The Formula Consensus Helvetica

Preface

The divine apostle to the Gentiles earnestly impressed on his true child (γνηστω τεκννω) Timothy that he “continue in those things which” εμαθε και επιστωθηη that is, “which he had learned and which had been entrusted to him” (2 Tim. 3:14). In these lamentable and exasperating times, it is entirely appropriate that the very same thing frequently enter our recollection and call itself to mind. All the more so since sad experience shows that the faith once delivered to the saints by the Word of God is being perverted from the form of sound words (ιύποτυπωσει) and is contracting no slight blemish from the errors that are cropping up not in one principle division of the truth but on every side.

For our part, since the heavenly Father has honored us (unworthy as we are) with divine grace and goodness to a greater extent than many other nations, it is right that we gratefully put down the following circumstance to that account: he has hitherto endowed our leading men (προεστωτας), especially the very eminent nobles, the fathers of our country, and the very upright guardians of the church, with the spirit of piety, wisdom and courage. As a result, they religiously guard the store (κειμηλιον) of truth that they received from our forefathers out of the Word of God; they grip it tightly, as they say, in their hands, and they do not allow doctrinal corruption to have any access to our churches. But since constancy is nothing less than to desire to maintain what has been acquired and every day we hear the same angel that cried out to the church in Philadelphia, “Behold, I am coming quickly. Hold fast to what you have so that no one will take your crown” (Rev. 3:11), therefore it is right that we bend our knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and fervently pray that in these difficult times he might mercifully preserve this special advantage (πλεονεκτημα) and benefit for us, even to the end of the age.

Nevertheless opinions that are inferior in several matters of importance, but especially in the doctrine that concerns the extent of divine grace, could gather strength, infect impressionable young men and thus with the passage of time also infect our churches themselves. Moreover (seeing as how scarcely any crop is more fruitful, more fertile than error) the toleration of these opinions by reason of an excessive leniency could cause other, worse opinions to spring up, as has happened at other times, such as the sad example of Remonstrantism can show. Therefore, it is incumbent upon us, by the authority and instruction of the elders, to give consideration to some effective and sacred barrier. The canons that deal with the doctrine of universal grace, as well as with several related matters of importance, were born of this consideration, and we have endorsed them by unanimous consent. In adopting a suitable arrangement, we have been particularly concerned that truth should join love in a most welcome synergy (ήδιστη συζυγια) and contend with uncertainties, as they say, for the palm.

Nor indeed is there a reason for the honorable foreign brothers, whom we otherwise cherish and fraternally esteem as having obtained a faith of equal standing (ίσοτιμον πιστιν λαχοντας), to be angry with us about a disagreement that has been brought to light for good and weighty reasons, or to keep saying that we are furnishing anyone with an opportunity for schism. For on both sides, by the grace of God, the foundation of the faith remains, and in both cases, gold and silver and not a few precious stones have been built upon it out of the Word of God. The unity of the mystical body and of the Spirit is secure, “Just as we were called in one hope of our calling; for us there is one Lord, one special faith”–and in that same faith a holy concord and bond of hospitality is to be preserved–”one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all things, and in all of us” (Eph 4:4-6). Accordingly, among us the chain and bond of a most tender love will always remain secure, and, by the grace of God, the most sacred obligations of the communion of the saints will remain in a state of good repair.

As to what follows, we will not cease to call upon God, the Father of Lights, in pious petition that he might determine and grant that our instruction be salutary and that he might deign to bless it through Jesus Christ, the only inaugurator and consummator of our faith and salvation.

“Preface” to the “Formula Consensus Helvetica” in, Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation, ed., James T. Dennison, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Reformation Heritage Books, 2010), 4:518-519. [Underlining Mine.]

In his book, The Plan of Salvation, Warfield lays out the following:

We will ask, however, an American divine to explain to us the sacerdotal system as it has come to be taught in the Protestant Episcopal Churches.60 "Man," we read in Dr. A. G. Mortimer’s "Catholic Faith and Practice," "having fallen before God’s loving purpose could be fulfilled, he must be redeemed, bought back from his bondage, delivered from his sin, reunited once more to God, so that the Divine Life might flow again in his weakened nature" (p. 65). "By his life and death Christ made satisfaction for the sins of all men, that is, sufficient for all mankind, for through the Atonement sufficient grace is given to every soul for its salvation; but grace, though sufficient, if neglected, becomes of no avail" (p. 82).[footnote 61] The Incarnation and the Atonement affected humanity as a race only [footnote 62]. Some means, therefore, was needed to transmit the priceless gifts which flowed from them to the individuals of which the race was comprised, not only at the time when our Lord was on earth, but to the end of the world. For this need, therefore, our Lord founded the Church" (p. 84).¹

The above is not all that interesting to me, what is interesting is Warfield’s footnote 62 on page, 109, which reads:

Query: Is there any such thing as the "race" apart from the individuals which constitute the race? How could the Incarnation and Atonement affect the "race" and leave the individuals which constitute the race untouched?

