Dispensationalism and the Doctrine of Election
Refutation of Calvinism, Arminianism, and Covenant Theology
Introduction
In the day and age of milk and cookies theology, there is seldom much hunger for the meat of God’s Word. However, true theology is a line upon line, precept upon precept work. This kind of detailed research is not for the
milk and cookies crowd. This kind of work is the careful and meticulous examination of the Biblical data of all that God has said about something from cover to cover and in minute detail. However, in this detailed research of what God has said, we must approach with caution lest we interject or impose our own ideas or philosophies upon what God has said and, thereby, change or misrepresent what God has said.
The discussions surrounding Calvinism, Arminianism, Covenant Theology, and Reformed Theology has been going on for centuries. It undoubtedly has been a heated discussion involving numerous points of view and even more numerous positions resulting in hundreds of variations and degrees of disagreement resulting in many, many articles and books. However, I do not believe that anyone has really ever dealt with all of these issues from a definitive way or from a purely dispensation perspective.
In most of the things I have read on these issues and in most of the discussions I have been involved with on these issues, there is a blending and merging of varying degrees that goes on. Obviously, intelligent people are trying to reconcile the incoherency of the things they read or hear regarding these discussions. Perhaps the problem really lays in trying to reconcile irreconcilable doctrinal statements. Perhaps they are irreconcilable because they really are not Scriptural in the first place. The honest theologian involved in the science of hermeneutics will honestly consider that possibility and begin to look for answers to irreconcilable issues outside of the dynamic of these ongoing theological debates. If we are going to find the answer to these issues, those answers will be found in Sola Scriptura.
The issues of Calvinism, Arminianism and, Covenant/Reformed Theology has been a source of great frustration for me over the history of my Christian growth. I have struggled with finding God’s answers to these issues for over 40 years of ministry. The greatest frustration was in seeing men that I loved and respected adopt methodologies of Biblical interpretation that, to me at least, were so obviously faulty. It was the use of these faulty methodologies that led them to the systems of theology they now embraced. It seemed obvious to me that once they were trained in a certain methodology, with accompanying deductive suppositions, that the outcomes of a theological position could almost be predetermined.
The greatest frustration was seeing hundreds of young men who desired proper training to learn to study and communicate God’s truths being trained in institutions that were training men in these faulty methodologies. These young men come to Bible Colleges and Seminaries trusting that the men teaching them know what they are doing and that these men are authorities in the academic areas in which they teach.
I have many close friends that I recognize as men who genuinely love the Lord Jesus and seek to serve Him the best they can who are on all sides of these issues. They are people who have invested thousands upon thousands of hours, just like I have, searching the Scriptures for answers to these issues. I do not expect that these men will be easily convinced that the positions they hold are really not what God teaches in His Word. Dogmatists are dogmatists because they have diligently researched their positions and believe those positions to be anchored to the Rock. I respect them for that.
I certainly do not hold myself up as the standard of Biblical orthodoxy. I say this lest I be accused of arrogance. However, I do ask that the thousands upon thousands of hours I have invested in the study of these issues at least be given a hearing by those truly seeking for truth, for that is all that I am attempting to present in these studies, i.e., what I believe God’s Word says. I do not seek for fame and I certainly have no hope of fortune. I simply want to see God glorified by accurately revealing Who He is according to the revelation of His inspired Scriptures.
I have discussed and debated these issues with hundreds of men. I have been involved with panel discussions of these issues with some of the finest theological minds in modern day fundamentalism. I have read every book written on these issues that I could get my hands on. I have read Augustine. I have read Calvin. I have read Luther. I have read Zwingli. I have read the Dutch Remonstrance of 1610, the Cannons of Dort, the Westminster Confession, the London Baptist Confessions of 1644 and 1689. I have read almost every published work on these issues in the last 25 years. I have traveled across this country from shore to shore to hear the best minds of our day debate these issues. I know many of these men personally. I say all this lest I be accused of ignorance. Granted, you may still question my intelligence, but please do not accuse me of ignorance.
