Bad Boy, Bad Boy! Whatcha Gonna Do?

Last year was the 500th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth. This year is the 400th anniversary of the Remonstrance (H/T to Reformation 21 for reminding me!), the theological dispute that led to TULIP, the so-called Five Points of Calvinism. For the next few weeks we will look at them and hopefully come to appreciate God’s amazing grace more. (NB: I am deeply indebted to the preaching of Dr. Larry McCall, who pointed me to the Doctrines of Grace and more. His series, “God’s Amazing Grace” was very helpful to me both in my theological development as a young man and is the basis for these posts.)

Today we are going to start with a question that may seem a little silly, but here it is: Who gets the credit for our salvation, God or man? Being of a good, Reformed persuasion, we would immediately respond, “God, of course.” That’s right. God gets all of the credit. Many Christians today might object, “But wait a minute. Didn’t I choose Jesus? Didn’t I ask Him into your heart? Don’t I get some credit?” (OK, they might not ask the last question, but that is inexorably where the first two lead.)

Why do so many believers think like that? Because the message being proclaimed by most churches today is that, in terms of salvation, God has done all he can do to provide salvation for you. Now it is up to you. The salvation equation taught by so many churches is that God + man = salvation. What will you do?

Of course, Reformed Christians believe that salvation is all of God’s grace. The Doctrines of Grace try to succinctly describe that grace. It is important to remember as we embark on this series of posts, to note a few things.

First, there are NOT five points to Calvinist or Reformed teaching. There are many, many more aspects to what we believe than just the Doctrines of Grace. Second, John Calvin did not invent Calvinism any more than Sir Isaac Newton invented gravity. Nevertheless, the five points are associated with Reformed theology. How did they come into being?

In 1609, a leading Dutch Reformed minister, James Arminius died. The next year, 1610, some of his followers went to the leaders of the church of Holland and asked the church to re-write its statement of faith. They were known as “Remonstrators,” or public objectors. They wanted to change five things about the Dutch Reformed church’s doctrine. So, I kid you not, here are the Five Points of Arminianism:

1. Man is free to accept or reject the grace necessary to be saved. In other words, man has a free will.

2. God elects, or chooses, on the basis of foreseen faith. This is often called “conditional election.” It means that God peered down the corridors of time and chose those individuals for salvation that he saw would already believe.

3. Christ died to make salvation possible for all men.

4. Man may resist God’s grace. In other words, God submits himself to man’s final say. It is up to us to either accept or reject God’s gracious gift of salvation.

5. The idea that the elect would persevere in their faith needed more study.

Now, the church agreed to consider revising their doctrinal statement and so they had a conference, called a synod, in the town of Dort. What’s more is they wanted to get input from all kinds of Protestants and so they invited men from Germany, Holland, England, and France. 84 men in all came. These 84 men met for 7 months, and 154 sessions in all. The key question that they discussed was, “Were the five issues raised by the Remonstrators biblical?” After 7 months and 154 sessions, 84 men from 3 different countries unanimously, agreed that the Remonstrators were not correct. The synod’s final statement was, “Salvation is to be viewed as the work of God’s grace from beginning to end.”

The Synod of Dort responded to the Remonstrators with 5 points of their own. In English, these five points form an acrostic, TULIP, to help us remember what they are. They are:

• Total Depravity
• Unconditional Election
• Limited Atonement
• Irresistible Grace
• Perseverance of the Saints

Let’s start now by looking at the first point, Total Depravity. What is it? First, it is important to remember that Total Depravity does not mean that people are as evil as they can be. It means that sin has affected our entire being.

Imagine, for example, that I put one drop of poison in a glass of water. The instant I do that, it is no longer water, it is a chemical solution. The issue is not how much poison is in the water. The issue is that the poison has affected every molecule of the water. So it is with us. Does the Bible teach we are completely affected by sin? Absolutely.

Sin has affected our minds, our ability to know God.

Romans 1:21 says, our hearts are foolish and dark:

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

As a result of that darkening, we are unable to accept God’s Word as truth. 1 Corinthians 2:14 says:

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

Worse, we are hardened against and callous to the truth when we hear it. Paul continues in Ephesians 4:18-19:

[Unbelievers] are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity.

Sin has affected our bodies, too. Our bodies are instruments by which we were created to glorify and enjoy God forever. Yet the first thing sin did was kill. Romans 6:23 solemnly reminds us:

The wages of sin is death.

Death was never part of God’s original plan, but it was the result of sin.

Sin has also affected our wills. Consider:

But to all who did receive [Christ], who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12-13)

In other words, neither human ancestry, human desire, nor human will can save us.

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. (John 6:44)

That verse alone defeats the idea of free will. No one, NO ONE, Jesus says, comes to salvation unless the Father draws him.

So the clear teaching of Scripture, then, is that sin has completely affected us in totality. Intellect, emotion, and will, body and soul, we are alienated from God and unable (and unwilling!) to do anything about it. How, then, can anyone be saved?

We can’t accomplish salvation, plain and simple. But God can. Speaking of salvation, Jesus said,

With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. (Matthew 19:26)

How does God do the impossible? Sola gratia, by grace alone.

Paul writes in Ephesians 2:1-5:

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience-among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ-by grace you have been saved.

It is worth noting that Paul says we are dead, not sick. Just as death renders a corpse incapable of responding to the world around it, so sin renders us incapable of remedying our spiritual situation. We are objects of God’s wrath. “But God,” Paul says, and with those two words he declares that God alone works salvation, and that by grace.

Only God gets the credit for salvation. It is all of grace. There is no room for pride in salvation. Understanding Total Depravity affects how we view God. We begin to understand that he must be a God of sovereign grace. It affects how we worship. The consideration of our sinfulness and misery over against God’s grace should drive us to passion in our worship. It also affects how we serve God. We should serve Him with submissive obedience.

So, how do we get from sin to salvation? Stay tuned, Gentle Reader.