B. B. Warfield (1851–1921) on the Westminster Confession, the Love of God, and the Universal Sincere Offer of Salvation in Christ

The Confession Based on the Love of God.

2. It is frequently objected again that the Confession makes too little relatively of the love of God and too much relatively of His sovereignty, and thus reverses the emphasis of the Bible. The framers of the Confession are not responsible, however, for this separation of God’s love and sovereignty; to them His sovereignty seemed a loving sovereignty, and His love a sovereign love, and in founding the whole fabric of their Confession on the idea of God’s undeserved favor to lost sinners, they understood themselves to be glorifying His love to sinners. It is perfectly true that they seldom make use of the term “love”; but this is due to the exactness of their phraseology, by which they prefer to speak of God’s “goodness” and “grace”—by the one of which terms they designate His general love and by the other His special love for His people. When this is understood, so far as they from neglecting to emphasize the love of God, that it is rather within the truth to say that there is no other one subject so repeatedly and emphatically and lovingly dwelt upon. The “goodness” of God is one of His essential attributes (II., i.) and is infinite (V., iv.); nay, all “goodness” is in and of Him (II., ii.). It was in order to manifest His “goodness” that He created the world (IV., i.); and hence it is manifested by the light of nature (I., i.)—even that He is good and doeth good to all (XXI., i.); as also by the course of providence (I., i.; V., iv.), which is so administered as to redound to the praise of His “goodness” (IV., i.). Even His dealings with sin manifest His goodness (V., iv.). Especially does His treatment of the elect, however, flow from His free unchangeable love (XVII., ii.; III., v.; V., v.); His love follows them at every step, and every separate blessing bestowed upon them is a “grace”: effectual calling (X., ii.), faith (XIV., i.), justification (XI., iv.), pardon (XV., iii.), adoption (XII., i.), each is reckoned among the saving graces (XIII., i.; XVI., iii.; XVII., i.; IX., iv.). All His acts to His children are those of a gracious God (V., v.), all things being made to work together for their good (V., vii.), even His correctings being gracious (V., v.) and all to the praise of His glorious grace (III., v.). There is certainly no lack of emphasis on God’s love here; though no doubt it is His sovereign love that is emphasized. Nor is it at all true that in glorifying God’s infinite love for His children, the Confession minimizes or fails to give due recognition to His unspeakable love for all His reasonable creatures. He is the God of love: “Most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin, the rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (II., i.). Moved by this love He has voluntarily condescended to covenant with men as men, with a view to their fruition of Him as their blessedness and reward (VII., i.); and when men had spurned this offered favor, He was pleased to make a second covenant, “wherein he freely offered unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith him him, that they may be saved (VII., iii.)—an assertion of the universal sincere offer of salvation in Christ which is not taken away, but rather established, by the immediately subsequent assertion that God has further taken care that it shall not in all cases remain without fruition. To overlook these and similar passages in the effort to represent the Confession as disregarding the proportion of faith is most seriously to misrepresent its teaching. As a matter of fact the Confession builds its whole fabric on God’s love, and emphasizes His general love quite as strongly as the Scriptures themselves; although like the Scriptures, it does not substitute a general benevolence for the whole round of Divine attributes, or deny His sovereignty or His justice in proclaiming His love.

B. B. Warfield, On the Revision of the Confession of Faith (New York: Anson D. F. Randolph & Company, 1890), 25–27. Commenting on this writing by Warfield, Bennett said, “...there is a genuine love of God for all and a desire for all to be saved. Warfield clearly teaches this in the quotation above, and Charles Hodge says it in his sermon on John 3:16 in Princeton Sermons.” See Christopher Bennett, “For God So Loved the World,” Foundations 38 (Spring 1997): 3–4.

Later on, Warfield references a criticism of Robert Smith Candlish about the Confession:

Dr. Candlish, in supporting his overture in the Free Church Presbytery of Glasgow, supplies a good example of how they are presented. “The Confession,” he is reported as saying, “did not express, in their scriptural proportions, some aspects of the Gospel, and these were such vital and precious truths as the love of God to the world, His free offer of salvation to all men, and the responsibility of every one who heard this gracious call for accepting or refusing it. It was not meant that these truths were not contained in the Confession. He strongly contended that they were in it, but they were not so prominent in it proportionately to the statement of other truths—those of the sovereignty and almighty power of God’s grace—as they were in the Bible” [The Glasgow Herald 37 (Tuesday, February 12, 1889), p. 10].

