Seeing God’s glory everywhere

Edwards calls the Word of God the “chief” and “soul” of the means of grace. More than anything else, it serves to center our practice of the faith. In the Word of God, we learn Heaven’s language so that when we interact with others, gaze upon creation’s beauty, pray, fast, keep Sabbath, meditate and contemplate the truths of God, we come to “hear” and “read” about God’s truthfulness and faithfulness everywhere we look. No wonder Edwards could say, “I believe that the whole universe, heaven and earth, air and seas, and the divine constitution and history of the holy Scriptures, be full of images of divine things, as full as a language is of words ... .”

To see Christ as the glorious and beautiful Lamb of God we need the Spirit to reveal him to our hearts directly.
The Scriptures are the musical score that teaches the language of God, and all creation serves as the symphony proclaiming the glory and beauty of its creator. As we “read” all reality, we bask in the glory, beauty and goodness of the God of grace. Our hearts are moved in love as we both watch and participate in the “theatre of God’s glory.”

Reading God’s Word in the Spirit is learning to read all of reality in light of who God is. Scripture become the lens through which everything else becomes clear. This is the reading that leads to wisdom. Fleshly reading puffs up with fleshly knowledge, but the means of grace—reading in the Spirit—holds you always before Christ as your Savior, King and Lord.

~ Jonathan Edwards