Bible Interpretation, Books of the Bible, Sunday School

What Is the Point of Genesis 1?

5 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

There are several possible interpretations of the individual verses in Genesis 1, but if we step back and look at the overall theme of the Book of Genesis, chapter 1, what is it about?

The creation account of Genesis 1, as the preamble to the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible), announces that the God of Israel, the covenant Deliverer of his people, is Creator of all that exists. The opening verse says it all: the God of covenant and the God of creation are one and the same.

God is depicted as the autonomous Master who has by his uncontested word commanded all things into existence and ordered their design and purpose. In the ancient near east during the second millennium BC, there were other creation stories.  In those, the ordered universe owed its existence to a struggle between a hero deity and a beast which represented chaos and disorder. The gods of creation were depicted primarily as re-ordering unruly matter, not creating matter.

The ancients’ understanding of origins was tied to their concept of the natural world as alive and personal. They believed that natural phenomena were related to the activities of the gods. Ancient myth, then, tells of a threatening and unpredictable world where the gods operate, placing society at their mercy.

Against this backdrop the Genesis 1 account speaks volumes regarding the uniqueness of biblical revelation.  Indeed, God’s Word was required to liberate antiquity from its superstitions and fear of the world that was viewed as a playground for fickle and cruel gods.  Genesis 1 teaches that God is and that he is Sovereign Lord above and over nature. God created the universe by his speaking it into existence.

In Genesis 1, God not only creates all matter out of nothing, he then orders and designs that matter to become productive. He separates light from darkness; the sky from waters below; the land from the waters. Vegetation, birds, fish, land animals, and finally human beings, fill God’s creation.

In summary, the God of Genesis 1 is not re-ordering an already existing natural world. He is not fighting against other pre-existing gods. The God of Genesis 1 is creating the natural world from scratch, and then giving it order and design – making it productive. Although Christians who take the Bible to be the Word of God may differ on the details, we should all agree that this is what Genesis 1 is ultimately about.

Bible Interpretation, Theology

How Does Job Slam the “Prosperity Gospel?”

Leave a comment

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

I cringe when I hear preachers or evangelists promise their followers that if they will believe in Jesus, their lives will be blessed with material wealth and prosperity. I have decided that the only way the “prosperity gospel” can flourish is if absolutely nobody in those churches where it is preached reads the Book of Job.

See, the idea behind the prosperity gospel is that if you move from a sinful life to faith in Jesus (which gives you a righteous standing before God), your material wealth will immediately increase. Faith = righteousness = wealth.

How does the Book of Job flatly contradict this theology? Well, it’s simple. Job is called the most righteous God-believing man alive and God allows Satan to take away all of Job’s material wealth, not to mention all of his children. Let’s look at the verses.

In verses 1-3, look at what kind of man Job is:

In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil. He had seven sons and three daughters, and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.

To strengthen the point, God himself says of Job, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.”

The author of Job is trying to make it clear that Job is a paragon of righteousness. Job is the kind of man who God wishes all of us would be like. So, according to the prosperity gospel Job should continue to prosper and never suffer. As long as he is blameless and upright, God will bless him.

But look what happens to Job next. God allows Satan to take all of Job’s blessings away in Job 1:13-19. First, Job’s oxen and donkeys are carried off by Sabean marauders, and the servants watching over them are killed. Second, Job’s sheep and more servants are killed by fire from heaven. Third, another group of marauders, the Chaldeans, steal Job’s camels and kill yet more of his servants. Fourth, Job’s children are all killed when a windstorm destroys the house they are feasting in.

Where is the prosperity? Where is the good life that God owes Job for his righteousness? What is truly fascinating is that for the next 30 chapters of the book, three of Job’s friends preach the prosperity gospel to him! What is their theology? Their theology is simple: God always and immediately punishes the wicked and always and immediately blesses the righteous.

But we know their theology is false because Job is a righteous man, and yet he is suffering enormously. Job continuously argues his case to his friends, but they will not listen. At the end of the book, God finally weighs in and agrees with Job that his friends’ theology is completely wrong. God says to one of the three friends, “I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has.”

