IT is a maxim in philosophy, observes an acute and profound writer,2 that no more causes should be admitted than are both true and sufficient to account for the effects. And it is equally clear, that if supernatural influence is necessary to repentance and other holy exercises, then man has not the ability to repent without such aid. It is manifestly a contradiction to assert that man is able to commence the work of holiness by his own exertions, and yet that he cannot do this without divine aid. Every text, therefore, which ascribes regeneration to God is a proof of man’s inability to regenerate himself. I reassert it, that man has no power whatever to come to Christ, or to repent, or to believe savingly, and that they who teach otherwise are inculcating erroneous doctrine—doctrine in direct opposition to the experience of the Church of God and the Scriptures of truth. Let me now notice a few popular objections to these assertions, and reply to them.
1The above extract should be read in connection with the article in a former issue on “Pelagianism and Semi-pelagianism.” It is taken from a pamphlet entitled: Human Ability: A Delusive Fictitious by the Rev. William Parks, a Calvinistic minister of the Church of England. The most satisfactory treatment of this subject we have come across will be found in Dr. Cunningham’s Historical Theology, I. 588, etc.
2“Theological Essays,” (First Series) reprinted from the Princeton Review, and edited by Dr. Fairbairn, Professor of Divinity, Aberdeen (afterwards Principal Fairbairn of Glasgow Free Church College).
Objection.—Common sense tells us that whatsoever we are commanded to do, we must have power to do. We are commanded to repent, therefore we have power to repent, etc. Answer.—This is fallacious reasoning. The law was promulgated by God for man’s instruction, and yet we are told by inspired authority that no man can keep the law. Amidst thunders and lightnings the voice of words was heard, “Thou shalt not covet!” and yet we are told by an inspired apostle that every man covets or has coveted; that no man has ever kept or can keep the law spiritually; and that it is totally out of the question that any man can be justified by the law. What has common-sense to say to this awful fact? Does not God pronounce a curse upon every one who continues not in all things written in the law to do them? (Deut. xxvii. 26; Gal. iii. 10). And where is the man who has done these things, or can do them? The man that doeth them shall live by them; but where is he? Reader, are you he? Am I he? Nay, we are both breakers of the law in ten thousand instances. Every individual born of Adam is in the same predicament; so it cannot be true that we have power to obey everything that is commanded. It is clear that God gave the law to man in the flesh, and yet that man did not and could not obey it. What, then, becomes of the objection, that “where anything is commanded, it must follow that there is power to obey?” The fact is, God must necessarily command what ought to be, not what man can perform. God being all holy and all pure, He cannot but command all holiness and all purity; but it by no means follows that we poor, sinful creatures can be all holy and all pure likewise. And further, if God’s commands do not humble us in the dust, and make us look unto the Fulfiller of all righteousness, being convinced that we cannot keep the laws of God in His sense of keeping them, we have never been taught by God the Holy Ghost! In short, “the argument from the command to ability manifestly goes to undermine the whole Gospel, and overthrow all the revealed principles of the moral government of God.” Let, then, those who would
thus deceive their own souls by fleshly reasoning see to it, for assuredly they are in a most awful snare!
Objection.—But we read of parties who walked in the precepts of the law blameless. Did not they keep the law? Answer.—They kept the letter of the law as many now do, and thus were externally blameless; but that their observance of the law was not perfect, and that consequently they felt themselves guilty of breaking the law, is manifest from the fact of Paul himself flinging to the winds the sort of righteousness he had attained to by such blamelessness (Phil. iii. 6-9). The sentence, “By the law shall no flesh be justified,” is of itself enough to expose the fallacy of the objection, “where a command is given, there must be power to obey.”
Objection.—But how can man be culpable for his enmity against God if he has no power to love Him? Answer.—I ask, in my turn, is a perverse and wicked subject not culpable for his hatred of, and disobedience to, a kind and benevolent monarch, because he cannot love him? Is a depraved son not culpable for hating his father because he cannot love him? Most assuredly both are highly culpable, notwithstanding their inability to love; and, simply because they are free agents, they have done and do just as they please. Let me illustrate this for the objector. A good and kind father brings up his son with all care and affectionate solicitude, but the son has got a depraved taste and a perverse disposition; he keeps low company and freely indulges his lusts. The longer he pursues his wicked course, the more estranged does he become from his father. His moral power to be obedient and to love becomes every day weaker and weaker; he, in fact, hates his father, and cannot bring his heart to love him. Such has been the career, and such the miserable experience of many a young man. Now, tell me, is this son not culpable? Does his want of ability to love his father render him excusable? Assuredly not; but, on the other hand, the more inexcusable, the more deeply culpable is he, the less power he possesses to obey and to love! It is so precisely with the impenitent sinner and his Creator. God has been kind and good to him; He has
showered down innumerable blessings upon him; He has given him food and raiment, and all good things to enjoy; but the sinner is perverse and wicked, and will keep bad company, and will give rein to his lusts and passions, and will please himself. The consequence is, the longer he pursues his wretched course, the greater his inability to love and to obey, and the more intense his enmity to holiness and to God. Surely this sinner is not excusable because he has no power to love or to obey! No; but on the contrary, the greater the inability, the greater the guilt. Impenitent sinner, it is so with you. You have had a good God to rule and direct you, but you would have none of Him; you would please yourself; and now you have no more power to reform and to love God than you have to make a world. And yet you are in nowise excusable. Yea, the greater your inability, the greater your guilt! Believe me, till men see these things they will never appreciate free grace; they will never understand that faith is the gift of God; they will never perceive the necessity for an Almighty Saviour plucking men as brands out of the burning!
