God Makes a Wish: That Each and Every Sinner Might Be Saved!

Posted by deangonzales on May 30, 2009
55 Comments

When you and I make a wish, we can’t be certain it will come true. But when God makes a wish, he has both the power and prerogative to effect its fulfillment. “Our God is in the heavens,” declares the psalmist, “he does all that he pleases” (Ps. 115:3). Nevertheless, the Sovereign God of all creation has not chosen to fulfill every one of his wishes he has disclosed to us. The Lord expressly desired that Adam and Eve refrain from eating the forbidden fruit (Gen. 2:16-17), yet he ordained their Fall (Gen. 3:1-6). He plainly wants all moral creatures on earth to conform to his revealed moral standard, as do the moral creatures in heaven (Matt. 6:10), yet he not only allows men to break his law but also uses their evil deeds to accomplish his plan (Gen. 50:20; Acts 4:27-28). And God sincerely yearns that each and every sinner might turn from his sinful autonomy, embrace his Creator as Lord and Savior, and enjoy God’s saving blessing, even though God has not in fact chosen to bring to fruition the salvation of each and every sinner. In other words, while God fulfills all his decreed wishes, he has chosen not to fulfil every one of his prescriptive or revealed wishes.¹

This mysterious and paradoxical reality²  is underscored in a text like Deuteronomy 5:29. As the Israelites prepare to enter the Promised Land, Moses recounts for them the Ten Commandments (Deut. 5:6-21), which God had given to their fathers and reminds them how their parents had responded when they heard the Yahweh’s thundering voice from Mount Sinai. They were frightened and awestruck (5:22-26). They pleaded with Moses to mediate between them and God. “Go near and hear all that the LORD our God will say,” they entreat Moses, “and speak to us all that the LORD our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it” (5:27). And God approved of their response according to Moses. “The LORD heard your words when you spoke to me,” Moses told them. “And the LORD said to me, ‘I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken.’” Literally, “they have done well in all that they have said.”

God’s generous assessment of their response is amazing given the fact that this is the same bunch of Israelites who would make the golden calf. This is the same bunch of Israelites who would grumble against the Lord in the wilderness. This is the same bunch of Israelites who would never enter Canaan because of unbelief. “With most of them,” the apostle Paul remarks, “God was not pleased for they were overthrown in the wilderness” (1 Cor. 10:5). So most of these people were reprobates and are probably now suffering in hell. Whatever devotion and commitment they expressed at the foot of Mount Sinai was superficial and short-lived.

Of course, their shallow response didn’t pull the wool over God’s eyes. God knew their professed devotion was only skin-deep. Accordingly, God immediately qualifies his commendation of their initial response with a striking expression that highlights both the spurious quality of their devotion and also God’s wish that it were otherwise:

Oh that they had such a mind as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever!

This passage teaches us that God passionately wishes³ the good of those who never experience that good.  And I don’t believe Matthew Henry is wrong to take the meaning of this text a step further. Commenting on this verse, he writes,

The God of heaven is truly and earnestly desirous of the welfare and salvation of poor sinners. He has given abundant proof that he is so: he gives us time and space to repent, by his mercies invites us to repentance, and waits to be gracious; he has sent his Son to redeem us, published a general offer of pardon and life, promised his Spirit to those that pray for him, and has said and sworn that he has no pleasure in the ruin of sinners.⁴

So it is that God genuinely and earnestly desires the salvation of all men (cf. John 3:16)⁵ though he only decrees the salvation of some.⁶ This is what Jesus taught when he declared, “Many are called, but few are chosen” (Matt. 22:14). These two truths may at first glance seem inconsistent to us. But there they are, side-by-side. Mystery indeed! But sacred mystery with which we must not tamper! What practical lessons can we draw from this biblical paradox?

Let us beware that we don’t deny one biblical truth in order to accommodate another.

Heterodoxy often results when men overemphasize one truth to the neglect or denial of another. We fear that some of our Calvinist friends suppress the clear teachings of certain texts that don’t seem to fit with their understanding of biblical doctrines like God’s sovereignty, transcendence, and immutability. In defense of rejecting the clear meaning of a text in favor of an implausible reading, they will appeal to “the analogy of Scripture.” But as Sam Waldron aptly cautions,

There is but one step between the responsible interpretation of the Bible which believing in its theological unity, refuses to so interpret any text as to transgress that unity; and on the other hand, the dogmatic interpretation of the Bible which assuming its system to be biblical, refuses to allow the Bible to speak. This latter method gags the Bible under the pretense of the analogy of faith (emphasis his).⁷

Our duty is to believe and preach whatever God reveals in His inspired Word whether or not our puny mind can trace out all the connections. Hence, a Calvinist may ex animo adhere to and teach both God’s absolute sovereignty in salvation and also God’s free and well-meant offer of the gospel to all men indiscriminately because both doctrines are taught in Scripture.⁸

(2) Let us desire the salvation of all men in imitation of our heavenly Father and our precious Savior.

