The Punt business and the Monkey Town book are very relevant issues and are very relevant due with resurgent Calvinism. Rachel Held Evans who wrote the Monkey Town book bristles when “Calvinism” gets mentioned because she quickly associates it with an image of a sadistic God who some how derives pleasure or is unmoved by the notion of eternal torment for those who “never had a chance”. Most Calvinists simply respond to her with a sort of theological shrug. The CRC, like many historically Calvinist churches have developed a more nuanced language about these matters and don’t fret over them but with the rise of Piper and Driscoll along with their hard line on WICO a lot of attention is once again being focused upon double predestination.
The biggest problem for both sides is clearly the Bible itself. Human agency is real and consequential, which Calvinists really don’t deny IMHO, but the Bible also speaks very strongly about election. Add to this the apparent “universalist” texts that Punt points out and we have the makings of a good conversation and some tough choices. A convenient way to dispel the problems are simply to prefer some texts over the others but most of us who want to take the Bible seriously will see this as a sort of a cheap cop out. The hope is that we might find a thread, a way, a language in through the contradictory passages to arrive an an understanding of a whole that all of them are pointing to. This is essentially the work of theology. Punt of course is convinced he has found it and there is a lot of appeal to much of what he says. My father once noted to me that most CRC pastors he knows pragmatically follow Punt’s lead in terms of approaching people, unlike the storied Calvinists who divine one’s election on the basis of a first impression. Punt hasn’t gotten the traction he’s really wanted and worked hard at.
The universalist passages ARE a part of the Bible just as much as the election passages or the “choosing” passages are and deserve to have their day in court. Culturally today there is a lot of attraction to not only Punt’s limited universalism but the full blown variety as well. It solves a lot of problems. Suddenly there is no hell, no worries about those born in the wrong country or at the wrong time, no yelling at gays or women serving communion, etc. Universalism, however, comes at a heavy cost and that cost tends to be the consequential nature of history. Universalism is one universalist single election but you quickly have the victims of history to reckon with. Does God really not care about genocide, environmental poisoning, child abuse, theft and all the other bad things we do to one another? Miroslav Volf notes that if you eliminate a judging God you leave retribution in our own hands setting up endless cycles of pay back which we as a species almost always get wrong. Even the Godfather in that great opening scene of the first movie notes that the man seeking justice doesn’t really seek justice, he wishes murder as pay back for an assault. Universalism leave us at the mercy of “a life for an eye”.
McGrath’s book on Heresy is very helpful here because he notes that heresies are ideas that arise for real reasons and are very attractive for certain times and places. Heresies are followed because they solve real problems. What the church begins to figure out over time, however, is that these heresies themselves begin to undermine the faith itself and things unravel because of them. For that reason the church puts up yellow tape and says “do go there”. Yellow tape usually makes us curious and so we tend to step over or under it to see what’s over there. We usually justify the trespass because we imagine that someone just put the tape up because they’re petty or small or nanny theologians. Over time, however, the hard floor of reality exerts itself and the full cost of our choices tend to come due.
McGrath’s book also helps us realize that theology is not a finished thing because history isn’t finished. We all have the duty and the privilege of working through the issues that our contexts present to us and that work is not without its risks or rewards, like the rest of life. If we who subscribe to the Canons of Dort wish to continue the process the task of working on these issues belongs to us.
