Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18

brill.com/jrt

Common Grace and the Ends of Creation in and

Jeffrey Skaff Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, nj, usa [email protected]

Abstract

Despite its marginal place in contemporary dogmatics, the doctrine of common grace potentially has much to offer to a theological account of the created order. Describing its relationship to special grace, however, to salvation, is no easy task. This article finds that Abraham Kuyper—the most prominent supporter of the doctrine—attempts to describe this relationship in two ultimately irreconcilable ways. In addition, it argues that only one of these ways—one in which common grace is always ordered to special grace—is acceptable. Such an account, which is defended by Kuyper’s contemporary Herman Bavinck, provides the basis for an understanding of the created order that should resonate with Christian theologians both inside and outside the Neo-Calvinist tradition, including those who have been influenced by Karl Barth.

Keywords common grace – Kuyper – Bavinck – created order

The Necessity of Common Grace

The doctrine of common grace, as articulated by Abraham Kuyper, attempts to address two closely related problems, one theological and one experiential. The theological problem arises especially in the Reformed tradition: if sin is as horrible and pervasive as Reformed theologians have often affirmed—if, in the words of the Westminster Confession of Faith, “we are utterly indis- posed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2015 | doi: 10.1163/15697312-00901003 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 4 skaff evil”1—why did God not simply obliterate humankind after the fall? How are we to explain not only God’s preservation of creation and creaturely life, but also God’s bestowal of blessings on fallen humanity? Furthermore, and this is the experiential dilemma, God’s blessings undeniably fall on the righteous and the unrighteous (Matthew 5:45). What are Christians to make of the fact that God blesses those who do not know the God of Israel and of Jesus Christ? Furthermore, how do we account for the wisdom and truth, and also the remarkable acts of love and justice, found outside the walls of the church? That is, how do we explain the presence of pagan virtue? Much to his credit, Abraham Kuyper brought these questions to the forefront of Reformed theological discourse (or at least to Dutch Reformed theological discourse). He did so, however, not simply because of the theological conun- drums they pose. He was well aware that the answers to these questions had immediate implications for how (and if) Christians engage in society and pol- itics. In his writings on common grace, the target of Kuyper’s attacks is often his opponents within the church who believe there are areas of life that stand apart from the Christian faith. “The word ‘Christian’ seems appropriate to you only when it concerns certain matters of faith or things directly connected with the faith … but all the remaining spheres of life fall for you outside the Christ. In the world you conduct yourself as others do; that is less holy, almost unholy, territory which must somehow take care of itself.”2 Kuyper understood the atti- tude of these Christians to contradict another core Reformed belief: all of life is lived in the presence of God. Unsurprisingly, since the problems which common grace addresses arise out of fundamental Reformed theological convictions, Kuyper found resources for a solution latent in earlier Reformed theology. He could justifiably appeal to historical precedent for the doctrine of common grace in passages like the fol- lowing from Calvin’s Institutes: “Amid [the] corruption of nature there is some place for God’s grace; not such grace as to cleanse it, but to restrain it inwardly.”3 Like Calvin, Kuyper believed that common grace acts to restrain sin. After the fall, he writes, without common grace “life on earth would immediately have turned into a hell.”4 In addition to restraining sin, common grace per-

1 “The Westminster Confession of Faith,” in The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (u.s.a.), Part 1: Book of Confessions (Louisville: Geneva Press, 1996), vi. 2 Abraham Kuyper, “Common Grace,” in Abraham Kuyper: A Centennial Reader, ed. James D. Bratt (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), p. 172. His emphasis. 3 , Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2006), p. 292. 4 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 169. Kuyper’s conservative critics who believe he downplays the

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 5 forms a positive function.5 God offered this universal grace so that the “infinite number of nuclei for high human development” deposited in creation would be allowed to develop.6 This “high human development” is on display “wher- ever civic virtue, a sense of domesticity, natural love, the practice of human virtue, the improvement of public conscience, integrity, mutual loyalty among people, and a feeling for piety leaven life,” as well as “when human power over nature increases, when invention upon invention enriches life, when interna- tional communication is improved, the arts flourish, the sciences increase our understanding, the conveniences and joys of life multiply, all expressions of life become more vital and radiant, forms become more refined, and the general image of life becomes more winsome.”7 In response to the theological problem of the effects of sin, the doctrine of common grace suggests that God universally bestows grace to keep the power of sin in check. Likewise, to the experiential problem, the existence of human flourishing and virtue outside the church, Kuyper points to the outworking of common grace, an outworking that unlocks the full potential of human beings created in the image of God. Because this grace is universal, Christians have no excuse for not living in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ (Philippians 1:27) in all “spheres” of which they are a part. Moreover, the doctrine of common grace provides the impetus for Christian involvement in the development of science and technology, and in political reforms that aim to increase human well-being.

