More on Introduction, Ground Work

Working through Olson


Dr. Roger Olson rightly warns in his book, Arminian Theology,  about setting our terms and their meaning. The larger sweeping one that he at first sets forth is Calvinism. He begins saying that Calvinism is the “theology that emphasizes God’s absolute sovereignty as the all-determining reality, especially with regard to salvation” (p. 15). That’s a fair rendering. I have been taught some similar things—something like this: a comprehensive system of God’s glory in creation and providence; or maybe something like this—a life system based on the revelation of the glory of the Triune God.


Dr. Bob Godfrey of Westminster Seminary of Escondido, CA worked in earnest to have us read through Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion in our three-year cycle of classes in Church History.


BB Warfield wrote with the heart when he reminded us that a basic definition of Calvinism is “pure religion.” He goes on to illustrate this by a man on bended knee in prayer. In prayer man is utterly, completely in the place of dependency. He says, “The Calvinist is the man who is determined to preserve the attitude he takes in prayer in all his thinking, in all his feeling, in all his doing.” See Warfield’s Shorter Writings, v. 1, p. 390.


Olson said, “…God’s absolute sovereignty as the all-determining reality, especially with regard to salvation.”


G. Mark Sumpter