The Scriptures are what I will be preoccupied with in these studies. I will not be giving large amounts of space or spending a great deal of time arguing with men who have been dead for 500 years (or more). I may refer to them occasionally and to what they have said, but I mainly will be preoccupied with what God has said in His Word. These studies will focus on being Sola Scriptura. In other words, I will not be preoccupied with merely proclaiming a statement of faith of Sola Scriptura. I will do all I can to present a position which is actually Sola Scriptura.
I know that almost everyone I know that holds to contradicting positions on these issues will make the same claim, but I respectfully state that when presuppositions are imposed upon Scripture interpretation, that these presuppositions immediately reduce true Biblical exegesis to eisegesis and a resulting faulty theology when those presuppositions are often unbiblical and/or extra-biblical. These presuppositions may by chance be proven Biblical, but this a dangerous methodology resulting in looking for and positing proof texts to support the presuppositions. This has been my experience in debate and discussion with the vast majority of Calvinists, Arminians, and Covenant Theologians. They take us to a Bible text on which they have imposed their presuppositions and then require an explanation according to those presuppositions, never even considering their presuppositions may be wrong. They just cannot understand why others cannot see what is so obvious to them. Of course, the reason others do not see what is so obvious to them is these others are not looking at the text through the lenses of their presuppositions.
There were two basic theological positions of Sola Scriptura coming out of the Reformation. One basically said, whatever the Bible does not disallow, we allow. The other basically said, whatever the Bible confirms, we confirm. Neither position was immune from the imposition of presuppositions and proof-texting. Those coming out of Roman Catholicism were especially prone to other two faulty methodologies: the imposition of presuppositions and proof-texting.
Most of the Reformers were trained theologians. However, we fail to take into account that they were very badly trained theologians, especially in hermeneutics. I know many will find that statement offensive. However considering the Ecclesiology, Soteriology, Pneumatology, and Eschatology of the vast majority of these men, we must conclude that the statement is true. These men came to the Bible with beliefs that were almost totally wrong. They in fact simply began looking for textual proofs for those beliefs. What they could not find proof texts for, they disallowed or rejected. In other words, they came to the Bible with hundreds of presuppositions looking for Biblical support (proof texts) for those presuppositions. This proof text methodology has been the basis for Roman Catholic and Covenant/Reformed arguments regarding baptismal regeneration and paedobaptism for centuries. Therefore, their presuppositions must be taught before they ask you to begin looking at their proof texts. This is what is still going on in varying degrees in many of our fundamental Bible Colleges and Seminaries today.
We must remember that almost every Reformer continued to hold to, and propagate, the major errors of Augustine’s original Covenant Theology. The Reformers continued to teach that the nation of Israel was cast away by God and replaced with the theonomic institution called the Church resulting in various State Churches in various countries around the world. They continued to teach that circumcision was replaced by infant baptism. They continued to propagate sacerdotalism and the conference of grace through sacerdotalism and sacramentalism. Although many proclaimed justification by grace through faith, that faith was still in the system, i.e., the conference of grace to the participant in the sacrament through the hands of a clergyman ordained by the Church. We must admit, that their understanding of salvation “by grace through faith” was radically different than what true (not new) Evangelicalism had held to down through the centuries. Even for the Evangelical Calvinist to day, being “saved by grace through faith” is really defined by their doctrine of Monergism (regeneration by God preceding a decision of faith).
Interspersed into all of this was the influence and integration of various pagan philosophies and philosophical methodologies. We find the influence of the philosophies of early Christian Gnosticism (manifested in the Calvinistic term secret gospel), Plato, Aristotle, Socrates and Pliny upon the thinking of the Reformers (what we know as a Classical Theological education). Many of the philosophical ideas of these pagan philosophers were the basis for theological methodologies based in logic and many of the presuppositions imposed upon the Scriptures down through the ages in varying degrees.
