92SermonsofJonathanEdwards (continued)
When the glorious dispensation of the gospel came, God passed by the Jews, and called those who had been heathens, to enjoy the privileges of it. The Jews were broken off, that the Gentiles might be grafted in (Romans 11:17). "I will call her 'my loved one' who is not my loved one" [Romans 9:25] And there are more children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband" [Isaiah 54:1]. The natural children of Abraham are rejected, and God raises up children to Abraham from stones. That nation, which was so honored of God, have now been for many ages rejected, and remain dispersed all over the world, a remarkable monument of divine vengeance. And further, God now greatly distinguishes some Gentile nations from others, and all according to His sovereign pleasure.
2. God exercises His sovereignty in the advantages He bestows upon individual persons.
Everyone needs salvation, and everyone is naturally, undeserving of it; but He gives some vastly greater advantages for salvation than others. To some He assigns their place in godly Christian families, where they may be well instructed and educated, and have Christian parents to dedicate them to God, and say many prayers for them. God places some under a more powerful ministry than others, and in places where there are more of the outpourings of the Spirit of God. To some He gives much more of the strivings and the awakening influences of the Spirit, than to others. It is according to His mere sovereign pleasure.
3. God exercises His sovereignty in sometimes bestowing salvation on the lowly and poor, and denying it to the wise and great.
Christ in His sovereignty passes by the gates of princes and nobles, and enters some cottage and dwells there, and has communion with its obscure inhabitants. God in His sovereignty withheld salvation from the rich man, who lived luxuriously every day, and bestowed it on poor Lazarus, who sat begging at his gate. God in this way pours out contempt on princes, and on all their glittering splendor. So God