Common and Special Grace as Parallel Historical Tracks

So far, so good. The extent to which one finds this solution satisfying depends in large part on its theological specification. The issue hovering over any account

breadth and depth of sin in creation are mistaken. The need for the doctrine of common grace arises from Kuyper’s belief in the extent of sin’s power, not from downplaying its significance. See, for example, David Engelsma, Common Grace Revisited (Grandville: Reformed Free Pub- lishing Association, 2003), pp. 34–41. Interestingly, it is Calvin himself who could be accused of downplaying the significance of sin, if the total inability to do good is the standard. Calvin can speak of “traces of the image of God” remaining in humanity after the fall that are evident in human reason. Calvin, Institutes, vol. 1, p. 277. 5 This is one reason why those who do not affirm something like Westminster Confession’s understanding of total depravity might still find value in the doctrine of common grace. 6 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 178. 7 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 181.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 6 skaff of common grace is its relation to “special” grace, to the grace “which in the end abolishes sin and completely undoes its consequences.”8 One way the issue can be framed is in terms of the eternal whence and whither of special and common grace. Do special grace and common grace issue from the same agent and do they have the same end? Kuyper unequivo- cally answers both questions in the affirmative. As to the agent, Kuyper argues, “The Son of God with the Father and the Holy Spirit himself determines the plan of the world. He is not enlisted by his Decree and for the execution of that Decree, but that Decree is His.”9 This decree encompasses both creation and redemption, and thus both common and special grace. Likewise, Kuyper explicitly affirms that the eternal end of both is the glory of God. In Kuyper’s words, their end is in “the Son’s glorification of the Father’s love, and so in the aggrandizement of the perfections of our God.”10 Though Kuyper says that common and special grace issue from the same agent, those with Barthian sympathies might challenge the adequacy of Kuy- per’s account of the being of the Son. When Kuyper insists, “Christ is at the head and is made central not insofar as he became our brother but because he is the Son of God the Father,” some might question the distinction being drawn between the Son’s being in eternity and his activity in time. Is the incarnation accidental to the being of the Son or is it somehow essential to who he is? More pointedly, in what sense is Jesus Christ fully divine?11 Because one of the motivations behind the Barthian critique of the being of the Son is the refusal to describe any of God’s activities in creation in such a way that they are not determined by the history of Jesus Christ, I will move on to a discussion of the relation of common and special grace in history, rather than pursuing this “ontological” line of critique explicitly, important though it is.12 If there are problems with Kuyper’s account of the being of the Son, this will likely play out in his articulation of the opera Dei ad extra. The best way to begin investigating the relation of common and special grace in creation is to ask what, in Kuyper’s view, God’s appointed end is for humankind. Kuyper refers to both temporal and eternal ends for humankind

8 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 168. 9 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 185. His emphasis. 10 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 171. 11 Kuyper draws attention to the fact that where one comes down on these questions largely depends on one’s interpretation of John 1, especially verse 14. 12 For a pursuit of this line of critique, see Cambria Kaltwasser, “Assessing the Christolog- ical Foundations of Kuyper’s Doctrine of Common Grace,” in The Kuyper Center Review, Volume 2, ed. John Bowlin (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011), pp. 200–220.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 7

