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 In
"pattern of Authority," Bernard Ramm says,
"Having rejected the authority of the Roman Church and its
efforts to underwrite the authority of the Bible, Calvin might
then have turned to human reason to demonstrate the authority of
the Bible. But there were two matters causing hesitancy in this
procedure: (1) the human reason had come under certain darkening
effects from sin; and (2) being fully persuaded by human reason
the believer would still have but human faith. There must be a
divine certainty about divine matters." (p.28-29) Ramm says
Calvin found his answer in the "internal or secret
witness of the Holy Spirit."
The
faith of a human is "human faith" — what else? It is
a human's acceptance of evidence, which genders trust. There is
first the FACT, be it something Jesus said or a miracle he
performed. Then, there is a WITNESS to the fact; followed by
TESTIMONY. God produces the facts, and His Spirit delivered
those facts unerringly via the witnesses (Jn. 14:26; 16:12-).
This is GOD, loving His creatures, giving His Son to die for
them, and calling all creatures with the gospel. God knows his
creatures, and is capable of calling so all may understand, and
be justly condemned if they refuse to heed (Jn. 3:16-21). Then
MAN hears, and believes or disbelieves. God is Savior of all
men, "specially of them that believe" (1 Tim. 4:10).
But
Ramm and other evangelicals give "human faith" an
illogical twist. With a theological base that denies free will
and accepts unconditional particular election, they confuse the reception
of evidence with its source a testing standards. The
Greeks
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relied upon "worldly wisdom" to
test the validity of the gospel message — and pronounced it
"foolish." This is no argument against the use of
human senses (to hear God's word) or human capacity to receive
it into honest hearts (seat of intellect) so as to believe and
act upon it. Is God incapable of calling by His word (Jn. 6:)?
Paul
came with "demonstration of the Spirit and power; that your
faith should not stand in the wisdom of men but in the power of
God (1 Cor. 2:4-). He proved the source of the message to
be divine. Men were expected to accept the message because of
its divine source, rather than because it could be proven true
in a laboratory. But they accepted it with their human senses
— what else?
In
recent years several brethren have written disparagingly of
man's ability to reason upon scriptures. "If we must reason
on it, this is dependence upon man." The most simple and
direct statement requires human assimilation, making the
understanding of scriptures (milk and meat) a matter of degree.
There is no scriptural reason to deny man's capacity to hear,
believe and obey. I fear some have been trapped in the
evangelical theology of depravity, "experience of
grace" and "enabling power." They can not equate
"grace" with "free will" response. And
saddest of all, they are on a track that finally demands
"internal and secret witness of the Holy Spirit" —
in reality a reliance upon subjective "feeling" which
dethrones the God they claim to praise.
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