It’s a wonderful thing to be convinced of the truth of God’s sovereignty in salvation. The doctrine of election is a glorious truth, and we all ought to be zealous for it! But brothers, should we not be equally zealous for this other truth? Should we not sincerely desire to see every sinner we meet come to Christ? Shouldn’t the very thought of them rejecting the gospel and incurring God’s judgment break our heart? Should we not hunger and thirst to see sinners turn from their sin and live? It was said of the Scottish pastor Robert Murray M’Cheyne that he was dying to have his parishioners converted.⁹ Are you dying to have your wife saved? Your husband? Your children? Your friend? Your parents? Your workmates? May God help us all to earnestly desire the salvation of all men!

(3) Let’s take comfort that a Sovereign God sincerely and earnestly wants all of us to come to Christ by faith and to enjoy eternal life.

“All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23) and “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). And if you do not repent of your sins and believe the gospel, then you will perish and go to hell. God is a holy God, and He cannot turn a blind eye to sin. He is a just God, and He will not be mocked. Those who reject God’s Son God himself will reject (John 3:36).

But know that God earnestly and sincerely wants you to be saved. The Bible doesn’t present God as some narrow-hearted scrooge who’s trying to keep everyone out of heaven. Instead, the Bible pictures God as pleading with sinners to be saved. Listen to this description of God in Isaiah 65:2: God says, “All day long I have stretched out my hands to a rebellious people.” I fear there are some who interpret this passage as if God were a cosmic fullback stiff-arming the sinner or a cosmic boxer keeping sinners at length with a left jab. But that’s not the imagery at all. God is standing with His arms wide open. He’s ready to receive! He’s like the Father of the Prodigal Son–He’s ready and willing to fall on your neck and heap upon you kisses of mercy. His heart is overflowing with compassion. Yes, God must be just. But He may also be the justifier of him who believes in Jesus. And that’s what God prefers to do. That’s his wish!

