Calvinism:
A Mental Disorder
A 'mental disorder' allegation with regard to Reformed Theology seems like an extreme assessment of
the philosophical system called Calvinism. But make no mistake! Calvinism is
far more philosophical than it is theological. It has its roots in speculation
rather than revelation. It is therefore entirely proper to brand
Calvinism as a system of philosophical speculation. This article will seek to illustrate and establish that allegation as
we take an imaginary trip through the scriptures with two men – one a
Calvinist and the other a Biblicist. The Calvinist is a staunch
five-pointer and knows all the arguments for his positions. The
Biblicist is a zero-pointer and knows why he rejects all five points of
Calvinism. At various stops along their journey, they engage in brief
dialogue before moving along to the next text. So off they go. First
stop: Genesis 4:3-16. The Biblicist points out that God, as he
reasoned with Cain, was sincere in his offer of acceptance IF Cain
would but do the right thing, bring the prescribed sacrifice, which
Abel his brother had brought. But our Calvinist argues that the reason
why Cain rejected God's offer is because God had not chosen Cain, did
not regenerate him so he could hear God's voice. As a result, Cain
heard only the sounds of God's words, not the words themselves. Cain
therefore remained spiritually dead and fulfilled God's purpose in NOT
electing him. I've actually heard Calvinists make this ludicrous
argument. Our Biblicist cautions that such an analysis puts the sincerity of God
in doubt, as if God was toying with Cain with no intention of accepting
him. The Calvinist assures the Biblicist that there is no
contradiction, that Cain COULD have responded if he WOULD have, that
God WOULD have accepted him if he HAD done well. But the Biblicist
contends, and correctly so, that if God MUST regenerate a man BEFORE he
can believe, and God chooses NOT to regenerate that man, then all of
the promises God makes to sinners like Cain contingent upon faith and
obedience are thus meaningless and portray God as disingenuous. But the
Calvinist maintains they're dealing with the 'deep things' of God – no
contradiction. Second stop: Isaiah 53:6. Here the Biblicist points out that “All” that
begins the verse and “all” that ends it MUST be the same group of
folks. The Calvinist concurs, but then insists that the
“all's” of Isaiah 53:6 MUST be a reference to the elect since it is impossible that the
Lord could lay the iniquity of any man upon Christ and that man not be
saved. It's the old “God cannot make the sinner pay for what Christ
paid” argument. In other words, God would NEVER allow his Son to
suffer for sins and then make the sinner suffer for them the second
time. The late and well-known Calvinist Harold Camping used to say that
any God that would require sins be paid for twice is a monster! The
Biblicist questions whether the CONTEXT could allow for such a meaning
since the prophet's primary target audience was the nation of Israel,
some of whom were saved, many of whom died in unbelief. The Calvinist
thinks his philosophical argument trumps the context.
Third stop: John 3:16. Here the Biblicist points out the obvious...that
the world is loved by God and drove him to give his only begotten Son
for their salvation. He adds furthermore if the plain sense of
scripture makes good sense, we should seek no other sense, lest we turn
the text into nonsense. But our Calvinist sticks with his “no
suffering twice” argument, insisting that if the “world” of John 3:16
meant all of humanity, then all humanity would be saved. Again, the
Biblicist cites the CONTEXT as an arbiter, reasoning that Jesus would
have expressed (1) a mindset consistent with OT mentions of “world”
that included, in almost every case, ALL of humanity, and (2) a genuine
desire for Nicodemus to “get it” in terms of understanding the new
birth, the question that triggered this whole line of thought on Jesus'
part. For the Calvinist, the philosophical once again trumps the
contextual. The “world” of John 3:16, in his mind, must mean “the world
of the elect.” The Calvinist knows that if “world” means “all of
humanity, both Jew and Gentile”, a meaning Nicodemus certainly derived
from Jesus' words, his whole system of Calvinist theory bites the
proverbial dust. Four
additional stops: 2 Corinthians 5:14; 1 Timothy 2:3-6; 4:10;
Hebrews 2:9. These two men could have made many more stops in their
journey. But these classic texts represent what many other texts
declare, that (1) Christ died for all who died spiritually in Adam, (2)
God would have ALL men to be saved and gave himself a ransom for ALL,
(3) Jesus is the Saviour of ALL men, especially believers, and (4)
Jesus tasted death for EVERY man. As the Biblicist graciously presents
a preponderance of evidence for an all-inclusive atonement, the
Calvinist, with his philosophical arguments for a
limited atonement, continues to maintain that “all men” cannot
mean all men,
that “every man” cannot mean every man, and that “the world” cannot
mean the whole world. At the end of the journey, the Calvinist believes he has weathered the
storm, that his rational system of philosophical thought has withstood the
test, notwithstanding his bastardization of nearly every text and
context along the way. With his philosophical penknife, the Calvinist
has eviscerated the Gospel. The Biblicist reminds him that by stripping
the Word of God of ANY and EVERY objective reference to a Universal
Atonement, he has essentially destroyed any biblical assurance
whatsoever that Jesus died for HIS OWN SINS. All that remains then is a subjective
experience, a profession of
faith, which may have indeed been genuine, resulting in the new birth.
He further admonishes the Calvinist that he is
dangerously close to "denying the Lord who bought him" (2 Peter
2:1). What
then shall we conclude about a man who believes the Gospel, trusts
Christ based on the persuasion that Jesus died for HIS sins, is
genuinely born
again, and down the spiritual road embraces a system of
philosophical thought in which he
MUST now argue that Jesus did NOT die for ALL, and therefore may or may
not have died for HIM because he has managed to explain away ANY objective
biblical evidence to support an atonement? ANY man
who would argue that Jesus did NOT die for all of humanity MUST also
acknowlede that the death of Christ may not have included him.
