Does the Bible teach the doctrine of Total Depravity?

 

Affirmative :  Moses Flores

 

            What does the Bible teach about the nature of humanity since the fall of man?  Some teach that man has not been affected by the fall at all.  Still others teach that man has become sick unto death, but is still able to do spiritually good things like repent and have faith of their own “free-will”.  However, the Reformed, or Calvinistic, tradition alone stands opposed to both of those concepts.  The Calvinistic doctrine of Total Depravity teaches that man is completely dead in trespasses and sins.  This is because we believe the Bible teaches that the effects of sin run through the whole being of the sinner.  The sinner, therefore, is thoroughly or radically corrupted by sin.  My purpose is to share what the Scriptures teach concerning the depravity, or inability of man.

            There are two main points that I wish to prove through the Scriptures.  First, that our corruption is such that our nature is now defined by sin (until regeneration).  Secondly, that this nature makes us unable to savingly respond to the Gospel call and believe in Christ for salvation.

 

            Genesis 3 reveals one the most tragic events in all of human history:  the fall of man.  In the Garden of Eden, man enjoyed perfect fellowship with God.  But Adam’s bliss did not last very long, for He soon sinned against God’s only commandment:  “thou shall not eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:17).  The moment Adam transgressed God’s law, Adam underwent radical changes in his entire being.  In particular, his spirit died, for his fellowship with God was broken.  By “death” I mean alienation from the life of God.  This is the first result of the fall.  This alienation from God is so total in its effect that it has plunged Adam into a state of ruin so that he could not find his way back to God without the Holy Spirit. His spiritual death ultimately manifested itself in his physical death as well. But Adam did not act for himself, for the Scriptures teach in Romans 5:12-19 that Adam’s sin plunged all his progeny into death and corruption with him.  Thus, we have become depraved.

            “Depravity” is defined as the state of being marked by corruption or evil.  What Calvinism means by Total Depravity is that “man’s nature is corrupt, perverse and sinful throughout.”  The adjective “total” does not mean that each sinner is as totally or completely corrupt in his actions and thoughts as it is possible for him to be.  Instead, the word ‘total’ is used to indicate that the whole of man’s being has been affected by sin.  This doctrine essentially teaches that all of man has been touched by sin – no part of man’s being has escaped the corruption of sin.  Our minds, our heart, our emotions, our wills – everything has been altered, changed, and damaged by sin.  The effect of sin is total. 

There are three specific areas that I would like to deal with  in regards to the fall and the degree that sin has affected us all. Romans 3:10-12, depicts these general areas that sin has affected:  righteousness, intellect and will.

             In regards to righteousness, the Scripture says “There is no one righteous, no not one.”  Righteousness, as it is used here, is defined in relation to God.  Certainly, when we compare ourselves amongst ourselves, we will always be able to say that some people act “more righteously” than others.  But this is not so when God is the standard of righteousness, as is the case when it comes to needing righteousness before God.  We forget that God is the judge and demands perfect righteousness.  Psalm 130:3 says, “if you, LORD, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?”  The Hebrew word for “mark” means “to regard, to look upon narrowly, to take heed to.”  Surely, it is easy to see, that compared to God’s ultimate standard of Law, we all “fall short of the glory of God” (cf. Romans 3:23).

            But not only are we affected in our righteousness, but our intellect is affected as well.  This is seen in the phrase “no one understands.” I am not speaking in terms of secular or natural things like sciences.  The Bible does not disagree that man has excelled in many areas like philosophy, science, technology, etc… What I am denying is that man has no understanding in spiritual things.  I Corinthians 2:14 says, that the “natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God …because they are spiritually discerned.”  As a sinner, the unregenerate man rejects the things of the Spirit of God because he does not understand them nor does he desire them.  He accepts only the things of the world.  Perhaps this is clearly seen in the pagan religions of the world.  True knowledge of God is only revealed in God’s word, but there is a notion that we can understand spiritual things on our own.  So mankind has engaged in creating their own gods that we know as idols. 

Finally, and most importantly in regards to this doctrine of Total Depravity, our very wills have been corrupted by the effects of sin:  “there is no one who seeks God.”  The meaning is that not only are we incapable of coming to God because of our sin and our lack of righteousness, as well as our incapacity to understand God, the sinner does not even want to come to God.  Perhaps someone might object to this and say, “Well that can’t be right!  People are seeking God everyday and in every way.  That is why people create so many religions.  They are simply on the wrong path, but they share the common goal of getting to God.”  This may sound pretty good, but according to Romans 1, people have rejected the God of the Bible as the true God and have created for themselves gods of their own devising.  It is sad to say, but even within the Church, there are people who are not seeking God, but rather a god of their own making.  They are seeking a god who is not completely sovereign in salvation, or a god who will not bring them into judgment for their sins, or a god who will only give them great financial gain, etc…  In short, they seek the blessings of God without God.  They are following an idol.  The Scriptures speak:  “There are none that seek God!!!”  The term “none” is universal is quantity toward the unregenerate. 

