This post is part of a series walking through the second volume of Abraham Kuyper’s Common Grace.
Having made the distinction between regeneration and conversion, and made the case that there is no common grace preparation (or, for that matter, any preparation at all) for regeneration, in this chapter Kuyper makes the argument that preparation is essential for conversion. We have wrongly collapsed regeneration and conversion together and must do the hard work of separating them again.
Specifically, we see that both particular grace and common grace precede conversion:
Particular grace precedes conversion in the sending of the Law and the Gospel. This sending takes place in multiple ways–though always externally to ourselves and through Scripture.
Common grace precedes conversion from within and is solidly distinct from the work of particular grace. It starts in our genealogy and birth–our ‘origin’ (the rest of this chapter). This is of course entirely nature, though God does seem to work through families in His election. He doesn’t have to do it this way, of course, but He seems to do so often. This is the sole basis for infant baptism, at least in its ‘juridical’ as opposed to its ‘spiritual’ basis. [As a Baptist, I of course am happy to agree with Kuyper here, though that’s self-serving agreement on my part, given that it utterly gets around pretending that there’s Scriptural basis for the practice…]
This genealogical pattern is an element of grace and has clear effects on children born and raised in it. These effects are a part of common grace. Not that this element is salvific; just that it affects the level of turmoil at an individual’s salvation.
Common grace can be before, at, or after birth, keeping in mind the Reformed doctrine that:
- Each person is directly created by God, not by the parents;
- Our personhood is ‘defiled by original sin’ (244-245)
Though we may tinker with the terms–each personality is a ‘special gift of God,’ not the result of common grace. (244-245)
So what, then, does common grace actually do in our genealogy? It does not incline specific kinds of personalities to salvation. We are all guilty and responsible, apart from any individual uniqueness.
Nor does common grace affect the way we “view … [our] later salvation- not the personality as such, but… in the wrinkles of his personality.” (245-246) Again, this does not mean a difference in original relation to Adam, just differences since then–children of Ham vs. children of Shem, for example. (246)
Most of us have no deeper sense of our family tree, but we’re starting to see in the mission field how conversion changes families over time. Yes, unbelievers can have families with civic righteousness, but it has a different grounding. Common grace passes through the generations–even if only in fits and starts.
Again, Kuyper does not want to overly reduce the spectrum of common grace’s operation. Environment, nature, and so on matters–we just need to remember that common grace works through all of these factors, including in our inner nature and its preparation for conversion.
Dr. Coyle Neal is co-host of the City of Man Podcast and an Associate Professor of Political Science at Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar, MO
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