Here is the bottom line: a person’s righteous standing before God is no guarantee of continuous material blessings. Job was as righteous a man as was alive at that time, and yet God, through Satan, took away all of Job’s material blessings. So if you believe in the prosperity gospel, I have a simple question for you: Are you as righteous as Job?

Bible Interpretation

How Should Christians Apply the Law? Part 4

1 Comment

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In part 3, we applied the first three steps of principlism to Lev. 5:2 in order to see how Christians should interpret and apply that passage. In this post, we will complete J. Daniel Hays’ analysis of Lev. 5:2.

Step 4:

How does the New Testament teaching modify or qualify this, principle? According to the New Testament, God no longer dwells among believers by residing in the tabernacle or temple; He now dwells within believers by the indwelling Holy Spirit. His presence, however, still calls for holiness on their part. He demands that they not sin and that they stay separate from unclean things.

However, the New Testament redefines the terms “clean” and “unclean.” “Nothing outside a man can make him ‘unclean’ by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him ‘unclean.’ . . . What comes out of a man is what makes him ‘unclean.’ For from within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and make a man ‘unclean'” (Mark 7:15, 20-23). Believers under the New Covenant are not made unclean by touching dead animals. They become unclean by impure thoughts or by sinful actions.

The New Covenant also changed the way God’s people are to deal with sin and uncleanness. Rather than bringing a lamb or goat to atone for sin, a believer’s sins are covered at the moment of salvation by the sacrifice of Christ. The death of Christ washes away sin and changes the believer’s status from unclean to clean. Confession of sin, however, is still important under the New Covenant (1 John 1:9), as it was under the Old Covenant. So an expression of the universal principle for today’s New Testament audience would be, “Stay away from sinful actions and impure thoughts because the holy God lives within you. If you do commit unclean acts or think unclean thoughts, then confess that sin and experience forgiveness through the death of Christ.”

Step 5:

How should Christians today apply this modified universal principle in their lives? There are many possibilities, but one specific application relates to Internet pornography. Many Christians now have easy access to pornographic material in the privacy of their homes or dormitory rooms. This text teaches that the holiness of God, who dwells within believers, demands that they lead clean lives. Viewing pornography clearly falls into the category that the New Testament says is unclean. Such action is a violation of God’s holiness and it hinders one’s ability to worship or fellowship with God. Therefore believers are to stay away from Internet pornography, realizing that it makes them spiritually unclean, offends the holiness of God, and disrupts fellowship with God. However, if one does fall into this sin, he must confess it, and through the death of Christ he will be forgiven and fellowship with God will be restored.

Hopefully this example, provided by J. Daniel Hays, illustrates how a Christian should interpret and apply the Law. Even though the Law was not written to the Christian, we can still learn a great deal about God  and his expectations of us from the Law.

Bible Interpretation

How Should Christians Apply the Law? Part 3

15 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In parts 1 and 2, we looked at a method of interpreting and applying the Law (first five books of the Bible) to Christians living today. Theologian J. Daniel Hays calls the method principlism and refers to five steps in the process. In this post, Hays will take us through an example of using the method.

Leviticus 5:2 provides an example of how the method of principlizing can be used by believers today to apply legal passages without being under the Law. The verse reads, “Or if a person touches anything ceremonially unclean–whether the carcasses of unclean wild animals or of unclean livestock or of unclean creatures that move along the ground–even though he is unaware of it, he has become unclean and is guilty.”

The action required to correct one’s ceremonially unclean status in this verse is described a few verses later. So verses 5-6 should also be included: “When anyone is guilty in any of these ways, he must confess in what way he has sinned and, as a penalty for the sin he has committed, he must bring to the LORD a female lamb or goat from the flock as a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for him for his sin.”

Using principlism, how should we interpret Lev. 5:2? Step 1:

What did the text mean to the initial audience? The context of Leviticus discusses how the Israelites were to live with the holy, awesome God who was dwelling in their midst. How were they to approach God? How should they deal with sin and unclean things in light of God’s presence among them? These verses are part of the literary context of 4:1-5:13 that deals with offerings necessary after unintentional sin. Leviticus 4 deals primarily with the leaders; Leviticus 5 focuses on regular people. Leviticus 5:2 informed the Israelites that if they touched any unclean thing (dead animals or unclean animals), they were defiled ceremonially. This was true even if they touched an unclean thing accidentally. Being unclean, they were unable to approach God and worship Him. To be purified (made clean), they were to confess their sin and bring the priest a lamb or a goat for a sacrifice (5:5-6). The priest would sacrifice the animal on their behalf and they would be clean again, able to approach and worship God.

