Where did Edwards fail? It is difficult to say. Sometimes leaders face an intractable situation that is impossible to solve, situations that sometimes lead to the clarity that their time in a congregation is over. But, all leaders, especially pastoral leaders, must grow in their ability to lead, even as contexts change. And, no, the problem wasn’t that Edwards needed to know his Enneagram or Working Genius. After all, you can’t become a good leader by studying leadership.

Jonathan Edwards was unequivocally the greatest mind of Colonial America. He was arguably one of the greatest minds America has ever produced. An in-depth reading of his copious works shows his facility with precise argument, big-picture thinking, biblical exegesis, redemptive-historical scholarship, and the philosophical underpinnings of the global culture he found himself in. He preached with skill and led a revival that spread throughout the colonies that now comprise the Northeastern United States. Admittedly he was also a little quirky, overly introspective, completely wrong about the slave trade,1 and, at times, unnecessarily speculative.2 He could also be pietistic to a fault. But despite his foibles, Jonathan Edwards was one of the most gifted pastor-theologians that the world has known (having a significant influence on modern theologians like John Piper and Tim Keller).
But he was also fired.
How could this happen? We tend to think that the powerful combination of theological training and homiletic skills ensures a long and mostly-peaceful pastorate. Where Edwards failed was in leadership.
Leadership — The Dirty Word
Let’s say it clearly. Many, many church leaders have unwittingly attempted to baptize the most recent leadership books to serve organizational needs. It isn’t that churches can’t benefit from the common grace insights of the popular leadership material (mainly covering managerial skills). They can (and should). General principles—wisdom and foolishness—govern how leaders organize and engage with the people they lead. But our book wasn’t written by Maxwell or Covey. Our book is the Bible, written by the Lord.3
So what should we do? We have to keep the Book primary while benefitting from other books. We must be students of Scripture before we are students of organizational principles. But we also can’t neglect to learn skills to help us avoid making stupid mistakes.
What Happened in Northampton?
Despite their initial positive response to the First Great Awakening, Edwards had several twenty-something young men within his congregation who now showed themselves, from all signs, not to be truly converted. And yet Edwards was tasked with shepherding them. One of these young men found a midwifery manual (with illustrations). He not only shared the manual with his buddies but began to make lewd comments to girls in the congregation based on a lascivious reading of the midwife manual. It became a congregational issue.4
Edwards was disturbed for several reasons. Where were these young men’s parents? 
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When reading these narratives, read carefully and consider all the details, both what is included and what is not. Finally, and most importantly, work hard to understand how all the Bible’s individual narrative units come together in one grand narrative, climaxing in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

The Bible records the covenantal narrative about God’s creation of all things, humanity’s fall into sin, redemption through the covenant of grace and its various administrations, and the consummation of all things in eschatological glory. God Himself is the master narrator as the One who declares the end from the beginning (Isa. 46:10) and who is Himself the first and the last (Isa. 44:6; Isa. 48:12). It is an ancient narrative told over a span of some fifteen hundred years in three different languages. The literary devices of the ancient world are not always like our own, so it can be challenging to understand what we encounter in these accounts. What follows, therefore, are three reading strategies that can help us better understand and appreciate the art of the ancient historical narrative as set forth in the Bible.
1. Understand that the unified narrative of the Bible is not always set forth in chronological order.
This can be seen in an ancient literary technique whereby the author makes a statement and then circles back to focus on important details about the event itself or how something came to be. Sometimes in the Bible, theology trumps chronology in the arrangement of recorded events. For example, Genesis 2 begins with a description of the seventh day of creation (vv. 1–3), but the rest of the chapter steps back in time to reconsider the events of day six in more detail (vv. 4–25). Genesis 10 records the names and descendants of Noah, the so-called table of nations, listed “by their clans, their languages, their lands, and their nations” (Gen. 10:31). However, in the very next chapter, we return to the time when there was only one clan, language, land, and nation in order to focus on the events of the tower of Babel. The same is true of 1 Samuel 16 and 17. At the end of chapter 1 Samuel 16, David is loved by Saul and serving full-time as his armor-bearer.
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Attempts by men and nations to prevent God’s sovereign purposes, not the least of which are conversion, are so pathetically impotent that God laughs at them. No nation ever has, and no nation ever will, hinder God from accomplishing his sovereign purposes.

