Many Bible teachers have been too kind to Calvinism. They have tried not to throw out, what is in their minds, the baby with the bath water. Some have gone so far as to refute one or two points of TULIP, letting the other points slide. Often this is because they have not fully understood what the points actually declare. Some teachers of Bible doctrine (myself included in past years) have described themselves as “moderate” Calvinists. But, regarding this system all of us should really be “teetotalers.” Do we really wish to identify in any way with a system that is not biblical at all, but which merely attempts to defend its unscriptural premise from the Scriptures? Let’s take a look at each point of TULIP.In the article, “Calvinistic Confusion,” we saw that, at the Synod of Dort, a document known as the Canon of Dort directly responded, in five articles, to the five articles which the Arminians had developed. The articles issued in the Canon of Dort have since come to be identified with the acrostic TULIP. The letters of TULIP represent the first letters of these doctrines developed by the Calvinists:
Total Depravity
Unconditional Election
Limited Atonement
Irresistible Grace
Perseverance of the Saints
Let’s consider each point individually!
TOTAL DEPRAVITY (IN CALVINISTIC THOUGHT)
Total Depravity can mean different things to different people. Man certainly is totally depraved in the sense that:
…as it is written,
“There is none righteous, not even one;
There is none who understands,
There is none who seeks for God;
All have turned aside, together they have become useless;
There is none who does good, There is not even one.” (Romans 3:10-12)
It is true that every human being enters the human race at birth in spiritual death, and that in spiritual death every human being is a helpless sinner (Romans 5:6,8) and an enemy of God ((Romans5:10). It is true that there is nothing of any human merit or effort that can be offered to God toward salvation. It is true that in spiritual death no human being is able to understand spiritual information (1 Corinthians 2:14), and that it takes the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit to convey the testimony of the Gospel to a person in spiritual death so the message can be understood and then believed or rejected.
But to the classic Calvinist, total depravity means that man, in his depravity, cannot even believe the gospel message! To the Calvinist, an individual must be regenerated before he can have faith. This is emphatically and wholly repudiated by the Word of God which constantly appeals to the sinner to believe unto eternal life.
“Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent,
Because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31)
“Repent” (Acts 17:30) is metanoe,w (metanoeo), to change one’s mind. Man does have a free will by which he is able to respond to the Gospel through faith—yet, most certainly, by grace alone. God in fact commands all to change their minds, recognizing that all are able to fulfill that requirement (which substantiates the fact of the unlimited atonement which we will get to soon). In Acts 16:31, Paul instructed the Jailer to “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved…”—not “Be saved so you can believe in the Lord Jesus.”
Yet it should not surprise us that the Calvinist recognizes man’s depravity in such a way. He in fact is forced to that conclusion if he acknowledges Calvin’s doctrine of predestination. If man’s will is inconsequential to election, he can only will to believe after he is regenerated apart from anything regarding his will.
UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION
The “T” in TULIP leaves no way of escape from the “U”—the doctrine of Unconditional Election. Election in Calvinism, as we have seen, does not regard the individual’s choice to believe, but is based on God’s sovereign will to elect only certain ones. And it cannot be conditional, because after all, no one can have faith before regeneration!
Yet the Bible teaches that there is a condition with regard to election: belief on Christ. Do you wish to be included in the elect? Then simply believe on Jesus Christ! The unbeliever is invited over and over in the Bible to meet that condition. If one believes, he is one of those who has been chosen in eternity past by God. God has anticipated the faith of all who would believe, and has chosen an elect: believers! All human beings are invited to believe:
“For God so loved the world, that He gave us His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)
NOW LET’S KICK THE “L” OUT OF TULIP!
Limited Atonement. How could anyone who acknowledges the authority of the Word of God believe this one? This doctrine asserts that Christ’s death on the cross had only the elect in mind; that its value was reserved for elect alone. It was designed for, and given to, only the elect. Of course, if you believe the “T” and the “U”—you’re locked into this one as well. After all, if the first two points are true, it is not reasonable to assume that Christ died for the non-elect! God would certainly not require the death of Christ for those He had not planned to save!