Step 2:

What are the differences between the initial audience and believers today? Christians are not under the Old Covenant, and their sins are covered by the death of Christ. Also because they have direct access to God through Jesus Christ, they no longer need human priests as mediators.

Step 3:

What is the universal principle in this text? The central universal principle in these verses relates to the concept that God is holy. When He dwells among His people, His holiness demands that they keep separate from sin and unclean things. If they become unclean, they must be purified by a blood sacrifice. This principle takes into account the overall theology of Leviticus and the rest of Scripture. It is expressed in a form that is universally applicable to God’s people in both the Old Testament and the New Testament eras.

In part 4, we will finish up the interpretation of Lev. 5:2 using principlism.

Bible Interpretation

How Should Christians Apply the Law? Part 2

1 Comment

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In part 1, we looked at a method of interpreting and applying the Law (first five books of the Bible) to Christians living today. Theologian J. Daniel Hays calls the method principlism and refers to five steps in the process. We covered the first three in part 1, so we now pick up with step 4.

The fourth step is to

CORRELATE THE PRINCIPLE WITH NEW TESTAMENT TEACHING

Filter the universal principle through the New Testament teaching regarding that principle or regarding the specific law being studied. Some of the Old Testament laws, for example, are restated in the New Testament as commandments for New Testament believers. When the Old Covenant was abrogated, the Old Testament Law ceased to be a Law for Christians. However, when the New Testament repeats a law it thus becomes a commandment for believers, to be obeyed as a commandment of Christ. But this validity and authority as a command comes from the New Testament and not the Old Testament. In addition occasionally the New Testament qualifies an Old Testament law, either modifying it or expanding on it.

For example for the command in Exodus 20:14, “You shall not commit adultery,” the universal principle relates to the sanctity of marriage and the need for faithfulness in marriage. As this principle is filtered through the New Testament, Jesus’ teaching on the subject must be incorporated into the principle. Jesus said, “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt. 5:28), thereby expanding the range of this law. He applied it not only to acts of adultery but also to thoughts of adultery. Therefore the commandment for Christians today becomes “You shall not commit adultery in act or in thought.” But Christians should seek to obey this command because it reflects a universal biblical principle reinforced by the New Testament, and not simply because it is an Old Testament law.

The fifth and final step is to

APPLY THE MODIFIED UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLE TO LIFE TODAY

In this step the universal principle developed in the previous step is applied to specific situations in believers’ lives today. Evidence of principlism can be found in the New Testament. As noted earlier, Jesus’ citation of 1 Samuel 21 to rebut the Pharisees follows a similar pattern. In 1 Corinthians 9:9 Paul cited Deuteronomy 25:4 (“Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain”) in defending his right to receive material support from the Corinthians (1 Cor. 9:4, 11-12).

In part 3, we will apply this method to a passage in the Law and see how the process works.

Bible Interpretation

How Should Christians Apply the Law? Part 1

3 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

I pointed out recently that the divine commands given by God to the nation of Israel in the first five books of the Bible (the Law) were not directed at Christians. The law was written for us, but not to us. Christians are not under the Law.

But this doesn’t mean that we should ignore what was written in the Law. On the contrary, there is much in the Law that we can apply to our lives today as 21st century Christians. So how do we interpret and apply the Law?

Theologian J. Daniel Hays offers an approach that he calls principlism. According to Hays, principlism

(a) is consistent, treating all Old Testament Scripture as God’s Word, (b) does not depend on arbitrary nontextual categories, (c) reflects the literary and historical context of the Law, placing it firmly into the narrative story of the Pentateuch, (d) reflects the theological context of the Law, and (e) corresponds to New Testament teaching.

