Simeon:

GOD’S FORBEARANCE.

2 Pet. iii. 8, 9. Beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

THE compassion of Almighty God has in all ages been abused by ungodly men, and made an occasion of impenitence and persevering wickedness. In the minds of many it has been made a source of triumph against God, as though he were not able or willing to vindicate the honor of his law. Just as our blessed Lord s condescension in noticing an abandoned, but penitent, woman was made by his enemies a reason for doubting whether he was a prophet–since, if he had been really inspired of God, he must have known how unworthy she was of such an honor; so the forbearance of God with an ungodly world has given occasion to “scoffers to say, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.” But such persons forget, that, how ever long God may have borne with the wickedness of men, he has given at the deluge a very awful testimony of his determination to punish it. And, though he now bears with sinners, he reserves the earth for a similar display of his vengeance by fire; and will surely, in due season, execute his threatenings against sin and sinners. In the mean time, how ever, he waits to be gracious to returning penitents, and will gladly lay aside his anger the very instant that they come to him in his appointed way.

The words which I have now read will naturally lead me to show,

I. In what light God s delay of his final judgment should be viewed–

God forbears to punish sinners, because he desires to save them–

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Simeon:

THE MEDIATION OF CHRIST.

1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.

IT is deeply to be regretted that the Holy Scriptures, instead of being improved for the ends for which they were given, have been made an occasion of the most bitter contentions by the very persons who have most professed to reverence their authority. Men have not been satisfied with receiving the dictates of inspiration with child-like simplicity, but have determined to reduce them to systems of their own; and have wrested to their own views every passage that militated against their pre-conceived opinions. The partisans on either side have been equally guilty in this respect. Amongst modern controversialists, none have more divided the Church, or indulged more acrimonious feelings against each other, than Calvinists and Arminians. The one party have taken all those passages which represent God as a Sovereign, dispensing his blessings according to his own will and pleasure, and have made all the rest of the Scriptures bend to them: the other party have done the same with respect to the passages which assert the freedom of the human will, and which speak of men as the sole authors of their own condemnation. It seems never to enter into the minds of either party, that those passages which they set at variance, may, like wheels moving in opposite directions, be in perfect harmony with each other; and that there may be a subserviency, where they see nothing but direct opposition. If they were once brought to consider this, they would be more candid in their interpretation of each other s sentiments, and more cautious of wresting from their plain and obvious meaning the passages which they cannot reconcile with their own exclusive system. The words we have just read are a strong-hold for those who adopt the sentiments which are called Arminian. And how does the Calvinist get over them? how does he make the universality of redemption accord with his particular election? He knows not how to do it in a way that shall agree with his own system; and therefore he denies at once that Christ did give himself a ransom for all; and says, that by “all” is meant some of every description, that is, some of all different ranks and orders of men, Jews and Gentiles, rich and poor. But how much better were it for men to confess their own ignorance, than thus to pervert the word of God! It is true that God acts as a Sovereign; and that salvation, from first to last, is all of grace, whether we can reconcile this truth with every other portion of God’s word, or not: nor are we any more at liberty to distort the passages that appear to militate against this system, than Arminians are to misinterpret those which obstruct their views. There is beyond all doubt a harmony in all the parts of the inspired volume, though we cannot exactly see it: (not but that we might see it, and clearly too, if we entered fully into the idea of the subordination of one set of truths to another): and if we determine to speak all that the Scripture speaks, and as the Scripture speaks it, we shall not be far from the very truth of God. This will not please the partisans of human systems: but it will, as far as such a plan is adopted, produce moderation in our own minds, and forbearance towards all who differ from us.

The way in which the text is introduced deserves particular attention. The Apostle inculcates the duty of “interceding, and giving thanks, for all men” without exception, but especially “for kings and all in authority,” because on them in a very great degree depends the peace and welfare of the Church. As a reason for extending our regards to all, he observes, that God does so in the government of the world, and that Christ has done so in the exercise of re deeming love, seeing that he “had given himself a ransom for all.” The Apostle, whatever be the subject he is treating of, finds an easy and natural transition to Christ, and especially when speaking upon any thing connected with Christian love, of which the love of Christ to us is the great exemplar. This is discovered chiefly in his mediation between God and man: and of that mediation we are led to speak,

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Simeon:

SALVATION FOR ALL.