THAT man suffers from a mental disorder, which is further complicated
by the purposeful bastardization of biblical contexts because he MUST
keep his Calvinism alive at all costs. Make no mistake! The Calvinistic
argument for Limited Atonement is philosophical, NOT theological. The
Calvinist MUST impose upon biblical contexts his philosophical
arguments in order to destroy the theological basis for a Universal
Aonement. Before
they part company, the Biblicist reminds his Calvinist friend that
the Gospel has both a PROVISION element (“Christ died
for our sins” -- 1 Corinthians 15:3-4) and
an APPROPRIATION element (“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou
shall be saved” – Acts 16:31). He also points out that hell, even
though it entails unimaginable suffering for lost sinners, has
absolutely NO
propitiatory value or payment value whatsoever Godward.
Christ
suffered and paid for our sins in full. God accepted that payment as
evidenced in the Resurrection. Men
go to hell, not to pay for sins, but because of unbelief that
leaves them in their sins to die in
their sins. While eternity in the Lake of Fire is a matter of suffering, the
sinner will not be paying for his sins. That was a work only God
himself could perform on a sinner's behalf, and he did so for ALL men
in the Person of his Son, Jesus of Nazareth. Men go to hell because of
unbelief, a failure to appropriate by faith the atonement God
provided. The seeds
of this mental disorder called Calvinism are typically planted in the
minnd of a believer, one who became a Christian by
believing the "whosoever will" gospel, when
he hears or reads for the first time a Calvinist make these
philosophical arguments. At first blush, they come across as SO
logical. He says
to himself, "How come I never heard this stuff before?" He
may conclude that his previous pastors were
'unlearned' or 'ignorant' for withholding such glorious
'insights' from him,
or for just not 'getting it'. He begins to immerse himself in the
writings of other
Calvinists (Puritans, Spurgeon, Boettner, Pink, MacArthur, Sproul et
al) to
constantly reinforce his new thinking. "How can so many good men
be wrong about this stuff?" he asks himself. Over time he
masters the 'proof-texts' in an effort to defend his
new-found
philosophical system. Having become a champion of
'sovereighty' (or so he thinks), he morphs into a zealot, arguing
against the same
Universal Atonement he once believed to the saving of his soul. He
is now proudly a 'Grace Man', who has bastardized every biblical
context
providing objective evidence for his own redemption. The
mental disorder of Calvinism is further complicated in the matter
of evangelism. Now that he has embraced the doctrine of Particular
Redemption, he's armed with only half the Gospel. He cannot tell
ANY lost man the Good News that Christ died for his sins UNLESS he is
willing to play the hypocrite. If he does not believe Jesus died for
ALL, how can he with good conscience assure ANY lost man of
that truth? In other words, how is it possible to evangelize ANY
lost man with the Good News that Jesus died for his sins when
Particular Redmption puts the whole issue in doubt? It is NOT
possssible! The only REAL evangelism done in this world is by
those who believe Jesus died for ALL. Where salvation from sin is
concerned, there is NO Good News to ANY man for whom
Christ did not die and for whom God made NO atonement in
the death of his Son. One of the arguments
a Calvinist learns early on is that his view of Particular
Redemption in no way affects evangelism. It goes like this:
"I don't know who the elect are. My job is to share the
Gospel, let God handle the results and save his elect!" But
this lame attempt to justify defective thinking once again
begs the question: "What Gospel is the Calvinist sharing?" If he's
telling a lost man Jesus loves him and died for his sins, then why
is he a Calvinist in the first place? He's a hypocrite. Charles Haddon Spurgeon is a perfect example of this mental disorder. In a sermon entitled “Election No Discouragement To Seeking Souls”,
Spurgeon made this statement: “Furthermore, if we understand the gospel
at all, the gospel lies in a nutshell. It is this: ‘Believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved'...This promise is the gospel” (Spurgeon’s Sermons,
Vol. 8, p. 233). The apostle Paul understood the gospel, and would
have this to say to Spurgeon: “That promise, brother Charles, is
NOT the Gospel. It's a half-Gospel. The Gospel is the promise
(offer) of forgiveness and life eternal based upon the Good
News that Christ provided an atonement for sins!” Because
Spurgeon held the false doctrine of a Limited Atonement, it was
impossible for him to declare the Gospel Paul preached. He was
forced, like all Calvinists are, to redefine the Gospel (as
promise minus provision) because of the
limited scope he placed upon the death of Christ. The Calvinist
who thinks he's preaching the Gospel by accentuating the promise
at the expense of the provision is certifiably
delusional. In the same message,
Spurgeon declared: “If any man who ever lived, or ever shall live,
believes in Jesus Christ, he hath eternal life. Election or no
election, if you are resting upon the rock of ages, you are saved. If
you, as a guilty sinner, take the righteousness of Christ—if, all black
and foul and filthy, you come to wash in the fountain filled with
blood—sovereignty or no sovereignty, rest assured of this, that you are
redeemed from the wrath to come” (Ibid, p. 233).
His remarks may sound commendable, but they are grossly
hypocritical and false. God CANNOT redeem ANY sinner for
whom Christ did not die. God CANNOT save him no matter how much he
believes! Spurgeon’s theology of Particular Redemption taught
him there was neither effectual grace nor a fountain filled with
blood for those excluded from the atonement. Spurgeon’s words are
indicative of his intellectual dishonesty, as well as that of every
Calvinist, in this area. Moreover, they enable us to understand that
the great success of Spurgeon’s ministry can be largely attributed to
his inconsistencies with the tenets of Calvinism rather than his
embrace of them.
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