Bob Gonzales, Dean
Reformed Baptist Seminary

1. For the common distinction between God’s decretive will and his perceptive will, see John Frame, The Doctrine of God (P&R, 2002), 531-33; or John Piper’s “Are There Two Wills in God: Divine Election and God’s Desire for All to be Saved” [↩]
2. I’m using the adjective “mysterious” in the sense of “that which is not easily comprehended or explained” and “paradoxical” in the sense of “that which seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a truth.” Lest anyone should misunderstand my position, I do not affirm that every dimension of truth transcends full comprehension on the part of humans. Nor do I believe that every true proposition or set of propositions is paradoxical. There are, however, dimensions or facets of biblical revelation that transcend the human mind’s ability to fully comprehend. And there are, I believe, certain biblical propositions that, when viewed side-by-side, seem contradictory but are not truly contradictory. For more on the nature of mystery and paradox in relation to biblical revelation, see Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith, 3rd edition (P&R, 1967), 41-46; John Frame, “The Problem of Theological Paradox,” Foundations of Christian Scholarship: Essays in the Van Til Perspective, ed. Gary North (Ross House Books, 1979), 295-330; James Anderson, Paradox in Christian Theology: An Analysis of Its Presence, Character, and Epistemic Status (Paternoster, 2007). For a helpful Internet resource, see Derek Ashton’s “THEOparadox.” [↩]
3. The opening Hebrew phrase mi-yitten (literally, “who will give?” but idiomatically, “Oh, that it were given!”) signals the optative mood, which is defined as follows: “designating a statement using a verb in the subjunctive mood to indicate a wish or desire.” See Ronald Williams, Hebrew Syntax: An Outline, 2nd ed. (Toronto University Press, 1976), sec. 547; Paul Joüon, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico, 2000), sec. 163d; Bruce Waltke and M. O’Connor, An Introduction of Biblical Hebrew Syntax (Eisenbrauns, 1990), sec. 40.2.2d. For other examples of this desiderative construction, see Exod. 16:3; Deut. 28:67; 2 Sam. 19:1; 2 Sam. 23:15; Job 6:8; 14:13; 23:3; Ps. 55:7; Jer. 9:1. The ESV, like nearly all other English versions, appropriately renders the expression with the words “Oh that …” (KJV, ASV, NASB, NKJV, NIV, NLT). A few translations employ the conditional “if only” (NRSV, NET, CSB). But even the “conditional” expression, in this case, carries optative force. [↩]
4. Commentary on the Whole Bible (reprint, Fleming H. Revell Co., n.d.), 749. Expositors like John Gill seem to reject Henry’s application of this text to salvation of sinners. Writes Gill, “These words do not express God’s desire of [the Israelites'] eternal salvation, but only of their temporal good and welfare, and that of their posterity; for their eternal salvation was not to be obtained by works of righteousness done by them, but their fear or worship of God, or by their constant universal obedience to his commands. They were saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, even as we. Their fear of God, and obedience to his will issued indeed in their temporal prosperity …” (For the Cause of God and Truth (reprint, Sovereign Grace Book Club, n.d.), sec. III, 4 [p. 5]. I agree with Gill that all men are saved by grace apart from works, I also agree that the blessing in view in the text had more immediate reference to their temporal prosperity in the Land of Canaan. Nevertheless, I also hold that God intended the people of the Old Covenant to look beyond its types and shadows of the Old Covenant to the eternal realities represented by such. Hence, their was both a temporal rest and an eternal rest (Heb. 4:1-10) envisioned in the blessing. In this way, the Mosaic covenant was not merely an administration of law but a “covenant of the promise” (Eph. 2:12). Moreover, “the fear” God desired from the Israelites in the text is nothing less than a “circumcised heart,” that is, regeneration and conversion. This God commanded of them (Deut. 10:16). But ultimately, it was an inward work only God’s grace could produce (Deut. 30:6; Jer. 32:39-40; Ezek. 36:26). Accordingly, since what God desires from the Israelites is ultimately regeneration and conversion and since such a heart-change is both the evidence of justifying faith and also a condition for eternal life (John 3:3, 5, 7; Heb. 12:14), I see no reason to confine the purview of this text to mere outward obedience and temporal prosperity. Strangely, in another place where Gill comments on this text, he seems to acknowledge that the “fear of God” in view is regeneration and conversion, and he locates the scope of the text within the scope of the covenant of grace: “that they would fear me; which is not naturally in the heart of man, is a gift of God, a part of the covenant of grace, is implanted in regeneration, and is no inconsiderable branch of it” (emphasis added).An Exposition of the Old Testament (William Hill Collingridge, 1852), 718. And though John Calvin, like Gill, interprets God’s wish anthropopathically (see below), he, nevertheless, did not limit the purview of the passage to the Israelites’ temporal blessing but applies the passage to his congregants as follows: “And so it is a very profitable warning for us when we see in this text how God wills that we should do the things that he commands us to the intent it might go well with us. Whereby we see that if we receive the doctrine with humility and desire to obey it, the end thereof cannot bee but happy so as we shall be sure of our salvation…. On the other side, let us rejoice inasmuch as we see how he procures our salvation and intends the furtherance thereof, as oft as his word is preached unto us” (emphasis added). Sermons on Deuteronomy (facsimile edition), trans. Arthur Golding (reprint, Banner of Truth, 1987), 261. [Note: Since I'm citing from a facsimile edition translated in 1583, I took liberty to update the spelling and punctuation for the modern reader.] [↩]
5. I agree with those Calvinist interpreters who see John 3:16 as indicative of God’s salvific stance towards the entire fallen race of humanity. See John Calvin, The Gospel According to John 1-10, trans. T. H. L. Parker, vol. 4 of Calvin’s NT Commentaries (Eerdmans, 1993), 73-76; D. A. Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God (Crossway, 2000), 17, 79-80; idem, The Gospel According ot John (Eerdmans, 1991), 203-07; John Piper, God So Loved the World, Part 2 [↩]
