This article is no longer available online, but the entire four-part series is available for purchase as a downloadable resource/pdf.
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What is Calvinism? How should we feel about what it teaches? How does Calvinism contrast with what we believe to be a more biblical view of sin and salvation?
Jack Cottrell examines the essence and errors of Calvinism in this 10-page resource that originally appeared as a four-part series in CHRISTIAN STANDARD.
The articles focus on “Sovereignty and Free Will According to Calvinism” and “According to the Bible,” and a two-part explanation and response to “The T-U-L-I-P Doctrines.” Included are an article on the history of Calvinism””which didn”t originate with John Calvin””and a bibliography of the best books explaining Calvinism and Arminianism.
All downloads include permission to reproduce material up to 10 times for ministry and educational purposes.
To order this resource, CLICK HERE. To sample the first few paragraphs of article one, continue reading below . . .
When most people think of Calvinism, they think of a flower: TULIP. These five letters stand for the “five points of Calvinism,” or the five interconnected doctrines of sin and salvation as Calvinists understand them.
Five Doctrines
The “T” stands for total depravity. The word depravity refers to a condition of the heart; it means the sinner”s soul or spirit is evil, sinful, corrupt, or spiritually sick.
Most Christians (including me) believe all sinners become partially depraved, but Calvinists say every human being is born totally depraved. This does not mean a sinner is 100 percent corrupt, or as depraved as he can possibly be. Nor does it mean every act of the sinner is both internally and externally evil. Even a totally depraved person can do things that are outwardly good.
What total depravity means is the total person is corrupted by sin; every aspect of human nature is depraved, including the intellect and the will. Because the intellect has been corrupted, a sinner cannot truly understand the things of God, including the Bible. Because the will is sinful, a sinner cannot do anything that is inwardly good and acceptable to God. The latter is the key element of total depravity. It is called the bondage of the will.
The most significant implication of this bondage is that sinners are totally unable to respond to the gospel and turn to God in faith and repentance. As Louis Berkhof says, the sinner “cannot change his fundamental preference for sin and self to love for God, nor even make an approach to such a change” (Systematic Theology, 1941:247).
This total inability is thus the heart of total depravity. Because the sinner is unable to believe the gospel by his own choice, regeneration must precede faith, with both regeneration and faith being the unilateral and unconditional gifts of God, and with God himself unconditionally choosing those to whom he will give them.
This “unconditional election (choosing)” is the second main point (the “U”) in Calvinism”s TULIP system . . .
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