Is
the Doctrine of Common Grace Reformed? 
Is
the Doctrine of Common Grace Reformed? Prof. Richard Mouw presents the affirmative arguments in the debate
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Transcription of A Debate On Common Grace 9/12/ 03
Distributed by the
(We are indebted to brother
Andrew Magni for providing this transcription of the debate. The following
represents that part of the transcription of the debate as presented by Dr. Richard Mouw.
For the entire transcription, see "Debate on Common Grace." The
audio can be downloaded by using the figure: 
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Table of Contents
1.2.I -
Prefatory - Mr.Noorman
1.2.II -
Description of He Shines in All That’s Fair, by Dr.Mouw &
1.2.III,IV- Introductions of
Dr.Richard J.Mouw & Prof. David J.Engelsma
1.2.V -
Format of debate explained
1.3.I -
XVII Speech of Dr.Mouw defending
cultural common grace
1.3.I,II Introductory remarks
1.3.III The
‘ Three Points ‘ of 1924 and their
manifestations
1.3.IV John
Calvin stipulates universal gifts of reason and understanding as a “ peculiar
grace of God “ , though admitting
that the pagan mind is “ choked with dense
ignorance “, and even his civic virtues lose all favor before God.
1.3.V
Dr.Mouw takes Calvin’s positive evaluations of pagan thought, and warning
not to dishonor the Holy Ghost by despising the truth given to pagans, seriously
1.3.VI Appreciation
of God’s multi-faceted engagement with and delight in His creation is
critical for a nuanced comprehension of His responses / relationship to the
unconverted and their works
1.3.VII God’s
positive non-redemptive purposes basis of “ common grace ministries “
1.3.VIII Prof.
Engelsma’s reduction of common grace to theological empiricism
1.3.IX Warnings
against empiricism legitimate, because of the heart’s proneness to
deception and the esteeming highly of that which God hates, cp. Jer.17:9, Isa.5:20
but his is a theologically founded activism which stimulates scripture study
1.3.X,XI Christian
celebration of pagan athletics, response to Prof.Engelsma’s critique
1.3.XII,XIII Unbelieving Hebrews participants is
God’s salvific program; Revisited’s ‘heart
breaking’ response to heathen tragedy : God is the author of all such
suffering and
does not sympathize with the subjects thereof : our natural feelings are not
reflective of the Divine pathos : Dr.Mouw demurs with two points :
1.3.XIV 1)
Humanitarian activism as precept, cp. Jeremiah 29:7; Luke 10:30ff
1.3.XV 2)
Humanitarian activism as N.T. principle, cp. 1 Peter 2:17, 3:15-17 : our
perceptively enjoined indiscriminate
compassion upon suffering men expresses the
love of the heart of God towards the same
1.3.XVI PRC
objection based upon acknowledgment of the immutable hatred of God
manifested in reprobation, cp. Romans 9:18
1.3.XVII The pathetic
heart of God vis. the wicked, cp. Matthew 23:37
Mr.Noorman : Thank you Rev.
Kuiper. Good evening and, again, welcome to tonight’s debate. In God’s Holy,
Inspired Word, we are repeatedly called to
be an understanding people : Psalm Forty-seven verse seven calls us to sing praises with
understanding. This means that we are to know of what we sing, when we sing the praises of
God. In a broader context, we must also live all of our lives with understanding. We
cannot do lip service to our beliefs in living our lives any more than we can with our
singing of praises. I believe that it is the hope of the Evangelism Committee of the
Southeast Protestant Reformed Church that tonight’s debate will help all of those who
are exposed to this grow in their understanding of the doctrines that shape their view of
God’s world, and better understand the relationships and the work that they find themselves in, as they complete their pilgrimage on this earth.
The question that will be
debated tonight is : is the doctrine of common grace reformed? The topic of tonight’s
debate is certainly not a new topic to
reformed circles. The doctrine of common grace has been debated in synods, consistory rooms, church narthexes, living rooms, kitchens,
and work places of reformed people for close to one hundred years. These debates center on
the relationship that the redeemed people of God, and the one church that they compose, can, or should have, with the unbelieving
world.
Our debate tonight comes on
the heels of the publication of two books, which have once again looked at this question.
