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It is interesting (at least to me it is) to note that I have received not one challenge to my many criticisms of calvinist doctrines, especially noting the extreme teachings of new calvinism. I have accused calvinism of being a false gospel (The False Calvinist Gospel; The False Calvinist Gospel blog), of containing lies (The Big Lie of the Calvinists – Limited Atonement) of being a counterfeit Christian cult (Calvinism is a Counterfeit Christian Cult) and of having serious limitations in Biblical interpretation (Calvinism and Biblical Interpretation).
I have accused the calvinist God of creating the vast majority of mankind for the single purpose of creating most of mankind evil, then condemning them to hell for their sin which they were created to do (The Calvinist God created most of Mankind for torment in Hell), and that in spite of the calvinists claiming that their God is more sovereign (than what??), their God will only take responsibility for the small number he chooses for heaven (Calvinists deny God His Full Sovereignty).
I have demonstrated that the calvinist God ordained that mankind (through Adam) would sin, yet condemned mankind for that sin which the calvinist God ordered him to commit. In fact, I have shown that calvinists even teach that God decreed sin (Calvin, White), ordained sin (MacArthur, Piper), willed sin (Pink), authored sin (Cheung), ordered sin (Westminster Confession), and that in no way could man ever have made the decision himself that sin should enter this world (The Heresy of Calvinism Refuted Part 2).
And as if this isn’t already more than enough to demonstrate extreme heresy, I have shown that the calvinist God randomly selects a group of people to go to heaven, that it is the luck of this heavenly lotto that permits a small group of mankind to go to heaven, and that the calvinist Jesus didn’t bother dying for even one of the sins of any of the others who didn’t win a prize in the heavenly lotto. I have shown that the calvinist God (according to such as MacArthur) only uses foreknowledge to demonstrate love to the ones he has chosen, and thus the calvinist God’s foreknowledge cannot apply to most of the world – he either doesn’t want to know about them, or even cannot know anything about them by using foreknowledge! (The Heresy of Calvinism Refuted Part 1)
All of these comments so far clearly show that most calvinist beliefs are oxymoronic in that they teach one thing and mean something totally different! For instance, the calvinist God created sin and then blamed Adam for it. The calvinist God also taught that we are saved by the gospel of salvation through Christ, yet requires that we have to be regenerated by the Holy Spirit before we can believe in Jesus Christ! (The Oxymorons of Calvinist Doctrine)
A further oxymoron is that calvinists claim that calvinism is the gospel, yet cannot effectively preach the Biblical gospel to the lost until after they have been born again (they prefer the term “regenerated”). (Calvinism is the non-gospel; Calvinists born again before they are saved)
The calvinist God only loves his chosen ones with agape love, not those who are going to hell, yet commands Christians to love their enemies! It seems that Christians can be more loving than the calvinist God! And in spite of Jesus being the propitiation for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2), the calvinists teach that the whole world actually means only the Christians in the world! (The Big Lie of the Calvinists).
Over and over I have demonstrated, in many documents on our website, that calvinism makes so many claims that just cannot be supported from the Bible; that, in fact, calvinism cannot be considered a Christian belief. Many calvinist “teachers” attempt to teach heresies as truth, while twisting facts and using verbal gymnastics to side-step any obvious issues. For example, MacArthur misuses the Granville Sharp rule (of Greek) to try to make foreknowledge the same as the foreordaining of God (MacArthur is Wrong) and misuses Hebrew Parallelism to teach that when the same word is used twice in a verse, then they have to have different meanings (MacArthur is Wrong – Again!). Like all calvinists, MacArthur teaches that no works can save a person, yet also teaches that the calvinist Jesus died for God’s chosen people because they were special enough; of course, the rest were not chosen for heaven because they were not special enough (MacArthur teaches Works Salvation)! As well as this, MacArthur teaches that if Jesus died for all mankind, then all He could offer would be a “potential” salvation, not an “actual” salvation. He says that a potential salvation is only a half-way salvation, not an actual salvation. Does that mean that a savage tiger, a potential man-eater, is only able to half-kill you, but not actually fully kill you? Is “potential” really any less potent than “actual”? Is a potential bullet from a gun any less deadly because it is not yet actual? (Potential Vs Actual Salvation? What’s the Difference?)