Aristotelian Syllogism (Deductive Logic as a methodology to deduce truth) may have been one of the most accepted methods resulting in many false theological positions. This methodology was certainly a major influence upon Augustine (Calvinism is really nothing more than a restatement of Augustinianism). Therefore, I can say unequivocally that Augustinianism and Calvinism are logical systems of theology. I can also say unequivocally that Aristotelian Syllogism is a faulty methodology for a solidly Sola Scriptura theology. If no one else, Augustine has proven that Aristotelian Syllogism is a faulty methodology all by himself. He can be credited with introducing more heresy into Christianity than almost any man in history. I believe it can be said that Augustine is the Father of Roman Catholic Systematic Theology and should be credited with the original ideas surrounding the confusion of God’s covenants upon which Covenant Theology was systematized .
It should be understood that Reformed Theology is the reformed or corrected Augustinian Theology. The original ideas that were the foundation for Covenant Theology were originally Augustinianism or systematized Roman Catholicism. The correcting of original Augustinian Theology was in three major areas of theology:
Ø Ecclesiology
Ø Eschatology
Ø Soteriology
The Reformation’s Ecclesiological reforms involved many degrees of change. However, the vast majority of Reformers continued to hold to State Churches with sacerdotal systems with sacramental conferences of God’s grace and with hierarchal forms of Church polity. The vast majority continued to hold to a theonomic world view of the Church’s purpose on earth. Therefore, the Reformation did not change Augustine’s or Roman Catholicism’s view of Ecclesiology in any real ways except in rejecting Papalism and some of the sacraments. They continued to view Church membership, water baptism, and Holy Communion as sacramental (means of conferring grace to participants through the hands of ordained clergymen). The entrance into the possibility (hope) of salvation was found only through baptism into whatever State Church any particular Reformer viewed as correct . Reformed Theology continued to be primarily Roman Catholic (Augustinian) in their Ecclesiology.
The Reformation’s Eschatological reforms hardly changed Augustine’s positions at all (if at all). Down through the years, we have seen some Covenant Theologians accept the Premillennial position regarding the second coming, but the vast majority of Reformers continued to be Postmillennialists or Amillennialists. This was due to the fact they continued to hold to an allegorical interpretation of prophecy and the supposition/imposition that God had cast away the nation of Israel and replaced national Israel with the State Church and the Priesthood of Israel with clergymen. Therefore, their heretical Ecclesiology greatly determined and influenced their Eschatology. Reformed Theology continued to be primarily Roman Catholic (Augustinian) in their Eschatology (primarily Preterism).
The Reformation’s Soteriological reforms were not really greatly different than Augustine’s either. Calvinism is really nothing more than a restatement of Augustinianism. There were some new developments by Zwingli, Menno Simmons, Jacob Arminius, and a few others, but the central position was that God has chosen certain people to be saved while the rest of humanity was relegated to reprobation. This position has been divided into as many different streams as there are different people holding it. When questions arrive considering these variations, Reformed Theologians always return to Augustine or Calvin as their standards of orthodoxy. They interpret Scripture from the statements of these men and their interpretation of what those statements mean (this is what they really meant), not necessarily merely upon what the Scriptures say apart from Augustine’s or Calvin’s comments. If this referral to Augustine or Calvin does not provide enough weight to their theological arguments, they will quote other noted Reformed scholars who give another variation of explanation from a Reformed perspective.
My purpose in writing this book is not to merely refute the presuppositions of Calvinism, Arminianism and, Covenant Theology, but to question the very methodology that results in Systematic Theologies. The systematic theologies known as Calvinism, Arminianism and, Covenant Theology are all logical systems of theology (Theo-logical conclusive statements). As logical systems of theology, they are built upon the foundation of logical presuppositions and proof-texts. In other words, these logical systems of theology are primarily based upon eisegesis, not Biblical exegesis. Logical presuppositions are imposed upon the interpretation of various Bible texts resulting in distorting pure Biblical exegesis.
The central presupposition imposed upon the Scriptures is that God has chosen or elected certain individuals to salvation and all others to eternal condemnation. Although there are considerable variations in this presupposition between Calvinism and Arminianism (and many more variations between those holding to these two positions), I will seek to show that this presupposition is NO WHERE to be found in the Scriptures. God has not elected anyone to be saved (to salvation) or anyone to be eternally condemned. Election has little, or nothing, to do with either salvation or condemnation.
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