The problem with this notion is that the Scriptures teach emphatically that the atonement is unlimited; that Christ’s work on the cross was expiatory and propitiatory for every member of the human race. Of course, not all will be saved, but only those who appropriate the value of the atonement by believing in Jesus Christ. The unlimited atonement is declared both directly and indirectly in many verses of the Bible, including John 1:29; John 3:16; 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Timothy 2:6; Hebrews 2:9; and, of course:
…and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world. (1 John 2:2)
IRRESTIBLE GRACE
In Calvinism, when that special inward call is extended to the elect person that God wishes to save at that particular time, the Holy Spirit’s work is in no way dependant on the person’s cooperation for success. This is called Irresistible Grace. Though the outward call of the Gospel can be resisted, the inward call of the Spirit cannot. The very willingness of the sinner to believe is wholly a gift from God that was purchased through the cross. It goes without saying, if you have bought into the first three points, this one naturally follows.
Yet clearly, the ministry of the Holy Spirit can be, and often is, resisted. In Matthew 23:37, Jesus told how he had desired to gather the Jews unto Himself, but they were unwilling. In Acts 7:51 Stephen accused his about-to-be murderers of resisting the Holy Spirit, just like their fathers did.
PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS
Do not confuse the doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints with the doctrine of Eternal Security. The latter teaches that one who has believed on Jesus Christ cannot lose his salvation. The doctrine of Eternal Security is correct. Perseverance of the Saints (sometimes called Preservation of the Saints) declares not only that believers are eternally kept in their state of salvation by God, but that all who have truly believed on Jesus Christ will be conformed in their experience, more and more, to Christ; that is, they will all, without exception, go on to lead obedient Christian lives, characterized by good works and fruit. The amount of good works will vary, but the general direction of the life will always be toward obedience and holiness. When the believer falls into sin, it will only be temporary and he will (if he is truly one of the elect) always come to repentance. This would be the logical outcome of the previous four points of TULIP.
Furthermore, in the doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints the believer’s election and spiritual regeneration are confirmed to him by his changed heart and fruitfulness. The believer’s assurance of salvation rests upon what is going on in his experience.
Yet the Bible is very clear that some, after they have believed unto eternal salvation, will be utter failures regarding obedience to Christ and regarding experiential fruitfulness. Considering this fact may make many believers uncomfortable; nevertheless, this is reality.
If one carefully reads the life of King Saul, it becomes apparent that he was certainly regenerate. Everything about his early career as recorded in the Bible points to his true salvation. Yet he went bad. Really bad. He spent a lot of time under divine discipline and was disobedient and under the influence of evil until the very end of his life. He departed from this world under the principle of sin unto physical death (1 Corinthians 11:30; 1 John 5:16-17). In fact, after Saul consulted a spirit medium (certainly not an act of faith or obedience), God providentially had the deceased Samuel surprise Saul by appearing to him. Samuel told Saul that because of his disobedience:
“Moreover the Lord will also give over Israel along with you into the hands of the Philistines, therefore tomorrow you and your sons will be with me. Indeed the Lord will give over the army of Israel into the hands of the Philistines.” (1 Samuel 28:19)
Samuel told Saul that the next day, Saul and his sons would be with him (Samuel). What could this mean, except that Saul (regenerate) and his sons (regenerate) would be joining Samuel (regenerate): Unless, of course, Samuel the prophet was unregenerate. Or unless Jonathan (one of Saul’s sons who died the day Saul died) was unregenerate. (Yet the Scripture portrays Jonathan as a very consistent, spiritual believer and a man of great integrity.)
But alas, Saul departed from physical life an utter failure. What could this possibly mean? It means that believers can, and do, utterly fail in their experience as God’s children. The life of Saul certainly repudiates the doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints. So do the lives of a number of others in the Bible, including some of the Kings of Judah who were believers, yet became spiritual failures.
The Apostle Paul, in describing the judgment of Christ for believers (an event that Calvinists unfortunately lump together with the Great White Throne Judgment for unbelievers), wrote that there would be rewards conferred to some believers, and loss of rewards for other believers (1 Corinthians 3:12-15), yet even believers without rewards will enter heaven:
If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. (1 Corinthians 3:15)
Paul even recognized the very real possibility that he himself could wind up in the category of being “saved, yet so as through fire.” In 1 Corinthans 9:24-25, he illustrates the reward concept with something with which his readers were all familiar: the Isthmian games, at the end of which the winner would receive a spruce wreath. Paul contrasted that perishable earthly reward with the imperishable reward that is the goal of the spiritual life (1 Corinthians 9:25), and he went on to give the reason that he was self-disciplined:
…but I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified. (1 Corinthians 9:27)
Disqualified; that is, from the reward. (Not “a castaway” as rendered in the King James Version.) Paul was not considering the possibility that he was not one of the elect—only the possibility that he could fail to follow through with the fulfillment of the spiritual life and be disqualified from eternal rewards bestowed on some of the elect.