First published was the book form of a series of lectures given in the year two thousand
at Calvin College Stob Lecture Series : this book is titled He Shines in All That’s Fair : Culture and Common
Grace by Dr. Richard J. Mouw. The second
book is the book form of a series of articles written in the Standard Bearer magazine as a response to Dr.
Mouw’s book. This book by Prof. David
Engelsma is titled “ Common Grace Revisited : A Response to Richard J. Mouw’s He Shines in All That’s Fair “
At this time I’d like
to formally introduce our two speakers, and
also go over the format that we will follow here tonight. To my left is Dr. Richard J. Mouw. Dr. Mouw will be
defending the position that the doctrine of common grace is reformed. He is a graduate of
Houghton College, and completed graduate studies at Western Theological Seminary,
University of Alberta, and earned a Ph.D. in
philosophy from the University of Chicago.
Dr. Mouw is currently in his tenth year as president of Fuller Theological Seminary in
Pasadena, California. Fuller is the largest multi-denominational seminary in the world. He
joined the faculty of Fuller Seminary as a professor of Christian philosophy and ethics
in nineteen eight-five after seventeen years as a professor at Calvin College here in
Grand Rapids, Michigan. In nineteen ninety-three he was inaugurated as the fourth
president of Fuller Seminary. Dr. Mouw is known throughout the world in evangelical
circles, and has authored eleven books, as well as articles, reviews and essays that have
appeared in more than thirty journals. He is a regular
contributor to the Belief.net web magazine. He is here tonight with his wife
Phyllis, and his son Dirk. Would you please join me in welcoming Dr. Richard Mouw.
To my right is Prof. David Engelsma. Prof. Engelsma will
be defending the position that the doctrine of common grace is not reformed. Prof.
Engelsma currently is professor of Dogmatics
and Old Testament Studies at the Theological School of the Protestant Reformed Churches in
Grandville, Michigan. He has served in this
position for the past fifteen years. Following his schooling in the Protestant Reformed
Seminary, he served as pastor of Protestant Reformed Churches in Loveland, Colorado and South Holland, Illinois. He is a graduate of
Calvin College, and he earned his Masters of Theology
Degree at Calvin Theological Seminary. He
has authored several books defending the historically
reformed position on marriage, divorce and remarriage, Christian education, the
covenant, and the end-times. Prof. Engelsma is also the editor of the reformed periodical the Standard
Bearer published by the Reformed Free Publishing Association. Prof.
Engelsma is married to his wife Ruth, and he has many
children. Please welcome with me tonight Prof. David Engelsma.
I ask as a courtesy to both
speakers that there be no further applause or comments from the audience from this point.
The format for tonight’s debate will include four segments. First, each speaker will
have thirty minutes to present his case on the topic. Dr. Mouw, who will argue that the
doctrine of common grace is reformed, will speak first, and Prof. Engelsma will follow. After the initial presentations, there will be a
fifteen minute intermission giving the speakers time to prepare their rebuttals. Then each
speaker will have fifteen minutes to rebut the other’s position. The third segment
will involve Dr. Mouw and Prof. Engelsma answering questions that they have prepared for each other and exchanged in
advance. The final segment will involve speakers answering questions prepared by you in the audience. In your program you will find
a space to write your questions. It will be very important that you address your questions
to one of the speakers, or to both of the speakers, if you wish. Dr. Mouw will receive all
the questions addressed to Prof. Engelsma, and he will choose which questions he would
like to have answered and it will work the same for questions addressed to Dr. Mouw.
Questions that you would like to have both men respond to would go to me and I would
choose those questions. My position as
moderator will be to keep the speakers timely, and I can assure each speaker that I will
cut them off after they have used the allotted time, plus a little bit,
maybe. After dealing with high school kids all week, a couple of seminary professors should be a piece of cake. And then I
will also present the questions to the speakers so that they can answer them. Our time
keeper tonight is Mr. Jim Noorman, and he will show me when the allotted time is up.
So we will begin our first
segment of the program tonight with Dr. Mouw.
Dr.Mouw : Thank you.
