Formed for the Glory of God: Learning from the Spiritual Practices of Jonathan Edwards

by Kyle Strobel

If you start with a Reformed understanding of salvation, with Edwards, that emphasizes God’s work to redeem and save, your understanding of the Christian life will likely be a story of how that same God sanctifies. Salvation reveals the kind of path we are on. The spiritual life is a part of and a continuation of our salvation. As a spiritual mentor of mine likes to say, we know salvation at the cross. It is at the cross where we find salvation, with nothing to bring or offer but ourselves. It is here where we come to know the gift of God in the sacrifice of Christ as wholly gift. But many mistakenly assume that the Christian life is lived elsewhere, as if we get up and leave the cross to live life on our own.[1] For Protestants, the Christian life is lived at the very place where salvation was first known—at the foot of the cross. It is here where we are saved and here where we are grown. The cross is not an event to leave, nor is it a starting line; it is the path itself. If spiritual formation is an extension of salvation, how do we understand salvation? We have already seen that our union with Christ, known in salvation, will ultimately lead us to the Father. In glory, we will share in the vision the Son has of the Father. We will share Christ’s life of love with his Father as we are accepted as the bride of the Son (Rev 19:6-9). If this is the end of the path, what is the beginning?