Total Depravity - Calvinism

I'm going to share my thoughts on Calvinism from time to time. I often wonder why this topic has been so dominant in discussions among the church today... I haven't come to any conclusions on that! I want to begin with this: the millennia long debate between the doctrines taught by Calvin and by Arminius is not, in my opinion, something that should be divisive in Christianity today (while I recognize that the reality is that it is). Doctrine is important! It is imperative to know and understand! Your doctrine will end up determining your actions. But what I think you will find here is that this topic (on both sides) ends up having to do some extra-biblical rationalizing when you get to certain points. Agreement between Calvin and Arminius goes very far, but it does diverge eventually. My point: God's word is like a fire and a hammer - Jeremiah 22 warns about adding to God's word and saying it is His word, or taking away from it and saying that He didn't say that... If the Bible is your final authority because it is God's word, then we can start on the same page.

God is great! He is righteous! He is merciful! Without God's grace, man would be without hope in this world!

I will try to keep these posts short to make it graspable enough to be considered a lunch-time thought - though I imagine I will fail frequently in this. And you all can tell from the time that I posted this and because of the detailed explanation ahead of it, I have been working on this post for a couple days, not just off the top of my head!

Anyway, I am reading a book by Lawrence Vance called, The Other Side of Calvinism. After reading the first 200 pages of basic history of the debate between Calvinism and Arminianism, he finally started on the 5 points of "TULIP." A chapter for each doctrine. As I read through the book, I plan to post here some of the major themes that are written, and then I will interact a little with it. One thing that may disappoint some is that I tend to completely disregard arguments that I find weak or hollow, so I may not mention them at all. I will try to focus on what I consider to be the major issues at hand. So... here goes:

Total Depravity:
The doctrine of Total Depravity is the teaching that man, because of the Fall of Genesis 3, when sin entered into the world, has been born with a sin nature. This sin nature depraves man of being able to save himself. The point where both Arminius and Calvin would agree: "Human nature has been and is utterly corrupted by sin so that man is totally incapable of doing anything to accomplish his salvation." Man does wicked deeds because he is depraved. He is not just depraved because of his wicked deeds.

• Romans 5:12-21 is a great text to show that man inherited Adam's sinful nature...
• Romans 3:10-18 is a great text to show how sinful man has become...
• Ephesians 2:3 shows that even born-again Christians were in times past sinners by nature...

Where the two parties go their own way is with the idea of Total Inability. Calvinism says that man "of himself, cannot repent and believe." That is, when confronted with the Gospel message and Holy Spirit conviction, a man is not able of himself to respond positively to that. Arminian theology would say that God has given all men the ability to respond positively to the gospel and Spirit's conviction, or to resist it. Both sides agree that man's human nature by itself cannot just start to believe, but rather the Holy Spirit has to do a work first - the Calvinist says the Spirit has to quicken (make alive) a man, to regenerate a man, to re-birth (born again) a man, in order for him to be able to believe. This quickening comes apart from anything on man's side of things. Once he is born again, he then is able to believe. Arminius says that the faith comes as a response to the Holy Spirit, and once a man believes, he then is born-again and becomes a son of God.

The agreement is this: Man is sinful by nature. Do you really have to teach a little child how to lie? how to be selfish? how to steal? You sure do have to teach them how to do good though. Man became sinner because of his nature passed on to him by his first father, Adam. The wages, the penalty for that sin is double-death. [Revelation 20:14 speaks of the second death. The first is the physical death when the body dies. The second is after the Judgment and is eternal.] When mankind was at enmity with God, that is, they were God's enemy (which we are by nature), God still showed unmerited favor, grace, by sending His Son Jesus to pay that penalty for the sin of mankind (Romans 5:8). Without God's grace, man would be without hope, having violated God's law and thus being unrighteous by God's standards. "But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith He loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;)" (Ephesians 2:4-5).

To the praise of the glory of His grace!

A Real Prophet

I've been reading through Jeremiah right now, and I have just been getting my pants kicked... I read Jeremiah 20, where around vss. 8ff Jeremiah says that he was faithfully preaching the word of the Lord, and the people had him in derision daily. They mocked him. He came to the conclusion that so many of us probably have come to - IT'S NOT WORTH IT. I don't want to be mocked any more! I'm just going to stop preaching, to stop witnessing, to sit in my hole and be quiet...

But that's where Jeremiah & I part similarities. Jeremiah had this "burning fire shut up in my bones" (vs. 9). He said,

"Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay."

He wanted to quit, but he was not able to stand down, to stay. He would get weary when he was not speaking the word of the Lord. For me, I get comfortable. Life gets easier for me. I am able to just fit in with the crowd. But, Jeremiah could say, God's "word was in mine heart."

So, what differentiates Jeremiah with me? A lot! But, I can't get over remembering what happened in chapter 1:9: "Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth." Jeremiah had a session with God. He met with God in a unique way that day. God ordained him to preach to the nation. Jeremiah recognized his total inability to preach God's word - until God put His word in his mouth.

