Also, conspicuously absent in Vanhoozer’s theology is any word that this communion and consummation involves sinners responding in faith to the message of God’s “sheer generosity” and “free determination to include human creatures as recipients of the Father’s love in the Son through the Spirit.” (RT, 259) Vanhoozer speaks as though people “respond” to God, but it is a “response” God predetermines for a limited number of elect persons and therefore causes in them. Vanhoozer writes,
“Participating in God is by grace – God’s free self-communication to those who have no claim on him in which he favors his recipients with a share in his Son and Spirit – yet it involves human activity (freedom). (RT, 282, 283)
What Vanhoozer means by “participating in God is by grace” is that out of all sinners “who have no claim on him” God predetermines which ones will inherit eternal life. The Calvinist definition of “grace” is God’s premundane decision to save a limited number of elect individuals to salvation, leaving all others outside his “grace.” He accomplishes this by a special “effectual call.” The “yet” in the above statement is also telling. It is an attempt to bring into this divine deterministic monological “favoring” of certain “recipients” – the elect – some sort of “human activity (freedom).” Again, Vanhoozer feels the incoherence of his theological position. The “yet” attempts to acknowledge some form of human freedom (reduced to “human activity”) in light of the inevitable determinism where “grace” is God’s eternal decision to save some sinners from among all sinners undeserving of salvation and “recipients” refers to “the elect.” Thus, as I have previously written in my chapter fourteen, “The Nature of Grace in Scripture,” on Calvinism “grace” is not made available to sinners “in Christ” in the sense that Jesus is the expression of God’s grace to all sinners (Jn. 1:16-18), but “grace” is primarily the decision of God to save some by Christ’s death. “Grace” has to do with God’s decision to save particular sinners from among all sinners undeserving of favor, rather than an attribute essential to his nature that motivates God to send Jesus as the savior of the world. Therefore, the Calvinist soteriological doctrines are referred to by Calvinists as the “doctrines of grace” along with the phrase “sovereign grace,” both of which express a predestinarian, limited divine decision to save some, rather than the abundant and the abounding grace that is found in Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world. So, we see here that given Vanhoozer’s doctrine of an “effectual call” what he means by “grace,” “free,” and “recipients” must be the standard deterministic Calvinist meanings. You have to read between the lines. “Free” means arbitrary. “Grace” reduces to the decision of God to save only certain sinners out of all who are undeserving of salvation. “His recipients” refers to the unconditionally elect. But note again, Vanhoozer never clearly explains how the full scope of his soteriological doctrines serve to show us how the gospel is truly “good news.” Vanhoozer continues,
“I participate” is ultimately a middle-voice verb. We participate in God as we actively image God – as we dramatize theos – yet it is ultimately the Spirit who recreates or “makes common” the image of God in us by efficaciously ministering the word of God. Saving grace is God’s self communicative, redemptive, and oriented-to-communion action “in Christ” through the Spirit towards undeserving others.” (RT, 283)
Examining this statement closely we see the “effectual call” once again setting the boundaries for the definition of “I participate” and human “freedom.” The “I participate” is gratuitous, that is, a presupposition one makes about themselves that they are among the elect. In addition, it is the Spirit who must efficaciously minister the word of God and of course he only does so in the elect, which are called here the “undeserving others.” Note again, the impersonal nature of the descriptions of “God’s self- communicative, redemptive, and oriented-to-communion action “in Christ” through the Spirit.” It is difficult to interpret or conclude from Vanhoozer’s statements anything other than that “saving grace” or “God’s oriented-to-communion action “in Christ”” is simply a monological action upon the elect. It seems that “I participate” (if I am elect) only as a vessel or vehicle or “instrument” in, through or upon whom God exercises his will. This is so because the “participation” is unconditional, that is, has nothing to do with me. Ask yourself, has Vanhoozer succeeded thus far in making his deterministic soteriology any less causal or monological?
In footnote 131 on page 283 Vanhoozer adds,
“The middle voice is neither a doing nor a being-done -to but a being caught up in a process – or in the case of soteriology, a person (Christ) – in which one is nevertheless active.”
To me this is just verbal legerdemain. It’s a disingenuous and incoherent way to avoid his theistic determinism to say one “is nevertheless active” in something that is “neither a doing nor a being-done -to.” The salvific scheme of Calvinism is at bottom “a being-done-to.” And what does Vanhoozer possibly mean by “being caught up in a process?” What could he mean by saying that in this process “one is nevertheless active?” This is certainly to strain words in an attempt to obfuscate the problematic nature of the Calvinist soteriological doctrines. Certainly Vanhoozer, due to his doctrine of “total inability,” cannot have man doing anything with respect to salvation, the sinner cannot even believe uless first regenerated by the Spirit. So how then is one “nevertheless active” in “a process?” How is this soteriological process “neither a doing…in which one is nevertheless active?” Also, we fail to see how it is that something is not “being-done-to” the elect who receive the “effectual call.” This is all quite baffling. In fact, it is double-speak. It is verbal gymnastics. Vanhoozer, like most Calvinists, know that their determinism doesn’t fit reality or the testimony of Scripture. Therefore, they would like to have it both ways. They want a human total depravity which entails total human passivity, unconditional election and an effectual call, so they will state that the human being is “caught up in a process that is neither a doing nor a being-done-to…” And yet, they also have to say that is “a process” “in which one is nevertheless active.” How is it that one can do nothing at all in a process, yet they are nevertheless active in the process? Vanhoozer is saying that the person is at one and the same time passive and active! Clearly this is a contradiction. It is nonsense. It is unbiblical and only driven by erroneous Calvinist deterministic theological presuppositions. The “communication” Vanhoozer speaks of lacks genuineness given his theology of unconditional election and an effectual call. I don’t see how the “effectual call” relieves his theology of is monological, causal, unconditional, impersonal characteristics. The fatal biblical flaw here lies in the presupposition that for God to be sovereign requires at least a salvific determinism which in turn skews the nature of human freedom, the content of the gospel and causes a misinterpretation of the biblical witness to the nature of faith.
