The Fallacies of Moral Government Theology - Part II

(modern Finneyism)
 

Charles G. Finney & Original Sin

by Pastor Leon Stump

Charles Grandison Finney (1792-1875) has been called “America’s greatest evangelist” and “the father of modern revivalism.” He studied extensively to be a lawyer, and though he was never admitted to the bar, he did serve as an assistant to a judge in Adams, New York, from 1818-1821. In 1821 his life was turned around dramatically by a remarkable conversion, after which in 1824 he was ordained by the Presbyterian Church and began holding revivals in upstate New York. These meetings were characterized by mighty displays of the Spirit of God in conviction and conversion, and the whole area was effected. In one congregation every person present was either brought to his knees or lay prostrate in a brief two minutes time period. Despite great opposition from some, the news of these meetings spread rapidly, and urgent appeals came from many towns and cities for Finney to come and hold meetings. The high point in his career as an evangelist actually came in these early years in 1830-1831 in Rochester, New York, where in six months time, over 100,000 people were converted and joined churches in the city and in a forty to fifty mile radius surrounding it. In 1832, Finney continued his evangelism for three years from two pastorates in New York City. Then in 1835, he accepted the invitation to become president of the newly established Oberlin College in Northern Ohio where he remained until his death.

Finney is most notable for his revival methods, his power in prayer and preaching, his support of social reforms, and his theology. Most evangelicals think of him only in terms of the first two-revival methods, and the power of the Spirit. But there is a small but influential number of people who think more of Finery’s theology than they do any of the other things for which he is noted. They call themselves, after a major emphasis in Finney’s theology, “Moral Government” people or those who follow Moral Government Theology. For many of these people, Finney was not only America’s greatest evangelist, but “the greatest evangelist since apostolic times” and “the greatest theologian since the apostle Paul.” It is primarily with this later claim that my articles will be addressed.

My acquaintance with Finney began early in my Christian life. Besides occasional references to him from Kenneth Hagin and others, I bought what is perhaps the best known book on his life, “Charles G. Finney” by Basil Miller. Since this book served as the official biography for the conference on the 150th anniversary of Finney’s birth, it is glowingly favorable to him. Any controversies over Finney’s message in particular are either hidden or presented in such a way that one is kept very much in the dark as to what his theology actually was. For example, the very term “perfection” does not set well with most evangelicals, and Miller, no doubt by design, treats Finney’s beliefs on it quite gingerly and in only two very brief paragraphs.

This [an experience of Finney in the Holy Spirit just before he left New York City for Oberlin] gave birth to Finney’s doctrine of Christian blessedness or sanctification or the “higher life” as Beardsley calls it. “A topic of absorbing interest at this time in Oberlin was the doctrine of the higher life,” writes Beardsley. Finney describes this experience as “the consecration of the whole being to God…that state of devotedness to God…a state not only of entire but of perpetual unending consecration to God.” He taught that the experience was to be sought and obtained through faith as a present and permanent possession. These views were enlarged in his book on Sanctification and also in his Systematic Theology, where as he says, “I discussed the subject of entire sanctification more at large.” (Charles G. Finney, Basil Miller; Zondervan Publishing House: Grand Rapids, MI; 1942, p. 96.)

Miller’s account of Finney on perfection is so sanitized that it is quite misleading. First, he adopts another term for it from another writer calling it “the higher life,” which would be far less offensive to many. Secondly, he makes it sound like it is the same as Wesley’s doctrine of sanctification (again, because of historical associations, much more acceptable). But Finney’s doctrine of perfection differs radically from the Wesleyan. Wesley taught that sanctification was a second work of grace subsequent to justification or the new birth in which one was delivered by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit from inbred sin or the sin nature we inherited from Adam. Finney would have none of this in every part-he denied inbred sin, so there was no need for deliverance from it to begin with.

Actually we must make a distinction between Finney and himself when it comes to his views on entire sanctification or perfection. It depends upon what part of Finney’s Systematic Theology and other works that you are reading. This is a common problem when reading the life works of any preacher or author. Apparent contradictions may be found owing possibly to the difference in time between one piece and another-the author’s views changed over time. This is common in Wesley’s writings, but nearly always accompanied by his own footnotes saying he had changed his mind on this or that particular point. Another advantage one has in reading Wesley’s Works is that dates are given for each sermon and treatise. Not so with Finney, hence the difficulty. Another possibility regarding apparent contradictions is that the author did not see any real contradiction in the things he said and can offer an explanation or clarification. Wesley does this often, but not Finney.

