DOCTRINES OF GRACE: CHAPTER 3. TOTAL DEPRAVITY PART II.
SCRIPTURAL SUPPORT AND DEFENSE
IS TOTAL DEPRAVITY TAUGHT IN THE SCRIPTURES?
if an alien landed in the middle of San Francisco or Atlanta or St Louis, and viewed the world with a non-biased perspective what word would he use to describe what he saw? I think that word would be “broken." Those of us who live in this world system simply assume the world is a broken place without thinking about it all that much. How did this all come about? Is this the way it was supposed to be? These questions ought to occupy any probing mind. Any search for answers on this most complex issue must stop at the Bible. So how does the Bible account for the way the world is today? If the Scriptures teach that the universe was created by God as wholly "good" then how did it get so messed up? To read the opening chapters of Genesis is to see a world which was perfectly suited to man in every way. Eden was a world of unmitigated joy, security, peace and righteousness. To read about Eden is to cause us to pant to be there. But how did we get here?
Something happened. The first humans disobeyed God, and that shameful act of rebellions led to hiding, probing questions, excuses, and finally murder. It didn’t take long for man’s history to turn from perfection and joy to brokenness and misery. As the reader we are immediately confronted with a new reality; man is a creature who groans under the weight of universal imperfection. Worse yet, man caused it and he continues to be a self-centered, ravaging wolf.
But it wasn’t supposed to be this way. Man was created upright. So how did he become so deeply flawed? The answer comes in one word. Sin. Man disobeyed God by eating the forbidden fruit which caused a pervasive change in man. How one sin could so drastically change the nature of man is known to God alone. This we do know; that sin is the most destructive force found in the universe. It is the only entity that ‘un-gods’ God. By committing one sin, Adam and Eve unleashed a tidal wave of evil that brought the stench of death to the entire creation. Closer to home is the fact that it drenched mankind in these putrid, polluted waters. This race of beings, created in the very image of God, was now focused on self and away from its Creator. Alas, God no longer was the centerpiece of man’s thoughts and affections. Man’s intimate Companion in the garden now terrified him. He who once spoke with God face to face now hid from Him. To fill the void created by this willful abandonment of God man found identity in the things of the earth, dabbling with machines and toys and weapons and sex and every conceivable diversion. As the apostle said, they exchanged the glory of God for birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things.[1] Worse yet, this love of self and sin, was permanent and indelible. No matter how hard he tried, man could not escape his repulsion to God. He was a sinner at birth and continued on a rebel sinner throughout his life. His once pure heart turned to everything unwholesome. As the wisest man in the Old Testament would say, "Truly, this only have I found: that God made man upright but they have sought out many inventions" (Eccl. 7:29).
Not only was sin itself a destructive poison that destroyed all who consumed it, but it also had the uncanny ability to spread faster than stage five cancer. It quickly filled every nook and cranny of the universe. Of all of sin’s children, death was the most devastating. This should not have surprised Adam for God had warned him that "in the day you eat thereof (the forbidden fruit) you shall surely die." The proof that sin is still alive and well in the world is death itself, for “the wages of sin are death.”
The stunning reality of death has been lost in our day. We easily downplay the impact of death as we dress it up in mortuaries and dull its sting by ‘celebration of life’ services. But the very concept of ‘death’ ought to bring shivers down our spine every time we come in contact with it. Death is the separation of the body from the soul, a complete deconstruction of being. But it gets worse. Sin not only guarantees the destruction of the body but it separates the soul from its source of life, God, both in the present and forever. In the garden the effects of this were quickly seen. Immediately after sinning, Adam no longer delighted in or communed with God. Adam no longer cherished the beauty of God. He saw His once gracious friend as vindictive and harsh. He avoided God. No longer being satisfied in God, Adam now found comfort in the created order. He was now alive to everything but God. But to God he was dead. That is the devastating consequence of sin.
To question whether death is the controlling reality of this world betrays a tragic ignorance which itself is a result of death. Everything in this world moves by the reality of death, as a city shakes in an earthquake. Men plan estates, work for retirement, live for experiences, rush after pleasures, save, spend, eat, buy, sell, travel, reconcile, and dream all with death in mind, whether conscious or subconscious. Death is the ultimate game changer. And it worms its way into every life, rich or poor, black or white, crafty or boorish. It causes men to devote their lives trying to beat death only to find that it swallows them up at the last. No one beats death, period. It is the ultimate victor in a world where nothing else always wins. Man thinks he delays death with many inventions, but death always arrives right on time. And if sin truly is the cause of death then it would seem that the cessation of sin would be the answer to defeat death. But try as he may man continues on in the ways of sin. Man has willfully buried himself in a casket from which there is no escape.
So what exactly is sin?
