The First Point of Common Grace: An Introduction (15)

.
Dear Forum members,
.
Before I get into the material that I plan to send you in this letter, I need to answer a question that came from one of our forum members.
.
The question is concerning my remark in my last letter that common grace modifies at least four of the five points of Calvinism and, perhaps, also the fifth, namely perseverance of the saints. The reader’s claim was that one ought not really be hesitant about saying that common grace also affects perseverance of the saints, and that thus all five points need to be modified if common grace is introduced into the body of doctrine known as the doctrines of grace. His reason for asserting this was that the five points of Calvinism are a whole, and to modify one is to modify all. The five hang together. They stand or fall together.
.
The reason for the objection of the correspondent is, of course, true. One cannot believe in a universal atonement without denying eternal predestination, including both election and reprobation. And so it is with all five.

. My “perhaps” however, had a slightly different emphasis than the reader gave it. My point was and is that the error of common grace directly modifies four of the five points. A universal love of God for men is in flat contradiction to sovereign election and reprobation. A universal atonement is in direct contradiction to sovereign predestination and limited atonement. A work of the Spirit in the hearts of all men enabling them to do good is directly contrary to total depravity. But no teaching of common grace directly opposes the preservation of the saints.
.
Even the Arminians did not think that their view had a direct bearing on what we now call the fifth point of Calvinism, for in the original Five Article of the Remonstrance, in which document the Arminians set down their position, the Arminians would not flatly say that they denied the preservation of the saints. They merely expressed doubt about the question. Further, the defenders of common grace readily admit that their views modify the first four points of Calvinism, and I am not aware of a modification of the preservation of the saints by those who defend common grace – a denial as blatant as their denial of unconditional predestination, total depravity, particular redemption, and irresistible grace.
.

Nevertheless, the correspondent is correct in his insistence that it is impossible to deny one of the five points without, in the end, denying them all. And so also the doctrine of the preservation of the saints has come under attack in “Reformed” circles.
.
* * *
In the last installment I made a few general remarks about common grace, particularly noting that, although common grace is to be defined as God’s attitude of favor or grace towards all His creatures, including all men, nevertheless, this attitude is not only objective but also includes the subjective infusion of grace in the hearts of all men by which they know that God is favorably inclined to them, and also by which they are changed for the better, though the change does not result in salvation.
.
* * * *