I’m delighted to be here. Feels like I’m running for political office. I was
thinking if I can hold my own with David
Engelsma I may go back and take on Arnold
Schwarzenegger in California. When I delivered the Stob lectures at Calvin College and
Seminary in the fall of two thousand, several
of my Christian Reformed friends expressed
puzzlement as to why I had chosen to focus on the theology
of common grace. It was clear that they saw this topic as lacking in any contemporary
relevance. To be sure they would
be quick to acknowledge that they subscribe to the common grace idea, but they also aren’t very interested in engaging in critical reflection on the issues that were
debated heatedly by the Dutch American Calvinists in the early
nineteen twenties. From their point of view the topic was dealt with adequately by the
Christian Reformed Synod of nineteen twenty-four whose pronouncements on common grace lead
to the expulsion of Herman Hoeksema and his followers who in turn established the
Protestant Reformed Churches.
The Protestant Reformed
folks, on the other hand, have been eager to keep the discussions going, and they have
been obviously frustrated by the larger
reformed community’s lack of interest in pursuing the issues. Their frustration is
understandable. I’m convinced that the debates of the nineteen twenties and the
Protestant Reformed Church’s continuing critique of the theology of common grace have importance for the entire
body of Jesus Christ in the twenty first
century.
To engage in critical
reflection on those matters for our present day situation is, or so I am convinced, to
perform a significant service to the life and mission
of the church in our own day. Given the interest that my
book based on my Stob lectures
has stimulated, not only in the broad evangelical movement, but also among Roman
Catholics, and mainline Protestants, to say
nothing of the recent release of a Chinese translation
by the officially sanctioned Protestant churches of mainland China, who now know who Herman Hoeksema is, I am even
more convinced of this hopeful assessment. So this discussion needs to continue. While
I’m firm in my belief that the theology of common grace is a solid basis for the proper
understanding of the church’s mission in the world, I also know that there are
important dangers associated with this topic. The idea of common grace can easily be
misused to legitimize a blanket uncritical endorsement of culture as such anywhere. Thus,
luring Christians into ungodly compromises with the forces of evil in the world. I
personally have found it helpful, even necessary, for my
own theological well being to continue to wrestle with the views of those
folks who reject the theology of common grace. With this in mind, I want to offer my sincere thanks to the Evangelism Society of the
Southeast Protestant Reformed Church for the effort that they have put into planning this event. And I also want
to express my deep gratitude to Prof. Engelsma for the careful attention that he’s
given to my thoughts on the subject of common
grace. I’ve learned much from his series of articles in which he sets forth an
extensive critique of what I argued in my book.
And I’m immensely pleased that his
reflections are now appearing in book form. I’ve been looking forward to continuing
our dialogue on this subject this evening. And while neither of us is likely to come away
from this discussion completely convinced
by the other, I do want to say, at the
outset, that I have already learned much
from Prof. Engelsma on a subject that we both care about very deeply.
The debates of the nineteen
twenties focused primarily on the teaching
set forth in what came to be known as the ‘ Three Points ‘ of nineteen
twenty-four, namely the Christian Reformed
synodical declaration that there is in addition to the saving grace, that is imparted only to the elect, also a common grace, an attitude of
divine favor that extends to all human beings, saved and unsaved alike, which is in turn
manifested in three ways, these three ways :
one : the bestowal of
natural gifts; such as rain and sunshine upon creatures in general.
two : the restraining of
sin in human affairs, so that the unredeemed do not produce all of the evil that their
depraved natures might otherwise bring about.
and three : the ability of
unbelievers to perform acts of civic good.
Defenders of common grace
like to appeal to John Calvin himself to defend their views. Calvin’s study of various Greek and Roman writers had left him
with a sense of appreciation for several pagan thinkers, including, and especially,
Seneca. This appreciation led Calvin to point to what he called ‘ a universal
apprehension of reason and understanding ‘ that is by
nature implanted in men, which because it is bestowed indiscriminately, upon
the pious and the impious, it is rightly counted among natural gifts. Indeed he insists
every human being ought to recognize this
implanted rational nature as, these are his words, “ a peculiar grace of God “.