Warfield was part of the empiricist-common sense realist school or tradition of Princeton. For him, a universal so defined as a mere abstraction is useless as it contains no meaningful content. What is also interesting is that the sentiment of Warfield’s opponent is the very sort of sentiment a lot of modern 5-Point calvinists invoke when they transmute the meaning of John’s “kosmos” (John 3:16 and 1 John 2:2) into something like species or humanity or some cognate.²

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The Colloquy of Thorn (1645)

1. Common Confession of the Doctrine of the Reformed Church in the Kingdom of Poland, and in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Respective Provinces of the Kingdom, For the Clarification of
Disputed Points at the Colloquy at Thorn, in 1645,

Presented on September 1.

1) From sin and death, there is no salvation or justification by the power of nature or through the righteousness of the law, but only through the grace of God in Christ, who redeemed us from wrath and the curse who were dead in sins through that only sacrifice of His death and through the merit of His perfect obedience in which He worked sufficiently for our, and not only for our, but also for the sins of the entire world. . . .

5) We are falsely accused, however, as if we deny that the death and merit of Christ suffices for all or as if we diminish His power. For we teach much the same as that which the Council of Trent taught in its sixth session, in the third chapter, namely: “although Christ died for all yet not all enjoy the benefit of His death; rather only they to whom the merit of His suffering is imparted:” We profess also that the cause or blame for this, whereby it is not imparted to all, lies in men themselves and in no way in the death and merit of Christ.

6) We are also falsely accused, as if we teach that not all those called through the Word of the gospel are earnestly, sincerely, or sufficiently called to repentance and blessedness by God, but rather that most are only seemingly and deceitfully called, only by signs through the revealed will, whereas the inner will of God’s counsel is lacking and He does not therein wish blessedness for all. We profess that we are far removed from this notion, for which people have charged us, either through false understanding or by the up toward words of a few; and that in God we attribute the highest truth and fidelity to all of His words and works, but in particular to those words which accompany the grace which calls to salvation, we do not attribute to Him a will which stands in constant contradiction to itself.

“The Colloquy of Thorn (1645)” in, Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centuries in English Translation, ed., James T. Dennison, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Reformation Heritage Books, 2010), 4:212, 213-214. [Underlining mine.] [Note: one could reasonably conclude from the above that, at that time, the entire body of Reformed churches in both Poland and Lithuania were hypothetical universalists!]

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Davenant:

To the first out of Ezek. 33:11, and the 18:32, we answer: This author¹ quite forgets the very question in hand. When we dispute of that special providence which is called predestination, and which concerns the bringing of some men unto eternal life, and the freeing of them from eternal death, we speak of such a will as (by the confession of all Divines), stands not upon uncertain conditions, but is most infallibly and immutable, and that not only certitudine præscientiæ Divinæ, but ordinis & causalitatis, as the Schoolmen speak. Now the will spoken of in the testimonies alleged is that of voluntas simplicis complacentiæ, or voluntas conditionata, which in regard of the good intended and promised unto men depends upon the good bahaviour of their own free-will. Notwithstanding this will which extends unto all, it is the Divine will and decree that some men creata libertas possit impedire effectus consecutionem: Et hoc vult permittere Deus propter majora bona[Ruiz, de volunt. 18. sect. 4.]. So that this will of exempting Judas or Cain from eternal death under condition of “Turning from their wicked ways,” and yet permitting them finally to run on their own wicked ways, is so far from proving that they were not under any such decree of reprobation, as we maintain that it is evidently demonstrated the truth thereof. It proves strongly that neither man’s sin nor man’s eternal death do fall sub voluntate simplicus complicentæ: for then they should be bona & ambilia per se: But it proves not but God may decree the permitting of some men to finally die in their sins, and eternally to be punished for their sins: wherein we place the decree of reprobation.

The inference or collection, “That God delights not in the destruction of wicked men,” we willingly grant. For he only said to delight in that whereunto he has a natural inbred propension, but this puts no necessary obligation upon God by special mercy to free all men from destruction, though he could most easily do it.

As for “sealing up millions under invincible damnation,” it does manifestly import an invincible act of God thrusting men first into sin, and then into hell, and both out of his mere pleasure. We utterly deny that reprobation infers any such dealing of God with men non-elected.

John Davenant, Animadversions Written By the Right Reverend Father in God, John, Lord Bishop of Sarisbury, upon a Treatise intitled “God’s love to Mankind” (London: Printed for Iohn Partridge, 1641), 166-177. [Some minor reformatting; some spelling modernized; marginal reference cited inline; italics original; and, footnote mine.]

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¹[That is, Davenant’s theological opponent.]