SIN IS AN INDELIBLE STAIN.
We spoke last chapter about the nature of human depravity. The Bible teaches that sin is like an indelible stain that permeates every part of a man. We also noted that our depravity especially infects man at the root of his being, the heart. Jesus concurs, “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies" (Mt 15:19). Sin is not just what we do; sin is what we are. So this leads to our previous question of why we cannot stop sinning. The answer is all too simple. Sin is part of man’s essence, as it impossible to prevent a bird from flying, so it is impossible to stop man from sinning. Lady Macbeth’s cursed spot cannot be erased. No amount of will power or mental intuition or physical exertion can eliminate sin. No religion, no moral reformation, no resolute determination can break man’s addiction to sin.
In opposition to this are many theories that promote the idea that sin is not ingrained in human nature but is a learned behavior. If this be true then whatever is learned can be unlearned. But the Bible teaches that no such solution is possible. Why? Because sin is part of our essential nature; it is in our genetics. We are born with sin much as we are born with our gender, our personality, our aptitudes. Just as one cannot take heat out of light, so sin cannot be removed from human nature. Sin, my dear reader, is woven into the very warp and woof of your being. This means that the elimination of sin requires a power far deeper than anything the world has to offer, a power that can actually change the nature of being.
The proof that sin is part of our nature comes with simple observation. If sin is socially constructed we would expect sin to be diminished in those who have less contact with evil things; i.e. the young, the rich and the isolated. But this seems not to be the case. The great church father Augustine wrote about his own state of infancy in his famous Confessions. He states that sin in him was as strong in his childhood years as in his adulthood. The only difference, he explained, was that children have less strength to express their sin so it ‘appears’ as if they sin less. But anyone who has raised children will admit that the heart of a child is every bit as wicked as that of a hardened criminal. They covet just as strongly even though they have not the strength to fulfill their desires. David admits this about himself when he writes, "I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me" (Ps 51:5). In another Psalm he adds, "The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies” (58:3) The prophet Isaiah adds further, "(you) were called a transgressor from the womb” (48:8). So the question remains, can this sin nature be tamed by environment or self-effort? To ask the question a different way, “is there anything powerful enough to drive this poison from man’s system?” A man who lived in the fourth century said ‘yes’ to that. His name was Pelagius. He was a teacher in the church with many followers. So let us explore this Pelagian option.
INABILITY TO KEEP THE LAW AND TOTAL DEPRAVITY.
This fourth century bishop argued that men were not fallen in Adam and therefore were born with morally neutral natures. Men could live righteously by the force of their wills which were not affected by the Fall. Every man, said Pelagius, had the potential to live a morally perfect life. One of the chief means by which a man could do this was by imitation. The object of that imitation would of course be Christ, and Pelagius backed up his claims with Scripture.
But was the British bishop right in saying that holiness could be attained by emulating the lives of righteous men, particularly Jesus? Verses such as Philippians 2:5 and 1 Peter 2:2, said Pelagius, teach that Christ is to be the object of our emulation. In Pelagius’ mind, if the Bible commanded man to do something, it must therefore be possible for him to do it. And if man is commanded to live this way, reasoning backward, Pelagius deduced that man’s will was not fatally damaged by the Fall. This then became the central issue to be debated. Is man able to do all things God commands him to do? Enter Augustine, the great North African Bishop of Hippo. He asserted that God often requires mankind to do things he cannot do. Futhermore, man was still required to obey and failure in this regard rendered man guilty. Obedience is still man’s duty. Augustine pointed out that there were many instances in the gospels where Jesus asked men to do the impossible. For example in his famous sermon he commanded the crowd to “be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Mt 5:48). Was Jesus implying perfection was possible or merely that moral perfection was required by God to enter heaven? Certainly the latter for Jesus knew that the heart of man was a fountainhead of sin (Mt 15:19). Further, He knew that man’s will could never come to God apart from a work of grace (John 6:44). James, a writer whose book is filled with commands, admits that “we all stumble in many things” (James 3:2). Paul takes man’s inability to live a righteous life to new levels and notes that the law which was designed to bring life (if perfectly obeyed) brings only death (see Rom 7:10). Later on in the same book Paul says that “what the law could not do in that it was weak in the flesh God did by sending His own Son” (Romans 8:3). In his first sermon in Pisidian Antioch Paul did not encourage his listeners to try hard to keep the law but rather says, “Let it be known to you, brethren, that through this Man is preached to you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him everyone who believes is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses’ (Acts 13:38-39). If Pelagius was right, then Paul would have commanded his listeners to keep the law as the way of salvation or at least presented it as an option. But this he did not do. On the contrary, the New Testament writers repeatedly assert that the law though ‘holy, just and good’ cannot save. Though commanded to obey, man has absolutely no ability to do so. In other words it is impossible for man to keep the law or to work in any way for his salvation (Gal 2:16).
