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Abraham Kuyper, Common Grace 1.22, Conscience

23 Friday Apr 2021

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CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CONSCIENCE AND THE COVENANT OF WORKS

And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” Gen. 2:16-17

Kuyper begins this chapter with a discussion of conscience. In this opening section he presents two very different concepts of conscience and attributes the modern conscience to be a function of the Enlightenment. 

This discussion of conscience begins with the observation that Adam had no conscience, as we know it. This leads to a discussion of two ways of understanding conscience. In one manner, the newer understanding, conscience is a self-executing faculty which can determine whether a course of conduct is morally appropriate. This faculty as an innate knowledge of what God requires and functions as an “oracle” to our mind.

Functioning in this manner, conscience has an authority independent and over God’s Word. Not raised by Kuyper, but proof of his thesis can be found in the many concessions and transformations of Christian moral behavior and opinion in the world after Kuyper. God’s Word is either rejected or nuanced in such a way as to be meaningless. Any number of examples could be given on the evolution of Christian morality in a number of instances. 

The previous Reformed understanding of conscience before “rationalism was busy trampling faith,”  did not understand conscience as an independent “capacity” but rather as a recurrent reflective mode of thinking. Kuyper identifies three elements of this reflective thought: 

First, it knows the external law of God; the knowledge of good and evil. Second, we have a knowledge of ourselves and our actions. Third, there is a reflexive comparison of our conduct with knowledge of God’s law. He refers to this as a “higher impulse” and pursuant to the impulse we continually reflect on our life in comparison to the law. 

In this respect it then differs from the latter concept of conscience as an independent source of knowledge. 

In this understanding, the conscience is dependent upon the content of the external law which informs and forms the conscience. In looking at some pre-Enlightenment sources, it is possible to see an understanding consistent with Kuyper’s model:

False Rule. 3. Conscience. It is, saith one, my conscience. This is no rule for an upright man; the conscience of a sinner is defiled, Tit. 1:15 conscience being defiled may err; an erring conscience cannot be a rule, Acts 26:9. ‘I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus;’ he who is an heretic may plead conscience; admit conscience to be a rule, and we open the door to all mutinies and massacres; if the devil get into a man’s conscience, whither will he not carry him?

Thomas Watson, “The Upright Man’s Character,” in Discourses on Important and Interesting Subjects, Being the Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, vol. 1 (Edinburgh; Glasgow: Blackie, Fullarton, & Co.; A. Fullarton & Co., 1829), 328. Here, he explicitly denies the conscience has any independent moral standard, but it is imported – at the very least one without salvation cannot have a properly functioning conscience. 

There are other uses which are ambiguous on this point, such as Manton’s “That true morality and good conscience cannot be had without the faith of the gospel; so that we are not only better provided, but indeed cannot perform such obedience as is acceptable to God without faith in Christ.” Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 17 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1874), 429. The trouble for the unbeliever is the inability to pacify the conscience because he cannot live right. This raises the question, why does the unbeliever have any pangs of conscience if he is ignorant of the law?

Thomas Boston goes further and writes: “This moral law is found, 1. In the hearts of all men, as to some remains thereof, Rom. 2:15. There are common notions thereof, such as, That there is a God, and that he is to be worshipped; that we should give every one his due, &c. Conscience has that law with which it accuses for the commission of great crimes, Rom. 1 ult. This internal law appears from those laws which are common in all countries for the preserving of human societies, the encouraging of virtue, and the discouraging of vice. What standard else can they have for these laws but common reason? The design of them is to keep men within the bounds of goodness for mutual commerce.”Thomas Boston, The Whole Works of Thomas Boston: An Illustration of the Doctrines of the Christian Religion, Part 2, ed. Samuel M‘Millan, vol. 2 (Aberdeen: George and Robert King, 1848), 61.

And similarly by another, “but God hath given both light streaming forth from the word, and he hath given the eye of conscience, that by both these men might come assuredly to know that they are called out of darkness unto light.” James Nichols, Puritan Sermons, vol. 6 (Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1981), 389.

In another place we see the conscience being deceived and thus judging wrongly: “Conscience is sometimes deceived through ignorance of what is right, by apprehending a false rule for a true, an error for the will of God: sometimes, through ignorance of the fact, by misapplying a right rule to a wrong action. Conscience, evil informed, takes human traditions and false doctrines, proposed under the show of Divine authority, to be the will of God.” James Nichols, Puritan Sermons, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1981), 13.

