In Christian theology the doctrine of God and the doctrine of salvation go hand-in-hand. Several other doctrinal themes pale in comparison to the issue of God’s relationship to us with regard to our eternal salvation, that is, what God’s disposition is towards us and whether or not there is the possibility of salvation for each of us individually and whether or not we can know and be assured of our eternal destiny. Therefore what Vanhoozer believes in this regard is the most important point of his theology. As such, that is my main concern in this examination of his two books, First Theology and Remythologizing Theology.
A central issue in these works is his teaching regarding the “effectual call.” My concern is to evaluate the biblical accuracy and practical implications of such a teaching. Vanhoozer believes the “effectual call” to be a prime “test case” for examining how it is that God can unfailingly determine one’s eternal destiny (God’s sovereignty) without violating their personhood or human freedom (human free-will). But inherent in the Calvinist doctrine of an “effectual call” is the biblically problematic presupposition of unconditional election, that is, that God has predetermined that certain people will inherit eternal life and all others are therefore inevitably predestined by that same God to eternal damnation. This determination to eternal life or eternal damnation is unconditional in that we are “altogether passive therein,”[1] only to be either “effected” by the Spirit or left “unaffected.” We have absolutely nothing to do with where we will spend eternity, whether in heaven or in hell. It is all the decision and work of God. Yet Vanhoozer attempts to demonstrate how both literary and “speech-act theory” lend their insights into how God performs this unconditional election and “effects” it by a “call,” maintaining that such a “call” is suitable to us as free beings that accept or reject God’s salvation as an act of response to Christ in the gospel for which God holds us responsible. Vanhoozer maintains that God reveals himself through his Word, and works his will in the world by “communicative action” and in “dialogical relation” with his human creatures. Communicative speech-act theory supposedly alleviates the impersonal, strategic, manipulative, causal connotations that are associated with “classical theism” which includes the universal divine causal determinism (i.e., God’s sovereignty) of Calvinist theology. Although I do think that Vanhoozer brings needed careful attention to what the Bible means when it talks about God’s “communicative” relationship with his human creatures, I also think this “communicative” approach fails to reconcile his deterministic brand of “classical theism” with human freedom. Also, the logical, moral, and epistemic incoherence that Calvinist determinism generates with other biblical doctrines reveals its inadequacy as an accurate interpretation of biblical truth. Vanhoozer writes,
“The remythologizing way forward calls for a robust concept of triune authorship that accounts for (1) divine sovereignty – the Godness of God; (2) human freedom – the person in the imago Dei; and (3) the integrity of their relation. My thesis is that triune authorship is best viewed in terms of communicative rather than strategic action…” (RT, 317)
And my thesis would be (along with the Calvinist’s own confession) that this “triune authorship,” this “Godness of God” in Calvinist terms reduces to a theological determinism in which God ordains “whatsoever comes to pass.” As such, it is incompatible with a forthright, coherent understanding of human freedom – “the person in the imago Dei.” Vanhoozer’s understanding of “divine sovereignty” is ultimately deterministic, therefore his explanation of “human freedom” is deficient and the “integrity of their relation” is destroyed and rendered incoherent. Vanhoozer’s doctrine of an “effectual call” is the necessary corollary to theistic determinism. We deduce his more fundamental theology mainly through this doctrine of an “effectual call.” It rests upon and is inseparable from the Reformed Calvinist doctrines of a premundane election of persons that is unconditional, and a sovereignty defined comprehensively with respect to all that occurs. Hence, Vanhoozer speaks of God in literary terms as the “Author.” This refers to God’s absolute, deterministic sovereignty. Now, what humans do can be called “secondary authorship.” This “secondary authorship” as “authorship” is incompatible with the Calvinist doctrines which are comprehensively deterministic. These are the required doctrinal bases of an “effectual call.”
