Why I am a Neo-Calvinist...
I was out on a brisk holiday walk this afternoon when I began to reflect on my life and the path that has led me to call myself a "neo-Calvinist."
Some of you may be aware of my background. Others of you may be surprised to learn that I did not grow up Reformed. My Christian walk began in fundamentalism (yes, the wild-eyed,legalistic, "Left Behind" type)and later moved briefly into Pentecostalism. These two camps are inherently anti-culture and shy away from interaction with the "world" (I'm sure some people will find this stereotype unfair, but overall I think it is accurate). In high school I encountered the five points of Calvinism under the influence of a Reformed Baptist pastor. Unfortunately, this pastor was a hyper-Calvinist and strongly antagonistic toward any Christian tradition which smacked of "Arminianism" (for the record I also have problems with Arminianism but am disturbed by some Calvinists' inability to think about anything beyond the five points). In addition one of my good friends (a local Christian book store owner) was doing a lot of reading in the Roman Catholic mystics and early church fathers. Naturally, being a hyper-Calvinist I was attracted to the esoteric piety of people like St. John of the Cross or Miguel Molinias. Here were people who took Christianity seriously and were unaffected by shallow North American Arminianism.
The practical result of this cross of hyper-Calvinism and Catholic mysticism in my life was a morbid introspective spirit characterized by a hatred of creation. Strangely enough, during this time I lived almost like a Protestant monk. I spent a great deal of time reading theology (mainly books by Puritans, etc.) and studying Greek in isolation only to become more and more self-engrossed. Like every good hyper-Calvinist, I was worried about my election. I could see from my personal habits and tendencies that I was very far from being a perfect individual.
Thankfully, after a few years of this, my family broke away from the paranoid Reformed Baptist pastor (essentially a church split with all of the anathemas directed at my family). As I recovered from a "we-are-the-elect-and-there-are-no-others" mentality, I found comfort in the writings of Charles Spurgeon and John Bunyan. However, I was still very much opposed to culture and suspicious of doing anything besides Bible reading, praying, etc. After all, these were the only things which really mattered in life. Work, play, and everything else which was not purposefully Christian was at best "physical" and "worldly." To sum it all up, I was a recovering gnostic.
After high school I enrolled at Dordt College because it seemed to be a good solid Calvinistic institution. Imagine my shock when many of these Dutch "Calvinists" had no clue what the five points of Calvinism were. However, by God's grace I had come to study history, and the entire history department was filled with Neo-Calvinists who confessed the Canons of Dordt but also pushed me to think about the goodness of creation and the need for a Christian worldview. It was here that I read books by Al Wolters, Abraham Kuyper, Herman Dooyeweerd, etc. Keeping in mind my essentially gnostic background, Neo-Calvinism liberated me to think as a Christian and live as a true human being (no more ranting about how horrible it was to be a "soul trapped in a body!").
Since that time, I have continued to call myself a Neo-Calvinist and work within Neo-Calvinism's intellectual tradition.
So that's it...that's why I would call myself a Neo-Calvinist.
Some of you may be aware of my background. Others of you may be surprised to learn that I did not grow up Reformed. My Christian walk began in fundamentalism (yes, the wild-eyed,legalistic, "Left Behind" type)and later moved briefly into Pentecostalism. These two camps are inherently anti-culture and shy away from interaction with the "world" (I'm sure some people will find this stereotype unfair, but overall I think it is accurate). In high school I encountered the five points of Calvinism under the influence of a Reformed Baptist pastor. Unfortunately, this pastor was a hyper-Calvinist and strongly antagonistic toward any Christian tradition which smacked of "Arminianism" (for the record I also have problems with Arminianism but am disturbed by some Calvinists' inability to think about anything beyond the five points). In addition one of my good friends (a local Christian book store owner) was doing a lot of reading in the Roman Catholic mystics and early church fathers. Naturally, being a hyper-Calvinist I was attracted to the esoteric piety of people like St. John of the Cross or Miguel Molinias. Here were people who took Christianity seriously and were unaffected by shallow North American Arminianism.
The practical result of this cross of hyper-Calvinism and Catholic mysticism in my life was a morbid introspective spirit characterized by a hatred of creation. Strangely enough, during this time I lived almost like a Protestant monk. I spent a great deal of time reading theology (mainly books by Puritans, etc.) and studying Greek in isolation only to become more and more self-engrossed. Like every good hyper-Calvinist, I was worried about my election. I could see from my personal habits and tendencies that I was very far from being a perfect individual.
Thankfully, after a few years of this, my family broke away from the paranoid Reformed Baptist pastor (essentially a church split with all of the anathemas directed at my family). As I recovered from a "we-are-the-elect-and-there-are-no-others" mentality, I found comfort in the writings of Charles Spurgeon and John Bunyan. However, I was still very much opposed to culture and suspicious of doing anything besides Bible reading, praying, etc. After all, these were the only things which really mattered in life. Work, play, and everything else which was not purposefully Christian was at best "physical" and "worldly." To sum it all up, I was a recovering gnostic.
After high school I enrolled at Dordt College because it seemed to be a good solid Calvinistic institution. Imagine my shock when many of these Dutch "Calvinists" had no clue what the five points of Calvinism were. However, by God's grace I had come to study history, and the entire history department was filled with Neo-Calvinists who confessed the Canons of Dordt but also pushed me to think about the goodness of creation and the need for a Christian worldview. It was here that I read books by Al Wolters, Abraham Kuyper, Herman Dooyeweerd, etc. Keeping in mind my essentially gnostic background, Neo-Calvinism liberated me to think as a Christian and live as a true human being (no more ranting about how horrible it was to be a "soul trapped in a body!").
Since that time, I have continued to call myself a Neo-Calvinist and work within Neo-Calvinism's intellectual tradition.
So that's it...that's why I would call myself a Neo-Calvinist.
continue reading Why I am a Neo-Calvinist...
posted by Nevada @ 3:33 PM
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