(though he does not use that language, as far as I know). Temporally, the end of humankind is “high human flourishing,” the natural human flourishing grounded in creation that is evidenced in human virtue as well as in (at least some) technological and scientific progress. The eternal end of humankind is fellowship with God. Common grace and special grace correspond, respec- tively, to these temporal and eternal ends. Though it risks oversimplifying matters, there are two main ways by which we can envision how common and special grace interact in the created order. The first, which I will focus on in this section of the paper, resists trying to coordinate the temporal and eternal ends of humankind. Importantly, this does not imply that there is no higher unity in them—their origin and end in God remain. Neither does it imply that there cannot be a certain priority to humanity’s eternal end—certainly fellowship with God is a greater good than natural human flourishing. What it does imply is that common and special grace operate in parallel with one another and only indirectly and occasionally intersect with each other in history. While Herman Bavinck identifies this as the Roman Catholic position—I will withhold judgment about whether he is right to do so—Roman Catholics are certainly not the only ones who hold to it. Bavinck writes, “According to the viewpoint of Rome, there exists in the divine mind two conceptions of man and thus also a double moral law, two sorts of love, and a twofold destination or goal.”13 In many instances, however, this viewpoint could easily be ascribed to Kuyper. For example, Kuyper writes, “The social side of man’s creation in God’s image has nothing to do with salvation nor in any way with each person’s state before God … the highly ramified development of humanity acquires a significance of its own, an independent goal, a reason for being aside from the issue of salvation.”14 For Kuyper, these two streams within creation are so independent that the progress of “the social side of man’s creation in the image of God” may “even clash openly with an interior development in holiness and become a temptation to the believer.”15 Kuyper also does not find it necessary for these two ends of creation to be linked up in the eschaton. He does not believe it matters whether the full realization of this “independent goal” is “consumed in the coming cosmic conflagration.”16 At least some contemporary Neo-Calvinists follow Kuyper in positing two or more distinct goals in creation.

13 Herman Bavinck, “Common Grace,” transl. R.C. Van Leeuwen, Calvin Theological Journal 27 (1992), p. 45. 14 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 178. 15 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 179. His emphasis. 16 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 179.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 8 skaff

Richard Mouw writes, “I am insisting that as God unfolds his plan for his creation, he is interested in more than one thing. Alongside of God’s clear concern about the eternal destiny of individuals are his designs for the larger creation.”17 This way of understanding the relationship of common and special grace is fraught with problems.18 In the first place, it seems to introduce schizophrenia into God’s intentions for creation. Why would God create with two purposes in mind, purposes that have little to do with each other?19 (The Barthian critiques of what this might imply about the being of God are relevant here.) Perhaps, one might argue, the ends of humanity only diverged from each other after the fall. This does not take one very far though, as one still needs to explain how the ends were coordinated prior to the fall, as well as why God did not bring them back together in redemption. Assuming that anyone who holds to this position believes that fellowship with God is a greater good than natural flourishing, then the further question rises of why God willed natural flourishing at all. Why is there a lesser end for human creatures alongside fellowship with God? A moral question follows: Why does God create persons who will contribute in important ways to the ends of common grace, and as such act in accordance with God’s will for the created order, only then to send them to Hell for eternity? One could respond to all of these “Why?” questions by appealing to the mystery of God’s will.20 The best way to respond to this appeal is simply to move to other criticisms of this position, after which one could press the seeming contradiction between God’s hidden and revealed wills, thus reintroducing the charge of schizophrenia. Separating special and common grace also risks introducing a dualistic understanding of creation. The temporal end of human creatures would likely

17 Richard Mouw, He Shines in All That’s Fair: Culture and Common Grace (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), p. 50. 18 What follows are simply some of the implications of conceptions that treat common and special grace as parallel tracks in history.The fact that Kuyper himself rejects some of these consequences reveals the tensions in his thought. 19 David Engelsma, a Reformed critic of the doctrine of common grace, and almost certainly not a sympathetic reader of Barth, also criticizes the idea of “multiple divine purposes.” “Against this proposal of an independent cultural purpose of God with history, there is a weighty objection. The objection is decisive. Jesus Christ is not behind this cultural purpose! Jesus Christ is not in this cultural purpose as it unfolds in history! Jesus Christ is not the goal of this purpose of God with creation and history!” Engelsma, Common Grace Revisisted, p. 80. 20 Mouw, He Shines in All That’s Fair, p. 50.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 9 be seen to have to do with this world, and the eternal end with the world to come, or the afterlife. Since the eternal end has precedence, temporal crea- turely life could then be regarded as unimportant. Ironically, then, the more one separates common and special grace, the less reason there is for Chris- tians to be involved in society, thus undercutting one of the main motivations for developing the teaching on common grace in the first place.21 It is possible that involvement in the world could still be construed as an act of obedience grounded in Christian belief, but it is hard to imagine how the motivations for doing so could be anything other than self-centered. Even if motivations were God-centered—one might say, for example, that one is involved in cre- ation because God loves creation—the transitory nature of creation and its strong subordination to the supernatural ends of humanity makes it difficult to uphold even the relative goodness of creation. This is especially the case if one takes seriously Kuyper’s remark mentioned earlier, that the full realization of the development of creation may simply be consumed in the eschaton. Within a scheme that tends to separate the outworking and ends of common and special grace, the significance of Christ’s death on the cross is either severely limited in scope, is bifurcated, or both.22 It might be limited in that its atoning significance is only thought to affect the end of special grace—it only concerns human souls, and especially their state in the afterlife. In this way of thinking, Christ’s redeeming work, at best, only indirectly concerns the natural ends of human creatures, the ends of common grace. One could argue that those who are sanctified in Christ are better able to contribute to the ends of common grace. Kuyper suggests this might happen when “a wide variety of customs, usages, mores, and laws are current that clearly manifest the influence of divine revelation and are followed by a broad class of people who personally want nothing to do with faith or conversion.”23 Or it might occur on a smaller scale where “the personal confessors of Jesus in their own circle allow the life of common grace to be controlled by the principles of divine revelation.”24 However one might describe this indirect influence of Christ’s atoning work on common grace and the natural ends of the created order, a