Warfield, “On the Revision of the Confession,” 80.

Here is more from his “The Confession of Faith as Revised in 1903” that came out in 1904:

The Declaration as to the Decree of God
The first section of the “Declaratory Statement” has reference to the Third Chapter of the Confession, and to the doctrine of God’s Eternal Decree therein taught. Its end, according to the Preamble, is to guard this doctrine from certain false inferences, sometimes drawn from it as stated in the Confession, and to explicate it more fully than is done in the Confession in certain of its aspects. It runs as follows:

The Presbyterian Church in the United States of America does authoritatively declare as follows:

First. With reference to Chapter III of the Confession of Faith: that concerning those who are saved in Christ, the doctrine of God’s eternal decree is held in harmony with the doctrine of his love to all mankind, his gift of his Son to be the propitiation for the sins of the whole world, and his readiness to bestow his saving grace on all who seek it. That concerning those who perish, the doctrine of God’s eternal decree is held in harmony with the doctrine that God desires not the death of any sinner, but has provided in Christ a salvation sufficient for all, adapted to all, and freely offered in the gospel to all; that men are fully responsible for their treatment of God’s gracious offer; that his decree hinders no man from accepting that offer; and that no man is condemned except on the ground of his sin.

We observe that this declaration begins by very strongly emphasizing the reaffirmation of the doctrine of the Decree, which is already implied in the Preamble. “With reference to Chapter III of the Confession of Faith,” it declares that “the doctrine of God’s eternal decree” therein taught—both “concerning those who are saved in Christ” and “concerning those who perish”—“is held.” This doctrine it declares, we observe, “is held.” It is not repudiated; it is not modified; it is not qualified; it is not in any way weakened or diluted; it simply “is held.” Reaffirmation could not be more explicit.

The purpose of the Declaration is not exhausted, however, by this reaffirmation. Not only is the doctrine of the Decree as defined in the Third Chapter of the Confession “held,” but certain other doctrines, which are now enumerated, are held too; and the purpose of this Declaration is to assert the harmony of this one doctrine that is “held” with these other doctrines that are held along with it. The assertion is not, be it observed, that these doctrines, here enumerated, are held in despite of the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession, as some seem strangely to suppose. It is not even that the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession is held in despite of these other doctrines here enumerated, which are nevertheless recognized as also true. Much less is it that the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession is held so far only as it is—or may be thought by Tom, Dick, or Harry—to be in harmony with these other doctrines now enumerated, though there seems to be an inclination in some quarters to attempt to impose such a sense on it. The assertion is not that the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter is out of harmony with the doctrines here enumerated, and therefore cannot be held, at least in its integrity, along with them, but must be modified to make room for them, if not wholly set aside that they may be held in its stead. On the contrary, the explicit assertion is that the doctrine of the Decree, as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession of Faith, both can be and actually is “held” by the signatories of the Confession, in harmony with these other doctrines, and therefore needs no modification in order to make room for them. In one word, what we have here is the most emphatic assertion possible of the harmony of the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession of Faith with the doctrines here enumerated. The edge of the implied polemic is directed not against the Third Chapter of the Confession, or the doctrine there stated, but against all who suppose that the doctrine of God’s Eternal Decree there stated is not, and cannot be, held in harmony with the doctrines here enumerated; or needs any modification whatever in order that the doctrines here enumerated may be held, or may come to their rights.

Now, what are the doctrines of which it is here declared that they are in harmony with the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession, and may usefully be published now to refute false inferences drawn from that doctrine, or to bring out more clearly some of its implications? They are enumerated in two sets. The one set is to protect from false inferences, and to bring out the implications of, the doctrine of the Decree in its relation to the saved: the other in its relation to the lost. In the first interest the following propositions are enumerated: (1) that God loves all mankind; (2) that he has given his Son to be the propitiation for the sins of the whole world; (3) that he is ready to bestow his saving grace on all who seek it. In the second interest, it is declared: (4) that God desires not the death of any sinner; (5) that he has provided in Christ a salvation sufficient for all, adapted to all, and freely offered in the gospel to all; (6) that men are fully responsible for their treatment of God’s gracious offer; (7) that his decree hinders no man from accepting that offer; (8) that no man is condemned except on the ground of his sin.