Left--Prof. Louis Berkhof
.
The first point of common grace as adopted by the Christian Reformed Church in 1924 is confusing and ambiguous on the question: To whom does God show His favor? The language of the first point speaks of God’s favor “towards His creatures in general” (Hoeksema and Hanko, Ready to Give an Answer, 63), but also speaks of an attitude of favor “towards humanity in general, and not only towards the elect” (Ibid). One could conclude from this that the first point intends to make a distinction between an attitude of favor towards the brute creation and God’s attitude of favor towards all men. But this is evidently not the way in which the first point of common grace is interpreted by its supporters. Both Louis Berkhof, the primary author of the three points (Louis Berkhof, De Drie Punten in Alle Deelen Gereformeerd [The Three Points Reformed in Every Part] [Grand Rapids: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1925] 11), and H. J. Kuiper, for many years the editor of the church paper, The Banner (H. J. Kuyper, The Three Points of Common Grace [Grand Rapids: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1925] 11-13) assert that the meaning of the first point is that God’s attitude of favor is shown to people, not the brute creation.
. Right: Rev. H. J. Kuiper and Dr. John H. Kromminga
.
To add to the confusion of the first point and seemingly to contradict what Berkhof and Kuiper say, one Scriptural passage referred to as proof of the doctrine of the first point is Psalm 145:9: “The Lord is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.” This text obviously refers to the brute creation and God’s works of providence in it, which reveal God’s goodness. The fact that this passage is quoted as proof would seem to indicate that the first point does actually teach that God has an attitude of favor towards the creation itself. If this interpretation is not what the Synod meant, but refers only to men, then Psalm 145:9 must be interpreted to read: “The Lord is good to all men, and his tender mercies are over all people.” This is an interpretation of the text that seems to me to be forced, unnatural and incapable of being sustained. Why, therefore, Psalm 145 :9 is quoted as proof of God’s attitude of favor towards all men remains a mystery.
.
But be all that as it may, we assert from the outset that it is correct and in agreement with the Scriptures to say that God is favorably inclined toward His creation – as Psalm 145:9 asserts. He loves His creation, is merciful towards it and views it with great favor.
Psalm 145:9 is a clear example of Hebrew parallelism, a poetic device in which two or more sentences are so related to each other that the one explains and sheds further light on the other. In this verse, for example, the expression in the second part of the verse, “his tender mercies”, explains “the Lord is good” in the first part of the verse. And the words “all his works” is a further explanation of the word “all” in the first sentence. Thus the verse teaches that God’s mercies are towards all his works and those tender mercies towards all His works show His goodness.
.
Further, if the first point of common grace wanted to interpret the sentence “The Lord is good to all” as meaning that the Lord is good to all men, this interpretation stands in flat contradiction with verse 20 where the same Psalm reads: “The Lord preserveth all them that love him: but all the wicked will he destroy,” where the reference is to those whom God loves is obviously to God’s elect.
.
The question of whether God loves His creation is important for another reason. I have met and spoken with men, especially, from a Presbyterian background, who say they believe in common grace. But when they explain their position, it becomes evident that these men identify common grace with providence and simply mean that God’s providence gives evidence of God’s goodness towards His creation. With this idea I have no dispute, although whether the idea ought to be called “common grace” is another question. To call it such is at least confusing when the term is universally used for different ideas.
.
There can be no question about it that God is favorably inclined towards His own creation, for He created it and it remains His possession. The devil, after his fall and banishment from heaven, attempted to seize the earthly creation from God and make it his own domain. He persuaded Adam and Eve to join him in that endeavor, because neither he nor his demons had any direct access to the creation. They were angels and not material creatures, as this creation is. He had to enlist Adam and Eve, for they had been placed by God as the heads of creation. Satan was eminently successful, and so it seems as if the creation today belongs to wicked man. Wicked man uncovers the powers of creation, penetrates its secrets, and from it makes products that make his life in the creation easier and more pleasant. Looking around us and observing what goes on in the world today, we could not only be easily persuaded that man has complete control over the creation, but that he uses it in countless ways to sin. He is a servant of Satan and has obediently followed Satan’s grand scheme to make this creation a kingdom of darkness where God is banished from His own world.
.
But God does not relinquish His claim upon His own world. In fact, it is impossible for God to do this, not only because of God’s own purpose in creating all things, but also because God is the Author of providence. Creation means that God gave all the universe its existence by the Word of His mouth. Providence means that God, by the same Word of His mouth, continues to give the creation its existence. Further, all that happens in it is done by His sovereign control. That is the doctrine of providence. He not only spoke the word “star”, but the star formed by the Word of His power is upheld by that same Word. That is, only when God continues to speak the Word “star” does that star continue to exist. If God should cease saying that word, the star would disappear and be no more.
.
There is a certain irony involved in this. The very creature God upholds by the Word of His power man uses to sin against God. If God did not uphold that creature, man would not be able to use it to deny God. And the same is true of man himself. He too is given his existence every moment by the Word of God’s power. From God’s point of view, the same is true. He upholds every creature to give it to man, knowing full well what man will do with it. It is like a murderer who uses his victim’s gun to shoot him. But there is one thing man cannot do: he cannot take God’s creation away from God.
.
God will not permit that to happen in any case, because God has His own purpose with this creation. To that purpose even all Satan does is subordinate; he too is under the sovereign rule of God. What that purpose is, God determined from eternity. It is to glorify Himself through the redemption of the creation by the suffering and death of Christ.
.
When Adam chose to assist the devil in his wicked purposes, Adam fell into depravity and corruption. The words of God were fulfilled: “The day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die.” That death was not only physical, but also spiritual, for sin is death. Adam came under the curse, a curse that drove Adam out of Paradise, but also out of fellowship with God. To live apart from God is death.
.
But Adam fell into sin as the head of God’s creation. Created to be representative of God Himself in God’s world, he became Satan’s representative when he agreed to do Satan’s will. As Satan’s representative, the whole creation came under the curse. Death pervades this earthly creation. Evolutionism may claim that death in the creation is only a weakness inherited from lower forms of life and an animal ancestry and soon to be overcome as the creation continues to produce higher forms of life, but this is part of the devil’s lie to draw man away from God the Creator. The curse of death is God’s just anger and fury as He punishes the creation as well as Adam its head.
.
Christ died for the creation as well as for His people in order that the creation might be redeemed. The Biblical proof of that is solid. When God established His covenant with Noah after the flood, God established His covenant with every living creature (Gen. 9:9-17). The Psalms speak of God’s love for His creation in many places. It is striking, however, that the Psalms, in extolling the glories of the creation, speak prophetically of Christ, revealed in the creation (Psalm 19:1-6, where the figure of the sun as a bridegroom coming forth from its chamber speaks of Christ, the Sun of Righteousness that arises with healing in His wings, Malachi 4:2). It is striking that the law of God is also mentioned in vss. 7-14 as the gospel that converts the soul, makes wise the simple, rejoices the heart, enlightens the eyes, and gives rewards to those who keep it. The connection between the first part of the Psalm and the second part is surely that the law of God is present in both the creation and man, and has the same power in both creation and man. Psalm 33:6-11 speaks of the power of the Word of God that creates and upholds all the creation. This same truth is mentioned in John 1:1, 2, where that same creative Word of God is said to have become flesh in the person of Jesus Christ (verse 14).
.
Many names given in Scripture for Christ are taken directly from the creation: Lion of Judah’s Bright and Morning Star, Lily of the Valley, Rose of Sharon, etc. All these indicate that Christ’s redemption extends to the entire creation.
.
Romans 8:19-22 speaks of the hope of the creation to be delivered from the bondage of corruption. “For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan without ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.”
.
Paul speaks of the same truth in Colossians 1:20: “And [God] having made peace through the blood of his [Christ’s] cross, by him [Christ] to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.” The apostle is very specific and emphatic about the fact that in Christ’s cross all the creation, the earthly and the heavenly, is reconciled to God. All shall therefore, be saved. God snatches His own creation out of the dirty hands of the wicked and not only restores it to its original pristine purity and beauty, but raises it to a much higher level of glory in the new heavens and the new earth, when heaven and earth shall become one creation.
.
Hence, to speak of God’s grace towards the creation is a perfectly Biblical thought and no one can make objection to it. Surely the quotation of Psalm 145:9, used as a proof text for the first point of common grace, is, on the contrary, a powerful text to prove God’s love towards His own creation: “The Lord is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.” How true!
.
Gradually the righteous are, for the present, squeezed out of God’s world till they are all but destroyed. Then, at that moment when the devil congratulates himself in the accomplishment of his nefarious purpose, Christ comes in power and glory, and the whole creation is snatched out of the hands of the wicked led by Satan. And, irony of all ironies, that same creation, now glorified, is given to the people of God as their everlasting inheritance, for the meek shall inherit the earth (Matt. 5:5), while the wicked are banished forever in hell.
.
With warmest regards,
Prof. Hanko

The Serious Implications of "Common Grace" (14)

.
Dear Forum Members,
.
Greetings in our Lord Jesus Christ. It will interest you to know that Mrs. Hanko and I are once again in Singapore. The Covenant Evangelical Reformed Church was greatly in need of help once again; one of the pastors of this church, Rev. Lau Chin Kwee, is still recuperating from major surgery. He had a rare genetic disease and the only life-saving measure was a heart-liver transplant. This was the first operation of its kind in all Asia and only the 17th in the whole world. It was performed by a team of 50, of which ten were doctors. He is recuperating well and could possibly return home this week. His surgery has attracted a lot of media attention, and the family has been greatly bothered by this. Pray for him and his family in this difficult time.
.
* * * *

