You Might Be A Calvinist

You might be a Calvinist if...

Read the list. Calvinists or not you might find it funny.

Road Crossings

The top ten reasons the Emergent guy didn't cross the road.

The top ten reasons the Reformed guy didn't cross the road.

What Do You Mean By "Free Will"?

C. Michael Patton with a great post dealing with the issue of "free will". I remember arguing with a buddy in college about God's sovereignty in salvation and coming back at him with, "Well, you know, we all have free will." At the time I didn't know that "free will" as I understood it at the time doesn't really square that well with the Bible. Patton fleshes this out for us in his article. He writes:

There are many words and concepts in theology that suffer from misunderstanding, mis-characterization, and misinformation. “Predestination,” “Calvinism,” “Total Depravity,” “Inerrancy,” and “Complementarianism”, just to name a few that I personally have to deal with. Proponents are more often than not on the defensive, having to explain again and again why it is they don’t mean what people think they mean.

The concept of “free will” suffers no less with regard to this misunderstanding. Does a person have free will? Well, what do you mean by “free will”? This must always be asked.

Do you mean:

1. That a person is not forced from the outside to make a choice?
2. That a person is responsible for his or her choices?
3. That a person is the active agent in a choice made?
4. That a person is free to do whatever they desire?
5. That a person has the ability to choose contrary to their nature (who they are)?

Calvinists, such as myself, do believe in free will and we don’t believe in free will. It just depends on what you mean.

Be sure to read the whole thing.

A Kind Marriage, A Kind Calvinism

Abraham Piper writes a very helpful and honest post on the DGM blog about his marriage and how it relates to Calvinists that some people percieve as being, "self-righteous, condescending, arrogant, unfriendly, argumentative, and even stingy." He sums up by saying:

In my marriage, it doesn't matter whether I'm thankful if I don't seem like it. And in the church, it doesn't matter whether we have the fruits of the Spirit if no one can tell.

It won't be easy to change the pejorative stereotype that clings to Calvinism, but we can start by admitting that it is accurate far too often. Then we can make sure we are manifestly not self-righteous, condescending, arrogant, unfriendly, or argumentative. Also, you can count on us to buy dinner or coffee sometimes.

Paying attention to those who disagree with us and taking them seriously, even if we're pretty sure we'll still disagree, is part of what it means to be in the body of Christ. It's humbling; it sanctifies. It will make us better husbands and wives. It will make us better Christians, and maybe even better Calvinists.

The Fog of Theological Jargon

In dealing with some objections to the study of theology, Dr. Michael Williams from Covenant Theological Seminary says this:

Another objection: "Theology delves too deeply into things it cannot know, mysteries that are beyond human understanding, and this preoccupation with the unknowable puts theologians out of touch with the practical everyday lives of people." This one makes me scratch my head because it is unfortunately often true. Theology is often too speculative, far more speculative than it has any right to be. It is one of the things I am going to argue in this course. Much of seventeenth-century Calvinism, my own tradition, engaged in the kind of inquiry that Calvin himself would have called speculative. Theologians have sometimes claimed to know more about heaven and hell, the age to come, the ministry of angels, and many other things than the Bible says, and sometimes we have specialized in and trafficked in the most highly questionable of theological concerns. Perhaps it will tickle the ears of the overly curious. But let me spread the guilt around to get other people involved. I think an overly speculative and argumentative theology is also sometimes the special interest of theological students. Once we have mastered some of the ideas and impenetrable fog of jargon, we seek for someone to joust with. We have not mastered the goal of theological study, nor its real intention, but we have got some of the tools -- I was going to say the weapons -- and thus we seek intellectual combat with anyone who is willing to take us on. In other words, sometimes we know just enough theology to get into trouble and to give the theological enterprise a bad name. So unfortunately I think this third objection is often far too true.

From this lecture.

Dealing with Sovereignty

All Christian believe in divine sovereignty, but some are not aware that they do, and mistakenly imagine and insist they reject it…

The root cause is the same as in most cases of error in the church; the intruding of rationalistic speculations, the passion for systematic consistency, a reluctance to recognize the existence of mystery and to let God be wiser than men, and a consequent subjecting of Scripture to the supposed demands of human logic.

J.I. Packer, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God

Certainly there are great mysteries connected with the being of God, but that should not be surprising to any except those who want to be God themselves=

D.A. Carson, The Gagging of God, 235

The best rule of sobriety is, not only in learning to follow wherever God leads, but also when he makes an end of teaching, to cease also from wishing to be wise.

Calvin, Institutes III, 21, 3

There were theologians before Calvin?

Mark Lauterbach reports on some reading he had been doing lately:

In the providence of God my reading has been taking me back into multiple examples of the early centuries of the church. Here was a huge gap in my education. I have three books by these early fathers on my shelf. But I am now reading Athanasius on The Incarnation plus multiple excerpts from the fathers in defense of the Trinity and the union of God and man in the person of Jesus the Messiah. I am seeing some truths spoken in a way that is fabulous and I am wondering why I have missed these. Up til now I guess my view of church history has been something like this: PAUL (1500 year gap following) . . . Luther, Calvin . . . . Edwards . . . various Reformed writers . . . Warfield, Machen . . . Piper. I act as though the men of the first centuries did not do much!

