Archives for October 19, 2019

From Edwards’s church in Northampton, our PRTS tour group went to the Bridge Street Cemetery in Northampton, where we were grateful to locate the side-by-side gravesites of David Brainerd and Jerusha Edwards (daughter of Jonathan and Sarah; first picture above), as well as the gravesites of Solomon Stoddard (Jonathan Edwards’s grandfather; second picture above) and his son John and their wives, and Timothy Dwight and many of his descendants. Dr. Haykin lectured at most of these sites for us, focusing especially on the godliness of David Brainerd and Jerusha Edwards. It was a moving and humbling time.

Yesterday afternoon we took the PRTS tour group to the church site in Northampton, Massachusetts where Jonathan Edwards preached from 1727 to 1750 at what is now First Church at Northampton. By the Spirit’s powerful grace, Edwards experienced two seasons of revival in those years that were a major part of the Great Awakening. In the first picture above, we took a group picture in front of this church. The second picture is an impressive sculpture of Edwards inside the church building. Dr. Haykin and I both gave lectures on Edwards to our tour group and we then sang a few classic psalms and hymns.

Next stop on our tour was Natick, Massachusetts, to visit the Eliot Church of Natick, where the famous Puritan missionary to the Native Americans, John Eliot, preached. He would go on to establish 14 ”Praying Indian” towns. Scholars estimate that 1100 of 3600 American Indians in these towns were converted through his Spirit-blessed preaching. This is also one of the oldest church sites in America and the first Meetinghouse was built here in 1651. This was my favorite place on the trip so far, as Eliot is one of my heroes.