Category: Calvinism

God Chose Us Before the Foundation of the World

On By Dave MallinakIn Calvinism, Expository, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church

Election is a mystery. I admit it. But the Bible teaches election, so we must as well.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. (Ephesians 1:3-6)

A Few Exegetical Notes

The word “chosen” in verse 4 is the verb form of the word “elect.” Peter uses an adjective form of the same word in I Peter 1:2.

Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ…

Peter uses “elect” descriptively, emphasizing the method God uses in saving them that believe. Paul uses “chosen” as a verb, showing what God did on our behalf. Paul emphasizes the result of our salvation – that we should be holy and without blame before him in love.[1] Because God has chosen us, we are sanctified (4), adopted (5), accepted (6), redeemed and forgiven (7), and we have an inheritance (11).

Paul uses the aorist middle indicative “hath chosen.” The indicative points to the reality of the choice. God’s choice is actual, not potential. The timeless aorist tells us the choice is made for all time. The middle voice tells us that God made the choice for His sake, not ours. 

This selection of the saints in this age of grace is the act of God choosing out from among mankind, certain for Himself. These become His own, to be used for a certain purpose.[2]

The context confirms this.

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Why Good People Object to the Doctrine of Perseverance

On By Dave MallinakIn Apologetic, Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Independent Baptists, Issues Facing the Church

I also think that that little catch phrase, perseverance of the saints, is dangerously misleading because again, it suggests that the persevering is something that we do, perhaps in and of ourselves. Now, I believe, of course, that saints do persevere in faith and that those who have been effectually called by God and have been reborn by the power of the Holy Spirit endure to the end, so that they do persevere. But they persevere not simply because they are so diligent in their making use of the mercies of God. But the only reason we can give why any of us continues on in the faith even till the last day is not because we have persevered so much as that is because we have been preserved. And so I prefer the term the preservation–the preservation–of the saints, because this process by which we are kept in a state of grace is something that is accomplished by God. (R.C. Sproul, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CK-QdF64yng)

I understand the “P” in the TULIP to say that the God who saves a man keeps that man to the end. Thus, Sproul and many others have suggested that the “P” would better represent Calvinist theology if it stood for “preservation” instead of “perseverance.” Indeed, the Bible emphasizes not the perseverance of the saints but God’s preservation of the saints.

Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: (Philippians 1:6)

For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day. (2 Timothy 2:12)

I have attempted to engage honestly with Calvinism, avoiding caricatures while expressing my objections based on Scripture. My main objection has been to the Calvinist tendency to blur or erase the paradox, the mysterious interaction between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility and free will. This tendency shows up in various ways in the first 4 points of Calvinism. But in the doctrine of perseverance, I see a different problem related to what R.C. Sproul acknowledges above. If Sproul admits the problem, I am not alone in my concern. But Sproul and other Calvinists haven’t done themselves any favors.

The word “perseverance” is terribly misleading. Nor do these quotes help things. Consider what a variety of famous (or infamous) Calvinists have said.

Conclude we, then, that holiness in this life is absolutely necessary to salvation, not only as a means to the end, but by a nobler kind of necessity — as part of the end itself. (A. W. Pink “On Sanctification” https://gracegems.org/Pink/sanctification.htm)

Neither the members of the church nor the elect can be saved unless they persevere in holiness; and they cannot persevere in holiness without continual watchfulness and effort.  (Charles Hodge comments on I Corinthians 10:12 https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/eng/hdg/1-corinthians-10.html)

Endurance in faith is a condition in salvation (R. C. Sproul “Grace Unkown” – this article deals extensively with Sproul’s book: https://faithalone.org/journal-articles/book-reviews/grace-unknown-the-heart-of-reformed-theology/)

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Saving Grace Is Not Absolutely Irresistible

On By Dave MallinakIn Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church1 Comment

A friend of mine likes to remind me that in the free offer of the gospel, God isn’t play-acting. God doesn’t make a show of extending the offer of salvation to sinners when, in reality, He has withheld any possibility of them being saved. Perhaps this summarizes the conflict over Calvinism better than any other illustration.

