Society of Evangelical Arminians: What is Arminianism?
The following is by Dan Chapa of the Society of Evangelical Arminians (SEA). Since theologically serious alternatives to Calvinism seem to be in short supply these days, SharperIron contacted SEA recently about the possibility of representing classical Arminianism for the SI audience. To learn more about the SEA, see their About Us page.
Arminianism is a summary of our understanding of the Scripture’s teaching on salvation. The name comes from Jacob Arminius, who led 17th century opposition to Calvinism, but the idea stems from Scripture and has deep roots in the early church fathers. Many non-Arminians have mistaken notions about Arminianism—as do many Arminians. This post will define and defend the essential aspects of Arminianism (total depravity, resistible grace, unlimited atonement and conditional election), without critiquing Calvinism.
Total Depravity
Both Calvinists and Arminians believe in total depravity—the idea that fallen man requires God’s grace through the beginning, middle and end of the salvation process. Adam’s fall left us unable, of our own strength, to repent and believe or live a life pleasing to God. But total depravity is not utter depravity; the lost don’t commit the worst sins possible on every occasion. Still without God’s grace, sin impacts every aspect of life and we cannot seek God on our own. Rather, He seeks us and enables us to believe.
Resistible Grace
Arminians may vary on exactly how God’s grace works; but all Arminians hold to the necessity of prevenient grace (grace that comes before conversion that enables us to believe). When God’s grace starts drawing us to conversion, we can choose to say no and reject Christ. God hasn’t predetermined repentance and faith; nothing causes these such that rejection is impossible and we cannot choose otherwise. But believing does not earn or cause salvation; God chooses to have mercy on believers.
Arminians find resistible grace in passages speaking of God’s grace and man’s rejection of it. God is seeking, drawing and inviting mankind to Himself (John 1:9, 4:23, 7:17, 12:32, 16:8; Rom. 2:4, Titus 2:11, Rev. 22:17). In Isaiah 5:4, God asks what more He could have done (showing the sufficiency of His grace) and He invites Israel to judge itself (showing the reasonableness of His requirements). The reasonableness of God’s commands and invitations shows that God treats us as if we can obey Him, which implies that we can, and this harmonizes with our moral intuitions.
In Matthew 11:21, Christ says Tyre and Sidon would have repented if the same works He had done in Chorazin and Bethsaida had been done there. Tyre and Sidon were bywords for sinfulness, so they were neither elect nor regenerate. Yet the same divine works would have brought about repentance in them, showing the fitness of God’s works to bring about repentance and placing the difference in man’s response.
Also, the divine lament passages strongly affirm the resistibility of grace (Ps. 81:13; Luke 13:33-34, 19:41). Some passages plainly say people reject and resist God’s efforts to bring them to Him (Gen. 6:3, Jer. 13:11, Ezek. 24:13, Luke 7:30, Acts 7:51). God hardens hearts by turning over people to their own sinful lusts (Rom. 1:18-28). This implies that God’s grace was softening their hearts and restraining their wickedness. Additionally, the highly controversial Hebrews warning passages (however interpreted) indicate that God’s grace is resistible (Heb. 2:1-3, 3:6-14, 6:4-6, 10:26-29, 12:15). (Most self-identified “Arminians” have held that true believers can forsake Christ and perish as unbelievers, but the earliest formal statement of Arminian theology—the 5 points of the Remonstrants—expressed uncertainty about the point and, conceptually, it is not an essential tenet of Arminian theology.)
Resistible grace often leads to the controversial question of whether faith or regeneration comes first. Some disagreement stems from defining regeneration. Does regeneration include God’s imparting eternal life to us? Does regeneration include God’s enabling belief? Arminians typically answer yes to the first question and no to the second, so naturally we see faith as preceding regeneration. Ephesians 1:13, John 1:12-13, John 5:24-28, Romans 6:2-6, Galatians 3:2 and 2 Corinthians 3:18 support this order. Notice the issue is which grace enables man to believe (prevenient grace or regeneration) not the depth of man’s depravity without grace.
Scriptures say we have wills and choose (Deut. 30:19, Josh. 24:15, 1 Cor. 7:37). “Choose” is normally defined as “to select from a number of possible alternatives” and we reject imposing on Scripture definitions of “choose” that either remove essential elements or are stipulated philosophical definitions. God tests us—whether we will obey or not—which implies that at least sometimes obedience is up to us (Exod. 16:4). God promises that we will not be tempted beyond our abilities (1 Cor. 10:13), which implies that we can choose to obey or not. God’s desire to have a relationship with free creatures magnifies His love, and His ability to providentially govern and rule a world with free creatures magnifies His sovereignty.