I have finished the discussion of the history of common grace, giving particular attention to the history of the gracious and well-meant gospel offer. The time has come to begin a discussion of the doctrines themselves, the Biblical proof offered in support of them and the evaluation of them from a Biblical and confessional perspective.
.
Before I enter a detailed discussion concerning the doctrine of common grace, I should make some general remarks.
.
The doctrine of common grace has implications for many other doctrines of the Reformed faith. By virtue of the fact that common grace deals with grace, it touches on and significantly modifies these doctrines that historically have been called “the doctrines of grace”. These doctrines of grace are usually defined as the “Five Points of Calvinism.” Common grace has implications for at least four of the five points of Calvinism, and perhaps all five: unconditional election, particular redemption, total depravity, and irresistible grace, and perhaps the preservation of the saints. While a consideration of this aspect of the subject surely has benefits, and while I intend to demonstrate in passing how common grace modifies these doctrines of grace, I will be concentrating on the doctrines of common grace themselves.
.
I say, I will be concentrating on the doctrines (in the plural) of common grace. Common grace itself is one doctrine that teaches that God is gracious to all mankind, and not only to the elect. But included in that general doctrine are at least four other doctrines. That is, God is said to show His favor to all men and not only to the elect in at least four different ways. Briefly, they are: God’s attitude of favor towards all men shown to them by gracious and wonderful gifts in creation; God’s work of restraining sin in the hearts of the unregenerate by His Spirit so that unsaved people are not as bad as they could be and would be apart from common grace; the ability of the unregenerated man to perform good works by the power of the Holy Spirit; and the gracious and well-meant offer of the gospel.
.
Although the four doctrines that form parts of the general doctrine of common grace are separate doctrines, and although they may clearly be distinguished form each other, the similarity and relationship between these four doctrines lies in the fact that all are manifestations of God’s grace or favor to all -- although that grace is worked in different ways.
.
* * * *
It is important to remember, as I have pointed out before, that the word “grace” has basically two connotations in Scripture. The first one is God’s unmerited attitude of favor to the elect. No one does anything to merit that favor, but rather forfeits it with all he does. Favor is always gratuitous. The second meaning of the word “grace” is a work of God in the heart of the sinner that brings God’s blessings upon the object of grace and spiritually changes the recipient of that grace. In the elect, God’s grace is the power within men that bestows on them all the blessings of salvation, spiritually alters them so that the regenerated child of God can be called “a new creature” (Gal. 6:15); enables them to walk as God’s people in the world, gives them strength to bear the trials of life, and leads them infallibly to their eternal destination. But if one teaches that God shows grace to the reprobate, this grace to the reprobate is also both an attitude of favor and an internal work of God, a bestowal of benefits internally given that change a man, though that change is not conversion or salvation. We must keep this in mind.
.
There is a point here that needs to be made. Although common grace is defined as an attitude of God towards all men, that attitude is not simply objective, out there somewhere, an attitude of which the object is unaware, an attitude hidden in the heart of God. The object of common grace may despise God’s gracious attitude towards him, but he does know it and experience it and his rejection of it is the proof that he knows it..
.
The objective attitude of God’s favor towards all men becomes subjectively man’s experience in two ways. The first is simply that the object of God’s attitude of favor is made aware of this favor of God and what it means for him personally.
.
The well-meant gospel offer is one part of common grace that stresses the knowledge the sinner has of God’s gracious attitude towards him. The gospel itself expresses to him in a gracious offer, that God wants very much to save him and is willing to do all that is necessary to make salvation possible for him. In fact, it is God’s intention to save him and the only reason he is not saved is because man himself puts up obstacles to God’s work that are not overcome by God.
.
This consciousness of God’s favor that makes the unregenerate sinner aware of this gracious attitude of God towards him is very important. What good does it do if the sinner is unaware of how greatly God loves him? A young man may like very much a young lady, but shyness keeps him at a distance and she never becomes aware of it. However, he may gain courage and send her a dozen roses on her birthday, or he may find the courage in himself to express his feeling towards her. Then she knows, whatever her own reaction might be.
.
So God also makes known to the sinner that He is favorably inclined towards him. He does this in more ways than through the gracious gospel offer. In giving a man the Holy Spirit who restrains sin in him, the man knows this comes from God. Just as a sick man knows he is made better by the skills of a physician, the sinner knows he is made better by the divine physician. This gift is impressed upon the consciousness of man by God Himself. God gives man this gift because God loves him – so the common grace advocate teaches.
.
It has frequently been said that man is conscious of God’s goodness towards him because of what has been called in Reformed theology, a sensus divinitatis (sense of divinity), or semen religionis (seed of religion). This sense of divinity is indeed a reality, as Scripture and our confessions teach. But it is a serious mistake to claim, as some do, that this sensus diuvinitis is also the fruit of common grace. We shall consider this more in detail at a later point.
.
