John Calvin and Unconditional Election

By: Scott Armstrong

The following is the third in a series based on a Reformation lecture by theologian H. Ray Dunning and re-formatted for the Holiness Today podcast. The first article dealt with Martin Luther and his understanding of justification by faith alone.

John Calvin was the systematic theologian of the Protestant Reformation. His name is also attached to the branch of the Reformation known as Reformed, the other branch known as Lutheran. For those of us in the Wesleyan tradition, the name Calvin and Calvinism conjure up some bad images. And perhaps for me to even propose to talk about him creates some negative reactions. However, let me remind you that John Wesley described his own position as being only a hair’s breadth from Calvinism.

The truth is that Wesleyanism and the teaching of John Calvin share common ground at many points. One of the first tenets of Calvin’s theology which comes to mind is the idea of unconditional election. Even Calvin called it a horrible decree, which preordains some men to be saved and the rest to be lost. We should of course bear in mind that Calvin was not the first to advocate this position. It appears first (as far as I know) in the history of Christian thought in the work of Saint Augustine. It was shared by Martin Luther, but Luther shied away of speaking openly of double predestination as it is called. He was willing to speak of some being predestined to be saved but not the converse. Calvin’s willingness to carry an idea to its logical conclusion is shown in his insistence that we might as well say it as infer it.

But before we react too negatively to these ideas, we need to remember that such teaching was, in part, a reaction against the Roman Catholic doctrine of salvation by works. To place man’s salvation solely in the hands of God was to raise a bullwark against this unscriptural teaching. This may account to some extent for the reformers willingness to accept the doctrine of predestination. Furthermore, the doctrine of predestination was a logical deduction from the doctrine of total depravity. No one took original sin more seriously than John Calvin. Again, following Saint Augustine, he ascribed all good to God alone and denied man any initiative whatsoever with regard to his salvation. If man is unable to turn to God alone, it seems only reasonable to conclude that those who did not turn to God did not have grace extended to them.

It was precisely at this point that Wesley spoke of himself as being but of a hair’s breadth away. He was not one wit less convinced than Calvin that man was paralyzed by sin to the point of utter inability to will the good. But he avoided the conclusion to which Calvin came by his doctrine of prevenient grace, which was extended to all men, giving each one the gracious ability to respond to the evangelical message but, unlike Calvin, leaving man free to reject.