1 Tim. ii. 3, 4. God our Savior . . . will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

IT is truly lamentable to see how men, in every age, have strained and wrested the Holy Scriptures, in order to make them speak the language of their own particular creed. Some, averse to the idea that God should express his good-will to all the sinners of mankind, limit the word “all,” and make it signify nothing more than some of all descriptions and characters; whilst others run to a contrary extreme, and deduce from this expression a persuasion that none shall ever perish. It were well, if, instead of contending for human systems, and especially those of Calvin and Arminius, we were content to receive the Scriptures with the simplicity of little children: for, after all that has been said or written in support of those two most prominent systems, it is impossible to reduce the Holy Scriptures either to the one or to the other of them: for, on both hypotheses, there are difficulties which can never be surmounted, and contrarieties which man can never reconcile. It is by attempting to be wise above what is written, that we involve ourselves in all these difficulties. If we would be content to take the Scriptures as they are, and to leave the reconciling of them unto God, by whose inspiration they were written, we should find them all admirably calculated to produce the ends for which they were designed. How delightful is the truth here intimated! and how strange is it, that, instead of enjoying it, and adoring God for it, men will make it only a ground of acrimonious contention! I thank God, that all the Scriptures, whatever be their bearing, are alike acceptable to me; and that, whether they mark the sovereignty or the mercy of God, I am alike ready to prosecute them, in accordance with their plain and obvious meaning. By attending to the original, we shall often find our way clear, when, from a diversity of idiom, a translation scarcely conveys the precise idea. The passage before us, for instance, does not convey in the original any thing like a secret determination in God, but only a willingness, that all should be saved: it is precisely parallel with what is spoken by St. Peter, when he says, “God is long-suffering to us-ward; not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”¹ And this is assigned as a reason why God would have us pray for all men. Our intercessions for them are pleasing and acceptable to him, because “he is willing to save all” without exception and without reserve.

In the words before us, then, we see,

I. The disposition of God towards our fallen race–

We are not to understand the text as expressing any decree, either in reference to some favored individuals, or in reference to all mankind. We have said, that it imports only a willingness to save; and that in that sense it has no limit whatever; the whole human race being objects of his tender compassion, and equally accepted of him, when they seek him in his appointed way.²

1. For all, without exception, has God given his only dear Son–

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Du Moulin:¹

III. Reprobation is the decree of God, by which from eternity he decreed, not to give to certain men his grace, by which they might be freed from their engrafted depravation, and from the curse due to them, and appointed them to just and deserved punishment for their sins.

VI. God is, after the same manner, the cause of reprobation, as the judge is the cause of punishment of them that are guilty, and sin is the meritorious cause. Seeing therefore the consideration of sin does move the judge, and the judge does condemn to punishment, it appears that sin is the remote cause of damnation, and not only a condition necessarily fore-required, and that the judge is the next and nearest cause.

VII. Furthermore although sin be the case of appointment to punishment, yet it is not the case of the difference between the Elect and Reprobate. For examples sake: Two men are guilty of the same crime, and it pleases the king to condemn one, to absolve and free the other, his sin indeed that is condemned is the cause of his punishment, but it is not the case why the king is otherwise affected to the other then to him, seeing the fault on both sides is alike. The cause of the difference, is that something steps between, which does turn the punishment from one of them, which in the work of predestination is nothing else but the very good pleasure of God, by which of his mere good pleasure, he gave certain men to Christ, leaving the rest in their inbred corruption, and in the curse due unto them. For which difference, it is great wickedness for us to strive with God, seeing he is not subject nor bound to any creature, and punishes no man unjustly, giving to one the grace that is not due, and imposing on the other the punishment that is due.

XII. And although reprobation cannot be said to be the cause of sin, because sin goes before reprobation, yet it cannot be denied that reprobation is the cause of the denying grace, and of the preaching of the Gospel, and of the spirit of adoption, which is peculiar to the elect. For seeing this denying is a punishment, it must be, that it is inflicted by the will of a just judge….

XV. …This is the fountain of their² error; this last beginning has led aside those acute men into byways. The respect of election is one, the respect of reprobation is far other. For sin and infidelity is not a condition after the same manner in the reprobates, as faith is a condition required in the elect. For sin is a condition fore-required in reprobates, but faith is a condition following election. Reprobation is made for sin, but election is made to faith. Sin is the cause of the appointing to punishment, faith is the effect of election. God finds sin, but works faith. Sin follows reprobation only in the necessity of consequence, but not in the necessity of the consequent. But faith does follow election in both ways….

Peter Movlin, The Anatomy of Arminianisme (London: Printed by T.S. For Nathaniel Newbery, and are to be sold at the signe of the Starre vnder Saint Peters Church in Cornehill, and in Popes head Alley, 1620), 210-212, 216-217. [Some reformatting; some spelling modernized; footnotes and values mine; and underlining mine.]

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¹Pierre Du Moulin was an extremely “high” Calvinist, with (apparently) strong voluntarist and rationalist influences. A few of his definitions and expressions are objectionable, such as his definitions of divine love, for example. Du Moulin later became an aggressive opponent of Amyraut and all things Amyraldian. Regarding the above statements, I have attempted to extract only his critical positive affirmations, and not his negative comments against Arminianism and Arminians.

²“Their,” that is, the Arminians.