The following is the body of an e-mail I wrote to a friend about my previous post.
On your first paragraph, I see the challenge to be:
1) to maintain the tension between the poles of truths revealed to us in a "dialectic" form. Rev. Rob Rayburn of Seattle (PCA) has a remarkable series of sermons on this subject:
http://www.faithtacoma.org/sermons/Scripture/Reading.htm
but you are familiar with the idea, for example, the tension between "all of grace" on one side and "human responsibility" on the other regarding salvation. To quote Rayburn:
"I am speaking of the fact that biblical truth is universally presented in dialectical form. By that I mean that the Bible characteristically presents any doctrine in terms of its polarities. The truth concerning any particular subject or theme is taught, now in one place, now in another, in terms of the poles that lie at the opposite ends of the particular continuum."
2) to give credit to each passage of Scripture as it stands, being careful not to try to make it say something it doesn't say, lest one begin to construct a system the Bible will not support. The "analogy of Scripture" is a legitimate idea, based on the doctrine of divine inspiration, but it can become a tool for forcing parts of the Bible to fit one's favorite passages. Humility and good training in Logic goes a long way.
As for your comment about works and salvation, in reference to my article, the issue assumes that our salvation is a complex matter, in the sense of being multi-faceted. Paul champions justification by faith alone in opposition to justification via the works of the law. James champions the place of sanctification in the life of those who "claim" to have believed unto justification. Thus, James does not contradict Paul on justification - justification is still not of works - but he makes us think about the "whole package" of salvation, which has a place for human responsibility. It is all of grace, in the long run: "what hast thou that thou didst not receive?" I Cor. 4:7. But having grace, we are not to presume upon grace (which is the best way of expressing it that I can think of). In other words, the Calvinist (vs. the Arminian, who does indeed make works the ultimate basis of salvation), must be careful to not argue away the N.T. warnings of apostasy, saying, "well, that's only hypothetical because anyone truly elect will not apostasize." It is true; the elect will not be lost - Jesus said so. However, God presents much of what He says about our salvation to our current, time-bound, human experience. That means we must beware of looking at everything from the perspective of the eternal decrees (which are unknown to us) and take seriously God's commands to be faithful.
All of this touches on the issue of assurance of salvation, which you rightly move on to. The issue you raise is a good one, especially in the history of Puritanism. By the way, Max Webber has been debunked on his famous theory. There were Puritans who did indeed get messed up regarding assurance. The problem was not keeping the tension I discussed above. The New England Congregationalists were probably the worst. They came up with the idea that the elect would have a particular experience of conversion, with a set series of events. Thus, if anyone were to be admitted to the Table, they had to be able to recount a particular narrative of their conversion. Only those who could honestly say they had this experience could be assured they were elect. There is much that is preposterous about this, but the main thing is the idea that our assurance is to be based upon our ability to discern the election of God, which, as you say, is something "far from being certain". It's really presumptious.
The Calvinistic consensus on assurance is that our assurance is based primarily upon the simple promises of God in Scripture. We look away from our experience (which can be so varied and misunderstood) to the faithfulness of God in His Word. We thus honour Christ as the all-sufficient Saviour. Secondarily, we recognise such things as those which James says, and that John says in his First Epistle, which point to the idea of "fruit of repentance;" that is, evidence of regeneration. Quite simply, if you see your life being changed by God (and for those of us who have this experience, we can testify that He is doing the work, not us...) then that is additional evidence of the validity of one's faith. However, as has already been noted, since this can be such a subjective exercise, it can be problematic. Here's where people like Cowper and Johnson come in. It helps our assurance, but it cannot be the ground. There is a more objective aspect of this, of course. The Bible points to this in those passages that plainly say that murderers, adulterers, idolators, etc., will not inherit the kingdom. James does too, pointing out various hypocrisies. The subjective troubles are those which the introverted bring upon themselves, seeking to examine their faith. Another good example of subjectivism is Bunyan, in his "Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners." You will note that Bunyan gets relief whenever his attention is drawn away from self-examination to the objective promises of the gospel.
The Arminian position, for the sincere and reflective soul, cannot give assurance, because it falls out of balance with the tension of the dialectic, chosing to make our works the determining factor, not the faithful love of God and the faithful duty of the Son to keep all those whom the Father has given to Him. It results in people being preoccupied with how they are doing and tends to develop spiritual pride and all the ills that go along with it - man-centeredness, legalism, strife, etc.
These are, of course, generalities. Calvinists can be rather full of strife as well! But it is not because of the temptations of their doctrine - they are just sinners.
I consent with you the idea of emotional disposition due to background. Such things are real and it underlines all the more how important it is that we understand for ourselves how God nurtures us and consequently nurture our children in the same manner.
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