Here are eight doctrinal propositions, all of which are declared to be in harmony with the doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession, and to be held by the signatories of the Confession in conjunction with that doctrine; enumerated here either to repudiate false inferences drawn from that doctrine as set forth in the Confession or to explicate more fully aspects of truth less fully brought to expression in the Confessional statement than may be now thought desirable. Obviously there is a polemic edge to the enumeration. Against whom is it turned? Of course, against those who deny that the doctrines here enumerated are harmonious with the Doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession. And that is to say, against Arminian objectors to the Doctrine of the Decree as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession—the very essence of whose objections to that doctrine has ever been that it is inconsistent with the doctrinal propositions here enumerated, and is not and cannot be held in harmony with them. The first section of the “Declaratory Statement” appears, then, to be nothing other than a sharp repudiation of the ordinary Arminian assault on the doctrine of the Decree, as set forth in the Third Chapter of the Confession, and puts in a brief assertory form the common Calvinistic response to this assault.

This will appear in the plainest light when we go on to observe, that as the assertion of the harmony of these propositions with the doctrine of the Decree is a commonplace of Calvinistic polemics, so every item of doctrine affirmed in these propositions is a commonplace of Calvinistic divinity. It cannot be necessary to pause to justify this remark to even the most inattentive reader of Calvinistic literature. It will suffice if we simply illustrate the matter by a series of cursory quotations from recognized Calvinistic divines, in which each of the eight propositions will be found to be clearly asserted in turn. We throw these quotations into small type to enable the reader who is familiar with Calvinistic thought commodiously to pass them over unread.

   1. “The Heavenly Father loves the human race, and would not have them perish.”—Calvin, on John iii. 16.
   “The Scriptures represent the redemption by Christ as . . . the fruit of God’s love to mankind.”—Edwards, II, p. 462.
   “The Scriptures plainly teach that God exercises a love of benevolence towards all men.”—Girardeau, Calvinism and Evangelical Arminianism Compared, p. 275.

   2. “The Scriptures plainly teach that God so loved the whole world that he gave his only begotten Son to make expiation for the sins of the whole world.”—Shedd, Presbyterian and Reformed Review, I, p. 10.
   “Augustinians do not deny that Christ died for all men. . . . He died for all that . . . he might lay the foundation for the offer of pardon and reconciliation with God on condition of faith and repentance. . . . This is what is meant when it is said, or implied, in Scripture that Christ gave himself as a propitiation, not for our sins only, but for the sins of the whole world.”—C. Hodge, II, p. 561.

    3. “Now, like as God is ready to bestow these benefits on all and every one, and that for Christ’s sake, in case they believe; so Christ hath merited pardon of sinne and salvation for all and every one, in case they believe.”—Twisse, Riches, etc., p. 109.
   “An all-sufficient Savior has been held up before him, abundantly able to save all that were ever invited to come; a door of access has been opened to the throne of grace, so that he might have gone with boldness and sought for the mercy which he needed with the certain prospect of obtaining it.”—Thornwell, II, p. 176.

    4. “God delights in the conversion and eternal life of the sinner rather than in his perdition, because this is a thing . . . congruous with his own infinitely compassionate nature.”—Turretin, IV. xvii. 33.
   “According to the Scriptures communicating good to the creatures is what . . . God . . . delights in simply and ultimately. . . . Ezek. xviii. 32. . . . Ezek. xxxiii. 11.”—Edwards, II, p. 242.
   “The natural spontaneous desire of God towards all men . . . expressed in Ezek. xxxiii. 11, xviii. 32 . . . springs from the compassionate love of the Creator towards the soul of the creature.”—Shedd, I, p. 452.

   5. “Augustinianism teaches that a plan of salvation adapted to all men and adequate for the salvation of all is freely offered to the acceptance of all.”—C. Hodge, II, p. 644.
   “In the general offers of the gospel, God exhibits a salvation sufficient for and exactly adapted to all, and sincerely offered to every one without exception.”—A. A. Hodge, Outlines, p. 229.
   “We hold it perfectly consistent with this truth, that the expiation of Christ for sin—expiation of infinite value and universal fitness—should be held forth to the whole world.”—Dabney, p. 533.

