For Calvinism

by Michael Scott Horton

Arminians affirm synergism (i.e., “working-together,” or cooperation between God’s grace and human willing and activity), while Calvinists affirm monergism (i.e., “one-working,” or God’s grace as the effectual source of election, redemption, faith, and perseverance).

Reformation theology holds that the sinful inclination itself incurs God’s judgment, and this inclination not only weakens but imprisons the whole person. No one can overcome this inclination through free will. Cooperation with grace will not heal the soul. From the sinful condition proceed sinful acts.

We are not free to choose whether or not we will be sinners, but in every sinful thought, desire, and action we are doing what we want to do. We are not compelled to sin. Just as God’s immunity to sin derives from his own natural goodness rather than any external compulsion, so the reverse is true for sinners.

So, Calvin argues, fallen human beings are “not deprived of will, but of soundness of will.”

God is not arbitrarily choosing some and rejecting others. Rather, he is choosing some of his enemies for salvation and leaving the rest to the destiny that all of us would have chosen for ourselves.

Socinian position. Advocates of this view hold that God does not have exhaustive foreknowledge of the acts performed by free creatures.8

God does not create unbelief; this is the natural state of fallen humanity. But he does need to create faith in the hearts of his elect. Because God uses means — both in salvation and in condemnation — we are accountable for our own response.

Since we are to judge of the will of God from His Word, which testifies that the children of believers are holy, not by nature, but in virtue of the covenant of grace, in which they together with the parents are comprehended, godly parents ought not to doubt the election and salvation of their children whom it pleases God to call out of this life in their infancy (Gen. 17:7; Acts 2:39; 1 Cor. 7:14).

We cannot be persuaded into the kingdom by the greatest of rhetoricians or subject matter; we need to be liberated from within to embrace the gospel from without.

Through this Word, the Spirit works not only to propose, lure, invite, and attract, but actually kills and makes alive, sweeping sinners from their identity “in Adam” to the riches of their inheritance in Christ.