The “I” in the TULIP represents “Irresistible Grace,” which has been described as the difference between God’s “external” call and His “internal” call. Some have modified the adjective “irresistible” to “effectual.” However, the teaching itself is fairly consistent among Calvinists.

In addition to the outward general call to salvation which is made to everyone who hears the gospel, the Holy Spirit extends to the elect a special inward call that inevitably brings them to salvation. The external call (which is made to all without distinction) can be, and often is, rejected; whereas the internal call (which is made only to the elect) cannot be rejected; it always results in conversion. By means of this special call the Spirit irresistibly draws sinners to Christ. He is not limited in His work of applying salvation by man’s will, nor is He dependent upon man’s cooperation for success. The Spirit graciously causes the elect sinner to cooperate, to believe, to repent, to come freely and willingly to Christ. God’s grace, therefore, is invincible; it never fails to result in the salvation of those to whom it is extended. (https://www.fivesolas.com/cal_arm.htm)

In his online lecture on Irresistible Grace, R.C. Sproul acknowledges the problems with the term “irresistible.”

Now beloved, the history of the human race is the history of relentless resistance by human beings to the sweetness of the grace of God. What is meant by irresistible grace is not what the word suggests, that it’s incapable of being resisted. Indeed, we are capable of resisting God’s grace, and we do resist God’s grace. But the idea here is that in spite of our natural resistance to the grace of God that God’s grace is so powerful that it has the capacity to overcome our natural resistance to it. That’s why I prefer the term effectual grace rather than irresistible grace because this grace that is irresistible effects what God intends to effect by it.

And in Chosen by God, Sproul says,

Calvinism does not teach and never has taught that God brings people kicking and screaming into the kingdom or has ever excluded anyone who wanted to be there. Remember that the cardinal point of the Reformed doctrine of predestination rests on the biblical teaching of man’s spiritual death. Natural man does not want Christ. He will only want Christ if God plants a desire for Christ in his heart. Once that desire is planted, those who come to Christ do not come kicking and screaming against their wills. They come because they want to come. They now desire Jesus. They rush to the Savior. The whole point of irresistible grace is that rebirth quickens someone to spiritual life in such a way that Jesus is now seen in his irresistible sweetness. Jesus is irresistible to those who have been made alive to the things of God. (Chosen by God, pp. 122-123)

I will admit that I have often thought of my coming to faith in Christ this way – that Christ was, in a certain sense, irresistible to me, that I found His grace irresistible when I finally embraced Him as my Savior. I would guess that believers who fought His saving call ferociously would agree that eventually, after long resistance, they found that they were powerless to resist any further.

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Why I Don’t Believe in Limited Atonement

On By Dave MallinakIn Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church2 Comments

No doubt we’ve all heard Calvinists make statements like this: “Jesus doesn’t love the world,” “Jesus didn’t die for the world,” “Christ didn’t die for all or all would be saved.” As one man said,

The Bible teaches again and again that God does not love all people with the same love. “Loved by God” is not applied to the world but only to the saints.

Defending limited atonement in Chosen By God, R. C. Sproul says,

The world for whom Christ died cannot mean the entire human family. It must refer to the universality of the elect (people from every tribe and nation) or to the inclusion of Gentiles in addition to the world of the Jews. (Sproul, p. 206-207)

Sproul explains that the word “any” in 2 Peter 3:9 – God is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” – doesn’t mean “any” in an absolutely unrestricted sense.

Any time we use the word any, we’re assuming some reference–any what? any of which group? Certainly Peter doesn’t say that God is not willing that any person perish. We had to supply that “person” as if it were tacitly understood.

But is there any other possible reference to the “any” besides any human being? Well, obviously, there are other possibilities, not the least of which is a particular class. You have a class here of people, and that word “people” makes up a distinctive class. And if I said any of that class, I would mean any person. Or I could have another class, a class called Jews, and if I spoke of any of that class, it would refer to anyone who is Jewish, or American, or whatever other group I would incorporate within that circle.

