Calvinists will often critique the non-Calvinist understanding of faith that maintains it as a possibility for all sinners. Calvinists will say that such a view must mean that it is the more “virtuous” people that are able to believe. Calvinists will state that given the non-Calvinist view, the reason why one person responds to the gospel is because of some innate advantage that is the result of their upbringing, personal qualities, or character traits that enable them to believe. Others who do not have these qualities don’t believe. Calvinists therefore conclude that the non-Calvinist position on faith rests upon some “virtue” within certain persons. They will say that those more fortunate in their past experiences and upbringing, which has given them a more receptive disposition, find it easier to believe. They may have a more impressionable or receptive personality, and some are even “smarter” than others. This is the reason for faith verses unbelief. Therefore, only those with these better experiences and character qualities believe and are saved.
This is, of course, a mere caricature of the non-Calvinist position. The non-Calvinist will hold that there is nothing distinctive about one person over another when it comes to faith. Faith is possible for everyone, not because some people are more inclined to believe given certain character traits, dispositions or advantages, but because of our common humanity and similarity as sinners needing salvation. Faith is possible for everyone because we all find ourselves in the same position before God – we all are sinners in need of salvation. The “good news” is for sinners, and faith enables anyone to have access to the salvation being offered in the gospel. Faith transcends all character differences along with social, economic, and educational distinctions. It stands above familial lineage and religious achievements. Faith is not dependent upon these distinctions. But it does have to do with the person’s willingness to humble themselves in light of the gospel and agree with God with respect to the salvation offered them in Jesus. It has to do with the person’s will. God designed the gospel message to be received without requiring any other criteria except faith. That is the beauty of faith. It transcends all differences and comes to all with the challenge to simply believe. That there is something that enables one to believe and not another is not the perspective of Jesus or the New Testament writers (Jn. 5:30-47, 8:24, 20:3-31, Acts 15:1-21, 17:22-34, 18:5-6, 28:23-28, et al., esp. Rom. 1:16-32) The gospel message challenges each person’s mind and heart equally when it requires the self-surrender of faith. There is only one barrier to faith, that is, pride. But this humbling of oneself ultimately involves the will. (Phil. 2:3-9) Everybody has a will. The sinner must humble themselves in agreement with God regarding their sinful condition and helplessness, turn, and believe in Christ’s work on their behalf. If they continue to resist they will become hardened in their mind and heart. But this is a barrier they have erected. And as they persist in their willful rejection of salvation they place themselves in a very dangerous position from which it becomes more difficult to return.
Faith is possible for everyone because salvation is for everyone. Sin has not so eradicated free-will that when people hear the gospel they cannot believe unless they recieve an “effectual call” or “irresitble grace” and are regenerated so as to believe. This turns the biblical presentation of faith and conversion on its head. Sinners certainly can believe, and must, believe. This is especially so in that the Holy Spirit of God is always present in the preaching or witnessing of the gospel message to open the mind and heart of the hearer towards believing. But his work is not “effectual,” and the message of grace is not “irresistible” as we find in the Calvinist’s predestinarian scheme. The gospel message may be rejected. So, the sinner is without excuse for their unbelief (Rom. 1:16-32) and rejection of the “good news” of their salvation. They choose to remain in unbelief while the one who does believe understands that the requirement of faith has nothing to do with a special higher or better quality in themselves but a willingness to submit to the message of grace and the work of the Spirit. Theologian Herman Ridderbos explains the role of the Spirit in the nature of faith as witnessed by John in his gospel. Commenting on John 3:17-18, he writes,
“A striking feature of this passage finally, is the degree to which everything is concentrated on the importance of believing. Whereas in vss. 1-8 the birth from above is posed above all else as the indispensable condition for entry into the kingdom of God, in vs. 12 and especially in vss. 15ff. the crucial importance of believing comes increasingly to the fore. It is clear that the one cannot do without the other: the birth from above, however much it is a miracle of the Spirit, is not effected without the call to faith and the response of faith. Nor is faith simply a stage in the salvation-order transformation of a person; it rather describes the totality of transformation as the work of the Spirit. And in this connection faith is always the way in which and the means by which the new life comes into being. It is for this reason that all the emphasis falls on believing.