Hence, man cannot escape knowing, so claim the advocates of common grace, that God loves him, shows mercy to him, truly shows kindness and benevolence toward him and is very much interested in saving him and making him blessed. Through all God’s works man comes to know that God is indeed favorable towards him.
.
Grace involves all the communicable attributes of God. Grace is, in that sense, a broad term, a generic term that includes many different attitudes of God. Grace includes love, mercy, kindness, benevolence, longsuffering and the like. For example, if God gives him grace, God loves the reprobate, according to common grace. Some defenders of common grace are quick to point out that this love of God for the reprobate is not the same kind of love, perhaps not as intense, not as strong, but love nonetheless, which God shows to the elect. The same is true of the other virtues of God. He is compassionate to the wicked; He is merciful to them in their misery; He is sympathetic to them in their troubles; He enjoys nothing so much as to see them happy and does all that He can to make them happy. And so common grace is God’s favor upon the wicked of which they are conscious, and the benefits of which grace they experience every day.
.
But this is not all. The defenders of common grace also teach that grace, subjectively bestowed on the sinner, involves a subjective and inner change in the sinner, although not a saving change. This lies in the nature of grace. When the Holy Spirit works in the hearts of the sinner to restrain sin and to enable the sinner to do good works, that powerful grace modifies his total depravity, lessens the power of sin in a man, and leaves an unsaved sinner no longer totally depraved. I know that defenders of common grace, in defense of this position and intent on trying to remain Reformed, speak of a distinction between total depravity (one of the Five Points of Calvinism) and absolute depravity. Apart from common grace, so they say, man is absolutely depraved, but through common grace he becomes totally depraved. It is obvious that this is a mere playing with words. In the thinking of those who promote common grace, the term “total” does not mean “total,” but partial.
.
The same is true of the well-meant gospel offer. Because it is a gracious offer, it is a vehicle whereby God gives to everyone who hears the gospel a subjective grace by means of which a man has the power to accept or reject the gospel. In fact, as we shall see, that grace that never saves, gives sufficient power to the sinner to see his own sins, see the just punishment of God that is his lot because of his sins, see the blessedness of escaping from sin by fleeing to Christ; and yet he refuses to go to Christ for salvation. We shall discuss this at a later date. It was known among Puritans as the doctrine of preparationism.
.
That there is this internal working of God in the hearts of the unregenerate that changes him is made clear in the writings of Herman Bavinck, the great Dutch theologian and contemporary of Abraham Kuyper. Bavinck, though brought up in the tradition of the Secession of 1834, and though he became professor of Dogmatics in Kampen Seminary, the Seminary of the Secession Churches, nevertheless, moved to the Free University, Kuyper’s pride and joy, to take up the position of professor of Dogmatics there. The Secessionists never quite forgave him for doing this.
.
Right: Dr. Herman Bavinck
.
Bavinck, in his book, Our Reasonable Faith discusses common grace from the viewpoint of general revelation and speaks of general revelation as a manifestation of common grace. (Herman Bavinck, Our Reasonable Faith [Grand Rapids: Wm B, Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1956] chapters 3 & 4.)
.
He first makes a point of it that the content of general revelation and special revelation are the same: But though they have the same content, they are to be distinguished from each other. “And, however essentially the two are to be distinguished, they remain intimately connected. … The general revelation is owing to the Word which was with God in the beginning, which made all things, which shone as a light in the darkness and lighteth every man that cometh into the world. … The special revelation is owing to that same Word as it as made flesh in Christ, and is now full of grace and truth …”(37, 38).
.
This relationship between general revelation and special revelation is described as follows: “It is common grace which makes special grace possible, prepares the way for it, and later supports it; and special grace, in its turn, leads common grace up to its own level and puts it into its service” (38).
.
That this common grace is also worked internally in the heart of man is Bavinck’s conviction: “After all, the revelation of God in nature and in history could have no effect upon man if there were not something in man himself that responded to it. … And so too the revelation of God in all the works of His hands would be quite unknowable to man if God had not planted in his soul an inerasible (sic, inerasable is correct) sense of His existence and being. … God reveals Himself outside of man; He reveals Himself also within man. He does not leave Himself without witness in the human heart and conscience” (42, emphasis belongs to Bavinck).
.
And, of course, general revelation is, in the mind of Bavinck, common grace. And so the fruits of common grace in general revelation are many: “It is owing to general revelation that some religious and ethical sense is present in all men; that they have some awareness still of truth and falsehood, of good and evil, justice and injustice, beauty and ugliness; that they live in the relationship of marriage and the family, of community and state; that they are held in check by all these external and internal controls against degenerating into bestiality; that within the pale of these limits, they busy themselves with the production, distribution, and enjoyment of all kinds of spiritual and material things; in short that mankind is by general revelation preserved in its existence, maintained in its unity, and enable to continue and to develop in history” (59).
.
That all these things are true of mankind we do not doubt. That they are the fruit of general revelation, much less, common grace, is quite another matter.
.
With warmest regards,
.
Prof. Herman Hanko