The contradictions in Finney on entire sanctification are enormous, even within his Systematic Theology. He argues in chapters seven, twenty-seven, and thirty-three that entire sanctification is nothing more or less than entire obedience to the moral law of God and that man has the natural ability (or free will) to obey this law completely. All sin is nothing more than the exercise of the will to disobey the law of God. But when a man repents and is converted, he turns his will to obey the law of God entirely (and thus be entirely sanctified). No sin is consistent with the repentance (turning from and forsaking all sin) that a man exercises in conversion, so there is no need for any change in a man’s nature or constitution in order for him to be entirely sanctified. No “second work of grace” is necessary. Man, Finney maintains, has the natural ability to keep the whole moral law of God.

But in chapter thirty-five Finney, rather masterfully, may I say, argues that entire sanctification is not at all possible in our own strength. We must, he says, have a revelation of and appropriate to ourselves by faith Christ and all His offices and relations to us as outlined in the New Testament. We need to know Christ as our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30), our Mighty God, true vine, advocate, and shepherd if we are to be entirely sanctified.

In my discussions with Moral Government people, they seem to have an appreciation only for the first part of what Finney says about perfection-that it is attainable merely by the exercise of the free will (with the “help” of the Holy Spirit in some vague sense) beginning at conversion, which is the turning of the will to do the will of God. Therefore, they deny that perfection is something to progress toward after conversion, as Finney definitely teaches in chapter thirty-five, but insist that perfection begins at conversion. In none of their preaching, teaching, or conversation do they seem to have the least grasp on what Finney ways in chapter thirty-five about the necessity of having Christ revealed to and in the soul as our salvation and sanctification. They approach the sinner and the believer, justification and sanctification, entirely on the grounds of obedience to the moral law just as Finney erroneously does in chapters seven, twenty-seven, and thirty-three. Any salvation that does not have Christ as its center is no salvation at all and is the worst, most fundamental, and destructive of all errors.

Miller’s biography of Finney ignores or deliberately conceals the distinctive features of his theology and highlights his emphasis upon evangelism, holiness, prayer, practical consecration and service, and the power of the Holy Spirit. (The book is subtitled, He Prayed Down Revivals.) Possibly at least in part due to the popularity of Miller’s book, which went through many editions, most evangelicals have a very high regard for Finney. But if they had or took the opportunity to examine his theology, the regard of even non-Calvinists (who have always detested Finney) would not be nearly so high.

Besides the Miller biography and the occasional references from Hagin and others, my only other exposure to Finney’s teachings came from some youth groups that were part of “the Jesus movement” of the late 1960’s and early ‘70’s. I was saved in December of 1966, and at that time I knew of very few who had come out of the “hippie” culture that swept America in the mid-1960’s, primarily through the hallucinogenic drugs marijuana and LSD. But within a few years, tens of thousands of youth were being evangelized, beginning in California and then across the nation. This evangelistic movement, some of it planned but much of it spontaneous, came to be called “the Jesus movement” and the youth who were reached by it were called “Jesus freaks.” As with any raw religious movement, much of it was dubious and spurious, and many of those who had been reached were merely caught up in the excitement and the novelty of a current “fad” and did not become lasting disciple of Jesus Christ. Only those who were incorporated into churches with discipleship programs lasted.

One of the most prominent groups seeking to disciple young people in those days was founded by a youth pastor named Tony Salerno. Named “the Agape Force” after the Greek word for “love,” it began in California, then moved to East Texas along with several similar or associated ministries, including singer/songwriter Keith Green’s “Last Days Ministries” and David Wilkerson. (David Wilkerson was a prominent figure in the “Jesus movement.”) Often converted folk rock singer Barry McGuire, the Second Chapter of Acts, and a teacher from New Zealand named Winkie Pratney accompanied the Agape Force in meetings, seminars, and youth camps.

Tony Salerno and the Agape Force came to my home church in West Columbia, Texas, only once, but our youth were in their meetings in Houston and other nearby places on a number of occasions. In addition, a lesser known group from California that took in youth on drugs, etc., and tried to rehabilitate them came to our church, and some of that group stayed there for a number of years to work with our youth. All of these ministries (with the exception of David Wilkerson) based their teaching almost exclusively on the writings of Charles Finney. These groups had some strange ways, but not all of them were directly due to their adherence to Finney. For one thing, they all lived communally. The reason I didn’t like them was because by 1968 the “faith movement” headed by Kenneth Hagin based on the writings of E.W. Kenyon had completely captivated me, and the Agape Force and its associates were definitely not part of nor influenced in the least by the faith movement. I simply assumed, not having studied his theology, that since these groups were based on Finney’s writings they were orthodox or at least okay in their doctrine. They stressed, to put in mildly, repentance. It was their answer for everything it seemed. They preached on sin a lot, with a view to getting people to humble themselves and be “broken” (sorrowful) for their sin and “selfishness.” At that time I didn’t think that is what people needed at all, but in hindsight, that was probably the spiritual level of most of our youth; they could have used some true repentance. On the other hand, repentance will take you only so far with God, and if continued in as if it were the whole of Christianity and the Christian life, after a time it can have just the opposite effects intended. People become hardened, disillusioned, and oppressed and quit following the Lord altogether instead of being established in Christ. I realized that the great stress upon repentance was no doubt from Finney, but I did not understand at that time the basis in Finney’s theology that was behind this.