Edwards occupies an interesting middle position, “Thus natural conscience, if the understanding be properly enlightened, and errors and blinding stupifying prejudices are removed, concurs with the law of God, and is of equal extent with it, and joins its voice with it in every article.” Jonathan Edwards, The Works of President Edwards (Worcester: Isaiah Thomas, Jun., 1808), 442–443. There is a natural conscience which would conform to the law of God, were it enlightened. 

And Luther held to a view that conscience can know of sin but not condemn the man as a sinner, “Zachman writes of Luther’s negative view of conscience: “The conscience can recognize sins (acts), but it cannot of itself, even under the external revelation of the law, acknowledge the person as sinner (nature). The subjective ability to feel oneself a sinner and to sense the wrath of God on sinners is thus a gift of God, and not an ability of conscience.” Justification is solely God’s work ex nihilo, not out of any preexistent salvific matters including human accretions, the murmuring of conscience, etc.” Dennis Ngien, Fruit for the Soul: Luther on the Lament Psalms (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2015), 155–156.

And Calvin, “In like manner, when men have an awareness of divine judgment adjoined to them as a witness which does not let them hide their sins but arraigns them as guilty before the judgment seat—this awareness is called “conscience.” It is a certain mean between God and man, for it does not allow man to suppress within himself what he knows, but pursues him to the point of making him acknowledge his guilt. This is what Paul means when he teaches that conscience testifies to men, while their thoughts accuse or excuse them in God’s judgment [Rom. 2:15–16]. A simple awareness could repose in man, bottled up, as it were. Therefore, this feeling, which draws men to God’s judgment, is like a keeper assigned to man, that watches and observes all his secrets so that nothing may remain buried in darkness. Hence that ancient proverb: conscience is a thousand witnesses.11 By like reasoning, Peter also put “the response11a of a good conscience to God” [1 Peter 3:21] as equivalent to peace of mind, when, convinced of Christ’s grace, we fearlessly present ourselves before God. And when the author of The Letter to the Hebrews states that we “no longer have any consciousness of sin” [Heb. 10:2], he means that we are freed or absolved so that sin can no longer accuse us.” John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion & 2, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, vol. 1, The Library of Christian Classics (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), 1181–1182.

This brings us on both sides of the Enlightenment. While none of these examples hold the conscience an infallible witness, there is at least a general sense of God’s law.

Oddly, Kuyper’s position in some way is closer to John Locke,  Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Book 1, Chapter 2:

“7. Men’s actions convince us that the rule of virtue is not their internal principle. For, if we will not in civility allow too much sincerity to the professions of most men, but think their actions to be the interpreters of their thoughts, we shall find that they have no such internal veneration for these rules, nor so full a persuasion of their certainty and obligation. The great principle of morality, “To do as one would be done to,” is more commended than practised. But the breach of this rule cannot be a greater vice, than to teach others, that it is no moral rule, nor obligatory, would be thought madness, and contrary to that interest men sacrifice to, when they break it themselves. Perhaps conscience will be urged as checking us for such breaches, and so the internal obligation and establishment of the rule be preserved.

“8. Conscience no proof of any innate moral rule. To which I answer, that I doubt not but, without being written on their hearts, many men may, by the same way that they come to the knowledge of other things, come to assent to several moral rules, and be convinced of their obligation. Others also may come to be of the same mind, from their education, company, and customs of their country; which persuasion, however got, will serve to set conscience on work; which is nothing else but our own opinion or judgment of the moral rectitude or pravity of our own actions; and if conscience be a proof of innate principles, contraries may be innate principles; since some men with the same bent of conscience prosecute what others avoid.

“9. Instances of enormities practised without remorse. But I cannot see how any men should ever transgress those moral rules, with confidence and serenity, were they innate, and stamped upon their minds. View but an army at the sacking of a town, and see what observation or sense of moral principles, or what touch of conscience for all the outrages they do. Robberies, murders, rapes, are the sports of men set at liberty from punishment and censure. Have there not been whole nations, and those of the most civilized people, amongst whom the exposing their children, and leaving them in the fields to perish by want or wild beasts has been the practice; as little condemned or scrupled as the begetting them? Do they not still, in some countries, put them into the same graves with their mothers, if they die in childbirth; or despatch them, if a pretended astrologer declares them to have unhappy stars? And are there not places where, at a certain age, they kill or expose their parents, without any remorse at all?”