THE DOMINO EFFECT
More than one Calvinist has voiced the challenge to prove any of the five points true and the rest must follow as necessary parts of the system—yet prove one point wrong and the whole system must be rejected. I would encourage every believer to follow those very instructions, using the Scriptures as the standard. The five points go down like a row of dominos in the light of the Word of God.
THE PRACTICAL PROBLEMS OF TULIP
We have seen some of the doctrinal problems of the five points of Calvinism. Now let’s consider some of the practical problems. The major experiential problem with Calvinism is that absolute assurance of salvation is impossible with this system. Where Arminianism (because it includes the belief that one can be regenerated and then become reprobate) causes the believer to fear that he can lose his salvation—Calvinism causes the believer to fear that he may not have actually been saved at the time when he thought he was.
Also, there is the problem of stimulation of the energy of the flesh. Both Arminianism and Calvinism cause believers to strive in a way that is not oriented to grace, and is therefore not the operation of the spiritual life. The Arminian strives to stay saved; the Calvinist strives to validate that his saving faith was genuine.
THE INSIDIOUSNESS OF IT ALL
Calvinism came to the colonies from Europe and is still deeply rooted in the denominations of Reformed theology. But the serious damage done by Calvinism lies not only on the conscious, but also the subconscious level. In other words, many in our nation today do not necessarily think of themselves as Calvinists. Many actually have no idea what Calvin or his successors taught. They are not indoctrinated into Calvinism per se, because there has been a general trend in the Church to downplay doctrine and doctrinal issues altogether. Yet they are subtly and subconsciously poisoned from a religious culture which has been saturated with Calvinism for centuries. So, at the Christian book store they buy commentaries, some of which are overtly Calvinistic in their approach; others of which are devotional and stay away from doctrinal issues, yet which consider it a “given” that anyone who has genuinely believed will, without exception, be living a life of fruitful obedience, characterized by good works. This notion has come from hundreds of years of Calvinism.
The entire first epistle of John is misread today by most commentators, who perceive the letter to be a series of tests whereby a professing Christian can determine whether or not he is truly saved. Yet, in actuality, John’s express purpose in writing the epistle was to promote fellowship with God (1 John 1:3-7) among those to whom he was writing. His intended readership clearly consists of those who have believed in Jesus Christ, and have thus already received the forgiveness of God (1 John 2:12); in other words those who are regenerated. Furthermore, he wants them to know that they have eternal life (1 John 5:13)—that is, to be assured of their salvation—not through validating it by their own personal experience, but by continuing to believe the testimony of God concerning His Son Jesus Christ.
On the conscious level, Calvinism has actually been enjoying quite a revival in recent years. Included in this phenomenon are many young people, many of whom read the reformers with zeal and revere them in a way that is truly cultic. You can purchase bumper stickers with Calvinistic slogans and buy t-shirts bearing portraits of the Reformers and famous Puritans. This is not to take away from the appreciation we should have for the Reformers and others who have, often with great sacrifice, recovered and defended important doctrines of the faith. But we need to keep things in perspective and be careful to test everything against the Word. And, the writings of theologians which are not even founded on Scripture—but on premises they have imposed on the Scripture, and then have attempted to defend from the Scripture—these writings should be quickly recognized and rejected by the Bible believer. A tulip is a pretty flower. TULIP is an ugly theology.
CALVINISM OR ARMINIANISM? HOW ABOUT NEITHER?
Thank God, we don’t have to be either Calvinist or Arminian in our viewpoint. Instead, we can just allow the Scriptures to speak to us themselves! Some theologians have shown the contrast between the differing views of election through various logical orders of arrangement of the divine decrees. It is not really even necessary to go there (though this can sometimes be helpful in putting things in perspective). The bottom line is this: God is sovereign. God has a sovereign purpose (Let’s not be lofty here—God’s sovereign purpose is simply what God wants to do.) God has factored the free volition of human beings into His plan, and He has chosen an elect for salvation. The elect He has chosen consists of those who will believe with free will. Divine omniscience anticipates the decisions human beings will make. It is that simple. And the fact of man’s free will is of great importance regarding the appeal trial of Satan, a subject which will be considered in detail on this web site.
Scripture quotations taken from the NASB. www.lockman.org
This article is a revised excerpt from “Then the Proconsul Believed: A study of the Acts of the Apostles, Volume I—Acts Chapters 1—13,” by Lee Griffith, available free of charge, upon request.
Copyright © 2006 Lee Griffith. All rights reserved.
