Suprising Work of God

I have always wanted to read something from Jonathan Edwards besides his famous sermon, "Sinners at the Hands of an Angry God." Rather than jumping into his more substantial theological works, I decided to try "The Surprising Work of God." This book is a historical and personal account of the Great Awakening in his town and his church in 1734-35. From a historical perspective, it is utterly fascinating to read how Edwards' articulates the things that he and his congregants observed in the lives of so many people in their community. One thing that is striking is the weight that Edwards places on God's sovereignty, not surprising to those who are well-schooled in his theology. All of the events described in this book place complete control in the hands of God, who chooses those whom He will draw to Himself. There are several specific stories about people that Edwards knew, including a 4-year-old girl who had a remarkable spiritual transformation. He concludes the book by describing how God removed Himself from the people and the aftermath of that change. The biggest difficulty in reading this book is that it is so foreign to the 21st-century reader. Even those who appreciate Edwards' theology will surely find his stories to be hard to understand, as the experience of the 18th-century New Englander is so markedly different from today. It is hard to even conceive of some of the events that he describes, which he would surely attribute to the reality that God works in amazing and indescribable ways. Ultimately, I was not drawn into this book as much as I had hoped. Several of the middle sections were hard to follow and impossible to relate to my own experiences. But I still found the exercise of reading Edwards and more fully understanding the Great Awakening to be richly rewarding. For anyone wanting a primer in contemporary church practices, you should look elsewhere. But if you'd like a touchpoint with the writing of Edwards and are interested in this period of incredible spiritual importance in the history of the American church, then this would be a solid resource.