Moreover, when we observe
this gift of natural reason at work in secular writers, Calvin advises, we should, and
I’m going to quote him a little bit at length here, “ we should let that
admirable light of truth shining in them “, these are pagan thinkers now, “
teach us that the mind of man, though fallen, and perverted from its wholeness, is
nevertheless clothed and ornamented with God’s excellent gifts. If we regard the
Spirit of God as the sole fountain of truth, we shall neither reject the truth itself, nor
despise it where it shall appear, unless we wish to dishonor the Spirit of God. Those men
whom scripture calls natural men, were indeed sharp and penetrating in their investigation
of inferior things, let us accordingly, learn by their example, how many gifts the Lord left to human nature even after it
was despoiled of its true good. “ John Calvin.
Now, Herman Hoeksema and
his followers, on the other hand, have been quick to point out that in spite of such
praise, Calvin was also inclined to speak
very negatively about the products of the
unregenerate mind. When Calvin credits the unredeemed with some grasp of the principles of
civic fairness, for example, he quickly adds
that even when the human mind follows after truth, he says, “ it limps and staggers
“. In the lives of unbelievers, Calvin says, the civic virtues are so sullied, that
before God they lose all favor. So that
anything in him that appears praiseworthy, he says, “ must be considered worthless.
“ And while he acknowledges, “ that “, quote, “ some sparks still
gleam in the fallen mind, that light is nonetheless choked with dense ignorance so that it
cannot come forth effectively. “
Now, we all agree that
Calvin says these things, but we differ in how we assess the importance of his various remarks on the subject. The Protestant
Reformed folks take Calvin’s negative comments as expressing his real view, and they
dismiss his more positive assessments of pagan thought as unfortunate misstatements. On
the other hand, while I do want to take his negative thoughts seriously, I also want to
honor his positive evaluations, and furthermore, I’m convinced that the stakes are
very high here. Since as Calvin says, if we despise the truth when it comes to us from
unbelievers, we run the real risk of “
dishonoring “, he says, “ the Spirit of God.” In his helpful critique of my reflections on the
subject, Prof. Engelsma takes me to task for emphasizing the fact that God’s goodness
shines in all that’s fair, without also giving due attention to the fact that the
Lord also curses all that’s foul. Well he’s right to call attention to the
cursedness of much that issues forth from depraved hearts and minds. But I want to
respond, by also expressing my dissatisfaction with the way he refuses to
acknowledge how God’s creating purposes
are often honored by people who do not
acknowledge God as the source of the glory that
is displayed in their thoughts and deeds. And I want to focus here on what I see as the
basic points of contention between us on this matter.
As I read the situation,
the crucial questions are these : what does
God take delight in, and what does God hate. The critics of common grace insist that God
takes delight in the saving of His elect people, and He hates everything that issues forth
from the lives of the unredeemed. I’m convinced that that assumption fails to do
justice to the full scope of God’s complex interest in His creation. The God of the
Bible certainly cares about more things than
the issue of salvation. Even before human beings were created, God took satisfaction as He
contemplated the swarms of non-human living things that He had called into being and the
Psalmist tells us that the Lord continues to take delight in the workings of His creation,
all the workings of His creation. Why should we doubt that God takes pleasure when a good
poem is written, or when a no-hitter is pitched on Monday, or when a string quartet
performs a Mozart piece with splendid artistry. Whether or not such things are
accomplished by believers or unbelievers.
This issue of the
more-than-redemptive scope of God’s positive purposes in the world has important
practical implications, especially in
connection with what I call “ common grace ministries “. For example, a
Calvinist involved in ministering to people in a hospital sponsored alcoholism recovery
program once described this situation to me very poignantly . He says, “ I regularly see people move from a desperate kind of bondage
to alcohol to new dimensions of freedom in their lives. The change is often very dramatic, yet it isn’t at all obvious that
in experiencing this release from addiction, they’ve been regenerated in the classic
sense. Their lives have been transformed, but they have not come to know Jesus. I do want
them to become Christians, “ he said, “ and I also want to celebrate what looks
for all the world to me like a grace occurrence in their lives. “ Well here’s
another case that I used in my book to make
my point. A Christian therapist counsels a
non-Christian couple. Their marriage has been seriously wounded by the husband’s adulterous affair. The
therapist helps them to be honest about the hurts, fears and angers that have surrounded
this episode. Finally, a moment comes when the husband tearfully acknowledges the pain that he has caused, and he
asks his wife to forgive him. She reaches out with a new found tenderness toward him. They embrace, both of them sobbing. It’s clear
that they intend to build a new life together. Now, they
haven’t been saved in the process, but the therapist is convinced that she has
witnessed, and has been privileged to be a human instrument in a powerful display of healing grace. She senses that she has
reinforced the kinds of behaviors and attitudes that God wants for human beings.
