Featured Calvinism Question : How does God work through the Soul?

Hi Yesua 1,
I know and believe your answer is the right answer but what I’m getting at is this: If man’s soul is made free by God’s Grace, why doesn’t man have the “Power” (Free Will) to make a choice (exercise that Free Will) to follow Christ? Calvin’s whole thesis is the same as Luther’s in that they both deny Free Will can be used anywhere to bring you to Regeneration, Justification and Sanctification. If God’s Grace is in our soul it would have to affect our Intellect and Will. If it affects our Will then it makes it free. Yet Calvin seems to want to say that when you Will to follow Christ, God really is doing 100% of the Willing, you’re really doing nothing. It just looks like you’re doing something - God is doing it all.

 

Hi atpollard,

I put my comments throughout you reply. Thanks again!

First, I am a Calvinist (Particular Baptist variety), so I was not focused on the question of Regeneration preceding Justification, but rather I was focusing on your use of “sanctification” and my knowledge that Lutherans, Catholics and Baptists often use the same terms, but have very different meanings for those terms. Total Depravity only applies to man’s Justification, it is not part of how God sanctifies us.

My Comment: It’s good for me to know you are a Calvinist. I’m glad you are because you would be the one who could clarify things. Actually, when you say Total Depravity only applies to man’s justification, answers part of my question.

LaGrange said: ↑
So what I see is that it says man is “Free to Will” yet in other places that man is not free to Will - that man can’t do anything good.
Question: Is God doing the total Willing in man once he is Regenerated or Justified? It seems that it would have to be God doing all the willing because man Never has a Will that’s free - Free Will.

I will have to leave it to God to give the definitive answer, but here is my best shot at explaining as much as I understand:
Free Will is another term that different folks like to define in different ways, so depending on your definition man either has free will or does not have free will (and both are completely obvious).
Can you choose to wear a red shirt or a blue shirt, or does God compel your choice of what color shirt to wear? It is patently obvious that man has the free will to choose the color of his shirt. An omniscient God already knows what color shirt you will choose to wear and has included that choice as part of His eternal plan. While the color of a shirt is a silly example, a less silly equivalent example is “can you choose to lie or tell the truth, or does God compel your choice?” Suddenly the answer matters. If man has no free will, then God is the source of evil.
Can you choose to flap your arms and fly away? It is a silly question with the obvious answer that man does not have the free will to do what is physically impossible. A less silly example would be “can you choose to live a sinless life and earn salvation?” If man has the free will to “be perfect”, then the death of Christ was unnecessary. However scripture teaches us that no one is without sin, so it is impossible for you to be perfect. Men do not have the free will to act contrary to our “human nature”.

My Comment: Exactly. When I studied both Luther’s “Bondage of the Will” and Calvin’s “Treatise on the Eternal Predestination of God”, they both define Free Will differently from the scholastics. I noticed that right off.

So let us now look at your question and a fallen man (John Doe). John was born under the curse of Adam, meaning that he was born into a sinful world full of temptations to entice him away from God. John was born with a flesh that loves the forbidden touch and is easily excited by the lust of his eyes. John has a mind that is quick to think in worldly human logic terms. If John sees something that he likes, John’s mind is naturally inclined to want it. If someone hurts John, his mind instinctively wants to hurt them back. John has a soul that desperately struggles to be master of its own destiny, to dominate over others, to rule and be served. This is John’s innate “fallen nature”, his natural man. This is the “depraved” (bent, warped) body from which springs the lust of the eyes, the “depraved” mind that finds “bless those that curse you” to be foolishness, and the “depraved” soul that refuses to submit to any LORD and demands to be master of its own destiny.
John Doe has the Free Will to do anything that he wants, and the “depraved” nature that wants nothing to do with the foolish things of God. So John exercises his free will (which is in reality a will enslaved to sin) to freely and willingly choose to sin. Thus John continuously stores up for himself more and more wrath from a Holy God. If God did nothing, all of the John and Jane Doe’s in the world would freely choose sin and justly end in eternal damnation.

My Comment: I understand. John is not Enabled.

God created mankind to worship Him and to obediently serve Him. Scripture says that is nothing more than our just service ... that is what we are SUPPOSED TO DO. It is the reason people exist. So God was not prepared to do nothing. God chose to do something.
John Doe was incapable of freely choosing to come to God, because John would never willingly act contrary to his nature and do the opposite of what his body, mind and soul all told him was ‘right’. So God DREW (John 6:44) John Doe to Himself and created life where only death had dwelled (Eph 2:1-10).
You already have lots of really good books by really smart Theologians on all of the scripture and theory about the transformation that happens as one goes from being “sinner” to “saved”, so I will not attempt to discuss the transformation at REGENERATION/JUSTIFICATION in detail. I will just offer a simple personal experiential narrative.

My Comment: Yes, John 6:44 means God’s grace draws John and he is Regenerated.

