"I don't believe in Total Depravity, and think the idea is totally depraved." -My friend Mark (here)
Thursday, April 22, 2010
A Depraved Idea (Quote of the Day)
Here is the quote of the day for April 22, 2010. This one made me smile; A nice surprise in the middle of a long day.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Total Depravity and Calvinism's Ugly God
This sunday my Pastor preached a sermon on the topic of Total Depravity, or as he put it: "Your Instincts Stink." You can hear it online (at least for a few weeks) here. This is the kind of sermon that makes me want to look for an Arminian church, not because I dislike my church, (on the contrary, I love it and the people there) but because sermons like this can damage my faith.
My pastor did an excellent job communicating the Calvinist belief that man cannot accomplish anything good on his own. This ideas was expressed via the teachings of Johnathan Edwards and Augustine that
Now, the idea here is that our inclinations (and therefore our actions) are (because of the fall) always evil, and only by the grace of God can we do anything good, including believe and have faith. Salvation is accomplished solely by God, through the sacrifice of Jesus and the election of God's chosen people who are able to believe through power given them by God. Going back to the Edwards/Augustine quote above, God changes our inclinations, allowing us to act differently, to believe, and to be saved. Man has absolutely no part in it anything.
I can see how this is comforting. The ball is in God's court. I don't have to worry about it. But to me it is extremely troubling. If you always act according to your strongest inclinations, you have absolutely no ability to change the course of your life whatsoever. You may think you can simply examine your inclinations/motivations, (this was suggested in the sermon) and try to change them, but if this idea is correct, the action you took to examine your motivations was in iteself a response to your strongest inclination at that moment. You are a deterministic being. Your life has already been determined, and your future actions, thoughts, feelings, and emotions are already determined, unless God intervines.
Of course the whole Calvinist system is based on the belief that (for the elect) God WILL intervine, and help us change our inclinations, giving us the ability to believe in Jesus and be saved.
But that's not the only problem with Calvinism. As I've discussed before, the problem of evil is a very difficult one for anyone who believes in a personal god. The ugly God of Calvinism is a god who created this world, orchastrated evil, saves some people of His own choosing, and damns the rest to hell for not believing something that isn't true. Calvinism heightnens the problem of evil so greatly that a better alternative is that God does not exist at all.
I think the Arminian system gives a much more believable (and palletable) scenario, while still taking seriously what the Bible says about election: That God, by his grace, created man with a choice, and "elects" some by pursuing them, (perhaps as a result of their choices) and further enabling them to choose better still.
A Calvinist might say "But you are undermining Gods soverignty! God is in control, not man!" Blogger Ken Schenck at the blog Quadrilateral Thoughts answers this well:
Now back to what I mentioned above, about sermons like this, and how they can damage my faith: There is nothing wrong with going to a church that teaches ideas that are contrary to your own beliefs. If one is actively engaged with their faith, and continually examining their beliefs, this is inevitable. But when ideas like this are presented in a way that suggests something is wrong if you don't totally agree, or that there isn't room for discussion, I begin to wonder if I am worshiping in the right place. I'm not suggesting that any belief be accepted as equal, but some discussion of alternate (but equally biblical) views should be accepted.
Of course, a Calvinist would claim that Arminianism is unbiblical based on their selected proof texts...
My pastor did an excellent job communicating the Calvinist belief that man cannot accomplish anything good on his own. This ideas was expressed via the teachings of Johnathan Edwards and Augustine that
"Man will always act according to his strongest inclination at that moment."
Now, the idea here is that our inclinations (and therefore our actions) are (because of the fall) always evil, and only by the grace of God can we do anything good, including believe and have faith. Salvation is accomplished solely by God, through the sacrifice of Jesus and the election of God's chosen people who are able to believe through power given them by God. Going back to the Edwards/Augustine quote above, God changes our inclinations, allowing us to act differently, to believe, and to be saved. Man has absolutely no part in it anything.
I can see how this is comforting. The ball is in God's court. I don't have to worry about it. But to me it is extremely troubling. If you always act according to your strongest inclinations, you have absolutely no ability to change the course of your life whatsoever. You may think you can simply examine your inclinations/motivations, (this was suggested in the sermon) and try to change them, but if this idea is correct, the action you took to examine your motivations was in iteself a response to your strongest inclination at that moment. You are a deterministic being. Your life has already been determined, and your future actions, thoughts, feelings, and emotions are already determined, unless God intervines.
Of course the whole Calvinist system is based on the belief that (for the elect) God WILL intervine, and help us change our inclinations, giving us the ability to believe in Jesus and be saved.
But that's not the only problem with Calvinism. As I've discussed before, the problem of evil is a very difficult one for anyone who believes in a personal god. The ugly God of Calvinism is a god who created this world, orchastrated evil, saves some people of His own choosing, and damns the rest to hell for not believing something that isn't true. Calvinism heightnens the problem of evil so greatly that a better alternative is that God does not exist at all.
I think the Arminian system gives a much more believable (and palletable) scenario, while still taking seriously what the Bible says about election: That God, by his grace, created man with a choice, and "elects" some by pursuing them, (perhaps as a result of their choices) and further enabling them to choose better still.
A Calvinist might say "But you are undermining Gods soverignty! God is in control, not man!" Blogger Ken Schenck at the blog Quadrilateral Thoughts answers this well:
"If God can create the world out of nothing, then He is certainly able to empower a person, by his prevenient grace, to reach the smallest point of volition ex nihilo, a point of the barest will either to remain depraved as they are or to signify ever so slightly a desire for more grace... leading to God's empowerment to signify a desire for more grace still. Would you suggest that God is not clever enough to figure out how to do this, to empower totally depraved humanity to begin to make a choice?"
Now back to what I mentioned above, about sermons like this, and how they can damage my faith: There is nothing wrong with going to a church that teaches ideas that are contrary to your own beliefs. If one is actively engaged with their faith, and continually examining their beliefs, this is inevitable. But when ideas like this are presented in a way that suggests something is wrong if you don't totally agree, or that there isn't room for discussion, I begin to wonder if I am worshiping in the right place. I'm not suggesting that any belief be accepted as equal, but some discussion of alternate (but equally biblical) views should be accepted.
Of course, a Calvinist would claim that Arminianism is unbiblical based on their selected proof texts...
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