Posted over at my blog

Snapshot preview.
A man who I greatly respect, Mark Driscoll, claims that Jesus Christ died for all people sufficiently, but only saved the elect. So the atonement is sufficient for all, but only effective for those God ordained to salvation. I believe this is incoherent, and wonder if Driscoll is attempting to explain common grace. (I accept Louis Berkhof's definition of common grace.) My conclusion is this. Common grace is not the atonement.

I appreciate comments either here or on my blog. If you want to read Driscoll's own words, quoted in full, hit up my blog.

__________________
Pittsburgh, PA
New Covenant PCA, a church replant that you could read about here.
Co-Director of Children's Ministry
Bible Teacher - Trinity Christian School
M. Div Candidate at the Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary
Blogger, Relentless Grace

Although I don't necessarily like the wording of "Sufficient for all, efficient for only the elect," I do say that it does not equal Driscoll's Words here:
What "sufficient for all, efficient for only the elect" means is that Christ's blood is powerful enough to save all people without exception (sufficient for all), but that the atonement's intention is not for all people without exception (efficient for only the elect). So it's a "well Christ's blood could cover all the sins of all people without exception, but it doesn't," hence, in my opinion, shows the unnecessity of having such a statement. His view seems much more like Amyraldianism, IMHO. Jesus did not die "for the sins of everyone."

I believe John Owen used the similar phraseology, and I'm certain he would never affirm Driscoll's statement above.

Also, Driscoll's misusing those "prooftexts."

__________________
Josh Hicks, Chloë's Dad
Christ Covenant Reformed Presbyterian Church, RPCGA
Facebook - The Calvinist Vent
Board Rules - Signature Rules - Suggestion Box

It is God that multiplies our sorrows.... God, as a righteous Judge, does it, which ought to silence us under all our sorrows; as many as they are, we have deserved them all, and more: nay, God, as a tender Father, does it for our necessary correction, that we may be humbled for sin, and weaned from the world by all our sorrows; and the good we get by them, with the comfort we have under them, will abundantly balance our sorrows, how greatly soever they are multiplied. - Matthew Henry

to Josh

__________________
Benjamin P. Glaser, M. Div, Licentiate, Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church
Member Fairmount ARP Church
Pittsburgh, PA

Deo Vindice

Herein is the problem...the Father Elected SOME to be in Christ, and Christ Propitiated for that SOME...how is it then Christ's payment was more than Propitiation?

Look VERY carefully at the word PROPITIATION...meditate on it...

Also, I don't believe the Scriptural term "GRACE" is at all COMMON period...someone please show me where God's G-R-A-C-E is common to all men...and I will analyze it, and get back to you.

I CAN'T find it, and agree with Herman Hoeksema, that Calvin (who wrote "general grace"), at least in translation...should have used some other term...as I saw, so did he, that that term has become a "chink" in the armor of the Reformed Faith...not his words per se, but the same conclusion just the same

__________________
Duane
Lighthouse Bible Church (Independent Reformed)
Delavan, WI

Election is the Good News (Gospel)

What good work must we do to inherit the Kingdom of God?
THIS is the WORK OF GOD, that ye believe on Him in Whom He hath sent.

Admin Note:

Let's keep the subject narrowed toward Driscoll's statements about the atonement, rather than the thread turning into a discussion about "common grace." There are multiple threads about the latter found throughout the PB, and if someone wants it to be discussed in the particular context of this thread, it would be best to start a new thread.

Driscoll is saying that the death of Christ accomplishes one thing for the elect and accomplishes something else for the non-elect. This idea is unbiblical. Christ's atonement accomplished the same thing for all of those He died for. Christ's atonement did not accomplish anything for the non-elect because He did not die for the non-elect.

__________________
Curt Hayashida
member, Community Bible Church (Non-denominational)
Vallejo, CA

That Christ's death is sufficient payment for the whole world isn't just common Reformed speech; it's absolutely confessional:

The fact that Christ died with the intent and purpose only of saving the elect does not mean his death is not sufficient to save any number of people. As the orthodox theologians would state, Christ need not have suffered any more or less if more or less people were to be saved in God's design.

I believe the very useful "life boat" metaphor originated with Charles Hodge. A life boat big enough to fit everyone on the ship heads towards the wreckage with the intent of saving two hundred of the four hundred passengers. The fact that the boat is only intended for some does not mean it is incapable of saving more. The limiting factor is not the sufficiency of Christ's death; rather, the "limiting factor" it is the intention of what it is supposed to accomplish. It has no other purpose than to purchase salvation for the elect, and therein is it called a limited atonement.

Edited to add:
Although, reading back over the OP and Josh's first comment, Driscoll's statement does sound a little off, to say the least...
It certainly seems to be going beyond simple sufficiency. I guess I can't make any statements about it, though, not hearing the context.