21 Bavinck frequently recognizes this connection between dualism and asceticism. See, for example, Herman Bavinck, “The Catholicity of Christianity and the Church,” trans. John Bolt, Calvin Theological Journal 27 (1992), pp. 228–229. 22 Louis Berkhof, who follows Kuyper in most respects, recognizes that Kuyper inadequately describes how common grace is related to the atoning work of Christ. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), p. 437. 23 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 199. 24 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 200.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 10 skaff limitation on the extent of Christ’s work remains, since Christ’s work only truly redeems individuals. Any such limitation stands at considerable odds with key scriptural texts (e.g., John 3:16–17 and 2Corinthians 5:19) and undercuts the force of Christian belief in both the incarnation and resurrection. Holding fast to a separation of common and special grace might also lead to bifurcation of the work of Christ. At times Kuyper especially seems to stumble at this point. He writes, “Our Savior made whole the sick and fed the hungry, but the paramount thing in His ministry was, after all, that in strict allegiance to the Scriptures of the Old Covenant, He openly proclaimed His own Divinity and Mediator ship.”25 Why should healing the sick and proclaiming his divinity be distinguished so sharply?26 This bifurcation becomes even more apparent when Kuyper argues that in “reflecting on Christ,” we should not “think exclu- sively of the blood shed in atonement,” but also consider “the significance of Christ for the body,for the visible world, and for the outcome of world history.”27 This leaves the impression that “the blood shed in atonement” does not in itself concern the body, the visible world, and the outcome of world history, which stands in contrast to Colossians 1:20: “Through [Christ] God was pleased to rec- oncile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” Based on the passage cited, it is hard to imag- ine how Kuyper understands Christ’s blood shed on the cross to include the reconciliation of earthly things. If common and special grace are separated from each other there can be no articulation of “evangelical ethics,” ethics that arise from the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Christian social ethics, since they concern the natural ends of creatures, would fall entirely within the realm of common grace, and, as such, would only need to look to creation as the source of their norms. While there may indeed be a place for reflection on the created order within Christian ethics, if creation is not understood through the light of special grace then, aside from the problem mentioned previously about the limiting of Christ’s work, much of the critical potential of distinctly Christian convictions is lost. Whether it is intentional

25 Abraham Kuyper, Lectures on (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1931), pp. 187–188. See also Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism, p. 174. 26 Karl Barth better captures the witness of Scripture when he writes, “the deed and word or the word and deed of Jesus are twofold in their unity. In both we have His self-declaration, the indication of the kingdom of God drawn near in Him … For the most part the Word precedes and the act follows. But neither is lacking even where one or the other alone is mentioned or receives prominence.” Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, vol. 4, part 3: second half (Edinburgh: t&t Clark, 1962), p. 862. 27 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 172.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 11 or not, special revelation, because it only concerns the ends of special grace, is disqualified at the outset from challenging what might appear to be the obvious outworking of common grace. Kuyper in particular risked being co-opted by whatever contemporary norms seemed to indicate the development of the potentialities of creation because he associated the movement of common grace with progress and development in human history. “Common grace … precipitates a series of successive centuries. If that series of centuries is not directed toward an endless, unvarying repetition of the same things, then over the course of those centuries there has to be constant change, modification, transformation in human life. Though it pass through periods of deepening darkness, this change has to ignite ever more light, consistently enrich human life, and so bear the character of perpetual development from less to more, a progressively fuller unfolding of life.”28 In sum, any position such as Kuyper’s that describes the movement and ends of common and special grace in creation as mostly or completely independent cannot satisfactorily uphold Christian beliefs about God, God’s will, creation, atonement, and ethics. An appeal to the unity of the two graces in the eternal glory of God does little to rehabilitate the position—there are simply too many remaining problems.

