The Works of Jonathan Edwards Series

Here is a list of pointers to all 26 published volumes of The Works of Jonathan Edwards Series. The ISBN points to the publisher's web site (Yale Press) and the ASIN points to Amazon. I've put it into an actual HTML table so that you can copy and paste, retaining data structure for whatever purpose you may desire.

Note that these works (and additional ones that are not published yet) are also available for free online: http://edwards.yale.edu/archive/.

Also, here is an Amazon.com wish list containing all 26 volumes.

Title	ISBN	ASIN
Volume 1: Freedom of the Will	978-0300008487	0300008481
Volume 2: Religious Affections	978-0300009668	0300009666
Volume 3: Original Sin	978-0300011982	0300011989
Volume 4: The Great Awakening	978-0300014372	0300014376
Volume 5: Apocalyptic Writings	978-0300019452	0300019459
Volume 6: Scientific and Philosophical Writings	978-0300022827	0300022824
Volume 7: The Life of David Brainerd	978-0300030044	0300030045
Volume 8: Ethical Writings	978-0300040203	0300040202
Volume 9: A History of the Work of Redemption	978-0300041552	0300041551
Volume 10: Sermons and Discourses, 1720-1723	978-0300051360	0300051360
Volume 11: Typological Writings	978-0300053524	0300053525
Volume 12: Ecclesiastical Writings	978-0300058970	0300058977
Volume 13: The "Miscellanies", Entry Nos. a-z, aa-zz, 1-500	978-0300060591	0300060599
Volume 14: Sermons and Discourses, 1723-1729	978-0300068412	0300068417
Volume 15: Notes on Scripture	978-0300071986	0300071981
Volume 16: Letters and Personal Writings	978-0300072952	0300072953
Volume 17: Sermons and Discourses, 1730-1733	978-0300078404	0300078404
Volume 18: The "Miscellanies," 501-832	978-0300083309	0300083300
Volume 19: Sermons and Discourses, 1734-1738	978-0300087147	0300087144
Volume 20: The "Miscellanies," 833-1152	978-0300091748	0300091745
Volume 21: Writings on the Trinity, Grace, and Fait	978-0300095050	0300095058
Volume 22: Sermons and Discourses, 1739-1742	978-0300095722	0300095724
Volume 23: The "Miscellanies," 1153–1360	978-0300101027	0300101023
Volume 24: The Blank Bible	978-0300109313	0300109318
Volume 25: Sermons and Discourses, 1743-1758	978-0300115390	0300115393
Volume 26: Catalogues of Books	978-0300133943	0300133944

The Shack

Jesus died to save sinners. His death was necessary because God requires punishment for sin, everyone is sinful, and no one can please God through any amount of good behavior. This necessity of the cross is what Paul refers to as the "offense of the cross" (Galatians 5:11).

Paul is referring to the fact that it is offensive to us that we cannot earn our salvation; that we cannot please God with good behavior. It is offensive to hear that we are not acceptable to God. However, if we do not understand that we are not acceptable to God on our own, then we will not come to the cross in repentance and seek forgiveness through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. As obvious as this may seem, the church has been plagued with attacks on this central doctrine for a long time.

The Shack is a work of contemporary fiction that attacks this central doctrine. Even though it is fiction, it contains ideas about God which must be examined to see if they agree with Scripture, just as Paul would have done (2 Corinthians 10:3-5). So, let us examine Young’s theology by looking at what The Shack teaches about sin. In the chapter entitled "A Breakfast of Champions," Papa, the character presented as God the Father, says this to the protagonist on page 178:

"I am not who you think I am, Mackenzie. I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it."

The primary error here is that God does not need to punish sin. God, because He is holy, commands us to be holy (1 Peter 1:16) and cannot tolerate sin; there is no sin or darkness in him (1 John 1:5). And, we know that God’s punishment for sin is wrath and death (Romans 1:18-19,6:23). Therefore, because of the holiness of God, God must punish sin. And, from the scriptures we have cited, God states that He does punish sin. If, on the contrary, God does not need to punish sin, then there is no need for Jesus Christ to take our punishment for us and provide grace to us. Romans 5:15 proclaims that while many people were made sinful through the sin of Adam, many people will be given the gift of grace through Jesus Christ. John 1:17 affirms that grace came about through Jesus Christ. And, throughout the New Testament, the writers affirm that grace is of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have grace...only because of His death and resurrection.