You can’t accuse people for being in error because they stress repentance. Some of their methods were a little strange, but they justified them with the claim that they were necessary for youth coming out of a background of sin, drugs, and rebellion. There were only a few things I heard from these groups that I questioned. I remember hearing and reading Winkie Pratney teach that we were sinners, not because of Adam’s fall, but because of our own choice, and that Adam was not the “federal head” of the fallen human race. This bothered me somewhat because, through the “deeper life’ influence in Kenyon’s writings, I had become quite familiar with Paul’s parallel between Adam and Christ in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15. Pratney rejected this parallel, seeing it as the grounds for excuse for sin-“it’s Adam’s fault,” “I was born a sinner and can’t help but sin because I have a sin nature,” etc. I don’t think I realized that this was Finney’s teaching; I just knew I didn’t agree with it. On another occasion, one of our youth returned from a summer camp led by the Agape Force and related that one night the speaker, after stressing how much human sin over the millennia has grieved God, asked everyone to get on their knees and pray for God! On still another occasion, a Ft. Worth pastor remarked off hand that the Agape Force were into “Finneyism,” but I don’t know on what he based his remark. Other than a few anecdotal incidents like this involving Finney people, I was not aware of any major doctrinal error in the groups, and, like I said, because of a general high regard for Finney that everyone seemed to possess, despite the fact that few of us had examined his teaching in any detail, I assumed everything was all right, at least on the doctrinal score.

Years passed until I had the opportunity, after having gotten out of the faith movement, to meet others who were deeply into Finney’s teachings. Again, they laid great stress upon sin, judgment, and repentance, but by this time, because of my exposure to classic Christian writings of the past, I knew the validity of seeking to bring the lost to salvation by first leading them to repentance through exposing their sin. I still did not know or realize the distinctive elements in Finney’s theology and merely assumed they were okay or at least benign. It was only over a period of years of contact with these people that I increasingly became aware of some serious doctrinal differences between us. For some time I was not certain whether these differences were due to the actual teaching of Finney or those who followed after him. I had been given several small books by Gordon Olson, a leader in the “Moral Government” movement. There were a number of things in them that were troublesome, but these were of a relatively minor nature. At this time the only works of Finney himself I possessed were Lectures on Revival, The Heart of Truth (lectures on theology), a book of letters entitled Principles of Discipleship, and a book of sermons entitled True and False Repentance. But I had not read all of any one of these titles. The portions I had read seemed okay at the time.

At the beginning of my dialogues with the Finney people, the conflicts seemed to be over relatively minor points, namely, original sin, the foreknowledge of God, etc. Finney viewed the doctrine of original sin as a major “hiding place” for sinners and blasted away at it. Original sin is the belief that all men inherit through natural generation from Adam the tendency to sin or a sin nature. Infidels and Unitarians argued that God was unjust in punishing men for having and subsequently expressing in their deeds a sin nature inherited at birth from Adam. How could we help but sin if it was our nature to do so? Carnal “believers” excuse their continuing to sin by blaming the fallen nature of the flesh inherited from Adam, and that this nature, according to Calvinism, could not be shed until death. Sin, they insist, is a practical necessity, and it is impossible not to sin at least some.

I argued that one could knock down these excuses for sin from Scripture without giving up the doctrine of original sin. John Wesley certainly did. By the power of Jesus’ blood, the new birth, the indwelling Holy Spirit, and the Word of God, we can overcome all sin. The Bible does teach a moral as well as natural depravity proceeding from Adam to all men, but this corrupt or sinful nature does not necessitate sin but only inclines men to it. They may therefore still be condemned by God for yielding to and following after it. Finney people see this as being logically “inconsistent” with oneself, but it seems no more inconsistent than Finney is with himself on many of his own views.