Coordinating Common and Special Grace

Thankfully, not all of Kuyper’s thought points in this direction. At times he conceives of another way special grace and common grace interact in history. In this alternative view, common grace is always ordered to special grace. In the first place, Kuyper affirms the restraining element of common grace was necessary for the birth of the elect. “Had Adam and Eve died the day they sinned, Seth would not have been born from them, nor Enoch from Seth … On that basis alone all special grace assumes common grace … Without the latter the former cannot function.”29 In addition, the Reformed confession maintains “that all things, also in this world, aim at the Christ, that his Body is the key component, and that in this sense one can say the church of Christ forms the center of world history.”30 I will return to the question of the extent to which Kuyper contradicts himself within his writings on common grace,

28 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 174. His emphasis. 29 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 169. His emphasis. 30 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 170. His emphases.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 12 skaff but at this point one might simply note the difficulty of reconciling these passages with what he writes about “an independent goal”31 of creation and about the possibility of the fruits of common grace simply being consumed at the moment of their “full visible realization.”32 As this way of thinking is only one strand of Kuyper’s reflections on common grace, and, as is well known, he was not a careful systematic thinker, I will turn to one of his friends and contemporaries, Herman Bavinck, to look for more theological specification of this position. Bavinck strongly opposed all attempts to refer to a twofold “destination or goal” in creation, which, as indicated above, he took to be the Roman Catholic position.33 His articulation of the relation between common and special grace is much more complex. He judges that in the Old Testament, “Common and special grace each flow in their own channels.”34 This is the “economy of divine forbearance and long-suffering.”35 The goal of this temporary arrangement is their coming together again in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Here is Bavinck’s rich description of this reunification:

Christ is of Israel. The New Testament is the full-grown fruit of the old covenant. The portrait of Christ comes into sharp focus only against the tapestry of the Old Testament … Israel was chosen for the sake of all mankind. For a time the gratia specialis dug a channel for itself in Israel, only to flow out into the deep, wide sea of humankind, which had been maintained and preserved for it by the gratia communis … The stream of special grace swells and grows to overflow the banks of the nation Israel. It spreads itself across the face of the entire globe … The two, special and common grace, separated for ages, once again combine. The wild olive tree is engrafted into the good olive tree. And in Abraham’s seed all the families of the earth are blessed.36

For Bavinck, there is no question of whether in Christ special grace infects the whole earth and, therefore, the entire domain of common grace. “The entire world with all its treasures, including matter and the body, marriage and labor, are created and ordained by God … [In Christ’s] resurrection [he] took them

31 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 178. 32 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 179. 33 Bavinck, “Common Grace,” p. 45. 34 Bavinck, “Common Grace,” pp. 40–41. 35 Bavinck, “Common Grace”, p. 41. 36 Bavinck, “Common Grace,” p. 44.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 13 all back as henceforth purified of all sin and consecrated through the Spirit.”37 Elsewhere, he writes, “The Gospel is a joyful tiding not only for the individual person but also for humanity, for the family, for society, for the state, for art and science, for the entire cosmos, for the whole groaning creation.”38 With statements such as these, Bavinck thoroughly distances himself from some of the major problems with positions that separate common and special grace. There is no hint of limiting or bifurcating the work of Christ—Christ’s blood shed on the cross sanctifies all of life, and not simply in an indirect sense (e.g., through sanctified individuals). As such, the stage is set for an account of evangelical ethics. Interestingly, this does not draw an absolute dividing line between Bavinck and Kuyper, as one might expect. There are points where Kuyper unashamedly grounds social action in Christ’s reconciling work. In his essay on poverty, he argues that the Christian response to poverty is grounded in the example of “a Redeemer who, although he was rich, became poor for your sake so that he might make you rich.”39 Statements like these show that Kuyper’s practical instincts were sometimes much better than his theoretical framework. While this element in Kuyper’s thinking, as well as Bavinck’s account of the impact of special grace on common grace, is both straightforward and com- pelling, the precise nature of the reverse relation, of the ordering of common grace to special grace is trickier to identify. For both Kuyper and Bavinck, com- mon grace maintains and preserves humankind for special grace. The language of “maintaining and preserving,” which is deliberately borrowed from Bavinck, is significant. Although Bavinck does not explicitly make the point, later Neo- Calvinists emphasize that common grace is not a praeparatio evangelica.40 While it maintains the field in which special grace will act, it does not directly assist the movement of special grace—it is neither partially nor totally saving. Even so, one might say that the end of common grace is always that of special

