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Friday, July 14, 2023
A W Tozer, The Pursuit of God, n.d.
Nicholas was a true follower of Christ, a lover of the Lord, radiant and
shining in his devotion to the Person of Jesus. His theology was
orthodox, but fragrant and sweet as everything about Jesus might
properly be expected to be. His conception of eternal life, for
instance, is beautiful in itself and, if I mistake not, is nearer in
spirit to John 17:3 than that which is current among us today. Life
eternal, says Nicholas, is "nought other than that blessed regard
wherewith Thou never ceasest to behold me, yea, even the secret places
of my soul. With Thee, to behold is to give life; 'tis unceasingly to
impart sweetest love of Thee; 'tis to inflame me to love of Thee by
love's imparting, and to feed me by inflaming, and by feeding to kindle
my yearning, and by kindling to make me drink of the dew of gladness,
and by drinking to infuse in me a fountain of life, and by infusing to
make it increase and endure."[2]
Now, if faith is the gaze of the heart at God, and if this gaze is but
the raising of the inward eyes to meet the all-seeing eyes of God, then
it follows that it is one of the easiest things possible to do. It would
be like God to make the most vital thing easy and place it within the
range of possibility for the weakest and poorest of us.
Several conclusions may fairly be drawn from all this. The simplicity of
it, for instance. Since believing is looking, it can be done without
special equipment or religious paraphernalia. God has seen to it that
the one life-and-death essential can never be subject to the caprice of
accident. Equipment can break down or get lost, water can leak away,
records can be destroyed by fire, the minister can be delayed or the
church burn down. All these are external to the soul and are subject to
accident or mechanical failure: but _looking_ is of the heart and can be
done successfully by any man standing up or kneeling down or lying in
his last agony a thousand miles from any church.
Since believing is looking it can be done _any time_. No season is
superior to another season for this sweetest of all acts. God never made
salvation depend upon new moons nor holy days or sabbaths. A man is not
nearer to Christ on Easter Sunday than he is, say, on Saturday, August
3, or Monday, October 4. As long as Christ sits on the mediatorial
throne every day is a good day and all days are days of salvation.
Neither does _place_ matter in this blessed work of believing God. Lift
your heart and let it rest upon Jesus and you are instantly in a
sanctuary though it be a Pullman berth or a factory or a kitchen. You
can see God from anywhere if your mind is set to love and obey Him.
Now, someone may ask, "Is not this of which you speak for special
persons such as monks or ministers who have by the nature of their
calling more time to devote to quiet meditation? I am a busy worker and
have little time to spend alone." I am happy to say that the life I
describe is for everyone of God's children regardless of calling. It is,
in fact, happily practiced every day by many hard working persons and is
beyond the reach of none.
Many have found the secret of which I speak and, without giving much
thought to what is going on within them, constantly practice this habit
of inwardly gazing upon God. They know that something inside their
hearts sees God. Even when they are compelled to withdraw their
conscious attention in order to engage in earthly affairs there is
within them a secret communion always going on. Let their attention but
be released for a moment from necessary business and it flies at once to
God again. This has been the testimony of many Christians, so many that
even as I state it thus I have a feeling that I am quoting, though from
whom or from how many I cannot possibly know.
I do not want to leave the impression that the ordinary means of grace
have no value. They most assuredly have. Private prayer should be
practiced by every Christian. Long periods of Bible meditation will
purify our gaze and direct it; church attendance will enlarge our
outlook and increase our love for others. Service and work and activity;
all are good and should be engaged in by every Christian. But at the
bottom of all these things, giving meaning to them, will be the inward
habit of beholding God. A new set of eyes (so to speak) will develop
within us enabling us to be looking at God while our outward eyes are
seeing the scenes of this passing world.
Someone may fear that we are magnifying private religion out of all
proportion, that the "us" of the New Testament is being displaced by a
selfish "I." Has it ever occurred to you that one hundred pianos all
tuned to the same fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are
of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard
to which each one must individually bow. So one hundred worshippers met
together, each one looking away to Christ, are in heart nearer to each
other than they could possibly be were they to become "unity" conscious
and turn their eyes away from God to strive for closer fellowship.