TOTAL DEPRAVITY PROVED BY GOD’S JUDGMENT
If anything could cause a man to stop sinning it would be the fear of enduring the judgment of God. The Romans thought they could deter rebellion by public crucifixion which was such a hideous sight that men could hardly bear to look at it. The Roman government believed that when others saw the horror of a man hanging naked on a cross under a burning sun for days, that this would shock citizens into obedience. This may have worked for the Romans but it begs the question of whether or not judgment deters men from sin? A study of the Genesis Flood gives us the answer. By the time Noah comes on the scene, humanity is in a severe moral downgrade. Genesis 6:5 says succinctly, "The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." Here is a world overtaken by universal disobedience to God. His patience with man has run out and God brings on a worldwide flood to judge the race. Due to His own word to Abraham, God must spare one man and his family. Now one would think that having seen God’s universal judgment, Noah would resist sin at all cost. But soon after Noah exited the boat he gets drunk and lays down naked in a drunken stupor, is seen naked by his grandson Canaan who is cursed by God (Gen 9:20-27). Why would Noah sin right after witnessing God’s universal judgment on humanity? Very simple. Noah sinned because he was a sinner by nature and all the judgment in the world could not burn sin out of him. Hundreds of years later Noah died, proving again that effects of sin, death, lay like a pall over the creation. Water could not change Noah’s heart, or heat, or threatening, or even divine wrath. Sin had wormed its way into the very fiber of creation and nothing could eliminate it. The patriarch Job wrestled with this question years later, asking, "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?” And the answer is clear; “no one” (Job 14:4).
If sin were to be defeated it would need a stronger opponent than the threat of judgment.
The evidence for the indelible nature of sin mounts as we look at Israel, God’s Old Testament chosen people. God called this nation to Himself through Abraham. He desired that they be holy and separated from the other nations, for God Himself was holy. In Leviticus 19:2 God tells Moses to "speak unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy." If any people knew the importance of not sinning against God it was Israel. Yet to look at their history is to witness a continual trail of sin and disobedience. Evidently the law of God could not stem the tide of sin. Even when God demonstrates His hatred for sin by judging them severely, Israel continues to sin. Take, for example, an event that took place in the wilderness wanderings. In Numbers chapter 16 a group of Levites led by Korah rebel against Moses. After a quick trial, God opens up the ground and it swallows up Korah and his followers, a swift and stunning judgment by the hand of God. If ever there was a time when Israel would forsake her sin it would be now. Would not those who were spared now live fully unto the Lord? When the following day dawned this is what we read:
"On the next day all the congregation of the children of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron saying, ‘You have killed the people of the Lord’" (16:41).
Those who saw an entire family being swallowed up by the earth murmured against God the very next day. Do we see how weak the threat judgment is to quell sin? The fact that men sin no matter how much they witness the judgment of God is proves that sin is not learned behavior but an integral part of man’s nature.
When we look at the 16th chapter of Revelation we find the same thing. When the fourth bowl of wrath is poured out on the earth we might expect that man, having learned his lesson, would be softened and beg God for forgiveness. But instead we read,
"And men were scorched with great heat and they blasphemed the name of God who has power over these plagues and they did not repent and give Him glory" (Rev 16:9).
If men could choose not to sin, this horrific time of final judgment would be just the time for men to finally obey God. Yet the text in Revelation is clear that men in these final years do not soften to God but actually harden. If Pelagius was right, then any man exposed to this level of divine judgment would instantly reform himself. But this is not the case. The evidence is clear that men sin even when they know to do so brings them the greatest infliction of pain. That is because sin is in the warp and woof of man’s nature and cannot be removed. So the principle stands: man is a sinner not because he sins, rather he sins because he has a sin nature. Just as a leopard cannot change its spots so no one born of Adam can alter his love of sin.
Up to this point we have proven that man is evil by nature by showing that man cannot stop sinning no matter what external pressure is put on him. That severe judgment and divine law are ineffectual to stop sin is one of the great proofs that sin is a learned habit but an ingrained part of man’s nature. But more proof is needed. We turn now to many texts in the Bible to bolster our argument.