Let's look at a couple more examples:

• Young states on page 277 that there can be grace without suffering. (From the immediate context, he seems to be referring to suffering in general, and the preceding paragraphs seem to indicate that Young could be also referring to Jesus' suffering at the cross.) If he is referring to Jesus' suffering at the cross, this is disturbing.
• He claims on page 144 that there was no separation at the cross. He says that God the Father was actually with Jesus at the cross. He claims that Jesus just "felt" separated, but was not in actuality enduring separation from God the Father, in our place, for our sins (2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 1:4).

Because of this serious error, that the message of the gospel is being undermined, Young's book must be thrown out, because Young doesn’t accurately present the gospel (Matthew 24:4–5; 2 Corinthians 11:1–4; Galatians 1:6–9; 2 Peter 2:1–3).

I'm not sure why Young wants to distort the gospel, but it could have to do with a desire to be culturally correct. But, we cannot fear the persecution of people for preaching the truth of the gospel, that they are unacceptable to God because of their sin but that through repentance and faith in Jesus they can be saved. Persecution is exactly what we are promised for preaching truth (Matthew 5:11). We cannot simplify the truth with the goal of making Christianity more palatable. The way is in Jesus Christ alone (John 14:6), and it is a narrow way (Matthew 7:14). Those who would disbelieve will continue to disbelieve after hearing the gospel (Luke 24:11). The only way people can come to Jesus is for God the Father to draw them (John 6:44). We simply must pray that God would grant them repentance and bring them to knowledge of the truth, and we must preach the pure, full, true gospel in obedience and faith.

For further reading, I suggest Gary Gilley’s review or this excerpt from one of Mark Driscoll's sermons.

(Note: all of my page numbers are from the Large Print Edition of The Shack.)

The Message

I have been investigating The Message (by Eugene Peterson) for a few months now. I'm going to meet with some friends this week and present my reasons for why I think it should be avoided, and I want to clarify my reasoning through writing.

But, first, I'll start with issues that other people raise that I do not think are compelling enough to ban The Message from common use:

1. The Message is not a Bible translation. I would agree with this, but I don't think most people are going to care about the difference. It looks like the Bible (NavPress in fact markets it as a Bible), feels like a Bible, and sounds somewhat like a Bible.
2. The Message contains occult references. Again, based on the research I've done, this seems to be a valid concern, but most people will probably justify this away and claim it's not a big deal.
3. Eugene Peterson's world view is not biblical. I watched a YouTube video of him being interviewed about his writings, and I was bothered by some of his responses. But, I would rather not accuse him of this without meeting with him in person.
4. The style is offensive. This is merely a preference. I personally do not like the style of The Message. But, style should not be our standard of judgment here (John 7:24).

Again, these are issues that I do not think should be raised against Eugene Peterson. However, there is one important issue that should be raised.

God's words are changed in significant ways. When I say "words," I don't mean the actual English word differences. Certainly, the Bible wasn't written in English. And, since The Message officially is a paraphrase (J.R. Miller considers it a commentary), we won't worry about word differences in general. That is the leeway afforded to paraphrase.

However, we should take issue with passages in The Message where, based on a comprehensive understanding of Scripture in the original languages, the theology communicated is different; that is, the meaning that God intended when he spoke the words of Scripture is not the same meaning as that communicated in The Message.

God strongly forbids changing his words (Deuteronomy 4:2; Deuteronomy 12:32; Proverbs 30:6; Galatians 1:8-9; Revelation 22:19). So, let us look at three examples where God's words have been changed in significant ways in The Message:

First, any reference to God's holiness is removed from the Lord's prayer in Matthew 6:7-13 (MSG). Most translations say something like "hallowed by be your name" (Matthew 6:7-13). In this passage, Jesus is referring to His Father as hallowed, as holy and sacred, set apart from man, as one in whom there is no sin. Christ is saying that His Father is exalted and worthy of complete devotion, because he is perfect in goodness and righteousness. The original languages do in fact contain these words.

Second, "[r]ecover your dear early love" is used in Revelation 2:1-5 (MSG) instead of "repent, and do the deeds you did at first" (Revelation 2:1-5). Repenting is turning away from our sin and being contrite in the presence of a holy God. Recovering our love does not communicate repentance of sin. Loving God, truly, is obeying His commands (1 John 2:5). And, since we all sin, all of us are constantly needing to repent of our sin before God. The Greek word here, metanoeo (Strong's number 3340), implies turning away with abhorrence from and amending for your past sins.