Social religion is perfected when private religion is purified. The body
becomes stronger as its members become healthier. The whole Church of
God gains when the members that compose it begin to seek a better and a
higher life.
All the foregoing presupposes true repentance and a full committal of
the life to God. It is hardly necessary to mention this, for only
persons who have made such a committal will have read this far.
When the habit of inwardly gazing Godward becomes fixed within us we
shall be ushered onto a new level of spiritual life more in keeping with
the promises of God and the mood of the New Testament. The Triune God
will be our dwelling place even while our feet walk the low road of
simple duty here among men. We will have found life's _summum bonum_
indeed. "There is the source of all delights that can be desired; not
only can nought better be thought out by men and angels, but nought
better can exist in mode of being! For it is the absolute maximum of
every rational desire, than which a greater cannot be."[3]
_O Lord, I have heard a good word inviting me to look away to Thee and
be satisfied. My heart longs to respond, but sin has clouded my vision
till I see Thee but dimly. Be pleased to cleanse me in Thine own
precious blood, and make me inwardly pure, so that I may with unveiled
eyes gaze upon Thee all the days of my earthly pilgrimage. Then shall I
be prepared to behold Thee in full splendor in the day when Thou shalt
appear to be glorified in Thy saints and admired in all them that
believe. Amen._
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Nicholas of Cusa, _The Vision of God_, E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc., New
York, 1928. This and the following quotations used by kind permission of
the publishers.
[2] _The Vision of God_
[3] _The Vision of God_
VIII
_Restoring the Creator-creature Relation_
Be thou exalted, O God, above the heavens; let thy glory be above
all the earth.--Psa. 57:5
It is a truism to say that order in nature depends upon right
relationships; to achieve harmony each thing must be in its proper
position relative to each other thing. In human life it is not
otherwise.
I have hinted before in these chapters that the cause of all our human
miseries is a radical moral dislocation, an upset in our relation to God
and to each other. For whatever else the Fall may have been, it was most
certainly a sharp change in man's relation to his Creator. He adopted
toward God an altered attitude, and by so doing destroyed the proper
Creator-creature relation in which, unknown to him, his true happiness
lay. Essentially salvation is the restoration of a right relation
between man and his Creator, a bringing back to normal of the
Creator-creature relation.
A satisfactory spiritual life will begin with a complete change in
relation between God and the sinner; not a judicial change merely, but a
conscious and experienced change affecting the sinner's whole nature.
The atonement in Jesus' blood makes such a change judicially possible
and the working of the Holy Spirit makes it emotionally satisfying. The
story of the prodigal son perfectly illustrates this latter phase. He
had brought a world of trouble upon himself by forsaking the position
which he had properly held as son of his father. At bottom his
restoration was nothing more than a re-establishing of the father-son
relation which had existed from his birth and had been altered
temporarily by his act of sinful rebellion. This story overlooks the
legal aspects of redemption, but it makes beautifully clear the
experiential aspects of salvation.
In determining relationships we must begin somewhere. There must be
somewhere a fixed center against which everything else is measured,
where the law of relativity does not enter and we can say "IS" and make
no allowances. Such a center is God. When God would make His Name known
to mankind He could find no better word than "I AM." When He speaks in
the first person He says, "I AM"; when we speak of Him we say, "He is";
when we speak to Him we say, "Thou art." Everyone and everything else
measures from that fixed point. "I am that I am," says God, "I change not."
As the sailor locates his position on the sea by "shooting" the sun, so
we may get our moral bearings by looking at God. We must begin with God.
We are right when and only when we stand in a right position relative to
God, and we are wrong so far and so long as we stand in any other
position.