SCRIPTURAL SUPPORT FOR TOTAL DEPRAVITY
In the previous chapter we gave some verses that demonstrate that men are depraved through and through. Texts like Isaiah 1:2-6 demonstrate that Israel was depraved in mind, affections and will. "The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint," said the prophet. Now we move for a more detailed scriptural proof of this doctrine. To do this we shall look at the book that deals most clearly with the plan of God’s salvation, the Book of Romans. And of course to prove the need for this salvation, Paul must first of all demonstrate the depth of inbred human depravity. And it should not surprise us that the apostle begins here for as we have said earlier all other biblical doctrines rest on the how we look at the doctrine of sin. Paul devotes the lengthy section, Romans 1:18 to 3:20, to show that all men --Jews and Gentiles -- are under the same domain of sin. As to the Gentiles Paul need not say much as the reality of their sin is graphic and grotesque. The list of sins outlined in 1:29-31 are enough to make one’s blood curdle. In chapter 2 Paul pulls a surprise. He shows that the Jews have the same depraved nature which only differs in its subtlety. External sins are replaced by the internal sins of self like pride self-sufficiency and hypocrisy. Hear the apostle’s shocking words,
"Therefore you are inexcusable O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things... And do you think this, O man, you who judge those practicing such things and doing the same that you will escape the judgment of God?" (Romans 2:1,3).
The Jews were convinced that the Gentiles were depraved sinners, yet they were blinded to their own sin because of their religious pride. They believed that their stewardship of the law of God (not obedience to it) was sufficient to save them. But Paul hammers away at this false security. Jews, says Paul, despite all their advantages are made from the same stuff as Gentiles and commit the same kinds of sins. They may keep the law externally, but internally they possess the same illicit desires. Years earlier Jesus had said the same thing to Jews on the Sermon on the Mount.
"You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Mt 5:27-28).
In this famous sermon, Jesus was deepening the Law of Moses to cover not only external behavior but hidden evils of the heart. In doing this He was unmasking the hypocrisy of the Jews who hid behind an outward conformity to the law. According to Jesus what goes on in man’s heart is what matters, and this is where the Jews had failed.
Paul’s methodology in this section of Romans smacks of legal convention. He brings different groups before the bar of God and presents evidence not only to prove that all men are guilty before God but they are sinful in all their parts. Sin is a universal, not an ethnic problem. To prove this Paul appeals to the Old Testament psalms. He summarizes,
“There is none righteous, no not one; There is none who understands; (their mind is void of God-centered thoughts) There is none who seeks after God. (their will refuses to move toward God), They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one. Their throat is an open tomb; With their tongues they have practiced deceit, The poison of asps is under their lips, Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood; Destruction and misery are in their ways; And the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.” (in their affections they hate Him) (Romans 3:10-18)
Having said this Paul concludes his argument,
"For we have previously charged both Jews (outwardly good people) and Greeks (outwardly bad people) that they are all under sin" (Rom 3:9).
Now most Christians would agree that the Bible teaches that all men are sinners. Yet many would posit that sin’s influence is not so extensive as to cripple humanity’s ability to do anything good. Yet, the Bible teaches that sin’s grip over man is so debilitating as render man dead to all things spiritual. But can this be proved? Let us further search the scriptures to discover the extent of sin’s dominion over man.
SINFUL IN ALL HIS PARTS
First let’s look at the mind. What do these verses in Romans say about man’s ability to understand? Note the statement in that previously quoted section in Romans 3 verse 11, "There is none who understands." Right away we see that sin has affected man’s ability to comprehend certain things. But what exactly is man unable to comprehend? Paul draws this statement from Psalm 14:2 where the author, David, describes the fool. If we turn to 1 Corinthians we find that a fool in the biblical sense is one who cannot understand the true nature of God or His gospel.[2] To be unable to understand calculus or philosophy puts one at an intellectual disadvantage but when one cannot understand how God saves sinners, the disadvantage is damning. Could any result of sin be worse than this? Yet the Bible teaches that sin has blinded men’s understanding of saving truths. We call this the noetic[3] effects of sin.
Paul further describes the debilitating effects of sin on the mind as pure hatred for God. We refer not to an emotional hatred. That will be discussed later. Here the hatred takes the form of apathetic ignorance. That is the natural man has "God in none of his thoughts" (Ps 10:4). Why would man never think about God? The reason is that man generally takes no time to think about things that mean nothing to him. Man is capable of searching out many things but he cannot and will not search out things for which he has no interest. Ephesians 4:17-18 says that natural men walk about in the world and use their minds in many ways, but when it comes to spiritual things they walk "in the futility (emptiness) of their mind having their understanding darkened being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them.” Man can soar to great heights of knowledge in many fields such as medicine, psychology and agriculture, but when it comes to knowing God they want no part of it. They are alienated from all thoughts of him. Natural man’s mind is completely devoid of any thoughts of God.
So the spiritual state of man’s mind is dismal. First, he has no capacity to understand God. And second, even if he could know God, he has no interest in doing so for he is positively uninterested in the things of God. Fallen man is like a dog trying to understand the beauty of broccoli; he neither understands it nor cares about it.
