God's Sovereignty, Free Will, and Salvation - Introduction

Sovereignty

Free Will &

Salvation

Is everyone going to be saved?

The History of Unitarian Universalism

In the sixteenth century, Laelius Socinus
and his nephew Faustus revived the fourth
century heresy of Arianism and taught
that the Trinity was a false doctrine and
that Christ was not God. In that sense,
they were “Unitarian” in their teaching.

But they went further and said that some
of God‟s attributes were optional and not
necessary. They claimed that God‟s
justice is optional, but is mercy is
mandatory. Therefore, if justice is optional
and mercy mandatory, then according to
Socinianism, all people will be saved by
God. In this respect, they were
“universalists”.

Answer: No, there will be few saved, many lost

“Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that
leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. “For the gate is
small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it. ”
(Matthew 7:13–14)
“Many will say to Me on that day, „Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your
name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many
miracles?‟ “And then I will declare to them, „I never knew you; depart from Me,
you who practice lawlessness.‟ ” (Matthew 7:22–23)
www.confidentchristians.org

Answer: No, there will be few saved, many lost

“Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth
and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great
and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book
was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which
were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which
were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were
judged, every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were
thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone‟s
name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. ”
(Revelation 20:11–15)

Who decided that the plan of salvation
included the fact that few would be saved
and many lost?

Answer: God Decided the plan
“For indeed, the Son of Man is going as it has been
determined; but woe to that man by whom He is
betrayed!” ” (Luke 22:22)

“this Man [Jesus], delivered over by the
predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you
nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and
put Him to death. ” (Acts 2:23)

“But the things which God announced beforehand
by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ
would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. ” (Acts 3:18)

“For truly in this city there were gathered together
against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You
anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with
the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do
whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined
to occur. ” (Acts 4:27–28)

Who ultimately determines who is going to
be saved?

Is it Ultimately God or Us?
“But we should always give
thanks to God for you,
brethren beloved by the
Lord, because God has
chosen you from the
beginning for salvation
through sanctification by the
Spirit and faith in the truth. ”
(2 Thessalonians 2:13)

“They said, “Believe in the Lord
Jesus, and you will be saved, you
and your household.” ”
(Acts 16:31)


If it‟s God, then He determined who He would save.

If it‟s us, then God determined that it would be us, using our
free will choice.

Either way, God is in sovereign control over our salvation.

Let‟s look at a brief history of the
sovereignty, free will, and salvation
debate.

“Grant what thou
commandest, and
command what thou
dost desire.”
- Augustine


Pelagius vs. Augustine

Pelagius (c.354-after 418) was
a British monk who emerged as
a spiritual leader of both clergy
and laity in Rome around A.D.
380. He bristled greatly at
Augustine‟s statement and
took issue with his views on the
inherited sinfulness of man from
Adam and the moral inability
that Augustine believed
Scripture taught.



Pelagius‟ teachings can be
summarized in three basic positions:

1. There is no connection between
Adam‟s sin and the state all
people are born into. People are
born innocent without sin
2. People have the free will to
choose good or evil
3. There is a grace of God active in
the world, but it is only an
„illuminating grace‟ that influences
people, but it can be resisted


Augustine opposed Pelagius and
argued that Scripture clearly teaches
every human is born in sin and their
conscience is marred so that they, by
nature rebel against God. In short,
Augustine‟s position was that people
do not save themselves, because they
cannot, nor are they saved against their
will, because they will not. God needs to
make their will compliant: “Neither the
grace of God alone, nor he alone, but
the grace of God with him…”

At the council of Carthage in A.D.
412, Augustine won and had Pelagius‟
views officially condemned.


Thomas Aquinas Follows Augustine

Thomas Aquinas followed
Augustine where the free will of
humanity is concerned and stated
that all people are absolute debtors
to God and cannot merit salvation
on their own or by their choice.

“It is impossible that any creature
should cause grace.”

“Hence, however much a man
prepares himself, he does not
necessarily receive grace from God.”


On All Saints Day in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 thesis to the door
of the Castle Church in Wittenburg Germany in hopes of stirring an
academic discussion with church leaders. Most historians will say that the
core issue was Luther‟s position of salvation by faith alone. But also at
issue was something more.

