, that such an individual person, in such a town in Scotland or New England, believes.”[15]
Third, Edwards and the Puritans would differ greatly with modern evangelicals about the role of doubt in assurance. For modern evangelicals, doubt and assurance cannot go together. Modern believers are taught “never doubt your salvation” because they often equate salvation and assurance. The Puritans maintained a distinction between salvation and assurance. Some of them spoke of salvation as the root and assurance as the flower. It was the root which gave the plant life; it was the flower which gave it its beauty. A plant might live without its flower, but it cannot live without its root.
This distinction even led them to develop a theology of doubt as a means of moving toward assurance. Indeed, doubt in the believer’s life might serve as a blessing because it would cause the believer to move out of spiritual lethargy into action in order that his assurance might be established. Periods of doubt were not a problem for the Puritans as it is for evangelicals today. To the Puritans, a weak faith was still faith nonetheless. According to Thomas Brooks: “he that cannot find in himself the evidences of a strong faith, must not conclude that he has no faith; for he may have in him the evidence of a weak faith when he has not the evidences of a strong faith in him.”[16] Therefore many of sermons of the Puritans dealt with such practical topics as hindrances to assurance, difficulties in assurance, and steps to having assurance.
Beginning in November of 1746, Thomas Gillespie of Scotland carried on a series of correspondences with Jonathan Edwards over his concerns with what Edwards had written in his Treatise on Religious Affections. Gillespie was especially concerned that Edwards had placed too much emphasis upon works as evidence of salvation to the extent that believing had been minimized. Indeed he had even questioned the wisdom of a believer ever doubting his salvation: “It merits consideration whether the believer should ever doubt his state, on any account whatever, because doubting, as opposed to believing, is absolutely sinful.” Edwards’s reply was that “faith was greater than any one’s subjective feelings; and that faith precedes assurance, survives its lapses, and invites man to struggle for his assurance.” [17] That statement is, in itself, very instructive. Edwards notes that faith preceded assurance so that it could not be the same thing as assurance. Additionally, he recognized that true faith survives even though it has “its lapses.” Most importantly, he affirmed that it was faith that gives the believer the desire to continue the struggle for a more complete assurance. Such a view of assurance provides hope rather than discouragement to the struggling believer.
Indeed, for Edwards, each doubt that arises may be beneficial to assurance in that it causes the believer to a re-examination of his faith. That re-examination in a true believer actually results in a strengthening of his assurance. In “Religious Affections,” he notes:
when there are many of these acts and exercises, following one another in a course, under various trials, of every kind, the experience is still heightened; as one act confirms another. A man by once seeing his neighbor, may have good evidence of his presence: but by seeing him from day-to-day, and conversing with him in a course, [and] in various circumstances, the evidence is established. The disciples, when they first saw Christ, after his resurrection, had good evidence that he was alive: but by conversing with him for forty days, and his showing himself to them alive, by many infallible proofs, they had yet higher evidence.[18]
In support of his position, he also cited a similar understanding of assurance from the writings of Solomon Stoddard:
The more these visible exercises of grace are renewed, the more certain you will be. The more frequently these actings are renewed, the more abiding and confirmed your assurance will be. A man that has been assured of such visible exercises of grace, may quickly after be in doubt, whether he was not mistaken. But when such actings are renewed again and again, he grows more settled and established about his good state. If a man see a good thing once, that makes in sure: but if afterwards he fear[ed] he was deceived, when he comes to see it again, he is more sure he was not mistaken.[19]
Additionally, Edwards taught that even the believer’s struggle with indwelling sin was, in fact, an evidence of true faith. He believed that the true Christian was never entirely satisfied with anything less than being perfectly holy. For him, remaining sin is a great burden and he is not happy until it is removed. Those with a spurious faith would be little concerned with holiness and never struggle with sin. Thus, even the continual struggle with indwelling sin provided the believer with some evidence of true faith.[20]
Finally, Edwards and the Puritans would differ with modern evangelicals over the finality of assurance. For modern evangelicals, assurance is a thing that, once gained, is never lost. The Puritans would disagree strongly. Because they recognized the reality of indwelling sin, they also recognized that one’s assurance may waver at times. According to the Westminster Confession,
“True believers may have the assurance of their salvation divers ways shaken, diminished, and intermitted; as by negligence in preserving of it; by falling into some special sin, which woundeth the conscience, and grieveth the Spirit; by some sudden or vehement temptation; by God’s withdrawing the light of his countenance, and suffering even such as fear him to walk in darkness, and to have no light …”[21]
They were certainly not suggesting that salvation once gained could be lost; but assurance could be lost by failing to live close to Christ and walk in ways that please God.
