So far we’ve traced Arminius’ own beliefs about salvation and begun to contrast them with the theological system that was developed by those who followed after him. I’ve chosen to call Arminius’ beliefs Classical Arminianism, distinguishing it from Traditional Arminianism, the system developed by students of Arminius in the centuries since his life and work. Traditional Arminianism, though built on Arminius’ work, has drifted a bit from Arminius’ own understanding of Scripture.
I reiterate that Arminius is not a definitive authority on the truth. We must not hang our theological hats on his hooks without critiquing his beliefs by Scripture. He has no more authority to define the truth than any other man. I do believe, however, that Arminius was a diligent student of Scripture; inasmuch as his beliefs align with Scripture, we are able to benefit.
The things we’ve discovered so far are:
- Classical and Traditional Arminianism are agreed that all men, as a result of Adam’s sin, are born incapable of doing good and unable to keep God’s law. Not only that, man is unable to desire to do good apart from God’s grace (though Traditional Arminians would not emphasize that to the extent that Arminius did).
- Both views, based on their understanding of man’s sin nature, believe that God must provide a measure of grace for anyone to be saved, since “the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God.” This grace that precedes salvation is called “prevenient grace.”
- Both views believe that this prevenient grace can be resisted by man and that a man is responsible for whether or not he yields when touched by grace.
- Classical and Traditional Arminianism do not agree on the extent of prevenient grace. Traditional Arminianism holds that prevenient grace is distributed in some measure to all men. Arminius seemed to think it was confined to the proclamation of the gospel. That is, God’s prevenient grace operates in concert with His means of grace and is thus not experienced equally by all men.
As we continue down the roads of these systems, we find that they continue to diverge. While they agree on some of the initial principles, there are some subtle—but important—differences between these views, especially on their understanding of predestination, election, faith, and the nature of man’s free will.
I note again that these terms (with the exception of “free will”) are found in the very pages of Scripture. If we embrace all of God’s inspired Scriptures, we must wrestle with these concepts. You and I do not have to agree on our understandings of predestination and election, nor do we have to agree with Arminius or the Traditionalists. But we must each have an understanding. To reject these concepts wholesale is to cut out biblical language. Equally, faith is a constant theme in Scripture, and we must not neglect due emphasis on the necessity of faith for salvation.
We discussed Arminius’ own beliefs about predestination in the first two articles of this series. To summarize, he believed that God predestines for salvation those He foreknows will believe. He argued this not only from Romans 8:29 but also from the many Scriptures that condition the benefits of salvation to those who believe (cf. John 3:36, John 8:24, Acts 10:43, Acts 13:46, 1 John 5:12[1]). He says, “It is universally true that ‘God wills that all men should be saved, if they believe, and be condemned if they do not believe.’ That is, God has made a decree for electing only believers, and for condemning unbelievers.”[2] Also, “God by His own prescience (foreknowledge), knows who, of His grace, will believe, and who, of their own fault, will remain in unbelief.”[3]
On this the Traditionalists agree. Olson writes, “Predestination is simply God’s determination to save through Christ all who freely respond to God’s offer of free grace by repenting of sin and believing in Christ. It includes God’s foreknowledge of who will so respond.”[4] Classic and Traditional Arminianism agree that election is according to God’s foreknowledge of faith. God knows who will believe, and He chooses them for salvation.
For broader context, the Calvinist believes God’s predestination is the cause of a person’s faith, thus making it necessary that grace be irresistible. If God has chosen someone, then they must respond to His grace. In contrast, the Arminian believes that a person’s faith is the cause of God’s election. He is free to yield to or to resist God’s grace when it acts upon him, and God elects those He knows will yield to His grace. “God’s electing foreknowledge is caused by the faith of the elect.”[5] Arminius labored this point continuously, arguing time and again that those who believe are those God has chosen for salvation, not the other way around. He emphasized that the human and divine elements cooperate in the production of faith, neither overruling the other. His primary contention with his contemporary Calvinists was that they minimized the significance of faith in the process of salvation.
