Wholly and Only for Christ's Sake

As justification is granted wholly for Christ's sake, so it was doubtless wise in itself, and seemed wise and good to God that it should be granted to the believer in such a way that he should see and know that it was granted wholly and only for Christ's sake; and that as he is really and wholly dependent on Christ for this inestimable blessing, so he should be made sensible of this his dependence, and cordially consent to it. But this is faith. Besides, faith more than any other grace ascribes to all beings their proper place and character. By faith in Christ, as just now observed, we acknowledge and feel our own entire dependence on him. We see his glorious excellence and all-sufficiency, and our own sinfulness and ill-desert; and to see and feel all this is to ascribe to Christ his proper place and character, and to acknowledge and feel and assume our own. And this temper will naturally lead us to right views of Christ, and will bind us most strongly to him. Faith also makes us willing to receive justification as a free gift. It disposes us to be sincerely thankful for it, and to relish and prize it, and all its consequent blessings; and in these respects also it renders the believer the proper subject of justification and the proper heir of heaven.

—Jonathan Edwards