__________________
Paul Korte
OPC
Flint, MI

They who perceive in themselves discoveries of the divine goodness, so full and absolutely perfect, and who make them the subject of earnest meditation, will never embrace new doctrines, by which the very grace they feel so powerfully in themselves is thrown into the shade. --John Calvin

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

Yes, the problem is that's not how Driscoll is using the statement.

Yeah, I just realized that there was a link to that blog, and read over Driscoll's statement. Thanks. That doesn't sound too good...

He separates Christ's death from its effect. If salvation doesn't come from Christ's death, which is his position, what does it come from? What "something extra" are the elect getting that the non-elect, who have been covered by Christ's blood, are not?

Indeed, it is incoherent.

__________________
Andrew DeShazo
Husband of Kathryn
Father of Phillip-Giles B. DeShazo
Deacon
Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, Memphis, TN
"From out of the depth of unbroken Infinfity arose the Question, "Who am I?" And to that Question there is the answer, "I am God!" -Meher Baba, died 1969.

"I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Christ, died 33 AD, ressurected three days later.

Driscoll is saying that the elect receive salvation from Christ's death, but the non-elect receive something else from Christ's death. What Driscoll is saying is unbiblical. Christ's death accomplished the same thing for all of those He died for.

I love the doctrines of grace. I am thankful that I teach at a confessional school where I am not only free to teach them, but required to do so. It is a blessing. I think everyone here shares my frustrations and come to the same conclusions.

God elected a portion of humanity to salvation. Jesus Christ died for the sins of that portion. For that portion God took the guilt of our sins and placed it upon Christ. Upon the satisfaction of God's wrath, Christ's righteousness was then put upon us. We see this imagery of a Great Exchange throughout the Bible. What we do not see, however, is the idea that Christ died for all people, while God the Father elected only a certain number.

Driscoll's idea of unlimited limited atonement smacks of the idea that God, the Father and God, the Son had two different agendas. Instead we only see God, the Father electing, God, the Son accomplishing, and God, the Holy Spirit applying.

I'm not that familiar with Driscoll, but I recently saw a blog post somewhere where he was described as a "4.5 point" Calvinist. I think his view of the atonement may be similar to that of Southern Seminary Prof. Bruce Ware, who argues for a "multiple intentions" view of the atonement.

__________________
Christian
One Pilgrims Progress

Robbie,
Can you please post a link to the message where Driscoll said these things?

Thanks.

__________________
Rick Taron
Bellingham URC.
Everson, WA.

What I have heard (again, HEARD) is that Bruce Ware is a person who greatly influenced Driscoll, as Pilgrim pointed out. So, I would say he is saying the sort of things Dr. Ware would say. He is one of our elders, and I love him as a Christian brother, but I just think is completely wrong on this point! I understand what this view is trying to do, because they think they are explaining both the "limited" and "unlimited" passages of Scripture. They try to sound Calvinistic by saying it secured the redemption of the elect, but they also want to say Christ did die for all people. It is definitely incoherent...

__________________
Nate Wood
Student, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
Clifton Baptist Church
Louisville, KY

These words are in his book Death By Love, 2008, Crossway. In the chapter addressed to his son. Bruce Ware has an article online explaining this more in detail... if you google search Ware, unlimited limited a... it will come up.

Iam agree, and he also separtes Christ death from Christ being the Highpriest and Mediator of his elected alone!

__________________
* Ralph Wilms (7-10-1974)
* Church : Christengemeente Roermond (The Netherlands)
* 1729 Goat Yard Declaration of Faith & 1646 Baptist Confession of faith

"To our mind, either everything or nothing must be held in subjection to the will and providence of God. Even the wickedness of ungodly men is restricted by predestination, so that the wrath of man shall praise God, and the remainder of wrath He will restrain." - GILBERT BEEBE (1800-1881)

Driscoll is typically sloppy in his use of the “sufficient for all, efficient for the elect” terminology. William Cunningham (1805-1861) gives insight into potential misunderstanding of the Reformed position, which serves as a call for care in using it:

“A distinction was generally employed by the schoolmen, which has often been adverted to in this discussion, and which it may be proper to explain. They were accustomed to say, that Christ died sufficiently for all men, and efficaciously for the elect, — sufficientur pro omnibus, efficaciter pro electis. Some orthodox divines, who wrote before the extent of the atonement had been made the subject of full, formal, and elaborate discussion, and Calvin himself among the rest, — admitted the truth of this scholastic position. But after controversy had thrown its full light upon the subject, orthodox divines generally refused to adopt this mode of stating the point, because it seemed to ascribe to Christ a purpose or intention of dying in the room of all, and of benefiting all by the proper effects of His death, as an atonement or propitiation; not that they doubted or denied the intrinsic sufficiency of His death for the redemption of all men, but because the statement — whether originally so intended or not — was so expressed as to suffest the idea, that Christ, in dying, desired and intended that all men should partake in the proper and peculiar effects of the shedding of His blood.

Calvinists do not object to say that the death of Christ — viewed objectively, apart from His purpose or design — was sufficient for all, and efficacious for the elect, because this statement in the first clause merely asserts its infinite intrinsic sufficiency, which they admit; whereas the original scholastic form of the statement, — namely, that He died sufficiently for all, — seems to indicate that, when He died, He intended that all should derive some saving and permanent benefit from His death.”