This is a very preliminary exercise and I have never really thought the issue through before. I without question concur that the conscience can be informed and deformed, and it is certainly no infallible rule. But I don’t think the issue can settled as easily as before and after the Enlightenment. 

Kuyper, Common Grace.19 (Original Righteousness Continued)

01 Tuesday Dec 2020

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The previous post in this series may be found here.

Kuyper continues on with the issue of original righteousness in Adam: Was righteousness a supernatural addition to human nature? In this chapter Kuyper examines the issue from a different direction: Whence disordered or rebellious desire in human beings?

He presents the contrast between the Roman Catholic and the Reformed understanding of the question. 

The Roman Catholic view (he cites to Bellarmine) explains it thus: The mater which makes up human nature is inherently subject to this defect. To create a human being is to create a being capable of defecting and such defection is an unavoidable consequence of making human beings from matter:

Bellarmine, the skillful Roman Catholic polemicist, who has argued the case for the Roman Catholic side of this doctrine most thoroughly, returns time and again to the point that the temptation to sin lies in the makeup of our nature. Thus he says among other things, “The desire of the flesh is at present a punishment for sin, but for man in his natural state this condition would undoubtedly have been natural, not as a given positive aspect of his nature, but as a deficiency, yes, even as a certain sickness of his nature, that flowed from the constitution of matter.”

If this is so, then there is something matter which is inherently contrary to God. If God could have created a human without this defect inherent in matter, then God could have/should have done so. That God did not create such a human being argues that God could not make such a being and still use matter. There thus must be something ultimately incorrigible in matter.

So, the “fountain of sin” lies in the very fact that we are human beings: which is a deduction Kuyper makes from Bellarmine’s understanding of human nature. Since this “fountain” bubbles up as its own accord, a sinful desire is not sinful. It only become sinful when the will consents to the desire. There must be a second move to turn a desire for sin into a sinful desire. 

He makes the observation that the Reformed and Roman Catholic positions differ not on the doctrine of the Trinity but on the doctrine of humanity. Our anthropologies differ: this is the place where the two diverge. Sin does not have its origin in something inherent in the physical body and the soul, but rather has its source in the spiritual (not the physical). Satan a pure spirt without body introduced humanity to sin. 

Human beings were created with original righteousness, not as a supernatural addition but as something inherent in humanity – but that this original righteousness exists in our dependence – not independence from God. 

Kuyper then draws out an implication from this fact of dependence: Human beings were not created with humanity as the end, the purpose of humanity. Human beings were created for God and God’s purposes. Human beings were specifically created to glorify God; God creates us for His glory. 

There is another corollary which Kuyper draws: If human beings have some purpose other than God’s glory, if there is some purpose, some end which we should/may achieve other than God’s glory, then God becomes an instrument to help us achieve that end. God becomes a tool in our effort to achieve our glory. 

God created Adam in such a way, with excellency and glory, because such an Adam was needful for God’s aim. God did not need Adam, but it did please God to create Adam and to work through Adam and to so sustain Adam by grace. 

Abraham Kuyper, Common Grace.11 (The legitimacy of government)

16 Thursday Apr 2020

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The previous post on this book by Kuypermay be found here:

Chapter 11 concerns the basis for the institution of government.  It is Kuyper’s contention that Genesis 9:6 forms the basis for the institution of government among human beings:

Genesis 9:6 (ESV)

6           “Whoever sheds the blood of man,

by man shall his blood be shed,

for God made man in his own image.

The argument proceeds as follows. First, Kuyper disposes of the three common theories for the institution of government. In this, he is looking for a moral justification, a moral legitimacy for government.

He begins with the age-old government by conquest: someone uses forces to kill and steal and by violence controls some territory and human beings. For as long as the conqueror maintains power, he maintains his position. After many years, the conquest becomes tradition and the murder is crowned with legitimacy. He notes the irony of giving a reward for murder for the sake of theft.  This is not real justice but rather a reward for sin.  And so, this cannot be a firm basis for true legitimacy in power.

Second, he considers the “social contract” theory: a group of free individuals contract with one another for the creation of the government. The sovereignty resides in the “people” who freely enter into a new arrangement. This runs into two problems: One, the initial social contracting event never took place. Two, even if such did happen, the contract has no power bind the children of these people who will then their own sovereign right to reject their parents’ decisions.

