Calvinism vs. Arminianism Part II: Total Depravity

In the second blog of this series I am going to talk about the doctrine of Total Depravity as Calvinism teaches it and also about free will. In the next blog I will talk about irresistible grace.

Here is a link to the introduction on Calvinism and Arminianism.

A little side note about Calvinist that I picked up as I was studying, was how high they regard the sovereignty of God and Grace. This idea of God’s sovereignty is crucial to them and will pop up a lot in their teachings. The idea of God’s sovereignty almost seems like a lost or ancient idea these days, so I will define it quickly. It basically means that God is God and that He created the heavens and the earth, and that He is in control of all things and can do what He likes.

Total Depravity

Total Depravity is the teaching that every part of man was affected by the fall, his body, mind, heart, emotions and even his free will.

Total Depravity does not mean that man can do nothing good in relation to other humans. It means that if those goods deeds did not proceed from faith, then it is still sin in the sight of God.

"whatever does not proceed from faith is sin." (Romans 14:23)

So Total Depravity is absolute when compared to God, but it is not absolute when compared to other humans. You still following me? It basically means that you can’t comprehend the nature of your depravity by comparing yourself to other people, only when you compare yourself to God do you get a sense of the depth of total depravity. The other four points of Calvinism logically flow from this doctrine, so total depravity will be crucial in understanding, irresistible grace, limited atonement, unconditional election, and the perseverance of the saints.

Because of total depravity, man is not able to freely choose God.

(Note: Just keep in mind that most of this deals with a person before he has been regenerated. So if you are a believer then you can’t think about some of this in your current regenerate state, you have to think about it from an un-regenerated perspective. Because now you have a new nature and can choose good over evil)

Here are some effects of total depravity:

1. Man’s fall from God is total.
There is no one that seeks God, no one that seeks holiness and no one that seeks what is right.

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23)

“for there is no one who does not sin” (1 Kings 8:46)

“Do not bring your servant into judgment, for no one living is righteous before you.” (Psalm 143:2)

(Romans 3:9-20; James 2:10-11; 1 John 1:8)

2. Everything man does is sin.
“…everything that does not come from faith is sin.” (Romans 14: 23)

“18I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” (Romans 7:18)

John 3:19-21

3. Man’s inability to submit to God is total
“Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.” (Romans 8:5-8)

"No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:44)

(John 3: 5-7; Romans 6: 17-18; Ephesians 2: 1-5; Ephesians 4: 17-18; 1 Corinthians 2:14)

Arminianism teaches that man was greatly affected by the fall, but he is not in a total state of helplessness. God enables sinners to repent but does not interfere with their free will. This free will is untouched by the fall and is able to choose good over evil. The person has the power to cooperate with God and be regenerated, or don’t cooperate and perish. So man needs the spirits help to believe but he doesn’t have to be regenerated before he can believe.

In Calvinism, through irresistible grace, the Holy Spirit regenerates you before you can believe. (I’ll get into this in a later blog)

To me it doesn’t make sense why everything would be affected by the fall except your free will. So the next logical step is to take a look at Free Will.

Free Will

Free will is sometimes described as why some people accept Jesus and others don’t. This position is generally taken by the Arminianist. They reject the Calvinist idea that God is completely sovereign over our free will and that He elects and predestines people based purely on His desires. The common defense of the Arminian view is that God looked into the future to see who would pick Him and then predestined them. This seems like an icky position to be in, because it states that God had to look into the future to see what a person’s free will choice would be, basically denying God’s omniscience. God’s view of time is very different than ours; He doesn’t have to look into the future.

A common objection used against Calvinism is that they take away man’s free will and make God the author of evil. Since man cannot freely choose God, God has to predestine or elect some people to believe, and the others will perish.

But this is not the case with Calvinism. Man still has free will, but his free will can’t choose to do good.

Libertarian free will states that an unbeliever is able to will whatever he wants to, independent of his sinful nature. Compatibilist free will states that an unbeliever is only able to do what his sinful nature permits him to do.

The Calvinist sees free will as containing four aspects: conception, desire, choice, and accomplishment.

1. Conception

• We must be able to conceive of an idea before we can desire, choose, and accomplish it.
• But we cannot conceive of something beyond our ability or nature to conceive.
• I can’t conceive of something I can’t conceive of.

2. Desire

• We can only desire what we can conceive.
• I can conceive of becoming a huge bird, so I can also desire it.

3. Choice

• We can only choose what we can desire.
• But we cannot choose beyond or ability or nature to choose.
• I am free to try to attempt to accomplish my desires

4. Accomplish

• We can only accomplish what can be chosen to accomplish.
• This doesn’t mean I can accomplish all my choices.
• I can conceive of becoming a huge bird but I cannot accomplish it because I cannot violate my own nature.

Therefore free will is limited by our nature and what we can conceive of, desire and choose. We are not free to conceive of anything possible, we are not free to desire anything possible since not all things can be conceived of, we are not free to choose what we cannot desire, and we are not free to accomplish that which we cannot desire.

God has free will right? But God is only free to choose what is in accordance with his nature. God has the ability to conceive of lying, but he can’t accomplish it because it would violate his nature.

Calvinist believe that we have free will just like God has free will, but we can’t freely choose to do something that is against our nature. If our nature is totally depraved like Calvinists believe then we cannot choose to accomplish good, because it goes against our nature. So God has to regenerate us first and give us a new nature before we can have faith and believe.

So this is a summary of what the doctrine of total depravity is about. If the doctrine of total depravity as presented by Calvinism is true, then it would seem to me that no one would ever believe in Christ unless God predestines and elects people and overcomes their total depravity with His irresistible grace.

So from what I can gather it seems to hinge on total depravity. Is our free will limited by our sinful nature? Or is our free will fully independent of all things, including the sovereign knowledge and control of God, and equally free to choose between good and evil?