37 Herman Bavinck, “Calvin and Common Grace,” Princeton Theological Review 7 (1909), pp. 438–439. One thing this description leaves out is what happens to common grace after Christ. If one says that common grace is waiting for the arrival of special grace, then the immediate effect of Christ’s work would be limited, which Bavinck clearly does not want. It seems that Bavinck should deny the continuance of common grace after the resurrection, since its caretaker role is no longer needed. There is no indication, however, that he ever acknowledged this was an issue. 38 Bavinck, “Catholicity,” p. 224. 39 Abraham Kuyper, TheProblemofPoverty, ed. James W.Skillen (Sioux Center: Dordt College Press, 2011), p. 68. 40 Berkhof, Systematic Theology, p. 437.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 14 skaff grace. This rules out the possibility of two competing wills in God and of inde- pendent goals in creation. The language of maintaining and preserving also has the advantage of eliminating the need to affirm progressive development in human history. One need not affirm with Kuyper that “God has used the cen- turies, step-by-step, to help us discover ever more, ever new things by which our human life could be enriched.”41 Rather, common grace could be said to keep creation in a sort of “waiting state” for special grace. Its purpose is that of a caretaker. But what is the end at which both common and special grace aim? It cannot be simply the disembodied human soul in communion with God in the after- life. This possibility has already been left behind by what Bavinck has said about special grace sanctifying all human life. Positively, Bavinck frequently speaks of grace restoring creation. Jan Veenhof calls this “the refrain that is unceas- ingly repeated” in Bavinck’s theology.42 God’s original purposes for creation as well as the ends revealed and made possible in Christ are thus “this worldly.” The created order is not something that humanity will ultimately transcend. Christ’s work—with particular emphasis on the incarnation and resurrection at this point—affirms God’s will for creation and initiates and guarantees its sanctification by grace. Accordingly, Bavinck frequently states his preference for talking about “sin and grace,” rather than “nature and grace” or “natural and supernatural.”43 A brief statement of the end of common and special grace, and thus human existence, might simply be the following: Fellowship with God in a redeemed and renewed created order. Developing what this means with any more precision is beyond the scope of this paper, in part because Bavinck him- self provides few clues as to how to do so.44 Following Bavinck’s instincts, the

41 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 175. 42 Jan Veenhof, Nature and Grace, trans. Albert Wolters (Sioux Center: Dordt College Press, 2006), p. 17. There is a debate here about whether “renews” fully captures Bavinck’s thought. Does this de-emphasize that special grace glorifies the original creation and brings it to completion? The question is not irrelevant, but cannot be taken up here. See Jon Stanley, “Restoration and Renewal,” in The Kuyper Center Review, Volume 2, ed. John Bowlin (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011), pp. 81–104. 43 See, for example, Bavinck, “Catholicity,” p. 236. 44 Early in his career, Bavinck expressed concern about being able to combine a Ritschlian perspective which emphasizes the fulfillment of earthly vocations and a view that con- siders “contemplation of God and fellowship with him” as “the highest goal:” “Personally, I do not yet see any way of combining the two points of view, but I do know that there is much that is excellent in both, and that both contain undeniable truth.” Quoted on Veen- hof, Nature and Grace, pp. 8–9. It is debatable whether Bavinck ever did combine these positions in a satisfactory way.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 15 most important aspect of a more robust account will be to hold together as closely as possible the temporal and eternal ends of human creatures.45 Keep- ing in mind that the covenant-initiating activity of God is first and foremost concerned with the existence of a people, there can be no opposition between, on the one hand, friendship, love, and justice, as well as the pursuit of wisdom and truth, and, on the other hand, full creaturely fellowship with God. This way of conceiving of the relationship between common and special grace answers the question about the continuance of human life after the Fall by referring to common grace as an exercise of God’s patience as God works to reconcile creation. Christians are those who are God’s ambassadors in the min- istry of reconciliation (2Corinthians 5:18–19), and are therefore called to action in all spheres of life. But what of pagan virtue? Within this scheme, how should Christians understand the wisdom, truth, justice, and love found outside the church? One can only call these “virtues” in a relative sense. Insofar as the spheres of life outside the church are still awaiting the arrival of special grace, all that happens there will be marked by the presence of sin.46 There can be no relaxation of the breadth and depth of the power of sin. Any “true” instances of virtue found outside the walls of the church will be the result of special grace. That being said, pagan virtue can still be relatively good. According to Bavinck, “The love of family and kin, societal and political life, art and science are all in themselves objects of [God’s] divine good pleasure. He delights also in these works of his hands. They all together constitute, not in their mode of being but in their essence, the original order that God called into being and creation and that he still preserves and maintains, sin notwithstanding.”47 It seems, then,

