An English Lesson - Part 2

Though I am no theologian, I consider myself to be a fairly sound 5 point Calvinist. Yes, from time to time I have hiccups over the Limited Atonement ("Particular Redemption" to some). That's because I'm human and my old rebellious nature chafes with the utterly false and uncorroborated assertion that God is capable of being unfair; especially of Him being less fair than I would be if I were God (by which, of course, I make myself God).

But it is upon another of the Sovereign Grace doctrines that I come to write this, the second of my English Lessons. I speak of the doctrine of the "Total Depravity of Man". When the students of Jacob (James) Arminius originally framed the objections that came to be known as the "Remonstrance", by which they claimed to refute the received wisdom of the organized reformed church in Holland, they did not put them forward in the sequence we now know as "TULIP".

The original sequence is not important here. What matters is to understand the wisdom of those who have gone before us in re-organizing the points in refutation of the Arminian heresy into what came to be known as T-U-L-I-P. It was no accident that they rightly made first the doctrine (the "T" of TULIP) the "Total Depravity of Man". And it is upon this doctrine that the Holy Spirit has begun dealing with me, starting with my recent trip to England to visit my family. You see, God is not so concerned with the doctrines that I struggle with (like the Limited Atonement) as He is with the ones that, in my blind arrogance, I think I actually understand.

Let me begin by explaining what the doctrine of Total Depravity actually says. In a nutshell it means that every faculty of all human beings is, from conception, corrupted so that no one is able to do that which is pleasing to God. In other words, we are born sinners and therefore we are all born lost. But it behooves me to mention also what the doctrine does not say. It does not say that all men are a bad as they possibly could be. It does not deny that some men are kind or generous or compassionate. Nevertheless, left to themselves, and without the restraining grace of God, all men would sooner or later betray their true nature by exhibiting greater and greater evidence of their depraved natures. There is none good but God alone (Mark 10:18) and all goodness exhibited by fallen men is due to God's restraint.

Sadly, this Biblical truth is not really believed by most professing Christians today. That is because it isn't taught or preached to them. The under-shepherds have much more to answer for than the sheep. As a consequence of this failure, there are many who cannot grasp the other doctrines of grace, such as Unconditional Election or the Limited Atonement; they simply have not come to the place where they understand that nobody on earth deserves to be saved and so God is just when He saves only some. Thus, the abandonment of Total Depravity as a doctrine undermines everything else in the gospel. But this is for another time.

Though I have long accepted Total Depravity as sound doctrine I have done so making two errors. One, in having only an intellectual comprehension of it. Two in regarding unsaved people as more than what the doctrine allows - that is seeing them as utterly depraved and thus misapplying the concept of "totalness". Let me explain.

I am the only person in my family who is saved. My parents aren't. My brother and his family aren't. My aunts, uncles and cousins aren't - to the best of my knowledge. I am unaware of anyone on either side of my family ever having come to Christ. I have a JW uncle somewhere. My brother is a Moonie (excuse the term, but it gets the meaning across more simply than the words that the acronym HSAUWC represents) - but no one knows Christ. Yet both my Father and my brother are better people than I am. This has always bothered me, as it should.

Take my brother, for example. For the last 25 years or so he has been a faithful husband and a caring father to 5 children, all of which still live at home - the oldest being 24 and having just graduated university. He has been a stout supporter of the Moonies, putting his energies and his talents to use for them in the US and as a missionary in central Europe. He has been punched in the nose for his beliefs. He has made many friends. He has denied himself for his creed and for his family and, by that, has learned a meekness that he never exhibited in all the years I knew him growing up - even into manhood. For a long time his steadfastness and his change of character not only perplexed me but also made me mad. How could a person who believed in such a patently false religion exhibit such evidences of grace? He has not received Christ. He believes in a false Messiah. He is not regenerate. Unless he repents and believes he will undoubtedly end up in hell for eternity. So why is he so much better than me when I profess to belong to Christ?

Then there is my father. Whatever I may have said about his inability to nurture me as a child and his own tormented depressions - yet he has devoted a life to loving my mother. He has cared for her. He read great books to her. He provided for her. Even now that she has Alzeimer's Disease and is confined to a home he visits her every single day - a journey of 45 minutes each way by bus. He takes her protein enriched snacks, a banana, pieces of chocolate to put in her oatmeal. He talks to her even though she barely gives any sign of recognition any more. Yet my father is an agnostic. He steadfastly resists any presentation of the gospel.

And here I am. A man almost friendless, whose children merely tolerate him. A penniless societal cast-off with no possessions to speak of. A man with a life characterized by great sins done to others. A life punctuated by periods of fanatical profession followed by times of the most dire apostasy. A person who had made the Name of Christ a byword among the heathen. A person still racked with besetting sins, resentments and hatreds - always under the looming threat of depression. A person who has fallen into the depths of the mental health system not once - but twice. And yet I belong to Christ. How can this be? How can it be when people so much nicer - so much more accomplished and so much more doers of good than me are lost?

Well, apart from an understanding of Total Depravity and the need for sovereign grace to save, it cannot be understood. God saves not the righteous, but sinners; he saves those who know they need a physician not those who disdain one because they think themselves well.

God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being {Greek no flesh} might boast in the presence of God. (1Corinthians 1:27-29)

I must be careful not to imply that I believe that we may sin the more that grace may abound. I say with Paul, "May it never be!" God is sovereign, but man is responsible. I will answer to God for my life - but not with my life - because Christ has already paid for all my sins. I will suffer shame and loss before His judgment seat - but I will not suffer hell for eternity.

But what of my father and brother? What of all those unsaved people who lead lives that are better than mine; kind people - hospitable, generous, gentle, productive people? Those who are not utterly depraved? And the tragedy is this - that though they are not utterly depraved they do not understand that they are Totally Depraved. They cannot please God. They cannot make themselves acceptable in His sight regardless of what good they do. Unless they are found in Christ they are lost. They cannot see the good they do as springing from God's common grace. They want to own the goodness themselves. They will want to justify themselves before God on the basis of their own deeds, not realizing that their deeds are tainted by sin and that any attempt to own any goodness in themselves is actually stealing from God what is rightfully His - His glory. God demands absolute perfection because He is absolutely holy. Any one who thinks he can measure up to that standard is in for a great shock.

My father and my brother are better people then me, but they are not better than Christ. They fall short of Christ's righteousness by an infinite amount. They need to stand before God in His righteousness. Anything less will be terrible. Yet, while they live I can now be at peace with their goodness. I can appreciate it. I can have compassion on them in their goodness, knowing Who is restraining evil in them. I can accept their graces without the twin destructive tendencies of jealousy and judgment. May God have mercy on them as He has on me, a far greater sinner.