Finney insisted that a distinction must be made between physical and moral depravity. He defined “depravity” (from the Latin de and pravus, “crooked”) as “lapsed, fallen, departed from right or straight….deterioration, or fall from a former state of moral or physical perfection” (Systematic Theology; Bethany House: Minneapolis, MN;1976, p. 164). Finney went on to explain in his Systematic Theology that all men inherit and are born with physical depravity from Adam but not moral depravity. Physical depravity, he says is disease (and death). Moral depravity is “the depravity of free-will, not of the faculty itself, but of its free action….It is synonymous with sin or sinfulness” (Ibid., p. 165). Man inherits and is born with disease and mortality from Adam, but not sin or a sin nature. He lists the most common arguments used to substantiate the doctrine of original sin: 1) Universality. All men, without exception, sin. 2) All men sin from the earliest stages of their lives. 3) This is not owing to any change that occurs after their birth. 4) Sin is free and spontaneous, not against man’s nature but in harmony with it. 5) Sin is hard to overcome and must therefore be agreeable to man’s nature. 6) The suffering and death of infants previous to actual transgression. 7) It is Scriptural: Job 14:4 (with 15:14 and 25:4), “Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? Not one;” Psalm 51:5, “I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me;” Psalm 58:3, “The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.” In rebuttal, Finney maintains that all of this can be accounted for by holding that physical, not moral, depravity was inherited from Adam. He says that physical depravity includes disorders of the mind and affections and is the grounds of moral depravity. Because we are born with desires to satisfy our natural appetites, which are not sinful in themselves, we become habituated to gratifying these desires and thus become selfish before we are able to reason or choose right from wrong. Then when we are able to discern the difference between and choose right from wrong and are tempted, we all infallibly choose wrong and sin because we are already given over to selfishness:

Physical depravity may be predicated of mind….As mind, in connection with body, manifests itself through it, acts by means of it, and is dependent upon it, it is plain that if the body become diseased, or physically depraved, the mind cannot but be affected by this state of the body, through and by means of which it acts. The normal manifestations of mind cannot, in such cases, be reasonably expected. Physical depravity may be predicated of all the involuntary states of the intellect, and of the sensibility. That is, the actings and states of the intellect may become disordered, depraved, deranged, or fallen from the state of integrity and healthiness….

The sensibility, or feeling department of the mind, may be sadly and physically depraved (p. 165)….The appetites and passions, the desires and cravings, the antipathies and repellencies of the feelings fall into great disorder and anarchy….[T]he whole sensibility becomes a wilderness, a chaos of conflicting and clamorous desires, emotions and passions. That this state of the sensibility is often, and perhaps in some measure always, owing to the state if the nervous system with which it is connected, through and by which it manifests itself, there can be but little room to doubt….

The human body is certainly in a state of physical depravity. The human mind also certainly manifests physical depravity (p.166)….As the human mind in this state of existence is dependent upon the body for all it’s manifestations, and as the human body is universally in a state of greater or less physical depravity or disease, it follows that the manifestations of mind thus dependent on a physically depraved organization, will be physically depraved manifestations. Especially is this true of the human sensibility. The appetites, passions, and propensities are in a state of most unhealthy development....Every person of reflection has observed, that the human mind is greatly out of balance, in consequence of the monstrous development of the sensibility. The appetites, passions, and propensities have been indulged, and the intelligence and conscience stultified by selfishness (p.168)….

[P]revious to regeneration, the moral depravity of mankind is universal....[and] total....[that is] the moral depravity of the unregenerate is without any mixture of moral goodness or virtue (pp.169-170).... [The universality of moral depravity, he says, does not prove the doctrine of original sin.] Sin maybe the result of temptation; temptation may be universal, and of such a nature as uniformly, not necessarily, to result in sin, unless a contrary result be secured by a divine moral suasion (p.174)…..[W]ith a constitution physically depraved, and surrounded with objects to awaken appetite, and with all the circumstances in which human beings first form their moral character, they will seek universally to gratify themselves, unless prevented by the illuminations of the Holy Spirit (p.176)…..[M]ankind have become so physically depraved, that this fact, together with the circumstances under which they come into being, and began their moral career, will certainly, (not necessarily,) result in moral depravity….. [M]y own views of moral depravity [are] that it results from a physically depraved constitution; and the circumstances of temptation under which children come into this world, and begin and prosecute their moral career (p.178)….[T]he first moral conduct and character of children is sinful….[T]heir physical depravity, together with their circumstances of temptation, led them into selfishness, from the very first moment of their moral existence (p.180)….[T]he sensibility acts as a powerful impulse to the will, from the moment of birth, and secures the consent and activity of the will to procure (p.189) it’s gratification, before the reason is developed. The will is thus committed to the gratification of feeling an appetite, when first the idea of moral obligation is developed. This committed state of the will is not moral depravity, and has no moral character, until the idea of moral obligation is developed. The moment this idea is developed, this committal of the will to self-indulgence must be abandoned, or it becomes selfishness, or moral depravity. But, as the will is already in a state of committal, and has to some extent already formed the habit of seeking to gratify feeling, and as the idea of moral obligation is at first but feebly developed, unless the Holy Spirit interferes to shed light on the soul, the will, as might be expected, retains it’s hold on self-gratification….This selfish choice is the wicked heart-the propensity to sin-that causes what is generally termed actual transgression. This sinful choice is properly enough called indwelling sin. It is the latent, standing, controlling preference of the mind, and the cause of all the outward and active life….

