Charles Grandison Finney on Election & predestination

Conditional — grounded in foreseen faith

THE POSITION

Everyone who will be saved was chosen from eternity to salvation "through the sanctification of their hearts by faith in Christ," with the means elected as really as the end. The election is not for foreseen good works but on condition of foreseen repentance, faith and perseverance. The stance's word "grounded" goes further than he does, though. The foreseen fact "must have been a condition in the sense of a sine qua non, of their election to salvation, but could not have been the fundamental reason for it." The reason he gives is the highest good of the universe: the best system of means for that end "included the election of just those who were elected, and no others." Conditioned on foreseen faith but not grounded in it, so the state is a lean.

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ABOUT THIS FIGURE

Law student turned revivalist of the Second Great Awakening, licensed and ordained by a Presbyterian presbytery in 1824, later professor of theology and president at Oberlin College. His Lectures on Revivals of Religion argued that a revival is the right use of means and not a miracle. His Systematic Theology built a doctrine of salvation on moral government and on the sinner's natural ability, and denied original sin as a sinful nature, imputed righteousness, and that the atonement paid what sinners owed. This entry rests on that Systematic Theology (1878 edition), the Revival Lectures, one chapter of the Memoirs, three Oberlin Evangelist pieces and one letter.