Civic's Question About Sproul's Article on Total Depravity
Oct 18, 2022 8:45:11 GMT -8
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2022 8:45:11 GMT -8
Civic's Question About Sproul's Article on Total Depravity
@civic
You asked whether I agree with Sproul's article HERE. For the most part I do agree with Sproul. However, I would change the words "moral ability" to spiritual ability. His reference to moral ability can be confusing, especially since he's also said humans have not lost all moral faculty, "Our moral sense has been impaired by the fall, but even the most hardened sinner still has God’s law on his conscience and can recognize the difference between good and evil on at least some level (Rom. 2)." Logically speaking, if we can recognize between good and evil then we haven't lost ALL moral faculty. He should have better clarified this.
I would replace the words, "moral inability" with "spiritual inability," and I would do so based upon the scriptural assertion there exist some without the Spirit. All they have is the flesh and that flesh has been compromised and adulterated by sin. When this is understood we also thereby understand there are two, not one, basis for Total Depravity (TD). The first is the corrupting effects of sin, and the second is the absence of the Spirit. This problem occurs even among the regenerate, whereby an already regenerate person can believe, think, feel, will, and act solely in, or out of, th flesh and not the regenerating Spirit dwelling within. This is made clear in Romans 8 where Paul - writing to the already regenerate about their life in Christ - tells them the mind of flesh is hostile to God and does not and CANNOT please God. If this is a problem within the regenerate and indwelt believer, then it is an impossibility within the non-believer completely lacking the Spirit. The latter has only a mind of flesh.
They are spiritually unable.
More germanely, though, the doctrine of Total Depravity is about the effects of sin, not the human faculty. This gets confused and misrepresented often. Calvinists are often the worst at accurately presenting this doctrine. TD simply asserts the effects of sin are such that the effect is salvifically incapacitating. This is often phrased or worded as human inability, but TD is about the effect of sin. Sproul attempted to specify this when he wrote, "we lack the ability to choose rightly, to exercise our wills in the proper direction of absolute dependence on God and submission to His will," and he is correct as far as that goes but it's not quite complete. The greater, larger, truth is that even the regenerate and indwelt have difficulty exercising our will in the proper direction of absolute dependence on God and submission to His will.
We can see it every time a logical fallacy or an eisegetic reading of scripture is deployed
.
So..... we can see it Sproul's article
because of the contradiction between "moral inability" and our ability to recognize between good and evil. Sproul was a very intelligent, educated, studied, experienced, and articulate individual. He could have should have avoided that error (however minor it may be).
The reason this is worth noting is because examples like this get used two ways. The first is to argue the existence of the Spirit within is no guarantee against mistakes, and his ordinary (fleshly) faculties of reason are demonstrably sufficient for understanding salvation in the flesh - and thereby an ability to choose God salvifically. The second goes in the exact opposite direction and argues the fleshly mistakes among the regenerate are evidence of sin's severity and unchecked by the Spirit they multiply in every possible way to render the sinfully dead and enslaved completely incapable. Both are poor reflections of Calvinism and TULIP's T.
One last note: Total Depravity is not solely Calvinist. It was rooted first in Augustine and all the leading Reformers relied on Augustine's position. It's also important to remember Calvin was building on Luther. ore germane to this op, Arminius was an adherent of Total Depravity, too. Arminius, despite his synergist inclinations, was a "T". He makes this quite clear in section 7 of Disputation 11 where he appeals to John 15:5 for justification regarding humanity's inability. According to him, the human will in the sinful unregenerate state, "it has no powers whatever except such as are excited by Divine grace".
I agree.
Apart from Christ we can do nothing salvifically. The only thing we bring to our salvation is the sin from which we are being saved and it is only after regeneration that we are able in any way to collaborate with God to work out our salvation. I can't find a single example of a non-believing unregenerate sinfully dead and enslaved person working out his/her salvation apart from Christ anywhere in the Bible. Everyone in the Bible even remotely alluded to the salvation experience is somewhere reported to have God already at work in his or her life for that purpose and not once is that ever explicitly attributed to the sinner's unregenerate will.