Therefore Vanhoozer has left himself a formidable challenge to navigate through an explanation as to how God has ordained each person’s eternal destiny apart from any conditions that involve the person themselves without generating logical, moral, epistemic, and biblical incoherence with the testimony of Scripture on the nature of faith, human personhood, the reality of sin, sole authorship (“human authorial voices,” RT, 309), contrary choice, moral responsibility, and the concept of justice and the meting out of just judgment.
Therefore, Vanhoozer is wrestling with how it is that if God’s will determines everything that happens in the world, how can this coherent with the persistent witness of Scripture that much of what happens in the world is obviously not in accord with Vanhoozer’s definition of the will of God as divine determinism. This is especially so with respect to the implications of the workings of his determinism in relation to human being and personhood.
Also, looking at this from another angle, if God needs to act in his world to accomplish his predetermined purposes for all things, including the eternal destiny of each person, how is it that he does so without violating human personhood? How can Vanhoozer maintain that God effects what he wants to accomplish in the world and maintain that those accomplishments are both predetermined and all-encompassing, while it is clear that human beings, due to the fact that they have thoughts, desires and wills of their own, produce sin and evil that is contrary to God’s will? I submit that if we are going to be biblically coherent, and this is the crux of the matter, then reality and Scripture reflect something other than Calvinism’s theistic determinism.
In order to be true to the biblical witness to a God who interacts personally with men and women as having wills of their own, we cannot sanction the Reformed Calvinist’s theistic determinism that operates on the fear that if God did create man with genuine human freedom then his own sovereignty is in jeopardy. So Vanhoozer fully understands the problem of the determinism in his Calvinist position and wants to avoid the concept that God works in people in a strategic, unidirectional, impersonal, coercive, causal manner. Vanhoozer therefore pits “communicative agency” against “motional causality” (RT, 24) where the former is how Scripture depicts the way God accomplishes that which he has predetermined for every individual in every respect. According to Vanhoozer this is different than an impersonal causality. It is different in that it is “communicative” and “persuasive.” This, Vanhoozer says, is an acceptable way to depict how God accomplishes what he has predetermined for everyone and everything.
I have already pointed out how the Calvinist incorrectly helps himself to the word “persuasion” in that by definition it cannot exist in a deterministic worldview. It presupposes libertarian freedom. Be that as it may, Vanhoozer sees the negative concepts of strategic, unidirectional, impersonal, coercive, causality reflected in what he calls “classical theism,” a term I believe he should associate more precisely with his Reformed Augustinian/Calvinist theology. For many non-Calvinist/Arminians would consider themselves “classical theists” to the degree that the term connotes a distinction from today’s cutting edge “process,” “relational” and “openness” theologians, against which Vanhoozer provides a helpful and thorough critique, but they do not see Calvinist theistic determinism taught in Scripture.
Reformed Calvinist theology is problematic. Vanhoozer knows it and feels it deeply. Yet as admirable as his attempt is to alleviate those problems by recasting them in the “script” of literary theory, I submit that it fails. It fails because Vanhoozer retains a definition of God’s sovereignty that cannot be sustained with biblical, rational, or moral coherence. Vanhoozer writes,
“God authors human creatures in his image to be willing covenantal agents…Though God is the Author of all that is, human beings nevertheless exercise a secondary authorship, and hence genuine freedom.” (RT, 303)
What Vanhoozer means by “God is the Author of all that is” is that God has predetermined and causes all that occurs. It is not merely saying that God created all things, it is more an expression of Calvinism’s universal divine causal determinism in literary language. Therefore, the equation of the “secondary authorship” mentioned here with “genuine freedom” is completely gratuitous. It is a mere unsubstantiated assertion. How is it that if God is “the Author of all that is,” meaning that he predetermined and causes everything that occurs, that people can also be rightly described as being “authors?” There is no such thing as “secondary authorship” under a God who has comprehensively “Authored” all things and therefore causes all things to act according to his will. Vanhoozer just pulls this