Read the whole post here.

Calvin on General Revelation

"There is within the human mind, and indeed by natural instinct, an
awareness of divinity. This we take to be beyond controversy. To
prevent anyone from taking refuge in the pretense of ignorance, God
himself has implanted in all men a certain understanding of his
divine majesty. Ever renewing its memory, he repeatedly sheds
fresh drops." (Institutes 1.3.1)

"...this conviction, namely, that there is some God, is naturally inborn
in all, and is fixed deep within, as it were in the very marrow...From
this we conclude that it is not a doctrine that must be learned in school,
but one of which each of us is master from his mother's womb and
which nature itself permits no one to forget, although many strive with
every nerve to this end." (Institutes 1.3.3)

Reformed Dorks Unite!!!

These shirts (and other questionable material) might not be as bad and the usual stuff that I see at Christian music festivals, but they come close. I'm sure they will be the normative dress at Piper's national conference in September.

I guess I did kinda like the Reformed thong though... (yes it's for real) I'm sure that Luther would have been down with this this little number. Knox, maybe. Calvin and Zwingli would have been staunchly opposed.

**Update** Editors note - Just so you are not confused, I didn't search the internet for a dumb thong that said "simply irresistable" on it. It's actually on the above page in case you didnt' see it.

Who sits around and comes up with these things?

My friend Justin begged me to link to his John Owen website. I guess i will oblige him just this once. Here it is...

(BTW - if you don't know who John Owen is yet you can read about him here. Basically, he is the Jonathan Edwards of 17th century England.)

A New Emphasis in Critique

What is the proper means of critiquing someone else’s beliefs? Recently I have been pondering this issue as I have been engaged in some interesting conversations on blogs , through reading and listening to lectures. One of my biggest concerns has to do with what logicians and philosophers call “The Straw Man Argument”. Wikipedia defines it as follows:

A straw man argument is a rhetorical technique based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position. To "set up a straw man" or "set up a straw-man argument" is to create a position that is easy to refute, then attribute that position to the opponent. A straw-man argument can be a successful rhetorical technique (that is, it may succeed in persuading people) but it is in fact misleading, since the argument actually presented by the opponent has not been refuted.

I see this happening all the time when the person who if being critiqued is not able to respond in “real time”. The typical way this is played out in a scholarly ways is that the one person with a certain set of beliefs will write a book that outlines his position and then someone who holds a different position will respond critiquing that position. This can be seen all over evangelicalism with debates concerning Open Theism vs. Orthodox Reformed Theology or Calvinism and Arminianism, etc. A great example can be found in Norman Geisler’s “Chosen But Free” and then the response of James R. White with “The Potter’s Freedom”. This issue is not new to the life of the church and all the great debates throughout the course of church history usually were structured in this way all the way from Augustine and Pelagius through Luther and Erasmus.

My great draw back with this structure for critique is that there is no place for person-to- person response and listening. It is too easy (whether intentional or not) to set up a “straw man” argument or over simplify and misrepresent a belief that one holds so that it seems very black and white when the incorrect belief is crushed. For example, one author may say, “My difference with person x has to do with his belief that…” then goes to articulate his take on the beliefs of the person he is critiquing. He may or may not be correct in his articulation of the other person’s belief.

Thus I would suggest that for greater health in this sort of thing that we attempt to move toward “real time” critique, that is not necessarily a debate structure, (although it could easily turn into that) but a means by which a real conversation would take place with give and take and clarification and correction with an audience listening in to judge for themselves what they take to be of value and what should be discarded.

This fall I am looking forward to hopefully attending the Desiring God Ministries national conference (watch the trailer here) which will no doubt deal with the issue of the Emergent Church. On the roster of speakers there is not one person who is in favor theologically with the positions of the Emergent church. I am totally fine with this, because I am not a big fan of their theology, but wouldn’t there be a great strength in inviting one of these guys to carefully articulate what it is that they really believe and then watch them interact with a D.A. Carson or a John Piper? I think is would be wonderfully more powerful than simply having D.A. or Pastor John give us quick sound bites on what it is they believe and then critique it or warn us of the dangers from there.

Another strength of this position is that it enables a relationship between persons to take place. Writing books, or blogs, or emails back and forth is very impersonal and I feel it is much easier to the “ethic of love” shine through in face-to-face contact and could decrease much of the feelings of personal attack that can creep in though the written forms.

Some might say that this is not very practical. Why not? If one has time to write a whole book about a person’s beliefs, why couldn’t they hold a public conversation that deals with the issues? At least in Christian circles I would hope that we could move toward more of this type of thing.

Thoughts?

Free Willy?

Free will vs. God's sovereignty? Theological giant, Matt Perman comments:

Finally, let me conclude with a clarification to avoid misunderstanding. I am not saying that man is entirely passive in salvation. The Scriptures clearly teach that man's will is involved in coming to Christ. It is a choice that we make. What I do deny is that man is ultimate in salvation. Thus, when we believe in Christ, God must be the one who is causing us to do this through His effectual call. The issue between Calvinism and Arminianism is not whether man makes a choice, but why man makes the choice that He does. Calvinism answers that belief is ultimately a result of God's effectual grace, while Arminianism answers that it is not ultimately because of anything God is or does.

To read the whole article, click here