Thursday, June 28, 2012

Arminians at prayer

I’m going to comment on some statements by Roger Olson about an Arminian theology of prayer:




A case in point is prayer for friends and loved ones who are not saved. I know many non-Calvinists who pray, and see nothing wrong with praying, that God will simply “save” them. Of course, only a Calvinist (whether by that label or under another one) can reasonably ask God simply to “save” someone.

It’s true that a Calvinist, consistent with his theology, can pray for the lost without all the mental reservations that Arminianism logically requires. A Calvinist has far more freedom in prayer. And that’s one more reason to be a Calvinist.


My experience of non-Calvinist Christians (from membership and leadership in about 12 churches during my lifetime) is that they are not, by and large, theologically trained at all. They have picked up pieces of this and that (theologies) and pasted them together in ways that seem good to them without any real reflection on the outcome (the eclectic worldview, theology that results from that informal process). I’m not saying that doesn’t also happen among Calvinists; I’m just saying it’s not as common IN CALVINIST CHURCHES.

What I long for is a church that knows it is not Calvinist and teaches non-Calvinist theology/doctrine (about God’s sovereignty) and actively helps members and attenders develop spiritual lives that are consistent with non-Calvinist (e.g., Arminian) beliefs.

Recently I visited a church I know is not Calvinist (although there may be a few Calvinists sprinkled among the members) in overall ethos. A mature Christian person gave a “testimony” from the pulpit during the Sunday morning worship service. He concluded with (paraphrasing) “I don’t know why God chose for my mother to have cancer” (but I’m learning to live with that, etc.).

I heard that and subtly looked around to see if anyone whose face I could see registered any kind of surprise or dismay. None. I mentioned it to a few people who are members of the church and who I know are not Calvinists; they didn’t think anything of it. Their response was of the nature of “Well, that’s his belief about God and so who are we to question it?” What I think they really meant was “If that’s what makes him feel comfortable….”

However, I am convinced that if I took that man aside and queried him about God and, say, the holocaust, he would deny divine determinism.

I could give numerous similar examples of what I’m talking about. I’ll mention just one more.

I knew a husband and wife who were most definitely not Calvinists and do not believe in divine determinism as a true account of God’s sovereignty. However, after their son’s death in a car accident, they talked about it as if they were Calvinists! For example, they loved to tell friends how God planned and executed the accident so that their son did not suffer any pain; he was killed instantly.

It’s true that many laymen (and even many pastors) lack theological consistency. That said, Olson’s criticism is quite ironic. He’s accusing many Arminians of failure to be consistently Arminian. Yet Olson’s theology of providence is inconsistent with traditional Arminian theology. When Olson denies that God causes natural evil, or that God is responsible for natural evil, that’s contrary to his exposition of Arminius. And it’s also inconsistent with Charles Wesley. Olson has a revisionist theology of providence.

Olson’s criticism reminds me of atheism. Atheism logically commits the atheist to deny moral norms or mental states (e.g. moral relativism/nihilism, eliminative materialism). But because that’s so unnatural, atheists keep reverting to statements that are inconsistent with their atheism.

Likewise, because Arminian theology is so unnatural in the way it dichotomizes reality, that makes it hard to live by what they say they believe. Arminians keep slipping back into default Calvinism.


Here is how I teach my students. DO NOT wait until your parishioners experience a tragedy to talk with them about God’s sovereignty. If you are a Calvinist (many of them are), teach that to your congregation and clearly communicate its implications for practical life including how to understand evil and innocent suffering. If you are not a Calvinist, figure out your theology of divine sovereignty especially as it relates to salvation, evil and innocent suffering (I’ll be happy to help! :) , and teach your congregants about that. Do not wait until they face horrible tragedy and then try to answer their cries of “Where is God!?”

I agree with him that we shouldn’t wait until tragedy strikes to work out our theology of providence. However, Arminian theology is not a silver bullet to slay questions like “Where is God!?” in the wake of personal tragedy.


Because I like my prayers to be consistent with my beliefs (e.g., about God’s sovereignty and about reality) I never ask God to change the past. I don’t think God can do that. I think it’s even incoherent to talk about changing the past. In that I agree entirely with Calvinist philosopher-theologian Paul Helm.

However, I clearly recall an incident where my mother prayed that God would work it out that whoever found her purse (which was no longer where she lost it) would turn out to be a Christian or at least an honest person and return it to her. Of course, at the point of her prayer, she was asking God to change the past (or assure that something that already happened have happened in a certain way).