6. Some Calvinists resist this conclusion and suggest that the reader interpret the optative predicated of God figuratively, as an anthropopathic expression. At best, the text identifies the kind of heart disposition of which God approves and in consequence of which he rewards, and it indicts the Israelites for failing to manifest such a disposition. The text cannot, according to these interpreters, denote a fervent longing for the salvation of the non-elect since (1) genuine emotions cannot be predicated of God, and (2) unfulfilled desires are logically inconsistent with God’s sovereignty and perfect blessedness. See Wilhelmus à Brakel, The Christian’s Reasonable Service, trans. Bartel Elshout (Soli Deo Gloria, 1992), 1:117; John Gill, An Exposition of the Old Testament, 717-18; Matthew Poole, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (reprint, Banner of Truth, 1962), 1:349; Robert Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith (Thomas Nelson, 1998), 692, n. 25; Matthew Winzer, “Murray on the Free Offer of the Gospel: A Review”; accessed May 30, 2009 on the Internet: http://www.fpcr.org/blue_banner_articles/murray-free-offer-review.htm. It must be admitted that Calvin himself avoided the force of such passages and suggested a figurative reading though he affirmed, “[God] invites all promiscuously to (eternal) life.” Commentaries on the Last Four Books of Moses, trans. Charles W. Bingham (reprint, Baker Book House, 2003), 1:337; idem, Sermons on Deuteronomy , 259-61. Such an interpretation, however, is exegetically implausible and unwarranted by the analogy of Scripture. First, according to the plain meaning of the text (which the detractors above concede), God is not said merely to approve of human devotion and consequent felicity in the abstract. Rather, he is said to desire a concrete objective ardently, and that concrete objective is nothing less than that those identified in the text, i.e., the Exodus generation and their descendants, should both fear him truly and enjoy his blessings eternally. Second, a proper understanding of God’s transcendence, sovereignty, and immutability does not preclude the attribution of genuine emotions to God (see my “There Is No Pain, You Are Misreading”: Is God “Comfortably Numb”?). Third, the analogy of Scripture does not require the reader to relate every divine desire to God’s decretive will. Those who attempt to do so often point to texts like Psalm 115:3, which reads, “Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases” (cf. Ps. 135:6). The syntax of this passage does not demand that every desire experienced by the subject must of necessity be realized. It only demands that every desire that the subject chooses to bring to fruition be realized (compare 1 Kings 9:1). Accordingly, I agree with those commentators and theologians whose interpretation does justice to the exegetical data of the text without violating the Scripture’s clear testimony of God’s absolute sovereignty and transcendent felicity. See Thomas J. Crawford, The Mysteries of Christianity (William Blackward & Sons, 1874), 351-352; Frame, 534; Arthur W. Kuschke, Jr., John Murray, and Ned B. Stonehouse, “The Free Offer of the Gospel”; the majority report submitted to the Fifteenth General Assembly of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (1948) taken from the Minutes, Appendix, pp. 51-72; K. W. Stebbins, Christ Freely Offered (Covenanter Press, 1978), 43-47; Samuel E. Waldron, Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith (Evangelical Press, 1989), 122. [↩]
7. From Waldron’s unpublished lecture notes on “Hermeneutics.” C. H. Spurgeon also warns against this danger when he writes, “My love of consistency with my own doctrinal views is not great enough to allow me knowingly to alter a single text of Scripture.  I have great respect for orthodoxy, but my reverence for inspiration is far greater.  I would sooner a hundred times be inconsistent with myself than be inconsistent with the word of God…. God forbid that I should cut or shape, even in the least degree, any divine expression. So runs the text, and so we must read it.” [↩]
8. Most Calvinists who affirm the “free” and “well-meant” offer of the gospel do so because of their allegiance to Scripture and not from a cowardly desire to please men. For this reason, I was disappointed to read James White’s caricature of such Calvinists like myself (and those referenced above) in a post entitled “Of Squeamish Calvinists and Hyper-Arminians” (March 18, 2009); accessed May 30, 2009 at http://www.aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=3197; Internet. Ironically, White is reacting to Calvinists who view his rejection of God’s well-meant offer of the gospel as “hyper-Calvinist,” which he views as a kind of ad hominen argument. But exchanging ad hominen for ad hominen is not normally Dr. White’s debate methodology. For another specimen of ad hominem argumentation, see Sean Gerety’s “The Sincere Insanity of the Well-Meant Offer.” For a defense of the free and well-meant offer of the gospel, I would direct the reader to the following resources: R. Scott Clark, “Janus: the Well-Meant Offer of the Gospel and Westminster Theology,” in The Pattern of Sound Doctrine: Essays in Honor of Robert B. Strimple, ed. David VanDrunen (P&R, 2004), 149-79; Robert Lewis Dabney, “God’s Indiscriminate Proposals of Mercy,” in Discussions: Evangelical and Theological (reprint, Banner of Truth, 1967), 1:307f; idem, Systematic Theology (reprint, Banner of Truth, 1985), 555-59; Frame, 534-37; John Murray, The Free Offer of the Gospel (Banner of Truth, 2002); Iain H. Murray, Spurgeon v. Hyper-Calvinism: The Battle for Gospel Preaching (Banner of Truth, 1995); Stebbins, Christ Freely Offered; Waldron, Modern Exposition, 121-122. For helpful Internet resources, see Robert Lewis Dabney’s “God’s Indiscriminate Proposals of Mercy”: Phil Johnson’s A Primer on Hyper-Calvinism; John Piper’s “Are There Two Wills in God: Divine Election and God’s Desire for All to be Saved”; the historical resources on David Ponter’s Calvin and Calvinism and Theology Online, as well as and Tony Byrne’s “Theological Meditations.” [↩]
9. This is taken from Andrew Bonar, Diary and Life (reprint, Banner of Truth, 1984). Bonar recounts, concerning M’Cheyne, “A servant-girl, in a house where he stayed, described him as “‘deein’ to hae folk converted” (397). [↩]

