Conversion: A Divine and Supernatural Light

Scripture focus

For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

2 Corinthians 4:6 KJV

At a glance

Summary of the chapter

New England Puritanism had long taught a “morphology of conversion” — a typical sequence of knowledge of the law, conviction of sin, striving, and often disappointment before saving faith — developed by divines like William Perkins partly to counter the antinomian claim that grace bypasses all human means. Edwards grew up inside this system, and his own conversion experience did not fit its expected order, leaving him wary that overzealous preaching sometimes blurred law and gospel by “forcing the beginnings of saving faith back into legal preparation itself.”

Edwards nonetheless agreed that preparation ordinarily precedes conversion, since a sudden, total change of mind is hard to imagine without any preceding movement; but he insisted that any seeking itself is already a fruit of the Spirit's prior work, since “God insists upon being inquired of for his mercy before he bestows it.” He found this pattern across Scripture — Israel cried out before the Red Sea deliverance, the Canaanite woman pleaded before Jesus answered — evidence that God awakens the very cry he then answers.

Edwards traced a characteristic order — conviction of one's danger, then a deepened sense of one's utter moral inability to remedy it — while noting real variety: plainer, less reflective people tend to be moved first by fear of loss, more reflective people by rational persuasion of the good offered, yet the Spirit can reach either sort. Whatever the route, the change itself remains, for Edwards, a genuinely supernatural “divine and supernatural light” no natural process can produce.

Key points

• Edwards inherited the Puritan “morphology of conversion” — law, conviction, striving, and often disappointment before saving faith — from divines like Perkins and Ames.
• His own conversion experience did not match this expected sequence, making him wary of preaching that confused legal preparation with the beginnings of saving faith itself.
• Edwards held that ordinary preparation precedes conversion, but insisted that even the seeker's earnest search is already the Spirit's prior work, not unaided human effort.
• He found the pattern of God awakening a cry for help before answering it repeated throughout Scripture, from the Red Sea to the Canaanite woman's plea.
• Whether a person is moved chiefly by fear of loss or by rational conviction, the decisive change of heart remains, for Edwards, a wholly supernatural gift.

A line worth remembering

God insists upon being inquired of for his mercy before he bestows it.

McClymond & McDermott The Theology of Jonathan Edwards, ch. 24

Related Scripture

• John 3:3
• Acts 26:18
• 2 Corinthians 5:17
• Psalm 119:130

For reflection and discussion

1. How did Edwards's own conversion experience shape his caution about rigid preparatory 'steps' toward salvation?
2. What does it mean that even a sinner's seeking after God is already evidence of the Spirit's prior work rather than pure human initiative?
3. Edwards observed that some people are moved more by fear of loss and others by rational conviction of the good offered — which has been truer of your own path toward faith?