The End for Which God Created the World

On Sunday, Michael mentioned a treatise by Jonathan Edwards entitled, "The End for Which God Created the World." We wanted to provide some helpful references here on the blog in case you would like to read this treatise yourself. There are a few different places on the Internet to find Edwards' work.

In 1998, John Piper wrote a book entitled, "God's Passion for His Glory." In the second part of his book, he provides the text of Edwards' treatise, along with helpful explanation. This is especially helpful as Edwards' mid-18th-Century writing style may be difficult to digest for modern readers. If you would like to read Edwards' work through Piper's book, these may be the steps to take:

1. Visit DesiringGod.org to find the online excerpt of Piper's "God's Passion for His Glory."
2. Read the Introduction to Part II, starting with Page 20 of the PDF file. This gives helpful notes on how to read Edwards' treatise as well as a clarification of the terms used.
   
3. Then read all of Chapter 1 of Part II in Piper's book. This is the actual text of Edwards' "The End for Which God Created the World," along with helpful notes from Piper.

Reading Jonathan Edwards is not easy, in part because we are no longer used to this style of writing today; but Edwards' thoughts are profound and compelling.