Spiritual Declension: Lessons From Early 18th Century Particular Baptists, Part 4-Negative Attitudes toward the Evangelical Revival: Reason #1

Posted by jsmitheasley on January 20, 2009
20 Comments

In the late 1730’s, in connection with the ministries of men like George Whitefield, John Wesley, Howell Harris, Daniel Rowland and others, Great Britain became the scene of one of the greatest spiritual awakenings that has ever occurred in the history of the church. The same thing happened in America. Thousands gathered sometimes in the open air to hear men like George Whitefield and others preach the gospel. Multitudes were converted and brought to Christ and the whole fabric of English society was transformed.

What effect did this great awakening have upon the Particular Baptists? It basically passed by many of them. According to Mark Reid, “The Baptists seem to have largely passed the first Evangelical Revival by with very few records of positive responses to it in the peak years”.[1] Naylor describes the attitude of Particular Baptists as stubbornly negative towards the evangelical revival.[2] In the words of Haykin, “up till the death of Whitefield in 1770 the majority of Calvinistic Baptists in England stood aloof from this great work of God, the Holy Spirit, and were largely untouched by it.”[3] There were exceptions but this is the general picture that we are given. The awakening did begin to have a more substantial effect upon them by the last quarter of the century but when George Whitefield died in 1770, over thirty years after the awakening began, Particular Baptists were still basically untouched on a large scale. Why is that? What accounts for their negative attitude toward the revival?

First of all, they were suspicious of the revival because many of its leaders were members of the Church of England. They had a hard time accepting that anything good could come out of a denomination they refused to consider as a true church. This was partly related to what was a commendable and faithful commitment of the Baptists to the importance of biblical church order. In some instances, however, this commitment went wrong by swinging over to the extreme of failing to have a proper spirit of catholicity toward all true Christians. Many of the Baptists were aware that their churches were in a state of decline and some of the leaders, like John Gill and Benjamin Wallin, had strong opinions as to how this decline was to be remedied. Haykin writes, “For them the pathway to church renewal lay first and foremost in an earnest commitment to upholding the distinctives of Calvinistic Baptist church order and discipline.”[4] For example, Benjamin Wallin, pastor of the Maze Pond congregation, argued that “as long as there was a neglect of believer’s baptism and the principles of congregational church government, any attempt to revive the churches of Christ was ‘essentially deficient.’”[5]

Well it’s not surprising that men like Wallin criticized the revival. The emphasis of the preaching was not upon biblical church order and the proper subjects of baptism. It was upon those great central and essential gospel doctrines of salvation by grace alone, justification by faith and the necessity of the new birth. In addition, most of the great preachers who were leaders of this revival were members of the Church of England. For example, George Whitefield, Daniel Rowland, Howell Harris, William Grimshaw and William Romaine were all members of the Church of England. So were John and Charles Wesley. Worse than that the Wesley’s were also Arminian. Harris was too at the beginning, though he early on became a Calvinist.

These realities caused the Particular Baptists in general to view the whole revival with suspicion and to stay aloof from it. William Herbert, a Welsh Baptist pastor, was a friend of Howell Harris. He protested to Harris about his staying in the Church of England, which we can perhaps sympathize with. But one may question the attitude that seems to be revealed in the manner in which he did so. “In a letter he wrote to Harris in January of 1737, he compared the Church of England to a pub, ‘which is open to all comers’, and to a ‘common field where every noisome beast may come.’”[6] Then he appealed to one of the favorite texts of Particular Baptist’s at that time, Song of Solomon 4:12. Don’t you realize, he asked Harris, that the scripture describes the church as “a garden enclosed, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed. Separate from ye profane world.” Arnesby Baptist Church in Leicestershire excommunicated members in the first half of the 18th century “for going to Babylon to be joined together according to the wicked way of the Church of England.”[7]

Their dislike for the Wesley’s is more understandable in light of the Arminianism of the Wesley’s. But most of the great leaders of the revival were Calvinists like George Whitefield and Howell Harris and many others. These were men who were willing to establish friendships with the Baptists. Some Calvinistic Baptists (particularly those influenced by Hyper-Calvinism), however, complained of what they called the “Arminian dialect” and “semi-Pelagian addresses” of men like Whitefield because they preached for conversions and exhorted the lost to flee to Christ for salvation.[8]

