Is the Calvinist-Arminian debate overblown? It's a question today from a young man, a listener to the podcast, who writes in to ask us this. "Hello Pastor John, I've argued about predestination and free will with fellow believers for years. I'm a five-point Calvinist myself, but lately these conversations have grown tiresome to me.

No amount of debate seems to settle all the questions, and I recently read a letter by C.S. Lewis where he called the Calvinist-Arminian debate pretty much pointless because it only answers questions about this life, answers meaningless in eternity." Lewis wrote this, "Both the statement that our final destination is already settled, Calvinism, and the view that it still may be either heaven or hell, Arminianism, seem to me to imply the ultimate reality of time, which I don't believe in.

The controversy is one I can't join on either side, for I think that in the real, timeless world it is meaningless." Pastor John, I think Lewis raises a fair question here. Is this whole debate time-bound? And even within time, I find myself more and more asking, what is the real-life fallout?

Is the practical and spiritual value of Calvinism for this life significantly better? And if so, how? Oh, Lewis, Lewis, Lewis, my friend, my mentor. Let's start here. There is a huge difference between saying on the one hand, "Fruitless debates have grown tiresome," which I can totally understand and would not encourage, and saying on the other hand, "I'm not seeing the real-life fallout or the practical spiritual value of Calvinism in this life." Those are radically different sentences, and the last one is tragic, tragic.

And I hope such a theological, personal malaise doesn't fall on me, and I hope it can be lifted from our young friend. So first a word about Lewis, bless his heart and rest his soul in heaven, and then about Calvinism and time—that's the issue that he raised, time—and as I go along, I will try to show for our friend the preciousness of these things.

I have read more of C.S. Lewis than any other author on the planet except Jonathan Edwards. I love C.S. Lewis. He has made a great difference in my life. But one thing you will look for in vain in all the writings of C.S. Lewis, and that is careful, serious, biblical exposition.

We have no idea how he did it. I presume he did it. We have to guess how C.S. Lewis read his Bible, because he does not show us, which means he comes at biblical theological questions more philosophically than he does exegetically. This is certainly the case when it comes to Calvinism versus Arminianism.

As far as I can tell, he simply sweeps aside dozens of specific, clear, biblical sentences with the philosophical wand of timelessness. Anybody who reads the Bible carefully and seeks to submit to the Bible's own logic—not an alien philosophical presupposition, but seeks to submit to the Bible's own logic—will be content with Lewis's way of handling the issue of Calvinism and Arminianism.

It cannot satisfy if you are a Bible-saturated person who takes sentences, real, live, meaning-carrying sentences seriously when you read the Bible. Here's what I would say to Lewis. Let's just pretend that I'm now talking to C.S. Lewis about the five points of Calvinism. Four of them, I would say, Mr.

Lewis, four of them do not address the time issue at all. And the fifth one addresses the time issue because God made it address the time issue. God put the "pre" in predestination. Man didn't decide to do that. God did that. And he had good reasons for doing it, not to be swept away by the wand of timelessness.

So let me take them one at a time. Total depravity. The issue is, at the point of my conversion, was I dead? Was I dead? Was I utterly incapable of seeing or savoring Jesus Christ as my supreme treasure? Answer, yes, I was. I was dead, blind, spiritually incapable of believing on Jesus.

First Corinthians 2.14, the natural person, that John Piper, does not accept the things of the Spirit of God. No way, I'm stiff in arm and totally in my deadness and fallenness and blindness. They are folly to me. I'm not able to understand them. They are spiritually discerned, and I don't have the Holy Spirit.

I hate God, and I love myself, and I am in bondage. And the question is not one of time. And the answer makes all the difference in the world about whether you praise yourself or praise your God in speechless wonder that you are now a lover of Jesus, that you can see the light of the glory of the gospel.

John Piper now sees the light of the glory of the gospel. How did that happen? If you think you were only partially incapable of faith and just needed a little divine nudge, your amazement, your humility, your worship, your reverence will be hindered. How dead and how helpless were you when God saved you?

Come on, Lewis, come on. Talk about First Corinthians 2.14. Talk about Romans 8.7. Talk about Ephesians 2.4. Talk about Second Corinthians 4.4. Give me your philosophical wand of timelessness. Talk to me about the deadness of the human soul. That's number one. Number two, irresistible grace. The question, Mr. Lewis, is what happened on that bus ride that you described in "Surprised by Joy," the one that you began as an unbeliever, and to your own amazement, you ended as a believer?

What happened? The Bible is not silent about what happened. It is not left to your philosophical speculation. It goes like this. The God who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," shone in your heart to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ, Second Corinthians 4.6.

God did a creative miracle in your life, Mr. Lewis, just as much as when he called the universe out of nothing. He took out the heart of stone and put in the heart of flesh. He raised you from the dead and seated you in the heavenly places with Christ.

