Tolerant Calvinism: A friend sent me the following question privately, and I replied with a few simple thoughts. Much more could certainly be said, and perhaps I will return to the subject later. For now, I only want to offer a few considerations that may be helpful to those who have struggled under this way of thinking. My purpose is not to settle every question or prove anyone wrong, but simply to suggest that there may be a few things worth reconsidering.
Question: What is your opinion of the belief that before anyone can be considered a true brother, he must believe that every Arminian and tolerant Calvinist—Calvinists who believe Arminians might be saved—are lost and have not been given life by God because they do not reject those people as unbelievers? I once believed that, but I have changed some on that position. They say it is not enough to rest in Christ and His righteousness alone, but that you must consider everyone who does not believe the same gospel as you—Arminians and tolerant Calvinists—as lost and without spiritual life. If you do not, then you are guilty of believing the same gospel as they do.
Reply: There is so much wrong with this persuasion that it is difficult to know where to begin. Perhaps we should begin by asking what gives any of us such confidence in our own understanding of the gospel. How can we speak as though we have been delivered from every possibility of error and are now able to determine, with absolute certainty, who has been given life by God and who has not? That is far more certainty than any of us should claim. The gospel should make us deeply conscious of our need for mercy, not persuade us that our judgment of everyone else is beyond question. We are saved by the perfection of Christ, not by the perfection of our discernment.
This way of thinking does more than defend the gospel. It places an additional burden upon it. A man must not only rest in Christ and His righteousness, but must also condemn every Arminian, every Calvinist who believes an Arminian may be saved, and everyone who does not condemn them with sufficient firmness. In the end, separation itself becomes the proof of spiritual life. The smaller the circle, the purer the faith is assumed to be. The gospel becomes an ever-narrowing circle of rejection. Before long, the clearest evidence of faithfulness is no longer simply a right confession of Christ, but a right judgment concerning everyone else.
One danger is that Christ may remain at the center of our language while our own discernment moves to the center of our confidence. At that point, we are no longer simply asking what a man believes concerning Christ. We are asking whether he has judged everyone else exactly as we have. Luke 9:49-50. Those words should make us careful about treating disagreement with our circle as though it were necessarily rejection of Christ.
There is a real difference between rejecting Arminianism as a corruption of the gospel and declaring that every person influenced by it has never been born of God. The first is a judgment concerning doctrine. The second goes much further and attempts to determine what God has or has not done within another person. We may examine doctrine by the Word of God without claiming certainty about another person’s spiritual condition. Many of us once believed things that we now recognize were deeply mistaken. If the Lord had dealt with us according to the clarity of our understanding, where would any of us be? Our confidence has never rested in the accuracy of our theology, but in the faithfulness of Christ toward weak, confused, and undeserving sinners.
This does not mean that error should be ignored or that fellowship has no boundaries. Error should certainly be opposed, and the gospel should never be softened merely to preserve fellowship. But refusing to approve error is not the same as claiming that everyone who misunderstands something about the gospel is spiritually dead. That sort of certainty belongs to God, not to us.
I once thought much more along these lines myself. Looking back, I can see how easily zeal for the truth can become confidence in our own ability to define the exact boundaries of grace. But grace is not proven by how many people we are willing to condemn. Our confidence must rest in Christ, not in the imagined perfection of our theological eyesight. Perhaps, then, we can speak plainly about error while still remembering how often we ourselves have been mistaken. The best any of us can do is speak honestly, remain open to correction, and keep looking to the Lord for mercy and understanding. We have nothing else. We are all in the hands of God, and thankfully, His hands are merciful. MPJ
PostScript: Thank you for explaining that. I understand that you are not trying to treat Arminians with contempt or personally condemn them. You believe they are outside the faith because of the gospel they confess, while still desiring to teach them the truth. I respect the seriousness behind that position. I think our difference is simply here: I am not certain that every confused or contradictory profession tells us everything about a person’s relation to Christ. I agree that Arminianism corrupts the gospel and should be plainly opposed. I am less certain that everyone who speaks in that language can therefore be judged with absolute certainty as entirely outside the faith. People can hold serious inconsistencies. They may speak of Christ as their only hope while also defending ideas that contradict that hope. We should correct the contradiction, but I think we should remain humble about how much we can finally conclude concerning the person.
PostScript #2. I understand the distinction you are making, and I think it is an important one. Refusing to confirm someone as a brother is not necessarily the same as making a final declaration concerning his salvation. We may judge what a person openly confesses and decide that we cannot receive him as a brother on that basis. I agree that a man who understands and openly teaches Arminianism should not be received as a faithful preacher of the gospel. Where I remain cautious is in deciding how much more must be concluded from that. We know what he teaches, and we may judge it plainly by Scripture. But do we therefore know everything about the man himself, and must every believer pronounce the same judgment before we can receive him? That is the point at which I think your distinction, though helpful, still needs to be carried carefully.
