Posts tagged Inherited Corruption
The Error that Fallen Men and Women Can Increase Common Grace and so Achieve Salvation— The Rejection of Errors, Third and Fourth Head of Doctrine, Canons of Dort (5)
The Error that Fallen Men and Women Can Increase Common Grace and so Achieve Salvation— The Rejection of Errors, Third and Fourth Head of Doctrine, Canons of Dort (5)

Synod rejects the errors of those . . .

Who teach that corrupt and natural man can make such good use of common grace (by which they mean the light of nature) or of the gifts remaining after the fall that he is able thereby gradually to obtain a greater grace—evangelical or saving grace—as well as salvation itself; and that in this way God, for his part, shows himself ready to reveal Christ to all people, since he provides to all, to a sufficient extent and in an effective manner, the means necessary for the revealing of Christ, for faith, and for repentance.

For Scripture, not to mention the experience of all ages, testifies that this is false: “He makes known his words to Jacob, his statutes and his laws to Israel; he has done this for no other nation, and they do not know his laws” (Ps. 147:19–20); “In the past God let all nations go their own way” (Acts 14:16); “They were kept by the Holy Spirit from speaking God’s word in Asia”; and “When they had come to Mysia, they tried to go to Bithynia, but the Spirit would not allow them to” (Acts 16:6–7).

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Of course, Arminians do not want to say that sinful people are saved by personal merit gained through accumulated good works or human effort. But they do seek a way to affirm that God enables all people to seek grace, and then upon finding that grace, and provided they continue to seek grace, the more grace they will attain, eventually leading to the exercise of saving faith. To put this in popular jargon, “God helps those who help themselves.”

To circumvent the biblical and Reformed doctrine of total inability articulated throughout the previous articles of the canons, which teaches that that no one can come to Christ unless they are first made alive through regeneration, Arminians stress a universal, potential grace. Arminians affirmed that anyone who takes advantage of this universal grace (which they spoke of as described as “common grace,” and which has a different meaning than current Reformed uses of the term), can eventually receive sufficient grace to exercise “evangelical” or “saving faith.” Recent Arminians often base their view on contemporary notions of “fairness”— it isn’t right for God to give grace to some and withhold it from others since that would not be “fair.” So grace must be universal in some sense. But early Arminians—such as those singled out by the Canons—usually framed the matter in semi-Pelagian categories. Adam’s fall corrupted human nature. Nevertheless although remaining corrupt and sinful, humans still retain the ability to seek grace, gain more grace, and act upon it by exercising faith and repentance.

The specific issue addressed here is how Arminians understand “common grace” (the light of nature) which is an end-run around the Reformed stress upon an efficacious, particular grace. This becomes clear when the canons identify the two errors addressed here. The first error is that sinners supposedly “make such good use of common grace (by which they mean the light of nature) or of the gifts remaining after the fall that he is able thereby gradually to obtain a greater grace—evangelical or saving grace—as well as salvation itself.“ Depravity, yes. Total depravity and inability, no.

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The Canons of DortKim RiddlebargerThe light of nature, Inherited CorruptionComment
“The Spread of Corruption” -- Article Two, The Third and Fourth Main Points of Doctrine, Canons of Dort
“The Spread of Corruption” -- Article Two, The Third and Fourth Main Points of Doctrine, Canons of Dort

Article Two

Man brought forth children of the same nature as himself after the fall. That is to say, being corrupt he brought forth corrupt children. The corruption spread, by God’s just judgment, from Adam to all his descendants—except for Christ alone—not by way of imitation (as in former times the Pelagians would have it) but by way of the propagation of his perverted nature.

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Article 2 of the third/fourth head of doctrine deals with the way in which the effects of Adam’s sin are passed on to his descendants. When Adam fell into sin, all those whom he represented as the biological and federal head of the human race fell with him. Adam lost “original righteousness”—including true righteousness, holiness, and knowledge (Ephesians 4:24; Colossians 3:10) and came under the curse and death as a result of his act of rebellion. The question arises - what does it mean when we speak of Adam’s descendants as born in sin and likewise under condemnation.

There are many biblical texts which come to mind when considering this topic, although we have space to briefly survey but a few of them. In Psalm 51, the Psalmist declares, “behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Psalm 51:5). In Psalm 58:3, the Psalmist reminds us that “the wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray from birth, speaking lies.” In Genesis 6:5, we learn from Moses that the reason that God sent the flood as judgment upon the earth was that “the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”

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The Canons of DortKim RiddlebargerInherited CorruptionComment