The Preaching of the Gospel: Promise and Command

Prof. Robert D. Decker

[Source: The Standard Bearer, vol. 72, no. 2 (Oct. 15, 1995), pp. 34-36]

From the very beginning of their history and continuing to the present, the Protestant Reformed Churches have been accused of teaching and defending “hyper-Calvinism.” Because the Protestant Reformed Churches deny that God is gracious to all who hear the preaching of the gospel, that God sincerely desires the salvation of all who hear the gospel, and that God freely offers salvation to all who hear the preaching of the gospel, the Protestant Reformed are dismissed by many as “hyper-Calvinists.” It is charged that the Protestant Reformed preach only to the elect, regenerated sinner, that the Protestant Reformed do not believe in missions, and that the Protestant Reformed refuse to call everyone to repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. My esteemed colleague is precisely correct when he insists, “This is total, and usually inexcusable, misrepresentation.”¹ To put it bluntly, the Protestant Reformed Churches are not guilty as charged. The Protestant Reformed Churches teach and practice missions vigorously both in North America and in foreign lands. The Protestant Reformed Churches teach and vigorously defend the, truth that God calls all men everywhere to repent of their sins and to believe in the Lord Jesus.²

What the Protestant Reformed Churches deny, and that too most emphatically, is that the preaching of the gospel is an offer in the Arminian sense, i.e., an offer to all which depends on the free will of the hearers. Further, what the Protestant Reformed deny is that God is gracious to all who hear the gospel preaching and that God desires the salvation of all who hear the preaching of the gospel.

The synod of the Christian Reformed Church in 1924 adopted three points of doctrine by which she expressed belief in the error of common grace. The first point as adopted by the CRC synod of 1924 reads:

Relative to the first point which concerns the favorable attitude of God towards humanity in general and not only towards the elect, synod declares it to be established according to Scripture and the Confession that, apart from the saving grace of God shown only to those that are elect unto eternal life, there is also a certain favor or grace of God which He shows to His creatures in general. This is evident from the Scriptural passages quoted and from the Canons of Dordrecht, II, 5 and III/IV, 8 and 9, which deal with the general offer of the Gospel, while it also appears from the citations made from Reformed writers of the most flourishing period of Reformed theology that our Reformed writers from the past favoured this view.³

The latter part of this first point (sometimes called “the little point of the first point”), “This is evident from the Scriptural passages quoted and from the Canons of Dordrecht, II, 5 and III/IV, 8 and 9, which deal with the general offer of the Gospel,” is the CRC’s official teaching of a well-meant offer of the gospel.

To this teaching the PRC object on biblical and confessional grounds. We shall have to limit ourselves to a discussion of the confessional references and biblical texts cited by the 1924 synod.

Canons II, 5 reads:

Moreover the promise of the gospel is that whosoever believeth in Christ crucified, shall not perish but have everlasting life. This promise, together with the command to repent and believe, ought to be declared and published to all nations and to all persons promiscuously and without distinction, to whom God out of his good pleasure sends the gospel.

This article teaches that the promise of the gospel must be preached promiscuously to all nations and men without distinction. It teaches that the gospel goes where God in His good pleasure sends it. The content of the promise of the gospel, according to this article, is that whosoever believeth in Christ crucified shall not perish, but have everlasting life.

Note well that the article presents the promise of the gospel as strictly particular, for it is to them that believe in Christ, that is, the elect. The gospel is not presented as a general offer which can be rejected or accepted at will, but as a command! The article certainly does not teach that the preaching of the gospel is grace of God to all who hear it.

Canons III/IV, 8 states:

As many as are called by the gospel, are unfeignedly called. For God hath most earnestly and truly shown in his word, what is pleasing to him, namely, that those who are called should come to him. He, moreover, seriously promises eternal life, and rest, to as many as shall come to him, and believe on him.⁴

This article teaches that the calling of the gospel is unfeigned. This calling is to repent and believe. God is serious when He sends this calling to any man. No man has the right before God to remain in his sin and persevere in unbelief. God reveals in the gospel what is pleasing to him, viz., that the ones called should come to Him. God seriously promises eternal life and rest, not to all who hear the gospel, but to as many as believe and come to Him. The promise of the gospel, therefore, is strictly particular. Certainly the article does not teach that the preaching of the gospel is grace to all the hearers.