Here we must note that this inability to know God does not render man innocent. Man is an active participant in his ignorance. According to Paul, men with darkened minds "suppress the truth in unrighteousness" (Romans 1:18), that is, they push God out of their minds by a willful act. This does not mean that men are constantly beset with foul thoughts of God. In fact, most men will think at times of some god or another. But what men avoid is thinking on the one, true God of the Bible. That is the ‘god’ they purposely avoid. As character of natural man is succinctly stated in the Scriptures: "God is in none of his thoughts" (Ps 10:4).
The situation is far more desperate than men simply turning their minds away from God. The real tragedy is that man can do nothing to repair the damage sin has inflicted on the mind. This has more to do with man’s will, but it behooves us to mention it here. Man’s fallen mind is absolutely resistant to any human solution. Notice again how Paul describes it in Cor. 2:14, "The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned.” A man may absolutely hate something but may later on change his affections. But a mind darkened by sin has no capacity to know God and what one does not know one cannot consider. No fact about human nature is more frightening. A blind man may not care to read a warning sign because it doesn’t concern him. But even if he wanted to obey the sign he couldn’t because he can’t see it. So it is with man with respect to God. He has a double blindness before God; he can’t see God and he doesn’t care to see God. Such is the state of the carnal mind. The eulogy has been given: the mind is dead to God.
If all that wasn’t enough to paint a desperate picture, there is yet one more factor that makes the spiritual ability of man’s mind even more tragic. That is, the mind of man is blinded by an external force, the great enemy of the knowledge of God, the devil. It is the great desire of the evil one to keep all men from the truth. It says in 2 Cor. 4:4 that he, "Blinds the minds of them who believe not.” Jesus taught basically the same thing in what we call the Parable of the Sower (Matt. 13:1-9). When the gospel message is planted in the mind, the wicked one snatches it away immediately to ensure that it will not take root (vs. 19). If perchance any glimmer of light would reach a man’s mind, the devil would deflect that ray immediately and prevent the mind from understanding the gospel.
When we say that the mind of man is fallen, what we mean is that it has no capacity to understand anything good, any truth, and certainly anything true about Jesus Christ. His mind is a dead, dark, disinclined organ. We conclude, therefore, that man born in Adam, is deeply depraved in his mind in every sense.
But what about that aspect of man’s personhood called the affections? Can men actually feel good about God or enjoy God? We have already answered a good portion of this question by showing how the natural mind is ignorant and indifferent to God. In addition to that, man’s heart is disaffected from God. The Bible teaches that men born in Adam have no attraction to God and are born loving anything but God, especially themselves and the world. To say it another way, man is born loving everything but God. In Romans 3 Paul continues his résumé of fallen humanity by saying, "There is no fear of God before their eyes" (3:18). This is a statement pulled right out of Psalm 36:1 where David again lists the characteristics of the ungodly. One of those characteristics is that carnal man loves carnal things. Paul will note that the Ephesians before they were saved conducted themselves "in the lusts of our flesh,” and were always "fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind” (Eph. 2:3). All men are born with the capacity to love and hate. These ‘loves’ and ‘hates’ are behind many choices we make in life, most of which are morally neutral (i.e. broccoli over spinach). However with regards to things spiritual, man has no affection for them only repulsion. The reason is that the natural and spiritual realms are intrinsically opposed to one another. A man can either love ‘things below’ (everything that is not God) or ‘things above’ (everything about God). What he can’t do is love both. Jesus said this very thing, "No man can serve two masters." Romans 8:7 says that the carnal mind (the mind of natural man) is at enmity against God. 1 John 2:15 says that if one loves the world he cannot have a true love for God. The mind of unconverted man has no good feelings for God or His law. This is easy to spot by noting what direction a man’s affections travel. For the natural man, his eyes are bent downwards and he supremely loves the guy in the mirror. He is attracted to the things of the world, its pleasures, goals, principles, philosophies, etc. The ultimate sin of carnal men is succinctly stated by Paul, "Men will be lovers of themselves" (2 Tim. 3:2). Natural man loves everything of God. The Bible calls this darkness. Jesus said, "This is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light" (Jn. 3:19). Indeed the natural affections are born loving darkness which is another way of saying he loves himself and the world. As with the mind, the fallenness of the affections is a willful activity. Ephesians 4:19 says that the Gentiles, "Who being past feeling (calloused) have given themselves over to lewdness to work all uncleanness with greediness." In their mind they “suppress the truth” and in their affections “they give themselves over.” Man loves the foul stench of sin and is likened to a dog which has returned to his vomit (2 Peter 2:22). What a sad picture of humanity.
