A Defense of the Reformed Understanding of the Human Will

The complacency with which many evangelical Christians today regard the question of free will in humanity is an unmistakeable indication of the radical shift in mainstream Protestantism from its Reformed moorings. To Luther and Calvin alike, the idea of a human will that is in all respects bound by its corrupted nature was not only a fact demanding strict adherence; but more than that, it was a principle foundationally requisite for a pure gospel. In The Bondage of the Will, some of Luther’s strongest rebukes to Erasmus address the absolute necessity of arriving at a clear understanding of free will. Replying to Erasmus’s “unheard-of assertion” that the doctrine of free will “is something non-essential”, Luther states,

I think it is vital. If it is ‘irreligious’, ‘idle’, ’superfluous’- your words-to know whether or not God knows anything contingently; whether our will is in any way active in matters relating to eternal salvation, or whether it is merely the passive subject of the work of grace; whether we do our good and evil deeds of mere necessity-whether, that is, we are not rather passive while they are wrought in us-then may I ask what does constitute godly, serious, useful knowledge? (1)

In fact, Luther, does not even stop there, but presses his assertion to the ultimate conclusion that, “If it is not really essential, and is not surely known, then neither God, Christ, the gospel, faith nor anything else even of Judaism, let alone Christianity, is left!” (2) Calvin is equally strong in his insistence that man’s will is completely bound to servitude of sin. In Book Two, Chapter Three of his Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin dedicates a lengthy and powerful discussion to the premise, “Conversion of the will is the effect of divine grace inwardly bestowed.” There, having quoted Ezekiel 36:26,27, he argues that,

If, therefore, a stone is transformed into flesh when God converts us to zeal for the right, whatever is of our own will is effaced. What takes its place is wholly from God. I say that the will is effaced; not in so far as it is will, for in man’s conversion what belongs to his primal nature remains entire. I also say that it is created anew; not meaning that the will now begins to exist, but that it is changed from an evil to a good will. I affirm that this is wholly God’s doing, for according to the testimony of the same apostle, “we are not even capable of thinking” [II Cor. 3:5 p.]. (3)

In summary, for each of these reformers, the bondage of the human will was a matter of foundational importance. For Calvin, the importance of this doctrine was primarily doxological: any merit attributed to man is, to that extent, a detraction from the absolute sovereignty and efficacy of God’s grace. (4) Luther’s emphasis, on the other hand, was the purity of the gospel message. But to both, the matter was of vital significance.

By Nathan Pitchford, to read the rest click here