What is the lesson for us as Reformed Baptists as we enter into the 21st century? Well here we are reminded of how important it is to have a catholic spirit toward all true Christians, though they may not be part of our circle of churches. Though some may have difficulty accepting this, God in his sovereignty sometimes greatly blesses and uses men who are not Reformed Baptists; men who don’t have everything right in their ecclesiology, or even men who are wrong in other areas of their theology. They have the gospel and they preach the gospel, but they are lacking in some areas. May I dare to say it, they may even be confused Arminians. Yet God uses them, and He may even use them in ways He’s not using any of us. We need to be able to rejoice in that. We need to ask ourselves, if God raised up some men in our day full of the Holy Spirit; men who are preaching the gospel and whose preaching God is mightily blessing with every biblical evidence of true conversions (not merely decisions, but real conversions), and those men are Methodists or Episcopalians, or Assembly of God or some other denomination, or some other kind of Baptist, other than Reformed Baptist, could we rejoice in that and be thankful for it? Could we even consider those men as our friends and brothers and even work together with them insofar far as we can? Or is our almost immediate knee jerk reaction to be critical and to pick at any and every fault we can find to try to discredit any one God is using who is not one of us?

Let us not be guilty of the sectarian spirit John manifested when he said to Jesus, “Master, we saw someone casting out demons in Your name and we forbade him, because he does not follow with us.” Jesus rebuked John for that spirit. (Mk. 9:39). Rather let us have the spirit of Aquilla and Priscilla. Near the end of Acts 18 we are introduced to a fervent preacher by the name of Apollos. He was an eloquent man and mighty in the scriptures. However we’re told that there were certain deficiencies in his understanding of the truth; “That he knew only the baptism of John.” When Aquila and Priscilla heard him, what did they do? They didn’t write him off and have nothing to do with him and tell people to stay away from him. No, they sought to befriend him, took him aside and explained to him the way of God more perfectly. So let us not have the spirit of John in Mk. 9, but the spirit of Aquila and Priscilla in Acts 18. And even when deficiencies remain, if the gospel is being preached, let us rejoice. Let us have the spirit of Paul writing from a Roman prison in Pp. 1:15-16 when he said, “Some preach Christ of envy and strife, and some also from good will…what then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached; and in this I rejoice, yes, and will rejoice.”

Related to this, there’s a common mistake we need to be aware of. It’s the error of thinking that there can be no revival without thorough reformation first. It’s true that reformation sometimes precedes revival. Likewise it’s true that we must always be pursuing more and more thorough reformation. If we are not seeking to reform our lives and our churches by the scriptures, it is presumption to expect revival. But in God’s sovereignty it is simply a fact of history that sometimes revival precedes reformation. Some of the Particular Baptists thought there could be no church renewal if there was a neglect of believer’s baptism and the principles of Baptist church government. They were wrong, and because they felt that way, they renounced the revival when it came. But consider, for example, what happened in the reformation of the 16th century; both in Europe and in England? It was first a spiritual awakening before it became a reformation. Men like Luther and others first came to understand the gospel and were converted and they started preaching the gospel. In England there were men like Hugh Latimer who got converted and began preaching the gospel. At first they were still in the Roman church but reformation followed after, not before. What about the revival in England that we’ve been considering? Listen to Lloyd-Jones making this same point that I’m making,

There are people who say, ‘You have no right to talk about revival, you have no right to expect revival until people become Reformed in their doctrine’. The simple answer to that is that George Whitefield received his baptism of power in 1737, but did not become a Calvinist in his theology until about 1739. Revival had come to him and through him to many others, before his doctrine became right. Exactly the same thing happened to Howell Harris.[9]

Many Particular Baptists missed it because they weren’t willing to even allow for that possibility in their ecclesiology. Perhaps they could have been the Priscilla’s and Aquila’s of that generation; from a posture of support, friendship and participation helping these men to understand the way of God more perfectly, instead of renouncing what God was doing through them. Perhaps they could have learned a few things from Whitefield, Harris and Rowland as well and maybe even from John Wesley.[10]

Jeffery Smith
Covenant Reformed Baptist Church
Easley SC

[1] Mark Reid, “Religious Revival and English Baptists in Eighteenth Century England,” 2001. Internet article at www.webministries.co.uk/papers/c18baps.html (accessed January 2009).
[2] Quoted by Reid.
[3] Haykin, One Heart and One Soul: John Sutcliffe of Olney, his Friends and his Times (Durham, U.K.: Evangelical Press, 1994), 27.
[4] Ibid. 26.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Ibid. 27
[7] Ibid.
[8] Ibid. 28.
[9] D.M. Lloyd-Jones, “Revival: An Historical and Theological Survey”, in The Puritans: Their Origins and Successors (Carlisle PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1987), 14-15.
[10] On this point see Ian Murray, The Old Evangelicalism: Old Truths For A New Awakening (Carlisle, PA: The Banner of Truth Trust, 2005). Chapter five is entitled, “What Can We Learn From John Wesley?”

