Pastor John, it appears that 18th century theologian Jonathan Edwards and his wife owned household and farming slaves, perhaps as many as six total, and they seem to have owned at least one slave at all times, even up until Jonathan's death. How does his slaveholding factor into your evaluation of Jonathan Edwards' theological legacy?

Instead of trying to explain how it could be, I think the most helpful thing to do at this point would be to just to answer the question, "Okay, what effect does that have on you, you lover of Edwards? What difference does that make to you? Does that affect you at all?" And here are four or five responses or effects that it has on me.

Number one, it warns me not to idolize or idealize any man except Jesus. Something's going to show up and disillusion me if I pick out a dead man or a living man as somebody that I'm going to idealize. There is no ideal man except Jesus. So that's the first thing.

It's a warning to measure my admiration carefully. Number two, it cautions me that if he had blind spots on that issue, he may well have had blind spots on other issues, which means that I'm going to now read with some more care. I think our vigilance in reading is heightened when we know that a man has blown it.

In one area we say, "Well, we've got a fallible man on our hands here, therefore we will now read with some special vigilance lest we be sucked into approving everything that he says on any issue at all." So let it have a salutary and cautioning effect on how we read an author, including Edwards.

Third, it makes me marvel that God uses any of us. I have documented numerous of my besetting sins. I came back to Bethlehem. People can go listen to this sermon after my eight-month leave in which I had done a lot of soul searching. I think in the sermon I gave to the BCS Chapel in Act the Miracle and one in the church, I tried to describe the most recurrent sins of John Piper.

It was a very sobering season for me. I simply have to marvel that, number one, I survived 33 years in the pastorate as an imperfect man and that God used me. I didn't just survive. I loved it. The people, by and large, I think, loved me. God did some good.

I know those sins better than anybody except maybe Noel. So I'm not quick to point my finger at Edwards, but I am quick to marvel that he was used and I have been used and I am amazed. Number four, Edwards' failure in that regard teaches me that sanctification has blank spots like knowledge has blind spots.

Here's what I mean. We can be making good progress in five areas of our lives and doing badly in a sixth area, a blank area where the Holy Spirit, for some reason, isn't exerting all the power that he could and we are resistant and still holding on to some sin.

We can be knowing rightly in five areas and be mistaken in a sixth area. So what I see in Edwards' failure is a reminder that not only does knowledge have blind spots, sanctification has blank spots, and all of us should therefore search our lives instead of just congratulating ourselves on the four areas of progress, look at that fifth or sixth area that is still such a mess in our lives and pray and appropriate the gospel and the grace of God to fight it.

And here's one more. What makes me, Edwards' failure here, makes me pray for light on my life and on my day. What are my blind spots? What are my days, my church's blind spots? What is the church blind to today that in 200 years the godly will look back and say, "How could they possibly have done that or believe that or let that happen or go that way?" And so given how amazingly godly Edwards was, I do not presume that any level of sanctification I attain in this life means there's not something else to be ferreted out.

Keep your servant back from presumptuous sins and cleanse me of hidden faults, Psalm 19 prays. So I hope that the flaws of my greatest teachers, and Edwards is about the greatest, will do me good in the end, and I hope we don't have to hide them in order to realize they can serve us.

Yes, thank you, Pastor John. The sermons mentioned earlier in the podcast on besetting sins include these two. I'll give you the titles. The first one is "Our Deepest Prayer," which was preached on January 9, 2011, and the second one is "I Act the Miracle," which was preached at Bethlehem College and Seminary Chapel on February 24, 2011.

Both recordings are available for free at DesiringGod.org, and there you will find thousands of other free books, articles, sermons, and other resources from John Piper. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening. 1. John Piper's "I Act the Miracle" is a book that was published by the New York Times in 1932.

It is about the great sin of the Christian faith. It is about the great sin of the Christian faith. It is about the great sin of the Christian faith. It is about the great sin of the Christian faith. It is about the great sin of the Christian faith. It is about the great sin of the Christian faith.