The Problem(s) with Calvinism

I attend a Bible Church.  This supposedly means that we have no denominational or other distinctives ahead of the Word of God.  Supposedly, our doctrinal statement is derived totally from the Word of God, and the Word of God is the measure of all things there.  But I'm finding more and more that there are preconceptions the precede the Word and shape the acceptable interpretations of the Word in my church.

One of these preconceptions is Calvinism.  Now, there are a lot of good things about Calvinism, and Calvin's Institutes have lots of good material in them, true.  But, they are not the Word of God.  I find that our church is dedicated to Calvinism prior to the Word of God, and that is a problem. Here are three problems that I see that seem to relate to this precommitment to Calvinism:

1. Lack of knowledge and hunger for knowledge about God's Word
2. Spiritual passivity and laziness
3. Prejudice against some of the scary implications of God's Word

In a Bible church, you would expect the members to be familiar with what the Bible says. But I have found many instances among the people where it is clear that they don't know the Word of God, and don't wish to be bothered to find out what it says.  One lady thought that the Christmas song, the "Little Drummer Boy" was somehow scriptural.  When I joked with her that it was in Luke 46, I was appalled to hear her respond with satisfaction that she had been certain the Drummer Boy was in there somewhere! Another time, I asked a member to tell me how she knew that the "last would be first and the first, last," (a fraction of a verse she quoted).  She couldn't even answer me.  It was like, "haste makes waste" or some other proverb we've heard from youth to her.  And this was the wife of an elder in the church.

Worse, it seems that the majority of the elders in the church do not know the Word of God like it was the most important book in their lives.  I say this to our shame and my own.  I've had many conversations with the elders about biblical matters, and while all are conversant in the Word of God, and many have memorized much of it, they exhibit a certain denseness and stupidity (for lack of a better word) about the meaning of it.  The main teaching elder and his mentor seem to know the Word well, but both of them judge it by their own prejudices and do not understand basic beliefs.  For instance, even though there is no scriptural support for the idea that the spiritual gifts (the charismata) have gone away with the apostles, they subscribe to this convenient position on the basis of a single proof text in 1 Cor 13.

Calvin's Institutes were not a summa of theological thought, they were a diatribe against the bad practices of the Catholic Church at the time.   Calvin was drawing people away from practices born of man's will, and drawing them back to the Scripture and to God.  This was very appropriate.  But Calvin's adherents have gone so far the other direction, that they feel content to wait for God to do all the work.  Jesus was the completion of God's work, that is why He is our Sabbath (Heb 4).  But there's seven days in the week, and we can't spend all our time in the Sabbath.  If someone needs healing, we pray for the doctors to have wisdom.  If someone needs money, we give them a little something and then send them off to the government dole.   We are supposed to be making a difference in this world, not waiting for God to do everything.  God did his part with Jesus.  God rested on the Sabbath, but then He resumed His awesome work in the Creation He made.  Jesus said, "My Father has been working right up to this very day." But when He died, Jesus said, "It is finished."  God's done working. In Jesus, He poured out all the power, wisdom, knowledge, and everything else we need to bring His kingdom to fruition, but it is up to us to do the work in His poured-out power.

I fear we will find the scary truth of the parable of the talents when we face judgment day.  The Master entrusted his wealth to his servants, and he expected an increase.  But the wicked, lazy servant just buried his talent.  He was expecting the Master to make his own money work, and he didn't have a clue how to work the money himself.  Each of them received at least a "talent" of money, but even one talent is a fortune by today's standards.  Even the lazy servant could have at least put it in the bank and gotten interest.  We, like him, bury our talents, the inexpressible riches and power of Jesus, and expect the Master to do all the work.  The problem is, we know that our Master expects growth and income from His investment, but we're passively afraid to do anything.  We're afraid to take His word and His power and do something.

We have an unction from the Holy One, and we know all the truth.  Why then are we ignorant? We have the power that raised Christ from the dead.  Why do we act powerless when someone has a cold or is deaf or lacks money?  We have the command of Jesus that whoever comes after Him will do the works that He did, and greater works will he do because Jesus has gone to the Father.  And all we do is redefine the "greater works" to mean something spiritual.  Why aren't we doing just the works that Jesus did?  Why aren't we healing the sick, raising the dead, and cleansing the lepers?

Just last Sunday, for the first time since I can remember, our teaching elder gave a message on an evangelistic topic.  There was at least one unsaved person in the audience that I knew of.  But he didn't extend an invitation at the end.  Instead, he preached it as if only to Christians, citing the greatness of our salvation. When I talked to him and the other elders, their basic response was that you don't want to push people to get saved.  If God wants them saved, you won't be able to stop it!  Why don't we at least invite the unsaved to Jesus.  My experience is, if you don't ask, you won't get.  No one passes the salt unless  you ask for it.  My children don't do what I want just through suggestions.  We need to be making it personal to people and asking them, or they will just skate over the gospel thinking they are already saved.

Now, I'm not against my church or its people or eldership.  But I am mighty frustrated.  I love these people, but it's like they don't realize we're in a war here!  And we have the ultimate power on our side!  Instead, people passively submit to the works of the devil like disease, tragedy, etc., and they call for patient endurance of "God's will."  When will they wake up and see that not everything that happens is part of God's will just by definition?

They continually beg the question by saying, "If it happens, it must be God's will."  Then they say, "If it's God's will, it will happen."  They don't realize that this is circular reasoning.  This also makes God guilty of the very acts of men that He condemns.  Murder, rape, incest, genocide, abortion, all the gross sins you could imagine are all God's will under that system.  I have no responsibility except to ride it out.  This is closer to Hinduism than Christianity, and it makes me mad!

When Jesus came off the mount of transfiguration to find his disciples couldn't cast a demon out of a boy, He wasn't happy with them.  When they couldn't calm the storm, Jesus wasn't pleased.  How many times did Jesus rebuke them for their lack of faith?  These are men He had previously sent out with miraculous powers to, "heal the sick, raise the dead, and cleanse the lepers."  The disciples had come back rejoicing that even the demons had to submit to them.  But they were still powerless, depending on Jesus for something He had entrusted them to do themselves.  Like the lazy servant, they just couldn't summon the faith to believe that Jesus had given them power to deal with their circumstances.  And sadly, neither can we.