Third, Romans 3:9-20 (MSG) is grievously distorted from "whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law" into "whatever is written in these Scriptures is not what God says about others but to us to whom these Scriptures were addressed in the first place." In this passage (specifically Romans 3:19-20), Paul is saying that the law was given to bring us to a knowledge of our own sin. When a sinner is judged by the law, they are found to be unacceptable to God. Before we can be justified through faith in Christ, we need to humble ourselves and come to Jesus. That's what belief in Jesus means. We believe that Jesus can and will save us from eternal damnation. In believing this, we must not also believe that our works can justify us. That's why Paul is so polemic against legalism in the book of Galatians.

There are many more examples of these kinds of deviations on the article What kind of message is The Message? by crossroad.to.

Some may object and say that The Message is only a paraphrase, and we should therefore not be so polemic against it. However, the perception of many people is that it is a Bible. ChristianBook.com, in fact, calls it "The Message Bible," and in their description, they say this: "Experience the life-changing power of the translation that captures the vitality and directness of the original languages" (emphasis added). (To my knowledge, Eugene Peterson has not contradicted the claim that The Message is a translation, which is asserted even by the publisher, NavPress.) Paul states in 2 Corinthians 10:4-6 that every idea against the true knowledge of God must be torn down. Furthermore, since many people seem to believe that The Message is a Bible, this becomes a stumbling block for them (Matthew 18:6-9). They are trusting its words, but its words contain serious deviations from sound doctrine. My reader might agree with me that discernment is a character trait that is sorely lacking in the church. Rather than encouraging, promoting, or approving use of The Message, we should discourage its use and in fact acknowledge publicly that it contains serious errors, for the sake of those weaker in faith and knowledge (1 Corinthians 8:9).

Even though not all of The Message deviates from sound teaching, we should still throw it out when confronted with serious issues like these. Like leaven, which works throughout a large quantity of dough, false teaching works throughout an entire church and subverts the pure message of the gospel (Galatians 5:9). If even only one of us believes even just a little false teaching, it will taint all of us and even the whole church.

To conclude, I will simply say that I will not in good conscience recommend to others or tolerate usage by others of The Message. The rendering of The Message has changed God's words significantly, in ways that contradict sound, Biblical teaching. Sound teaching is commanded in Scripture (Titus 1:9; 1 Timothy 6:3-5; 2 Timothy 1:13), and there is in fact only one alternative: false teaching. The Message contains false teaching.

I'm reminded of 2 Timothy 4:3, which says:

For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.

Other related articles
Tim Challies on Eugene Peterson
J.R. Miller on why The Message is not a Bible translation

Reductionistic Legalism Part 1

When I ask friends to describe legalism, it is often that I hear the slogan that legalism is "rules over relationship."

Most of them miss the fact that I was asking for a description of legalism, for them to describe the character of legalism "especially as determined by salient features" (Merriam-Webster), not a simple reduction of its character into a single sentence. Perhaps this is my error in not asking a clearer question.

The reason I ask is that I want people to move from a simple theology into a Biblical theology. This is not to say that the Bible is hard to understand --- surely, we only understand the Bible because God gives us understanding (1 Corinthians 2:6-16) --- but that people tend to oversimplify Biblical concepts and thereby lose the "salient features" that make them compellingly practical.

"Rules over relationship" is somewhat practical, because it reminds us that we are placing too much importance on following "rules" over a "relationship" with Jesus. But, is this the only important feature of legalism? Personally, I don't find this a compelling renouncement of the heresy of legalism. For, certainly, it is heresy.

The book of Galatians begins (Galatians 1:1-2:14) with a long defense by Paul of the gospel and his apostleship. Throughout this introduction to his main point, which he gets to in Galatians 2:16, that "a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ", the recurring theme is that the gospel and its ministration is not natural, but supernatural, given by God Almighty.

This, I think is the first salient feature to notice. Legalism is about the natural over the supernatural. It's about accepting the ideas of culture rather than God's ideas, human philosophy instead of Biblical teaching.

This is why teaching pastors are so vital (1 Timothy 5:17), and furthermore why reading, studying, and meditating on Scripture is so vital in a Christian's life. We know that God's word is used by the Holy Spirit like a sword, judging us and revealing our hearts (Hebrews 4:12), and we know furthermore that the hearing and understanding of Scripture trains us to be godly (2 Timothy 3:16-17; Isaiah 55:11; John 17:17; Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:25-27).