So we've seen over the past few weeks the historical and sociological factors that were affecting the community in which Edwards ministered. This week, we get down to the business of answering this question... Did Edwards invent Youth Ministry? Now, whilst Edwards held to the
traditional view of puritan New England which valued respect and deference to
elders and older members of society, Edwards also displayed a particularly
favourable view of youth.
He thought it difficult for those over fifty
to convert, and said it was better to trust God when young in order to grow up
into a deep habit of Godliness.
Edwards
himself was also relatively young when he began his ministry in Northampton,
only twenty-five years old, and so he was sympathetic to the youth in his
congregation and paid close attention to them in his preaching and pastoral
care.
Differing from those such as Hooker
who ministered before him and had a relatively simple view of childhood, Edwards
recognised three distinct stages of childhood development, infancy (from birth
to age six or seven), childhood (from seven to fourteen to sixteen) and youth
(sixteen to twenty-five).
Edwards said, ‘The age of man is frequently
distinguished into childhood, youth, middle age, and old age.‘
He believed children reached a crucial turning
point around age seven, ‘in terms of their ability to reason and grasp abstract
concepts.’
Edwards ‘also shared the modern assumption
that children experienced another significant transformation during puberty –a
stage he identified as “youth” rather than “adolescence”.
Edwards ministry to children was one of the
most striking results of his theology of ‘religious affections which meant that
unlike earlier Puritan ministers, who equated religion with a rational
understand of Scripture, Edwards claimed that true faith was a matter of the
heart and that anyone, of any age was capable of demonstrating a changed heart
through changed behaviour.
Due to his understanding of the
different ages and stages of children and youth, and his belief that true
religion was a matter of the ‘affections’ not primarily a rational thing, Edwards
attempted to tailor his religious instruction to fit the different and distinct
needs of each group.
Edwards wrote in a letter to Thomas Prince
that he had held special religious meetings for ‘children’ who were ‘under the
age of sixteen’ as well as for ‘young people’ between the ages of sixteen and
twenty-six.
Brekus notes that, ‘when Jonathan Edwards
began his pastorate in Northampton in 1727…he almost immediately began
directing his sermons to the children and older “youth” of the congregation.‘
In 1733, Edwards began to develop a technique
of preaching which involved a variety of tones of voice, and was directed
specifically to the adolescents in the community.
He also sought to explain the Bible in plain
language, so that younger people could understand.
Tracy
notes how Edwards continued to speak directly to young people because he viewed
most of the older parents in his congregation to have failed to bring their
children up in the faith.
Perhaps a key insight in to the way
Edwards responded to his social setting can be seen in the application given in
one sermon,
‘Another thing I would advise is
private religious meetings. If young
people, instead of meeting to gather to drink or to frolic, would meet from
time to time to read and to pray to God, and together to seek their salvation,
doubtless it would have a great tendency to more and more lead them to think of
it and to fix their minds on it. This
would be found a great help to them, and this is the best way they can help one
another.’
It seems here that Edwards is
arguing for special meetings of youth and young people to grow in their
Christian character and knowledge and to turn away from worldly living. In fact over and over again in sermons
delivered specially to ‘youth’ Edwards speaks of the need to pursue God rather
than the evil of the world,
‘The time of youth is the best
time; the days of old age are evil days for any such design. Old age is a very disadvantageous time to
seek God, to set about seeking God and salvation in comparison of youth’
Or again, ‘It is ordinarily a much
more easy thing to affect the mind of a sinner in youth than one who is old in
sin’.
And
again, ‘Make religion the business of your youth.’
Edwards believed that the best time
someone could seek their salvation was when they were a ‘youth’ and so he
worked hard with the youth in his congregation.
He preached favourably concerning young
people who decided to have faith and live pious lives.
Another less favourable view of
Edwards’s work with young people, would be not that of a pastor adapting to his
context in order to bring the gospel to a growing generation of adolescent
young people, but rather a pastor desperate to keep his job by winning the
support of the younger generation over and against the older members of the
Northampton church. Harry Stout quotes
Kenneth Minkema’s research that showed that a large majority of the members who
criticized Edwards and eventually dismissed him were older members who had
entered the church under the ministry of his predecessor, Solomon Stoddard. Stout argues that, ‘In retaliation, he
[Edwards] berated the aged as too old for conversion and held the youth up as
role models of faith.’
Minkema goes even further arguing Edwards
developed an antagonism towards old persons that, ‘ultimately verged on
outright hostility’.
He also notes that Tracy has shown that
Edwards gained the allegiance of the town’s youth during the awakenings of
1734-35 and 1740-42, only to have them turn on him when he was dismissed in
1750.
This could be further evidence of a man
driven more by the need to survive. When Edwards was sacked he claimed, ‘that
many youths continued to support him, but the majority of his church denounced
him for his rigidity and harshness.’
So whilst Edwards did seem to rely on the
support of the youth it seems likely that his focus on the youth was because he
simply found them more willing or likely to convert, then because he was trying
to use them to keep his job secure.
For many, Edward’s ‘youth ministry’
is seen as one of his most notable successes as a Pastor.
Ava Chamberlin notes,
‘The Northampton youth, those
young men and women between the ages of fifteen and twenty-six who were
preparing to make choices about career, marriage, and family formation, were
the group most affected by changing social and economic conditions. As with youth throughout New England, the
burden of growing land scarcity fell disproportionately on their shoulders, and
increasing the conflicts and anxieties of adolescence.’
In fact it was the youth became the
main participants in the revivals in Northampton, for which Edwards is largely
remembered, in 1734-35 and again in 1740.
Harry Stout notes that Edwards would often
strategize for revival and that youth and young people were always at the
centre of his thoughts and plans.