The single greatest proof of man’s degraded affections is how he treated Christ when He came into the world. It says in Isaiah 53:2 that men hid from Christ because "He had no form or comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him." The holy, beautiful, pure and majestic Son of God came to dwell with men and they hated Him without a cause (Ps 69:4). So they killed Him. Can any argument be tighter? Man is born with affections that simply detest God proven by the fact that man “crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor 2:8).
THE STICKY ISSUE OF THE WILL
Up to this point most evangelical Christians would be in agreement. Man is born ignorant and hostile toward God, and he has no agreeable feelings toward God. But what about man’s will? Was it also crippled by the Fall? Here there is a great divide among Evangelicals.
Let us first define what the will is. The will is that component in humanity that chooses. All living things can potentially take different paths but they usually do so in a limited way and always according to the predesigned principles etched into their natures. Because of his reasonable mind and moral conscience, man has the ability to freely choose in ways that other creatures cannot. A man who stands at a fork in the road can freely choose either. He can even meditate on the road not taken. Man is a choosing being. The "chooser" is the will. Of all created beings, only man and angels can choose freely in the sense we have described above. They alone have rational minds.
The issue in theology is this: "Is man's will able to choose what is spiritually good, that is, can the will of man choose salvation?" There are many Christians, good Christians, who believe men are depraved in mind and emotions but that they have a will that is still able to choose the good. But is this an accurate portrayal of the human will taught in the Bible?
Before looking at texts let us first analyze how the will of man works. When men choose several factors conspire to determine how they choose. If a man driving his automobile is about to take a right turn and sees that there is an accident in the middle of the road, he may quickly change his mind and proceed forward. What caused him to make that choice? The answer is obvious. His mind surveyed the situation and it determined that turning right would cause more inconveniences than if he continued straight. His rational mind assessed the situation and he made a choice. This is a simple illustration. Keep in mind that most choices involve a complexity of factors that determine what choice will be made. And it is those factors that determine one’s choice. For example the man in the previous illustration might be a firefighter in which case he might actually turn toward the accident in order to help. Or he would turn because he is nosey, or perhaps he doesn’t care about getting home on time. Faced with choices there will always be a multitude of factors that impinge on one’s decision. This includes a rational assessment of the mind.
Not only does the analysis of reason play a part in making a choice but there is another influence on choice, which is, of course, the affections. Men will choose that which they love and will recoil from that which they hate. In the illustration above the man may choose to avoid the accident because he hates the sight of blood. Again there are many complexities in this simple analogy. Sometimes the mind and the affections work against one another. What if the man’s mind really wants to go down the street where the accident occurred because he thinks it will get him home quicker while his affections recoil at the sight of blood? What choice does he make then? The answer is that the man will yield to the stronger or more compelling of the two influences. Looking at this issue in simple terms we offer this axiom about the human will. The human will always moves in the direction of the strongest inclination determined by the interaction of the mind and the affections at the moment of choice. In other words the will is simply that which follows the path of the strongest desire. What the will cannot do is to operate contrary to the dictates of the mind and affections. The will is not a rogue force that operates without warrant. The will is a follower that always executes a man esteems is best and is most attracted to.
Take a dog, an animal that is a notorious carnivore. Put in front of that dog two bowls of food. The first bowl is loaded with spinach (something dogs hate) and the second bowl is filled with bite sized bits of tender beef. Which bowl will the dog choose? We all know the answer. Try the experiment a thousand times. Which bowl would the dog choose? You know the answer. The reason the dog will always choose the meat is quite simple. The dog has a nature that loves meat. Because he has the nature of a dog he will always choose meat over spinach – 100% of the time! He has the capacity to choose spinach, but he won’t. The will does not and cannot operate in a random, independent way from the intrinsic nature of being.
Now let’s apply this to the will of man regarding spiritual things. If, as we have labored to show, the mind of man is so darkened that it does not understand God and his affections recoil from the very thought of God, what makes one think that a man will naturally choose to know and love God? The thought is preposterous. Jesus told the unbelieving Jews in John chapter 6 that the reason they did not choose Him was because they were unable to do so. They had come to Jesus for to have their bellies filled but they did come to Him as the Messiah who would give them life. And because they did not know who He was nor felt any attraction to Him they eventually walked away from Him (John 6:66). Given this, the crowds could not move toward Him. Christ said this, "No one can come to me except the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day" (Jn. 6:44). Note that Jesus unequivocally states that these people could not come to Him. He uses a word of ability. Why? Because when the mind understands nothing about Jesus and the affections feel nothing for Him, then the will is absolutely incapable of moving toward Jesus for salvation.
