The Trinitarian Vision of Jonathan Edwards and David Coffey By S ...

Introduction

Evangelicals are often confessional but not functional trinitarians; they frequently do not use the doctrine to inform the discussion of other doctrines. They also believe in Jesus and his work on the cross but do not take the basic reality of the Incarnation as informative for their understanding of the way believers experience salvation. They believe that salvation is primarily a transforming personal relationship with Jesus Christ, but it is also absolution from a wrathful God who is ready to punish all people who fail to call on the name of Jesus Christ. Many Evangelicals want to believe in a God who is merciful to the great multitudes that have never heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but they lack the theological categories to support that aspiration. This book seeks to address these areas of evangelical theology. To do so, it draws on the work of a well-known figure in the evangelical tradition, Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758), and that of a contemporary Roman Catholic theologian, David Coffey (1934–), and their use of a common trinitarian model—the Augustinian mutual love model. The mutual love model provides a way to understand Christ and grace as works of the trinitarian