Much of our difficulty as seeking Christians stems from our
unwillingness to take God as He is and adjust our lives accordingly. We
insist upon trying to modify Him and to bring Him nearer to our own
image. The flesh whimpers against the rigor of God's inexorable sentence
and begs like Agag for a little mercy, a little indulgence of its carnal
ways. It is no use. We can get a right start only by accepting God as He
is and learning to love Him for what He is. As we go on to know Him
better we shall find it a source of unspeakable joy that God is just
what He is. Some of the most rapturous moments we know will be those we
spend in reverent admiration of the Godhead. In those holy moments the
very thought of change in Him will be too painful to endure.
So let us begin with God. Back of all, above all, before all is God;
first in sequential order, above in rank and station, exalted in dignity
and honor. As the self-existent One He gave being to all things, and all
things exist out of Him and for Him. "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to
receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things,
and for thy pleasure they are and were created."
Every soul belongs to God and exists by His pleasure. God being Who and
What He is, and we being who and what we are, the only thinkable
relation between us is one of full lordship on His part and complete
submission on ours. We owe Him every honor that it is in our power to
give Him. Our everlasting grief lies in giving Him anything less.
Systematic Theology by Louis Berkhof The Operations of the Holy Spirit in General
II. The Operations of the Holy Spirit in General
A. TRANSITION TO THE WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
As already intimated in the preceding, in
passing from Christology to Soteriology, we pass from the objective to the
subjective, from the work which God accomplished for us in Christ and which is in its sacrificial aspect a finished
work, to the work which He realizes as time goes on in the hearts and lives of believers, and in which they are
permitted, and also expected, to co-operate. And in the construction of this
doctrine, too, we should be guided by Scripture. Dr. Bavinck calls attention to
a difficulty that arises here, since the Bible seems to teach on the one hand
that the whole work of redemption is finished in Christ, so that nothing
remains for man to do; and on the other hand, that the really decisive thing
must still be accomplished in and through man. Its teaching respecting the way
of redemption seems to be both autosoteric
and heterosoteric. Therefore it is
necessary to guard against all one-sidedness, and to avoid both the Scylla of
Nomism, as it appears in Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism, Arminianism, and
Neonomism, and the Charybdis of Antinomianism, as it reared its head, sometimes
as a specific doctrine and sometimes as a mere doctrinal tendency, in some of
the sects, such as the Nicolaitans, the Alexandrian Gnostics, the Brethren of
the Free Spirit, the Anabaptists of the more fanatic type, the followers of
Agricola, the Moravians, and some of the Plymouth brethren. Nomism denies the
sovereign election of God by which He has infallibly determined, not on the
basis of the foreseen attitude or works of men, but according to His good
pleasure, who would and would not be saved; rejects the idea that Christ by His
atoning death, not only made salvation possible, but actually secured it for
all those for whom He laid down His life, so that eternal life is in the most
absolute sense of the word a free gift of God, and in its bestowal human merits
are not taken into consideration; and maintains, either that man can save
himself without the aid of renewing grace (Pelagianism), or can accomplish this
with the assistance of divine grace (Semi-Pelagianism and Arminianism). On the
other hand Antinomianism, which is sometimes said to be favored by
hyper-Calvinism, holds that the imputation of our sins to Christ made Him
personally a sinner, and that the application of His righteousness to us makes
us personally righteous, so that God sees no sin in us any more; that the union
of believers with Christ is a “union of identity” and makes them in all
respects one with Him; that the work of the Holy Spirit is quite superfluous,
since the sinner’s redemption was completed on the cross, or — even more
extreme — that the work of Christ was also unnecessary, since the whole matter
was settled in the eternal decree of God; that the sinner is justified in the
resurrection of Christ or even in the counsel of redemption, and therefore does
not need justification by faith or receives in this merely a declaration of a
previously accomplished justification; and that believers are free from the
law, not only as a condition of the covenant of works, but also as a rule of
life. It virtually denies the personality and work of the Holy Spirit, and in
some cases even the objective atonement through Christ. Both atonement and
justification are from eternity. The penitent sinner wrongly proceeds on the
assumption that God is angry with him and merely needs information on that
point. Moreover, he should realize that whatever sins he may commit cannot
affect his standing with God.
