The guardians of ‘free-will’ have exemplified the saying: ‘out of the frying-pan, into the fire.’ In their zeal to disagree with the Pelagians they start denying condign merit, and by the very form of their denial they set it up more firmly! By word and pen they deny it, but really, in their hearts, they establish it, and are worse than the Pelagians upon two counts. In the first place, the Pelagians confess and assert condign merit straightforwardly, candidly and honestly, calling a spade a spade and teaching what they really hold. But our friends here, who hold and teach the same view, try to fool us with lying words and false appearances, giving out that they disagree with the Pelagians, when there is nothing that they are further from doing! ‘If you regard our pretences, we appear as the Pelagians’ bitterest foes; but if you regard the facts and our hearts, we are Pelagians double-dyed.’ (Luther, Bondage of the Will)
Is our salvation wholly of God, or does it ultimately depend on something that we do for ourselves? Those who say the latter (as the Arminians later did) thereby deny man’s utter helplessness in sin, and affirm that a form of semi-Pelagianism is true after all. It is no wonder, then, that later Reformed theology condemned Arminianism as being in principle a return to Rome (because in effect it turned faith into a meritorious work) and a betrayal of the Reformation (because it denied the sovereignty of God in saving sinners, which was the deepest religious and theological principle of the Reformer’s thought). Arminianism was, indeed, in Reformed eyes a renunciation of New Testament Christianity in favor of New Testament Judaism; for to rely on oneself for faith is no different in principle from relying on oneself for works, and the one is as un-Christian and anti-Christian as the other. In the light of what Luther says to Erasmus, there is no doubt that he would have endorsed this judgment. (“Historical and Theological Introduction” to Bondage of the Will)
The context of the statement just above has to do with where faith comes from. This is not a secondary issue, but instead is at the heart of the doctrines of depravity and of justification. If sinners are dead in sins and trespasses and the will is bound to sin, then the will is not free to make a spiritual choice out of love for Christ. When the inability of man was taught, it had to do with the utter helplessness of man in sin. If the sinner can do one thing for himself, including and especially a work of the will to come up with faith so that God will save him, then that is a clear denial of man’s depravity and utter helplessness in sin. While there are most likely many who assert that man is dead in sin, if our preaching and evangelism do not teach that and build on that we are like those that Luther spoke of in the first quote from above. It is to deny one thing in terms of doctrine and yet teach it in practice.
We must note very carefully that a denial of man’s utter helplessness in sin, whether by doctrine or by practice, is to be a semi-Pelagian which is what Arminianism really is. Arminianism is not semi-Reformed, it is semi-Pelagian. Arminianism (by definition) must deny the utter helplessness of man in sin because it affirms and champions a ‘free-will.’ A will that is free is free from the bondage of sin at that point and is also free of the power of efficacious grace. Clearly, then, Arminianism is in principle a return to Rome. It does this in at least two ways. One, in effect it turns faith into a work. Two, it denies the sovereignty of God in saving sinners. When a person denies the sovereignty of God in saving sinners, that person cannot uphold salvation by grace alone at the same time. When God’s sovereignty is dismissed at any point, it is also at that point that biblical grace is dismissed as well. What Arminianism does is replace biblical grace at the point of faith and replace it with the work of the human will. That is an error that denies the Gospel of grace alone.
In the modern theological world men are expected to be gracious and winsome. For some reason humility is now thought of as always thinking that other views could be right and I could be wrong, so discussion must always be kept at a very civil level and to actually say that another is wrong is to be proud. Yet the statements above (quote from the Introduction of Bondage of the Will) are vitally important to the Church or all ages if they are even close to being correct. If Arminianism is “a renunciation of New Testament Christianity in favor of New Testament Judaism” because “to rely on oneself for faith is no different in principle from relying on oneself for works,” then there is a lot of New Testament Judaism going on in our day under the guise of Christianity. If it is true that “the one is as un-Christian and anti-Christian as the other,” then there is a lot of un-Christian and anti-Christian teaching going on today in Evangelical circles and in Reformed circles as well. If Arminianism is as un-Christian and anti-Christian as Pelagianism, then the professing Church is literally filled with anti-Christians today.
But again, the issue pointed out is that it has to do with relying on oneself for faith rather than grace for faith. A reliance on self for faith is not only un-Christian, it is anti-Christian. One can teach a lot about justification by faith alone and miss the bigger principle of grace alone and so miss the real point of justification by faith alone. But it is also true that if we miss the point that faith must come by grace alone, salvation is then by works. Those who teach that are more dangerous than the full Pelagians because their error is more disguised by truth.
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