The picture that Jonathan Edwards paints in "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is a truly terrifying one. It almost seems blasphemous because God is portrayed not as loving and compassionate but as a ruthless and sadistic tormentor, devising a multitude of horrible punishments against which sinful mortals have no hope whatsoever of protecting themselves.
In this sermon the Devil is not the source of evil but a mere functionary, awaiting the orders of God to proceed with the torment of any particular human soul. "The devil stands ready to fall upon them, and seize them as his own, at what moment God shall permit him." (Edwards, p. 427)
"This sermon has been widely reprinted as an example of "fire and brimstone" preaching in the colonial revivals, though the majority of Edwards's sermons were not this dramatic. Indeed, he used this style deliberately. As historian George Marsden put it, "Edwards could take for granted...that a New England audience knew well the Gospel remedy. The problem was getting them to seek it."[19]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Edwards_(theologian)
This is an important observation. Edwards is not in fact sadistically tormenting his listeners but trying to arouse their repentance with a rhetorical device that they would recognize as such. The parishioners that he is addressing know very well that they have an opportunity to escape the horrors he describes by accepting Christ as their Savior. What is puzzling to me about born-again theology, not being familiar with it beyond what I have seen in the media, is that it does not seem to be a voluntary experience. The believer must be somehow emotionally overcome, affected directly by the liberating truth. It seems like that also would be something that was dependent on grace, rather than an experience that you can will to happen because you are afraid of damnation.
20/20
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