Back to Chapter 6 – What’s At Stake? The Character of God and the Truth of the Gospel
Most Christians who consider themselves “evangelical” are indifferent to the fact that two mutually exclusive soteriologies – Calvinist and non-Calvinist – are being taught in their churches. This obviously raises interpretive and hermeneutical questions regarding how we can know which one, if any, is the proper understanding of Scripture. It also raises questions about the life of the mind, intellectual integrity, and the pursuit of truth within the Evangelical church because two mutually exclusive positions cannot both be true. The late R. C. Sproul writes,
“Alternative interpretations which are contradictory and mutually exclusive cannot both be true unless God speaks with a fork tongue.”[16]
Statements like this are always astounding to me because of the inconsistencies and contradictions that Sproul’s Calvinist theistic determinism generates with other biblical truths, as in those enumerated in chapters 4 and 5. Amazingly, Sproul refuses to admit that his critique applies to his own interpretations of Scripture and his theology. This is evidence of the suppression of reason within Calvinism that I will examine in Chapter 8.
This controversy also has ramifications for how we understand the “evangel” or the gospel as “good news.” This is of critical importance, for the gospel message is at the heart of biblical history along with the plans and purposes of God in the world. One’s soteriology logically entails the content of their gospel message. Therefore, given these mutually exclusive soteriologies, the gospel is at stake in this controversy. When being consistent with their soteriologies, each position logically entails very different “gospel” messages. Nevertheless, whatever side you find yourself presently on, you cannot escape those who will tell you how important this matter is and what’s at stake here. Indeed, Calvinist D. A. Carson writes,
“The objective truth of the gospel, Paul insists, enjoys an antecedent authority; if even an apostle tampers with that, he is to be reckoned anathema (Gal. 1:8-9). So an authoritative gospel must be passed on.”[17]
Even in light of the Scripture’s teaching on submission to godly leadership, the truth of the gospel still holds absolute sway. Carson continues,
“Whereas Christians are encouraged to support and submit to spiritual leadership (e.g., Heb. 13:17), such encouragement must not be considered a blank check; churches are responsible for and have authority to discipline false teachers and must recognize an antecedent commitment not to a pastor but to the truth of the gospel.”[18]
Carson also adds,
“…the church is not at liberty to ignore or countermand or contravene the authority of the gospel itself, now at last inscripturated, without sooner or later calling into question its own status as a church.”[19]
The preservation of the true, biblical gospel is of utmost importance. Calvinist John MacArthur states,
“I don’t like battles particularly, especially battles with other Christians; but they seem to be necessary for the protection of the truth. The apostle Paul warned the Ephesian elders that of their own selves men would rise up to lead people astray. The church has suffered through the centuries attacks from the outside from unbelievers, but the most devastating attacks have always come from the inside. And in all the years of my life, now many, many years in ministry, it seems as though there has never been a time when we aren’t engaged in some battle for protecting the truth, clarifying the truth, a battle waged as a kind of civil war, even inside the church. In fact, not just in my lifetime, but there’s really never been an era in all of church history when the gospel was not under assault, under attack usually from within the church.
The truth is that we would expect that, because the gospel is the only way of salvation. It is the gospel that delivers men out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. And naturally, Satan, as the prince of the power of the air, as the ruler of the kingdom of darkness, wants to hang onto all that he possesses; and so he wages endless war against the gospel. Now sometimes there are direct attacks against the gospel; but the more formidable ones and the more subtle ones are those that seem innocent enough and they come generally from the inside of the church.
