Who wrote the following pair of Faulknerian sentences:
“In his lapsed and sinful state, man is not capable, of and by himself, either to think, to will, or to do that which is really good; but it is necessary for him to be regenerated and renewed in his intellect, affections or will, and in all his powers, by God in Christ through the Holy Spirit, that he may be qualified rightly to understand, esteem, consider, will, and perform whatever is truly good. When he is made a partaker of this regeneration or renovation, I consider that, since he is delivered from sin, he is capable of thinking, willing, and doing that which is good, but yet not without the continued aids of Divine grace.”
Calvin?
No.
Luther?
No.
Give up?
It’s your boy, Jacobus Arminius (but you can call him ‘Jim’).
If you’re surprised, the likely reason is that Arminianism has become a very confused subject over the course of the last century. To the rescue, rides Roger E. Olson with his publication Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (considering the name of the author, and the subject of the book, can we all agree to refer to this work as the REO Free-Wagon?). I have just started reading Olson’s book, but I already love it. And one of the main points that he has made in the preface and introduction, is that Arminianism is most certainly not semi-Pelagianism. Furthermore, he notes that the majority of churches in the US that would be labeled the former are in fact the latter! Hence the oddity of the above quote.
As you might have noticed, I’m so excited about this book I could spit. Some personal history: I was raised in a non-intellectual, Arminian tradition that often tended towards semi-Pelagianism (not that anyone but the senior pastor and my father would have know what that meant!). In college, all of my conservative Christian friends were reformed Calvinists. Interacting with them forced me develop my theology quite a bit; the primary result was that I eschewed my semi-Pelagian tendencies, and heartily embraced an emphasis on the gospel of grace, and imputed righteousness under a heavily forensic metaphor for atonement (yay Anselm!).
In my mind, I no longer identified with Arminian congregations, even though I thought that perhaps other intellectual “Arminians” probably held similar views to my own. I was also fully aware that Arminianism had a history of which I knew little but the tangential polemics from Reformed Calvinist pulpits. Rejecting some of the doctrines they attributed to Wesley and others, I gave myself the negative and disappointing label “non-Calvinist.”
Until today. One of the first things Olson does is to establish Arminianism as a valid, evangelical, reformed theology. He distinguishes what he calls ‘Arminianism of the heart’ or ‘evangelical Arminianism’ from ‘Arminianism of the head’ or ‘humanist Arminianism.’ The latter seeks to elevate man by his participation in salvation. The former seeks to glorify God by affirming an interpretation of scripture that renders him just as well as merciful and gracious. If people asked me now, I would probably tell them that I am a reformed Arminian (I prefer that to ‘evangelical Arminian’ since it establishes unity with other Protestants through a long history of reformation as opposed to a recent reaction to fundamentalism).
But enough about me, here’s the new project: I’m going to blog through Olson’s book, chapter by chapter. I’ll start with the preface and introduction, then continue with each of the ten myths that are addressed.
- Arminian theology is the opposite of Calvinist/Reformed theology
- A hybrid of Calvinism and Arminianism is possible
- Arminianism is not an orthodox evangelical option
- The heart of Arminianism is belief in [libertarian] free will
- Arminian theology denies the sovereignty of God
- Arminianism is a human-centered theology
- Arminianism is not a theology of grace
- Arminians do not believe in predestination
- Arminian theology denies justification by grace alone through faith alone
- All Arminians believe in the governmental theory of the atonement
Hope you’ll come back for these eleven posts and let me know what you think of them and the book.
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HT: JollyBlogger, who gave an official-type review of the book that put me on to it. For the record, he heartily recommended the book, and he’s a conservative, high Calvinist, PCA pastor.
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