With the Lord’s help, we would like to consider the subjects of God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. The two subjects are often set in opposition to each other, as though they were mutually contradictory, rather than complimentary. Both are true, and they are found side by side in the Word of God. Parties and sects have been formed around each subject, while much heat and little light have been generated on both sides.
A stormy controversy arose in the latter part of the sixteenth century between the followers of John Calvin (1509-1564) and Jacobus Arminius, whose real name was Jacob Harmensen, or Herrnansz (1560-1609). The battle between Calvinists and Arminians is still going on.
Calvinism
Calvin saw and taught the total ruin of man, and that since Adam fell, all his posterity were born in sin and possessed a will opposed to God. Thus Calvinism taught that mankind was hopelessly lost unless God stepped in and saved some, but that this He did, first by His own sovereign choice in a past eternity and then by giving them faith in Christ when they were living on the earth. Calvin then went on to falsely assert that those not selected for salvation were selected for hell — an example of where human reason leads to error in trying to reconcile by the human mind what is beyond the human mind to comprehend.
Arminianism
Arminius denied that man was beyond the power to help himself, contending that he could, by exercising his own free will, improve himself, and that at least he had the power to accept the good and refuse the evil — to exercise faith in Christ or reject Him. This is generally termed the doctrine of “free will.”
Free Will
Has man today such a thing as a free will morally? No! Adam was placed in the Garden of Eden by his Creator. He was perfect in innocence, for God, after creating him, looked at His creation and said it was “very good.” He was happy in relationship with his Creator, but to remain so he needed to walk in obedience, for that was the only right thing for a creature. He was not outwardly forced to remain in that state; there was only one test applied to him in the matter of obedience. He was to abstain from the fruit of only one tree, and God warned him of the consequences of disobedience. As soon, then, as he exercised his own will, he sinned. This was not all; he became a sinner with a will opposed to God. From that moment forward, all of mankind (with the single exception of the “Lord from heaven,” “the second Man,” “the last Adam”) have been disposed to the evil of self-will. Since man’s will is now inclined toward evil, how can he by the exercise of it bring himself back to God? Let us quote from another on the subject of free will:
“A man being really set to choose between evil and good ... is alike horrible and absurd, because it supposes the good and evil to be outside and himself neither. If he is one or the other in disposition, the choice is there. To have a fair choice, he must be personally indifferent, but to be in a state of indifference to good and evil is perfectly horrible. If a man has an inclination, his choice is not free; a free will is rank nonsense morally, because, if he has a will, he wills something. God can will to create. But will in moral things [in man] means either self-will, which is sin (for we ought to obey), or an inclination to something, which is really a choice made as far as will goes.”
“To say that he [man] is not inclined to evil is to deny all Scripture and all fact; to make him free to choose he must be as yet indifferent, indifferent to — having no preference for — good and evil, which is not true, for evil lusts and self-will are there, the two great elements of sin, and if it were true would be perfectly horrible.”
“The doctrine of free will helps on the doctrine of the natural man’s pretension not to be entirely lost, for that is really what it amounts to. All men who have never been deeply convinced of sin, all persons with whom this conviction is based upon gross and outward sins, believe more or less in free will. You know that it is the dogma ... of all reasoners, of all philosophers. But this idea completely changes all the idea of Christianity and entirely perverts it.”
The Need of New Birth
If natural man could by the exercise of his own will bring himself into favor with God, then it is not true that “they that are in the flesh cannot please God,” but God’s Word is true. It would likewise negate the positive declaration, “Ye must be born again.” Why did the Lord say, “No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him”? Because man’s heart is so far estranged from God that if man were left to himself he would never come. It is true, as in the parable, that when the invitation reaches needy sinners, “they all with one consent [begin] to make excuse” (Luke 14:1818And they all with one consent began to make excuse. The first said unto him, I have bought a piece of ground, and I must needs go and see it: I pray thee have me excused. (Luke 14:18)). They not only have a nature disposed toward evil, but they are not disposed to accept God’s gracious invitation, no, not even with God’s beseeching them to come. If it were not for sovereign grace that drew any of us to Christ, none would have partaken of God’s free gift.
Scripture completely sets aside any good in man, as our Lord said, “Ye will not come to Me,” not even when He was graciously seeking them. The will was at fault. Again we read of His own, “Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:1313Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:13)). And in James 1:1818Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. (James 1:18), “Of His own will begat He us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.” Even the faith to believe in Him is not of ourselves, but “is the gift of God” (see Eph. 2:88For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (Ephesians 2:8)). When the redeemed ones in glory render praise and worship to the Lamb who saved them (Rev. 5), there will be no one present who was saved by exercising his own will or apart from the constraining of divine grace. Not one will be there who will mar that new song by taking any credit to himself, not even for his faith. Every one there will be there as the evident trophy of God’s grace, even as Mephibosheth in David’s house was visible evidence of David’s goodness (2 Sam. 9).
Christian Truth, Vol. 12, adapted