Much attention has been given to Canada’s recently passed, “Bill C-4.”  Reportedly, some 4000 pastors expressed their willingness to protest the bill from pulpits last Sunday. If you are not familiar, among other things, it criminalizes “conversion therapy” of people in homosexuality and transgenderism. I spoke with a long-time Canadian citizen last week who said that the Bill is intended to forbid things like actual physical harm, torture, kidnapping, and assault on children under the guise of “conversion therapy.” Obviously forbidding those things is necessary.
However, the wording of the Bill is not only ominously broad, but seems to target God’s definition of gender and sexuality. For example, the Bill’s Preamble declares that it is a “myth” to believe that “heterosexuality, cisgender gender identity, and gender expression that conforms to the sex assigned to a person at birth are to be preferred over other sexual orientations, gender identities and gender expressions.” Thus, according to Canadian law, God’s good and loving design for marriage sexuality, and gender (Gen 1:26-27, 2:24), is a myth. The Bill goes on to define conversion therapy as, “a practice, treatment or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual; change a person’s gender identity to cisgender; change a person’s gender expression so that it conforms to the sex assigned to the person at birth.”
With the passing of Bill C-4, Canada has criminalized the evangelism, counseling, and shepherding of people in homosexuality and transgenderism. According to the Bill, it is a criminal offense, punishable with up to five years in prison, to be used of God in bringing the incredibly loving news of Christ crucified in our place and risen from the dead to such individuals. Let’s be clear what Canada has done. In passing this Bill, Canada announced, and sanctioned, its hatred for people involved in homosexuality and transgenderism. Conversion to faith in Jesus Christ meets the greatest need of the human race; it is the zenith of God’s love extended to a person. So, to forbid this from individuals is to hate them.
Before getting into what the Bill can and cannot do, let’s consider the unspeakable deluge of God’s love in conversion; how loving God’s conversion is. In converting the sinner, God sets his unshakable love on us though we had not loved him (Rom 5:8). Then, God imputes all of our sin to the perfect, sinless, glorious Person of Christ in his death at the cross (1 Pet 2:24). He also imputes the righteousness of Jesus Christ to us, the sinners, though we have only lived in sin (2 Cor 5:21). As if that was not enough, we are then made spiritually alive by the regeneration of the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5), thereby having the power to be transformed out of previously enslaving sins (Rom 6:6-7). What a blessing that is! To finally have the ruthless shackles of sin shattered from our souls; to be rescued from Satan’s brutal lordship over us; to be converted from our sprint into hell’s ruin! There is nothing better than being converted to Christ! Nothing better, absolutely nothing! What a blessed God he is to love us enough and care about us enough to convert us to faith in Jesus Christ! Glory to God for his grace and mercy and kindness in conversion. But there is more: consequent of conversion to Christ, we are at peace with God (Rom 5:1). We thereupon have hope; real hope that hinges, not on us, but on the Person and finished work of Christ (Rom 8:25). Instead of a terrifying doom and inescapable finality, death becomes a door to greater blessing whereafter we will live in the bliss, joy, peace, and happiness forever with Christ and God’s glorified people (2 Cor 5:8; Phil 1:21, 23; 1 Thess 4:16-17; 1 John 3:1-2; Rev 21:3-4). And this whole package of salvation; this consequence of conversion; all of this is permanent, irreversible (though we will still sin), and instantly gifted to us simply on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ (Eph 2:8-9). Blessed be God for his love of conversion. This conversion cannot be accomplished through any kind of physical force or coercion. It is only by the power of God (1 Cor 1:30-31).
Now, as we think about this, it behooves us to consider, what can and can this Bill actually do?
What Bill C-4 Can Do
This Bill can effectually bring about the imprisonment of anyone (Christian or not) who would counsel, speak, teach, preach, or communicate, in such a way as to encourage those in homosexuality and transgenderism to embrace heterosexuality and/or their actual gender. The wording of the Bill is general enough to open the door for that. So, Christians, and others, will almost certainly face imprisonment at some point.
Consequently, the Bill can, in effect, separate parents from their kids, husbands from wives, pastors and teachers from churches, counselors from hurting people, and friends from one another. In doing so, the Bill can cause tremendous and unnecessary hurt and suffering.
The Bill can, and has, declared its hatred for God and his word. Canada’s government has, in effect, slapped God in the face and trampled underfoot the Person and work of Christ by criminalizing Christian conversion.
The Bill can, and will, store up God’s wrath for the governing officials responsible for the Bill, should they refuse to repent and turn to Christ for forgiveness. Canada’s governing officials responsible for this are under God’s judgment and will stand before him one day for a reckoning (Rev 20:11-15).
What Bill C-4 Cannot Do
As much harm as this Bill can do, there are things that it cannot do.
This Bill, and any like it, cannot and will not stop a single individual in homosexuality and transgenderism in Canada from converting to faith in Jesus Christ. Not one person, not a single one, will be stopped from repenting of sin and embracing Christ as Lord and Savior. How do we know that?
“All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out” (John 6:37).