Third, there is the possibility of spontaneous design: governments just happen. And while this does take, it is an immoral pantheistic understanding of moral order. It is irrelevant how the government comes to be; only, it just does come to be.

None of these theories meet the moral case. Rather, Kuyper roots the fact of government in the common grace of God.

His construction of this argument is based upon the principle that authority derives solely from God:

We urgently request our readers to place all the requisite emphasis on this. The one true position that Scripture points out to us is that as people we by nature have authority over nothing. All authority belongs to God and God alone. All things belong to him and nothing to you. You have no authority over anything, no matter what it might be, unless God grants you this authority. (98)

Using the chapters of Genesis, he then lays out places were God grants authority to human beings: authority over the animals, authority to eat plants and later to eat animals, and so forth. He contrasts this with God’s withholding of authority to eat from the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The fact that there are any government lies in the delegation of God’s authority in some measure to human beings. Governments are things ultimately appointed by God:

Romans 13:1 (ESV)

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.

This does not mean that all authorities in existence are good, moral or right. But it does mean that as part of God’s common grace he has bestowed government into the world as a thing which can come into existence.

There are other questions, not addressed by Kuyper at this point, concerning the right use of that authority.

He then lays the original institution of the fact of human government into the world at Genesis 9:6.

There are two ways to understand God’s grant of authority in these instances. First, a grant of authority could merely be a matter of permission. For example God tells Adam that you may eat from this tree but not that tree. Adam has the physical ability to defy the law and to exceed the grant of authority. Whether Adam abides by the grant of authority.

A second way to understand the grant of authority to understand it as not merely permission but also possibility. When God grants dominion to Adam and Eve in creation, he did not merely grant permission but in the grant made the matter so.

Kuyper confesses the possibility that some sort of government may have existed prior to the Flood; but if it did so, it did so without a basis in a grant from God. The exercise of such authority would be similar to the rebellion in the Garden.

 

Kuyper, Common Grace 1.7

19 Thursday Sep 2019

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In the seventh chapter of Common Grace, Kuyper comes to:

5 And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning:

from every beast I will require it

and from man.

From his fellow man I will require a reckoning

for the life of man.

Genesis 9:5 (ESV)

First, the verse concerns God’s “reckoning”; not human reckoning (that comes in verse 6).

Second, God will judge the killing of a human being.

This judgment is apart from capital punishment and human government, which dealt with in verse 6.

He lists three ways in which God will deal with the human murderer: (1) conscience; (2) providential punishment (the way in which the murderer’s life will play out will provide a punishment); (3) eternal punishment.

A temporal punishment, such as conscience and providence which leads to repentance would be a grace. To not be lead to repentance but rather suffer eternal punishment is a far greater act of justice and retribution than any temporal response.

Third, God will require a reckoning from both predatory animals and from human beings.

Fourth, he notes a distinction made between the acts of animals and humans. In the first sentence, God notes especially the shedding of blood. This applies to both animals and humans. But in the parallel verse, which pertains only to human beings, God speaks of taking the “life”, the nephesh, which also means the soul of a human being.

The reason for this distinction lies in the fact that a human being does not kill for “blood” (eating) in the way an animal does. A human kills to take a life. God will require blood from the animal, but a life from the human.

Fifth, on question as to the extent of the flood, he offers this explanation. The “whole world” is used in various senses and must be read in context. Thus, “The whole world has gone after him” (John 12:19) does not mean every human being in the world, but only those who have come into contact with him.

 

The contextual use of the phrase “the whole world” in the Flood Narrative is difficult to determine. It unquestionably means a flood sufficient to kill all human beings: that is apparent from the direct purpose of the narrative. Whether the narrative demands that portions of the earth uninhabited by human beings was also flooded is more difficult to establish. It could mean that the entire globe was awash. But there is room for debate on the interpretation.

Kuyper on Common Grace 1.6

04 Wednesday Sep 2019

Posted by in Abraham Kuyper, Genesis, Uncategorized

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The previous post in this series may be found here. 

Genesis 9:3–5 (ESV)

3 Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. 4 But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. 5 And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.

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Goya, Three Salmon Steaks

In chapter six, Kuyper considers the provisions of the Noahic covenant which pertain to the relationship between animals and human beings. He will conclude that the primary basis for this command is to erect a clear demarcation between human beings and animals.

First, human beings may animals as well as plants.

Second, human beings must be distinguished from animals, in that we will not eat living animals. In distinction from animals and in reverence to God, the animal must first be dead before it may be eaten.