Now in my book, I was very
intentional insisting that we deal with concrete cases. Prof. Engelsma sees
this as a basic defect in my approach. This
means, he says, that “ my defense “, and I’m quoting him here,” my defense of common grace is based on what we see,
feel and think as we observe our neighbors in the world. When we take this approach
“, he concedes, “ the theory of
common grace wins hands down. “ He goes on, “ We critics of common grace also
see fine, decent, moral, friendly, likable unbelievers. We too see good in the ungodly,
much good, sympathizing with the suffering neighbor who worships another god or no god at
all. We too wonder why God does not feel pity for them. And these experiences, “ he says,
“ tempt the critic of common grace “
quote, “ to suppose that the Christian is permitted, is indeed called, to join with
non-Christians in what would seem to be the noblest of all causes, creating a society, a
nation, a world of justice, peace, beauty and
goodness, and to do so, “ he says, “ without the gospel and the Spirit of Jesus
Christ. “ Now Prof. Engelsma has commended me for my
candor in stating just why it is that
I embrace common grace theology and I want to return the compliment. I find these comments
of his about what he finds tempting in the case for a common grace theology, I find these
comments to be commendably candid. And I want to try to get this clearer this evening
about just why it is that we move in such
different directions from this common inclination to reach out to suffering unbelievers,
and to enjoy the works of people who operate
apart from redeeming grace.
As Prof. Engelsma sees it,
my error is that I start with my
feelings of sympathy and
appreciation for unbelievers, and then I try to
square these feelings with my reformed theology. He wishes that I would heed a word of
advice that Herman Hoeksema once gave to his seminary students, referring to what was then
the heart of Grand Rapids’ life, Hoeksema warned, “ Do not do your theology on
the corner of Monroe and Division. “ And
this is where Prof. Engelsma thinks I go wrong, he says, “ I spend much too much time
doing my theology on the streets of Southern California. “ Now,
let me make it clear, that I endorse what I think is the basic concern that Engelsma and
Hoeksema are raising in stating the case this way. I
think they’re saying that we must not get our theology from
our experiences out there in the world. And that’s an appropriate warning. We can see
the real dangers of an experience based theology at
work in the churches today. For example, people are defending all sorts of deviant
behaviors and relationships on the grounds that they
experience these patterns as ‘ fulfilling ‘ or ‘ nurturing ‘.
When we encounter such theological moves, we must call people back to the teaching of
God’s Word. In clear recognition that the human “ heart is deceitful above all
things, and desperately wicked “ and that we are prone as sinners to ‘ call good
evil and evil good ‘. So, the Protestant Reformed folks are issuing a legitimate
warning. But it’s one thing to warn, again rightly
so, against deriving our theology from
our experiences, and its a very different
thing to insist, as I want to do, that we must bring our theology to the street corners of Grand Rapids, and Los
Angeles and Singapore, and Calcutta in the recognition that the God of the scriptures, is
the ruler over every square inch of creation
and that His word is, indeed, ‘ a lamp unto our feet ‘ as we walk the city
streets and the rain forest pathways, and hospital corridors, and putting greens that
traverse the fullness of the world that has been made by the hands of our sovereign Lord.
In this sense I do want our students at Fuller Theological Seminary to learn to do
theology on the street corners. Furthermore,
when we do our theology out there on street
corners, in this good sense, we will often be forced to take a new look at
what the Word is teaching us. Discovering, on occasion, new wisdom that can be mined from
the riches of God’s revelation to us. When we’ re out there on street corners,
we often discover new questions that we must bring back to the Word of God for guidance
from above.