category of “secondary authorship” out of thin air. He does so because he needs it in his attempt to relieve his deterministic theology of its drastic implications. More accurately, given Vanhoozer’s determinism, human beings are “secondary actors” or “secondary animate objects” that God motivates and moves according to his own predetermined will and plan. In essence, God needs and uses people to act out his predetermined plan. God fashions them and employs them as he sees fit. They are the instruments by which he accomplishes his purposes for the world. Just as a carpenter could never produce a chair without the wood being present, so God could never accomplish his plans without his “secondary human objects” on the scene. But human beings are not wood. And that is the point here. Hence, Vanhoozer talks about “human creatures” as “willing covenantal agents,” and rightly so. But again, “willing” and “agent” are two words that are incoherent with Vanhoozer’s theistic determinism. One would think that on the basis of all these words and phrases (i.e., “secondary authorship,” “genuine freedom,” “willing” and “agent”) Vanhoozer would include the fact that persons are the sole author of their actions and that they have the ability of contrary choice. That is what it means to be a willing, personal, agent with genuine freedom. But this is not coherent with Vanhoozer’s literary and theological meaning of “Author” as applied to God and his “effectual call.” When Vanhoozer talks about God as “Author” he means to say that God has ordained “whatsoever comes to pass.” Vanhoozer’s descriptions of these “secondary authors” require theological and worldview perspectives contrary to his universal divine causal determinism. When he talks of “willing covenantal agents” that “exercise a secondary authorship” which entails “genuine human freedom,” he is saying that God does not comprehensively “effect” willingness in every person for the purpose of having them irresistibly and unfailingly do his will in every circumstance. In other words, he is describing a reality that is contrary to his fundamental Calvinist beliefs. Vanhoozer’s words are inconsistent with what he believes theologically. Although he uses words with certain meanings that are contrary to his Calvinist determinism, he uses those words by changing their meanings to “fit” (in his mind and the mind of Calvinist) to his universal divine causal determinist theology. This is what compatibilism is all about.
So, for the non-Calvinist, what does God “effect?” In contrast to Vanhoozer’s soteriological determinism, God “effects” the provision of our salvation in Christ. He “effects” his self-revelation by calling and covenanting with Abraham, whose faith was counted to him as righteousness; a faith “tested” and therefore not predetermined by God. (Gen. 15:6; 22:1-19) Even if the test was for Abraham’s sake, in order for it to be coherent as a test the outcome could not be predetermined by God. Hence another word (i.e., “test”) that is not coherent within Vanhoozer’s deterministic worldview. Here we are touching upon the doctrine of election. One aspect of that doctrine has to do with God accomplishing his “purpose” by his choice and establishment of Israel, who even as “the elect” people of God were able to obey or disobey him, and for their disobedience many were destroyed and judged by God (Deut. 11:26-28; chps. 28, 30 and 31). This “people of God,” as a group, were established through “election” (i.e., God’s decision) for a “purpose” (Rom. 9:11) so that salvation would come through them. The aspect of faith was emphasized to communicate that this salvation would transcends being a part of national Israel, that is, simply by being among the “elect” as the historical “people of God.” God’s “purpose in election” would serve to show that “the elect” were to include all who have the faith of Abraham. All who believe in the promise of God, even the Gentiles, can be included among the elect – “the people of God.” By faith “in him” (Christ; the “Elect One” – 1 Pet. 2:4) they too are among the “elect,” that is, God views them also as his chosen people (Eph. 1-3) on the pattern of his relationship with Old Testament Israel. Israel was God’s special possession. In the New Testament, the word “elect” now refers to believers, also on the pattern of the Old Testament (e.g., Abraham, Gen. 15:6). God always dealt with people on the basis of faith, with the law serving other purposes including the means of the expression of one’s faith. Nevertheless, salvation was come through promise not privilege, and as such it would be by faith so that it may be obtained by all. It would be by faith, not by one’s own righteousness or mere possession of the Law as misunderstood as the means of the grace of God exclusively to the Jews, who, to remain in that grace, required obedience to the Law. I will deal with the doctrine of election in detail in a separate chapter.