Third, animals are not given the equivalent right to eat human beings.

Some further observations.

Three points of elaboration.

Kuyper notes the Noahic covenant has no foreshadowing of the New Covenant in the way the Mosaic Covenant points forward to the coming Messiah. He refers to the Mosaic Covenant as being a covenant of shadows – and that the foreshadowing did not start until the giving of circumcision and the coming of Israel.

As to killing animals, he contends rightly that this is a provision of the Noahic covenant – it is not based upon the creation order.  Kuyper notes how we naturally revolt against killing animals – it takes some to overcome that hesitancy.

Kuyper also infers a high degree of barbarism in the pre-flood world, such that limitations on tearing animals in the manner of beasts and restrictions on cannibalism were necessary as a common grace restraint.

He notes that by requiring the life to depart to God who gave it, we are giving deference to God in the taking of the animal. Calvin, who informs a great deal of Kuyper’s thought on this subject writes in his commentary:

This ought justly to be deemed by us of greater importance, that to eat the flesh of animals is granted to us by the kindness of God; that we do not seize upon what our appetite desires, as robbers do, nor yet tyrannically shed the innocent blood of cattle; but that we only take what is offered to us by the hand of the Lord. We have heard what Paul says, that we are at liberty to eat what we please, only we do it with the assurance of conscience, but that he who imagines anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean, (Romans 14:14.) And whence has this happened to man, that he should eat whatever food he pleased before God, with a tranquil mind, and not with unbridled license, except from his knowing, that it has been divinely delivered into his hand by the right of donation? Wherefore, (the same Paul being witness,) the word of God sanctifies the creatures, that we may purely and lawfully feed on them, (1 Timothy 4:5.) Let the adage be utterly rejected which says,‘that no one can feed and refresh his body with a morsel of bread, without, at the same time, defiling his soul.’Therefore it is not to be doubted, that the Lord designed to confirm our faith, when he expressly declares by Moses, that he gave to man the free use of flesh, so that we might not eat it with a doubtful and trembling conscience. At the same time, however, he invites us to thanksgiving. On this account also, Paul adds “prayer” to the “word”, in defining the method of sanctification in the passage recently cited.

John Calvin, Genesis, electronic ed., Calvin’s Commentaries, 1998, Ge 9:3.

 

Why Common Grace is Not Enough (or even Necessary) for Counseling

20 Wednesday Dec 2017

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, Psychology, Uncategorized

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I am working on an essay for the Journal of Biblical Soul Care on the matter of common grace. If anyone has a comment, I would appreciate it. [Sorry for the formatting oddities]

Schematic representation of (1) why Biblical Counseling holds that the Scripture and the Spirit are sufficient for counseling; and (2) Biblical Counseling holds that common grace is not sufficient, nor even necessary for counseling. (This is not to say that common grace observations are not useful, nor that such observations are untrue.  Yet if the Scripture is sufficient for counseling, then counseling can be conducted without reference to a common grace observation.)

 

God

Loss of the created relationship: sin

Man

Gen. 3

This loss flows downward into two separate, but related streams of injury.

 

Sin causes:

 

Subjective/Internal Injury

loss of the image in some respect. (The precise nature of the loss of image due to sin is debated. But at the very least this loss is what is renewed: Col. 3:10.) There is sin, shame and unrepentance.

 

 

The injury

1) makes the man incapable of responding to the objective injuries with joy and contentment;

2) contributes to and creates more objective/external injuries:

a) our personal sin

b) our sin against others

c) our foolishness and sin which cause human and natural injuries (such as a poorly built house which collapses).

 

 

 

 Objective/External Injury

Physical Death

Pain of work

Hostile Environment

Human relationship difficulties

Hostility of spiritual beings

Eternal punishment

 

These things cause additional damage as human beings suffer from the effects of sin and decay (both personal and “natural”).

 

 

 

 

Psychological and emotional injuries fit into both categories: We begin with a damaged human being: both in mind and body. That human being suffers at the hands of others, himself and the sin of others. These injuries show up in the body and mind.

 

Grace

 

Special Grace is given for the restoration of the subjective injury: this is referred to as salvation: justification & sanctification. The renewal of the mind.

 

  

Common grace is given to ameliorate full effects of the objective injury of sin. These injuries cannot be remedied in this age, because sin necessitates death (and all the lesser included injuries).

 

Common grace gives men an understanding of some of the objective, physical effects of sin.