Both Classic and Traditional Arminianism believe that predestination is according to faith. Where they begin to diverge is on their understanding of what determines whether or not an individual exhibits faith. Both camps believe that faith is only possible by God’s grace. The Traditionalist, concerned that God’s mercy and goodness be properly emphasized, believes that all men have experienced sufficient grace such that they can exercise faith and be saved. Thus the determining factor is the individual’s choice to receive God’s grace or resist it.
They understand election to be corporate, but predestination to be personal.[6] God’s unconditional purpose in election is to save a group of believers; God’s conditional purpose in predestination is to elect those who exhibit faith. Put differently, election is God’s purpose to save people through Christ, and He has determined that all who believe can be saved through Him. But predestination is His selection of those particular people He knows will respond to the gospel in faith. Traditionalists are careful to clarify that election contains no selection of individual persons. Election is corporate, the choice of a people but not of specific people. Since election is not limited to particular persons, God provides prevenient grace to all, and those who God knows will yield to it are predestined.
Arminius himself held a view slightly more complex, but one that seems to do better maintaining the biblical tension between God’s provision of grace and man’s responsibility to receive it. While the Traditionalist believes that God’s prevenient grace extends to all, Arminius was not so definitive. Instead, he acknowledged that God gives grace variously according to His will. “It does not follow from [the belief that election is according to faith] that ‘God always acts in the same manner towards all men.’ For though He may seriously will the conversion and salvation of all men, yet He does not equally affect the conversion and salvation of all.”[7] He cited Deuteronomy 4:7 and 7:6, Psalm 147:20, Matthew 13:11, and Acts 14:16 as the basis for this conclusion. For example, he said “Matthew 13:11 proves that grace is not given equally and in the same measure to all, and, indeed, that the knowledge of ‘the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven’ is not divinely bestowed on all.”[8] He was not so concerned about limiting election to the corporate dimension, allowing that God works differently in different individuals.
His understanding of election had both corporate and personal elements. Thus it is insufficient to conclude that he thought the sole determining factor in a person’s predestination is his own exercise of faith. Rather, the determining factor is both God’s will and the individual’s choice. “Faith is, in such a sense, of the mere will of God, [Who] does not use an omnipotent and irresistible influence in producing faith in men, but a mild suasion and one adapted to incline the will of man, according to the mode of the human will: therefore the whole cause of the faith on one, and the unbelief of another, is the will of God, and the free choice of man.”[9]
Notice his emphasis on the cooperation of God’s prevenient grace and man’s choice. God gives grace, not just corporately, but individually, yet not in the overruling of an individual’s will but in the guiding of it toward the truth. What then is the distinction between the one who believes and the one who refuses to believe? God’s will and man’s choice. What, then, determines whether one will have faith and be numbered among the elect? The answer is the same. God works in a man to lead him to faith, and that man must cooperate with God in that move. Will God override the man’s will? Certainly not. Equally so, man will not come to God apart from God’s initial, preceding, enabling grace.
To limit Arminius to simply a corporate election is difficult, since he so often references God’s prevenient grace operating in a specific sense in particular people and not just generically. For example, he says “Those decrees ‘I will to give life to him who believes’ and ‘I will to give faith to this man’ are distinct.”[10] The first decree is corporate: If anyone believes, I will give him life. But the second is personal: I will give this man faith. He knew no personal experience of faith apart from the personal gift of God’s grace. This emphasis on faith itself being God’s gift is a component often lost in the Traditional framework. Yes, election is according to God’s foreknowledge of a man’s faith. Yet where does that faith come from? Arminius attributed God as the source of faith, not in erasing man’s own will, but in stimulating it and cooperating with it so the man is led to exhibit faith. Only those who yield to this divine action are numbered among the elect.
Thus in Arminius’ understanding, personal election (predestination) is both according to foreknowledge of faith and foreknowledge of those particular persons who would receive God’s gift of faith through His prevenient grace. God is sovereign over the distribution of prevenient grace. Those who experience it are free to yield or to resist. Those who yield are saved; those who resist are damned. God, knowing who will yield and who will resist, chooses particular people for salvation according to their faith.