Three Comments on Common Grace

The "Common Grace" issue in the Christian Reformed Church (13)

.
Dear Forum Members,
.
In the last installment I pointed out that the Christian Reformed Church (henceforth, CRC) was composed of basically two groups when divided theologically. There were, first of all, the immigrants who had their roots in the Churches of the Secession and many of whom held to a certain common grace that emphasized a gracious and well-meant gospel offer. Secondly, there was a sizeable group that had its roots in Kuyper’s movement, had adopted Kuyperian common grace and had immigrated to this country where they had succeeded in taking over important positions in the church. A third group could be found, however, composed of immigrants (or children of immigrants) who, though the members of this group had their roots in the Churches of the Secession, did not hold to the gracious and well-meant gospel offer. Many of these were from the Northern part of the Netherlands where the more orthodox people of the Secession could be found. Also belonging to this third group were many from Kuyper’s new denomination who were advocates of Kuyper’s early teachings on particular grace, but, although perhaps unable to pinpoint exactly what Kuyper’s errors were, were too Reformed to be devotees of Kuyper’s common grace.
.
God, in His providence, works in strange and unexpected, but marvelous ways. So He did also in the CRC in the first quarter of the 20th century. The tensions in the CRC over common grace and Kuyperian theology were grievous and had the potential of splitting the church into two denominations, each of which supported either Kuyperian common grace or Secessionist theology. A split in the CRC seemed inevitable.
.
The whole issue of Kuyperian common grace came indirectly to the broader assemblies of the CRC through the teachings of a professor in the Seminary by the name of Dr. Ralph Janssen. He had received his advanced education in European universities, and had learned the arts of higher critical studies of Scripture. These higher critical studies and their teachings became the content of many of Dr. Janssen’s courses. At bottom was a denial of the infallibility of Scripture and a natural explanation of Scripture’s contents that robbed Scripture of its divine authorship and reduced Scripture to man’s work – at least in part. Among other views of higher criticism that he held, Janssen insisted that the miracles recorded in Scripture did not have to be explained in terms of God’s direct work, but could easily be interpreted in such a way that scientific laws of nature were not violated. For example, the manna that Israel ate in the wilderness was not given by God directly, but was found naturally in a certain plant common to the wilderness. The miracle lay in Israel’s ability to find it. How that plant could provide sufficient food for 3,000,000+ people for forty years we leave to the imagination of unbelievers. He also taught that the water that came from the rock at Rephidim was always present in the rock and not specially created by God. The miracle lay in the fact that Moses happened to hit the rock in a particularly thin spot. His blow broke the rock and the water, always there, was released. He also insisted that the religion of Israel came not from divine revelation in its entirety, but was a modification of heathen religions to suit Israel’s unique position among the nations.
.
While we need not enter into these views in any kind of detail, we are interested in the fact that Janssen appealed to Kuyperian common grace in support of his position. He argued that, because it was true that the unregenerate could do such good works as created a neutral area of cooperation between the church and the world, scientific discoveries ought to be included in the church’s thinking, and the church’s interpretation of Scripture could be modified so as to make Scripture scientifically acceptable. He also argued that if the heathen possessed common grace, their religions had many elements of good in them, with the result that Israel could pick up these elements and incorporate them into its own religion.
.
Rev. Herman Hoeksema was, far and away, the most vocal critic of Janssen’s views. He wrote against Janssen’s views in the church paper, The Banner, until its pages were closed to any discussion of the controversy. When the views of Dr. Janssen became an issue in the Seminary, Rev. Hoeksema was appointed to a committee to study these views and bring conclusions and recommendations to the synod, the church’s highest governing body. The report that was finally adopted by the Synod of 1922 was a report based on the word of and mainly drafted by Rev. Herman Hoeksema. However, the report did not address itself to Janssen’s main line of defense, Kuyperian common grace, but limited itself to the issue of higher criticism itself.
.
The Synod of 1922 condemned Janssen’s views, but, following the leading of the committee report, did not deal with the question of common grace. Hoeksema, in later years, regretted that the committee and the synod did not tackle the problem of common grace in connection with Janssen’s errors. Although Janssen was relieved of his teaching responsibilities in the Seminary, nothing was said about his views on common grace, which he had used as a basis for his teachings.
.
The reason why both the committee and the synod refrained from dealing with the deeper issue of common grace does not appear in the record, but it can be conjectured that both the committee and the synod were aware of the deep tensions in the church over this question and were hesitant to bring these tensions to the floor of a major assembly at a time when the church was threatened by the deadly error of higher criticism.
.
But because Kuyperian common grace was wide-spread in the CRC, there were also many Janssen supporters in the college and throughout the churches. These men were furious that their mentor had been condemned, and decided to make common grace an issue that the church would be compelled to face. They did this by way of protests against the preaching of Herman Hoeksema, who, they knew, denied both Kuyperian common grace and the well-meant gospel offer. It is interesting that Hoeksema himself had been born and raised within the tradition of the Secession Churches, but had never held to a well-meant gospel offer. And when, while still in the Netherlands, he came into contact with Kuyper’s teachings, he learned from the Kuyper of sovereign and particular grace, not the Kuyper of common grace.
.
The result was that Hoeksema’s teachings went to the Synod of 1924. Strangely enough, Hoeksema’s teachings were never condemned by the synod; and, indeed, the synod officially declared him to be Reformed. But, in spite of that, the synod took it upon itself to draw up an official statement on the doctrine of common grace. The leaders in the CRC, who were especially interested in such a statement, saw also an opportunity to heal a widening breach in the churches between the followers of Kuyper and the followers of the Secession leaders. And so they adopted a statement of common grace that approved both kinds of common grace: a gracious and well-meant gospel offer and a common grace in the unregenerate that restrained sin and enabled the wicked to do good works.
.
The decision served its purpose, and the breach in the CRC was healed by the decisions of this synod.
.
On the other hand, a little more than a half year after the synod, Hoeksema was deposed from office and driven out of the CRC for his denials of common grace. But in the good providence of God, that segment of the CRC that repudiated both the common grace of the Secession Churches and Kuyperian common grace, saw in the teachings of Hoeksema the solid and uncompromising truth of the Reformed faith taught by Calvin, on through Dordt and many Reformed theologians, and which was preserved to the present. They went with Hoeksema and became the nucleus of the Protestant Reformed Churches, a denomination that today holds firmly to the doctrines of sovereign and particular grace.
.
And thus we bring our brief historical study to an end. It ought, I think, be evident that history does not support the theories of common grace, but is on the side of those who stand for sovereign and particular grace.
.
God willing, we will enter into the doctrinal ideas of common grace vs. sovereign and particular grace in subsequent forum installments.
.
With warmest regards,
.
Prof Herman Hanko

