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Many people in our day do not understand how a righteous, just God can punish anyone by casting them into hell. Remember that a widespread awakening began in the Christian church in 1741 when Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon: "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." You may want to read that sermon on the internet.
Many people in our day do not understand how a righteous, just God can punish anyone by casting them into hell. Remember that a widespread awakening began in the Christian church in 1741 when Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon: "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." You may want to read that sermon on the internet.
Yes, many people reject the notion of a 'righteous, just' God incinerating his subjects for an eternity because those people are sane.
Many people in our day do not understand how a righteous, just God can punish anyone by casting them into hell. Remember that a widespread awakening began in the Christian church in 1741 when Jonathan Edwards preached his sermon: "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." You may want to read that sermon on the internet.
I read it in eighth grade social studies class. I was appalled. Apparently you are not.
Quote:
The God that holds you over the pit of Hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect, over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked; his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times so abominable in his eyes as the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince: and yet ’tis nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment: ’tis to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to Hell the last night… but that God’s hand has held you up: there is no other reason to be given why you han’t gone to Hell since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn worship: yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you don’t this very moment drop down into Hell. Oh sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in.
Yeah, that sermon may as well be straight out of a book entitled, "The Cult Leader's Guide to Keeping Members Pacified and too Frightened to Leave."
Well, okay, the title is too long to be a book but perfect for a peer reviewed journal article.
In any event, that's really what those kinds of sermons are all about - even if Edwards sincerely believed it.
Fear, coupled with destroying a person's self-respect, is a foolproof way to keep butts in the pews.
Edwards benefitted from a simple fact of his age: telling people, in effect, to go to hell because they were so bad, was a novel concept which resulted in what Edwards delightedly referred to as people being caught up in "the affections" -- running home in tears, wailing in agony. Carnival barkers had barely been invented. Terrific analysis here:
In our overstimulated media age, it's difficult to understand. A similar thing happened when John Philip Sousa toured the US in the early part of the last century giving concerts of patriotic music. They had nurses in attendance to handle all the people who fainted, so stirred were they. Now, neither Sousa nor Edwards would make much of an impression, unless perhaps it was a yawn. We have far more impressive entertainment piped into our brains 24/7, in living color and stereo sound.
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