Objection.—But are men to do impossibilities? It would be out of all character to insist upon a man walking who had no feet, or working who had no hands. Answer.—Men are not expected to do impossibilities; that is not the question. But the question is, Are men culpable for not walking or not working? If a man never had hands or feet, it could not be expected of him to walk or work; but suppose a man to mutilate himself, to cut off his hands or feet for the purpose of avoiding walking or working, would not he be culpable? Would not the moral obligation to walk and to work be fully upon such a man, though he had lost the physical power? Most certainly. So it is with man and God. Man has mutilated himself—he has ruined himself—of his own free will, for he has done as he pleased; yet the moral obligation to serve God remains the same. God requires no physical impossibilities. He does not require an infant to build a house, or an ungifted man to paint a beautiful picture, or carve a splendid statue; but He is fully justified in blaming
men for their sins, and regarding them as culpable for their hatred of Him; for though they have no power to do otherwise, their federal head (Adam) once had, and they themselves have ever since been doing just as they pleased, in adding sin to sin. It would be quite different if men were under a necessity to sin; but this is not the case. Every man, when he sins, follows the bent of his own inclinations. He sins freely. And he knows he would rather gratify his passions than live a life of holiness.
Objection.—“I cannot change my own heart, and yet God condemns me for not doing so!” Answer.—Thou hypocrite, out of thine own mouth will God judge thee! You know right well that you do not want your heart changed. You are pleasing yourself. You love darkness rather than light; you love sin rather than holiness, and why should you dare whine out this insincere objection? You—if God does not change you—you will stand at the last day with that liar in the parable who made the miserable excuse for not employing his one talent, by saying that God was rigid, and austere, and unjust! If you think that God will condemn you for not changing your heart, why don’t you set about trying to do it? But you never stir in this direction. If you desire to be changed, there is nothing to prevent you going to God; coming to Christ, that you may have life; for the desire is change itself. But you desire nothing of the kind. You love your sins. You are unwilling to come to Christ, because you love something else better. You love this present world, and are as free as the air you breathe in the service of your sins! Human inability is nothing but human unwillingness to serve God.
Objection.—There can be no merit or worthiness in our standing if we have not power to fall. Answer.—Alas, that men should be ever harping upon the string of human merit! What merit can we possess, who derive all our will and power to do good from God? Suppose a child at school to be given a difficult sum in arithmetic to do—a sum beyond his natural capacity—and suppose the master does it for him, what merit would the
child possess? or what credit could he lay claim to? None. It is precisely so with poor man and God. God has set man a difficult sum to work, but God works it Himself for His pupil; then what merit does the pupil possess? what credit can he lay claim to? None. That men have power to fall if they choose or please is beyond dispute; but if they will not choose or be pleased to fall, is there no worthiness in them? Yet, after all, it is a worthiness derivable from Another.
Objection.—If men are compelled to act—to sin or be holy—against their wills, then all accountability is destroyed. Answer.—Men are not compelled to do anything of the sort. They do just as they please. The man who sins pleases himself. The man that is holy pleases himself. The latter has been drawn by the sweet bands of love towards God; he has been made willing in the day of God’s power. The former has not had the favour extended to him, and herein lies the difference; but as for compulsion or necessity, it is out of the question. So accountability remains in its full force. Fallen man, as it has been observed by Dr. Twisse, has a power to abstain from particular sins; but he has no power to abstain from them in a gracious or holy manner. Thus Judas, had he chosen, could have refrained from betraying Christ, but not in a holy manner, i.e., from principles of faith and love. In other words, it was perfectly consistent with Judas’s continuing a wicked man, that it should have pleased him to refrain from his act of treachery; and had it thus pleased him, he could and would have abstained from it. But there is no conceivable act or state of the natural man, no desire of salvation, no resolutions to be holy which do or can produce faith and love. There is a gulf between the two (i.e., between the natural man and faith and love) which nothing can fill but the renewing work of the Holy Ghost.
The sum of all is this, viz., no unregenerate man can change his own heart, yet he is not on that account rendered excusable. Man is a moral agent, and free in all his sinful actions. He does just as he pleases, and wills as he pleases; and unless changed by the miraculous power of God’s Holy Spirit, must
be at last condemned, and condemned most justly. Moral inability is the very essence of sin, for it arises from unwillingness to obey and love the All Good. If a man is unwilling to do an act, it is folly or hypocrisy for him to complain that he is unable; yet this is positively the condition of all men by nature: they don’t want to serve or to love God, but when told the whole truth, they strive to fasten the blame upon God, saying, “Why dost thou find fault? for who hath resisted thy will?” They forget that they have ruined themselves; and that instead of it being true, that where there is inability there is no blame, the very reverse is the fact, viz., where there is the greatest inability, there is the greatest amount of guilt.
No marvel that there are so many deluding themselves and their hearers by preaching up human ability; men do not understand their position with respect to God. No marvel that there are so few admirers of free and sovereign grace. Men fancy they have the power to dispense with any extraordinary aid—that they can as easily love God as hate Him. Miserable and deluded men! You have no power whatever to come to Christ. You have no ability whatever to obey God. You are helplessly ruined. You are totally alienated from God. You cannot believe and repent to the saving of your souls; and yet God’s curse is upon you for your inability, and that most justly and righteously! If ever you are saved, you must come with all your heart and soul unto Jesus Christ as a complete Saviour; and if ever you do this, you will have been wrought upon by the sovereign grace of Him who will have mercy on whom He will have mercy! Man’s sin is his own. Man’s salvation is all of God.