The point here is to note that we cannot possibly comprehend the providential options available to an all-wise and all-powerful God. Contra theistic determinism, there is a myriad of ways God can bring about his purposes as he dynamically interacts with his human creatures. And this myriad of ways in which God can accomplish his purposes given the reality of human freedom is what being sovereign is all about. Thus, it is not theologically necessary for us to cast God in a deterministic mold to ease an unfounded fear that if all human actions and events were anything but completely predetermined by God he would not be sovereign. It’s as if the Calvinist believes that if God did not predetermine all things, then he would be subject to free decisions of man and he would lose control. As such, God would not be able to accomplish the things he has planned and purposed, for man may choose not to “cooperate” with God and the world will never realize his desired ends.
As I show in my essay on the account of the rich young ruler (Vanhoozer Pt.1.23), it is biblically unsustainable to characterize divine/human interactions (i.e., “God-in-communicative-act”) as predetermined, with God’s will being the sole ontological source of the human response and action involved in those divine/human interactions. Even amidst the claim of “communicative action” we do not see a static predetermination of the human response in relation to the content of the divine communication to the person. The nature and content of the divine communication helps us properly define the nature of the divine/human relationship. We see that according to the content of the divine communicative act that there is a dynamic element of human response that has its source in the human will. It is a response that does not subject God to man but requires a response from man to God’s communicative initiative and activity. God’s word makes way and calls for a positive response to his communication. It is obviously not a predetermined response that God effects in the person, changing their will to conform to his. Rather, there are continually two distinct wills involved. The human will may be circumscribed by the divine will but not extensively determined by the divine will. The person is being “consummated” in the testing, but the result of this “consummation” is not predetermined by the will of God for that person. The “consummation” that will obtain is a result of the person’s obedience or disobedience to the divine “communicative act” which contains the expression of the divine will for that person. This expressed will accurately reflects the desire of God for that person. There are not tow wills in God with respect to that person, as if God calls them to salvation (prescriptive or proscriptive will), yet he has predestined them to eternal separation from himself in hell (decretive will). There is only one divine will in operation with respect to every individual. There are not two conflicting “wills” in God. The content of God’s “communicative act” does not conflict with God’s eternal decrees or determinations for his human creatures. There is nothing secretly going on behind the scenes whereby God has predetermined the person to a certain irresistible course.
So yes, even in the midst of human freedom God is able to and is bringing about his purposes, but he includes us in them “in Christ.” Our inclusion comes through an “invitation” to believe in Jesus and follow him as Savior and Lord. That invitation can be accepted or rejected. It is to believe in God’s saving work in Jesus or to reject it and remain under condemnation. Although God will unfailingly accomplish his purposes, we also see that the Bible testifies to a dynamic freedom in the God/man relationship under the sovereign activity of God. God spoke through the prophets to confront the will of men so that God might show himself and his purposes to willing persons who would receive his Word and bring it to the less willing and those who do not know him at all. The prophet’s life was acutely circumscribed by God for the purpose of the divine communication, yet the people could obey or disobey that communication. For example, Jonah exemplifies both the range of the free will of a prophet in relation to God’s sovereign will, and all in the context of God’s desire to show universal mercy without salvific distinction among the Ninevites. The Scriptures testify to God’s communication to persons about what he is going to do despite their stubborn resistance to him. We also see person with whom God communicates who freely will to do his will (e.g., Mary in Lu. 1:38). This willingness and also the stubbornness are most often in Scripture assigned to the person themselves, otherwise we could not coherently explain, for instance, the clear biblical teaching on moral praise or moral blameworthiness.