By the way, MacArthur, while condemning freemasonry as evil, incongruously also praises the spiritual harvest of his freemason grand master great grandfather (Is MacArthur a freemason?).
So far, in perhaps 12 months of placing such documents online, not one person has been able to make a reasonable comment on why anything that I have written is not true. Currently this website is attracting a good number of genuine hits every day, yet seemingly not one person has been able to refute any of my statements. People are reading my documents, and apparently are either in agreement with the information, or, at least, have no significant dispute with my comments (judging from the total lack of disagreement!). However, I am certain that some of those reading would call themselves genuine calvinists (or new calvinists) yet not one has considered it reasonable or necessary to actually comment.
I realise that when calvinists are confronted with truths that they cannot refute, they are very likely to just ignore them, giving them the silent treatment! I’ve had this reaction from calvinists a few times already: that when they cannot effectively and truthfully answer what is said, they will turn away from you, and go back to their lies. Like Winston Churchill once said, “Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing has happened.” That is, they will turn away and pretend that it (the truth) never happened in the first place.
But the Bible is truth! If the calvinists stuck to what the Bible said, they wouldn’t be calvinists, though. The Jehovah’s Witnesses have their Watchtower Society, the Seventh Day Adventists have their writings of Ellen White, the Mormons have their book of Mormon, and the calvinists have Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion. Without their extra writings of enlightenment they would probably have to believe in the Bible alone. But they cannot worship their Gods without these extra revelations, and they correspondingly condemn others who don’t believe (as they do) of being somehow not spiritual, or unsaved, or unenlightened, etc.
So, here’s the challenge: can any calvinist actually demonstrate to me, by the use of the Bible alone, and without referring to Calvin or any other of their “learned teachers”, any of my writings that are not Scripturally correct? Remember that the Bible has to be consistent throughout; any inconsistency therefore has to have a lie somewhere. And, if they wish to prove that their interpretation is the only one, they will have to absolutely disprove any alternative teaching that gets in the way of their “truth”! No-one has taken up the challenge yet, probably because it’s not easy to disprove a Biblical truth! But, I’m listening!
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The Seventh Day Adventist connection to new calvinism
I have documented this connection to some extent elsewhere; however, it is necessary to demonstrate the extent to which the Seventh Day Adventist (SDA) teaching on daily justification has influenced the development of new calvinism.
“Seventh Day Adventists Believe …..”
Daily Justification. All believers who are living the Spirit-filled sanctified life (Christ-possessed) have a continuing need for daily justification (Christ-bestowed). We need this because of conscious transgressions and because of errors we may commit unwillingly. Realizing the sinfulness of the human heart, David requested forgiveness for his “hidden faults” (Ps. 19:12, RSV; cf. Jer. 17:9). Speaking specifically of the sins of believers, God assures us that “if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1).
(https://www.sdanet.org/atissue/books/27/27-10.htm)
SDAs believe that it is necessary for them to continue to obey the Law of God in order to demonstrate that they are saved. They do not necessarily believe that the works of the Law save them; rather, they believe that if they are truly saved, then they will indeed obey the Law. Effectively it results in their obedience to the Law of God being that which saved them, because that is what they have to demonstrate in order to be considered saved. Obedience to the Law is theoretically a consequence of their salvation, yet in practice it becomes the cause! Therefore, if you sin, you may demonstrate your lack of justification and so you must repent, confess and renounce your sin in order to be restored to justification with God. The act of repentance remains the responsibility of the SDA believer, though.
The SDAs were not the only ones to perceive a need for daily or ongoing justification to maintain their salvation. Luther also taught that justification was ongoing: On no condition is sin a passing phase, but we are justified daily by the unmerited forgiveness of sins and by the justification of God’s mercy. Sin remains, then, perpetually in this life, until the hour of the last judgment comes and then at last we shall be made perfectly righteous. (Luther’s Works Vol.34, p.167.)
Daily we sin, daily we are continually justified, just as a doctor is forced to heal sickness day by day until it is cured. (Luther’s Works Vol.34, p.191.)
Of course, Luther was still very catholic in his doctrines, being an Augustinian monk, and hadn’t quite broken free of the need for daily or regular confession for justification.