Scripture teaches us to recognize a
certain economy in the work of creation and redemption and warrants our
speaking of the Father and our creation, of the Son and our redemption, and of
the Holy Spirit and our sanctification. The Holy Spirit has not only a
personality of His own, but also a distinctive method of working; and therefore
we should distinguish between the work of Christ in meriting salvation and the
work of the Holy Spirit in applying it. Christ met the demands of divine
justice and merited all the blessings of salvation. But His work is not yet
finished. He continues it in heaven, in order to put those for whom He laid
down His life in possession of all that He has merited for them. Even the work
of application is a work of Christ, but a work which He accomplishes through
the agency of the Holy Spirit. Though this work stands out in the economy of
redemption as the work of the Holy Spirit, it cannot for a moment be separated
from the work of Christ. It is rooted in the redemptive work of Jesus Christ
and carries this to completion, and that not without the co-operation of the
subjects of redemption. Christ Himself points out the close connection when He
says: “Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He shall guide you into
all the truth: for He shall not speak from Himself; but what things soever He
shall hear, these shall He speak: and He shall declare unto you the things that
are to come. He shall glorify me, for He shall take of mine, and shall declare
it unto you.” John 16:13,14.
B. GENERAL AND SPECIAL OPERATIONS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
Scripture clearly shows that not all the
operations of the Holy Spirit are part and parcel of the saving work of Jesus
Christ. Just as the Son of God is not only the Mediator of redemption, but also
the Mediator of creation, so the Holy Spirit, as represented in Scripture, is
operative, not only in the work of redemption, but also in the work of
creation. Naturally, Soteriology is concerned with His redemptive work only,
but for its proper understanding it is highly desirable to take some account of
His more general operations.
1. THE GENERAL OPERATIONS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.
It is a well known fact that the trinitarian distinctions are not as clearly
revealed in the Old Testament as in the New. The term “Spirit of God,” as it is
employed in the Old Testament, does not always denote a person, and even in
cases in which the personal idea is clearly present, does not always
specifically point to the third person of the Holy Trinity. It is sometimes
used figuratively to denote the breath of God, Job 32:8; Ps. 33:6, and in some
instances is simply a synonym for “God,” Ps. 139:7,8; Isa. 40:13. It serves
very commonly to designate the power of life, the principle that causes the
creatures to live, and that is in a unique way peculiar to God. The spirit
dwelling in the creatures, and on which their very existence depends, is from
God and binds them to God, Job 32:8; 33:4; 34:14,15; Ps. 104;29; Isa. 42:5. God
is called the “God (or, “Father”) of the spirits of all flesh,” Num. 16:22;
27:16; Heb. 12:9. In some of these cases it is quite evident that the Spirit of
God is not a mere power but a person. The very first passage in which the
Spirit is mentioned, Gen. 1:2, already calls attention to this life-giving
function, and this is particularized in connection with the creation of man,
Gen. 2:7. The Spirit of God generates life and carries the creative work of God
to completion, Job 33:4; 34:14,15; Ps. 104:29,30; Isa. 42:5. It is evident from
the Old Testament that the origin of life, its maintenance, and its development
depend on the operation of the Holy Spirit. The withdrawal of the Spirit means
death.
Extraordinary exhibitions of power, feats
of strength and daring, are also referred to the Spirit of God. The judges whom
God raised up for the deliverance of Israel were evidently men of considerable
ability and of unusual daring and strength, but the real secret of their
accomplishments lay not in themselves, but in a supernatural power that came
upon them. It is said repeatedly that “the spirit of Jehovah came (mightily)
upon them,” Judg. 3:10; 6:34; 11:29; 13:25; 14:6,19; 15:14. It was the Spirit
of God that enabled them to work deliverance for the people. There is also a
clear recognition of the operation of the Holy Spirit in the intellectual
sphere. Elihu speaks of this when he says:
“But there is a spirit in man, and the breath of the Almighty
giveth them understanding.” Job 32:8. Intellectual insight, or the ability to
understand the problems of life, is ascribed to an illuminating influence of
the Holy Spirit. The heightening of artistic skill is also ascribed to the
Spirit of the Lord, Ex. 28:3; 31:3; 35:30 ff. Certain men, characterized by
special endowments, were qualified for the finer work that was to be done in
connection with the construction of the tabernacle and the adornment of the
priestly garments, cf. also Neh. 9:20. Again, the Spirit of the Lord is
represented as qualifying men for various offices. The Spirit was put, and
rested, upon the seventy who were appointed to assist Moses in ruling and
judging the people of Israel, Num.
