the glorious exchange

Here is a post from November 2006, reprinted because of some recent questions at our last unplugged. I will be expounding upon these as requested by those who commented. I probably should have done this 2 years ago…

A recent podcast from the Resurgence (link) got me to thinking. The topic is “Preaching and Teaching Jesus From Scripture” [great podcast, by the way, I highly recommend it if you’re a pastor or teacher], and it was talking about this new wave of reformed thinking, which I consider myself to be a part of.

The major point brought up was that “traditional” Calvinism started with total depravity, that is, man. The Bible, however, starts with God. Another point I myself thought of when thinking about Calvinism is that it omits the teaching and life of Jesus; that is, it talks nothing about living the Kingdom life in the here and now. All of the components deal with either the past or future. Following this thinking, I devised a new acronym, along the lines of TULIP, to describe this new, and more Biblically accurate, Calvinism.

• Providence of God - This component simply states that God, in the beginning and even now, provided everything for Adam and Eve. They needed nothing, whatsoever.
• Radical Corruption - This states the same thing as total depravity: our very nature is sin, down to our core. This is passed on from our forefathers, and will continue to be passed on. There is no way we, in and of ourselves, can overcome it.
• Attainable Life - This attests to the teaching of Jesus. He showed us a way of living that overcomes our corruption through indwelling of the Spirit. This is the Kingdom life for the here and now.
• Inherited Election - This is the same as unconditional election: we’ve done nothing to merit our election by God, it is simply inherited by us because of the sovereign grace of God.
• Reserved Atonement - This is the same as limited atonement. It states that when Christ died, it was sufficient for everyone, but it only affected and is efficient for the chosen elect.
• Irresistible Grace - This has remained without change. It simply says that no one can resist the Spirit drawing them to the Kingdom, but that the Spirit can and does yield to one’s resistance.
• Eternal Security - This component is equivalent to the perseverance of the saints, which says that if we are called, then we will persevere to the Coming Kingdom, Heaven.

Just my two cents. There’s a lot more behind the added two (Providence of God and Attainable Life), just thought I’d throw it out there.