Dr. Abraham Kuyper's common grace (12)

.
Dear Forum members:
.
In my last installment, I introduced our readers to Dr. Abraham Kuyper’s success in bringing into Reformed theology a novel view of common grace.
.
I call this view of common grace “novel”, because Kuyper himself, in his three-volume treatment of the subject, speaks of his view as being new; he insists that nothing like it could be found in Reformed writings since the time of the Reformation.
.
However, in spite of Kuyper’s claim to novelty, there had been, for a long time, those within Reformed circles who frequently spoke of the “good deeds” of the wicked. My own paternal grandmother, a basically uneducated member of the churches of the Secession, but an unusually godly and pious woman, and one who lived through the controversy over common grace in 1924, but stayed with Rev. Hoeksema, could never quite understand why it was not a good work for an unbeliever to help a man who had fallen into a creek or river and could not save himself. She was from the Churches of the Secession and reflected in her thinking a stream of thought in these churches that inclined towards common grace. She had, however, no use for Kuyper, and it is doubtful whether she ever fully understood what he was saying.
* * * *
I offer here a brief sketch of Abraham Kuyper’s views on common grace. (For a detailed description of Kuyper’s views on common grace [his three-volume work has never been translated] see Henry Van Til, The Calvinistic Concept of Culture [Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1959], and, Henry Danhof and Herman Hoeksema, Sin and Grace, tr. by Cornelius Hanko [Jenison: RFPA, 2003].)
.
While Kuyper rejected the idea of a gracious and well-meant gospel offer, he held strongly to another kind of grace common to all men that restrained sin in such a way that men were enabled to do good works. By good works Kuyper meant works pleasing to God and of use by the church.
.
Kuyper spoke of common grace as first of all a major dose of some antitoxin administered to Adam immediately after the fall (the figure is Kuyper’s). He claimed, without a smidgeon of Biblical support, that had God not intervened with His common grace, Adam would have, after the fall, become a beast and the creation a chaotic wasteland. In fact, according to Kuyper, Adam would have fallen dead at the foot of the tree. (Kuyper is not clear here on whether man would actually have died a physical death or whether he would become a beast; both are claimed to be true. Sometimes he even speaks of Adam becoming a devil if common grace had not been administered to him.) The result of his sin was that, although a deadly and fatal dose of poison was administered to Adam because of the fall, by giving Adam common grace, God gave Adam, so to speak, a dose of an anti-toxin, which resulted in Adam’s vomiting out some of the poison he had imbibed. The result is that while Adam came close to death and retained consequences of his brush with death, he did not actually die in the fullest sense of the word. While he became depraved, he was not as depraved as he would have been had not common grace been administered. While he would have become a beast without the antitoxin administered to him, he now retained his rational and moral nature and continued to be a man. While he would have become utterly incapable of doing any good if God had not intervened, he now retained the ability, apart from saving grace, to do some good in this world.
.
Kuyper spoke of this common grace as being the work of the Holy Spirit. By the power of the grace that the Holy Spirit worked, the full effects of sin were avoided. Apart from that common grace man would have become a devil, vicious, corrupt, depraved, beyond the possibility of being saved.
.
But, since common grace was given to Adam, and through Adam, to his posterity, and since by means of that common grace, unregenerate man is capable of doing good, a wide area of “neutrality” is created in this world, in itself neither good nor bad but morally neutral, in which the wicked and the righteous are able to cooperate in many works of mutual interest, particularly in making this world a better place to live. An example of this neutral ground would be the shop in which believers and unbelievers work together on assembly lines in a manufacturing plant. Because working conditions were frequently dreadful in the 19th and early 20th centuries, believers and unbelievers could and did join in “neutral” labor unions to fight together for improvement in working conditions. And here in this morally “neutral” area in which the unbeliever could, by his good works, contribute significantly to the well-being of mankind and the church, Kuyper found his justification for forming a coalition with Roman Catholics to work together to spread the Reformed faith throughout the world.
.
This cooperation, in Kuyper’s thinking, would begin in the Netherlands where all the citizens, under the auspices of a State Church, could promote the Reformed faith and from the Netherlands would come a great revival that would spread throughout all the world and make this world a better place to live. This thinking has been carried on in many places where, under the supposed banner of the Reformed faith, labors are put forth to improve this world. And, to be a genuine Reformed believer in this world, it is said, means to be busy in winning all institutions of society, and society itself for the cause of Christ. If one does not hold to this sort of common grace and himself join in the crusade to save the world from itself, he is an Anabaptist, and guilty of world-flight.
* * * *
The movement led by Kuyper began in the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. The interesting and important aspect of this movement is that immigrants from the Netherlands came to America, now not only from the Churches of the Secession of 1834, but also from Kuyper’s new movement. The result was tension in the Christian Reformed Church, which church most of the immigrants joined. Some within the CRC promoted the views of the Secession Churches with its emphasis on piety and from which came the common grace of the gospel offer, and some promoted the views of common grace developed by Kuyper. There was bitter enmity and antagonism between the two movements, both of which were found within the Christian Reformed Church.
.
I had a Dutch teacher while studying in Calvin College, himself a devotee of Kuyperian common grace, who frequently in class would speak to us of the bitter in-house conflicts between these two wings in the CRC, and who would say to us that the half of what went on had not been revealed, but that he was going to write a book about it someday in which the whole story would be told. He never wrote the book, so far as I know.
.
The conflict between these two wings in the church threatened to split the church. If this had happened, it would not have been surprising, for the same doctrinal and ecclesiastical split occurred in the Netherlands. Although the Churches of the Secession and the Kuyperian churches in the Netherlands did unite in 1892, the union was a shot-gun marriage that was, from the start, doomed to failure. An effort was made in 1905 to heal the divisions, but nothing worked. Finally, the split became reality in 1944, when Dr. Klaas Schilder was deposed from office and began what is now known as the Liberated Churches.
.
(Right: Dr. Klaas Schilder)
.
Interestingly, many who left the Reformed Church under Dr. K. Schilder were of the Secession of 1834 and, therefore, leaned toward the common grace of the offer, the same idea appeared among the people of the Liberated Church. It took, however, a slightly different form. It was connected with the sacrament of baptism instead of the preaching. The Liberated, therefore, instead of speaking of a general offer in the preaching, spoke of a general promise to all baptized children in the sacrament of baptism. Instead of the common grace that comes through the preaching, the Liberated speak of a common grace that comes through baptism. Instead of emphasizing the grace of the offer that enables a man to choose for or against the gospel, the Liberated speak of a grace that comes through baptism enabling all baptized children to accept or reject the promise. And so, both the gracious offer of the gospel and the gracious promise of the covenant are conditional, so that both depend upon the fulfillment of the condition of faith in order to have salvation realized fully.
.
But the division of 1944, while it included many issues, involved also the differences over common grace: Kuyperian common grace vs. the common grace of the well-meant offer of the gospel.
.
That nearly brings the history of common grace to the origin of the Protestant Reformed Churches. But we will wait with that part of the story till the next installment.
.
With warmest regards,
.
Prof. Herman Hanko

