This is taken from “Mennonite Church USA:
We believe that, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God offers salvation from sin and a new way of life to all people. We receive God’s salvation when we repent of sin and accept Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. In Christ, we are reconciled with God and brought into the reconciling community of God’s people. We place our faith in God that, by the same power that raised Christ from the dead, we may be saved from sin to follow Christ in this life and to know the fullness of salvation in the age to come.
From the beginning, God has acted with grace and mercy to bring about salvation–through signs and wonders, by delivering God’s people, and by making a covenant with Israel.1 God so loved the world that, in the fullness of time, God sent his Son, whose faithfulness unto death on the cross has provided the way of salvation for all people.2 By his blood shed for us, Christ inaugurated the new covenant.3 He heals us, forgives our sins, and delivers us from the bondage of evil and from those who do evil against us.4 By his death and resurrection, he breaks the powers of sin and death,5 cancels our debt of sin,6 and opens the way to new life.7 We are saved by God’s grace, not by our own merits.8
When we hear the good news of the love of God, the Holy Spirit moves us to accept the gift of salvation. God brings us into right relationship without coercion. Our response includes yielding to God’s grace, placing full trust in God alone, repenting of sin, turning from evil, joining the fellowship of the redeemed, and showing forth the obedience of faith in word and deed.9 When we who once were God’s enemies are reconciled with God through Christ, we also experience reconciliation with others, especially within the church.10 In baptism we publicly testify to our salvation and pledge allegiance to the one true God and to the people of God, the church. As we experience grace and the new birth, we are adopted into the family of God and become more and more transformed into the image of Christ.11 We thus respond in faith to Christ and seek to walk faithfully in the way of Christ.
We believe that the salvation we already experience is but a foretaste of the salvation yet to come, when Christ will vanquish sin and death, and the redeemed will live in eternal communion with God. (Article 8. Salvation - Mennonite Church USA)
Does this express a more Calvinistic or Arminian view of salvation?
The first part seems certainly Arminian, however the third is certainly Calvinistic.
The second paragraph is everyone’s view - well those who submit to Scripture teaching.
Your thoughts?
Does this confession fit?
Discussion in 'Calvinism & Arminianism Debate' started by agedman, Sep 18, 2019.
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Men do not proactively "receive" God's salvation by doing anything.
Salvation is a gift, not a reward.
To me, that is a completely man-made expression not found in the Bible.
Faith is a gift ( Ephesians 2:8 ) that comes by "hearing" God's word ( Romans 10:17 ).
No one has faith to "place" in Christ because it is given to His elect by God ( Jude 1:3 ).
The saints are the elect, and true faith comes only to them, and not to all men ( 2 Thessalonians 3:2 ).
I would phrase it as, " when we "hear" the good news of the Gospel, the Holy Spirit moves us and we believe God's words."
Christ's sheep do not "accept" the gift of salvation, they already have it.
They therefore believe on Christ, and know that they are saved.
They trust in the Gospel as the message of that salvation, not the means of it.
He has not provided the way of salvation for all people.
He has provided the way of salvation for people out of every tongue, tribe and nation.
Item # 7...everyone seems to say that, even though doctrinally and when it all comes out "in the wash", the only unmerited salvation is when God does the choosing and men simply react to His miraculous work. -
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MB -
Second, this IS Calvinistic thinking. It does NOT present any innate “freedom of the will” nor innate capacity to inspire God to look to see if enough faith has been generated to credit us with Salvation.
Quoting from part of the Op which draws directly from the Mennonite Church, USA web page cited below:
When we hear the good news of the love of God, the Holy Spirit moves us to accept the gift of salvation. God brings us into right relationship without coercion. Our response includes yielding to God’s grace, placing full trust in God alone, repenting of sin, turning from evil, joining the fellowship of the redeemed, and showing forth the obedience of faith in word and deed.9 When we who once were God’s enemies are reconciled with God through Christ, we also experience reconciliation with others, especially within the church.10 In baptism we publicly testify to our salvation and pledge allegiance to the one true God and to the people of God, the church. As we experience grace and the new birth, we are adopted into the family of God and become more and more transformed into the image of Christ.11 We thus respond in faith to Christ and seek to walk faithfully in the way of Christ.
(Article 8. Salvation - Mennonite Church USA)
Perhaps you mis understand irresistible grace. God does not coerce, His Grace takes no such measures, nor are such measures needed by God. That is what non-Calvinists must adhere and practice.
Most Calvinistic thinking in this matter agrees that “the goodness of God leads us to repent,” not His wrath. That “Godly sorrow works repentance unto salvation” and such sorrow is brought by God not by human conjuring, for the person, saved or not, living and abiding in the worldly soulishness of ungodliness does not “receive anything of (from) the Holy Spirit.”
Typically the Calvinist holds to the work of God implanting faith causes that person to declare salvation. (For with the heart... with the mouth...).
