“The Puritan ‘holy experiment’- blending belief in a church of the truly converted with the idea of a Christian state- seemed destined to fail almost from the start.  There are problems in operating any church on earth when only God knows who the members are” (Shelley 344).
 

A brief history of the Puritans:

 
In England, the Puritans (so-called because they wanted to purify the Church of England) despised the Roman Catholic influence in the Anglican Church . . .

            Some wanted to stay and reform it                 Some wanted to form a “new Israel”

                                    |                                                                       |

Oliver Cromwell took power in the                          Many Presbyterians became

1630’s and ruled a Puritan Commonwealth             Congregationalists in America

                                    |                                                                       |

1640’s: A synod of Presbyterians and Puritans            Puritanism weakening after first

wrote the Westminster Confession of Faith    generation- Solomon Stoddard (1643-1729)

                                    |                               helped introduce “Half-way Covenant” (1662);

The Puritans in England split into                 voting became dependant on property and

            | --------------- |  ----------------- |               not church membership (1691)

Presbyterians    Baptists      Congregationalists                                |

         (believer and not infant baptism)                        Jonathan Edwards

                                                                                     (1703-1757) lead the

                                                                                    “Great Awakening” in America

                        |                                               (1740’s)

John Wesley (1703-1791) befriended George Whitefield                                                                                                         (1714-1770).  At Oxford, and John, his brother Charles, and

 Whitefield started the “Holy Club,” the beginning of Methodism.

                                   |                                                 |

Whitefield and Calvinistic Methodists                John Wesley, the Arminian,

split from Wesley; Whitefield eventually           continued to try to reform

joined Edwards in America.                                the Anglican Church until Methodism

                                                                             was finally recognized as a new

                                                                             denomination in 1787.

“Edwards wrote over six hundred sermons . . . Few of them are hellfire and brimstone in nature, and eyewitnesses say that when Edwards preached, he was articulate but not particularly emotional” (Olson 504).
 

“No theologian in the history of Christianity held a higher or stronger view of God’s majesty, sovereignty, glory, or power than Jonathan Edwards” (Olson 506).
 

“’. . . it appears that all that is ever spoken of in Scripture as an ultimate end of God’s works, is included in that one phrase, the glory of God,: which is the name by which the last end of God’s works is most commonly called in Scripture’” (Edwards quoted by Olson, 506).  From Dissertation Concerning the End for Which God Created the World

“’I am persuaded, no solid reason can be given, why God, who constitutes all other created union or oneness, according to his pleasure, and for what purposes, communications, and effects, he pleases, may not establish a constitution whereby the natural posterity of Adam, proceeding from him, much as the buds and branches from the stock and root of a tree, should be treated as one with him, for the derivation, either of righteousness, and communion in rewards, or the loss of righteousness, and consequent corruption and guilt.’” (Olson 508).  From The Doctrine of Original Sin Defined by Edwards
 
Sarah’s “’great rejoicing has been with trembling, i.e. attended with a deep and lively sense of the greatness and majesty of God, and the person’s own exceeding littleness and vileness.  Spiritual joys in this person never were attended with the least of laughter, or lightness, either of countenance or manner of speaking; but with a peculiar abhorrence of such appearance in spiritual rejoicings’” (Source 8).  From The Works of Jonathan Edwards
 

 
1.  Boettner, Lorraine. The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination. Phillipsberg, NJ.  The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1932.

2.  Lutzer, Erwin. Doctrines that Divide. Grand Rapids, MI. Kregel Publications, 1998.

3.  “Museum of Pilgrims.” 28 Jan. 2002.  <http://solo4.abac.com/echoes/museum/index.htm

4.  Olsen, Roger E. The Story of Christian Theology. Dovers Grove, Il. InterVarsity Press, 1999.

5.  Shelly, Bruce L. Church history in Plain Language. Dallas. Word Publishing, 1995.

6.  Steele, David N., and Curtis C. Thomas. The Five Points of Calvinism. Philadelphia.  The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1932.

7.  The Westminster Confession of Faith. Atlanta. Committee for Christian Education and Publications, 1990.

8.  “Would Jonathan Edwards Support the Toronto Blessing?” Haykin, Michael A. G. and Gary W. McHale, eds. 28 Jan. 2002. <http://www.jonathanedwards.com/text/Toronto%20.htm>
 

*  Sources 1, 4, 5 and 8 were used in the preparation of this presentation, and the others, like those employed, are highly recommended.

Source 1 . . . is an extensive and thorough analysis of core Calvinistic beliefs.

Source 2 . . . addresses common questions about Calvinism and describes pertinent historical debates (between Whitefield and John Wesley, for example).

Source 3 . . . provides access to sermons by Edwards and other Puritans, portraits, and information on the revival.

Source 4 . . . offers detailed description of the revival and other events of the time.

Source 5 . . . is true to the title!

Source 6 . . . is a concise explanation of the “five points” of Calvinism (TULIP- Total  Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and Perseverance of the Saints) that countered the Arminian “Remonstrance;” Scriptural support is given.

Source 7 . . . was written in the 1640’s, and was an important reformed work resulting from the Puritan Commonwealth in England.

Source 8 . . . is an interesting article that explains the reasons that Edwards would not have endorsed “manifestations of the Spirit” such as those practiced by Airport Vineyard today.