I don't subscribe to double
predestination, but I don't think Calvin's followers are idiots or
deceived, at least no more than the rest of us! And probably less so. There is
a great deal more to Calvinism than this. To return to a previous analogy: our
careful theologies are like various cartographic projections of a spherical
earth onto a flat sheet of paper--they all entail distortions, especially at
the edges. Double predestination is in the corner of the "Calvinist
Projection"; at the same time, it's only one short logical step from the idea
that our being at the Table is God's grace and choice, not earned by any act
or attitude of ours (even faith being a gift). If it is false, it is a good
warning of the results of boxing God in logically.
On the other hand, this view prevents us from
judging people and thinking ourselves superior to those who are not
believers. It leaves people and the whole question of their eternal
destiny in God's hands where they belong. I also sometimes wonder to
what extent our righteous horror at predestination is due to our thinking
being permeated by the secular liberal doctrine (liberal in the social
philosophical sense, not theological) of the free choice of the
individual.
More than any other single group of Christians I
know, Calvin's contemporary followers have a profound understanding
of:
1. covenant
2. the unity of Old and New Testaments in a
single redemptive story
3. grace as the ground of our
salvation
4. community
5. the ministry of reconciliation and
restoration, involving all aspects of personal and public life and all of
creation.
They are, among the Christians I know (and I know
them very well), the most whole-heartedly and consistently
engaged in this ministry. They believe God is for the world and they
therefore live hopefully in the world. They do not compartmentalize and
do not take a narrow, moralistic stance on social issues. They make it their
task to really understand the culture we live in and be salt and light in
it, working on solutions instead of just talking. They know the value of
Christian scholarship and are responsible for a great deal of it. And they
were doing this long before it became cool among other evangelicals.
By comparison, I find the theology and
practice of other evangelicals to be rather dilettantish a lot of the time.
Debbie