11:17,25,26. These also received the spirit of prophecy
temporarily, to attest their calling.
Joshua was chosen as the successor of Moses, because he had
the Spirit of the Lord, Num. 27:18. When Saul and David were anointed as kings,
the Spirit of the Lord came upon them, to qualify them for their important
task, I Sam. 10:6,10; 16:13,14. Finally, the Spirit of God also clearly
operated in the prophets as the Spirit of revelation. David says, “The Spirit
of Jehovah spake by me, and His word was upon my tongue,” II Sam. 23:2.
Nehemiah testifies in Neh. 9:30: “Yet many years didst thou bear with them, and
testifiedst against them by thy Spirit through the prophets: yet they would not
give ear.” Ezekiel speaks of a vision by the Spirit of Jehovah, 11:24, and in
Zech. 7:12 we read: “Yea, they made their heart as an adamant stone, lest they
should hear the law, and the words which Jehovah of hosts had sent in His
Spirit by the former prophets.” Cf. also I Kings 22:24; I Pet. 1:11; II Pet.
1:21.
2. THE RELATION
BETWEEN THE GENERAL AND THE SPECIAL OPERATIONS OF THE HOLY
SPIRIT. There is a certain similarity between the
general and the special operations of the Holy Spirit. By His general
operations He originates, maintains, strengthens, and guides all life, organic,
intellectual, and moral. He does this in different ways and in harmony with the
objects concerned. Something similar may be said of His special operation. In
the redemptive sphere He also originates the new life, fructifies it, guides it
in its development, and leads it to its destiny. But in spite of this
similarity, there is nevertheless an essential difference between the
operations of the Holy Spirit in the sphere of creation and those in the sphere
of redemption or re-creation. In the former He originates, maintains, develops
and guides the life of the natural
creation, restrains for the present the deteriorating and devastating
influence of sin in the lives of men and of society, and enables men to
maintain a certain order and decorum in their communal life, to do what is
outwardly good and right in their relations to each other, and to develop the
talents with which they were endowed at creation. In the latter, on the other
hand, He originates, maintains, develops, and guides the new life that is born from above, is nourished from above, and
will be perfected above, — a life that is heavenly in principle, though lived
on earth. By His special operation the Holy Spirit overcomes and destroys the
power of sin, renews man in the image of God, and enables him to render
spiritual obedience to God, to be the salt of the earth, the light of the
world, and a spiritual leaven in every sphere of life. While the work of the
Holy Spirit in creation in general undoubtedly has a certain independent
significance, yet it is made subordinate to the work of redemption. The entire
life of the elect, also that preceding their new birth, is determined and
governed by God with a view to their final destiny. Their natural life is so
regulated that, when it is renewed, it will answer to the purpose of God.
C. THE HOLY SPIRIT AS THE DISPENSER OF DIVINE
GRACE.
As the covenant in which God made
provision for the salvation of sinners is called the covenant of grace, and as
the Mediator of the covenant is said to have appeared “full of grace,” so that
we can receive out of His fulness “grace for grace,” John 1:16,17, so the Holy
Spirit is called “the Spirit of grace,” since He takes the “grace of Christ”
and confers it on us.