On the other hand, it is no less true that the new birth does not rest on an antecedent human decision. Faith is not the response of the higher or the better self to the message of the gospel. …In other words, faith belongs to the ministry of the Spirit. It is not a predisposition that is already present but a decision that is realized in the address of the Word and that is subject to the moral power that proceeds from that Word. There can be a “hearing” and a “seeing” only when the Word is understood and followed in accordance with its meaning (cf. 5:25; 6:26).”[17]
Ridderbos continues,
“In this connection much has been, and is being, written about the Johannine idea of predestination, and references to texts like 6:37, 39, 44; 10:29; 17:2ff. is self-evident. And, in contrast, when it comes to faith or the call to faith the Evangelist obviously does not think of a preestablished divine decision, for his entire Gospel is a continuing struggle on behalf of faith and a continual indictment of the culpable and mysterious character of unbelief. Especially in the dialogue with Nicodemus, where the necessity of birth from above is so clearly asserted, not believing and not accepting (vss. 12, 13, 18ff.) are not attributed to the flesh, and the situation of Nicodemus himself is viewed not as closed but as clearly kept open. The Spirit is like the wind, blowing where it wills. Hence one must inevitably conclude that every deterministic schematism is as alien to the gospel as is any dogma of inviolable human freedom. Faith will always bear on its face the sign of the grace of being a child of God, just as unbelief bears the sign of disobedience to the summons of the gospel (cf. vs. 36; see also the comments on 1:12f.)”[18]
Allthough Ridderbos walks a fine line with the Calvinist position, I read him as ultimately not crossing the line into the predestinarianism that is not supported by the text. The “human response” of faith is made possible by the nature of man as a dependent creature in relation to his Creator and Savior. Of course, all this cannot happen apart from the work of the Spirit of God. To be “born again” or “born from above” is a uniquely spiritual event. And this must happen if one is to see or enter the kingdom of God (Jn. 3). Now, the nature of this birth “from above” is precisely that, it is from above, not below. It transcends all human lineages (including the Jewish lineage which had the distinction of being “the people of God”), the desires of the “flesh” (perhaps the misguided, man-made conventions, constraints, expectations, demands, etc. of a “religion”), or the physical births that occur by the planning of man (Jn, 1:13). The point to note here is that due to the context we cannot take what John lists as the ways one is not “born from above,” that is, by “the will of the flesh” and by “the will (or “volition”) of man,” to include faith. Faith is integral to the new birth and the whole context of John’s gospel presents faith as the sinner’s responsibility, implying that they, especially given the enabling of the Spirit, are capable of belief (Jn. 20:31). The corollary is also true. Unbelief is placed squarely on the will of the one who rejects the gospel (Jn. 3:18; 5:39-40; 8:24). There are no predestinarian explanations for either faith or unbelief.
In that we are talking about birth “from above” or a spiritual event, the Spirit of God is therefore also at work in the gospel. Ridderbos stressed this point. Faith and salvation are not dependent upon the character of the man resulting from any intellectual status or economic or familial privilege, and neither is faith subject to the stipulations or requirements that any religion or religious persons may establish or expect (Jn. 3). The phenomon of being born from above is like the wind that cannot be seen or harnessed but is evident when present (Jn. 3:7-8). Faith is simply a person’s genuine decision to accept both intellectually and personally God’s saving message and to cooperate with the Spirit’s intent to save. Faith is not always simultaneous with the hearing of the message, but always in the knowledge of that message in which the Spirit is always present. Indeed, the Spirit, working in the gospel message, enables the sinner to positively respond to the gospel message which explains the implications of their sin for their relationship with God and eternal destiny. There is content to the gospel that involves the mind of the sinner. He must think about what he hears. Upon the sinner’s repentance and faith, which is their assent and personal trust in Christ, God grants them the forgiveness of sin and bestows upon them eternal life. The Spirit then comes to live in them. They are “born anew.” It is because a complete and sufficient salvation has been accomplished for all by Christ on the cross that a sinner can be saved by faith. Faith is designed by God as the great leveler which allows for all persons to please God and be saved (Heb. 11:6). Hence, salvation is said to be by grace through faith – grace being the initiative, plan, purpose, and work of God to accomplish salvation for the whole human race lost in sin, and faith as the simple response of the sinner leading to eternal life in contrast to their continued unbelief leading to ultimate condemnation (Jn. 3:18).
1 Herman Ridderbos, The Gospel of John: A Theological Commentary, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 140.
2 Ibid. 140-141.
The Truth of the Gospel 