So here’s what I want
to do now. I want to probe two kinds of experiences out there in the world in the hope of
further clarifying just where we really disagree about these matters. The first has to do
with a fairly trivial case, the athletic accomplishments of the unregenerate ( we call
theology athletics now ). In my book I offered the opinion that Christians can
enjoy the putts of Tiger Woods, and home runs
hit by unbelieving major leaguers. And that
furthermore in doing so we can rest in the
assurance that God Himself enjoys such things. “ Christianity Today “ used the
‘ God enjoys baseball ‘ theme in its feature about my book, and Prof. Engelsma
in his critique had some fun with my Tiger Woods example, even as he chastised me for
celebrating the accomplishments of a “ Sabbath breaking golfer “. Now, I promise
I will immediately repent of my sin if I am
bearing false witness in saying what I am about to say, but I think I remember reading
somewhere that Herman Hoeksema enjoyed watching the Detroit Tigers on television.
If so, I think I can
understand what a non-common grace explanation for this enjoyment might look like. Here we
have, the argument could go, not just one, but a whole team of Sabbath breaking Tigers,
who regularly defy the law of the Lord. They do not exercise their talents to the glory of God,
but for all that, they do some things that show forth some of God’s creating
handiwork. While the exploits of these often God-less major leaguers are indeed
contributing to their own destruction, the elect can nonetheless appreciate signs of
God’s creaturely goodness in these
deeds. The critic of common grace, while insisting that there’s no grace at work
here, could still acknowledge that this activity does
take place in a world created by God, and
that even perversions of God’s good handiwork can serve godly purposes such as providing for the leisurely enjoyment of a baseball game by a hard working
Protestant Reformed pastor-theologian.Well, I think I could live with that kind of
theology of baseball and golf if I had to,
but it still seems to me to miss one important dimension. Namely, the way in which something that is not meant to be to the
glory of God, nonetheless can bring glory to God. An Al Kaline and a Tiger Woods are in fact
displaying some of the prowess and ability that God wanted the creation to display. The
appearance of this kind of thing was one of God’s motives for creating a world that
included among, other things, athletic talent, and the God who continues to take delight
in the works of his hands, does in fact enjoy these
displays of His creative handiwork in our own enjoyment of these things, then we are
honoring God as the one who shines in all that is fair in His creation.
The second experience is a
much more serious one. In my book I repeated a story, that I’d read, about the brutal
rape of a Muslim woman, by soldiers in Eastern Europe who had beheaded her new-born child.
I used this horrible example, to illustrate my strong
sympathy for an unbeliever in a specific
situation. And I argued that in my positive concern for her, I believe strongly that I
‘m sharing in God’s profound sympathy for
her in her suffering. Prof. Engelsma responded to this example in two different ways :
First, he stated his own
deep conviction that the God of the scriptures does not, and I quote, does not “ sympathize with the suffering of
the wicked “, including the wicked Muslim woman whose tragedy I described. But he also admitted that he can
appreciate my own response to this horrible
story. Indeed, he reports, he has his own experiences of this sort. And as a case in point, he tells what is for him,
and I’m quoting,” a particular instance of, or incident of,
heartrending distress.
“ A story from the Nazi era, told by
William Shirer in his well known book on the subject. And here’s Prof.
Engelsma’s description of the scene, I’m quoting, “ There’s a great
hole containing the bodies of many Jews already machine-gunned by the S.S. In the new
batch of Jews lined up at the edge of the pit [is] a little Jewish boy, about ten years
old. As Nazis wait, cold, callous, even enjoying what they
are about to do, the little boy, not comprehending, but fearful, clings to his
father. Looking down on his son’s anxious, but trusting face, the helpless father
tries to comfort his child. In a moment father and son will go down into the huge grave,
atop the mass of dead bodies, to be shot. “ end quote. I’m so grateful for Prof. Engelsma’s next words,
he says, “ It breaks our heart.“
But I also find it heart
breaking, when he goes on to say, that an event of this sort, quote, “ does not break
the heart of God. Since God, “ I’m quoting, “ Since God Himself inflicts
their suffering by His Almighty power of providence as punishment for their sins.
