Meet Jonathan Edwards: Seventy Resolutions

The resolutions

At nineteen, Jonathan Edwards began a list: Resolved, to live with all my might, while I do live. Resolved, never to lose one moment of time. Seventy resolutions in all — and, more remarkable, a weekly practice of rereading them and honestly scoring himself against them for the rest of his life. Before he examined any congregation, he examined himself.

Testing the fire

When religious revival swept New England in the 1740s, Edwards stood in the strange position of having helped ignite it and then becoming its most rigorous auditor. His Treatise on Religious Affections asked the uncomfortable question: how do you tell a true change of heart from a passing wave of feeling? His answer — watch what endures, watch what it costs, watch how it acts — applies to every enthusiasm, in any century.

Dismissed, and undiminished

After twenty-three years, his own congregation voted him out over a point of principle he would not soften. He moved to the frontier at Stockbridge, served a mission town, wrote his greatest philosophical work at the edge of the wilderness — and was called from there to lead Princeton. The setback did not lower his standard; it proved it.

Why they belong at your table

Seat him when you need rigor about your own heart — to test whether a conviction is real, resolve what to do about it, and keep the resolution.