If George Whitefield was the great evangelist of the Great Awakening in its North American phase, then Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) was the great thinker.  But he was by no means a detached analyst.  This is clear from his account- especially in his Personal Narrative – of his own spiritual experience.

Like the psalmists of old, Edwards delighted in God’s handiwork in creation:

‘I often used to sit and view the moon, for a long time; and so in the daytime, spent much time in viewing the clouds and sky, to behold the sweet glory of God in these things: in the meantime, singing forth with a low voice, my contemplations of the Creator and Redeemer. And scarce anything, among all the works of nature, was so sweet to me as thunder and lightning. Formerly, nothing had been so terrible to me. I used to be a person uncommonly terrified with thunder: and it used to strike me with terror, when I saw a thunderstorm rising. But now, on the contrary, it rejoiced me. I felt God at the first appearance of a thunderstorm. And used to take the opportunity at such times, to fix myself to view the clouds, and see the lightnings play, and hear the majestic and awful voice of God’s thunder: which often times was exceeding entertaining, leading me to sweet contemplations of my great and glorious God. And while I viewed, used to spend my time, as it always seemed natural to me, to sing or chant forth my meditations; to speak my thoughts in soliloquies, and speak with a singing voice.’

But Edwards’ thoughts and prayers also turned to focus on Jesus Christ:

‘Once, as I rid out into the woods for my health, anno 1737 [i.e., thirty-four years old]; and having lit from my horse in a retired place, as my manner commonly has been, to walk for divine contemplation and prayer: I had a view, that for me was extraordinary, of the glory of the Son of God; as mediator between God and man; and his wonderful, great, full, pure and sweet grace and love, and meek and gentle condescension. . . . The person of Christ appeared ineffably excellent, with an excellency great enough to swallow up all thought and conception. Which continued, as near as I can judge, about an hour; which kept me, the bigger part of time, in a flood of tears and weeping aloud.’

Here we note several themes: the importance of solitude, the expression of strong emotion, and (very significantly) not an emptying of the mind, but rather a filling of it with thoughts of ‘the glory of the Son of God’.

Schwanda notes that Edwards uses the word ‘contemplation’ thirteen times in the Personal Narrative.  But I must gently dispute the implication that what Edwards meant by that word was quite what many modern practitioners mean by it.

What is abundantly clear, however, is that Edwards experienced communion with God.  This was at the heart of his  personal piety (to use an old-fashioned word).

J.I. Packer explains:

‘The root of piety, Edwards maintained, is a hearty conviction (in his phrase, a ‘cordial sense’) of the reality and glory of the divine and heavenly things spoken of in the gospel. Such a conviction is more than an intellectual grasp of theological ideas, or a taking Christian truth for granted under the constraining pressure of community opinion; it is, rather, the result of direct divine illumination accompanying the written or spoken word of God, as Edwards explained in 1734 in his second published sermon, on Matthew 16:17, entitled, ‘A divine and supernatural light, immediately imparted to the soul by the Spirit of God, shown to be both a Scriptural and rational doctrine’.’

For Edwards, this divine enlightenment

‘is such as effectually influences the inclination, and changes the nature of the soul. It assimilates our nature to the divine Nature.… This knowledge will wean from the world, and raise the inclination to heavenly things. It will turn the heart to God as the fountain of good, and to choose him for the only portion. This light, and this only, will bring the soul to a saving close with Christ. It conforms the heart to the gospel, mortifies its enmity and opposition against the scheme of salvation therein revealed: it causes the heart to embrace the joyful tidings, and entirely to adhere to, and acquiesce in, the revelation of Christ as our Saviour: it causes the whole soul to accord and symphonize with it … cleaving to it with full inclination and affection; and it effectually disposes the soul to give up itself entirely to Christ.… As it reaches the bottom of the heart, and changes the nature, so it will effectually dispose to a universal obedience. It shows God as worthy to be obeyed and served. It draws forth the heart in a sincere love of God … and it convinces of the reality of those glorious rewards that God has promised to them that obey him.’

In his Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, Edwards stresses the importance of ‘holy affections’:

‘As the affections not only necessarily belong to the human nature, but are a very great part of it, so (inasmuch as by regeneration persons are renewed in the whole man) holy affections not only necessarily belong to true religion, but are a very great part of such religion. And as true religion is practical, and God hath so constituted the human nature, that the affections are very much the springs of men’s actions, this also shows, that true religion must consist very much in the affections.’

Tom Schwanda, “To Gaze on the Beauty of the Lord’ in Embracing Contemplation.

J.I. Packer, ‘Jonathan Edwards on Revival’ in A Quest for Godliness.