 

 

A note on what can be seen: When we consider the suffering which human beings experience, all human beings (by common grace) can those things which occur in the material universe; however, spiritual elements (the relationship between God and man) cannot be rightly seen or understood without God’s revelation. Human beings do intuit that such a level of explanation exists, and those the various religious and metaphysical explanations of humanity. (See, Daniel Strange, There Rock is not Our Rock).

“To my knowledge, Scripture never uses hen or charis to refer to his blessings on creation generally or on nonelect humanity. So it would perhaps be better to speak of God’s common goodness, or common love, rather than his common grace. The word grace in Scripture tends to be more narrowly focused on redemption than goodness and love, though the latter terms also have rich redemptive associations.”

Frame, John M.. Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Christian Belief (p. 246). P&R Publishing. Kindle Edition.

Restoration

 

The mind begins renewal in this age

 

 

 

 The objective injuries will not be renewed until the age to come. Common grace is given so that men will not immediately be annihilated nor destroy one-another.

 

Special grace, as granted by the Holy Spirit and the Word of God, is sufficient to remedy the injury to the mind, to the soul.  Special grace informs us of the true basis for the injury and so transforms the mind/heart of man that the man may be able to bear with contentment the injuries and losses which beset us in this age. As the mind is renewed, the man becomes capable of having the fruit of the Spirit and contentment irrespective of the state of one’s personal history, current condition, or physical limitations.

Any examination of the human condition aside from common grace tells us only of the objective, external injuries of sin. Common grace tells us that a man has a disease; or that a man has mistreated by another; or that a man engages in bad acts and espouses a bad motive. Common grace does not tell us why men die (beyond that told us in general revelation). Moreover, common grace cannot remedy the injury caused by sin. For example, medicine may lessen some physical ailment and even postpone death: medicine cannot overcome death absolutely. Common grace may impose limitations on the ability of men to sin against one-another it cannot remedy sin.

In short, common grace seeks to temporarily change the environment; special grace seeks to change the heart.

When this comes to psychology: common grace, at best, can inform some ways to maneuver the objective troubles; but common grace cannot teach us to be content, joyful and loving despite our objective troubles. Common grace observations (if you will) may tell us that children who grow up in abusive circumstances will exhibit more unhappiness on average than those who do not. This is true because sin injures us inside and out, and sin teaches us to sin. Common grace may even notice that sinful patterns have distinct and repetitive patterns. But common grace was never meant to renew the mind and conform us to the image of Christ.

 

Unless and until the relationship with God is restored and the inner man renew

 

No matter how good the common grace observation or strategy; common grace cannot transform the relationship between God and man, and thus cannot transform the man.

 

Addendum:

This is from an email exchange with an OT PhD:

For purposes of this paper, I need only take the existing view(s). Kuyper’s position is important because many of the integrationists quote Kuyper out of context. Kuyper made some sweeping comments about “all the creation” here and there. Since his work on Common Grace (which is massive. Only vol. 1 has been translated into English, there are three volumes; Lexham is publisher), these comments have been used to support a sweeping vision of “common” or even “creation” grace. Kuyper has a narrower definition of common grace than Calvin.

The phrase “common grace” is also problematic because the Bible never calls this “grace”. It is better to call it God’s goodness. I think Kuyper is right that God extended additional goodness in the covenant of Noah — Kuyper’s understanding makes sense of the “as in the days of Noah” language. He says that when the Son of Perdition appears God will withdraw the goodness offered at the time of Noah.

There are two basic elements which are attributed: human achievement and the restraint of sin (human achievement is present in Genesis 4; there is also some mercy shown to Cain: but Cain seems to be limited to Cain). These are emphasized by Calvin and Kuyper respectively. I have not found any analysis of the comparison and contrast between the views: which is interesting. Perhaps there is something in Dutch or German. There is a third element which is the perpetuation of the material world in a regular manner (albeit deteriorating; Rom. 8).

I think there is some work that should be done on this point. Most recent statements in systematics merely quote John Murray’s essay.

All I need to (and can) in this paper is demonstrate that under any of the existing theories of common grace/goodness do not support (1) a proper understanding of Man’s psychological injury; and (2) cannot provide a proper remedy for Man’s psychological injury. Common grace is meant only to ameliorate temporal injury to permit the continued existence of mankind for the purposes of God in creation (primarily, thought not exclusively for the preservation of mankind until the in-time salvation of the elect).