Hays describes principlism as a five-step method. The first step is to

IDENTIFY WHAT THE PARTICULAR LAW MEANT TO THE INITIAL AUDIENCE

Identify the historical and literary context of the specific law in question. Were the Israelites on the bank of the Jordan preparing to enter the land (Deuteronomy) when the law was given, or were they at Mount Sinai soon after the Exodus (Exodus, Leviticus)? Was the law given in response to a specific situation that had arisen, or was the command describing requirements for Israel after they moved into the Promised Land? What other laws are in the immediate context? Is there a connection between them? How did this particular law relate to the Old Covenant? Did it govern how people were to approach God? Did it govern how they were to relate to each other? Did it relate to agriculture or commerce? Was it specifically related to life in the Promised Land? What did this specific law mean for the Old Testament audience?

The second step is to

DETERMINE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE INITIAL AUDIENCE AND BELIEVERS TODAY

Delineate the theological and situational differences between Christians today and the initial audience. For example believers in the present church age are under the New Covenant, not the Old Covenant. Thus they are not under the laws of the Old Covenant. They are not Israelites preparing to dwell in the Promised Land, nor do they approach God through the sacrifice of animals. Also Christians live under secular governments and not under a theocracy, as did ancient Israel. In addition Christians face pressures  not from Canaanite religions but from different non-Christian worldviews and philosophies.

The third step is to

DEVELOP UNIVERSAL PRINCIPLES FROM THE TEXT

Behind the Mosaic commands for the original audience lie universal, timeless principles. Each of the Old Testament laws had a meaning for its first audience, a meaning that is related to the Old Covenant. But that meaning is usually based on a broader, universal truth, a truth that is applicable to all God’s people, regardless of when they live and under which covenant they live. In this step one asks, “What universal principle is reflected in this specific law? What broad principle may be applied today?”

The principle should be developed in accord with several guidelines: (a) It should be reflected in the text, (b) it should be timeless, (c) it should correspond to the theology of the rest of Scripture, (d) it should not be culturally bound, and (e) it should be relevant to both Old Testament and current New Testament believers. These universal principles will often be related directly to the character of God and His holiness, the nature of sin, the issue of obedience, or concern for other people.

We will continue with the final two steps and an example of using the method in future posts.

Bible Interpretation, Miracles

How Is a Messenger of God Confirmed? Part 2

12 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In part 1, we looked at the first sign that God promised to show the enslaved Israelites in order to prove that Moses was God’s true messenger. We now continue with the second sign.

Then the LORD said, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was leprous, like snow. “Now put it back into your cloak,” he said. So Moses put his hand back into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh. (Ex 4:6-7 NIV)

Alfred Edersheim explains the meaning of the second sign in his Bible History: Old Testament:

The second sign shown to Moses bore direct reference to Israel. The hand which Moses was directed to put in his bosom became covered with leprosy; but the same hand, when a second time he thrust it in, was restored whole. This miraculous power of inflicting and removing a plague, universally admitted to come from God, showed that Moses could inflict and remove the severest judgments of God. But it spoke yet other “words” to the people. Israel, of whom the Lord had said unto Moses, “Carry them in thy bosom,” was the leprous hand. But as surely and as readily as it was restored when thrust again into Moses’ bosom, so would God bring them forth from the misery and desolateness of their state in Egypt, and restore them to their own land.

Finally, God offered a third sign as proof to the Israelites:

Then the LORD said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first miraculous sign, they may believe the second. But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.” (Ex 4:8-9 NIV)

Edersheim explains the significance of the third sign:

The third sign given to Moses, in which the water from the Nile when poured upon the ground was to become blood, would not only carry conviction to Israel, but bore special reference to the land of Egypt. The Nile, on which its whole fruitfulness depended, and which the Egyptians worshipped as divine, was to be changed into blood. Egypt and its gods were to be brought low before the absolute power which God would manifest.

In order to prove that Moses was a true prophet, God provided three miraculous signs that would not only be supernatural in nature, but would also communicate meaningful messages to the Israelites. These were not random miracles, but miracles that were significant to the recipients.

Did these signs actually serve their purpose? Yes. In verses 29-31, we learn that

Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, and Aaron told them everything the LORD had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people, and they believed. (emphasis added)

So here is the takeaway. If a man living today claimed to be a true prophet of God, I would expect God to provide miraculous signs to authenticate him. If no miracles were forthcoming, then I would assume he is either a lunatic or a liar, but definitely not from God.