Too many times I find myself putting God's word into my mouth. I will be reading my Bible to find out what would make a good message to preach to others. I will read with the intent of looking for proof texts to support the doctrines that I hold to. I will even memorize, and put God's word in my mind! But, too regularly, I am failing to let God put His word in my heart. Let the word of God dwell in you richly in all wisdom... We need to approach God's word with the expectation of Him doing something in our lives, of Him teaching something that we need. When we do that, and His word is dwelling in us richly, in our hearts and not just in our minds, then we will have his word in us a burning fire in our bones. Out of the abundance of His word in our hearts, our mouths will speak!

And, if we're lucky like Jeremiah, we can get cast in prison, beaten, and have no known converts during the lengths of our ministries!

The Call

(I really am not trying to bet back on the alliteration things - It just so happened that my thought started with "C" today)

I was thinking about how a Christian gets "called" to the field that God has for him. I know that there have been different stories of how missionaries have been called - some spectacular, some not so much. I think one of the hardest things for someone that is willing to do whatever God wants, is to actually hear what God wants!

If you look at Michael Barone's call to the field on his website - which I must add, Michael, you have a great looking website at GospelToItaly.com... good job - but if you click on the "About Us" tab, and click on "Michael's bio & Call" you will find that God used a statement in a Bible Institute class to peak his interest in Italy as a mission field. Then he was finally convinced that HE needed to go during preaching at a Bible Conference. If my memory serves me correctly it was a message from Billy Wood on the value of a soul. Now, Michael & Erika have their deputation materials at the press and are starting to schedule meetings. Michael was confident enough that God's call for him was to go to Italy, that he acted on it. He arranged his job situation and lifestyle to accommodate what God wanted him specifically to do.

I know most of us would like to have a great sign in the sky ("in hoc signo vinces") to tell us what God wants us to do, but usually God speaks in the still small voice. Elijah saw the whirlwind, fire and heard the earthquake, but God wasn't in those. Sometimes He is. Jason Pielaet reminded us last night that God "spoke" to Korah through an earthquake in Numbers 16! But when He speaks to His children, often it is just in the quiet stillness of our walk -

So, I guess the best way to hear God's call for us specifically in our lives, would be to stop long enough to just listen to what God says. Acknowledge Him in everything (when you're sitting in a missions class, or hearing preaching in a Bible Conference, or maybe more importantly just during your daily quiet time devoted to Him), and He will direct your paths.

Today's Post

Proverbs 10:19: In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise.

Andy

Ads

I just need to make a clarification... There are ads on my site from Google. When you click on one of these ads, Google actually gives me money. It's something like 20 cents per click. So, you can feel free to go ahead and click on the ads at your lesiure.

Some of the things you click on will link you to some good stuff, however Shannon Young pointed out that there also are links to sites that will tell you that Jesus is not God. I just wanted to clarify that, while I truly DO endorse and suggest that you click on the ads from my blog, I DO NOT endorse everything that will be on the sites that they link to. So, the point is: Click freely, Read discerningly :)

This isn't my lunch-time thought for the day, just something to add in.

Strength or Drunkenness

Ecclesiastes 10:17 says,

"Blessed art thou, O land, when thy king is the son of nobles, and thy princes eat in due season, for strength, and not for drunkenness!"

My breakfast time thought this morning has to do with food. When I think on this verse in Ecclesiastes, I come to the conclusion that Solomon is saying that there are one of two purposes for eating. The first reason is that you can eat for Strength. That is obviously when you eat the food necessary to survive in life and even when you eat the food necessary to maintain a strong physical body. The second reason I see in this verse that you can eat is for Drunkenness. To me, it is saying that you are either eating for strength or you are eating for drunkenness. So, once a person has eaten as much food to give him enough energy to be strong, anything else on top of that is eating for drunkenness. I consider in my life how many of my meals' portions are limited to being enough for strength - not many. Most of my meal-size portions would be sufficient for maybe 3 or 4 people, I would guess. Does that not mean I'm eating "for drunkenness?"

I remember Pastor Curran one time talking about Jonathan Edwards and he very strictly regulated the food that he would eat. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that we in America probably eat more than we should be eating. How many times have we heard the analogy about the flesh and the Spirit - whichever dog you feed more will be the stronger dog. I like the analogy. Galatians 5:17 says that the flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. So, when I eat more food than is necessary for strength, at that point I begin feeding on the flesh... I don't like this post. I think I'll stop now.

The verse in Ecclesiastes speaks of the princes, and how it is better for the people when their princes are temperate (self-controlled/self-disciplined) in regards to their consumption (I could have continued to alliterate these posts by using consumption, but decided against it). The thing is at that time there, and throughout most of the world today, most of the common people would not have an issue to deal with like this. We in America, like the princes in Solomon's day, have the opportunity to pig-out because of our abundance that God has blessed us with.

You say, Hey, I don't get "drunk" when I eat a lot of food. That's a good point to my mind. I agree. I guess you'll just have to ask Solomon how come he was so unwise to write something like that!

So, I hope we all enjoy our Memorial Day... I'm looking forward to that third juicy hamburger for lunch and the potato chips and pop...