I want to focus on this inability of man to seek God and to come to Christ in and of himself for this is the very heart of the doctrine of Total Depravity, which has even led some to refer to the doctrine as Total Inability.  First, let me be clear about what the doctrine is saying:  Essentially, it is saying that fallen man does not possess the will to be saved.  Thus, the Arminian view of salvation through the “free-will” of man is wholly rejected.  Allow me to expound the words of the Lord Jesus in John 6:44.

In context, there is a crowd of followers who are seeking Jesus because He had previously fed a crowd of five thousand.  As Jesus begins to tell them that He is the true bread from Heaven, the Jews begin to grumble amongst themselves to which Jesus tells them, “stop grumbling among yourselves…no one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day.”  The Greek phrase oudeis dunatai  (translated “no one is able”, pres. tense verb) stresses the universal inability of man to “come to Christ.”  In the context of this entire discussion (v24-69), the phrase “come to Me” is meant to say “believe in Me” (cf v36, 40, 47; also synonymous with “eat” and “drink” (v54-56).  Thus, what Jesus is saying is that no one is able to believe in Him apart from a special act of the Father (which will be dealt within the 4^th debate topic of Irresistable Grace).  Why does man not have the ability?  Because, as has been shown earlier, mankind has become so corrupt in their sin that our very wills are not “free” from its effects.  Rather they are enslaved to sin.  Jesus elsewhere says that the one who sins is a “slave to sin” (cf. John 8:34). 

Now, at this point, one might with to say that God “draws” all men unto Himself.  However this cannot be the case for the Scriptures say that the one who is “drawn” by the Father is also raised up at the last day.  Operating from the supposition that universal salvation is not taught in the Bible, one may preclude the notion that all men are “drawn” in this sense by the Father, for not all will be “raised up on the last day”.

As Jesus finishes explaining that one must “eat His flesh” and “drink His blood” – again, this is to say “believe in Him” – the Bible says that many of his disciples said, “this is a hard teaching.  Who can accept it?”  Jesus even asks His own twelve, “Does this offend you?”   The Bible goes on to say that Jesus asked this knowing who would not believe in Him and even the one who would betray Him in.  Verse 65 shows that Jesus reiterates His statement about the inability of man to believe in Christ in light of this knowledge of them who would never believe: “This is why I told you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.” 

The words of Christ clearly teach the inability of fallen and sinful man to do anything at all to will salvation in and of themselves.  Lest one be led to believe this is an isolated text of Scripture, the Apostle Paul also clearly taught the same inability of the unregenerate man.  In Romans 8:7-8, the apostle says, “For the carnal mind is enmity toward God, for it is neither subject to the law of God nor indeed can be.  So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”  The same Greek verb (dunatai ) is used twice here to describe the inability of man, namely that the carnal man cannot obey the law of God nor can he please God.  Now, I would ask the question here:  Is true saving faith and genuine repentance unto salvation pleasing to God?  The answer should be obvious that those things are indeed the most pleasing to God.  If it is true, then, that those things are pleasing to God, and if it’s true that the unregenerate man cannot please God, then does it not follow that the unregenerate man cannot exercise saving faith and genuine repentance unto salvation, for those things are pleasing to God?  This would seem to be the case if we remain consistent with the Scriptures.

Paul has further stated, with regards to the spiritual inability of man to comprehend the things of God apart from the Spirit, that “the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can (dunatai) he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” 

The prophet Jeremiah spoke of the nature of the sinful people of Israel(which is in all humanity) in Jeremiah 13:23 when he said, “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots?  Then may you also do good who are accustomed to do evil?”  The clear meaning is that just as the nature of the color of skin and the spots of the leopard are not changed at will (because it is the defining nature of those categories), so neither can those who are accustomed to do evil change at their own will.  Job Himself asked, “what is man, that he could be pure?  And he who is born of a woman, that he could be righteous?  If God puts no trust in His saints, and the heavens are not pure in His sight, How much less man, who is abominable and filthy, who drinks iniquity like water!”  Sin is in our very nature.  Sin effects and directs our very wills.

 In conclusion, Calvinist author and theologian, A.W. Pink sums up:

 

“It is of utmost importance that people should clearly understand and be made thoroughly aware of their spiritual impotence, for thus alone is the foundation laid for bringing them to see and feel their imperative need of divine grace for salvation.  So long as sinners think they have it in their own power to deliver themselves from their death in trespasses and sins, they will never come to Christ that they might have life…So long as people imagine they labor under no insuperable inability to comply with the call of the gospel, they never will be conscious of their entire dependence on Him alone who is able to work in them ‘all the good pleasure of His goodness, and the work of faith with power’ (2 Thess. 1:11). So long as the creature is puffed up with a sense of his own ability to respond to God’s requirements, he will never become a suppliant at the footstool of divine mercy.” (Our Accountability to God, pg. 277-78)

 

 

            In Christ’s name.  Amen.