1. THE BIBLICAL USE OF THE TERM “GRACE”.
The word “grace” is not always used in the same sense in Scripture, but has a
variety of meanings. In the Old Testament we have the word chen (adj. chanun), from
the root chanan. The noun may denote gracefulness or beauty, Prov. 22:11; 31:30, but most generally means favour or good-will. The Old Testament repeatedly speaks of finding favour in
the eyes of God or of man. The favour so found carries with it the bestowal of
favours or blessings. This means that grace is not an abstract quality, but is
an active, working principle, manifesting itself in beneficent acts, Gen. 6:8;
19:19; 33:15; Ex. 33:12; 34:9; I Sam. 1:18; 27:5; Esth. 2:7. The fundamental
idea is, that the blessings graciously bestowed are freely given, and not in consideration of any claim or merit. The
New Testament word charis, from chairein, “to rejoice,” denotes first of
all a pleasant external appearance,
“loveliness,” “agreeableness,” “acceptableness,” and has some such
meaning in Luke 4:22; Col. 4:6. A more prominent meaning of the word, however,
is favour or good-will, Luke 1:30; 2:40,52; Acts 2:47; 7:46; 24:27; 25:9. It may
denote the kindness or beneficence of our Lord, II Cor. 8:9, or the favour
manifested or bestowed by God, II Cor. 9:8 (referring to material blessings); I
Pet. 5:10. Furthermore, the word is expressive of the emotion awakened in the
heart of the recipient of such favour, and thus acquires the meaning “gratitude” or “thankfulness,” Luke 4:22; I Cor. 10:30; 15:57; II Cor. 2:14; 8:16;
I Tim. 1:12. In most of the passages, however, in which the word charis is used in the New Testament, it
signifies the unmerited operation of God in the heart of man, effected through
the agency of the
Holy Spirit. While we sometimes speak of grace as an inherent
quality, it is in reality the active communication of divine blessings by the
inworking of the Holy Spirit, out of the fulness of Him who is “full of grace
and truth,” Rom. 3:24; 5:2,15, 17,20; 6:1; I Cor. 1:4; II Cor. 6:1; 8:9; Eph.
1:7; 2:5,8; 3:7; I Pet. 3:7; 5:12.
2. THE GRACE OF GOD IN THE WORK OF REDEMPTION. A discussion of
the grace of God in connection with the work of redemption again calls for
several distinctions, which should be borne in mind.
a.
In the first place grace is
an attribute of God, one of the divine perfections. It is God’s free,
sovereign, undeserved favour or love to man, in his state of sin and guilt,
which manifests itself in the forgiveness of sin and deliverance from its
penalty. It is connected with the mercy of God as distinguished from His
justice. This is redemptive grace in the most fundamental sense of the word. It
is the ultimate cause of God’s elective purpose, of the sinner’s justification,
and of his spiritual renewal; and the prolific source of all spiritual and
eternal blessings.
b.
In the second place the
term “grace” is used as a designation of the objective
provision which God made in Christ for the salvation of man.
Christ as the Mediator is the living embodiment of the grace of God. “The Word
became flesh, and dwelt among us ... full of grace and truth,” John 1:14. Paul
has the appearance of Christ in mind, when he says: “For the grace of God hath
appeared, bringing salvation to all men,” Tit. 2:11. But the term is applied
not only to what Christ is, but also
to what He merited for sinners. When
the apostle speaks repeatedly in the closing salutations of his Epistles of
“the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,” he has in mind the grace of which Christ
is the meritorious cause. John says: “The law was given through Moses, but
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ,” John 1:17. Cf. also Eph. 2:7.
c.
In the third place the word
“grace” is used to designate the favour of God as it is
manifested in the application of the work of redemption by
the Holy Spirit. It is applied to the pardon which we receive in justification,
a pardon freely given by God, Rom. 3:24; 5:2,21; Tit. 3:15. But in addition to
that it is also a comprehensive name for all the gifts of the grace of God, the
blessings of salvation, and the spiritual graces which are wrought in the
hearts and lives of believers through the operation of the Holy Spirit, Acts
11:23; 18:27; Rom. 5:17; I Cor. 15:10; II Cor. 9:14; Eph. 4:7; Jas. 4:5,6; I
Pet. 3:7. Moreover, there are clear indications of the fact that it is not a
mere passive quality, but also an active force, a power, something that
labours, I Cor. 15:10; II Cor. 12:9; II Tim. 2:1. In this sense of the word it
is something like a synonym for the Holy Spirit, so that there is little
difference between “full of the Holy Spirit” and “full of grace and power” in
Acts 6:5 and 8. The Holy Spirit is called “the Spirit of grace” in Heb. 10:29.