If one insists upon assigning “whatsoever comes to pass” to the irresistible work of God’s Holy Spirit, then theistic determinism cuts both ways. The good that we do is gladly assigned to God, therefore the evil we do must also assigned to God. It must be so if God has ordained “whatsoever comes to pass.” Hence, there are persons who are unwilling to do God’s will, and this is an unwillingness that is associated with the person themselves, for it would be incoherent to assign such unwillingness to God’s effectual working when the content of the “communicative act” is for the person to repent from this unwillingness and do God’s will. Scripture speaks of a freedom to choose to act contrary to God’s will as it is revealed to us by the word of the prophets, the Word incarnate, and the word written and proclaimed today, or, the freedom to choose to not act contrary to God’s will as revealed to us by these various “speech acts”. It is important to note that Vanhoozer’s theology cannot account for this fuller biblical dynamic.
Vanhoozer is sure to clarify that God’s speech and action are on a different level than human speech and action and that,
“God’s authorial speech both constitutes and consummates human characters, and this is not the contradiction but the basis of the human creature’s freedom and answerability.” (RT, 303, footnote 26)
Given Vanhoozer’s theology, “authorial speech” would mean “comprehensive determinative speech.” Vanhoozer seems to be saying that when God causes a person to will according to God’s will they are then acting in freedom and are made “answerable” to God. God “constitutes” their human character. But is this convincing? Vanhoozer is right if he means that we are only truly freed when we are in proper relationship with God. But that is different than claiming “authorial speech” (i.e., theistic determinism) is “the basis of the human creature’s freedom and answerability.” “Human freedom and answerability” are incoherent within Vanhoozer’s universal divine causal determinism. Vanhoozer merely asserts there is no contradiction in his position. But of course there is. According to Vanhoozer God’s word “constitutes and consummates” human character – our characters – such that we irresistibly perform out of that God given character what God wills. How is this not theistic determinism, only now in “speech-act” terminology? Furthermore, is this a proper and forthright use of language? Isn’t there a difference between stating that the person who chooses to do the will of God will be the one to experience the fullness of true human freedom and answerability, and stating that the person upon whom God effectually acts to change their will to do his will is still acting “freely,” that is, in “freedom” with the corollary of “answerability?” Granted men and women are only truly free when doing the will of God, but that is very different than claiming that” human freedom and answerability” require that God cause one to “will” his will and determine the person’s character. This does not seem to be a coherent use of these words. It appears that God is having a “conversation” with himself through persons. He is acting out his predetermined “theodrama” for himself by constituting the characters of human beings as he has preordained so that they will do his will. The willing and acting of those human beings has been eternally predetermined. For an individual person to genuinely will to do something, their active will cannot simply be reduced to a “willingness” to do whatever God’s will has predetermined for them, no matter how he “effects” it. Furthermore, for an individual person to genuinely will to do something, their active will cannot simply be reduced to “willingness” without discerning the source of this “willingness.” To will, by definition, is not to have another as the sole, irresistible cause of your “willingness.” It is to do what you will to do, and your “answerability” comes from that will which is your will;that is, from your self. This ability to will and act as sole author is not nullified by human sinfulness or inconsistent with the Spirit’s work, for our will is to be surrendered by virtue of the Spirit’s activity through the Word. The Spirit’s activity does not guarantee that surrender, but surrender cannot occur without it. And human sinfulness has not precluded the will from responding to the Word of God in faith, for faith is everywhere enjoined upon sinners. They are to repent and believe the “good news.”
