Free Will, Moral Responsibility, and Reformed Theology - Analytic ...

1. Introduction
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Paul L. Manata © 2011
The consequences Reformed theology has for God’s goodness, man’s free will
and his moral responsibility are said to be the Achilles’ heel of Reformed
theology. According to many Christians, Reformed theology is the bête noire of
the Christian tradition. This unfavorable assessment is due to the Reformed
teaching on God’s decree, providence, and omniscience as popularly summarized
in Reformed creeds and confessions and expounded by Reformed theologians.
This teaching is said to entail some unsavory results, primarily: (1) it turns men
into mere puppets who lack free will, responsibility and culpability for their sins;
and (2), this turns God into a moral monster and makes him the author of sin.
This paper will look at the issue of man’s free will and moral responsibility in light
of Reformed teaching on God’s decree, providence, and omniscience (I will refer
to these Reformed Teachings as RT). Before I address the topic of the paper, we
will look at some common reactions non-­‐Reformed have to these teachings.
1.1 Complaints and criticisms
As a first approximation, RT states that anything that comes to pass does so only
if God has decreed it; and, if God has decreed it then it must come to pass. That
God governs and works all things toward their appointed ends. Lastly, that God
knows all that could, would, or will come to pass simply by consulting his own
nature, will, or decree. In light of these teachings and what they seem to imply
about sin and men’s salvation, Christian philosopher Victor Reppert once
quipped, “The closest I ever came to atheism was when I first encountered the
biblical case for Calvinism.” 1 Arminian theologian Roger Olson tells us “The God
1 See , last accessed 7/1/11.