Soli
To the Glory of God Alone

The Five Solus
Christ Alone
„Solas‟
of the Sola Scripture Alone

Reformation
Sola
Faith Alone

Sola
Grace Alone


"It is wrong to suppose that the doctrine of
justification by faith alone, that storm center
of the Reformation, was the crucial question in
the minds of such theologians as Martin
Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, Martin Bucer, and
John Calvin. This doctrine was important to
the Reformers because it helped to express
and to safeguard their answer to another,
more vital, question, namely, whether sinners
are wholly helpless in their sin, and whether
God is to be thought of as saving them by
free, unconditional, invincible grace, not only
justifying them for Christs' sake when they
come to faith, but also raising them from the
death of sin by His quickening Spirit in order
to bring them to faith."
-Michael Haykin
Professor of Church History


Martin Luther on Free Will
Martin Luther called his
book “The Bondage of
the Will” his most
important work. In it he
argues that humanity is in
bondage to sin, freely
choosing to sin by their
own will, yet still a slave to
sin and unable to choose
God on their own.

“I praise and command
you highly for this also,
that unlike all the rest
you alone have attacked
the real issue, the
essence of the matter in
dispute.”
Martin Luther to Erasmus
Response to Diatribe of the
Freedom of the Will


Martin Luther on Free Will

“Free will without God‟s
grace is not free at all, but
is the permanent prisoner
and bondslave of evil,
since it cannot turn itself
to good.”
- Martin Luther


John Calvin on Free Will

Like Luther, the Genevan
Reformer embraced the notion
of original sin in humanity and
the inability of a sinful person
to freely choose God.

“When the will is enchanted as
the slave of sin, it cannot make
a movement towards goodness,
far less steadily pursue it.”


Calvin (with Luther) affirmed
humanity does have free will in that
people can and do act voluntarily,
without compulsion. Men and women
make choices every day that are
carried through freely via their will.
But concerning the things of God,
Calvin says humanity is “blinder than
moles.”

How they can a person freely
choose God according to Calvin?


“God, therefore, begins the good work
in us by exciting in our hearts a desire, a
love, and a study of righteousness, or
(to speak more correctly) by turning,
training, and guiding our hearts unto
righteousness. . . . I say the will is
abolished, but not in so far as it is [a]
will, for in conversion everything
essential to our original nature remains”
I also say, that it is created anew, not
because the will then begins to exist,
but because it is turned from evil to
good.”
- John Calvin


“Historically, it is a simple matter
of fact that Martin Luther and
John Calvin . . . and all the
leading Protestant theologians
of the first epoch of the
Reformation, stood on precisely
the same ground here. On other
points they had their differences;
but in asserting the helplessness
of man and the sovereignty of
God in grace, the were entirely
at one."
- J. I. Packer


The Catholic Church Responds
At the Council of Trent (1545-
1563) , the Catholic Church met to
consider the Reformation, with the
goal being to defend their beliefs and
distance themselves from the
reformers.

The Council affirmed the doctrine
of original Adamic sin; humanity is
born into the world separated from
God. Thus, infants born need
cleansing from Adam‟s sin and so
need to be baptized to wash away
Adam‟s disobedience.


The Catholic Church Responds
Baptism, said the Council, removes the
guilt of Adam from every child and
leaves them in a state of innocence with
a free will that may or may not choose to
sin. The position is clear: “If any one
denies, that, by the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ, which is conferred in
baptism, the guilt of original sin is
remitted; or even asserts that the whole
of that which has the true and proper
nature of sin is not taken away . . . Let
him be anathema.”

In essence, they are returned to a state
enunciated by Pelagius.


The Catholic Church & Molinism
To counter the intellectual and Biblical
arguments of the reformers regarding
God‟s sovereignty and humanity‟s free
will, the Catholic Church responded
with the Jesuit Luis de Molina.

According to Molina, God has three
kinds of knowledge:

1. Natural – Knowledge of everything
that could be
2. Free - Knowledge of everything
that will be
3. Middle - Knowledge of everything
that would be


The Catholic Church & Molinism
It is Middle Knowledge – scientia
media – that distinguishes Molinism.
This concept says God does not
know future free acts of individuals
like He does other things; He knows
them contingently. He has intuited
what each, according to their innate
liberty, would do if placed in a certain
situation. God, in essence, waits to
see what a free creature does before
He selects those who will be saved.
But since God is eternal, the
sequence is only logical and not
chronological.


