Epilogue

 

 

 

            The time I have spent writing this has been rather disillusioning.  Not disillusioning with Calvinism as a system, but at the disinterest in the truth among the Church at large.  By far most people I have spoken with, when hearing I am working on this book, react by declaring that Calvinism is not true.  But they do not really understand Calvinism!  And they do not want to.  It is as though Calvinism has been so hated for so long that now the people whom the church is composed of are disgusted by the very word!  But they don’t really know what Calvinism is about.

            I have learned a lot about myself as well, during this book’s pregnancy as it were.  I have a strong propensity to become highly focused on one aspect of God’s character at a time while neglecting the more important things, kind of like the Pharisees who focused on one point of the law but neglected the real subjects about the law, i.e. love and mercy.  Our God is a God who loves.  He is a good God, and whatever He does is perfect and it is good.

            Luther once said that bewilderment is the true comprehension.  I think we as Christians should store up the things on the previous pages and praise God, for salvation is wholly of Him.  But I also think that life itself ought not to revolve around the doctrines of Grace.  Christians should love the Grace of God, but they should not allow it to separate them from other believers.  Certainly I think this subject is very important, and it has thoroughly influenced the way I give thanks to God for my salvation.  It has humbled me more than any Christian today wants to be humbled.  I have found myself living in utter and complete dependence on God, a thing He is still teaching me.  But I will not compromise the relationship I have with other believers who disagree with me.  I thoroughly enjoy engaging in conversations about this subject with people but it seems that mostly, Arminians I talk to just want to jump right in and start talking about what’s wrong with my perspective.  There is no unity when this subject comes up!  I will talk with someone on the subject if they are honestly having questions or struggles, but it seems like you can tell when someone just wants to exasperate you with argument.  In those cases I simply say I will discuss it with them if they are open to the possibility of my position being the scripturally correct position, but like I said, I don’t want this subject to emotionally and spiritually separate me from them!  As Paul would probably say, “God forbid!”

It is frustrating to me also, because I absolutely love learning about truth.  I became a theist because the evidence convinced me that there is a God who created the universe.  From there I became a Christian because I was convinced by the evidence that Christ truly rose from the dead and that his time on the cross was spent bearing my sin.  This had huge implications for my life.  Later, I became a Calvinist because I was convinced by the scriptures that salvation is wholly of God.  But first and foremost I am a Christian.  I love truth and am frustrated because it seems that the only way to maintain unity is to remain silent on this subject.  But this is the truth, I am thoroughly convinced!  How do you just remain silent about something you know to be true but everyone else either doesn’t want to or can’t understand?

Certainly I am getting this book into peoples’ hands because I love truth and not because I enjoy division.  My greatest hope is that people will see the great grace of God and the utter fallenness of man and be amazed by God’s sovereignty, His grace, His mercy in saving anyone at all, and a low view of our fallen selves, because we deserve no good thing, but let us in all things lift up God who is forever praised.  Amen!

God’s sovereignty in salvation is a subject that has divided the church for at least 1700 years, and that will not change until we see Christ face to face because everyone sees things from their perspective and they have built all they know about God from that perspective.  I was a relatively new Christian when I began to see the truth of Calvinism, but luckily I had not built a lot on the foundation I had laid.  It was difficult to change the way I saw God, but I was more than willing to accommodate myself to what I found the truth to be.  Some who have been in the faith for many years, the way I see it, would have great difficulty in changing their perspectives at this point, because God has seemed this one way for so long that it’s hard to give that up in favor of another point of view.  I would hope that would not be the case, however.

Some may charge, “But you yourself are not open to the Arminian perspective.”  I understand that line of thought, but truly I was Arminian for several years before changing my theological viewpoint.  I understand the Arminian perspective, and I also understand how most Arminians don’t really understand Calvinism because I was in the same boat.  If I would hear a thoroughly convincing exegesis of scripture (particularly those segments in Romans 9 and John 6 which I spent much time examining) which led me to embrace an Arminian view of election, I would be willing to conform to the truth.

            Before I want to be right, I want to be unified in the body of Christ, however, for Christ prayed in the garden with His Father, “Let them be one even as You and I are one.”  Christ was on his knees, bleeding, about to be murdered by evil men, and He was not praying for deliverance from His future torments!  He could have prayed that the Father not leave Him while he was going to hang on the cross!  In that moment on the cross it was as though a mysterious sort of separation within the trinity itself seemed to happen.  What a horrible thing to be separated from the Father.  That is hell itself.  Why didn’t he cry out for deliverance from that horrible ordeal?  Surely the Father would grant to the Son anything He asks (John 16:23).  Instead the thing on His mind was what would happen to His church after He departed from this world!  We were what He was pleading for.  And He pleaded with the Father that we would be one and not divided.  How powerful is this truth!  That we, the people who have heard the Apostles’ testimony, would not be divided by what they say about Jesus and what He came to do for us.

            A song by Christian musician Justin McRoberts says it very well:

 

If I sit down with the wrong man,

Or don’t cast my vote Republican,

May I still worship at your side?

If my thoughts on Predestination,

Seem to you a bit outrageous,

May I still worship at your side?

So I’ll meet you at the cross.

If that’s the only place we meet,

It’s fine by me.

 

            Before we are Calvinists or Arminians, we are Christians, and I believe that if we all have the cross in common, we are brothers and sisters in the Lord.  It is my challenge to the Arminian readers out there to examine the scriptures and put away your previously held ideas asking, “What do the scriptures say?”

            In all things, let us praise Jesus Christ who has saved us wholly by His grace.  He has chosen those whom He will save and His hand cannot be stayed, for he is a mighty God!

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