Common Grace Revisited

By David J. Engelsma

In light of Scripture and the confessions, the author examines the theory of common grace, challenges its claim to be Reformed truth, and proposes another world-and-life view as an alternative to that... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0916206815
• ISBN13: 9780916206819
• Release Date: July 2003
• Publisher: Reformed Free Publishing Association
• Length: 112 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.3" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

A Tour-de-Force

I have just finished reading a great christian book, "Common Grace Revisited" by David Engelsma. He makes it clear, VERY clear, what is wrong with the doctrine of 'common grace'. Common Grace is the glue that weds the world to the church. It allows christians, muslims and atheists to work and cooperate for the common good of man even though they operate from contrary motives (the motive for the Christian should be to glorify the Christian God in all that he does. Can the atheist and muslim work from that motive?). Its hypothesis is that, since God gives life, prosperity and abilities to those whom He has rejected from eternity, there must be some sense in which He has a favorable attitude toward all of them even though He has determined not to redeem many of them from among the fallen race. But what has Athens to do with Jerusalem, darkness with light, Christ with Belial? Common Grace destroys the Antithesis. David Engelsma makes it clear where this false doctrine eventually leads: a saving attitude toward the reprobate world; in a word, Universalism. The propagators of Common Grace are exposed as those that contradict the doctrines of Sovereign Election and Reprobation, perhaps not with their mouths, but with their hearts. The Reformed thinker must understand that God is as much magnified by His Justice as he is by His Mercy. Many imagine that God is only glorified by His Mercy and that is the very point they go astray. When you get the idea into your head that God loves everybody, without exception, Reprobation will become a hated doctrine that must be explained away (go read Romans 9:13 again). Just because God bestows abilities and gifts on men, that is no sign that God loves them. Are satan and his demons recipients of common grace? They have a longer life, more abilities and more prosperity than them all! They will be cast down to Hell. It is not argued that we should remove ourselves from the world; we are in the world but not of the world, but we should be the ones spreading salt and light unapologetically and rebuking those men and nations who have forgotten God. Don't move the boundary marker that God has set. Reformed teachers are confusing the doctrine of Providence with the doctrine of Grace, creating a category fallacy. That men receive abilities and fortunes is not the favor of Grace but the dispensing of God's all-wise Providence. The Bible still states that the wrath of God abides on the wicked (Reprobates) "continually", so when does favor creep in? No doubt the same time as the wolves in sheeps' clothing creep in, unawares. Notable exponents and propagators of this error are the late Professor John Murray, John Piper, and Iain Murray, who try to argue, confusingly, that what they believe does not discover contradictions in God. Even Reformed professors who deny the arguments of Murray and Piper are going soft. They are too numerous to name. Why, Professor John Murray, because of this error, includes reprobates in the Atonem