Bible Interpretation, Miracles

How Is a Messenger of God Confirmed? Part 1

3 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt

Here is a typical conversation I’ve had on the blog with skeptics many times:

Skeptic: “What if a person today, claiming to be a prophet of God, comes along and tells you to do something? Wouldn’t you have to do it?”

Me: “Only if they could prove they were a true prophet of God.”

Skeptic: “How would you know that? After all, there are lots of people claiming to speak for God, and they tell their followers to do lots of crazy things.”

So what is the answer? Do we Christians blindly follow any person who comes along and says they have a new word from God?

One of the primary ways the great prophets of God were confirmed in the Bible was through miracles. Not all prophets were confirmed by miracles, but many were, and certainly the major ones were. Jesus, and all of his apostles were confirmed by miracles, and so were many Old Testament prophets.

In fact, there is an important passage in the Book of Exodus where this exact scenario plays out. God has asked Moses to go back to Egypt and free the Israelites from bondage, but Moses protests in Exodus 4.

“What if they [the Israelites] do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The LORD did not appear to you’?” (Ex 4:1 NIV)

God responds by showing Moses three miraculous signs that will prove to the Israelites that Moses is a true messenger of God.

Then the LORD said to him, “What is that in your hand?” “A staff,” he replied. The LORD said, “Throw it on the ground.” Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it.  Then the LORD said to him, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.” So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand. “This,” said the LORD, “is so that they may believe that the LORD, the God of their fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you.” (Ex 4:2-5 NIV)

Since the Pharaoh’s power was symbolized by a serpent, the purpose of this miracle was to show that God (through Moses) had power over Pharaoh. Alfred Edersheim, in Bible History: Old Testament, expands on this thought:

Hitherto Moses had wielded the shepherd’s crook. At God’s command he was to cast it away; his calling was to be changed, and he would have to meet “the serpent”—not only the old enemy, but the might of Pharaoh, of which the serpent was the public and well-known Egyptian emblem. “The serpent was the symbol of royal and divine power on the diadem of every Pharaoh”—the emblem of the land, of its religion, and government.

In part 2, we’ll look at two more signs that God will provide in order to authenticate Moses’s message to the enslaved Israelites.

Evolution, Morality

Does the Euthyphro Dilemma Apply to Evolutionary Ethics?

13 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

One of the most popular, but misguided, challenges that atheists fling at theists is Plato’s Euthyphro Dilemma. I have written about why this is no dilemma at all for theists in other blog posts, so I won’t cover that ground again now.

Philosopher Matt Flannagan, though, has introduced a new wrinkle in this debate. Flannagan argues persuasively that the Euthyphro Dilemma is actually a serious problem for those who argue that morality is the product of evolution.

In an article in the Christian Research Journal (vol. 36, number 01), Flannagan specifically challenges the position of Jerry Coyne, a biologist and outspoken atheist. Flannagan claims that “Coyne’s own secular account of morality falls prey to the Euthyphro dilemma.” Here is Flannagan:

After claiming that moral obligations cannot be constituted by God’s commands, Coyne offers an alternative: morality comes from evolution—humans evolved a capacity to instinctively feel that certain actions are wrong.

This position is pretty standard among many atheists that I speak to, so Coyne serves as a useful proxy for the wider atheist crowd. How is Coyne’s account susceptible to the Dilemma?

Plato’s question [in his dialogue Euthyphro] is equally applicable here. One can ask, “Are actions wrong because we have evolved a disposition to condemn them, or do we condemn them because they are wrong?” If the latter is the case, then actions are wrong prior to, and hence independently of, evolution, and so ethics is independent of evolution.

So how does Coyne avoid this problem?

To avoid this implication, Coyne must adopt the first option: actions are wrong because we have evolved an instinctive disposition to condemn these actions. The problem is this option makes morality arbitrary. Couldn’t evolution have produced rational beings that felt that infanticide and theft were obligatory or that rape was, in certain circumstances, OK?

As Darwin himself noted, “If men were reared under precisely the same conditions as hive-bees, there can hardly be a doubt that our unmarried females would, like the worker-bees, think it a sacred duty to kill their brothers, and mothers would strive to kill their fertile daughters, and no one would think of interfering.”