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Unconditional Love, Unconditional Election

On By Dave MallinakIn Apologetic, Calvinism, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church1 Comment

R.C. Sproul objects – I should say strongly objects – to the notion of unconditional love. In a popular video discussion, Sproul was asked, “When everyone is talking about the love of God, and God loves me just as I am, how would you respond?” He answered,

The kingdom of God is not Mr. Rogers’s neighborhood. I think there are few things more dangerous than preachers out there preaching that God loves everybody unconditionally because the message that is heard by the people who hear that is there are no conditions. I can continue to live just as I’m living in full rebellion against God, and I have nothing to worry about because there aren’t any conditions that I have to meet. God loves me unconditionally. I don’t have to repent, I don’t have to come to Jesus, I don’t have to leave my life of sin. No conditions, no strings attached. God loves me just the way I am. He’s glad that I turned out so nicely…

I don’t disagree with this. At least, not entirely.

In 2011, Tullian Tchividjian (Billy Graham’s grandson) published his book Jesus + Nothing = Everything.In 2013, he published One-Way Love: Inexhaustible Grace for an Exhausted World. Tchividjian is a neo-Calvinist, definitely not orthodox (consider his “Upside-Down Christianity” described here). However, Tchividjian has borrowed heavily from classic Calvinist teachings to describe God’s unconditional love. Tullian likes to use edgy language in his descriptions of God’s grace. For example,

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How “Total Depravity” Ignores the Gospel Call

On By Dave MallinakIn Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church1 Comment

The TULIP completely ignores man’s responsibility and the gospel call itself. It is, in fact, the TULIP more than any other feature of Calvinism that gives non-Calvinists the impression that Calvinism discourages evangelism and teaches men to wait for God to save them rather than repent and believe the gospel. I would go so far as to argue that Calvinism should discard the TULIP and teach what the Bible says as the authority for what we should believe about Christ in His saving work.

The TULIP focuses exclusively on God’s sovereignty in salvation. But this obsession with the sovereignty of God drifts precariously close to a hyper-Calvinistic overstatement of God’s sovereignty, ala A.W. Pink, who couldn’t appreciate any attribute of God without re-hashing God’s sovereignty all over again. Reading Pink’s Attributes of God, one gets the distinct impression that he sees the sovereignty of God as the one attribute that defines all the others, that sovereignty is more important than God’s holiness or love.

I have no wish to understate God’s sovereignty. God is God, and as an expression of the “Godness” of God, the TULIP seeks to glorify God and to remind us that God doesn’t lay aside His sovereign control when it comes to the salvation of sinners. I am very grateful that God gets all the glory, that salvation is His work, and that I am and have always been in His hand. None of this is a denial of God’s sovereignty. Nor is it a denial that the TULIP includes vital truths about God and His work in saving sinners. I am unwilling to join some of my dear friends in repudiating the TULIP as if it contains no truth whatsoever.

But as I have insisted, the Bible doesn’t resolve the mysterious interaction between God’s will and man’s. God’s will is exhaustive. Of that, there can be no doubt. Man’s will and his entire self have been significantly damaged by sin so that from the time of the Fall onward, man’s heart has been hopelessly corrupted, deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. To put too much stock in man’s ability would be to set aside what the Bible tells us about ourselves. To diminish God’s sovereignty in our salvation would be to ignore or reject what the Bible teaches us about God. I do not wish to fall into either error.

But we must say what the Bible says, and we must emphasize what the Bible emphasizes. I believe the TULIP goes beyond Scripture in its claims about the interaction between God’s will and man’s.

So much has been written on the TULIP that I couldn’t possibly interact with every explanation or claim. I have two fairly simple presentations of Calvinist soteriology in front of me, both apologetic in nature. The first is Chosen by God by R.C. Sproul. The second is Easy Chairs Hard Words by Douglas Wilson. I recognize that neither of these men has attempted a defense of the TULIP itself, and both provide a substantial explanation of Calvinism that includes the TULIP but doesn’t rely on it. In fairness, both men might agree with some of my critiques. I want to interact with the TULIP itself as it is typically presented since (anecdotally) the TULIP tends to be the go-to expression of Calvinist soteriology. My claim in this article isn’t that Calvinists aren’t more nuanced than the TULIP, but only that the Calvinist reliance on the TULIP is flawed and misguided. And I say this because the TULIP mischaracterizes the gospel by giving only half the story.