Edwards’s Teachings on Assurance
First, Edwards taught that the experience of assurance was grounded in the covenant of God. Assurance flows out of the certainty that God will not and cannot reject his elected and adopted children. Though perseverance is an evidence of faith, perseverance in itself is not the reason for salvation. Rather, the perseverance of the saints is because of God’s faithfulness to His covenant promises in Christ.[22] The emphasis on such promises “provided solid pillars for increasing weak faith.”[23] But the mere knowledge of those covenant promises did not mean that they were necessarily applied to any particular person. Those promises were for all who were in the covenant; but how could a person know he was in the covenant? This question brings us to the second aspect of Edwards’s understanding of assurance.
Second, Edwards taught that assurance came primarily through the evidence of works in a person’s life. In the Puritan understanding, assurance could be gained by believers through two closely related, yet distinct, syllogisms—the practical and mystical syllogisms. The practical syllogism (or syllogismus practicus) emphasized external works evidenced in practical daily living. It could be stated by the following syllogism:
Major Premise: Only true believers manifest the fruits of sanctification and good deeds.
Minor Premise: By God’s grace, I see the evidence of such fruits and works in my life.
Conclusion: Therefore, I may be assured that I have a saving faith.
Conversely, the mystical syllogism (or syllogismus mysticus) emphasized the internal exercises or “steps of grace.” The evidence of true faith depended upon the internal testimony of the Spirit to the believer. Thus it could be represented by the following syllogism:
Major Premise: Only true believers experience the witness of the Spirit and godliness.
Minor Premise: By God’s grace, I see the evidence of such increasing godliness in my life.
Conclusion: Therefore, I may be assured that I have a saving faith.[24]
While Edwards accepted the validity of the mystical syllogism, he placed most of his emphasis on the practical syllogism as the best evidence of true believing faith. The practice of outward signs according to Edwards far outweighed the value of self examination. In “Religious Affections,” Edwards states:
Assurance is not to be obtained so much as of examination as by action. The apostle Paul sought assurance chiefly this way, even by forgetting those things that were behind, and reaching forth unto those things that were before, pressing toward the mark …”[25]
True faith evidences itself in practice. In this manner, Edwards’s view of charity is quite different from that of the medieval position, where charity brings faith to its fullness. According to Edwards, faith is not brought to life by our actions; rather faith is demonstrated by our actions. In his examination of the Epistle of James, Edwards held that Abraham’s faith was perfected or finished by his holy practice. His actions demonstrated the reality of his faith. Edwards even offers his own parable as an illustration of works perfecting faith:
“If a prince makes suit to a woman in a far country, that she would forsake her people, and father’s house, and come to him, to be his bride; the proper evidence of the compliance over heart with the King suit, is are actually forsaking her own people, and father’s house, and coming to him.”[26]
While Edwards did not totally discount the mystical syllogism, he remained skeptical of those who placed their confidence in it apart from the practical syllogism. His skepticism about basing assurance on the inward testimony came chiefly from four concerns. In the first place, he was aware that sin in the heart of every man blinds him to the reality of any real self-examination. Second, examination based on inward introspection can often result in anxiety rather than assurance. [27] This is because the affections are always changing and can sometimes mislead the believer into doubting his salvation because of an overly active introspection. A third problem with self examination is that it tends to lead the saints to spend too much time dissecting their experiences. The end result is that they are hindered in their actual work of holiness. That is why Edwards advised that the best way to a full assurance is to be active in the things of God. Finally, Edwards felt that much self-examination was mere self-reflection. A true biblical self-examination should not to be a turning into oneself, as much as it was to be the using of God’s word like a mirror to examine oneself.[28]
Thus, for Edwards, the best evidence of the work of the Spirit in a believer’s life is to be found in his works. In his preface to The Life of David Brainard, Serno Dwight notes that “[Jonathan Edwards] praised his friend David Brainerd for finding assurance of saving faith in its ‘evidences’ in his sanctified life rather than in immediate whisperings of the Holy Spirit.”