Whether God’s grace operates in a general sense to all or in a particular sense to the elect is not clear from Arminius’ teachings. What is clear is that faith is a product of God’s grace. The source of faith is not anything in man; it is God’s gift. Faith does not exist apart from man’s demonstration of it, nor can it exist in a man unwilling to yield to God. Yet it cannot begin in man, but rather begins in God. God provides that which man lacks, and without God’s provision man cannot produce faith.
This raises a difficulty. If election is according to faith, and faith is given variously according to God’s will, how can God justly judge those who have not experienced sufficient grace for salvation? Or put more directly, if God is responsible for the faith of the elect, is He not also responsible for the unbelief of the reprobate? This would pose a significant problem, since God cannot be the author of sin, nor can He desire it, nor can He will it.
First, we must understand the difference between dependance on prevenient grace and subservience to it. Arminius believed that faith is impossible without God’s grace. Thus, we are dependent on grace for illumination before we can exercise faith. But that is distinct from subservience to grace. Irresistible grace is subservience, indicating that when God’s prevenient grace acts, we have no choice but to respond. But that was not Arminius’ understanding. Rather, he believed that when God’s grace acts, we have the opportunity to respond, an opportunity that was not ours apart from God’s grace but is now available to us. We, enabled by God’s grace, are free to choose or to resist, and thus are responsible for whether we yield or resist.
This means the reprobate also are responsible for their own resistance of God’s grace. Arminius says, ““It is not to the disparagement of grace, that the wickedness and perversity of most men is so great that they do not suffer themselves to be converted by it to God. The Author of grace determined not to compel men, by His grace, to yield assent, but to influence them by a mild and gentle suasion, which influence, not only does not take away the free consent of the free-will, but even establishes it.”[11] The one who turns his face away from the light rather than joyfully walking toward it is responsible for his own condemnation.
In terms of election and reprobation, then, we must keep the causes distinct. Election is by faith, a faith caused both by God’s prevenient grace and man’s cooperation with God’s grace. Reprobation is by disbelief, caused solely by a man’s own resistance to the truth. Arminius says, “Election to salvation is according to the foreknowledge of future faith, which God has determined to bestow of His own grace upon them by the ordinary means ordained by Himself. But reprobation is according to foreknowledge of unbelief or contempt of the gospel, the fault of which remains, entirely, in the reprobate themselves.”[12] God knows those who are His (who have faith), and they are chosen for salvation. He also knows those who will reject Him (who disbelieve or despise the gospel), and they are appointed to judgment.
To set up a direct parallel between the reprobate and the elect is to do damage to the biblical explanation of justice, for “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23), every mouth being stopped and the whole world being guilty before God (Romans 3:19). Thus we must understand that just deserts for all of us is eternal condemnation. It is God’s mercy that offers us redemption. God is not unjust to leave us to our deserved fate; He is immensely merciful to offer us salvation. Those who resist God’s grace are all the more responsible for their own condemnation.
Returning to our contrast between Classical and Traditional Arminianism, the Traditionalist defines election in terms of God’s choice of man and defines predestination in terms of man’s choice of God. Arminius (Classical) conflated election and predestination, not limiting God’s choice in election to just a group of people (believers) but extending it to include particular persons, those to whom He willed to provide the means to faith. Though the definition that predestination is according to God’s foreknowledge of faith occupies some common ground between the views, the views are not united in their broader understanding of predestination. They are distinct in their beliefs about the distribution of prevenient grace and the cause of faith, therefore they differ in their understandings of what “elect according to the foreknowledge of faith” actually means. Traditionalists would argue that an individual’s faith is the sole determiner of whether or not they are elect. Arminius understood predestination as a composite reality, determined both by one’s faith and by God’s grace.
[1] The Works of James Arminius, Volume Three (Lamp Post Inc., 2015), 356.
[2] Ibid., 356.
[3] Ibid., 357. Paratheses mine.
[4] Olson, Roger E., Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (Intervarsity Press, 2006), 37.
[5] Ibid., 35.
[6] Ibid., 37.
[7] Works, Volume Three, 357.
[8] Ibid., 363.
[9] Ibid., 366. Emphasis mine.
[10] Ibid., 357.
[11] Ibid., 363-364.
[12] Ibid., 356.