The Means of Grace Doctrine of the Calvinist Reformed.
Since, according to the doctrines of the Calvinist Reformed, saving grace in Christ is particular, there are no means of grace for the part of men to whom God's grace and Christ's merit do not extend. Rather, for this part of men, the means of grace have the purpose of being means of condemnation, as Calvin expressly teaches: "There is a general calling by which God, by means of the outward sermon of the Word, invites all alike to himself, even those to whom he takes the same to be a savor of death, and as a matter of grave condemnation." 541) If Calvin nevertheless speaks of means of grace also with respect to the rejected, saying that they earn damnation twice over by despising the grace offered to them as well, then this belongs to the
540) Winer, Komparative Darstellung 3, p. 117: "Although the sacraments of the Roman as well as those of the Evangelical Church are means of grace, both differ again in the determination of the grace which the sacraments convey; namely, the Evangelical Church teaches that the grace of forgiveness of sins is offered through the sacraments. At the same time, she describes as their effect the revival and strengthening of faith." (That this is true only of the Lutheran Church, not of the Reformed Church, will be clear from what follows). "The Roman Church, on the other hand, regards the sacraments in general as channels through which sanctifying and justifying grace" (i.e., gratia infusa) "flows in its rich manifoldness."
541) Inst. III, 24, 8: Est universalis vocatio, qua per externam verbi praedicationem omnes pariter ad se invitat Deus, etiam quibus eam in mortis odorem et gravioris condemnationis materiam proponit. [Google]
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self-contradictions in which Calvinist theology moves in the doctrine of appropriation and rejection of salvation.542) Consequently, the Calvinists cannot address the contempt of grace on the part of the rejected because, according to their doctrines, there is no grace for these unfortunates, and thus it cannot be contemptuous of them either. This obvious self-contradiction has been rightly pointed out in ancient and modern times.543) In short, according to the Calvinist doctrine that there is no grace and no merit of Christ for a part of men, there is also no means of grace for this part of men. Where Calvin and his comrades still speak of means of grace even to the reprobi and impii and ascribe to them a contempt for God's grace, there is an accommodation to the language of Scripture and of the Christian church, for which, if the doctrine of gratia particularis is upheld, there is no factual justification.
But the Calvinist Reformed also have no means of grace for the elect. Calvin explicitly instructs the believers to judge of their election not according to the external word, namely not according to the universalis vocatio, which is through the external word (per externam praedicationem), but according to the 'special calling' (specialis vocatio), which consists in the inner illumination of the Holy Spirit. And this is completely consistent from Calvin's point of view. Believers cannot know their election from the external word of the gospel, because in Calvin's opinion God invites through the external word not only the elect, but also those to whom he has given the
542) See the detailed evidence II, 25 st.
543) Thus, e.g., von Gerhard, L. de elect, § 68, quoted II, 51. Steitz-Hauck, RE.2 XIII, 294: "The believers are, according to the context of his [Calvin's] system, the elect, the predestined; only these experience (Inst. III, 24, 15 and especially Consens. Tigur., c. 16) the inward power of the Spirit and receive, besides the signs, also the res or virtus sacramenti. Therefore, it is basically only an empty phrase when he says that the promise is also offered to the unbeliever; indeed, it sounds like irony when he calls out to the latter: You must only take hold in faith of the word that is instituted in the sign, in order to have the thing [the effect] with the sign." If Steitz-Hauck, in passing, think that Calvin teaches an "objectivity of the means of grace" insofar as he, as a determinist, does not grant any justification to "subjectivity", it must be remembered that by "objectivity" of the means of grace one usually understands the nature of the means of grace, according to which God, through the means of grace, offers the forgiveness of sins to all who use them without distinction and is effective in all for the effect, respectively the strengthening of faith.
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invitation to a stench of death and as a matter of grave condemnation. Thus there is nothing left for the pii or electi but to abandon the external word of the gospel, because this can be a calling to damnation as well as to salvation, and to withdraw to the special calling or the inner illumination of the Holy Spirit (interior Spiritus illuminatio). According to Calvinist doctrine, however, this "inner illumination" of the elect does not take place through the external means of grace, but through the direct action of the Holy Spirit. This is also sharpened very decidedly by more recent Reformers. In Hodge we find statements like this: "In the work of regeneration all second causes are excluded." "Nothing intervenes between the volition of the Spirit and the regeneration of the soul." "The infusion of a new life into the soul is the immediate work of the Spirit." "The truth [in the case of adults]" — meaning the presentation of the truth of the gospel through the external word — "attends the work of regeneration, but is not the means by which it is effected." 544) Thus, consistent Calvinism minus means of grace is also in regard to the elect, first as to the presentation of God's gracious will, and therefore second as to the origin of saving faith and the effect of regeneration. How could faith and with it the rebirth to spiritual life come into being through a word which, according to Calvinist doctrines, is highly ambiguous, and which, according to divine intention, can convey both wrath and grace! One cannot allow oneself such a tremendous encroachment on divine revelation as is present in the denial of gratia universalis, and yet still retain the divine ordered means of grace. With the denial of gratia universalis, consequently, the means of grace also disappear. The fact that there are means of grace which are "signs and testimonies" (signa et testimonia) of God's gracious will toward us and therefore also awaken and strengthen faith through the action of the Holy Spirit,545 has as a necessary prerequisite the fact that the whole human world, not excluding any individual, is reconciled to God through Christ's satisfactio vicaria. It is therefore only an accommodation
544) Systematic Theology II, 684 sq.