NATURAL VS. MORAL ABILITY
One might object and say, but if men can choose rather freely in the secular realm why is it that He cannot choose freely in the spiritual? To say it another way, if a man is able to freely choose between red socks over green socks how can we say he has not that same freedom to make choices in the spiritual realm? At this point we must make an important distinction that was made by Jonathan Edwards 300 years ago. He said that all men in the natural realm have a natural ability to choose. That is, in the normal course of life men are choosing beings who have are equally able to make one choice as another. In other words, man’s will is perfectly healthy to do what it was intended to do; the will is neither broken nor disabled. To give the illustration above, no one would ever say that the man could not choose green socks. His will was perfectly able to carry out that activity. But here Edwards made a distinction and posited that in the moral realm man’s will had no such ability. He called this man’s moral ability which he distinguished from natural ability. Because the natural man is dead to thing of the spirit, this rendered him unable to choose things in that realm. In other words, natural man is dead to spiritual choices. And so, said Edwards, the natural man cannot choose things spiritual, they are to him like spinach to a dog. Jesus seems to be saying this very thing. "No man (natural) can come to Me, unless the Father draws him" (changing his nature). The words of Isaiah ring as true today as the day they were spoken, "There is no one who calls on Your name who stirs himself up to take hold of You" (Is. 64:7).
Edward’s analysis helps us to understand that in the natural realm man has a breadth of choices all of which are in the realm of his ability. But it is not so in the spiritual realm. The reason is that the spiritual realm is a whole other world that requires an entirely new nature in order to be seen. The Fall, as we have argued, destroyed that spiritual nature and therefore has rendered all natural men incapable of operating in the spiritual realm. A natural man, to be specific, cannot see Christ and therefore cannot come to Christ. This is why Jesus could say to the hardened Jewish leaders, "You are not willing to come to me that you may have eternal life" (Jn. 5:40). Unbelieving men are neither willing nor capable to come to Jesus. I trust we have shown this to be true.
IS THE WILL FREE?
In a real sense the doctrine of Total Depravity was at the center of the Reformation debate. Martin Luther saw this inability of the human will as the real issue between him and the Roman Church. The question on the table was could man save himself by cooperating with God’s grace (Rome) or did God have to do a sovereign work of resurrection on the dead sinner? In what he considered his most important work, The Bondage of the Will, Luther sparred vigorously with the humanist Catholic thinker, Erasmus, and argued cogently for the second view. Luther demonstrated that man's will is so bound to sin that it is unable to seek God on any level. In Luther's mind, if the will was able to choose Christ apart from divine grace then that brought the church’s theology back to the theology of the heretic Pelagius. In essence, this is exactly what the Roman Church believed though in a slightly different form.[4] On this issue Luther put his foot down. Speaking about the issue of the will’s bondage to sin, Luther praised Erasmus for seeing this as the key issue in his critique of Rome. He says,
"I give you great praise, and proclaim it — you alone in pre-eminent distinction from all others, have entered upon the thing itself; that is, the grand turning point of the cause; and, have not wearied me with those irrelevant points about popery, purgatory, indulgences, and other like baubles, rather than causes, with which all have hitherto tried to hunt me down, — though in vain! You, and you alone saw, what was the grand hinge upon which the whole turned, and therefore you attacked the vital part at once; for which, from my heart, I thank you."[5]
The issue of free will did not rest on whether men could choose or not. All agreed that men made choices and that those choices were free. Every day each of us chooses to do what we esteem to be best. No one coerces us nor are we robots obeying some mystical force. Many who disagree with the concept of the Bondage of the Will think that Luther and other Reformed people are saying that men make no free choices. That is not the argument at all. So let me say it loudly: Yes! Men have free wills. But this idea of free will must be understood in the context of how the will is defined. Free will means, man will choose anything he wants to choose, but he will only choose what is according to his nature. Natural man will always choose freely whatever he desires, but he will always choose that which he knows and loves.
When reformed people say that a man has no free will, what they are really saying is that man does not have an independent will. That is, man’s will is not a rogue force that does whatever it wants to do apart from the nature of the one’s being. The will is simply the execution of one’s desires. A man will not choose that in which he finds no value, nor does he choose what repulses him. In the natural realm a man may freely choose between the red sock and the green sock. No one forces him to do either. But man cannot choose between the red sock and a scientific particle he has never heard of, nor will he choose a chain saw shoved in his face over the red sock.[6]
FREE WILL AND THE SEEKER MOVEMENT
What practical application can we make from an understanding of the doctrine of Total Depravity? There are many applications and I will name a few. First, this doctrine annihilates the theological foundations of the modern "seeker movement" in American Evangelicalism. This is a broad based movement of many nuances held together by the common belief that external factors can manipulate man’s will to choose Christ. The methodology of this movement is forged by a belief that churches are justified in doing anything that might change or soften a sinner’s heart. If this philosophy undergirds the movement then any innovation that aids and abets this goal is acceptable. This would include things like entertaining music, fun programs, social activities, anecdotal messages, and dumbed down theology. If Total Depravity is not true then the mission of the church will always focus on the power of method rather than the power of God. Does this mean that churches ought not to use means? Of course not. Means are good and healthy if the right one’s are employed. So the real question is ‘what are the means that God has ordained to expand His kingdom?’ In the matter of spiritual work the major means that God has ordained in the saving of sinners is the preaching, teaching, and explaining the word of God and especially the gospel message (see James 1:18). If we really believe the doctrine of Total Depravity, then we will abandon all hope in man-made schemes, look to God alone to save sinners and employ the things He has ordained for the expansion of His kingdom. How one views this important doctrine determines how churches will formulate their worship, their mission, their outreach.