If then you have agreement with these things, you are more a Calvinistic thinker then perhaps you are aware. -
In addition, I see Menno's Catholic thinking about how salvation works, being mirrored in the confession.
Look at what the entire statement is hinging God's grace on...
For example:
" Our response includes yielding to God’s grace, placing full trust in God alone, repenting of sin, turning from evil, joining the fellowship of the redeemed, and showing forth the obedience of faith in word and deed."
Man has to yield to God's grace... ( not that God's grace is "irresistible" ).
Man has to place full trust in God alone... ( not that the believer's trust is already in Him from the moment of belief, Ephesians 1:13 )
Man has to repent... ( not that repentance has to be given to a person, 2 Timothy 2:25, which is why men really repent ).
Man has to join the fellowship of the redeemed ( not that we are made accepted in the beloved, Ephesians 1:6 ).
Man has to turn from evil...( not that the saved are made free from it, Romans 6:18 )
They are putting all this on the "front end", in their phrasing, not the "back end"...instead of salvation and the accompanying works of righteousness and obedience being a result of God's favor and power in a changed heart, they are phrasing it as His favor being gained by doing the things that they are listing.
That's "Arminian" thinking, not "Calvinistic" thinking. ;) -
It is a promise given to only those that believe.
As support, consider that the preaching of the cross ( the Gospel ), is foolishness to them that perish...but to us which ARE saved, it is the power of God ( 1 Corinthians 1:18 ).
Therefore, the promise is not to all people ( most of whom will think it is foolishness )....it is to certain people, the "called":
" For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, [even] as many as the Lord our God shall call." ( Acts of the Apostles 2:39 ).
Mostly because I see Scripture stating that if man is responsible for anything that leads to having or acquiring God's favor, that would be works ( Romans 4:4-5, Romans 11:5-6 ).
Therefore, anything a saved person does or has that can be used to "meet the requirements", is actually necessary evidence, instead of the ability to "meet conditions".
Finally, Mennonites believe in loss of salvation:
Eternal security - Third Way
What Sets Mennonites Apart From Other Faiths?
To me, that makes them "Wesleyan Arminian" / Molinist" in their teachings and beliefs.
As I see it, they are almost the same, doctrinally, as "Free Will Baptists". -
MB -
I merely ask a question gave what I seemed to see, and ask for others thoughts ABOUT THE DOCUMENT.
You made as if it were something expressing my own views. -
One does not have to use the word “irresistible” when discussing the manner of the effects of God’s Grace.
Too often I have seen those looking for certain “code words” which aren’t included, result in rejecting a statement.
However, I am also in agreement with your post.
I focused upon the two words, “our response,” as an indication that all that followed was responding to that first authorized by God. That all that followed was conditioned upon God first doing what God can only do in the matter of redemption.
In that light, does not the statement generally would fit your presentation?
“Our response” includes repentance, belief, trust, turning from sin, assembling, ... -
MB -
agedman
You be careful reading such things as confessions. You may turn into a free willed believer.
MB -
Like Luther, Calvin, and others that came out of the catholic foundation, there is (as a pendulum) certain items that may seem to swing away from certain teachings, and others that do not. I don’t doubt Menos writings will reflect this swinging, also.
The group is also typical of Baptist’s in that most members don’t concern themselves with nuances of doctrinal views and statements. They are content in traditions.
One item that stood out to me was the lack of any indication of some “free will” to attain salvation in the statement on the OP.
Rather, the active response to the work only God can do.
However, the earlier paragraphs read like a Methodist or Pentecostal. -
I’m sorry you do not recognize the typical “pray this prayer after me” technics used in many presentations of the gospel, the bait and switch stories which are followed by grand appeals of many such presentations, of the history of Hyles, Norris, Sunday, Moody, Finley, ... in which coercion and traditions of coercion were frequently used.
Coercion is the life blood of the modern worship with all the smoke machines, lighting, rhythmic repetitious embellishments.
Calvinistic folks don’t need and usually don’t use coercion.
Rather they make the sincere appeal to all. They present the gospel knowing that those whom the Father has and does give to the Son will hear and respond.
It is this in which caught my eye. The latter part of the OP quote.
The use of the two words, “our response” may or may not be an indication of at least part agreement with the Grace of God that instills the faith and salvation into the believer whose response will be repentance, proclamation of belief, joining an assembly, ... -
But, not having "gone to church" for the past 12 years or so, I kind of lost track of all that.
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What believers do, after having experienced the grace of God for themselves, is represented there.
I suppose I'm being sensitive to the language, because I was raised in an atmosphere of "free will" being the determiner. -
Sadly, what some consider "free" will, is nothing more than choosing from the options available to a fallen person from a fallen world that even groans under its present condemnation. (Romans)
Free will extends to making "good choices" but not to that which attains righteousness, nor righteous choices. -
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However, the last two seem to be a more calvinistic bent.
The last two paragraphs remark that the believer is responding and not the catalyst to the action of the Father is what caught my attention.