"We shall never be clothed with the righteousness of Christ except we first know assuredly we have no righteousness of our own." ~ John Calvin
Visitor: Whatever righteousness I effect in the world is the result of my own intention, effort, and good luck. To think otherwise is to imagine that we are not the authors of our own actions, but mere playthings of the gods
Response: perhaps you've misunderstood the bondage of the will. Human beings are indeed born with a will and make voluntary choices but, according to Scripture, are captive to sin, and in bondage to corruption ... which is why we need a Savior because we cannot save ourselves. We need RESCUE not advice.
If a man was on death row to die tomorrow and a friend came and declared: "I have good news".
"what is it" the prisoner replied.
"be good". Said the friend.
You see there is nothing helpful about this admonition to be good to a prisoner on death row yet false teachers say something similar all the time as it were gospel.
So we do make voluntary choices but not one of us makes the right ones. GOD does not coerce us, but when left to ourselves we act of necessity according to our fallen natures... not choosng evil because we are puppets or playthings but because THAT is what we actually want. Necessity, not coercion.
Visitor: Your prisoner has created a hell for himself out of his own free actions. Life is indeed tragic for some. I would say that he pursued the wrong choices in life. Contrariwise, those that make good choices often end up living lives of happiness. It is not that uncommon. Kant put it well when he said that 'man has a predisposition towards good, but a propensity for evil'. I believe that we do know how to make that choice and have the personal authority to do so by our own reasoning. More working parts will not yield clarity, only obscurity.
Response: there may be many relatively happy in the world because they made responsible choices overall, and lived a relatively upright life. This includes both Presbyterians and pagans alike. Men were created in God's image and have the capacity to make beautiful art do justice etc, but when weighed against God's perfect standard of righteousnes, we fall short. The prisoner analogy is about all if us, not just bad people. We may do good in a relative sense but compared to God's majesty and holiness we fall woefully short. If you read the sermon on the mount and your response is "I can do that Lord ... no problem" then you would be deceiving oneself and missing the point of the sermon. The purpose of God's commands, his law, according to Paul, is to reveal sin (see Romans 3:19-20) to show that our only hope for forgiveness is outside ourselves. Christ did not to give advice of how we can get to heaven if we just live a good life. We cannot trust in our woefully insufficient self righteousness but only in the righteouness of Christ.
Visitor: Ah, but who would really think to compare themselves to God's perfection anyway? I don't compare myself in the morning to an absolute standard of perfection and self flagellate when I fail to meet up. It should be painfully obvious how limited we are as beings. We are just animals--rational animals--but animals nonetheless. This does not take away from the degree of perfection needed to make moral judgments which are sound and to make the efforts necessary to live out one's moral ideals. That, too, falls to the rational animal to do. As it is said in the Odyssey, "the Gods cannot do for man what he must do for himself!"
Response: The Odyssey is not Divine revelation, but simply the thoughts of men. Flagellation is precisely the opposite of what those who are in Christ do to themselves ... for there is no condemnation in Christ. In Christ, God does not treat us as our sins justly deserve ... he has set us free from sin's bondage and reconciled us to God because of what HE has done. No amount of tears, good works or flagellation can please God. We are saved by Christ alone, for only he has the righteousness sufficient to bring us to God. In Him God completely accepts us and any attempt to add to Christ's finished work as if could curry God's favor is to miss the gospel. He is sufficient to save to the uttermost.
God created us for a purpose and we find our meaning in Him and our dependence on Him. The moment we depart from that purpose and declare autonomy we make up our own rules which is contrary to those of creation and we destroy ourselves. It not like we can say we haven't been warned. The reason we compare ourselves to God's perfection is because we want to be reconciled to him but cannot approach him because our relationship with him is broken . God is thrice holy and no sinful man can approach Him and live. At the same time, our only hope to live is to approach him. But given our sin (as a friend of mine has said) we want the true God like a thief wants a policeman. In spite of our evil God loves His people so in mercy God comes to bear the penalty we deserve upon himself... doing for us what we are unable to do for ourselves. You seem to be suggesting that you can pull yourself up by your own bootstraps and when you face God you will be content to trust in your own righteousness. God does not grade on a curve. He is perfectly just and will treat us exactly how we deserve. But to resolve this problem He instead treated Christ how we deserve so that we don't have to stand before Him in our sins, but clothed in Christ's righteousness.
Visitor: These concepts (salvation, good works, brokenness, etc.) are so laden with baggage that we cannot escape them until we learn to think for ourselves. The moment you say, "yes, I can do works on my own" the theologian can reply, "no, God alone is perfect and only works done in his spirit partake in glory". Here (within a religious tradition) there is no freedom. All the answers are already there. In this model, truly a human being is nothing more than God's chattel
Response: Thank you for your response. I have to say, I understand your position ... but lets be honest, these were orphaned ASSERTIONS without an argument.
As I said earlier, secular people can be moral. But While there can be personal moral feelings without God, it doesn’t appear that there can be moral obligation. Modern, secularist are in the position of insisting that other people’s morals are constructed yet acting as if theirs are not. In theory they are relativists, but in practice and interaction with those who disagree with them, they are absolutists.
Visitor: I am aware of the issue of moral relativism and, in particular, the preoccupation of religious types with this problem. To me, it is a fact of free human reason that there will be different interpretations of what moral obligations we are under. That doesn't mean that there aren't basic moral values which guide our reason. These moral values are a part of human reason. Moral constructivism is not the same as moral relativism.
