Christian Happiness

Preached by Jonathan Edwards, Fall 1720
Isaiah 3:10 "Say unto the righteous, it shall be well with him: for they shall eat the fruit of their doings."

A licensing sermon.
Reasonable beings, while they act as such, naturally choose those things which they are convinced are best for them, and will certainly do those things which they know they had better do than leave undone. (And, indeed, who in the world could imagine that there were such unreasonable creatures in the world, as that at the very same time that they themselves know a thing to be much to their advantage, yet will not choose or do it?) God always deals with men as reasonable creatures, and every [word] in the Scriptures speaks to us as such. Whether it be in instructing and teaching of us, he [gives us] no commands to believe those things which are directly contrary to reason, and in commanding of us he desires us to do nothing but what will be for our own advantage, our own profit and benefit, and frequently uses this argument with us to persuade us to obey his commands. For, "can a man be profitable to God as he that is wise may be profitable unto himself; is it any pleasure to the Almighty, that we are righteous, or is it gain to him, that we make our ways perfect?" (Job 22:2–3). But God has told [us] that if we be wise, we shall be wise for ourselves, and God, in our text, gives it as a special charge to assure the godly from Him that his godliness shall be of great advantage to him. (And that we may the better understand it and see how it is brought in, let us look back on the foregoing words.) God, in the beginning of this chapter, denounced great and terrible judgments against the children of Judah, as in the first [and succeeding] verses...