Hyper-grace teachers say that man has no responsibility, does nothing, and is ‘free’. Granted, man contributes nothing to his salvation. But, is God’s sovereignty manifest in such a way that man has absolutely no responsibility within the economy of salvation?
Does God’s sovereignty and human responsibility contradict each other?
The Reformed Protestants repeatedly pit these two doctrines against each other, claiming that to teach both is a two-track theology.
But, Hoeksema in Whosoever Will writes, “The two do not contradict each other. The objection is not rooted in a logical difficulty, but proceeds from a sinful, a radically wrong, a rebellious attitude against God”, pg. 149, (Eerdman’s 1945 edition).
And again, “Man’s responsibility in relation to God’s sovereign dealings is a mystery, to be sure. … But it is no contradiction.”, pg 150.
According to HH, the accusation of a two-track theology is often used when one assumes a contradiction in scripture. “Double track theology … proceeds from the supposition that there is a fundamental contradiction in Scripture”. (This was the approach of R B Kuiper against HH and for Arminianism.) Source.
Are sovereignty and responsibility unrelated?
In answer to this question then, we begin with R C Sproul Sr in this hour-long video. The crux of my point begins at minute 30ff.
For a short summary of this lecture please see this 6-page PDF.
My own summary of the PDF is as follows. The doctrine of concurrence states that there can be the choices of God at the same time there are choices of men and that our freedom never places a limit on God.
Sproul says that certain pagan ideas have infiltrated the church. These include the idea that free will means autonomy; and, that as a creature you can incline yourself to the good or to the bad with equal power.
God created us with the faculty and ability to choose. However, this natural faculty is enslaved by sin.
It is God’s wisdom and desire to work through our desires to bring about His plan, even if or when our desires are altogether evil. God can and does work through our evil desire to bring about His good purposes: ‘You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good’.
To conclude, the important thing is to remember is that the measure of our autonomy always remains under and according to God’s sovereignty.
Spurgeon on God’s Sovereignty and Man’s Responsibility
Next, we consider this 9-page transcript of a sermon by Spurgeon titled Sovereign Grace and Man’s Responsibility originally preached in 1858. Note especially page 8-9.
“This doctrine is as much God’s Word as the other. You ask me to reconcile the two. I answer, they do not want [need] any reconcilement. I never tried to reconcile them to myself, because I could never see a discrepancy. … Both are true. No two truths can be inconsistent with each other and what you have to do is to believe them both.”
A narrated audio version of the same sermon is on YouTube
(As a side note concerning the scholar whom Sproul mentioned in his lecture regarding the two parallel lines impossibly ‘meeting in eternity’, the scholar’s idea obviously originated with Spurgeon. However, Spurgeon meant that in heaven, we will finally understand how these two truths are related.)
Arthur Pink on God’s Sovereignty and Human Responsibility
And finally, we come to a lengthy excerpt from the book The Sovereignty of God by Arthur Pink. This will take a little over a half an hour to read.
Pink answers four difficulties:
First, how does God’s power being born upon men still preserve their responsibility?
Second, how can the sinner be held responsible for the doing of what he is unable to do? And how can he be justly condemned for not doing what he could not do?
Third, how is it possible for God to decree that men shall commit certain sins, hold them responsible in the committal of them, and judge them guilty because they committed them?
Fourth, how can the sinner be held responsible to receive Christ, and be damned for rejecting Him, especially when God had foreordained him to condemnation?
Pink teaches that the fact of man’s responsibility rests upon his natural ability, is witnessed to by one’s conscience, and is insisted on throughout the Scriptures. The ground of man’s responsibility, is that he is a rational creature capable of weighing eternal issues. The measure of responsibility varies by the degree of light each has enjoyed from God. The problem of human responsibility receives at least a partial solution in the Holy Scriptures, and it is our solemn obligation and privilege to search them prayerfully for further light.
Pink sums things up
“In conclusion, … it is the responsibility of every man to use the means which God has placed to his hand. An attitude of fatalistic inertia, because I know that God has irrevocably decreed whatever comes to pass—is to make a sinful and hurtful use of what God has revealed for the comfort of my heart! The same God who decreed the accomplishment of a certain end, also decreed that that end shall be attained through and as the result of His own appointed means. God does not disdain the use of means—nor must we.”
“… God has, from the beginning, chosen a people unto salvation; but that does not mean there is no need for evangelists to preach the Gospel, or for sinners to believe it; it is by such means that His eternal counsels are effectuated.”
Our responsibility
Scripture teaches that God requires all mankind to responsibly answer positively to His call and command to repent and believe, Acts 17:30.
“What is responsibility? It is the state in which I am under obligation to God. And man is for ever under obligation to love the Lord his God … it is the state in which man stands in judgment before God, and is answerable to Him for his deeds …”, WW, pg 150.
Additionally, God made us moral and rational; therefore, we are responsible for our answer to that call. HH states that God ‘never destroys our answerability‘, pg 150. God does not destroy man’s moral sense, pg 151. Our responsibility is ‘indelibly written in our consciousness’, pg 151.
HH also writes, “you hear with the natural ear … but you refuse to come, you reject the Christ, you only … aggravate your guilt”, pg 43.
As well as, “The sinner is not forced to Christ against his will and without understanding. …”, pg 132. See also pages 150-152.
The use of means
As Pink made clear, God uses means by His own appointment. By using means, God is righteous when He holds all men accountable for their actions and their sin, and their spiritual choices.
“… when Christ speaks! Through the power of His almighty word, you receive eyes to see, … the will to come to Christ.”, WW, pg 43.
“But for this very reason the preaching of the gospel is an indispensable means. While God through the Spirit draws the sinner from within, He calls him through the gospel, and thus the sinner performs the act of coming to the Savior consciously and willingly.”, WW, pg 132.
Only by faith in union with Christ
So also, Hoeksema writes in Whosoever Will, “He imparts Himself to us, and we receive Him. … He draws us, and we come. … ye came not of yourselves. It was His grace. He imparted Himself to you, and you drank, and continue to drink …”, pg. 55.
“By faith only we recognize the Christ, … long for Him, … But faith is not of ourselves. It is the gift of God. The will to come and eat the bread of life …. Is the fruit of grace”, pg 48 & 67.
God does not destroy our responsibility. Nor does He eliminate it. Instead, God, through Christ, frees us to exercise it rightly through faith.
Posted 8/28/2024