545) Augsburg Confession, Art XIII and V.
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to the language of Scripture and the church environment when the Calvinist Reformed call the Word and the sacraments "signs," "symbols," "seals" (signa, symbola, tesserae, sigilla) of divine grace.546) Provided that they really hold fast the gratia particularis, they lack the factual justification for this use of language. For in this case — namely, when the gratia particularis is held fast — word and sacrament can just as well be signs of wrath as of grace. Ambiguous signs, however, are not signs at all, but leave the thing to be signified in dubio. But they are also not signs for the "interior illuminatio" of the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit supposedly does not work this interior illumination through the external means of grace, but directly.
In the denial of gratia universalis and the assumption that faith arises through direct divine action, the scriptural concept of saving faith and saving grace cannot be upheld. Faith that does not come from the external word of the gospel is not faith in the scriptural sense. Faith in the sense of Scripture always arises and exists only vis-a-vis its correlate, that is, the Word of the Gospel.547) Faith, which, detached from its object, is supposed to come into being by the immediate effect of divine power, is infused feeling into man, and the saving grace is no longer the gracious disposition of God in Christ' (favor Dei propter Christ), but becomes gratia infusa, a good quality infused into man. Walking externally different paths, Rome and the Calvinistic Reformed meet again at the point of gratia infusa. According to the Roman conception, saving grace is a stream that pours into man by way of the multiform Roman means of grace, if man " does not place an
546) Conf. Helv. II, c. 19: Sunt sacramenta symbola mystica — quibus [Deus] promissiones suas obsignat, et quae ipse nobis interius praestat, exterius repraesentat ac veluti oculis contemplanda subiicit adeoque fidem nostram, Spiritu Dei in cordibus nostris operante, roborat et auget, quibus denique nos ab omnibus aliis populis et religionibus separat sibique soli consecrat et obligat et quid a nobis requirat, significat. — Conf. Belgica, art. 33: Sunt sacramenta signa ac symbola visibilia rerum internarum et invisibilium, per quae, ceu per media, Deus ipse virtute Spiritus Sancti in nobis operatur. [Google]
547) Rom. 10:14; Mark. 1:15; 16:15-16.
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obstacle in its way” (obicem non ponit). According to the Calvinist view, saving grace is a stream that does not pour into the soul through external means of grace, but directly and therefore irresistibly (as gratia irresistibilis). Both conceive gratia salvifica not as divine mercy or God's gracious disposition in Christ, but as a good quality instilled in man. It is true that the Calvinistic Reformed often define saving grace quite correctly as God's gracious disposition in Christo or as the forgiveness of sins,548) but by the denial of common grace and by the consequent denial of the attribution of grace through the Word of God and the sacraments, they are driven into the Roman fairway of "infused grace" as the foundation of the forgiveness of sins. Therefore, they also have the same trouble with their "grace" as the Romans. The gratia infusa or "the inner enlightenment" proves to be an imperfect quantity in practice and is subject to change. We recall again the example of Oliver Cromwell.549) For the awakened conscience, the gratia infusa, because of its imperfection, is not a cause of reassurance but of disquiet. It is in this embarrassment that the theory of infallible faith has been inserted into the Calvinistic system, by which faith in the gracious disposition of God is once more detached from the means of grace and placed upon itself, namely, founded upon its supposed or real former existence. Thus it is a fact that consistent Calvinism, with its denial of universal objective reconciliation, leaves no room for the Scriptural doctrine of the means of grace. That there is in practice among the Calvinistic Reformed a happy inconsistency with respect to this point, and that, against Calvin's warning, one nevertheless bases faith on the universalis vocatio and thus on the external word which promises grace to all men, has already been repeatedly admitted. Schneckenburger has also pointed out that especially in the counseling of those who think they have committed the sin against the Holy Spirit, the Reformed practice, if it wants to be successful, must place itself on the Lutheran standpoint.550)
548) II, 10, note 27.<w:t>549) p. 108.
550) Comparative account I, 260 ff.
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