   6. “The Doctrine delivered in the Gospell is such, and so confirmed, as may justly make them inexcusable that doe not believe. . . . If a man had a will to obey and believe but he could not, in such a case it were unreasonable he should be punished. But in the case of disobedience unto God we speak of, all the fault is in the will, voluntarily and wilfully.”—Twisse, Riches, etc., pp. 169 f.
   “The gospel offer, combined with the positive command of God, renders the duty of believing imperative upon all, and therefore leaves every unbeliever utterly without excuse in the sight of God. . . . The apostle was clearly of the opinion that the absolute and sovereign predestination of God did not take away responsibility from man or remove the guilt of his transgressions.”—Thornwell, II, pp. 176, 181.
   “Nothing but a sinful unwillingness can prevent any one who hears the gospel from receiving and enjoying it.”—A. A. Hodge, Outlines, p. 229.

   7. “God commanding all to [who?] heare the Gospell to believe, doth not hinder them from believing, when they are willing to believe.”—Twisse, Riches, etc., p. 172.
   “God makes no man an unbeliever. He commands and urges it upon all to believe, and debars none from the throne of grace.”—Thornwell, II, p. 175.
   “God, instead of hindering the sinner, is helping him.”—Shedd, I, p. 454; cf. Presbyterian and Reformed Review, I, p. 18.
   “The decree of election puts no barrier before men preventing them from accepting the gospel offer.”—A. A. Hodge, Outlines, p. 229.
   “His decree prevents no man from coming.”—Girardeau, as cited, p. 369.

   8. “For indeed, not any of our Divines was, I think, ever known to maintain that God did intend to damne any man but for sinne.”—Twisse, Riches, etc., p. 186. (See also pp. 8, 14, 34, 44, 46, 106, etc.)
     “God ordains none to wrath or punishment except on account of their sin.”—Girardeau, as cited, p. 188; cf. pp. 186, 227.
   “Everywhere it is sin which excludes from his favor, and sin alone.”—Dabney, p. 240.

The insertion of this section of the “Declaratory Statement” into the Confession has, therefore, as its entire effect the reaffirmation of the doctrine of the Decree as expounded in the Third Chapter, together with the repudiation of certain well-known false inferences drawn from it by Arminian objectors; and the explicit assertion of its harmony with a series of precious truths with which these objectors have been accustomed to assert it to be inconsistent, but its consistency with which Calvinists have always strenuously asserted and solidly argued.

Benjamin B. Warfield, “The Confession of Faith as Revised in 1903,” in Selected Shorter Writings of Benjamin B. Warfield: Professor of Didactic and Polemic Theology, Princeton Theological Seminary 1887–1921, ed. John E. Meeter, 2 vols. (Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing, 1973), 2:374–80. See also “The Confession of Faith as Revised in 1903,” in Union Seminary Magazine 16.1 (October–November 1904): 5–10.

The Chapter “Of the Love of God, and Missions”
The latter of the two new chapters is entitled in the Revised Confession, “Of the Love of God, and Missions.” This was not, however, its original title; and it is not perfectly appropriate to its contents. This chapter (like its fellow, in general) was borrowed by the Revision Committee which reported in 1902, and whose work, now incorporated into the Confession, constitutes the Revised Confession, from the work of a former revision committee, which reported in 1892, and whose work (including these two chapters) was at that time rejected by the Church. The title given the chapter by its framers was, “Of the Gospel”; and the chapter remains, despite the change of its title, distinctly a chapter on “The Gospel,” that is to say, to speak in more technical language, on “The External Call.” Of course it speaks of the “Love of God,” and of “Missions”; for the “Gospel” is the expression of the love of God, and in its proclamation creates what we know as “Missions.” But the chapter is in no sense a development of the doctrine of the “Love of God,” which is introduced only incidentally as the source and burden of the “Gospel”; nor is it a development of the doctrine of “Missions,” which, in the technical sense of that word, comes before us only in the closing section. It is a development of the doctrine of “the Gospel,” which it very properly represents as originating in and proclaiming the love of God, and as issuing in missions. Our present purpose is not criticism, but exposition; but so much criticism of the misfitting title which has been attached to the chapter seemed necessary to its exposition. It runs as follows:

I. God, in infinite and perfect love, having provided in the covenant of grace, through the mediation and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, a way of life and salvation, sufficient for and adapted to the whole lost race of man, doth freely offer this salvation to all men in the gospel.

II. In the gospel God declares his love for the world and his desire that all men should be saved; reveals fully and clearly the only way of salvation; promises eternal life to all who truly repent and believe in Christ; invites and commands all to embrace the offered mercy; and by his Spirit accompanying the Word, pleads with men to accept his gracious invitation.

