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"If God is sovereign, then his lordship must extend over all of life, and it cannot be restricted to the walls of the church or within the Christian orbit." Abraham Kuyper Common Grace 1.1.

Wednesday 4 December 2013

Kuyper's Common Grace #CG1.1 Kuyper's Foreword

Foreword

Kuyper begins his foreword with this provocative statement: “The Reformed paradigm has suffered no damage greater than its deficient development of the doctrine of common grace” (3). He then goes on to lament the lack of doctrinal development that occurred in Calvinism after 1650. What happened was a “repristinating their well-worn polemic against Arminianism” (5). 

For Kuyper common grace is “deduced directly from the sovereignty of God” and is the “root and conviction for all Reformed people” (p 5). Resuscitating the doctrine of common grace, which Kuyper plans to do here, will help the believer “take hold of the plow” rather than retreat from this life. It provides the foundation for engagement with the world and so avoid spiritual and ecclesiastical isolation and so help believers exercise dominion (5).


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