He opened your eyes to give heed to the truth. And in the very moment when you passed from death to life, God was decisive, not you. You did not impart life to your dead self. This is not an issue of time, Mr. Lewis. This is an issue of worship.

To whom will you give glory for your decisive passage from unbelieving death to believing life? Number three, limited atonement, or better, definite atonement. Here the question is not time. The question is whether the new covenant miracle that happens to every Christian when their dead heart, our dead heart, is replaced with a new heart, whether that new covenant miracle was definitely purchased for them by the death of Christ, but was not so purchased for everyone.

That's the issue. Or everyone would have a new heart if it was purchased that way for everyone. Jesus called his blood the blood of the covenant, Matthew 26, 28. The new covenant, he called it the new covenant, Luke 22, 20. And what the new covenant promised was that the old unbelieving rebellious heart of C.S.

Lewis and John Piper would be replaced by God sovereignly with a new soft believing heart and that the law of God would be written—we don't write it, he wrote it—on that heart so that we do from the heart what we're called to do, like believe and obey. This was all secured when we were purchased by the blood of the new covenant.

When Christ died, he secured a perfect, complete redemption, including the undeserved mercy of our conversion and faith. This is not a question of time. This is a question of what Christ achieved for his people on the cross. Did he lay down his life for the sheep, John 10, 11?

Did he ransom the children of God, John 11, 52? Did he ransom for himself a people scattered among the peoples, Revelation 5, 9, 10? Or didn't he? That's the issue. Number four, perseverance of the saints. This is not a question of timelessness or time. This is a question about whether you and I will wake up a believer tomorrow morning.

Will I? And I cannot imagine, for our young friend, by the way, who wrote in this question, I cannot imagine anything more immediately relevant to me when I go to bed at night or think about it all day long than the answer to the question, "Will I wake up a believer, heaven bound, tomorrow morning, or won't I?" Jude is so blown away by the glory of God's sovereign keeping, keeping, that the greatest doxology in the Bible is crafted to extol this work of God's sovereignty over our fickle free will, so-called.

If God left me to my fickle free will, I'd be out of here, prone to wander. Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love, take my heart, oh Lord, and seal it, chain it, bind it, keep me. So here's what Jude says, "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, keep you, and to present you blameless." He's going to keep you and present you blameless, sovereignly.

Yes, if He doesn't do it, it isn't going to happen. And then he says, "To the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory and majesty and dominion and authority forever and ever, amen." That's how amazed Jude was that God would not let him go. God wouldn't let him fall into unbelief.

God would not let his vaunted free will have the last word. This is not a matter of time. This is a matter of sweet assurance that tomorrow morning I will wake up with a heart for God. Lastly, unconditional election. Here we meet time, Ephesians 1, 4. He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him.

In love He predestined us, predestined us. So before the foundation of the world, predestined us for adoption. In love He predestined us for adoption, predestined us to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace. Paul's aim here is to inflame the praise of the glory of the grace of God.

That's his purpose. That's the goal of these three verses, 4, 5, 6. The sovereign, saving grace of God that is based not on our so-called free will but on the "purpose of His will." Paul intends to put God's saving grace outside our control so that when all history is said and done, the song of the ages will be, "To the praise of the glory of God's free, invincible grace," so that no human might boast except in the Lord.

And I would just say in closing that if these five realities are not humbling, emboldening, stabilizing, worship-inflaming, sacrifice-empowering, joy-igniting, what we ought to do is not ignore them, but get on our knees and cry out for the eyes of our heart to be opened. Glorious and amazing biblical realities.

Thank you, Pastor John. It's so good to rehearse those five points of Calvinism, as they're called. And speaking of how Calvinism shows its impact practically in this life, see Pastor John's 2002 article titled "Ten Effects of Believing in the Five Points of Calvinism." It's "Ten Effects of Believing in the Five Points of Calvinism." And speaking of the Calvinism of C.S.

Lewis, there's a lot more to say on this topic. See Doug Wilson's plenary session at our 2013 National Conference. That session was titled "The Romantic Rationalist, God, Life, and Imagination in the Work of C.S. Lewis." Worth checking out the article, the session, both of which can be found at DesiringGod.org.

Thanks for listening. If you haven't done so, get our new episodes as we release them by subscribing to Ask Pastor John in your favorite podcast app in Spotify or by subscribing to DG's YouTube channel. To find all 1,500 of our past episodes or to submit a new question of your own, go online to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

Well, 1 John 5:12 tells us this, "Whoever has the Son has life, and whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life." But what exactly does it mean to have the Son of God? How do we come into possession of Jesus? That's what we will look at next time on Wednesday.

I'm Tony Reinke. We'll see you then.