Take John MacArthur as an example. He was not an Arminian, but I believe his doctrine of lordship salvation seriously damaged the gospel by confusing grace with evidence, Christ with performance, and assurance with self-examination. I would not receive him as a faithful teacher of the gospel, and I would warn people plainly against that system. But once I have said that, what more am I required to say? Must I also declare that he was lost? Must I pronounce that he had no understanding of Christ, that he was reprobate concerning the faith, and that everyone who refuses to say the same is therefore suspect?
No. That is exactly where I believe we begin to go beyond our authority. I can condemn the doctrine without condemning the man in every possible sense. I can refuse his teaching without pretending to know the whole state of his soul. I can warn others without turning my judgment of John MacArthur into another test of whether they themselves believe the gospel. That is the point I am trying to make brother. Faithfulness does not require us to speak beyond what we know.
We gather the portions of truth we have been given, arrange them into a system, and then begin speaking as though our system were equal to the whole mind of God. We call our framework the gospel, establish the boundaries beyond which no sincere believer may pass, and assume that deviation from our understanding proves the absence of divine teaching. But how much do any of us really see? I realize I may not be expressing all of this perfectly, and I certainly do not imagine that I have every boundary figured out. I appreciate your thoughtful distinction because it has helped me examine my own position more carefully. I think we are both trying to be faithful without claiming more certainty than we have been given.
PostScript #3: I think this is a thoughtful distinction. Why must we feel compelled to pronounce a final judgment upon every person? We can examine what someone teaches, compare it with Scripture, and say plainly, “I believe this doctrine is false, and here is why,” without also feeling required to declare the person lost. I may say that John Wesley did not preach the gospel of sovereign grace. I may warn against his doctrine and explain why I believe it directs sinners away from the finished work of Christ. But I do not see why I must go beyond what he publicly taught and pronounce a final judgment upon the man himself.
Perhaps we have sometimes treated our judgment of others as though it were part of the gospel. But the gospel calls us to believe upon Christ, not to reach an infallible conclusion concerning every person who has misunderstood or corrupted the truth. We can speak plainly, reject error, and leave the hidden things with God. We do not have to turn every disagreement into a courtroom in which someone’s eternal state must be decided. At the same time, the answer is not silence. The New Testament gives us several examples of particular men being named and publicly warned against: Hymenaeus and Alexander- I Timothy 1:19-20; Alexander the coppersmith- II Timothy 4:14-15; Elymas the sorcerer – Acts 13:8-10; Simon Magus – Acts 8:20-23; and Diotrephes – III John 9-10. There is also the general command: “A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject.” Titus 3:10.
Scripture clearly does not teach that we must never identify a false teacher, reject a divisive person, or warn others about someone’s influence. Sometimes both the error and the individual are named. But there remains an important distinction. The apostles spoke with a unique authority given to them by Christ, and when they named a man or condemned a teaching, they did so as appointed witnesses of the Lord. Even then, the emphasis was generally upon exposing the error, protecting the church, stopping the harm, and calling the person to repentance.
So we do not have to choose between tolerating error and issuing a final condemnation. We may name harmful teaching, warn against those who promote it, refuse someone as a teacher, or decline fellowship with him. But none of that gives us the right to speak beyond what we know. There is a great deal of room between silence and final judgment. We can be firm, specific, and protective of the gospel without pretending that our judgment of a man is equal to God’s judgment of him. Marc.
PostScript #4: That is what makes the question difficult. I would not have received John Wesley as a brother in doctrine or as a faithful preacher of the gospel. We reject his gospel. We do not receive him as a faithful brother or teacher. We warn plainly against his influence. I believe he taught a fundamentally different way of salvation, and that his teaching did real spiritual harm by directing sinners away from the sovereign grace of God in Christ. So I am not trying to soften his doctrine or suggest that the differences were small. Nor do I feel obligated to call him a brother. His public teaching gives me no sufficient reason to do so.
But the matter does not end with what I think of Wesley. The real question is whether my judgment of Wesley must become binding upon everyone else. Must a man not only believe the gospel, but also condemn Wesley, condemn everyone who calls Wesley a brother, and condemn everyone who will not condemn them? If so, we are back to the very problem raised in the post: rejection of error has become an expanding chain of required condemnations, and agreement with that chain has become the practical test of faithfulness.
That is a very fitting Scripture. Romans 14 is not treating every doctrinal error as harmless, but it does remind us that weakness and confusion do not automatically place someone outside the faith. The weak brother is to be received, not subjected to endless disputes as though perfect understanding were the condition of fellowship. Brethren may not yet see everything clearly, and thankfully, that includes all of us in one way or another.