Third, Edwards was cautious to remind his listeners that the best way to assurance was not simply through doing deeds, but through drawing closer to Christ. This was certainly the emphasis of the English Puritans also. Richard Baxter advised his readers to
be sure that the first, and far greater part of your time, pains, and care, and inquiries, be for the getting and increasing of your grace, than for the discerning it…. See that you ask ten times at least, How should I get or increase my faith, my love to Christ, and to his people?[29]
Thomas Brooks wrote: “Therefore let thy eye and heart, first, most, and last, be fixed upon Christ, then will assurance bed and board with thee.”[30]
Likewise, Edwards did not point doubting believers only to outward evidences, but he pointed them toward a more vital union and relationship with Christ. In a letter to a young lady recently converted and struggling with some doubts, he wrote, “One new discovery of the glory of Christ’s face, will do more towards scattering clouds of darkness in one minute, than examining old experiences, by the best marks that can be given, through a whole year.”[31] In his sermon, “Christian Cautions,”
The way to grow in grace is to walk in the way of obedience to all the commands of God, to be very thorough in the practice of religion. Grace will flourish in the hearts of those who live in this manner. But if you live in some way of sin, that will be like some secret disease at your vitals, which will keep you poor, weak, and languishing.[32]
Suggestions for Discerning a True Faith
In this study, we have attempted to put the doctrine of assurance under the “microscope” of Jonathan Edwards. Since we have used a medical/scientific analogy for this examination, let’s continue to use such an analogy to provide some practical suggestions for directing people toward a biblical assurance in the spirit of Jonathan Edwards.
To facilitate a proper understanding of assurance, it might be best to call these evidences of eternal life “vital signs.” In the medical field, one’s physical condition is often monitored by the use of vital signs. Whenever an unconscious body is discovered, the first things examined are the vital signs to discover if the person is alive. In a similar fashion, the Bible gives us spiritual vital signs to provide assurance that we are alive spiritually.
Before we look at these, let’s consider four important facts about vital signs. First, vital signs are indicators; they do not cause or create anything. They only report the person’s condition. This is especially important when we speak about spiritual vital signs. They do not “make” anyone a Christian. Instead, those who have been born again by the Spirit of God have been made alive and therefore have these signs. Such an understanding is clear from the writings of Edwards: evidences do not save a person; they merely indicate that God has put spiritual life in that person.
Second, they are accurate. They leave little doubt as to the physical condition of the person. As you examine vital signs in your own spiritual life, do not fool yourself into thinking that you are on your way to heaven if the signs are absent. Just as a person whose vital signs are absent is physically dead, you are dead spiritually and need to be born again if these signs are not present. Edwards’s sermons which distinguished between true and false conversion often drove this fact home to his congregation.
Third, they are all necessary and related. Can you imagine a doctor arguing with his nurse: “I know there is no pulse, blood pressure or respiration, but I’m sure he’s alive because his temperature is not bad.” The body may have a temperature because it has recently expired – but it is still dead! Don’t use the vital signs as a checklist and conclude that you’ve got one vital sign so you must be okay. All the signs must be present in some degree for a full and complete assurance of eternal life.
Fourth, there is one important caution to remember when examining the vital signs: You need to look to see if they are PRESENT not to see if they are PREFECT. Can you imagine someone discovering he had a high temperature or high blood pressure and pronouncing, “I guess I’m dead after all”? In the same way, you need to look for the presence of these signs, not for perfection in them. However, should you find an area that is weak, this should be a warning that shows that, though you are alive spiritually, you are in ill health and need to take some corrective measures. This is why Edwards and the Puritans considered even a weak faith still as real faith. And this is why they labored so hard to show their listeners the means they might use to arrive at a more complete assurance of salvation.
Here are some of the signs that Edwards refers to in many of his writings:
First, A Love of Fellowship with Believers. According to 1 John 1:6-7, believers have two basic characteristics: they are forgiven and they fellowship. Those who profess to be followers of Christ that do not enjoy fellowship with other believers are to be held in suspect. The new nature of the believer leads him to desire to e with his brothers and sisters in Christ. In the case of John Bunyan’s Ignorance, unlike Hopeful and Christian, he “prefers to walk alone.” I would be deeply concerned about my salvation if I called myself a Christian and did not desire to be with other Christians. One vital sign of spiritual life is a new desire to be with other believers.
Second, A Deep Awareness of Sin. According to 1 John 1:8-10, another vital sign of faith is the awareness and admission of sin in our lives. Often believers are criticized as those who think they are sinless. However, a mark of true faith is that we come to acknowledge the fullness of our sin and flee to Christ. John makes it quite clear – those who say they have not sinned are simply liars. Believers sin, but they honestly admit their sin. In contrast, non-believers are always denying their sin, or minimizing it rather than confessing it. Therefore, one good sign of God’s work in our lives is admission of sin. John Owen noted that he did not know any believer to whom sin was not a burden and a sorrow. Richard Baxter said: “I think, if I could stand and mention all the other marks of grace…, it would appear that the truth and life of all of them lieth in this one.”
