"The way to Heaven is ascending; we must be content to travel uphill, though it be hard and tiresome, and contrary to the natural bias of our flesh"
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Edwards turns salvation into topography: Heaven is not a door you stroll through but a climb that punishes the calves. That physical metaphor is the point. It drags doctrine out of abstraction and into the body, where fatigue, resentment, and craving live. “Ascending” isn’t just direction; it’s a rebuke to the fantasy that grace should feel easy, that spiritual progress should align with comfort or “natural” desire.
The line also smuggles in a distinctly Edwardsian anthropology. “Natural bias of our flesh” treats human will as skewed at the factory, angled toward the downhill run of appetite and self-justification. In the Puritan and broader Calvinist context Edwards inhabits, this isn’t mere moralism; it’s a diagnostic claim about depravity and the necessity of divine aid. You can’t white-knuckle your way into holiness unless you first accept that white-knuckling is what the journey feels like.
Notice the emotional management embedded in “we must be content.” He’s not only demanding discipline; he’s training his listeners to reinterpret hardship as evidence of the right path. If obedience feels “hard and tiresome,” that’s not a sign you’re doing it wrong. It’s confirmation you’re fighting the proper enemy: yourself. The subtext is pastoral and coercive at once. By sanctifying strain, Edwards fortifies his community against temptation and doubt, and he also inoculates the sermon against complaints. The uphill road becomes a rhetorical trapdoor: discomfort can no longer argue against the truth; it becomes part of the proof.
The line also smuggles in a distinctly Edwardsian anthropology. “Natural bias of our flesh” treats human will as skewed at the factory, angled toward the downhill run of appetite and self-justification. In the Puritan and broader Calvinist context Edwards inhabits, this isn’t mere moralism; it’s a diagnostic claim about depravity and the necessity of divine aid. You can’t white-knuckle your way into holiness unless you first accept that white-knuckling is what the journey feels like.
Notice the emotional management embedded in “we must be content.” He’s not only demanding discipline; he’s training his listeners to reinterpret hardship as evidence of the right path. If obedience feels “hard and tiresome,” that’s not a sign you’re doing it wrong. It’s confirmation you’re fighting the proper enemy: yourself. The subtext is pastoral and coercive at once. By sanctifying strain, Edwards fortifies his community against temptation and doubt, and he also inoculates the sermon against complaints. The uphill road becomes a rhetorical trapdoor: discomfort can no longer argue against the truth; it becomes part of the proof.
Quote Details
| Topic | Faith |
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