Even Calvin couldn’t clearly rule out ongoing justification when he claimed that justification and sanctification couldn’t be separated. “Christ cannot be divided into parts, so the two things, justification and sanctification, which we perceive to be united together in him, are inseparable.” (Institutes Bk 3 Ch 11 Section 6)
Reformed writers such as John Murray also taught (in his document “Law and Grace”) that continuing obedience to the Law was necessary to maintain your elect status.
Puritan Anthony Burgess in 1654 wrote Thus it is here, God out of his mere grace did upon our believing put us in a state of Justification, from which favour we should fall every moment, did not God continue us therein. Hence in the Text its (unclear word) God that is continually justifying of us; ….. thus it is in our Justification, we need a constant remission, we want a perpetual imputation, because our sins and imperfections are renewed daily. (The True Doctrines of Justification Asserted & Vindicated – Anthony Burgess)
And the Gospel Coalition (of new calvinist leaders) states:
As we sin daily, so he justifies daily, and we must daily go to him for it. Justification is an ever-running fountain, and therefore we cannot look to have all the water at once.
(Quoted from puritan William Fenner, by Ray Ortlund, Renewal Ministries, www.ortlund.net, at the The Gospel Coalition National Conference, 13 April 2011. Ortlund’s website states that he is a Council member with The Gospel Coalition.)
It is reasonable to assume that the Gospel Coalition believes in both a once-off justification when born again, and an ongoing justification (by God) to maintain our righteous status before a holy God.
It was the SDA teaching of an ongoing justification process that Robert Brinsmead (an Australian who declared himself to be a Reform SDA) would take to USA with the Australian Forum around 1970. It was also in 1970 that Jay Adams, a professor at Westminster Theological Seminary (USA) wrote “Competent to Counsel”, a book that would abruptly change the direction of church counselling. And it was Jon Zens’ connection with Robert Brinsmead through Westminster Theological Seminary where he completed studies in 1972. It was at Westminster that he read Brinsmead’s Present truth magazine (which outlined Brinsmead’s views in the Australian Forum). Zens was reformed Baptist, but saw no real conflict with Present Truth which was reformed SDA.
It was Zens who was to do much of the pioneering work in the development of New Covenant Theology, which would play a major role in the development of Sonship Theology, which would, in turn, become known as new calvinism.
Zens’ groundbreaking articles in the late 1970s, “Is There a ‘Covenant of Grace’?” and “Crucial Thoughts on ‘Law’ in the New Covenant,” were highly instrumental in developing what came to be called “New Covenant Theology.”
(https://frankviola.me/jonzens/)
The Sonship movement finds its roots in the ministry of the late Dr. Jack Miller, founder of World Harvest Mission, a sending missions agency.
(Christ Covenant Presbyterian Church’s position on Sonship Theology)
(Jack Miller) served as pastor of New Life Presbyterian Church in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, and taught practical theology at Westminster Theological Seminary. Miller founded World Harvest Mission (now named Serge) and the New Life Presbyterian network of Orthodox Presbyterian churches. He was known for emphasizing the Christian’s status as a child of God, a view known as sonship theology. (Wikipedia)
However, it was Prof Jay Adams who would be the pivotal person in the development of counselling that would support this new theology at Westminster. His ground-breaking book “Competent to Counsel: Introduction to Nouthetic Counseling” came around the same time as the SDA input from Brinsmead, and the New Covenant Theology of Jon Zens. From Adams’ input came nouthetic counselling which was designed to provide counselling support for the new thinking that was developing at Westminster Seminary.
But the new nouthetic counselling movement apparently wasn’t as supportive of the developing Sonship Theology as it could have been. Jay Adams himself appears to have had strong views on the justification being a once-off event; thus his counselling methodology was going to be a problem for a theology that had taken the SDA doctrine of an ongoing or daily justification on board. If nouthetic counselling were to be an integral part of the new theology, then it had to be able to counsel for ongoing repentance and restoration by God’s grace. Nouthetic counselling allowed for God’s forgiveness, but it also assumed that God’s elect were justified once at regeneration, and that such people would demonstrate this by their puritan lifestyles. A puritan lifestyle didn’t really permit those with serious sin to continue to be declared God’s elect. If you sinned badly, you were out, off the list of elect! The nouthetic counselling of Jay Adams was therefore more suited for keeping people living within the puritan lifestyle, rather than counselling for restoration back to the puritan lifestyle if they had departed from it!