Third, A Lifestyle of Willing Obedience. In 1 John 2:3-4, the lifestyle of the believer is contrasted with non-believers. At first glance, it would appear that John is requiring sinless perfection. 1 John 2:29, 3:4-6, and 5:2 seem to echo the same. However, an examination of the context (especially 1:8-10) and the grammar (the use of a present indicative verb indicating continuing action) obviously lead to another conclusion. The passage is best translated with the idea that believers do not live lifestyles of habitual disobedience. Edwards clearly agreed with this assessment. We are not sinless, but struggle with sin and desire to be free from it. Such is not the desire of non-believers. They may desire to be free from the consequences of their sin, but they would like to hold on to the sin itself.
Fourth, A Witness of the Spirit Within. John speaks of this vital sign in two places: 3:24 and 4:13. Paul also speaks of the witness of the Spirit (see Romans 8:9, 16). What is this “witness” of the Spirit? It is not an emotional experience or certain spiritual gifts. The witness of the Spirit may be measured in many ways, but here are a few of the most obvious.
In Romans 8:15, Paul says, “For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, ‘Abba, Father.’” One mark of this witness is that we are now drawn to God and we cry out to Him as our Father. In Romans 8:14, we read, “As many as are lead by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.” This may indicate that believers are guided by God, but it most certainly indicated that they willingly follow Him (obedience).
In 1 Corinthians 2:12-14, we learn that a mark of a believer is a fresh understanding of the Scriptures. The natural man cannot understand these things “because they are spiritually discerned.” However, one mark of the work of the Spirit in a believer is that the Bible and the gospel which were once mysteries to him now make perfect sense. According to Edwards, the work of the Spirit causes men to have a greater regard for the Scriptures.[33]
Fifth, A Willing Confession of Christ. In his “Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God,” Edwards notes that the first characteristic of a true work of God in revival is that Jesus is confessed as the son of God and the savior of men.[34] The same can be said of the true believer. There is a new love for Christ and a new understanding of who He is and what He has done.
Two Cautions
1. Beware of Impatience. In 1 John 3:9, God’s life in us is described as His “seed” in us. The analogy refers to the seed of the male bringing about conception, but the similarities to a seed planted in the ground are also helpful. In both cases (the baby and the plant), one must give the seed time to grow before all the evidences of life are clear. If you are a new believer, you should expect to see some evidence of God’s life in your life. However, just as one would not plant a seed one day and uproot it the next because it did not bear fruit, so you must be especially patient with new believers and allow time for the evidence of life to grow.
2. Beware of Perfection. As was mentioned earlier, you need to look for EVIDENCE not for PERFECTION when examining these vital signs. Matthew Henry notes that the Holy Spirit usually changes the “affections and the attitudes” before He changes the “actions.”
One Warning
Beware of Presumption. Don’t take for granted that you are a believer just because you made a decision, had a religious experience, or are a member of a church. You must “examine yourself to see if you are in the faith” (2 Corinthians 13:5). Many have thought themselves to be saved only to discover that there really was no life in them. For Edwards and the Puritans, the gaining of assurance was a life-long pursuit, and one must be always examining himself lest he be found to be self-deceived.
Some may say, “Why should I examine my faith? I’m okay.” First, you need to do so because the Scriptures tell us to. “Examine yourself to see if you are in the faith,” Paul told the Corinthians. Those who are really converted have nothing to fear by an honest, Biblical examination of their salvation. Only the man-selling fake gold has anything to fear when a prospective buyer wants to have the gold tested before buying. Remember, the only thing worse than no assurance is a false assurance. What could be worse than to spend your whole life thinking that you were on your way to heaven, only to arrive at the judgment and hear Jesus say, “Depart from me, for I never knew you”? The matter of eternity is too important to go though this life unsure of your ultimate outcome. What could be worse than to be like Ignorance, ignoring any serious conversation about the true nature of faith and the evidences of assurance, only to cast away from heaven discovering too late that “there was a Way to Hell, even from the Gates of Heaven….” Let us be grateful for men like Edwards who directed others to the truth of the gospel and encouraged them to examine themselves so that they might find a more complete assurance of their salvation.
