Nathan Rice: "Calvinists Don't Try Hard in Evangelism"

Is that true? That is the belief expressed by Nathan Rice in a recent discussion that I had with him. Nathan declared on his blog that "OldTruth.com is now on my bad list" for a couple of reasons. First because he found unfavorable views expressed here about one of his favorite seeker sensitive preachers (Perry Noble), and secondly, Nathan felt that the kind of theological debating that he encountered here was uncharitable. He also argues that the bible is compatible with weekly church services that center around unbelievers, rather than on God being worshiped by believers. In this post we'll try to untangle some of those sentiments that are all too common in our postmodern age.

Nathan was put off by a recent conversation on Old Truth that ended up on the topic of Calvinism, and he expressed "I'm blown away at their attitude (not in a good way). Some people think they've got it all figured out, and that's what I'm trying to avoid on [my] site". At face value, it would seem that Nathan prefers blogs in which "less is figured out", but when he elaborated on whether or not he is arguing in favor of deliberate biblical ignorance, he said that his beef was more related to the attitude of the "Reformed" (Calvinistic) people who were expressing their theological views. The bad taste in Nathan's mouth about theology in general, and Calvinism specifically, reminded me of these words from two centuries ago by JC Ryle. It's as if they were written directly to the postmodern mindset of today:

"we live in an age when men profess to dislike dogmas and creeds, and are filled with a morbid dislike to controversial theology. He who dares to say of one doctrine that 'it is true,' and of another that 'it is false,' must expect to be called narrow-minded and uncharitable, and to lose the praise of men ... The danger is real, great, and unmistakable. Never was it so needful to say, 'Be not carried about (with divers and strange doctrines)'".

Nathan said to me: "The Calvinistic position that we need not "try"
(ie, put forth loads of effort) to get people saved because God elects, has been debated for centuries, yet you guys there seem to have it all figured out. I certainly am not foolish enough to engage in a debate over it, since I believe (as many theologians do) that the debate will always be fruitless."

So we see - on the one hand, Nathan refuses to talk about Calvinism, but on the other hand, he reserves the right to publicly misrepresent it by making untrue claims about it. Let's examine that claim.

Calvinists believe all of the bible, even the part that says "because we know what it is to fear the Lord we try to persuade men". So the reason that Calvinists "try hard" in evangelism is because the bible tells us to. Further more, Nathan seems to be ignorant of the evangelistic impact that Calvinists have had in church history. Calvinists such as George Whitefield struggled through pain and sickness (in Whitefield's case he was even stoned by a mob once) in a hard effort to spread the Gospel. The 18th century Great Awakening was a Calvinist lead revival of the Holy Spirit. The 19th century (called by some "the greatest century of missions") was also lead by Calvinists; men such as William Carey. Literally thousands of people came to the Lord through the preaching of Charles Spurgeon, who had a tremendous burden for lost souls. The truth is, Calvinists have tried very hard to spread the Gospel and have always preached the free offer of the Gospel to all men.

On the topic of Perry Noble and Seeker Sensitivity, Nathan directed this comment toward my views: "I certainly wouldn't want to stand in front of God one day and have to answer for someone who was seeking God, yet I ignored them because I didn't want to modify my [church] service". I presented Nathan with a challenge to demonstrate where in the bible it indicates that we should make our weekly church services arranged around evangelism of unbelievers. To which Nathan replied:

"Its right next to the verse that instructs us to have pulpits, steeples, wear suits, have a song service with songbooks, and gives details on how to properly conduct a Sunday School, and give a salvation invitation at the end of the service... NOWHERE! Yet you have no problem with these programs."

But those are false comparisons. The bible does provide for us a pattern in the book of Acts for church gatherings. Acts 2:42 for example, defines four activities for believers, in church services:

"And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers."

Throughout the New Testament the bible always talks about church gatherings as an assembly of believers, not unbelievers. Nathan is like so many today that want to "modify our church service" so that it essentially becomes something approaching a Billy Graham crusade. It is a redefining of the Acts model of "church". This is why Nathan objects to what I wrote about Perry Noble, though it is noted that his objections cited no biblical references nor did they demonstrate any biblical precedence whatsoever.

Related Nathan Rice Links:

• Nathan Rice posts an MMI article in favor of explicit sex sermons. This followed an Old Truth posting which exposed their graphic content.
• Nathan defends a megachurch that advocated music lyrics (to be used in church) describing how "well built" a woman is.
• Nathan Rice defends pastors who use foul language (read comments).