The apostle Paul, as you remember in our study of Galatians, was very clear in saying that if anybody preaches another gospel, if anybody alters the gospel, let him be damned, and he repeats that twice. And Jude reminds that we have to earnestly contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
…Proclaiming, protecting, and defending the gospel is the duty of every preacher and every Christian believer.”[20]
I believe MacArthur is correct, although we need to point out that he speaks incoherently with his own Calvinism, which is a universal divine causal determinism. When he talks about the necessity of protecting the truth from “attacks” from unbelievers outside the church and “devastating attacks” from inside the church, along with both “direct” and “more subtle” attacks against the gospel, then you should know that, according to MacArthur’s theology, these “attacks” have been predetermined and caused by God himself. The same applies to “Satan…as the ruler of the kingdom of darkness” wanting “to hang onto all that he possesses; and so he wages endless war against the gospel.” MacArthur’s Calvinist theology has God predetermining that there be a Satan and predetermining and causing him to wage “endless war against the gospel,” yet that is the very gospel God wants people to hear so that they “come to the knowledge of the truth.” MacArthur’s position is self-defeating. It is incoherent. And his soteriology suffers from the same incoherencies and contradictions because it too is a theistic determinism. Moreover, among all who hear the gospel and are called to come to Christ and be saved, only those whom God has predestined to salvation will do so. In short, MacArthur’s Calvinist divine determinism has God working at cross-purposes with Himself with respect to the gospel. This theistic determinism exhibits itself in unconditional election, which removes the “good news” from the gospel message. Those Calvinists who believe their TULIP soteriology is the gospel message either preach a gospel message inconsistent with their soteriology, or if consistent with it, a message with no “good news” for sinners. But either way, they believe a soteriology that destroys the gospel as “good news.” Therefore, MacArthur and those who preach Calvinism’s TULIP soteriology are preaching “another gospel.” It must be an “altered gospel.” And it would seem then that Paul’s sobering verdict upon these teachers of a false gospel applies (Gal. 1:6-9).
Also, we must ask what MacArthur means when he talks about “the gospel.” What is the content of the “good news” given his Calvinist soteriological “doctrines of grace?” You must ask yourself what the precise content of the message the Calvinist would preach and teach when he is preaching and teaching “the gospel.” Is it consistent with his underlying soteriological doctrines? If not, why not? Therefore, it is a subsequent and crucial question as to whether the Calvinist soteriology can even provide a message that can be considered “good news.” As I have shown throughout the chapters on this website and stated above, I do not believe it can.
But even if, as I contend, the Calvinist has no “good news” to proclaim when he is consistent with his soteriological “doctrines of grace,” and MacArthur is speaking inconsistently with his soteriology here, nevertheless, MacArthur is right. The gospel is at stake in this controversy. If Satan wanted to thwart the very essence of the work of God in this world and prevent people from salvation, he would do all he could to distort and suppress the gospel message. If Satan can pervert or prevent the gospel from going out into the world, he will keep people from being saved. This is either a real, sobering truth that should motivate us to pray and work for the promulgation of the gospel, and its truth and consistency in the evangelical church, or, as in Calvinism, the outcome has been unalterably predetermined to occur as God has willed it. Every person’s salvation or reprobation has been preordained by God and will unfailingly unfold according to what God has willed.[21] The Calvinist will claim this is done through the gospel message, but again, that claim is absurd given the incoherence between the Calvinist’s soteriological doctrines and the definition of the gospel as “good news,” the contingent nature of its call to salvation, along with the message of God’s love proclaimed to all in it, and the work of the Spirit in the mind and heart of the hearer to enable the response of faith.
Therefore, the question needs to be asked: what gospel is the biblical gospel that should be defended, and what “gospel” is a distortion of the truth of the gospel? Given two mutually exclusive soteriologies, which one is a distortion of the “good news?” I submit to you that it is the Calvinist TULIP soteriology that distorts the truth of the gospel. Indeed, there is no “good news” in the Calvinist soteriology.
Read the next section – Calvinists Claim Calvinism is the Biblical Gospel
Back to Chapter 6 – What’s At Stake? The Character of God and the Truth of the Gospel
Footnotes
[16] R. C. Sproul, Knowing Scripture, (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press), 39.
[17] D. A. Carson, “Church, Authority in the,” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Walter Elwell, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001), 249.
[18] D. A. Carson, “Church, Authority in the,” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Walter Elwell, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001), 251.
[19] Ibid. 251.
[20] John MacArthur, “Social Justice and the Gospel, Part 2,” Sept. 2, 2018. From the “Grace to You” website’s transcript of the sermon, which is incomplete and edited. https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/81-22/social-justice-and-the-gospel-part-2 Last accessed Oct. 12, 2025.
[21] On Calvinism, we must accept that the eternal destiny of each person has already been determined by God. Nothing can alter that eternal decree. As Calvin states,
“We call predestination God’s eternal decree, by which he compacted with himself what he willed to become of each man. For all are not created in equal condition; rather, eternal life is foreordained for some, eternal damnation for others. Therefore, as any man has been created to one or the other of these ends, we speak of him as predestined to life or to death.” – John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), 926.
The Truth of the Gospel 