It is especially in connection with the teachings of Scripture respecting the
application of the grace of God to the sinner by the Holy Spirit, that the
doctrine of grace was developed in the Church.
3. THE DOCTRINE OF GRACE IN THE CHURCH.
The teachings of Scripture respecting the grace of God stress the fact that God
distributes His blessings to men in a
free and sovereign manner, and not in consideration of any inherent merit of
men; that men owe all the blessings of life to a beneficent, forbearing,
and longsuffering God; and especially that all the blessings of the work of
salvation are freely given of God, and are in no way determined by supposed
merits of men. This is clearly expressed by Paul in the following words: “For
by grace have ye been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is
the gift of God; not of works, that no man should glory,” Eph. 2:8,9. He
strongly emphasizes the fact that salvation is not by works, Rom. 3:20-28; 4:16;
Gal. 2:16.
This doctrine did not go entirely
unchallenged. In some of the early Church Fathers, particularly of the Eastern
Church, we already meet with a strain of moralism that is not in harmony with
the Pauline emphasis. The tendency that became apparent in that section of the
Church, finally culminated in Pelagianism. Pelagius’ conception of grace was
rather unusual. According to Wiggers he comprehended under grace: (a) “The
power of doing good (possibilitas boni),
and therefore especially free will itself.” (b) “The revelation, the law, and
the example of Christ, by which the practice of virtue is made easier for man.”
(c) “Our being so made as to be able, by our own will, to abstain from sin, and
in God’s giving us the help of His law and His commands, and in His pardoning the previous sins of those
who return to Him.” (d) “Supernatural influences on the Christian, by which
his understanding is enlightened and the practice of virtue is rendered easy to
him.”[1]
He recognized no direct operation of
the Spirit of God on the will of man, but only an indirect operation on the will through the enlightened conscience.
In his view the operation of the grace of God was primarily, though not
exclusively, external and natural. In opposition to the Pelagian view, that of
Augustine is often designated as “the theology of grace.” While Augustine
admitted that the word “grace” could be used in a wider sense (natural grace),
and that even in the state of integrity it was the grace of God that made it
possible for Adam to retain his uprightness, his main emphasis is always on
grace as the gift of God to fallen man, which manifests itself in the
forgiveness of sin and in the renewal and sanctification of human nature. In
view of the total depravity of man he regards this grace as absolutely
necessary unto salvation. It is wrought in man by the operation of the Holy
Spirit, who dwells and works in the elect and is the principle of all the
blessings of salvation. He distinguished between operating or prevenient,
and co-operating or subsequent grace. The former enables the
will to choose the good, and the latter co-operates with the already enabled
will, to do the good. In his struggle with Semi-Pelagianism Augustine
emphasized the entirely gratuitous and irresistible character of the grace of
God.
In the subsequent struggles the
Augustinian doctrine of grace was only partly victorious. Seeberg expresses
himself as follows: “Thus the doctrine of ‘grace alone’ came off victorious;
but the Augustinian doctrine of predestination was abandoned. The irresistible
grace of predestination was driven from the field by the sacramental grace of
baptism.”[2]
During the Middle Ages the Scholastics paid considerable attention to the
subject of grace, but did not always agree as to the details of the doctrine.
Some approached the Augustinian, and others the Semi-Pelagian conception of
grace. In general it may be said that they conceived of grace as mediated
through the sacraments, and that they sought to combine with the doctrine of
grace a doctrine of merit which seriously compromised the former. The emphasis
was not on grace as the favor of God shown to sinners, but on grace as a
quality of the soul, which might be regarded as both uncreated (i.e., as the
Holy Spirit), or as increated, or wrought in the hearts of men by the Holy
Spirit. This infused grace is basic to the development of the Christian
virtues, and enables man to acquire merit with God, to merit further grace,
though he cannot merit the grace of perseverance. This can only be obtained as
a free gift of God. The Scholastics did not, like Augustine, maintain the
logical connection between the doctrine of grace and the doctrine of
predestination.