45 Speaking of a unified will in God and linking temporal and eternal ends need not imply universal salvation, though we cannot explore this potential objection from every angle here. Infralapsarians have less of a problem since their subordination of election and reprobation to the decree of creation allows them to conceive of the “decree” for repro- bation in a passive sense. Supralapsarians have to conceive of something like two eternal ends for human creatures. This could be articulated in such a way that any dualism in cre- ation as well as natural limitation in the scope of Christ’s work is eliminated, thus making it preferable to accounts that speak of independent natural and supernatural ends. The only previously cited problem that remains for supralapsarians is possible bifurcation in the being and will of God. 46 As noted above (n. 38), the sense in which common grace continues to wait for special grace after the resurrection—that is, in our current age—is unclear in Bavinck’s thought. 47 Bavinck, “Common Grace,” p. 60. What is the distinction between “mode of being” and “essence”? Bavinck does not say. Also, note again the language of preserving and main- taining. There is no hint of “progressive common grace” here.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 16 skaff that during the period of God’s longsuffering there can be utilization of the gifts of creation in a way that is in some sense good. Bavinck’s account of the relationship between special and common grace, which makes common grace subservient to special grace, addresses the the- ological and experiential concerns which motivated the development of the doctrine in the first place. It also provides theological justification for Chris- tians to be involved in society. Because his account avoids the problems that attend those that seek to separate the temporal outworking and ends of com- mon and special grace, there is every reason to prefer it. This does not mean one must leave Kuyper behind. We have seen instances where Kuyper holds common and special grace together. It should be obvi- ous at this point that I have no interest in trying to bring together what are truly his two competing ways of thinking about common and special grace. S.U. Zuidema, who is himself a sympathetic reader of Kuyper, encourages inter- preters not to try to make Kuyper consistent on this point. In an essay on Kuyper’s doctrine of common grace, Zuidema does not shy away from point- ing to explicit contradictions in Kuyper’s doctrine of common grace along the lines investigated here. Stated succinctly: While at times Kuyper refers to “an independent goal [in creation], a reason for being aside from the issue of salvation,”48 he can also write that apart from the church of Christ, “if [his- tory] should be terminated at some point because the elements of fire and water got the better of earth, the termination would be completely arbitrary; no goal would have been reached, nor any advantage gained.”49 Zuidema sug- gests that Kuyper himself was aware of the difficulties created by developing a polar distinction between common and special grace, and that Kuyper himself “said that any efforts to bring clarity in this problem would be more than wel- come.”50 Zuidema recommends that one best respects Kuyper’s legacy—and is better off theologically—not by trying to find perfect internal consistency in Kuyper’s thought at this point, but by recognizing that the one strand of Kuyper’s thought, the strand that insists on two independent goals in creation, must be rejected, and the other strand brought to the fore.51 With this, I am in full agreement.

48 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 178. 49 Kuyper, “Common Grace,” p. 170. See S.U. Zuidema, “Common Grace and Christian Action in Abraham Kuyper,” in Communication and Confrontation, by S.U. Zuidema (Toronto: Wedge Publishing Foundation, 1971), p. 55. 50 Zuidema, “Common Grace and Christian Action,” 96. See also, Zuidema, “Common Grace and Christian Action,” pp. 54, 100. 51 “No true follower of Kuyper can make a halt before these contradictory statements. He

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access common grace and the ends of creation 17