(William Cunningham, Historical Theology, vol. 2, p. 332, added paragraph break is mine).

__________________
Jim
1689 LBCF
Independent Bible Church
North Texas, USA

Having heard Driscoll's lecture on "Unlimited Limited Atonement," (which does sound rather incoherent prima facie, doesn't it?) and read his chapter in Death By Love, I'd have to say he does a rather clumsy job of explaining it. Though I think similar (and far more thorough) constructions of the atonement can be found in WGT Shedd's Dogmatic Theology or RL Dabney's lectures in systematic theology. It's just what some folks call "low Calvinism," certainly not historically unique.

__________________
B.C. Askins
Evangelical Church of Fairport, Member (Fairport, NY)
"If you eat a live frog in the morning, nothing worse will happen to either of you for the rest of the day."
-W.G.T. Shedd

Driscoll's view is close to if not the same as the view espoused by John Davenant (1572-1641) -- it has been called the dual reference view of atonement by Scottish theologian John Kennedy of Dingwall (1819-1884). IMHO, Kennedy did a good job of debunking the view in his Man’s Relations to God, (at Google Books) published 1869, pp. 100 - 116.

Some may tend to confuse Davenant's dual reference view with Amyraldism, but it's not quite the same. In any event, as mentioned above, Driscoll's view is not unique -- it's been around in what has been termed Low Calvinism.

I'm presently reading this book, and thoroughly enjoying it! I knew his position of LimUn. Atonement, and so have been interested to read his chapter here to see how he clarifies this. I should read the chapter in the next few days, and will post my thoughts here when I get the chance.

All this said, I really really like Death By Love, and despite this area where he may be wrong, I'd still strongly recommend it. It's not only theologically helpful, but it's great material to help deepen one's understanding and appreciation of the work of Jesus Christ, and it's a great book on seeing someone pastorally apply these truths where we may normally read strict doctrinal content on them. (Also noting that he does recommend Owen's The Death of Death in the back for further reading.)

__________________
Jacob
Sovereign Grace Ministries
Covenant Fellowship Church
WTS M.A.R. in Theology student
West Chester, PA

"Grace renews nature; glory perfects grace." ~ John Owen
"Grace tried is better than grace, and more than grace. It is glory in its infancy." ~ John Flavel
Blog - The Strasbourg Inn

I believe reading Death By Love has also been very valuable to me. I think it ought to be required reading for those who find themselves in impromptu counseling sessions with people from all walks of life (such as in parachurch ministries, college ministries, etc.). It is very pastoral and without much of the "irreverence" for which many have disregarded Driscoll's other books.

With regard to the dual reference theory, the tendency seems to be for all the "high Calvinists" to consider any other perspective to be either Amyralidian, at best, or (gasp) Arminian, at worst. G. Michael Thomas' historical survey The Atonement: A Reformed Dilemma from Calvin to the Consensus shows that Owen's view has not had the monolithic status within Reformed circles which many ascribe to it. The book was certainly an eye-opening and interesting read.

Excellent input everyone. When I saw his youtube vid he stated that he adhered to both positions, limited and unlimited, that didn't make sense to me since he seemed to be contradicting himself.

__________________
Julio Perez
Visting Branch of Hope OPC hoping this will be my home church.....


“No…we are all priests. Your vocation and your contentment in your vocation should not be dependent upon your being in vocational ministry or in being a figure of public acclaim. If God wills that fine…if He does not do that, you ought to still do what he has granted you to do to the glory of God.”

-Martin Luther

Mark's a good guy but I've not liked many of his sermons. Having worked with many unregenerate people throughout my life, trying to win them to Christ caused me to too often take positions that we're "odd" or to speak without fully thinking at times. I am NOT saying Mark does this, but listening to his sermons reminded me of when I did. For whatever that's worth.

__________________
Adam - Pennsylvania - Baptist

http://www.myspace.com/aleavelle

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/p...5655012&ref=nf

Interesting observation, Adam.

Like his methods or not I think it's hard to argue that Driscoll isn't one of the most discerning young ministers preaching today. That is when it comes to application of Scriptures; not necessarily whether one should wear a South Park t-shirt when he preaches. I think he lacks discernment in areas like that.

It was reading Death by Love that really sealed my mind on the fact that Driscoll has a lot of spiritual discernment and wisdom in pastoral counselling and application.

All in all I have found some profit in just about every Driscoll message I have ever listened to.

__________________
Ryan Barnhart - Pastor of OGBC
Husband to a beautiful wife, Father to two beautiful girls
Student at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary - B.D.

"I confess to you, that if I can but live and die serving the Lord Jesus, it will make no difference to me whether I am eaten by Cannibals or by worms. And in the Great Day my Resurrection body will rise as fair as yours in the likeness of our risen Redeemer." - John Paton