A naturalistic, materialistic determinism and a theistic determinism are essentially the same in their implications upon human freedom They are both determinisms. Hence, as we would rightly reject a naturalistic, materialistic determinism because it does not sufficiently account for the nature of man as a personal being, moral responsibility, and just judgment, so we reject a theistic determinism because it too cannot coherently account for these. Only a non-deterministic biblical theism can oppose naturalism and materialism precisely because it is inherently non-deterministic. It is theism that provides the ontological essentials to combat deterministic philosophies. When we make theism out to be deterministic then there is no difference between naturalistic, materialistic or theistic philosophies. The point of theism is that it differs fundamentally from naturalism and materialism not least in the fact that God does not determine our every thought, attitude, desire and action because in theism we have at work a God who is a person and therefore personal. How can we reduce naturalism, materialism and theism to the same resulting determinism? We cannot, or at least we should not! Naturalism and materialism inevitably result in determinism. Theism cannot be deterministic for then the result would be the same as natural or materialistic determinism and the fact of God makes no difference in the fatalistic hopelessness that is the essence of all determinisms. Naturalism and materialism are vastly different from theism precisely because the personal God has made his human creatures persons, and being persons, or at least respecting and valuing personhood, entails non-deterministic relations in which human persons freely respond to God’s communication to believe in the person and work of Christ and the Holy Spirit’s presence, act contrary to their strongest desires, rise to duty and overcome temptation, etc. The strength or weakness of a person’s character, formed by their choices over time given the gracious presence of God’s Word and Spirit, is still subject to their will and hence they can make good or bad choices to differing degrees and to differing ends. Vanhoozer’s language at times affirms this non-deterministic viewpoint, but it is inconsistent with his ultimate theistic determinism. For instance, Vanhoozer writes,
“It is in response to the dialogical situations that comprise my life, especially my dialogical relation to God, that I exercise the freedom to realize my own voice-idea. (RT, 336)
“All human beings…have authorial potential. I “author” myself, not in the sense of ex nihilo creation but rather by being the agent of my own actions.” (RT, 318)
Scripture testifies to a very real interactive dynamic between God’s gracious revelation (“speech-acts) and man’s decisions in light of them. All this is not contrary to, but subject to, God’s “authorial” or sovereign workings. People choose to do good or evil. Evil actions are certainly not God’s irresistible influence working a predetermined plan of evil in and through a person whom God has not chosen for salvation but has predestined to spend eternity in hell. Rather, a libertarian freedom of the will is the only basis upon which the realities of evil, moral effort, moral responsibility and just judgment can be coherently established. Such freedom is the essence of what makes any claim to a personal relationship between God and man a coherent claim. Such a situation does not diminish the sovereignty of God to work his will, support and bless the good, thwart and judge the evil, and bring all things to consummation according to his will.
Vanhoozer is attempting to coherently explain how God determines human action and eternal destiny while maintaining that humans act freely and willingly. But this “freedom” is simply reduced to irresistibly acting out the will of another. “I ‘author’ myself…by being the agent of my own actions” is linguistically, logically and morally incoherent in light of Vanhoozer’s theological backdrop of “Authorial” and “dialogical determinism.” He writes,
“…the present work has set forth an account of divine dialogical consummation according to which God “determines” human creatures precisely in and through dialogue: the “inner persuasive discourse” of word and Spirit. Human creatures are free because other created entities do not determine their actions. God, however, is not like other creaturely causes precisely because he works on a different ontological level altogether: his operation is Authorial…A communicative theism insists…on the efficacy of God’s authorial action.” (RT, 493)
“To speak of ‘dialogical determinism,’ then, is to maintain three tenets: (1) the dialogue between God and human creatures is real – interpersonally genuine; (2) the effect is communicative; (3) the outcome is determined.” (RT, 384)
Vanhoozer’s attempt to relieve the theological contradictions inherent in his Calvinism are unconvincing to me. In this regard the literary analogy of God as “Author” is employed in an unbiblical sense. Scripture reveals that the divine “speech act” is not always “Authorial” in the sense of bringing to pass a predetermined salvific outcome. Contrary to Vanhoozer’s bald assertion, “the outcome” is not “determined.” This is made perfectly clear in passages such as Jesus’ confrontation with the rich, young man in Matthew 19:16-30. Let’s examine it now in Essay 1.22.
Back to “The Vanhoozer Essays”
[1] G. I. Williamson, The Westminster Confession of Faith for Study Classes (Phillipsburg: Puritan and Reformed Publishing Co., 1978.), 88.
The Truth of the Gospel 