[1] Some of the best sources on the Puritan doctrine of assurance are R. H. Hawkes, “The Logic of Assurance in English Puritan Theology,” Westminster Theological Journal 52 (1990): 247-61; Geoffrey F. Nuttall, The Holy Spirit in Puritan Faith and Experience (Oxford: Blackwell, 1946): 34-61, 138–41; John von Rohr, “Covenant and Assurance in Early English Puritanism,” Church History 34 (1965) 195-203, and The Covenant of Grace in Puritan Thought (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986): 155-91; C. J. Sommerville, “Conversion, Sacrament and Assurance in the Puritan Covenant of Grace to 1650” (M.A. thesis, University of Kansas, 1963); William K. B. Stoever, ‘A Fair and Easie Way to Heaven’: Covenant Theology and Antinomianism in Early Massachusetts (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1978) 119-60; Joel R. Beeke, Assurance of Faith: Calvin, English Puritanism, and the Dutch Second Reformation (New York: Peter Lang, 1991); and Joel R. Beeke, “Personal Assurance of Faith: The Puritans and Chapter 18.2 of the Westminster Confession,” Westminster Theological Journal 55 (1993):1-30, cited as Beeke, WC.
[2] Bruce Bickel, Light and Heat: The Puritan View of the Pulpit (Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria, 1999), 141.
[3] John MacArthur, Jr., The Gospel According to Jesus (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1988) and Faith Works: The Gospel According to the Apostles (Dallas: Word, 1993).
[4] D. A. Carson, “Reflections of Christian Assurance,” Westminster Theological Journal (Spring 1992) 54:6.
[5] R. M. Hawkes, 248-49.
[6] Ibid, 251-52. “The Puritans did urge Christians to examine their works, not as a replacement to faith, but as a work of faith, to see God’s hand working within themselves.”
[7] Ibid, 253.
[8] Ibid, 252. See for example, Walter Marshall, The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification (1692, reprint, Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 1999).
[9] J. I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1990): 117–18.
[10] Hawkes, 253.
[11] John Gerstner, The Rational Biblcial Theology of Jonathan Edwards (Powhatan, VA: Bera Publications, 1993), III:226.
[12] Jonathan Edwards, The Works of Jonathan Edwards (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1974), II:596-603. Cited as Edwards, Works.
[13] See for example, Edwards’s sermon “The Christian Pilgrim,” in Works, 2:243-46.
[14] Conrad Cherry, The Theology of Jonathan Edwards (1966, reprint, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1990), 151.
[15] “Letters to Gillespie,” in John E. Smith, vol. 2 of The Works of Jonathan Edwards , ed. John E. Smith (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1972), 2:502-03. Cited as Yale 2.
[16] Thomas Brooks, The Works of Thomas Brooks (1861; reprint, Carlisle, Pa.: Banner of Truth, 1980) III:252.
[17] Yale, 2:470-76.
[18] Yale, 2: 452-53.
[19] Ibid, 453.
[20] Gerstner, 228.
[21] Westminster Confession of Faith, Article 18.4.
[22]One must be especially careful not to make the inference of Perry Miller: “The end of the Covenant of Grace is to give security to the transactions between God and men, for by binding God to the terms, it binds Him to save those who make good the terms.” Perry Miller, The New England Mind: The Seventeenth Century (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1939) 389. As Beeke notes, the Puritans were clear that the ultimate security of the covenant was in God’s sovereign grace, not in man holding God to any binding transaction. See Beeke, WC, 6.
[23] Beeke, WC, 8.
[24] A more detailed discussion of these syllogisms can be found in Beeke, WC, 17-18.
[25] Yale, II:195-96.
[26] Ibid, 445.
[27] Jonathan Edwards, “Christian Cautions,” at http://www.teachingresources.org/insights/EdwardsIndex.html.
[28] Jonathan Edwards, “Pressing into the Kingdom,” at http://www.teachingresources.org/insights/EdwardsIndex.html. self-examination should always be joined together with the reading of God’s Word:
“When you read or hear, reflect on yourselves as you go along, comparing yourselves and your own ways with what you read or hear. Reflect and consider what agreement or disagreement there is between the word and your ways…. Therefore when you there read the rules given us by Christ and his apostles, reflect and consider, each one of you with himself, Do I live according to this rule? Or do I live in any respect contrary to it? … How few are there who do this as they ought to do!” Edwards, “Christian Cautions,” op.cit.
[29] Richard Baxter, Catholic Theologie 9.138-39, cited in J. I. Packer, “The Redemption and Restoration of Man in the Thought of Richard Baxter” (Ph.D. dissertation, Oxford, 1954) 401, cited in Beeke, WC, 23, note 113.
[30] Thomas Brooks, Heaven on Earth (1654; reprint, London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1961), 307.
[31] Works, 1:liv
[32] Edwards, “Christian Cautions,” op.cit. Emphasis mine.
[33] Yale, 4:226.
[34] Ibid.
Teaching Resources International 