Unlimited Atonement
Christ died for everyone. This is not universalism; the benefits of Christ’s death are conditionally applied, not automatically or necessarily applied. Just as the Passover Lamb was slain and the blood applied, so also we distinguish between Christ’s death and the application of His blood to believers. Christ’s death makes salvation possible for all, and God desires all to believe and be saved through His blood, but only believers are actually cleansed by Christ’s blood.
We see conditionality in the application of Christ’s blood because justification is by faith (Rom. 3:21-26) and because Christ died for some who ultimately perish. Christ said to all the apostles, including Judas, my blood is “shed for you” (Luke 22:21-22). The apostates in Hebrews 10:26-29 were sanctified by Christ’s blood. The false prophets in 2 Peter 2:1 denied the Lord that bought them. 1 John 1:7 and Colossians 1:22-23 plainly teach conditionality in the application of Christ’s blood.
The many passages saying Christ died for the world or all men ground our belief that Christ died for everyone (John 1:29, 3:16-17, 4:42, 6:33, 6:51, 12:47; 1 John 2:1-2, 4:14; 2 Cor. 5:14-19; Heb. 2:9; 1 Tim. 2:4-6, 4:10). While “world” has a broad range of meanings, that range does not include any definition that would avoid the conclusion that Christ died for everyone, nor do we see validity in inventing a specially plead definition of world to avoid unlimited atonement. We see Christ’s sacrifice for all as the foundation of the sincere offer of the gospel to all in that everyone can be saved through what Christ accomplished on the cross.
Conditional Election
God gave pre-fallen Adam the ability to obey Him—He wanted Adam to be free to have a relationship with Him. God did not causally determine Adam’s sin such that he couldn’t obey and necessarily fell—such would be inconsistent with God’s holiness and hatred of sin (James 1:13, Jer. 7:31, Ps. 45:7). Thus, Arminians insist that God is not the author of sin, and free will is essential to Arminian theodicy. Our freedom lies between God and sin; otherwise God is ultimately responsible for sin.
In election, God considered man as fallen sinners. God chooses to have mercy (Rom. 9:16). Scripture calls the non-elect vessels of wrath, or appointed to wrath (Rom. 9:22, 1 Thess. 5:9). Now mercy on the one hand, and wrath on the other, presuppose sin. So Arminians view election as fixing the sin problem, rather than seeing the fall as something God planned in order to accomplish His goal of sending His chosen to heaven and the rest to hell.
Election automatically excluded unbelievers. So we see symmetry in some essential respects between election and non-election. Hellfire is a punishment for sins, so rejection is conditional on unbelief and impenitence.
Freely fallen sinners is one starting point in explaining election—God’s amazing love is another. He does not desire the death of the wicked, nor is He willing that any should perish, but rather He wills all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. (Ezek. 33:11, 2 Peter 3:9, 1 Tim. 2:4-6). God’s love of the world moved Him to send His Son so that the world through Him might be saved (John 3:16-17). Given man’s fall, the Father chose His Son as the basis and foundation for salvation, and our election is in Him (Matt. 12:18; 1 Pet. 1:20, 2:4; Eph. 1:4).
Just as rejection is conditional, based on sin and impenitence, election to salvation is likewise conditional, not based on works or merit, but based on God’s choice to have mercy on believers. Scripture describes predestination as God’s choosing to save those who believe (1 Cor. 1:21, 2:7); election is said to be in sanctification and in belief in the truth (1 Pet. 1:2, 2 Thess. 2:13). Conditional election includes God’s plan from before time to save through the gospel. Before the foundation of the world, God, in Christ, chose to glorify Himself by saving believers out of fallen mankind.
While all Arminians agree that election is Christocentric and conditional, Arminians may disagree on whether election is primarily corporate (election of the Church as a group with individuals sharing in the group’s election by faith) or primarily based on God’s foreknowledge of each individual’s faith.