Before, I was angry and vengeful. I had no use for any “invisible unicorn” god and no belief in any objective morality. The only law is “don’t get caught”.
Immediately after, there was a radical transformation in my worldview and my personality. It was like a light had been lit and I could perceive things I was unable to perceive before.
I believe that God removes the chains that bind our body, mind and soul as slaves to sin when He saves us. The Ordo Salutis is really only a theoretical and logical construct. In reality salvation seems to unfold uniquely for each individual with some events instantaneous and simultaneous and others slowly unfolding over years.

My Comment: Yes, I realize Regeneration, Justification, Adoption and Sanctification can be instantaneous.

Before salvation men are free to choose anything they desire, but men only desire is for sin. After salvation men are free to choose anything they desire, and a war wages within us between our old desire for sin and our new desire for holiness. As time goes on and the Holy Spirit continues to work, the desire for holiness grows and the desire to sin shrivels.
“it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” [Philippians 2:13 NASB]

My Comment: Phil 2:13 touches on exactly what I’m trying to figure out. You’ve described the process, so to speak, but I want to go deeper into the soul and kind of look at it while God is working through it. If I may draw a picture: If you draw a circle on a piece of paper and that circle is your soul. Inside the circle write “Intellect and Will”. Now, draw an arrow with the tip of the arrow in the circle. The arrow signifies God’s grace. Here’s my questions: Does God’s Grace effect the Intellect and Will or not? Does this soul have the power to choose the Good? With this grace, is the “Will” free to choose Christ or is the Will passive and God does it all? Another way you could look at it is like this: I’m exercising my Free Will to accept Christ but it’s really Christ doing my Willing but I just think I’m doing it. Would this be the way you see it?

 

Hi Benjamin,

My comments are inside your response.

My Question
How does God work through the soul during the sanctification process? If the soul is made up of Intellect and Will (at least that’s what distinguishes us from animals, plants and rocks)...
LaGrange said: ↑
In addition, when He exercises this “grace in the soul”, He brings about the effect that He intends to bring about. When God created you, He brought you into existence. You didn’t help Him. It was His sovereign work that brought you to life biologically. Likewise, it is His work, and His alone, that brings you into the state of rebirth and of renewed creation. Hence, we call this irresistible grace. It’s grace that works. It’s grace that brings about what God wants it to bring about.

My Comment: I think this is a beautiful way of explaining going from, really, creation out of nothing to Providence, which is God keeping us in existence.

I don't really get into these discussions much here anymore, but in regard to "God's sovereign work", I have a couple quotes I’d like to share regarding, "what God wants it to bring about" which leads to views of “veiled determinism” and how it can differ from what actually does come about. I would refer to these differences hinging on one's perception of the meaning of Divine Sovereignty in which I often categorize them between the differences in one’s views of either: “Divine Deterministic Sovereignty” or “Divine Providential Sovereignty” in relationship to predestination.

My Comment: I think I get it. Calvin divides Providence between “Universal Providence” and “Special Providence”. Special Providence is where I think Calvin gets more deterministic.

William Lane Craig explains, "It is up to God whether we find ourselves in a world in which we are predestined, but it is up to us whether we are predestined in the world in which we find ourselves."
Keathley explains a scenario that fits in with the above using the ambulance analogy. “Imagine you wake up and discover that you are in an ambulance being transported to the emergency room. You clearly require serious medical help. If you do nothing, you will be delivered to the hospital. However, if for whatever reason you demand to be let out, the driver will comply. He may express his concern, warn you of the consequences, but he will abide by your wishes. You receive no credit for being taken to the hospital, you receive all the blame for getting out. This is a picture of the Molinist view of salvation.”

My Comment: There are 2 major views of Predestination in the Catholic Church: the Molinist View and the Thomist View (Banezian View). I follow the Banezian View. I don’t disagree with the Molinist View but I just simply don’t know it. I’ve been told the Molinist View is the most prevalent view today.

As I'm sure you know much of what guides the views of Pre-Determinism rests on views of Divine Foreknowledge at its roots. In regard to this perspective I would say that scripture shows through Counterfactuals of Creaturely Freedoms that all things are not pre-determined according to God's foreknowledge in creation as being logical. This is where I come onto agreement with Molinism, by my perspective, their view is merely expressing these things (LFW) are logically possible within the type of knowledge God has (a type of middle knowledge, rather than limiting DFK and putting into a theological box, and also holding to the importance of not to exclude from Him knowing all things) and giving explanations how this (logical conclusion) can be observed.

My Comment: It’s funny you mention Counterfactuals. The first time I found myself reading about them, I remember I stopped reading and asked myself: “ Gosh, am I reading a theology book or a math book?” Lol It seemed like I was reading a math book with Truth Tables and other logical constructs.

Just my 2 cents of how God works through the soul of volitional creatures with the attributes of sense, reason and intellect who have also gained the attribute of the knowledge of good and evil through their own doing because of the free will ability (an ability never taken away) they were Divinely designed with and blessed to have from the beginning of creation.

My Comment: Banez developed Aquinas’ idea of Motion. Motion has to do with First and Secondary Causes. Banez called it “Physical Premotion” which is the study of how God works through the soul. This is what my original question is about. I’m trying to figure out how Calvin pictured this working.

Thanks for your thoughtful response!