[TruthTalk] Affection - Emotion - Holiness

[Judy Taylor]

Thanks for the URL Kevin,  So Edward's theology was rooted in Augustine and consists of all of these subsets ie natural virtue, true virtue etc.  Sounds to me as though much of what he wrote was to attempt to expose the folly of what he called "the new moral philosophers" According to the scriptures however, a man is either dead in trespasses and sin, walking according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air - the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience indluging the lusts of the flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind and are by nature the children of wrath .. OR .. they are quickened together with Christ, raised up, and sitting together in heavenly places in Him, (Ephesians 2:1-6)  Big difference!!!! "Edwards insisted that the socially useful benefits of natural virtue fell far short of true virtue. For him the unshakable foundation remained the regenerating grace by which God quickened the sinner. In his own words: "Nothing is of the nature of true virtue, in which God is not the first and the last." In sum, Edwards was asserting in ethics what he had previously asserted concerning the inner life in Religious Affections and concerning conversion in Freedom of Will No truly good thing, speaking strictly, exists which is not always and everywhere dependent upon God. Thirdly, Edwards also tried to show that the picture of virtue presented by the new moral philosophers was merely a confusing description of prudence, self-seeking, and self-love. In these efforts Edwards was striving to preserve the particularity of grace. By so doing, he hoped to reassert the unique goodness of God as the sole legitimate source of true virtue."