I think a theory of moral constructivism is superior to divine command theory as an account of moral obligation. I think we share a lot of the same reasons as to why obviously bad moral behavior is bad: murder, theft, etc. Obviously bad stuff and you won't find many modern people, let alone religious traditions, which do not proscribe these things. I may have mentioned Kohlberg's ideas about the stages of moral development of being kind of instrumental to me. Autonomy is the highest stage there. Divine command theory as a lifelong moral theory would be, on his account, a kind of inprisonment at a lower stage of moral evolution. I sort of understood Calvin (in this quote) to be going further down this path towards a view even more bizarre: there is no goodness possible from our own free actions but only because of divine dispensation or something like that. I couldn't resist plucking away at this. uI can't see how such a view puts you in the proper relationship of control over your own mind and actions, as it appears that virtue (here) is about evacuating your personality that God might fill it. I have tried this and it is a long wait. Better take matters into our own hands.
Response: Calvin is not saying men cannot be moral. We know all persons can be moral, whether they are atheists or otherwise. We are moral creatures. No doubt there are some atheists who are more moral than I am in many ways. Calvin would agree but that is not what he is talking about here. He is not talking about relative morality between men but rather how we become right before God. He is saying our own morality, as good as we may think we are is woefully insufficient for approaching God with. We need the righteousness of Christ to approach Him. You judge this as "bizzare". How do you know? Are you privy to the highest knowledge of God?. Bizzare is a value judgement which assumes that your own view is the truth, and Christianity is false. And how do you know that with such certainty? I propose that you could not possibly know this.
No "personality is being evacuated" as you say, but rather fulfilled for its original purpose. Unless you know something's purpose you cannot know right from wrong. You could only make it up... I propose that is what you are doing because you don't know man's purpose.
Visitor: What offends me about Calvin's idea here is that it supposes that our own virtue should be equivalent to God's and furthermore we should feel bad that it isn't. That's a heavy trip to lay on humanity: compare yourself to absolute perfection and measure up! Be ye perfect as your father in heaven is perfect? Really? That's bizarre to me. To demand moral rectitude/accountability is well within the ambit of constructivism.
Response: our Lord himself declared the the gospel is offensive and a stumbling block to many.
But are you really offended at the concept of justice? It seems to me that most human beings have a sense of justice built in. Most are not offended at human courts of law carrying out justice but happy for the order it creates in society. How much more God who executes perfect justice. Our human justice, as good as it is, is still deeply flawed and insufficient. God will make certain all justice is rendered perfectly. It is only offensive, I propose, because it is scary ... scary that we will give account for everything we have said, thought and done. And justice for it will be parcelled out perfectly. Yet (and take note) God knows that would be too much for us so in love he absorbed the justice for us in Christ. So we either get justice or mercy but no one gets injustice.
Of course it is a "heavy trip to lay on humanity", as you say... which is why God became flesh to do for us what we are unable to do for ourselves, so we no longer have to live in guilt and fear.
I was thinking a bit about what you said about moral constructivism and it seems that what you are talking about is along the lines that we can all arrive at morals in society through rational consideration which citizens of a country will probably accept through some kind of ideal conditions of choice, rather than appealing to metaphysical ideas of morality. Is this correct?
I largely agree with you --- Christians do not believe that human beings need some kind of divine dispensation or additional revelation in order to know right from wrong. Like you, we believe all human beings already know right and wrong because we are created in the image of God, who gave us a conscience which knows God's law, and know it simply by nature. In fact a non-Christian who has no Bible may behave better than a professing Christian who has one. Read the following texts from Romans and see this is basic Christian theology:
"13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. 14 For when Gentiles, WHO DO NOT HAVE THE LAW, by NATURE do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is WRITTEN ON THEIR HEARTS, while their CONSCIENCE also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them 16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus." Rom 2:13-16
also....
"So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? 27 Then he who is physically uncircumcised but keeps the law will condemn you who have the written code and circumcision but break the law." 2:26-27
The problem is not that men do not know the law, it is that they DO KNOW IT and suppress it. People are not ignorant of the law and to resolve this problem simply need more data from the Bible. No. they demonstrate they are rebels because THEY DO KNOW IT, but don't obey even what they naturally know to be true. Again, check out Romans:
"...by their unrighteousness SUPPRESS the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they KNEW God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened" Rom 1:18-21
This is a universal declaration... People without the law KNOW GOD declares the Bible... they know the law.. it is written on their hearts ...That I know the truth of the Law has no bearing on the fact that I resist it and want to be autonomous from it.
So you and I would agree that we can appeal to reason to form some kind of just laws on society ... because being in the image of God we already know what is right.
But again, this has nothing to do with the statement from Calvin. . He is not here talking about how to solve practical problems in society. He is referring to the ultimate purpose from which we are made. That God's laws have been broken and while we should do good works, we cannot be justified by them. They do not outweigh the offense we have made against a holy God. But thanks be to God, He is merciful and in Christ does not treat us as our sins justly deserve. We have no righteousness of our own, that is we cannot ear favor with God by good works, but need the righteousness of Christ to be reconciled to Him. This does not free us from good works, but frees us from a wrong opinion of good works, that they cannot justify us before God.
SO I think Calvin and I were talking about a completely different subject that what your comments were suggesting. You may disagree with Calvin but not for the reasons you stated.
Hope this clarifies.
Warm Regards
John Hendryx
Visitor: : I can appreciate the rigor of your response, it shows a lot of theological sophistication. I will still continue to think that the need to have Christ the intermediary between the Angry Father and his wayward children is more apparatus than we need. We (humanity) are far from perfect and, truth be told, we often appear as wicked, ignorant little beasts, but I don't think that the account of Original Sin helps things.