I didn’t criticize her; she was my mother and I was pretty young and didn’t want to show her disrespect or get into an argument with her. I let it go. What harm did it do? None.

However, if someone asks my theological opinion about praying for God to change the past, I will kindly tell them I don’t believe in it and explain why. (For example, there’s not a single example in Scripture of it and it’s illogical.)

i) Olson’s objection is confused. He fails to distinguish between changing the past and affecting the past. If God is timeless, then it’s feasible to pray for a past event (if we don’t know the outcome), and have God answer our prayer. God doesn’t have to hear the prayer in our timeframe to prepare the answer, or arrange events accordingly.

ii) On the other hand, many contemporary Arminians reject divine timelessness. In that case, affecting the past through prayer may not be coherent.


Normal language interpretation would seem to me to indicate that asking God to save someone, without any qualifications, is tantamount (whatever is intended) to asking God to do the impossible (from an Arminian perspective).

So, if a person asks me about such praying I will lead off the discussion with “What do you intend for God to do?” If the person says “I am asking God to intervene in their life to force them to repent and believe” I will say “That’s not possible” and explain why. If the person says “I am asking God to bring circumstances into their life to show them their need of him…” I will say “Well, that’s not what I think those words mean, but okay, if that’s what you mean, God knows what you mean and so go ahead and pray that way.”

It seems to me that “God, please save my friend” without qualifications normally means “God, break my friend’s will and force him to repent.” Perhaps not everyone who prays that prayer means that, but that’s what the words alone imply. That’s not consistent with Arminian belief. In my opinion, only a Calvinist (or maybe also a Lutheran) can pray that way consistently.

Olson is assuming that some Arminians pray this way because they haven’t thought through their position on Arminian soteriology and providence. But I think that’s somewhat naïve.

Fact is, Arminians may pray that way because they don’t care about the theological niceties of Arminianism. What they care about is the fate of their loved ones. Where the wellbeing of loved ones is concerned, people can be quite ruthless or unscrupulous. They will do whatever it takes. When push comes to shove, they want God to save their loved one by any means necessary. Abstractions about freewill take a back seat to the urgency and gravity of the situation.

It’s like hiking in the wilderness. Suppose, due to a terrible accident, your friend is pinned under a rock. You don’t want to amputate his arm. But if that’s the only way to save his life, you will take extreme measures.


And my opinion in this case is–it depends on what you mean because God always knows what you mean and you’re praying to God. And if you mean to ask God to violate someone’s free will and force them to be saved, then I don’t think that’s proper. If you mean to ask God to bring circumstances into a person’s life that will probably convince them of their need of salvation, then it’s proper. But why not pray with words that communicate what you mean?

i) I agree with Olson that our prayers should be theologically consistent.

ii) On the other hand, boldness in prayer can be a theological virtue. If Arminian theology causes a Christian to be very hesitant in prayer, to constantly second-guess himself, to suffer from the paralysis of analysis, then so much the worse for Arminianism. If Arminianism puts Christians in a straightjacket when they wish to pray, then that’s just one more strike against Arminian theology.

iii) In addition, it isn’t necessary to censure our prayers. Christian prayer has a built-in filter. This is not like paganism, where, if you inadvertently ask the gods for the wrong thing, they will give you what you ask for, to your detriment.

When we pray to God, we don’t have to phrase our prayer with lots of riders, caveats, and escape clauses, to avoid the danger of praying for the wrong thing. Christian prayer isn’t like an insurance contract, where everything you say has to be hedged about with cautious qualifications.

It’s not like, an hour after you prayed, the horrid realization dawns on you that you left something out, but it’s too late to go back and fix it, because the ink has dried on your signature, and now you’re doomed to get what you ask for. Prayer shouldn’t be a trial by ordeal. We shouldn’t approach God with extreme trepidation, for fear of tiny missteps with calamitous consequences. 

God makes allowance for our flawed prayers. He filters out the detritus. That’s understood going into the prayer. The efficacy of prayer is not dependent on the wisdom of the supplicant, but on the wisdom of the prayer-answering God.

Prayer is like a son asking his dad for something. The son may express himself poorly, but the father knows what his son means and, more importantly, what his son needs.

1 comment:

  1. It's hard to take Olson seriously when he portrays Calvinists as worshipping a Bully-God who "violates" and "forces" sinners to do things against their will.

    I wish he would interact with your critique, instead of ignoring it.

    ReplyDelete