“ referring to the Jewish father and son. To be sure, he quickly adds, the Nazis are fully responsible for their sinful deeds, he says,
“ Let these rapists, these murderers of babies,
and slaughterers of old men and little boys, let them be damned. “ He rightly says that. But in the bigger picture, we must
recognize, he insists, and I quote “ that in His sovereignty God acts through these
despicable murderers, and evil doers to punish the ungodly
in righteousness. “ Now if we had more time, I would want to argue for a more
nuanced treatment of what I believe to be the continuing special status of the Jewish
people in God’s redemptive economy. But for now I’ll treat his example as He
intends it, that is, as depicting the Jewish victims as persons who are outside the scope
of God’s saving purposes. Prof. Engelsma thinks that my deep sense that God grieves over the terrible
treatment of these Jewish folks at the hands of the Nazis is wishful thinking on my part. That I am allowing my feelings to shape my theological convictions without any Biblical
support. Well, let me point in these concluding remarks to the kind of Biblical support
that I would appeal to in support of my position.
I do not see in the
scriptures any pattern that permits us to
limit our Christian concern for the well being of others, exclusively to other Christians. Nor do I think the scriptures
depict God as being limited in that way. It’s clear, for example, that the Lord
called his people in the Old Testament to work for the well being of the larger Babylonian
society in which he had placed them in the time of their exile. The prophet says, “
And seek the peace, the shalom, of the city whither I have caused you to be carried away captive, and
pray to Jehovah for it, for in the peace
thereof, you shall have peace. “ Jeremiah twenty-nine [ verse seven ]. And when I
read the story of the good Samaritan I feel no obligation to figure out whether the
Samaritan or his victim, to whom he ministered, were numbered among the elect. The clear
message seems to be that we do not have to make sure that our neighbors have the right
theology before we know whether God wants us
to reach out to them in their suffering.
The underlining principle
here, I believe, is set forth nicely in
First Peter two where the apostle tells God’s elect people, to perform good deeds
among the Gentiles. So that even though the unbelieving world might presently accuse us of evil doing, they will glorify
God on the day of visitation.
And the apostle Peter obviously sees these deeds as aimed at the good of unbelievers. In
his four instructions in First Peter two seventeen he tells us that we are to fear, “
fobaeo”, fear the Lord, and we are to love, “ agapao “, agape love, to our
fellow believers, while also showing honor, timao, which means having regard for the well
being of, honor, both to those who govern us and to all human beings. In this same spirit,
in the next chapter, Peter tells us that we should always
be prepared to defend our convictions, quote, “ to anyone who demands from you
an accounting for the hope that is in you. “ And
that in doing so we should treat this anyone in a spirit of gentleness and reverence. In
all of this, are we being commanded to deal gently and reverently with, and to show honor toward, people for whom
God has nothing but hatred? Or are we being asked to look at others, as is so often the
case in the scriptures, even as our Father in heaven sees them ? I opt for the latter view. I believe that when we reach out in
compassion to suffering unbelievers, we are expressing a love that flows from the very heart of God.
I think that I know how my Protestant
Reformed critics would respond to me on this : they would insist that my feelings are understandable ones, but that I am
not honoring what they see as the strong
Biblical teaching that all those who are outside of Christ are God’s enemies. As
finite creatures then, we must simply stand
in awe, before the mystery of a sovereign God
who “ will have mercy on whom He will
have mercy “ and will harden the hearts
of those whom He has chosen to pass over in their rebellion before His face. As a
Calvinist myself, I cannot help, but respect that kind of appeal to accept humbly the mystery of God’s sovereign ways.
But there’s another mystery in whose presence I continually stand in awe, as a Calvinist, it’s the mystery of a divine Savior who came from heaven to fulfill God’s electing purposes, and who one day stood grieving over the rebellious city of Jerusalem, crying out in His sorrow, “ O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together as a hen gathered her brood under her wings, and you would not. “ I simply cannot avoid the conviction that we are being given here, in this picture of a grieving Savior, a profound glimpse into the very heart of God. The fact that requires, as I see things, the insights offered by the theology of common grace. Thank you very much.
Proceed to Prof. D. Engelsma's half of the debate.
Last modified: 15-Oct-2003