The Rise of Arminius
Jacob Arminius (1560-1609), one of
the reformers, moved away from
Calvin‟s and Luther‟s teachings where
sovereignty and free will are concerned.
Arminius said the relationship between
God and humanity is one of
cooperative assistance. The Holy
Spirit is not overcoming a hostile will to
make it compliant so much as it is
assisting and increasing a person‟s
natural faculties to respond to God.
The Holy Spirit only succeeds so far
as a person concurs. People can
prevent the grace of God by resisting it.


Arminianism vs. Reformed Teachings
The Synod of Dort was held in 1618-
1619 to debate the teachings of Arminius
and the reformers. There were key issues
at the center of the debate:

• A person‟s ability to choose God
• God‟s election based on foreknowledge
or His divine choice
• Whether Christ died for all
• Whether a person can resist grace
• If a person could lose their salvation

The end result was that Arminianism was
rejected and reformed teachings was
upheld.


T – Total Depravity
U – Unconditional Election
L – Limited Atonement
I – Irresistible Grace
P – Perseverance of the Saints

Overview of the Positions on Sin/Free Will
Pelagianism Arminianism Calvinism
(Semi-Pelagianism) (Reformed Theology)
State at birth Innocent Totally depraved Totally depraved
(conscience (conscience effaced)
corrupted)
Ability Can obey God Cooperate with God Cannot cooperate with
God
Guilt None Potential Judicial/actual

“In Adam” Not at all Potentially Legally/naturally

Inherited from Bad example Propensity to sin; Necessity to sin;
Adam necessity to die necessity to die
What is imputed One‟s own sin One‟s own sin One‟s own sin and
Adam‟s sin
Spiritual image of Retained Effaced Effaced
God
Effect of grace None Sufficient for all Efficient on those God
chooses

John Wesley – a Calvin/Arminian Mix
John Wesley (1703-1791) adopted a
position that was a middle ground
between Reformed and Arminian
teaching. He affirmed humanity was
totally depraved and could not
cooperate with God. However, he said
that because of Christ‟s work on the
cross, God‟s grace comes upon all
people – a grace termed preventing or
„prevenient‟ grace – and that people at
that point are capable of freely
cooperating with God where their
salvation is concerned.

“Without it (prevenient grace), the
Calvinist logic is irrefutable.”
– Robert E. Chiles

Positions on Sovereignty and Free Will
Calvinism Arminianism Wesleyanism

Total Depravity Unable to respond Able to respond Unable to respond to
to God without to God with help God without Prevenient
grace from God grace
Unconditional Elected to God‟s call goes God‟s call goes out to all
Election Salvation by God out to all; humanity and must be freely
alone freely believes and accepted by a person via
is saved a restored will
Limited Christ died only for Christ died for Christ died for everyone
Atonement the Elect everyone
Irresistible God‟s call Can resist God‟s Can resist God‟s call
Grace effectual; it cannot call
fail; a person will
freely come to God
when called
Perseverance of Cannot lose Can lose salvation Can lose salvation
the Saints salvation

Open Theism – A Heresy to Avoid

Open Theism is a theological position dealing with human free will and God‟s sovereignty. It
is the teaching that God has granted to humanity free will and that in order for the free will to
be truly free, the future free will choices of individuals cannot be known ahead of time by
God. In Open Theism, the future is either knowable or not knowable. Some open theists
say God knows the future, but voluntarily limits His knowledge of free will choices so that
they can remain truly free. Other open theists maintain that the future, being non existent, is
not knowable, even by God. Gregory Boyd, an advocate of Open Theism says, "Much of
it [the future], open theists will concede, is settled ahead of time, either by God's
predestining will or by existing earthly causes, but it is not exhaustively settled ahead of time.
To whatever degree the future is yet open to be decided by free agents, it is unsettled."

Concluding Thoughts and Questions…

Why evangelize…? Am I truly free…?

Can I lose my salvation…?

It‟s not fair…!
Does God choose some people for hell…?

Can God fail…? Sovereignty is just fatalism…!

God's Sovereignty, Free Will, and Salvation - Introduction

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God's Sovereignty, Free Will, and Salvation - Introduction