Exhortations to forsake sin, and to obey God, upon Arminian Principles, never can be attended with any good success, seeing they neither shew man the depth of his disease, nor the freeness, fullness, and all-sufficiency of the Gospel salvation; so that he neither knows his own utter helplessness, nor where all his strength lies. Sir Richard Hill
This is not a statement that would go over well in the modern day. It is so opposed to the modern idea of being nice and winsome and not speaking against other theological positions. It would be especially anathema to those who are trying to work in denominations of various theological stripes. However, all of those things have nothing to do with the truth of the statement. This statement should shake the ground that Arminians and anyone close to that position stand on. While Arminians claim that Calvinists (so-called) cannot be truly moral, the truth of the matter is that Arminianism as a system destroys any real basis for biblical holiness.
The biblical teaching on justification is that a sinner is justified by Christ alone, grace alone, and through faith alone. The biblical teaching on sanctification is that all that a sinner does that is acceptable to God must be done out of love for God. Love for God is a fruit of the Spirit and as such is a spiritual work and is not of the flesh or the will of the flesh. Jesus also told us that apart from Him we can do nothing (spiritual or good). Another biblical principle is that all good comes from Him, though Him, and is back to Him. Any motive or action that comes from the flesh or the will of the flesh, therefore, cannot be good or holy. True holiness comes from God and is out of love for God. True holiness is done in the strength of grace. The Arminian, however, teaches that the free-will is necessary for true holiness, but the truth of the matter is that what comes from a free-will is a will that is free from grace and free from true love and holiness.
The Arminian position leaves man depraved but not totally depraved, so man has something he can look to of himself. If man is not totally depraved, then man does not need to be totally saved and does not need Christ totally. The issue from that position is that men are told to make good choices, but the biblical position is that man needs grace to make any choice that is pleasing to God and the power of grace to carry out that choice. The issue becomes, as always, the tension or battle between free-will and free-grace. But if the will is free, it is also free of grace and as such it is of human works and human strength. If the will is free, it is free of Divine love and as such it is not from God and is from human effort and human strength. If the will is free, it is free of the fruit of the Spirit and as such it is the fruit of the flesh. If the will is free, it is free of the work of Christ and as such it is of self.
The issues cannot be any clearer when one sees this in the biblical context. The will that is free is a will that is given to works, while the will that is of Christ is freed from the flesh and enslaved to Christ and grace. The Arminian position does leave one dependent on works while the biblical position has people depending on Christ and His grace. When the doctrine of man’s total depravity and utter helplessness and inability is watered down, it always leaves men to their own devices and their own strength to some degree. As long as men look to themselves in any degree, they are not broken from their own righteousness and they are not looking to grace alone.
The Arminian position also leaves the Gospel of grace alone in reality, though perhaps not in words, and adds something to it. Anytime people are told that they must pray a prayer or make a choice or do an act of the will and that comes from a free-will, those people are not hearing the Gospel of grace alone. True faith does not come from the will that is free of grace and free of Christ, but instead Christ gives faith by grace. Sinners do not believe in Christ by an act of the will that is free from grace, but instead true faith can only come from grace and sinners must look to Christ for the faith they must have in Christ. Part of believing in Christ is to believe in Christ for faith and all spiritual blessings. The same thing is true of repentance. We must look to Christ for repentance instead of self or we will never repent of self.
The Arminian system is against the Gospel of grace alone and of the freeness of Christ to save sinners by His power and grace alone. The Gospel of grace alone does not depend on sinners to do one thing, but instead it depends on Christ to do all things and that by grace alone. The Gospel is all about the sufficiency of Christ instead of Christ having most of the sufficiency and man just a little or even the deciding amount. Oh no, Christ is fully sufficient and the teaching of free-will opposes that in theory. But the denial of free-will and the setting forth free-grace is rare today, especially if it includes opposing Arminian teaching at this point. As long as the Scriptures teach Christ alone and grace alone, it will stand against the Arminian teaching of free-will and oppose it for what it is. It is opposed to the Gospel of grace alone as the act of a will that is free of grace and love (which it must be if it is to be truly free) is nothing but the work of the flesh.
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