The Reformers went back to the Augustinian
conception of grace, but avoided his sacramentarianism. They placed the
emphasis once more on grace as the unmerited favour of God shown to sinners,
and represented it in a manner which excluded all merit on the part of the
sinner. Says Smeaton: “The term grace,
which in Augustine’s acceptation intimated the inward exercise of love,
awakened by the operations of the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5), and which in the
scholastic theology had come to denote a quality of the soul, or the inner
endowments, and infused habits of faith, love, and hope, was now taken in the
more scriptural and wider sense for the free, the efficacious favour which is in the divine mind.”[3]
While the Reformers used the term grace
in connection with justification, in other connections they often used the
phrase, “the work of the Holy Spirit,” instead of the term grace. While they all emphasized grace in the sense of the internal
and saving operation of the Holy Spirit, Calvin especially developed the idea
of common grace, that is, a grace which, while it is the expression of the
favour of God, does not have a saving effect. According to the splendid
dogmahistorical study of Dr. H. Kuiper on Calvin
on Common Grace,[4]
he even distinguished three kinds of common grace, namely, universal common
grace, general common grace, and covenant common grace. The Arminians departed
from the doctrine of the Reformation on this point. According to them God gives
sufficient (common) grace to all men, and thereby enables them to repent and
believe. If the human will concurs or co-operates with the Holy Spirit and man
actually repents and believes, God confers on man the further grace of
evangelical obedience and the grace of perseverance. Thus the work of the grace
of God is made to depend on the consent of the will of man. There is no such
thing as irresistible grace. Says Smeaton in the work already quoted: “It was
held that every one could obey or resist; that the cause of conversion was not
the Holy Spirit so much as the human will concurring or co-operating; and that
this was the immediate cause of conversion.”[5]
Amyraldus of the School of Saumur did not really improve on the Arminian
position by his assumption, in connection with the general decree of God, that
the sinner, while devoid of the moral ability, yet has the natural ability to
believe, an unfortunate distinction, which was also carried over into New
England by Edwards, Bellamy and Fuller. Pajon, a disciple of Amyraldus, denied
the necessity of the work of the Holy Spirit in the internal illumination of
sinners, in order to their saving conversion. The only thing which he regarded
as necessary was that the understanding, which has in itself a sufficiency of
clear ideas, should be struck by the light of external revelation. Bishop
Warburton in his work on The Doctrine of
Grace, or the Office and Operations of the Holy Spirit knows of no saving
grace in the accepted sense of the word, but limits the word “grace” to the
extraordinary operations of the Spirit in the apostolic age. And Junckheim in
his important work denied the supernatural character of God’s work in the
conversion of the sinner, and affirmed that the moral power of the word
effected all. The Methodist Revival in England and the Great Awakening in our
own country brought with them a restoration of the doctrine of saving grace,
though in some cases tinged more or less with Arminianism. For Schleiermacher
the problem of the guilt of sin was practically non-existent, since he denied
the objective existence of guilt. And consequently he knows little or nothing
of the saving grace of God. Says Mackintosh: “This central Biblical truth (of
divine mercy to sinners) Schleiermacher for the most part passes by in silence,
or mentions only in a perfunctory fashion that shows how little he understands
it.”[6]
The doctrine of divine grace is also necessarily obscured in the theology of
Albrecht Ritschl. And it may be said to be characteristic of the whole of
modern liberal theology, with its emphasis on the goodness of man, that it has
lost sight of the necessity of the saving grace of God. The word “grace” has
gradually disappeared from the written and spoken word of many theologians, and
many of the common people in our day attach no other meaning to the term than
that of gracefulness or graciousness. Even Otto calls attention to it in his
work on The Idea of the Holy that
people fail to sense the deeper meaning of the word.[7] The
Theology of Crisis deserves credit for stressing anew the need of divine grace,
with the result that the word is once more coming into use.
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