Spiritual Declension: Lessons from Early 18th Century Particular Baptists, Part 3-The Chilling Effect of Hyper-Calvinism

Posted by jsmitheasley on January 17, 2009
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Let me begin with a definition. What is Hyper-Calvinism. The hallmark of Hyper-Calvinism is the rejection of the free offer of the gospel to all men. It is the belief that preachers should not give indiscriminate invitations and exhortations to sinners to believe the gospel and come to Christ and to come to Christ immediately. The Hyper-Calvinist sees the doctrines of sovereign grace (unconditional election, particular redemption and human inability) in the scriptures and on the basis of that he rejects, or minimizes, human responsibility and the free offer of Christ to all. On the other hand, Biblical Calvinism, or what is sometimes called Evangelical Calvinism, embraces both of those truths because it believes they are both taught in the Bible. The Evangelical Calvinist recognizes that there is a tension in the bible that our puny minds are not able to fully reconcile. There is mystery here because we are dealing with God. As you can imagine, Hyper-Calvinism tends to squelch evangelistic and missionary zeal in the church.

The early 18th century Particular Baptists began to be heavily influenced by Hyper-Calvinism. In 1707, Joseph Hussey, a congregational pastor, published the book, God’s Operations of Grace but No Offers of Grace, in which he advocated Hyper-Calvinist views. These views were embraced by a member of his church, John Skepp. Skepp later became a Baptist and then a pastor of a Particular Baptist church. Skepp, together with another Particular Baptist who came to Hyper-Calvinistic views, John Brine, had a major influence in bringing those views into Particular Baptist churches. Also they became close friends with perhaps the most influential Particular Baptist pastor of that time, John Gill.[1] Gill was a very gifted scholar and preacher who pastored in London. There is considerable debate among scholars as to whether Gill himself should be classified as a Hyper-Calvinist. However there is little doubt that he was at least tinged with Hyper-Calvinism and many of those who identified with Gill were Hyper-Calvinists. Spurgeon later said, “The system of theology with which many identify his name has chilled many churches to their very soul, for it has led them to omit the free invitations of the gospel, and to deny the duty of sinners to believe in Jesus”[2]

Andrew Fuller gives a typical description when he describes the preaching of a Particular Baptist pastor named John Eve. In 1752 Eve was ordained pastor of the Baptist church in Soham, a small village north-east of Cambridge. He ministered there until 1771. Fuller grew up under his ministry. Later Fuller had this to say about that ministry. “Eve”, he says, was “tinged with a false Calvinism” and “had little or nothing to say to the unconverted.”[3] Generally there was no pleading and no exhortations to sinners come to Christ. The most the average Hyper-Calvinist might say to the unconverted was something like this, “Attend to the means of grace, and may the Lord call you in due time.” It shouldn’t surprise us that churches coming under this influence tended to be marked by a lack a passion for evangelism and missions that brought an appalling deadness to the churches.[4]

What should we learn from this as Reformed Baptists at the beginning of the 21st century? You might say, obviously the lesson is that we need to stay away from Hyper-Calvinism. True, and I don’t think any of us want to be a Hyper-Calvinist. We need to be careful, however, because a man may reject Hyper-Calvinism in name and still be tinged with Hyper-Calvinism in his practice or in his preaching. John Murray gave this warning shortly before his death,

The passion for missions is quenched when we lose sight of the grandeur of the gospel…. It is a fact that many, persuaded as they rightly are of the particularism of the plan of salvation and of it’s various corollaries, have found it difficult to proclaim the full, free, and unreserved overture of gospel grace. They have labored under inhibitions arising from fear that in doing so they would impinge upon the sovereignty of God in his saving purposes and operations. The result is that, though formally assenting to the free offer, they lack freedom in the presentation of its appeal and demand.[5]

So here is the question for us: Are we really preaching the free offer of the gospel? This raises the question, what is the free offer of the gospel? It has been well defined as,

that gracious and authoritative offer of salvation, in which God freely and indiscriminately commands and entreats lost men to come to Christ in repentance and faith; because He sincerely desires and delights in their salvation; so that any who are willing to have Christ on his terms may have him.[6]

This definition highlights three very important elements of the free offer of the gospel.[7] There is the essence of the free offer. “It is that gracious and authoritative offer of salvation, in which God freely and indiscriminately commands and entreats lost men to come to Christ in repentance and faith.” There is the motive of the free offer, “because He sincerely desires and delights in their salvation.” And there is the consequence or result of the free offer, “so that any who are willing to have Christ on his terms may have him.”

