Manifesto – 2 – Soteriology

I am going to make a commitment right from the beginning here.  I will attempt to mostly write about what I affirm; not about what I don’t affirm or what I reject or what confuses me, etc.  I will only make note of the opposite position to clarify what I am affirming.

Concerning soteriology.  I lean towards an Arminian perspective, but am a student of Craig Blomberg and as he said often in my Greek Exegesis class (on Romans) at Denver Seminary, both the Arminian and the Calvinistic perspective are present in the text.  A commitment to either is, in my opinion, not completely honest with the whole of scripture.

There are plenty of paradoxes in the NT and the quicker we embrace the mystery and the paradox of it all, the more we can live in our salvation and not question it or question God’s ability to save us.

The Arminian Ordo Salutis (Order of Salvation) is:

Prevenient grace, Faith, [Union with Christ], Justification, Regeneration, Sanctification, Glorification.

I believe that the move from grace to sanctification is as quick as the time b/w flipping the light switch and the light coming on  (almost unnoticeable).  (I recommend the article on www.monergism.com to clarify the reformed or Calvinistic Ordo Salutis.  I especially see the Faith/Union/Justification thing as almost silmultaneous.

One of the primary reasons I lean in the Arminian direction is because I believe in a Prevenient Grace. That is a “preventing” grace that is present all the time due to the sacrificial and victorious death death and subsequent resurrection of the Christ.  The Calvinistic idea of limited atonement, election, and predestination are difficult for me to affirm because of my life experience – see below.

I affirm Total Depravity and affirm that it is grace that woos the person to Faith.

I affirm that we are saved by faith through grace.  I believe it is God’s grace that assumes the power to convert. After that power takes effect and the person has surrendered to Jesus, he or she is justified. That is, I don’t understand man as not marred enough to express faith in his own power.  I just think it is grace that converts vs. regeneration.  In other words, I think of converting faith as a free will act of surrendor to grace vs. the Calvinistic idea of the necessity of regeneration before faith.

Grace is many things.  I think it is primarily the gift of God’s love to the undeserved.  The subsititutionary act of Jesus dying on the cross took place while we were yet sinners because God so loved the world (John 3:16).  I believe that Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection were the climax of human history.  God’s covenant relationship with his people was extended to the gentile through Jesus’ death and resurrection (the Gospel) and the avenue to salvation for the Jew nows travels through Jesus and not through acceptance of prior covenants, race, nationality, and obedience to the law.

I believe the church (the community of the saved) is Israel.  I do not believe Israel the nation or people of the Jewish race has any special or privileged position with God since the Christ-Covenant.  I believe the only way to God is through Jesus Christ – for the Jew and the Gentile.

I believe the elect are those that have placed their faith in Jesus, been regenerated and are persevering in the faith by being sanctified.

I believe God is sovereign and providential, but that foreknowledge and predestination are quite mysterious.  But, experientially, I am aware of some magnetized attraction to Jesus that I cannot shake.  I say, “I am prone to follow” not “prone to wander.”  So, that might be a total contradiction to my position – I’m okay with that.

I am not sold on the blueprint model (Greg Boyd’s terminology) and it is not necessary for God to be Sovereign in that way to be trusted or believed in.  I believe God is active and alive in time and space and interacts with his people in the here and now while working towards a telos that ends the current age and transitions into the age to come.

I believe people can walk away from the faith. I think the warnings in Hebrews and Paul’s paradoxical relationship with Judaizers, disciples that get turned over to Satan, and statements like Phil. 2:12 “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” are reminders that human beings with free will do have responsibility to persevere in the covenant relationship.  I also think John and James had a theology that communicates perserverence.  John 15 is my favorite passage of scripture. The necessity for Jesus to communicate abiding in the vine, in my opinion, points to perserverence.

I believe this view mostly makes sense to me because it is intuitive to my experience. I run in a movement that is Charismatic.  The Charismatic movement in general, sees people come to faith later in life.  This is one of the biggest hurdles for me concerning the Reformed perspective.  If we are foreknown and predestined in the reformed way, why do people come to faith later in life?   I have heard the Calvinistic arguments, I am just not persuaded by them.  It makes more sense to me that God’s prevenient grace is always wooing people.  Some surrender while young and some further down the timeline. (Also, I believe the “problem” of those with lesser intellectual capabilities is under prevenient grace.  An intellectual assent is not necessarily needed.  I think the trinitarian God most desires our affection, not our mental assent to propositions.)

Regeneration as I have experienced it and watched people experience it is a process.  We have been saved, we are being saved, and we will be saved.   Regeneration and Sanctification are the “being saved” part. I believe that those who are called unto Him undergo, in partnership with God through Jesus in the Power of the Spirit, a process that requires perserverence to come to  Paul says, “work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” (Phil. 2:2) The Calvinistic approach that Grace is Irresistible and that Regeneration happens before Faith and Justification is counter-intuitive to me.

I believe those placing their faith in Jesus and perservering in the faith will be glorified.  I look forward to that day.

I also think this really matters for the practicality of Salvation.  I am not on mission to convert people to a system or to a doctrinal statement.  I am living as one “given” by Christ to the world to proclaim the Gospel.  One of my hangups with the reformed perspective is that it can quickly become about the tradition and not about the mission.

I am called to relationship with Jesus and sent by him to proclaim the Gospel and continue the in-breaking reality of the Kingdom of God.

Well, that’s where I’m at.  I might change my mind.