Dr. Abraham Kuyper and Common Grace (11)

.
Dear forum members,
.
In my last installment, I discussed the basic concessions to Amyraldianism made by the men who sparked the so-called Marrow controversy. I also pointed out that the whole idea of a gracious and well-meant gospel offer came to the Netherlands from Scotland and, more particularly, from the Marrow men.
.
I must trace the development of this error in the Dutch churches and its subsequent spread to America.
* * * *
During the long period of deterioration in the Dutch churches after the great Synod of Dordt, the people who were dissatisfied with the modernistic preaching in the State Church met in homes in small groups, in which groups the Scriptures were studied, religious books were read and discussed, and prayers were made for a reformation of the church. These house meetings were called gezelschappen, or conventicles. These conventicles were instrumental in bringing about the so-called “Later Reformation”, and the influences of Scotland were especially strong among the people who attended these house meetings. The “Later Reformation” is to be distinguished from the reformation that came about through the Secession of 1834. It was a return to Christian piety in opposition to the cold and sterile religion of the State Church. The result of Scottish influences was that the whole idea of the gospel offer was found among many of these people of the “Further Reformation”. Being impressed with the spirituality of the writers from the ranks of the Marrow men, many of the Dutch people, themselves, thirsting for spirituality, became persuaded that the offer of the gospel played a crucial role in the cultivation of genuine piety.
.
Because of the apostasy in the Reformed Church (the State Church), reformation was needed to preserve the truth among the Dutch people. God sent such reformation through the work of a rather insignificant minister in the small village of Ulrum, in the province of Groningen. His name was Henry De Cock. After De Cock’s conversion to Calvinism and the Reformed faith, he and his consistory voted to secede from the apostate State Church to form a new denomination, orthodox in its theology and free from State control. Most of those who had been worshipping in conventicles saw the secession as an answer to their prayers. And thousands joined the Secession Churches so that the new denomination grew rapidly, even though it was severely persecuted by the government. The year of the Secession was 1834.
.
Six ministers went along with the Secession in its first stirrings: De Cock, Van Velzen, Gezelle-Marburg, Scholte, Van Raalte and Brummelkamp. But there was not unity of doctrine among them. Basically, there were two groups, both of which had been found earlier in the conventicles. The one group, composed of De Cock, Van Velzen and Geselle-Marburg, were soundly orthodox, while Brummelkamp was a strong defender of the gospel offer, and Van Raalte was not a strongly orthodox man. Scholte was something of a maverick and had little influence on the development of the churches of the Secession. He immigrated to Pella, Iowa and set up an independent congregation there. Van Raalte immigrated to Holland, Michigan, and his band of settlers, with the arrival of additional immigrants, formed the beginning of the Christian Reformed Church.
.
Roughly, the two camps in the churches of the Secession were also geographically divided. Brummelkamp led a faction that was predominantly to be found in the southern part of the Netherlands, while the more orthodox men had influence in the north. Brummelkamp was professor in the theological school in Kampen, the Netherlands, where he influenced many of the ministers of the Secession.
.
With Van Raalte occupying a moderate position, it is not surprising that when the Christian Reformed Church was begun in 1857 the well-meant gospel offer was imbedded in the thinking of many preachers and members of the church. It became a part of the doctrinal position of the Dutch Reformed churches, though it was not officially adopted until 1924.
* * * *
It is at this point that a major development in the doctrine of common grace, not related to the gracious offer of the gospel, took place, which we shall have to consider. In 1886, Dr. Abraham Kuyper led another reformation in the Netherlands that resulted in another denomination. His movement was called the Doleantie or “Aggrieved Ones”. The movement took that name because Kuyper and his followers insisted that, rather than form a church free from government control, they were the true continuation of the State Church and that, therefore, they had never really left the State Church, but simply represented it as it ought to be. They were “aggrieved” at the apostasy of their brethren and fellow members within the State Church. In this respect they differed sharply from the Churches of the Secession of 1834, which established a church free from government control.
.
Kuyper was a man of many gifts and one born to a position of leadership. However, when he entered the ministry he was unconverted and found a cozy home in the apostate State Church. But through a series of events, not the least of them a sharp reprimand from a simple farm lady in his congregation for preaching modernism, Kuyper was brought to the conviction that the Reformed faith, developed since the days of Calvin and Dordt, was indeed the truth of the Scriptures. He gave himself over to the defense of this Reformed faith and, to the utter dismay of his modernistic colleagues, began to do battle with them. His desire was to bring the church of the Netherlands back to its original strength when the Synod of Dordt scored a smashing victory over the Arminians.
.
Kuyper’s major writing in this period was a book with the title Dat God’s Genade Particulier Is, translated into English under the title “Particular Grace.” (The translation is by Mr. Marvin Kamps, and is published by the Reformed Free Publishing Association.) In this book Kuyper argued against the universalism of the modernists in the Reformed Churches and defended particularism in all areas of salvation, especially in the atoning work of Christ.. The interesting part of this book, as far as we are concerned, is Kuyper’s repudiation of the gracious and well-meant offer of the gospel. In fact, the texts commonly quoted in support of the offer of the gospel (II Peter 3:9, I Tim. 2:4, etc.) were all explained by Kuyper in a particularist way as referring to the elect only. Kuyper was, at this stage in his life, soundly Reformed.
.
(Right: Dr. Abraham Kuyper)
* * * *
But Kuyper underwent a change. He came out with a three-volume work entitled Gemeene Gratie or, General Grace. In this work, Kuyper, without ever repudiating his rejection of the free offer of the gospel, now, strangely, steered the church in the direction of another aspect of common grace, namely, a grace given to all men that restrained sin and produced in the unregenerate the ability to do good works.
.
This change in Kuyper’s thinking came about because Kuyper committed the grievous sin of resigning from the active ministry of the Word in order to enter politics. He formed a political party, ran for and won a place in the Lower Chamber and became the head of his party. He aspired, however, to the office of prime minister, but could not get sufficient members of his party elected to the Lower Chamber to thrust him into the prime minister’s office. And so he formed a coalition with the Roman Catholic party to secure enough votes to gain the prime minister’s seat.
.
But in Netherlands where sentiment could be as strong against Roman Catholics as it was in England, Kuyper had to justify theologically this strange and unnatural coalition. This he did with his theory of common grace.
.
In turn, Kuyper saw it as important that he lead the country as prime minister, because he held a view of the Netherlands, which sounds strange to our 21st century ears, but was not unusual in the days when the church was still a State Church.
.
Kuyper considered the Reformed Church of the Netherlands to be the true church, because it was the State Church. Now, it was characteristic of a State Church that that denomination, technically, is responsible for the spiritual welfare of all the citizens, even if they were not attending members of the one state-approved denomination. Usually every baby had to be baptized by the church, all the marriages had to be in the church, and funeral services and burials were conducted within the precincts of the church. Kuyper considered the Netherlands to be a genuine Reformed country with a genuine Reformed Church supported by a Reformed government. He saw a future in which the Netherlands would become the fountain-head of a mighty stream of the Reformed faith that would flow throughout all the world and make of the entire world a Reformed community, with every sphere of life subordinated to the rule of Jesus Christ. It was essential to Kuyper that a Reformed man be in a position of authority in the government to realize this dream. But he could gain leadership only by way of a coalition with Roman Catholics; and some theological justification for putting these two historic enemies in the same bed had to be made. That theological justification was common grace.
.
That brings us to a discussion of Kuyperian common grace, but that must wait till next time. We notice in passing that Kuyper’s dream of a world where every country and every institution of society are subordinated to the one rule of Jesus Christ has become the goal of many post-millennial movements, of many theologians found in Reformed and Presbyterian circles, and of many colleges and universities. Today we have the strange and inexplicable situation in which thousands speak of the Kuyper of common grace and regularly travel to his shrine to be renewed in their thinking, while almost no one remembers the Kuyper of sovereign and particular grace. The Kuyper gone wrong is the idol of many; the Reformed Kuyper has disappeared from the earth.
.
With warmest regards,
.
Prof. Hanko

The "Marrow Controversy" (10)

