Leave or Don't Leave a Calvinist Church?

Here another comment I made on Soteriology 101's most recent blog post, (Re)Thinking Through Romans 9.  

This one is in reply to someone who said that he just found a new church that he's enjoying, but he's starting to pick up on little tastes of Calvinism in it.  But he's not sure.  And he's wondering what we think and if we recommend that non-Calvinists stay in Calvinist churches (to be bearers of the truth there).

Here is my reply:

Hello Micah,

Nice to hear from you.  Thanks for commenting.

When you said “Some of the things the pastor says feel very Calvinistic but some feel directly in contradiction with Calvinism…”, it made me wonder if he accepts Calvinism in his head but struggles with it in his heart.  It seems a lot of people think they have to accept Calvinism but then they don’t talk like Calvinists because they aren’t comfortable with it and know how bad it sounds.  I’d ask him directly where he stands on the 5 points of Calvinism.  

(But many Calvinist pastors will try to be evasive, so be prepared.  And if he answers a question with a question – such as if you ask “Are you a Calvinist?” and he answers “Do you believe in God’s grace?  Do you think God is sovereign?  Do you think people can save themselves? Etc.” – then he’s a Calvinist who’s trying to hide it.  Don’t let him turn the questions back on you.  Keep pushing him till he answers clearly.)

You asked if we think non-Calvinists can attend a church led by a Calvinist.  I can’t tell you what you should do because only you know the conditions at that church and the trade-offs, but I can tell you my experience.

We were part of a great church for almost 14 years, raising our kids alongside many great families there.  And we would have stayed there forever. (I come from a very unstable, broken home and always wanted to find a place to be a part of long-term, forever.)  But then a Calvinist pastor took over and began pushing Calvinism.  We were one of the very few who were disturbed by what he was teaching.  However, we still would have been willing to stay if we knew that our efforts could lead to people talking about this issue, bringing it out in the open, helping others explore the Word for themselves to evaluate what the pastor was saying.

But we came to realize that all the leadership was Calvinist (and that the pastor was turning everyone into Calvinists by requiring Calvinist Bible studies) and that the pastor would not tolerate opposition.  He even preached a few times that the only possible responses we could have to his view of predestination is to “ignore it, get angry about it, or accept it.”  No disagreement allowed.  He made us all feel like if we disagree with him then we disagree with God and the Bible and that we are being proud, unhumble, resistant Christians who are trying to deny God’s glory and authority.  (Ironic, because if Calvinism is true then God would be causing us to do those things, and we couldn’t not do them.)

When we saw how he constantly manipulated people into Calvinism and twisted Scripture and when we realized that they would not allow disagreement or discussion on it, we knew we had to leave.  We could not be part of a church that spreads Calvinism because Calvinism (to our thinking) destroys the true gospel and Jesus’s sacrifice, replaces God’s truths with lies (making Scripture unreliable), damages God’s character by making Him the cause of sin, unbelief, evil (which makes Him untrustworthy at best, evil at worst), hurts people’s faith and their relationship with God, and declares most people un-save-able, closing the door of heaven on them.

If that’s not worth dividing over, then nothing is.  I don’t care what Calvinism gets right; if it gets the very heart of the saving gospel wrong and God’s character wrong, then it’s all wrong and very destructive to Truth.  And we wouldn’t feel right about staying at a church like that, silently and passively allowing its spread, making it look like we support it when we don’t.  We could not stand before God with a clean conscience if we did that.  Too much is on the line.  So we had to leave and shake the dust from our feet, even though we, too, have a heart for all our Calvinist friends who are still there.

For us, to stay there wasn’t worth the risks because they were growing more and more hardened in their Calvinist views.  But we do wish we could have alerted more people to what was going on under their noses before we left.  We do regret that we didn’t do more to expose it.  My husband still contemplates going back and passing out pamphlets against Calvinism or something.  I, however, think we should just hand them over to themselves.

If you can work for good in that church, to bring this issue out in the open, to get people talking about it and exploring the Word for themselves, then maybe staying for now is good.  But if you can have no positive influence there, then staying might just end up squashing the life out of you, suffocating your faith, destroying your enjoyment of God, leaving you feeling angry and hopeless every time you leave church on Sunday, poisoning your relationship with God – as it was doing to us when we tried to hold out as long as possible at our church under the Calvinist pastor, 6 years.  You might be excited about a new church now, but if it is a Calvinist church, you won’t be excited for long, because you know that Calvinism is not the truth.

I agree with brdmod: “The bottom line is – you are at risk.  And the risk is something that has the potential of being a very disturbing experience of you and your wife or your kids.  You have to ask yourself if the Lord would want your family to be subjected to that risk.  Personally – if it were me – I would find a congregation that is solidly NON-Calvinist….  Knowing what I know about Calvinists – I wouldn’t touch it with a ten-foot pole.”

These are just my opinions, but of course God will lead you to know what to do and when to do it as time goes on and things become more clear.  I hope you can have a positive influence on that church or others around you.  It may just be that you were put there at this time to expose Calvinism and to help others find their way out of it.  Maybe that will be some good that comes out of this situation.  God bless.  And thanks for sharing.

And a follow-up comment: 

Micah, Another thing to consider is that the longer you stay at that church, the more attached you’ll get to people (which will make compromise more enticing/likely) … and then the harder it will be to disentangle yourselves later if you need to.  If we willingly stay in risky circumstances, we’ll pay a price later.  If and when you know God is telling you to get out, do it quickly.  No stalling or compromise or excuses.  Just a word of caution.