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TULIP Trouble

On By Dave MallinakIn Apologetic, Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Independent Baptists, Issues Facing the Church3 Comments

The relation of divine sovereignty to human responsibility is one of the great mysteries of the Christian faith. It is plain from Scripture in any case that both are real and that both are important. Calvinistic theology is known for its emphasis on divine sovereignty – for its view that God “works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will” (Eph. 1:11). But in Calvinism there is at least an equal emphasis upon human responsibility. (John Frame, Apologetics to the Glory of God, p. 14)

I open with this quote because, first, John Frame is a well-known Calvinist, and second, because he accurately describes here the mysterious interaction between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility in salvation. Recently, I placed as the tenth on my list of things I wish would change among Independent Baptists, “overstated anti-Calvinism.” In my explanation of that objection, I said that quite often, in their haste to refute Calvinists, many Independent Baptists caricature Calvinism. In response to that article, some friends asked me to explain my objections to Calvinism, which resulted in an initial post in which I objected to the way Calvinists tend to blur the paradox between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility in their presentation of the gospel. Now, I want to raise before you the primary proof that in Calvinism, this paradox is either blurred or ignored.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

The TULIP does not account for man’s responsibility at all. Period. It gives no consideration to man’s responsibility, and nothing in it would give anyone the idea that man is responsible before God to repent and believe the gospel. If a person learning the TULIP were to take that as the summary of Christian doctrine, they would conclude that man has no part in God’s plan for our salvation other than to wait and hope that God might save him. The TULIP is an effective mnemonic device, for sure. But as far as a summary of Christian doctrine, it falls woefully short. One could argue that the TULIP only gives one side of the coin – later, I will contend that it also goes beyond Scripture in its attempt to describe God’s sovereignty in salvation. But supposing that the TULIP does give one half of the truth, half the truth is not the truth.

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A Critical View of Calvinism

On By Dave MallinakIn Calvinism, Gospel Conversations, Hot Topics, Issues Facing the Church2 Comments

Let me say at the outset that I won’t be interacting with the various Calvinist viewpoints or offering a nuanced critique of hyper-Calvinism v. “high” Calvinism v. “strict” Calvinism. I saw a comic strip on Twitter/X where a Calvinist poked fun at his fellow Calvinists about some of the high-handed intermural debate that goes on between Calvinists themselves. The comic said, “Brothers and sisters are natural enemies, like Arminians and Calvinists, or Lutherans and Calvinists, or Catholics and Calvinists, or Calvinists and other Calvinists.

This isn’t a strange thing. Our church is committed to exclusively using the King James Bible – a position most would describe as “King James Only.” But amongst King James Onlyists, that isn’t nearly enough. I don’t say that the King James Version is inspired, so I’m not really King James Only – I only “use” the King James. And this statement is made with thick scorn heaped upon my head.

Our nuanced opinion is a design feature, fed in part by our unique individuality and in part by our fallenness. And though the work of redemption ought to teach us to hold our viewpoints in humility, we all have those lines that “you shall not pass.” And woe unto that man that crosses our carefully-drawn line.

That said, a hyper-Calvinist will argue that man’s salvation and sanctification and really everything in life is all dictated by God, that man has no choice in anything, that even the suggestion that we should respond to the Gospel is a corruption of the Gospel. “High” Calvinism believes in evangelism because God commands it, but considers it more of a scavenger hunt in search of the elect. According to high Calvinism, God has no desire to save the non-elect. He calls all men to faith and repentance, but for the non-elect, this call only demonstrates that their condemnation is just. God doesn’t love all men, and the atonement of Christ is not available to all men. In other words, the universal offer of the Gospel is more a theory than a reality.

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