The element in this definition that we especially need to be careful about and clear about is that of the motive of the free offer. Is it true that God commands and entreats lost sinners freely and indiscriminately to come to Christ, because he sincerely desires and delights in their salvation? John Calvin himself certainly believed that. Commenting on John 3:16, he said, “Although there is nothing in the world deserving of God’s favor, he nevertheless shows he is favorable to the whole lost world when he calls all without exception to faith in Christ.”[8] As mysterious and difficult as it might be for our finite minds to comprehend and to reconcile with the doctrines of particular grace, the Bible does teach that in the general call of the gospel to all God is sincere and that the invitations of the gospel are an expression of His compassion and common love for men. In Ezekiel 33:11 God swears by his own self-existence that He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but sincerely desires that they would repent. It is God who says, “O that there were such a heart in them, that they would fear me and keep all my commandments, which it might be well with them, and with their children forever” (Deut. 5:29). See Him in the person of His Son weeping over Jerusalem, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to you; how often would I have gathered your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you would not” (Lk. 13:34). I was willing, but you were not willing. Remember the story of the Rich Young Ruler. This young man was beginning to feel something of the emptiness of his possessions. He came to Jesus but sadly he rejected our Lord’s message to him. Yet the text says, “And Jesus looking upon him loved him.” We shouldn’t get twisted up with the question as to whether that was the eternal love of divine election or what it was. We can take the scriptures at their face value, and leave the unsolvable mysteries to God. The Bible says that Christ looked upon that man with a heart of genuine love for him. In Luke 19 we read that, “When He was come nigh unto Jerusalem, Jesus beheld the city and He wept over it,” and He said, “If you had known, even you, at least in this your day, the things which belong unto your peace! But now they are hid from your eyes.” He wept, and He wailed over the city and I John 2:6 tells us that, “He that says he abides in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked”

It is a distortion of historical Calvinism that cannot tell sinners that the offer of Christ to them in the gospel is an expression of God’s sincere and common love for their souls. John Owen said, “Love towards all mankind in general is enforced upon us by the example of Christ’s own love and goodness which are extended unto all.”[9] At one point He encourages his hearers, to dwell on “the love of Christ in his invitations of sinners to come unto him that they may be saved.”[10] We must warn them of God’s wrath to awaken them but we must also tell them of God’s love in Christ to woo them. As Bunyan said, “It is not the over-heavy load of sin but the discovery of mercy…that makes a man come to Jesus Christ.”[11] Owen says that this love is to be proclaimed as ‘good news’ not to men as elect but to men as sinners.[12] The great reformer John Knox once said this, “By what means Satan first drew mankind from the obedience of God, the Scripture doth witness: To wit, by pouring into their hearts that poison, that God did not love them.”[13] Part of the business of gospel preaching is to extract that “poison” from the hearts of men and we will never do that with passion and urgency unless we really believe that God is sincere in his offers of mercy to sinners.

We will consider in blogs to follow the reaction of early 18th century Particular Baptists to the early stages of the Evangelical Awakening; how some reacted, why they reacted as they did, and what we can learn from it.

Jeffery Smith
Covenant Reformed Baptist Church
Easley, South Carolina

[1] Merck, 263.
[2] Iain Murray, Spurgeon and Hyper-Calvinism, 127, as quoted by Merck, 264.
[3] Haykin, Sutcliff, 19.
[4] I’m aware that there were some Hyper-Calvinist ministries that were well attended. See Oliver, History of the English Calvinistic Baptists: 1771-1892.
[5] John Murray, “The Atonement and the Free Offer of the Gospel,” in Collected Writings (Carlisle PA: Banner of Truth Trust,1989), 1:59,81
[6] Adapted from Greg Nichols, “The Doctrine of Christ” (manuscript for course taught for Trinity Ministerial Academy and Reformed Baptist Seminary: Lecture 32)
[7] Ibid.
[8] John Calvin, The Gospel According to John, 1-10, trans. T.H.L. Parker (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979), 74, quoted by Iain Murray, The Old Evangelicalism: Old Truths For A New Awakening (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 2005), 1112.
[9] John Owen, The Works of John Owen, Vol.15 (1850-53 reprint, Carlisle PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1976), 70.
[10] Owen, Works, Vol.1, 422.
[11] John Bunyan, The Works of John Bunyan, vol. 1 (1850 reprint, Carlisle PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991), 286.
[12] Murray, Old Evangelicalism, 121. Owen, Works, Vol. 6, 523.
[13] John Knox, Works of John Knox, ed. David Lang, Vol. 5 (Edinburgh: James Thin, 1895), 24, quoted by Murray, Old Evangelicalism, 157.