Calvinism

The name and its wider sense

The name comes from the Genevan Reformer John Calvin (1509–1564), but the Reformed churches grew from many Reformers, Zwingli, Bullinger and Bucer among them. ‘Calvinist’ began in the 1550s as a label used by Lutheran opponents in the debate over the Lord's Supper, and many in the tradition prefer to speak of Reformed theology. In its wider sense Calvinism is a faith that sets all of life, not only salvation, under the sovereignty and glory of God: the authority of Scripture, God's covenant with his people, worship ordered by the Word, churches governed by elders, and every sphere of life seen as a calling.

The doctrines of grace

In its narrower sense Calvinism is the teaching that God's grace works sovereignly in salvation from beginning to end. When the followers of Arminius issued their Remonstrance in 1610, the Synod of Dort (1618–1619) answered under five heads. Sinners, dead in sin, cannot turn to God by themselves. God chose some in Christ, not because he foresaw their faith, but according to his good pleasure. Christ's death is more than sufficient for the whole world, but was offered effectually for the elect. The Spirit renews their wills so that they come freely, and he keeps them to the end.

For He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless in His presence. In love He predestined us for adoption as His sons through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of His will,

Ephesians 1:4-5

Calvinists point to Jesus' words, "Everyone the Father gives Me will come to Me" (John 6:37), and to Paul's, "it does not depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy" (Romans 9:16). Matthew Henry puts it simply: "No one will come, till Divine grace has subdued, and in part changed his heart; therefore no one who comes will ever be cast out" Matthew Henry. The familiar acronym TULIP is a much later summary, popular in the twentieth century, and its words are easily misunderstood.

Other views and misunderstandings

Here evangelicals still differ. Arminians and Wesleyans teach that God elects those he foreknows will believe, that Christ died for all, and that prevenient grace, given to everyone, can be resisted. They take the word that God "wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Timothy 2:4) as his sincere will for each person. Lutherans also confess election by grace, but teach that no one is predestined to damnation Formula of Concord, art. 11. Both sides confess that salvation is all of grace; the Calvinist George Whitefield and the Arminian John Wesley parted over this question, yet preached the same new birth.

Calvinism is sometimes taken for fatalism, or for a brake on evangelism. Yet the Canons of Dort require the promise of the gospel, with the command to repent and believe, to be proclaimed to all people without distinction, and William Carey, who helped launch the modern missionary movement, was a Calvinistic Baptist William Carey, An Enquiry. The Westminster Confession counsels:

The doctrine of this high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care

Westminster Confession 3.8

The expulsion of the Remonstrant ministers after Dort is a shadow this tradition should remember with humility. The five heads are taught in the lesson The five heads of Dort, and the different views in What is predestination?