Beyond Neo-Calvinism

In closing, it is worth briefly mentioning a prominent alternative way of ap- proaching these questions within Reformed theology: the one taken by Karl Barth. He has much in common with those such as Bavinck who emphasize that all things inside and outside the church are ordered towards God’s will for fellowship with humanity. “[All things] take place as they have a part in the his- tory of the covenant. They take place for the sake of this history … they have no significance or value apart from God’s covenant will and work or in indepen- dence of them. They do not have their purpose and goal in themselves or apart from the purpose and goal to which the covenant work of God hastens. They can only hasten with it in the one direction.”52 When discussing the Noahic covenant for instance, Barth can also speak of a gracious activity of God that is “not positively [God’s] redemptive activity … but an activity on the basis of which the nations preserved by God cannot be excluded from His redemptive work.”53 The connection he seems to indicate here between preservation and redemption brings Barth very close to Bavinck. The only significant difference between them on this point is that Barth holds this gracious activity of God (he does not use the term common grace) in an even closer relationship to God’s “positively redemptive activity,” though the two activities are not iden- tical. Barth grounds the activity related to preservation in God’s election and in the history of Jesus Christ, rather than in creation. (Though to the extent that, for Bavinck, creation is ordered towards humanity’s eternal end, the distinc- tion between Bavinck and Barth diminishes further.54) This difference between them plays out in Barth’s conception of “pagan virtue.” Rather than speaking of the goodness of pagan virtue outside the walls of the church by appealing to the goodness of the created order, Barth sees these “lesser lights” and “sec-

will have to choose. As for me, I do not want to make a secret of my position, which is that if there is to be a restoration of Kuyper’s doctrine of common grace in which these contradictions no longer occur, it should be undertaken in no other way than in the way of a full-fledged elaboration of the things Kuyper wrote concerning the Christ and concerning particular [i.e., special] grace which ‘restores the creation in its root.’” Zuidema, “Common Grace and Christian Action,” p. 100. 52 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, vol. 3, part 3 (Edinburgh: t&t Clark, 1961), p. 36. 53 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, vol. 4, part 1 (Edinburgh: t&t Clark, 1956), p. 27. My empha- sis. 54 Zuidema, who is quite critical of Barth elsewhere in the essay, recognizes the commonality between one version of Kuyper (which would include Bavinck) and Barth on this point. Zuidema, “Common Grace and Christian Action,” p. 58.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access 18 skaff ular parables” as reflections of God’s redemptive activity.55 Barth, then, could perhaps affirm their relative goodness more strongly than Bavinck or Kuyper, and could do so (arguably) without diminishing the effects of sin, or hinting at an independent purpose in creation. Dutch Calvinists have typically rejected Barth’s account because they believe it (1) diminishes temporality by doing away with the drama of the history of God’s fellowship with humanity and (2) inevitably leads to universal salvation.56 I mention this simply to indicate some of the ways in which anyone seeking to bring Barth, Bavinck, and Kuyper closer together on their understandings of creation, redemption, and God’s will for creation will have her work cut out for her, whatever similarities they might have.

Conclusion

The theological and experiential questions that common grace addresses can- not be ignored by Christian theologians, especially those in the Reformed tra- dition. They must be addressed for the sake of theological coherency and in order to discern how to witness faithfully and effectively in the world. Though it is easy to caricature, Abraham Kuyper’s work on common grace cannot be ignored or dismissed when answering these questions. Not only is it more com- plicated than both his supporters and detractors often recognize, it has reso- nances in earlier Reformed theology and has proven compelling to many Chris- tians. That being said, part of following after Kuyper means rejecting certain problematic aspects of his thought. What I have tried to argue is that this can be done without leaving Kuyper, his fellow Neo-Calvinists, or other Reformed theologians behind. This sort of nuanced approach will likely provide the best means for articulating a positive account of creation and grace that is faithful to the past, theologically compelling, and appeals to diverse traditions within the one church of Jesus Christ.

55 Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, Vol. 4, part 3: second half (Edinburgh: t&t Clark, 1962), pp. 110–165. 56 The classic presentation of these criticisms is in G.C. Berkouwer, The Triumph of Grace in the Theology of Karl Barth (Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, 1956). Responding to these critiques, which could only be attempted elsewhere, would involve an analysis of Barth’s complex understanding of the relationship between time and eternity. See George Hunsinger, “Mysterium Trinitatis: Karl Barth’s Conception of Eternity,” in Disruptive Grace: Studies in the Theology of Karl Barth (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 186–209.

Journal of Reformed Theology 9 (2015) 3–18 Downloaded from Brill.com09/24/2021 06:22:40PM via free access