Zeal an Essential Virtue of a Christian

Tuesdays with Edwards!

In April of 1740 gave a sermon on Titus 2:14 (KJV), Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. The main point he makes is that zeal an essential virtue of a Christian. At the time, there was not a lot of zeal to be found in Northampton…at least not what Edwards saw as “Christian zeal.” To be honest it wasn’t very fashionable at the time. Even today being described as zealous or being a zealot has decidedly negative connotations. Who wants to be seen as zealous? Isn’t that more vice than virtue?

Edwards argues that what makes zeal (for anything) vicious or virtuous is not the affection (Edwards’ word for strong emotions) in and of itself, but its focus. Edwards described Christian zeal as “a fervent disposition, an affection of mind in prosecuting that which is for God’s glory and in opposing those things that are against it” (page 140).

In this section of the sermon, Edwards explains why one of the effects of God’s grace in the soul and life of the Christians is a healthy consistent zeal.

You can read this sermon in its entirety at the Jonathan Edwards Center website at www.edwards.yale.edu. This selection is from Sermons and Discourses, 1739-1742, ed. Harry S. Stout, The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 22 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003) pages 144-145.

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This is one thing wherein the power of godliness appears and wherein it differs from the form of it. These two are spoken of by the Apostle in 2 Timothy 3:5, the one as being peculiar to true Christians, the other common to hypocrites with them.

Sincere grace is a powerful principle in the soul, and the power of it appears partly in the nature of its actings. It is no dull, inactive, ineffectual thing. There is an holy ardency and vigor in the actings of grace. It is a kind of inward spiritual fire in the soul, and therefore when a man is converted and God pours out his Holy Spirit upon him, he is said in Scripture language to be baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire. There is an inexpressible ardor of soul when true grace is in exercise, so that the hearts of the saints do as it were burn within them. Luke 24:32, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?”

And this holy ardor that is in the exercises of true grace rises not in men by contemplation and enjoyment, but has respect to practice. It seeks the glory of God. It struggles after those means that tend to promote it and against those things that do oppose. And so it has the nature of zeal.

He that experiences the power of godliness at times finds within himself breathings and longings of soul— not only after more of a sight of God and more of an enjoyment of him but also holiness and conformity to God— such as have a strength and such a peculiar sort of inward vigor as other desires have not. They sometimes cause the soul to pant after God, and occasion a vehement struggle against sin.

And even in them that have comparatively small degrees of grace, yet God is wont sometimes so far to quicken the principle as to let the powerful nature of it appear in some measure.

There is something in the vigor of the actings of true grace that is inimitable and inexpressible, that does properly show that there is an omnipotent agent at work in the soul of a godly man. This makes true Christians zealous in prosecuting those things that tend to God’s glory and opposing what is against, whereas others, that have only the form of godliness without the power of it, are indifferent, lifeless and lukewarm with respect to these things.