“Resolved, whenever I do any conspicuously evil action, to trace it back till I come to the original cause; and then both carefully endeavor to do so no more, and to fight and pray with all my might against the original of it.” (Resolution 24)
Here we have the opposite of Resolution 23 in one sense, though the desire is the same. In 23 we saw that Edwards wanted to trace his actions to the root to be sure that they were for the glory of God. Here he wants to trace his evil actions to the root in order to discover any cause that he might do away with. Both are founded in a love for God and a desire to please Him in all things.
First, this would take a sensitive conscience. For a man like Edwards, who was known for his piety and godliness, to notice his own actions as evil, it would take a lot of sensitivity to God for this to happen. This type of activity is not for the cold of heart or for those who have no zeal for God, but this is truly for those who desire to seek God with all of their being. This type of thing is not carried out by timid souls who are satisfied with being lukewarm.
Second, this would again take a person that is willing to take the Word of God over the conclusions of pride and self-love. To get at the real cause of a sinful action absolutely requires a heart that is willing to face up to its own depravity. Self-love and pride hides behind many mirrors. In fact, by definition pride is hard to overcome because it hides the true state of the heart by the exaltation of self. Self-love operates by judging all things by what is best for self. However, if pride and self-love do hide the real root of sin from us, then we can turn from external acts of evil and never really turn from the root of sin. If the real issue is hidden from us, then if we decide to fight sin we will not really be fighting with the real sin at all.
As a way of practice, let us think of a fictional character we will call “Aaron.” Let us say that Aaron was driving down the road one day and realized that he was coveting another person’s car. Now what is he to do? He can simply stop the appearance of coveting that car and say that he has repented. But what was going on in his heart to covet the other person’s car? We have to ask those types of questions to get at the real issues. We know that he would not have been content with his own car to be coveting another person’s car. His pride and self-love would be telling him that he deserved a car like that. His pride might have told him that the other person did not deserve a car like that and ask why God gave that lowly sinner such a car. It is also true that his heart could not have been in the process of loving God with all of his being when he was coveting the car.
To boil it all down, the real issue behind coveting has to do with Aaron’s heart toward God. Perhaps he was not walking with God or perhaps he had grown cold toward God. Perhaps he had drifted toward duties rather than love for God. It might be that he was looking toward duties and rituals rather than grace. He might have drifted from God by neglecting the Word and prayer. He might have been trying to be religious or self-righteous rather than to love God from the heart. Perhaps he was trying to impress people more than God in his daily life as well as his religious life. But we must all know that we are “Aaron” when it comes to our sin. We must be utterly ruthless with our hearts in order to pursue God in honesty and love.
When we find a root of sin in our external behavior, we must learn to fight it properly. We cannot fight the outward sin unless we recognize the root issue of the heart in it. To fight sin in the heart is far different than fighting the externals of sin. Coveting must be cut off at the root or it will just turn to another form of coveting. Coveting is simply selfishness desiring things for selfish reasons, though it may mask itself in religious garb. The only cure for coveting is contentment with God and love for God and our neighbor. In other words, as the title of a famous sermon by Thomas Chalmers, “The Expulsive Power of a New Affection,” we must love God and others as a way of turning from sin in the heart. We must desire our affections to be lifted to God in order for them to be removed from ourselves. The problem with coveting is not the outward things as such; it is a heart that loves God too little. Therefore, to fight sin in the heart is to pursue God and pray for more and more of His love in the heart so that we can love Him enough to turn from the sins of the heart.
God Loves... Himself 
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