So option 1, for Coyne, is also very troubling because now morality is arbitrary, based on the randomness of the evolutionary lottery.

Coyne is left with either affirming that 1) morality existed prior to and independent of evolution, or he must affirm 2) that morality is really just arbitrary because moral values could have turned out very differently. Now that’s a real dilemma.

Theology

How Does John Calvin Explain the Virtuous Non-Christian?

10 Comments

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

John Calvin and his theological offspring are famous for the doctrine of total depravity. What does this doctrine mean?

Theologian R. C. Sproul, himself a Calvinist, describes total depravity as follows in his Essential Truths of the Christian Faith:

The Bible teaches the total depravity of the human race. Total depravity means radical corruption. We must be careful to note the difference between total depravity and utter depravity. To be utterly depraved is to be as wicked as one could possibly be. Hitler was extremely depraved, but he could have been worse than he was.

I am a sinner. Yet I could sin more often and more severely than I actually do. I am not utterly depraved, but I am totally depraved. For total depravity means that I and everyone else are depraved or corrupt in the totality of our being. There is no part of us that is left untouched by sin. Our minds, our wills, and our bodies are affected by evil. We speak sinful words, do sinful deeds, have impure thoughts. Our very bodies suffer from the ravages of sin.

Sproul goes on to quote Romans 3:10-12:

There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one.

This doctrine often leads to the question, “If people are totally depraved, sinful to our core, then how do we explain seemingly virtuous non-Christians, people who have never been regenerated by the Holy Spirit? Doesn’t the doctrine of total depravity tell us that these people shouldn’t exist?”

Not exactly. In order to answer this question, it is useful to look at the words of Calvin from his most famous literary work, Institutes of the Christian Religion. Calvin admits about the virtuous non-Christian,

Such examples, then, seem to warn us against supposing that the nature of man is utterly vicious, since, under its guidance, some have not only excelled in illustrious deeds, but conducted themselves most honourably through the whole course of their lives.

Calvin’s response is that the ability of a person to live virtuously at all is due to God’s special grace upon that individual in order to restrain his sinful nature.  Citing the many kinds of wickedness found in man, Calvin argues that

in the elect, God cures these diseases in the mode which will shortly be explained; in others, he only lays them under such restraint as may prevent them from breaking forth to a degree incompatible with the preservation of the established order of things.

Without God’s special grace, man would degenerate into complete corruption and the world would plunge into chaos. Calvin further explains natural men’s true motives for seeking good:

Some are restrained only by shame, others by a fear of the laws, from breaking out into many kinds of wickedness. Some aspire to an honest life, as deeming it most conducive to their interest, while others are raised above the vulgar lot, that, by the dignity of their station, they may keep inferiors to their duty.

The man that appears to live more virtuously owes all of this virtue to God’s special grace.  God distributes his special grace in a way that prevents the world from descending into chaos.  If we admit that these people exist, must we say that there is something good in them that earns them credit before God?  No.  Calvin argues,

But as those endued with the greatest talents were always impelled by the greatest ambitions (a stain which defiles all virtues and makes them lose all favour in the sight of God), so we cannot set any value on anything that seems praiseworthy in ungodly men.

In addition, righteousness is absent “when there is no zeal for the glory of God, and there is no such zeal in those whom he has not regenerated by his Spirit.”  He concludes, “The virtues which deceive us by an empty show may have their praise in civil society and the common intercourse of life, but before the judgment-seat of God they will be of no value to establish a claim of righteousness.”

Here is the bottom line. Calvin allows that some men live lives of relative virtue.  These men, however, owe all their excellence to God’s special grace, a grace that restrains their wicked natures like a bridle.  Calvin also argues that since men only pursue the good for their own personal ambitions, they merit no righteousness before God.

Although I do not consider myself a 5-point Calvinist, I think that Calvin’s ideas on man’s sinful nature are mostly correct. The regenerated Christian lives his life in a completely different way from the unregenerated non-Christian. I see this every day.

I am curious to know what you think about this doctrine and whether you think all men are born sinful at their core. Please leave comments!

A Christian Apologetics Blog