We are totally depraved. We are spiritually unable. We must first be made spiritually able. I provided a useful analogy for this involving a drowning victim somewhere in BAM. I'll try to track it down and link to it.
@civic
You asked whether I agree with Sproul's article HERE. For the most part I do agree with Sproul. However, I would change the words "moral ability" to spiritual ability. His reference to moral ability can be confusing, especially since he's also said humans have not lost all moral faculty, "Our moral sense has been impaired by the fall, but even the most hardened sinner still has God’s law on his conscience and can recognize the difference between good and evil on at least some level (Rom. 2)." Logically speaking, if we can recognize between good and evil then we haven't lost ALL moral faculty. He should have better clarified this.
I would replace the words, "moral inability" with "spiritual inability," and I would do so based upon the scriptural assertion there exist some without the Spirit. All they have is the flesh and that flesh has been compromised and adulterated by sin. When this is understood we also thereby understand there are two, not one, basis for Total Depravity (TD). The first is the corrupting effects of sin, and the second is the absence of the Spirit. This problem occurs even among the regenerate, whereby an already regenerate person can believe, think, feel, will, and act solely in, or out of, th flesh and not the regenerating Spirit dwelling within. This is made clear in Romans 8 where Paul - writing to the already regenerate about their life in Christ - tells them the mind of flesh is hostile to God and does not and CANNOT please God. If this is a problem within the regenerate and indwelt believer, then it is an impossibility within the non-believer completely lacking the Spirit. The latter has only a mind of flesh.
They are spiritually unable.
More germanely, though, the doctrine of Total Depravity is about the effects of sin, not the human faculty. This gets confused and misrepresented often. Calvinists are often the worst at accurately presenting this doctrine. TD simply asserts the effects of sin are such that the effect is salvifically incapacitating. This is often phrased or worded as human inability, but TD is about the effect of sin. Sproul attempted to specify this when he wrote, "we lack the ability to choose rightly, to exercise our wills in the proper direction of absolute dependence on God and submission to His will," and he is correct as far as that goes but it's not quite complete. The greater, larger, truth is that even the regenerate and indwelt have difficulty exercising our will in the proper direction of absolute dependence on God and submission to His will.
We can see it every time a logical fallacy or an eisegetic reading of scripture is deployed
.So..... we can see it Sproul's article
because of the contradiction between "moral inability" and our ability to recognize between good and evil. Sproul was a very intelligent, educated, studied, experienced, and articulate individual. He could have should have avoided that error (however minor it may be).The reason this is worth noting is because examples like this get used two ways. The first is to argue the existence of the Spirit within is no guarantee against mistakes, and his ordinary (fleshly) faculties of reason are demonstrably sufficient for understanding salvation in the flesh - and thereby an ability to choose God salvifically. The second goes in the exact opposite direction and argues the fleshly mistakes among the regenerate are evidence of sin's severity and unchecked by the Spirit they multiply in every possible way to render the sinfully dead and enslaved completely incapable. Both are poor reflections of Calvinism and TULIP's T.
One last note: Total Depravity is not solely Calvinist. It was rooted first in Augustine and all the leading Reformers relied on Augustine's position. It's also important to remember Calvin was building on Luther. ore germane to this op, Arminius was an adherent of Total Depravity, too. Arminius, despite his synergist inclinations, was a "T". He makes this quite clear in section 7 of Disputation 11 where he appeals to John 15:5 for justification regarding humanity's inability. According to him, the human will in the sinful unregenerate state, "it has no powers whatever except such as are excited by Divine grace".
I agree.
Apart from Christ we can do nothing salvifically. The only thing we bring to our salvation is the sin from which we are being saved and it is only after regeneration that we are able in any way to collaborate with God to work out our salvation. I can't find a single example of a non-believing unregenerate sinfully dead and enslaved person working out his/her salvation apart from Christ anywhere in the Bible. Everyone in the Bible even remotely alluded to the salvation experience is somewhere reported to have God already at work in his or her life for that purpose and not once is that ever explicitly attributed to the sinner's unregenerate will.
We are totally depraved. We are spiritually unable. We must first be made spiritually able. I provided a useful analogy for this involving a drowning victim somewhere in BAM. I'll try to track it down and link to it.