Closing Thoughts
When I was first challenged by a Calvinist friend regarding Romans 9, I couldn’t explain the passage. And since his explanation made sense, I reluctantly accepted Calvinism. Then one night, I was shocked by the warning in Hebrews 10 and decided to devote time to digging into Scripture on the issues. I studied for years and came out of that process an Arminian. It was difficult; Arminian resources were scarce and Arminians scarcer still. SEA fixes all of that, giving us resources and a community in which to build each other up. Space hasn’t permitted a detailed exegesis of each of the passages cited, but much more detail is available on the SEA website.
danchapa Bio
Dan Chapa was saved at an early age and Christ is the most important part of his life. He has attended independent or Southern Baptists Churches his entire life. His main ministries have been evangelism and teaching Sunday school, but he has also enjoyed discussing Calvinism/Arminianism over the years. He is a member of SEA and blogs at arminianchronicles.com. He lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and two boys.
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G. N. Barkman
Ed, as surprising as this sounds coming from me, I completely agree that the emphasis on “Calvinism” does not produce the fruit proponents have proffered. I think that’s because some people have tried to embrace the so-called “5 points” without actually embracing Reformed theology, which grounds and directs those points in a robust, well-balanced manner. These days I’m more wary of Calvinist Baptists than I am of Arminians.My experience is the opposite. Not that I do not enjoy some Reformed friends, but I have long felt more at home with the less Calvinistic, though I strongly believe in Sovereign Grace. But this is a purely subjective assessment. Another person might testify in the other direction, as you are doing.
But Charlie, the word “robust?”
As far as paradox, I am more and more impressed with a view I used to hold to decades ago, that these are indeed a paradox (the Arminian and Calvinistic perspective) and that they do, in fact, reconcile in heaven much as the Trinity does. It is one thing to say that something is not logical on a human plane with all our limitations of understanding. What we mean is that we cannot see the logic; that does not mean it is illogical. A man from the 15th century would think the workings of a computer make no logical sense, but they do. Leaving room for the limitations of human knowledge and ability to reason is not escape from reason, although it can be.
When you try to explain the boundaries of the Trinity to a Jehovah’s Witness, they will comment, “that’s not logical.’ And, in a sense, they are right. But then again they are wrong: it is logical, just beyond us. That is what I am saying with the paradox concept. As you mentioned, J.I. Packer does that (I remember reading his books decades ago) as do many others (although not with all the points of Arminianism).
"The Midrash Detective"
[G. N. Barkman] Calvinism teaches that God does whatever He chooses, but only that which is consistent with His character. God couldn’t have saved in any way that does not satisfy both His Holy justice as well as His mercy. It is hard to explain how any other way of salvation apart from the atonement of Christ could save. Am I missing something here?This is correct. But limiting this to Calvinism is a mistake. Most Wesleyans, I would think, would also agree with this. I would argue that MANY non-Calvinists or partial Calvinists would agree with this. This, to my way of thinking, is a crucial truth in defining fundamentalism. The cup could not pass from Jesus precisely because there was no other way. God has to be both just and the justifier of the one who believes in Jesus.
"The Midrash Detective"
[G. N. Barkman] Calvinism teaches that God does whatever He chooses, but only that which is consistent with His character. God couldn’t have saved in any way that does not satisfy both His Holy justice as well as His mercy. It is hard to explain how any other way of salvation apart from the atonement of Christ could save. Am I missing something here?But would not that be bringing God down to our level of understanding of morality? Is not God’s morality higher than ours?
If God deems that His justice is satisfied by nailing a rabbit to the Cross and/or having the objects of His mercy say “Blue” three times, freely choosing to save man as sinners on one or both of these terms, how can we deny God’s freedom to do so and render such means as unsatisfactory?
Who and by what authority does one have to tell God how men ought to be saved?
i would have to disagree that a paradox between Arminianism and Calvinism makes sense. In order to do so, one would have to reduce both systems to specific ideas, and ignore the nuances within those systems.
Personally, I don’t believe that a middle ground can exist between the two, or that paradox makes sense, because the two positions are too similar. It is like finding the middle ground between the living room and the hallway: there just isn’t enough space there. On the other hand, they are devided by a wall: election is either conditional or unconditional, and saving grace can either be resisted or not. Why or how election is conditional or unconditional can be varied, but you are on one side or the other.
your brother in Christ, Martin Alpha and omega forever
What is interesting is the idea that in order for something to be a legitamate choice, it must be unconditional. That doesn’t really hold up in life. I usually have some basis for the choices that i make.
your brother in Christ, Martin Alpha and omega forever
You said that you would like SEA to focus more on the Anti-calvinists of the internet. What would you like to see? How could we improve in that area in your opinion?
your brother in Christ, Martin Alpha and omega forever
[nbanuchi] If God deems that His justice is satisfied by nailing a rabbit to the Cross and/or having the objects of His mercy say “Blue” three times, freely choosing to save man as sinners on one or both of these terms, how can we deny God’s freedom to do so and render such means as unsatisfactory?If the blood of bulls and goats could never have taken away sin, I doubt a rabbit would suffice. I don’t have explicit scriptural support, but I think the fact that it took the bloody death of the God-Man has more to do with His character than caprice.