This principle is equally applied in common enterprises like the raising of children. This doctrine corrects the errant thinking that a godly environment is a guarantee of conversion. If all have fallen in Adam, then children brought up in godly homes are as spiritually dead as children of heathens. Children who have lived in homes where the Bible is taught, where church is faithfully attended, and where faith is radically practiced, are in the same need of the new birth as the child of an infidel. Though children of believers have distinct advantages in being exposed to the gospel, this in itself cannot save them. To be sure, there are also disadvantages to being brought up in a Christian environment. It is all too easy for children in Christian homes to adopt the externals of religion yet be devoid of grace. Paul teaches that there is a faith that is rooted in the power of man's persuasion (1 Cor. 2:5) and not in the power of God. The doctrine of Total Depravity will keep parents humble and on their knees because God alone saves.
Also, the doctrine of Total Depravity, if properly taught, strips sinners from any delusion that they can save themselves and will drive them to flee to Christ as their only hope of salvation. In one sense the doctrine of Total Depravity is very bad news. But in another sense it is the best news a sinner could hear, for it cuts off every other avenue of escape. Total Depravity gives sinners an honest appraisal of their condition before God and drives them to despair so that they might flee to Christ. This brings to mind an important principle. Man will always seek a remedy for what he perceives his problem to be. If he sees himself as spiritually crippled, he will look for a good strong set of spiritual crutches to strengthen his walk. If a man thinks his problem is his bad choices in life, he will look for self-help guides that will enable him to make better choices. If a man thinks his problem to be anger, he will take anger classes. If his chief problem is cancer he will hunt down the nearest faith healer, and so on. If man's problem is anything short of spiritual death, then the "gospel" will be something less than spiritual resurrection. But spiritual resurrection is the only answer for a dead humanity. Only the sovereign work of God can raise up a dead sinner. The gospel, therefore, is the good news that God alone can and will raise sinners from the dead through faithful preaching of His word. We yearn for the day that this message will be proclaimed in every nation and in every church. Then and only then can we expect to see a harvest of dead souls springing up into life eternal.
TOTAL DEPRAVITY AND THANKFULNESS
Not only will the doctrine of Total Depravity change the way we proclaim our message, but it will invigorate our worship by changing the way we view God. If we were only partially dead as semi-Pelagianism asserts, then we should give God only partial praise for a partial salvation. But if we truly believe that we were "dead in our trespasses and sins" and that our only hope for spiritual life is the power of God, then what will be our response if God has indeed saved us? What sweet praise ought to come from the lips of one who knows he has contributed nothing to his salvation! What deep thankfulness of heart ought to be resident in those who know that God has done all the saving work! The more one meditates on how bad he was prior to grace, the more he will fall on his knees before God and thank Him for "so great a salvation." The knowledge that one was once totally depraved before conversion ought to energize one’s worship like nothing else.
CONCLUSION
The doctrine of Total Depravity is cornerstone that sets the tone for all other Christian doctrines. Get this doctrine wrong and you are left with theology whereby God has partially saved partial sinners, which is no salvation at all. Denial of this doctrine will eventually gut the entire need for God’s sovereign work, and eliminate the need for God at all. Thanks be to God that He continues to save sinners to this day even if they don’t fully understand this truth. But to understand it makes one’s enjoyment of redemption all the greater to His glory. So we close with Paul.
“If we are faithless he remains faithful. He cannot deny Himself” (2 Tim 2:13).
[1] Romans 1:23
[2] Which is exactly what Paul called the Galatians who did not understand the gospel message. See Galatians 3:1
[3] Noetic means that which relates to the mind.
[4] In medieval Roman theology, one’s merit before God was bound up in the sacramental system. It was truly Pelagian at heart. However the Roman view considered God’s grace necessary and so their system is called semi-Pelagianism.
[5]https://www.ccel.org/ccel/luther/bondage.xiv.ii.html; Bondage of the Will section 168.
[6] Unless he has a martyr complex or is mentally disturbed in which case that becomes the strongest impulse of the hour.