Adams didn’t actually see a problem with the name Biblical Counselling; rather, it appears that his disagreement would eventually be over its application to a doctrine of an ongoing justification for ongoing restoration.
In a 1976 book, What About Nouthetic Counseling, Adams said he actually preferred the title “biblical counseling.”
Powlison was to take over Adams position in the development of Biblical Counselling. Note that “Pastoral Practice” now becomes “Biblical Counselling”!
The next big leader in Adams’s counseling movement was David Powlison, who succeeded Adams as the editor of The Journal of Pastoral Practice and immediately renamed it The Journal of Biblical Counseling.
The new Biblical Counselling movement was then developed further by Powlison, Welch and Tripp into the Biblical Counselling in churches today.
Biblical Counsellors identify with second-generation leaders like David Powlison, Ed Welch, and Paul Tripp.
(All these quotes from https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/two-sides-of-the-counseling-coin/)
All of this (that is, Sonship theology/new calvinism) has come about as a result of the fusion of ideas at Westminster, ideas such as (a) the ongoing justification of the SDA, (b) the traditional calvinism upon which Westminster was commenced (but which same doctrine was losing popularity to the young evangelical fundamentalists), and (c) the need for a church counselling model that was supportive of the doctrines taught. In fact, new calvinist John Piper says that There would be no New Calvinism without Westminster Seminary. (https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/5-reasons-why-the-new-calvinism-is-worth-supporting/)
The fusion of these ideas initially produced nouthetic counselling which was to become Biblical Counselling, and from these counselling models developed the Sonship Theology which would then become new calvinism. It was the early development of Biblical Counselling which came first, which then required a new theology framework in which to present the new counselling model. Biblical Counselling was not greatly supportive of any theology which required living a good life (which automatically cancelled out traditional calvinism). Instead it was more supportive of a theology that catered for people who sinned regularly. Traditional calvinist theology strongly discouraged people from committing sin in the first place, and frowned upon a lifestyle that appeared to condone, even encourage sin among God’s people. But Biblical Counselling was best used to restore sinful people back to a righteous relationship with God. And, best of all, people who sinned badly didn’t have to be removed from church membership, that is, if they repented and were restored again (by God’s grace, naturally).
See New Calvinism is Biblical Counselling
The most effective theology platform for Biblical Counselling to use was therefore one that permitted God’s people to sin, yet also to repent and be restored, all by the grace of God. Such theology may not actually openly encourage people to sin – it was always accepted that proper theology should appear to discourage sin – but it should make it much easier for people to repent and be restored to fellowship in the event of them sinning.
The New Covenant Theology of Jon Zens was indeed supportive of Biblical Counselling. New Covenant Theology was refined further to become Sonship Theology, which taught that no matter how much God’s elect sinned, God’s grace would always be sufficient to overcome their sin. Basically, no matter how much you sin, you cannot ever lose your salvation if you are one of God’s elect.
Sonship Theology is an attempt to elevate grace, the assurance of salvation we have in Jesus Christ, and the intention of God to preserve Christ’s sheep so that not one is ever lost. (https://covenant-presbyterian.church/articles/from-the-pastors-desk/sonship-theology)
Sonship Theology was a perfect consequence of the development of Biblical Counselling. Sonship Theology was an effective tool for Biblical Counselling. But many calvinists were not as supportive as they could be. It just didn’t have the right image to get people’s attention. It needed a new marketing image in order to escape the obvious accusations that it was only an excuse to be able to sin without penalty from a holy God. New Covenant Theology had been seen as a development of traditional Covenant Theology; it wasn’t an alien theology but just a “new” upgraded version of the “old”. And likewise, the new marketed image of “new” calvinism (instead of Sonship Theology) was seen as an upgraded version of the “old” calvinism. And in the past 12 or so years, new calvinism has become the name of the theology that was developed to support the doctrines of Biblical Counselling in the church today. The marketing has indeed been very successful, so far.
For further related reading please go to:
New calvinism is Biblical Counselling
Biblical Counselling as an Aid to Control the Church
Biblical Counselling & New Calvinism today
Also try these:
The False Calvinist Gospel blog
List of all my posts on this site.
If you wish to read other documents on the heresies of calvinism, please use this link.
Please feel free to comment Comments and contact page
Comments and replies are recorded on the Comments page.