As stated above Vanhoozer has certainly not “taken the form from the thing itself” when he completely ignores the critical biblical emphasis of the nature and purpose of faith in the Father’s design for salvation and the true nature of man’s freedom. As far as I can tell Vanhoozer has only two references in his Remythologizing Theology to faith. This is indicative of Vanhoozer’s reticence to deal with the biblical nature of faith because he is laboring under certain deterministic Calvinist presuppositions involving predestination, irresistibility and unconditionality that preclude faith from being an active decision on the part of the sinner with respect to the Word of God and the condition upon which God grants salvation. The Bible clearly states that salvation is “by grace through faith.” Salvation is a “gift” of God to those who “receive it” and those who receive it do so by faith. The Spirit is involved in the whole process, for the Spirit affirms the Word of God proclaimed as applicable to the sinner and the Spirit effects salvation in the sinner upon their repentance and belief in that Word. Faith is prior to regeneration. The sinner is not effecting their own salvation by their faith and repentance which is a typical Calvinist misunderstanding of the biblical nature of faith. The sinner, by believing, is not meriting salvation, earning it or contributing to it in any way. These are all serious misunderstandings of the nature of faith on the part of the Calvinist. Rather, faith is a surrendering to the salvation God has wrought on our behalf and receiving the Spirit who effects salvation as God promised to whoever believes. We can see how on the basis of unconditional election and an effectual call that faith fades into the background and simply becomes a subsequent evidence of one’s election and effectual call. But this makes talk of salvation by faith both redundant and impersonal.
We suspect that the word “free” in the phrase “God’s free self-communication” has the standard Reformed connotation that God has limited his salvation to be received by certain elect persons for “reasons taken from within himself.” “Free” refers to the unknown reason as to why God communicates himself to the elect only, rather than the biblical meaning of “as a gift” that is simply to be “received” apart from keeping the Law, merits, status, privilege, position, righteousness, etc. It is difficult not to conclude on the basis of unconditional election and an effectual call that “free” here means “arbitrary.” These doctrinal propositions converge to generate the moral incoherence in Reformed theology, that is, presenting God as arbitrary in his nature and actions. The phenomenon of salvation is a one-way event, a monological impartation of eternal life from God to those individuals destined for it.
Given the doctrine of an effectual call and its necessary exclusion of a multitude of non-elect persons from “God’s light, life and love,” Vanhoozer’s claims about the purpose of the church, participating in the nature of “God’s own communicative work,” and indeed, God’s purpose for creating the universe, are incoherent and ring hollow. He states,
“Christ summons and commissions the church to shed abroad the knowledge of the love of God through proclamation and lived demonstration. The church is the society of Jesus, a community ruled by the communicative practices of the exalted Christ, and earthly body where God’s light, life, and love circulate in human form, and thus a foretaste of eternal communion that is arguably the purpose for God’s creating the universe.” (RT, 501)
“To speak well of God is to serve as an agent of theological understanding, and ultimately to have a share in God’s own communicative work. Humans participate in God’s work whenever their speech and action mediate the knowledge and love – the light and life – of God. Disciples participate in God’s work whenever they appeal to others to heed the word of the Lord.” (RT, 503)
I for one simply do not know how to grasp intellectually or morally the propositions that God is a God of “light, life and love” and whose purpose for creating the universe is “eternal communion” with human persons while that same God created a multitude of human persons for the express purpose that they should not experience this “light, life, and love” and should be eternally separated from “eternal communion” with God and experience condemnation, darkness and death. On Calvinism, what is it to “speak well of God?” How does the Calvinist “shed abroad the knowledge of the love of God through proclamation?” What is the content of the Calvinists proclamation? What is there to speak to others given the Calvinist doctrines of a total inability, an unconditional election, an irresistible grace or effectual call, and a limited atonement – unless you hide those doctrines from the people? But aren’t these doctrines part and parcel of “God’s own communicative work?” Aren’t these doctrines, as biblical teaching (according to Calvinists), communication from God to the people? Isn’t the church summoned and commissioned to proclaim the Word of God of which these doctrines are an essential part? But where in the proclamation of these doctrines is mediated the knowledge, promise and assurance of “God’s light, life and love?” And how does the Calvinist honestly and genuinely “appeal to others to heed the word of the Lord” knowing that there are those whom God himself will not cause respond to that warning? What meaning does such a warning and invitation have in the scheme of Calvinist theistic determinism? Divine communicative action that is efficacious for only some cannot coherently be a divine communicative action that has universal scope and intention. It would be divine communicative action that is inapplicable and therefore a false warning and invitation to the non-elect. Sooner or later wouldn’t Vanhoozer have to teach his Calvinist doctrines of divine salvific exclusion and eternal hopelessness for the non-elect as well as “the knowledge and love – the light and life – of God” to the world? But how are these two compatible? Vanhoozer seems reticent to speak about the negative implications of his “God’s work.” Furthermore, any “appeal” to the non-elect to “heed the word of the Lord” is disingenuous and futile by God’s own decree that they not do so.
The Truth of the Gospel 