A Calvinist Response to Universalism

A Calvinist Response to Universalism July 21, 2011

In the book, Universal Salvation?: The Current Debate, edited by Robin Parry (aka, Gregory Macdonald) and Christopher Partridge, Daniel F. Strange, a UK Calvinist, responds to Thomas Talbott’s universalism. I cannot possibly enter into the intricacies of the issues here so I will do my best to sketch the major ideas in Strange’s case against Talbott and universalism. Of all the responses to these issues, this is one of the first by a Calvinist that willingly (and truly) embraces Calvinistic categories of particular redemption. Most of those who responded to Rob Bell did so on non-Calvinists bases, and had they operated as consistent Calvinists the debate would have been much simpler.

Do you think Strange has adequately responded to Talbott? What do you think of his three-fold breakdown of the kinds of God’s love? What about his idea that if Christ died for all, then universalism is true? [He disagrees since he doesn’t think Christ died for all.]

First, Strange is a compatibilist: that is, he thinks God’s complete sovereignty and the presence of evil are compatible without making God the author of evil; he thinks the freedom of humans cannot be explained coherently or biblically in the libertarian theory of freedom, and this means that humans are not free to act outside God’s control or outside human nature); and the final explanation for a theodicy — the reality of evil in a world made by God — is not to be found in freewill but in the sovereignty of God.

Second, he thinks Talbott minimizes the sinfulness of sin and does not see that God’s punishment against sin is not remedial or restorative but retributive as an overflow of the wrath of God against human rebellion against God’s glory. Hell is God’s undiluted anger against sinners. And he think sinners, after death, are irremediably and incurably sunk into rebellion forever. This justifies endless punishment (he cites Revelation 22:11). The sinner wants to live forever in order to sin forever. In addition, Strange says Talbott minimizes propitiation — that on the cross God poured out his wrath against sin and that Christ absorbed that wrath — and Strange thinks this is “the most important concept” of the atonement. But he also affirms the view that sin against an infinite being entails an infinite/eternal/endless punishment.

Third, in what will be perhaps the most controversial part of Strange’s response, he completely disagrees with Talbott’s view of love (which has to do with God, by nature, acting for the good of humans). God’s necessary love is only for himself, within the Trinity. And here is a critical factor, and I’m wondering if you think it is justifiable to call God “love” (God is love) and uphold this view: “God’s decrees of creation and redemption are not necessary because if they were God would be constrained by them” (156).  Thus, from the next page, “God does not have to love all of humanity (and eventually save them) for him to be love.” Mercy means God is giving someone what they do not deserve, so love for those in need is not necessary but chosen in the freedom of God. This leads Strange to three “kinds” of love:

1. God loves within the Trinity necessarily. God can do or be no other than love.
2. God loves providentially in a universal manner but this providential love is non-saving. This is common grace and in this God restrains sin and wrath and blesses.
3. God loves specially but not necessarily, in a saving way, those who are objects of his grace for salvation. In other words, saving love is for the elect and for the elect only. This leads, logically, to the view that Christ died only for the elect; and Strange argues that if Christ died for all, all are saved — all would then be objects of God’s saving grace. And I have to say Strange paints himself into a corner but he does so on the basis of his theology, but what he says means those of us who read 1 John 2:2 differently, and I’ve never read one good Calvinist explanation that truly explains this text: “He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.”

Strange’s piece frustrated me because it was so absent of biblical evidence and exegesis; he passed this off into footnotes but methodologically I’d have preferred more. More importantly, I’m unconvinced that Strange does not come passingly close to denying the simplicity of God: if God is love, God is always love, and it seems to me he makes God sometimes loving and sometimes not loving. That three-fold division requires more explanation for me in the context of God’s utter simplicity of love. But this is not my response to Strange, but Strange’s response to Talbott. It’s an excellent Calvinist response.


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