Canons III/IV, 9 states:

It is not the fault of the gospel, nor of Christ, offered therein, nor of God, who calls men by the gospel, and confers upon them various gifts, that those who are called by the ministry of the word, refuse to come, and be converted: the fault lies in themselves; some of whom when called, regardless of their danger, reject the word of life; others, though they receive it, suffer it not to make a lasting impression on their heart; therefore, their joy, arising only from a temporary faith, soon vanishes, and they fall away; while others choke the seed of the word by perplexing cares, and the pleasures of this world, and produce no fruit.—This our Savior teaches in the parable of the sower, Matthew 13.

It should be noted that the article speaks of Christ being “offered” in the gospel. The word translated “offered” is the Latin verb, offero, which has as its first and primary meaning, “to present.”⁵ With this no Reformed person has a problem. Christ is presented in the preaching of the gospel to all who hear that preaching. The fault and guilt of the rejection of the gospel by the reprobate is not God’s, nor Christ’s, nor the gospel’s, but wholly the sinner’s. This article does not even come close to suggesting that the presentation or offering of Christ in the gospel is grace to all who hear.

The CRC synod of 1924 cited three passages of Scripture in support of its contention concerning the “well-meant offer” of the gospel. The first, Romans 2:4, reads, “Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?” The text does not say that it is the intention of God to lead to repentance, but that God’s goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering actually leads to repentance. The apostle is addressing the “O man” of verses 1 and 3, and “man” here cannot be understood as an individual, for then the text would be saying of the same man that God’s goodness leads him to repentance, while that very man does not know this, despises that goodness, and gathers to himself treasures of wrath. This is impossible. If God’s goodness leads a man to repentance, that man does not despise that goodness. And, if a man despises the goodness of God, surely that goodness of God does not lead him to repentance. We must, therefore, understand “man” as a class, collectively. It is true that the goodness of God leads man, that is, elect man, to repentance. It is also true that man despises the goodness of God and gathers for himself treasures of wrath, not knowing that the goodness of God leads man to repentance. This is true of the ungodly, reprobate man.

The synod also cited Ezekiel 18:23 and 33:11. These texts read, “Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord God: and not that he should return from his ways, and live?” (18:23). “Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?”

These texts do not teach that God is gracious in the preaching of the gospel to the reprobate wicked. There is no offer of grace and salvation in these texts. In both passages there is a direct statement by the God of Israel that He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but in that the wicked turn from his evil ways and live. In 33:11 this statement stands in the form of an oath, “As I live, saith the Lord God,” and therefore is no offer, but a most emphatic divine assertion. Note too that both passages are addressed to the “house of Israel,” the typical manifestation of God’s church. God, because He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, comes to His church through the prophet and calls them to turn from their evil ways and live. By the power of that Word of God the elect do indeed turn from their evil ways and live. What a rich, abiding comfort there is in these passages!

No, God is not gracious to the reprobate in the preaching of the word. God does not come with a well-meant offer in the preaching of the word. God’s promise is always particular. But, most emphatically, God does “command all men everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:30). To every single one of His laboring and heavy-laden sheep Jesus comes with the command, “Come unto me, I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28). And when those sheep hear the voice of Jesus they come to Him and find rest! (John 10:27-28). Those who are not of Jesus’ sheep also hear the voice of Jesus, but they believe not, because they are not of His sheep (John 10:25-26).

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FOOTNOTES:

1. David J. Engelsma, Hyper-Calvinism and the Call of the Gospel (Grand Rapids: Reformed Free Publishing Association, 1980), p. 21.

2. Anyone who is sincerely interested in what the Protestant Reformed teach and what they deny relative to the points under discussion ought to read Engelsma’s book, Hyper-Calvinism and the Call of the Gospel and the doctrinal part of Herman Hoeksema’s The Protestant Reformed Churches of America.

3. Herman Hoeksema, The Protestant Reformed Churches in America (Grand Rapids: The Reformed Free Publishing Association, 1947), p. 317.

4. The phrase translated “that those who are called should come to him” is incorrectly translated as “should comply with the invitation” in some English editions of the Canons. The Latin original is “ut vocati ad se veniant.” (Cf. Philip Schaff’s Creeds of Christendom, vol. III, pp. 565-566).

5. Cf. Cassell’s New Latin Dictionary, by D. P. Simpson.