← Know What You Believe with Michael Horton
Know What You Believe with Michael Horton
Why TULIP Is Not Enough
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Is the "TULIP" acronym a helpful summary of Reformed theology? Michael Horton explains what TULIP misses about the Reformed tradition and why shorthand acronyms fall short of the richness and fullness of the Reformed confessions. DEFENDING CALVINISM -...
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Is God the author of sin and evil? Do we actually have free will? Did Jesus die for everyone or just some? In For Calvinism, Michael Horton provides a deep and thoughtful response to some of the most common misconceptions of Calvinism. He explores the historical roots of Reformed thought, unpacks doctrines like election and perseverance, and encourages faith and practice in today's world. This month, when you support our work with a gift of any amount, we'll send you a copy of this book for Calvinism. Get your copy today with a gift of Any amount@solamedia.org offers one of my.
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Long standing concerns with the way sometimes Calvinism is represented out there on the street is the way it's framed by the tulip, the flower. Total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, personality, perseverance of the saints. First of all, it's reductionistic. The Reformed confession is more beautiful, it's fuller, it's richer than that. Not saying these doctrines are unimportant, they're central really to Reformed understanding of salvation, the application of redemption. But there's a lot more there. Just as Luther's followers preferred to be called evangelicals but were labeled Lutherans by Rome around 1558, Lutherans coined the term Calvinist for those who held Calvin's view of the Supper over against both Zwingli and Luther, despite self chosen labels such as Evangelical and Reformed preferred. Because the aim was to reform the Catholic Church, not to start a new one, Calvinism unfortunately stuck as a popular nickname and now in recent years the clever Tulip acronym is used as shorthand for Calvinism and the entire Reformed tradition. Total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, Perseverance of the saints seems to have first appeared in the United states in the 20th century and its aptness can be questioned. Since the Reformed view teaches that Christ actually saved all for whom he died, rather than merely making salvation possible, limited atonement is not a very good term. Furthermore, the Canons of Dort labor the point that our will is not coerced or forced. So irresistible grace may not be as good as the traditional terms such as effectual grace and regeneration. It's hard to find a good flower for a more accurate acronym. Maybe we could stay away from the flowers for a while. Canons of Dort or the Five Points were a response to the Arminian Five Points, so it's not the whole Reformed faith. Predestination wasn't a central dogma. Contrary to popular misconception, Calvin didn't in fact differ from the average Augustinian theologian, either in the substance or the importance of his doctrine of predestination. As for the content of the teaching, Calvin's view of predestination was the traditional Augustinian view, affirmed even by Thomas Aquinas. In fact, Luther's mentor, Johann von Staupitz, wrote a treatise titled On Eternal Predestination. As for centrality in Calvin's preaching, you look in vain for predestination in his Geneva Catechism. Just as Luther's strong defense of predestination in the Bondage of the Will was provoked by Erasmus, Calvin's lengthy discussions of the subject were responses to critics. As important as predestination was in the thinking of Calvin, it's identical to what Luther said in the Bondage of the Will. It wasn't a central dogma from which all other doctrines were developed. In fact, if you look at our Reformed Confessions, the Belgic Confession devotes one long sentence to election. While it's only mentioned in the Heidelberg Catechism under the Holy Catholic Church as a communion chosen for eternal life and united in true faith. Even what we know as the Five Points of Calvinism emerged as a response to internal challenges. Jacob Arminius and his followers mounted a campaign in the beginning of the 17th century against the Reformed consensus. The Arminian Articles of Remonstrance affirmed total depravity, but rejected unconditional election and particular redemption. They also suggest that people can fall away and lose their salvation. They left that open. The Articles made regeneration dependent on human decision. In response, the Reformed Church called the Synod of Dort 1618, 1619. Not only a national synod, it included representatives from the Church of England, the Church of Scotland, and other Reformed bodies in Hungary, Poland, Switzerland and elsewhere. The result was a clear statement of Reformed unity on the doctrines of sin and grace, known as the Canons of the Synod of Dort, or the Five Articles against the Remonstrance. The Canons of Dort are part of the Reformed confession, and its substance was incorporated into the Westminster Confession and catechisms in the mid 17th century. It's always better to read a confession than to reduce it to a clever device. One finds in the Canons of Dort an abundant appeal to specific scriptural passages, not just proof texting, but demonstrating how dependent the argument itself is upon the passages selected. These five Points do not summarize the whole teaching of Reformed theology, but they certainly are essentials to its faith and practice. But Tulip also can miss the beauty in the Reformed Confessions. That's why the TULIP acronym can't be used as a summary of the whole Reformed confession. First of all, by starting with total depravity and ending with the preservation of the saints, the arc of God's plan for the ages from creation to glorification is narrowed. How can you leave out creation in the image of God? Before you talk about the Fall, it would seem that human beings are just totally depraved by nature, and that's not what the Bible teaches. And then also, if you leave glorification out, what's the hope for restoration? Do we just hope for perseverance? We'll just persevere. To what? Upon the rich doctrine of glorification. A rich vein of Christocentric mysticism runs from Irenaeus in the second century to Athanasius, Chrysostom and Augustine, Pseudo Dionysius and Maximus, to Bernard of Clairvaux and Luther, Calvin and the other reformers, the architects of Reformed orthodoxy and the English Puritans, made glorification a staple of tomes and sermons, and all of the Reformation confessions and catechisms bear witness to it. But it's completely absent from Tulip. C.S. lewis once wrote, we do not merely want to see beauty, though God knows even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words, to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it, into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and purity of morning, but they do not make us fresh and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendors we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with a rumor that it will not always be so. Someday, God willing, we shall get in. Maybe my favorite Pauline summary of the Gospel is in the Second Letter to Timothy, where he speaks of the Gospel of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death in and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. What a wonderful summary of the whole teaching of the Gospel. Election, calling, the Incarnation and the perseverance of the saints find a footing here. But so does glorification in Paul's summary. All around us is death and dying. But Christ's triumph has brought life and immortality to light. Through the Gospel, Paul says, mortal by nature we are made immortal like God by his grace in creation. We are crowned with glory by nature, but not yet glorified by grace. In justification we are given an external imputed glory, the beauty of Christ as our righteousness. In sanctification, the Spirit begins to conform us to the image of Christ. But in glorification we will be made inwardly and outwardly, in soul and in body, the most beautiful creatures in the universe. Whatever our confession is, that has to be in it. Because if truth is not good and beautiful, it can't lure us from all the idols around us. We must present the gospel in such a way that even if somebody's not persuaded of its truth, they might wish that it were true. And one such truth is glorification, stated in just these startling words of Irenaeus in the second the glory of God is man fully alive, but the life of man. Man is the vision of God. Isn't that wonderful? Not a dreary afterlife of disembodied souls playing harps for eternity, but man fully alive. Now that's beautiful. And that's part of what it means to be confessional.
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