Christian Course

...some directions how to conduct yourself in your Christian course..." from the pen of Jonathan Edwards
Northampton, New England
June 3, 1741

1. I would advise you to keep up as great a strife and earnestness in religion as if you knew yourself to be in a state of nature and were seeking conversion. We advise persons under conviction to be earnest and violent for the kingdom of heaven; but when they have attained to conversion, they ought not to be the less watchful, laborious, and earnest in the whole work of religion, but the more so; for they are under infinitely greater obligations. For want of this, many persons, in a few months after their conversion, have begun to lose their sweet and lively sense of spiritual things, and to grow cold and dark, and have "pierced themselves through with many sorrows (I Timothy 6:10)." Whereas, if they had done as the apostle did (Philippians 3:12-14), their path would have been "as the shining light, that shines more and more unto the perfect day (Proverbs 4:18)."