III. It is the duty and privilege of everyone who hears the gospel immediately to accept its merciful provisions; and they who continue in impenitence and unbelief incur aggravated guilt and perish by their own fault.

IV. Since there is no other way of salvation than that revealed in the gospel, and since in the divinely established and ordinary method of grace faith cometh by hearing the Word of God, Christ hath commissioned his Church to go into all the world and to make disciples of all nations. All believers are, therefore, under obligation to sustain the ordinances of religion where they are already established, and to contribute by their prayers, gifts, and personal efforts, to the extension of the kingdom of Christ throughout the whole earth.

It will be observed that the four sections of this chapter develop in logical sequence the doctrine of “The Gospel,” or, in other words, “The External Call.” In the first section the ground of the External Call or “the Gospel offer” is explained. In the second section, the contents of the External Call, or Gospel, are developed: thus, in effect, a definition of “the Gospel” is formulated. In the third section the effects of the External Call, or Gospel, are set forth. And in the last section the obligations growing out of the state of the case thus outlined are explained.

The doctrine thus developed is the ordinary doctrine of the “External Call” as expounded by the Reformed divines. The several declarations of the clauses are, indeed, but the commonplaces of the Reformed doctrine. It seems scarcely necessary to illustrate in detail so obvious a fact. One would need but to read over, say, Dr. Charles Hodge’s section on “The External Call” to obtain not only a parallel to the general treatment, but parallel statements of the most express kind for each of the several clauses. The chief propositions announced, moreover, are so nearly the same with the propositions embodied in the first section of the “Declaratory Statement” that the quotations from standard Reformed divines given to illustrate them (See above, pp. 378–380 [where he cites Calvin, Dabney, Edwards, Girardeau, C. Hodge, A. A. Hodge, Shedd, Thornwell, Twisse]) will serve nearly as good a purpose for the clauses here.

It cannot be said, on the other hand, that these propositions merely repeat anything said, with full explication, in other parts of the Confession. No doubt the doctrine of the External Call underlies the whole of the Confession; and important elements of it are here and there clearly asserted, as, for example, in the Tenth Chapter, where its relation to the Internal Call is fully explicated. The whole of it, indeed, is crisply contained in such a declaration as that made in VII. 3, that God, in the covenant of grace, “freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in him, that they may be saved.” But the Confession was too busy developing the contents of the gospel to stay to expand into all its details the doctrine of “the Gospel” itself; it was too much absorbed with the inward call of the Holy Spirit and its great sequences of salvation, to care to do more than explicitly to recognize and indicate in outline the external call of the Word. It must be allowed, therefore, that this chapter, with its detailed explanation of the External Call, does make a substantial addition to the doctrinal definitions of the Confession. It incorporates into the Confession a rather full exposition of the doctrine of the External Call, sufficiently clear, calmly stated, and thoroughly sound. It is a pity that its significance is somewhat obscured to the careless reader by the unmeaning title that has been attached to it; and that its bearing on the general doctrinal exposition of the Confession is somewhat concealed by the illogical position given it at the end of the document. But what it brings in itself is just a sound bit of Calvinistic theology, which perfectly homologates with the total contents of the Confession.

Warfield, “The Confession of Faith as Revised in 1903,” in Selected Shorter Writings, 388–91. See also “The Confession of Faith as Revised in 1903,” in Union Seminary Magazine, 17–19.

Summary: B. B. Warfield called these doctrines in the 1903 revisions to the Westminster Confession of Faith “a commonplace of Calvinistic polemics, so every item of doctrine affirmed in these propositions is a commonplace of Calvinistic divinity,” and consistent with what “Calvinists have always strenuously asserted and solidly argued.” He said they “very properly” represent the doctrine of the Gospel with its “proclaiming the love of God,” and that “it is the ordinary doctrine of the ‘External Call’ as expounded by the Reformed divines” and “common places of the Reformed doctrine,” which “seems scarcely necessary to illustrate in details [since it is] so obvious a fact.” They are “sufficiently clear, calmly stated, and thoroughly sound,” or a “sound bit of Calvinistic theology, which perfectly homologates with the total contents of the Confession.” For proof, Warfield cites Calvin, Dabney, Edwards, Girardeau, A. A. Hodge, Charles Hodge, Shedd, Thornwell, Turretin, and Twisse as teaching the same.

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