Who and by what authority does one have to tell God how men ought to be saved?
So I say nothing by my authority, I’m trying to be consistent with revelation.
First, so far as I can recall, God’s election in the Bible is always of people, not a method. In other words, the “election” idea is never used for the way that God saves, but for the people he saves. So while he has committed himself to save believers, that really isn’t the point here.Here’s where I think the idea of corporation election can be very helpful. God choose Israel as a Nation. In the NT, many passages speak of God choosing whole churches or believers as a group. And if seen as a collective or group or corporate body, one can see the strong implication that the category that groups them (i.e. faith) is firmly in view.
However, I do think that 1 Corinthians 1:21 directly addresses the issue and if you trace the outbound context through, it’s an important part of the wisdom God predestined in 1 Corinthians 2:7. I also think that Romans 9 teaches the same thing (but I certainly understand that’s highly controversial). Fundamentally, it helps explain why Paul brings up election in the first place. He is showing that the Gospel was God’s plan all along.
BTW, I hope you can see why I would view the word ‘subjugated’ as a bit of an overstatement.
God be with you,
Dan
Do you view election as choosing individuals, or something else?Both. ;-)
As to a general summary of my views on election, I break it into 4 main elements:
1) God’s choice of Christ as the foundation of salvation
2) God’s choice of faith as the condition of salvation
3) God’s choice to give provide the grace needed to bring men to faith
4) God’s choice to save the group of people He foreknew would believe.
God be with you,
Dan
Calvinism teaches that God does whatever He chooses, but only that which is consistent with His character. God couldn’t have saved in any way that does not satisfy both His Holy justice as well as His mercy. It is hard to explain how any other way of salvation apart from the atonement of Christ could save. Am I missing something here?I agree, I think. I am not saying God could have choosen to save without Christ. Rather, what I am saying is the condition by which we recieve Christ (i.e. faith) could have been different.
God be with you,
Dan
When you try to explain the boundaries of the Trinity to a Jehovah’s Witness, they will comment, “that’s not logical.’ And, in a sense, they are right. But then again they are wrong: it is logical, just beyond us.There’s nothing illogical about the Trinity, either in the aspects that we can understand or in the aspects that we can’t. Just because we cannot understand something does not make it illogical.
God be with you,
Dan
When you say you believe election is God’s choice to save the group of people He knew would believe, do you mean God chose each member of that group individually, or only that He chose to save the group? Whoever places themselves into that group by believing becomes, thereby, the elect of God?
Cordially,
Greg
G. N. Barkman
[danchapa] Ed,Dan, that is exactly what I am saying!When you try to explain the boundaries of the Trinity to a Jehovah’s Witness, they will comment, “that’s not logical.’ And, in a sense, they are right. But then again they are wrong: it is logical, just beyond us.There’s nothing illogical about the Trinity, either in the aspects that we can understand or in the aspects that we can’t. Just because we cannot understand something does not make it illogical.
God be with you,
Dan
"The Midrash Detective"
[Martin_G] Hey Ed,Martin, I agree that one accepts unconditional election or one does not. I writes as one who does. But I would argue that the Scriptures themselves come at these matters from both directions. We know, for example, that we cannot save ourselves. Yet Acts 2:40 exhorts us to do just that:
i would have to disagree that a paradox between Arminianism and Calvinism makes sense. In order to do so, one would have to reduce both systems to specific ideas, and ignore the nuances within those systems.
Personally, I don’t believe that a middle ground can exist between the two, or that paradox makes sense, because the two positions are too similar. It is like finding the middle ground between the living room and the hallway: there just isn’t enough space there. On the other hand, they are devided by a wall: election is either conditional or unconditional, and saving grace can either be resisted or not. Why or how election is conditional or unconditional can be varied, but you are on one side or the other.
And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.”I am saying that the Scriptures describe salvation in both Sovereign Grace terms and Arminian terms.
"The Midrash Detective"
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