Customer Reviews

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and Other Puritan Sermons (Dover Thrift Editions)

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Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God is the text of a sermon that Edwards preached to his congregation. I know of no author/preacher who is more consistently captivated by God's glory in his grace and love towards sinners, especially as manifested in the eternal joy in Him of heaven. But Edwards was also poignantly aware of the reality of hell. Hell is what we all deserve; God's eternal and infinite wrath is what we would be experiencing now and should experience for eternity if it were not in God's good pleasure to restrain Himself. God's glory in salvation and grace is made all the more glorious when his perfect and righteous wrath are manifested toward the vessels prepared for destruction. Edwards calls all hearers to recognize their powerlessness in the face of this God who is justly wrath-filled against them. Either rest secure in your position in Christ, where Christ has already absorbed this wrath and given us his righteousness securing eternity in heaven. Or be very afraid, be convicted by sin when you see just how horrible it is that a perfect God would punish it so, repent/turn, and trust in God to cleanse you from that sin, both its guilt and its power. This is an excellent sermon that I had not read in quite some time and am resolved to return to regularly. No matter who you are, you must know of the true God, both his justice and mercy.

I read this book back in 1990 about how God is angry with us and how he could wipe us out at anytime. It is right is many ways such as our unworthiness of God's love, that we deserve the consequences of our sin, and that sin makes God angry. However I am hard-pressed to see how what was written here lines up with how Jesus presented God. This book may have a case with the how God acted in the Old Testament, such as touching the Ark of the Covenant even to keep it from falling off a cart, making sacrifices in the Most Holy place of the temple and other instances where God is angered and brings immediate retribution but that era ended with Jesus' death. It says that the curtain in the temple tore thus signaling that everybody now had access to God, not just priests.

Certainly, God is not a matter to take lightly but this book is not something I would recommend to those who are looking to learn about God. Start with the accounts of Jesus - the Gospels and then tell me where you see an Angry God ready to pounce on sinners.