.
Dear Forum members,
.
We must turn now, in our historical treatment of the error of common grace in general and the gracious and well-meant gospel offer in particular, to the Marrow Controversy, which troubled the Presbyterian Church of Scotland in the first half of the 18th century. Before we do this, however, I must make a few remarks about theological developments in the British Isles, after the Westminster Assembly that relate to our subject.
.
The Presbyterian Church never became the state church in England. After the Cromwell inter-regnum, England was once again under a monarchy with the Stuarts from Scotland on the throne. The State Church again became the Anglican Church. Only in Scotland did Presbyterianism become a vital part of the life of the nation. A struggle in Scotland over the question of whether the Presbyterian Church of Scotland or the Anglican Church would be the state church resulted in a victory for the Presbyterian Church.
.
There were many who opposed some of the doctrines of the Westminster Confession. John Davenant, a delegate from England to the Synod of Dordt, defended a modified Amyraldian position. The same was true of Richard Baxter. Amyraldianism continued to have its supporters.
.
Many throughout the British Isles, known as Puritans objected to the formal orthodoxy of the State Church in England (Anglican) and the worldliness of its members, as well as its retention of Romish rites and ceremonies. Further, they charged the Church with the error of Antinomism. While I cannot go into this aberration in these articles, we may notice in passing that this error first appeared in Germany in the Lutheran churches of the Reformation. The chief defender of Antinomianism was John Agricola, but the error was (and is) always a threat to the church. In general, Antinomism taught that the redeemed and justified child of God did not have the obligation to keep the law of God. Antinomism denied the “must” of the law of God, for, so it argued, the justified sinner is righteous in Christ wholly apart from works. The charge was often leveled against the Presbyterian Church in Scotland because, the church held firmly to the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and opponents of that doctrine often accused the orthodox of teaching Antinomianism although the charge was false. That is, enemies of justification by faith alone attempted to thwart the doctrine by leveling against it a charge of Antinomianism. While the charge itself was not true, it was true that, because the Presbyterian Church was the State Church, all the citizens of the nation were technically members and the responsibility of the church. Among these were countless people who were thoroughly irreligious, hardly ever came to church and lived completely worldly lives.
.
This objection was brought against the Presbyterian Church of Scotland in the latter part of the 17th century and the early part of the 18th century by those who were later called the Marrow men, and who, while also charging the Presbyterian Church with antinomism, found fault with the worldliness and spiritual carelessness of so many in the church, and ascribed it to a lack in the preaching of the gospel. They charged the church with producing preachers who were cold and abstract and who lacked the passion for souls that ought to characterize the preaching. They wanted preaching that was conducive to leading people to Christ and thus produce genuine conversion..
* * * *
The origin of the name “Marrow Men” is found in a book by Edward Fisher, written in 1645, which appeared under the title, The Marrow of Modern Divinity (Swengel: Reinar Publications, 1975). In this book Fisher, in a dialogue between three fictional characters (Nomista [representing the law of God], Neophytus [representing a new convert] and Evangelista [representing the gospel]) discuss the problems in the church and find many of them to be rooted in a wrong conception of preaching. As, in his book, he analyzed the problems in the church, Fisher, through his fictional characters and attempting to alter the character of the preaching, made and defended statements such as these: “Christ hath taken upon Him the sins of all men;” “[In Christ] the Father hath made a deed of gift and grant unto all mankind;” “Whatsoever Christ did for the redemption of mankind, He did it for you;” “Go and tell every man without exception, that here is good news for him, Christ is dead for him.” This warmer approach to preaching, so he argued, would make it attractive to people and make the gospel more acceptable to those to whom it was preached.
.
In the early part of the 18th century the book came to the attention of some of the men in the church in connection with a controversy over what was called “The Auchterader Creed”. The Auchterader Creed was a statement drawn up by the Auchterader Presbytery, which the presbytery required a candidate to the ministry to sign in order to be licensed to preach. The statement read: “It is unsound to teach that a man must forsake sin in order to come to Christ.” In the course of the debate reference was made to Fisher’s book as containing the solution to the problem presented by the Auchterader Creed. The book of Fisher was republished and became itself an issue on the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland. After due consideration, Fisher’s book was condemned by the Assembly on the following grounds.
.
1) The book taught that assurance was of the essence of faith. (While there is no point in entering into this controversy, we should notice that the Westminster Confession, in 18.3, wrongly, denies that assurance is of the essence of faith: “This infallible assurance [of faith] doth not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties before he be partaker of it”.
.
2) It taught a universal atonement and pardon in the cross. (This was especially evident from the statement in the book that Christ was dead for all. While the distinction was attempted between Christ dying for all and Christ dead for all, this was a mere play on words and a subtle effort to defend a universal atonement.)
.
3) The book taught that holiness was not necessary to salvation. (From this teaching and that of point 5 below, arose the charge that Edward Fisher (and the Marrow Men who rejoiced at his teachings), were antinomian. So the charge of Antinomianism was made by the Marrow Men against the church, and by the church against the Marrow Men.)
.
4) It taught that the fear of punishment and the hope of reward are not allowed to be used as incentives to obedience.
.

5) It held that the believer is not under the law as a rule of life.
.
Because the whole issue was related to the preaching of the gospel, the General Assembly interpreted the book to be a defense of the gracious and well-meant gospel offer. And so it was. It was a bold attempt to introduce into the church the errors of Amyraldianism by means of altering the preaching. Because Christ’s atonement was for all men, preachers were to assure every hearer that God loved him, that it was God’s desire and intention to save everyone who heard the gospel, and that God earnestly and tenderly, through the gospel, wooed sinners to “close with Christ.” There was no need to reject the overtures of the gospel, because each man had a deed or grant that gave him the right to be saved, but the actual bestowal of salvation was conditioned on faith and acceptance of the overtures of the gospel.
.
Thus, although the Presbyterian Church of Scotland officially condemned these views, eventually they entered the church through the teaching of the Marrow men, and committed subsequent theology to this pernicious error.
.
Subsequent Presbyterianism has been influenced by the Marrow men and one finds that a gracious and well-meant gospel offer has infiltrated the thinking and preaching of many, if not most, of the Presbyterian Churches around the world.
* * * *
The question we now face is this: how did the idea of a gracious and well-meant gospel offer enter into Dutch thinking? From the time of the Synod of Dordt to the end of the 18th century it was not present in the Reformed Churches of the Netherlands.
.
There are several ways in which the gracious offer of the gospel was introduced into the Dutch Reformed Churches.
.
1) Because of the persecution of Protestants in France, many refugees found a sanctuary in the Netherlands. But many of these refugees were influenced by Amyraldianism, which had originated in France. D. H. Kromminga writes, “Before the revocation of the Edict of Nantes various heterodox opinions had made their appearance among the Reformed churches of France. At Saumur, professor Moses Amyraud had taught a double decree of predestination, an anterior decree determining that Christ should make atonement for sinners and that sinners should be called to salvation, and a further particular decree of the election of some and the preterition of others … These tendencies which were at work among the Huguenot refugees soon made their appearance also in the Netherlands and affected the course of scientific theology so that it began to lose its Reformed character.” (D.H. Kromminga, The Christian Reformed Tradition [Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1943] 48, 49.)
.
2) In the years subsequent to Dordt, the Reformed Churches suffered a period of doctrinal and spiritual decline – as was true in Scotland. Many, concerned about such outward religion as was practiced in the State Church in Netherlands, searched for an emphasis in theology and religion on piety, a godly life, and an assurance of salvation that came from inner conviction. These trends sparked what is sometimes called De Nadere Reformatie, or “The Later Reformation”. The perilous state of the Established Church and the reaction of many within the church to dead orthodoxy and ungodliness of life found in the church, paralleled the situation in Scotland at the time of the Marrow controversy.
.
3) The spiritual state of the church opened the door in the Netherlands to influences from the Marrow men in Scotland. Such influences were actually brought about by exchanges of professors in the universities, ministers in the pulpits and close contact through books and pamphlets. In fact, many of the books written by the Marrow men and their followers were translated into Dutch and became the spiritual food for people who were starving for God’s Word in the apostate State Church. But the price to pay for such exchanges was an introduction into Dutch thinking of the well-meant gospel offer. It took firm hold and characterized a stream of Dutch theology that has lasted to the present.
.
And so, in my own ecclesiastical tradition, the gracious and well-meant gospel offer has had remarkable influence.
.
We will continue this in our next installment, God willing,
.
With warmest regards in the Lord,
.
Prof. Herman Hanko