Tuesday, March 20, 2018

Answer the Fallacies of Forgiveness and Election without Faith.
From the Artesian Well Called The Lutheran Library Publishing Ministry


After finishing Loy yesterday, I decided to take another look at the 3-books-in-one published by Schodde as The Error of Missouri. The middle one Intuitu Fidei was translated by Lenski. The following quote is from part one.
Alec


Dr. Jacob Andreae is, besides Chemnitz, one of the main authors of the Formula of Concord. He was far more active than even Chemnitz himself in bringing matters so far that the Formula was produced. In the year 1574 he published a disputation on predestination in which thesis 10 reads as follows: “Predestination and election by grace is the eternal decree of God, declaring that He will save those persons who are penitent and believe in Christ, the Savior and only Redeemer of the world.” Thesis 172: “It is God’s immutable will that all should believe in the Gospel, and that those who believe shall be saved,” Mark 16. Th. 173: “As it is likewise His immutable will, that those who do not believe shall be damned.” Th. 174: “Nor does the universality of the promises of the Gospel contradict the particularity of election” (i. e. by the fact, that election is restricted to a few, or that only a few are chosen). Thesis 175: “For God has not promised salvation to all promiscuously, but only to those who believe.” Thesis 176: “Hence the particular election is included in the universal promise.”
Moreover in this disputation of 1574 Andreae opposes an unconditional election in the following words: “Whoever seeks predestination in an absolute decree of God, because God’s foreknowledge is absolutely certain, leads men to think that such a decree necessarily brings about the salvation of certain persons who under no circumstances can be condemned, while it likewise effects the damnation of others so that they cannot be saved. The result of this is that believers, becoming perplexed when considering this divine foreknowledge, cannot be cheered by consolation; men of Epicurean mind, however, thereby open for themselves and others the door for transgression; because the hidden will of God has decided everything, all our efforts avail nothing. . . . The reason why all are not saved is this, that they spurn the divine grace, which God offers to all in Christ. 
The fact, that this grace cannot be accepted by our own reason or strength, does not overthrow our proposition. All indeed are to hear, and by hearing are to come to faith. Whoever despises preaching, must accuse himself, and not a hidden decree of God, just as his conscience accuses only himself. The doctrine of an absolute decree also renders the work of the Word and the Sacrament useless. Reprobation by an absolute will, without the foresight of unbelief, is blasphemous. Whoever hears the Word, which he indeed cannot believe by his own powers, to him the Holy Spirit is promised, and He works that all who hear may also believe. This coming to hear preaching, this willing and hearing, God demands as a piece of outward obedience, a leading, as it were by the hand, unto Christ, although in itself it does not effect conversion. But this man can do, hear the Word which is the organ of the Spirit, or stop his ears; but man has not the least measure of power for assent, as Erasmus claimed, assent is altogether the work of the Holy Spirit.”
Well, well, Andreae, what are you teaching here? Are you, the actual author of the Formula of Concord still really in such lamentable ignorance regarding the very first letter of the pure doctrine of predestination, which consists of the very opposite of what you teach in these propositions? Don't you know that predestination and the universal gracious will of God are two entirely different "sides" of God's will, which neither reason nor the light of grace is able to harmonize with each other? Let me tell you, my dear Andreae, you should have remained at home with your wisdom, which betrays a "rationalizing tendency"; you had better remain silent as long as you have no clearer light on the a b c of the pure doctrine of predestination. See, "it is impossible for us to mediate between, or to harmonize with our reason, these two scriptural doctrines concerning particular election and concerning universal grace. Not even the light of grace is able to remove this discord, we must wait for the light of glory" ("L. u. W.", 1880, 308). How then could you write such nonsense as this: "The universality of the promises does not contradict the particularity of election; for God has not promised salvation to all promiscuously, but only to those who believe; hence the particular election is included in the universal promise." Why, the thing is just the reverse! Election is "an altogether different thing" from this universal promise. And therefore the particularity of election contradicts the universality of the promise, and we cannot solve the contradiction, and you dare not, as you venture to do. harmonize the two by referring to passages like these: "He that believeth shall be saved," or: "Without faith it is impossible to please God." I am very much afraid, my dear Andreae, that you agree with the later dogmaticians who make "election depend on faith", although I know, of course, that you are the chief author of the Formula of Concord and that you ought to know how it is to be understood. Certainly we respect your Lutheranism otherwise: but when you include the particularity of election in the universal promise ("He that believeth shall be saved"), understanding the former by the latter, when thus you attempt "to explain somewhat and make plausible to our reason'" (!!) "this wonderful mystery of election" by mixing in foreseen faith, then, we are sorry to say, you too have "forsaken the Scriptures and the Symbol" and gone off on the wrong track of Pelagianism. Still one thing serves to excuse you somewhat: your co-workers on the Formula, as the extracts from Selnecker and Chytraeus show, were likewise not quite straight on this subject, and, to put it as mildly as possible, badly misunderstood their dear Formula of Concord in this a b c point of the pure doctrine of election! _Sapienti sat_. [Note from the I. F. proper. – Translator.]