Again, it should be remembered, that the physical depravity of our race has much to do with our moral depravity. A diseased physical system renders the appetites, passions, tempers, and propensities more clamorous and despotic in their demands, and of course constantly urging to selfishness, confirms and strengthens it. It should be distinctly remembered that physical depravity has no moral character in itself. But yet it is a source of fierce temptation to selfishness….

Moral depravity is then universally owing to temptation. That is, the soul is tempted to self-indulgence, and yields to the temptation, and this yielding, and not the temptation, is sin or moral depravity. This is manifestly the way in which Adam and Eve became morally depraved. They were tempted, even by undepraved appetite, to prohibited indulgence, and were overcome….Just in the same way all sinners become such, that is, they become morally depraved, by yielding to temptation to self-gratification under some form (p.190)….

[To sum up:] (1.) The impulses of the sensibility are developed, gradually, commencing from the birth, and depending on physical development and growth. (2.) The first acts of will are in obedience to these. (3.) Self-gratification is the rule of action previous to the development of reason. (4.) No resistance is offered to the will’s indulgence of appetite, until a habit of self-indulgence is formed. (5.) When reason affirms moral obligation, it finds the will in a state of habitual and constant committal to the impulses of the sensibility. (6.) The demands of the sensibility have become more and more despotic every hour of indulgence. (7.) In this state of things, unless the Holy Spirit interpose, the idea of moral obligation will be but dimly developed. (8.) The will of course rejects the bidding of reason, and cleaves to self-indulgence (p.191).


Before we take up a few particulars in Finney’s argument, let me say that my main point is to demonstrate that his view on (or against) original sin is no solution to the problem at all. His purpose is first to remove the excuse sinners (and “carnal believers”) give for their sin-“I inherited a sin nature from Adam and cannot help but sin”-and second to silence the response of Unitarians and infidels that it would be fundamentally unjust of God to allow men to be born with a sinful nature and then punish them for doing what they only were born with the nature to do. Finney vehemently denies that men are born in sin or with a sin nature but then turns around and affirms that they are born with physical depravity which infallibly and universally (though not of necessity) leads them to sin and moral depravity from their very first encounter with temptation when they awaken to accountability. So, Finney does not solve the problem at all but simply moves it one step. Men are born, owing to Adam and not themselves, with a condition that enslaves them to selfishness before they are able to make moral judgments on their own which invariably (“certainly” Finney says) leads them to sin. No advantage is gained by this view against the excuses of the “carnal believer” or the protest of the infidel and Unitarian. Try it on them and see! The carnal believer (if you can get him to understand what Finney said in the first place) could just as easily (that is if he had the intelligence to do so) respond that he cannot help but sin because he was born with a physical depravity that led naturally and infallibly (“certainly”) through addiction to selfishness (while he was neither morally responsible for it, conscious of it, nor capable of correcting it) to moral depravity and sin. Adding the qualification “not necessarily” to “certainly,” that is, that the resulting moral depravity is a certain but not a necessary consequence doesn’t help much. The child doesn’t have to fall for his first temptation but he certainly will! His power to avoid sin is purely theoretical. It never happens! Without fail, Finney acknowledges, moral depravity and sin does take place!

In other parts of his writings, Finney argues at length for “natural ability,” that is, that men are naturally capable of obeying God and His law as opposed to the common view that men are naturally unable and must have God’s grace to do so. But here he admits that children “will seek universally to gratify themselves unless prevented by the illuminations of the Holy Spirit.” So I guess men are dependent upon God to keep them from sinning after all, despite all the Pelagian semantics for which Finney is known. And how often does the Holy Spirit exercise this “prevention” of sin? Do all children have equal access to this “illumination” without which they will be morally depraved?

Finney’s views ultimately do nothing to remove the offense infidels, Universalist, and Unitarians raise against the justice of God concerning these things. Try it on them and see if they lay down their arms against the orthodox Christian doctrine! If you can find one with the sense to do it, I’m sure he will see that you have only moved the problem one step and not removed it at all. There is no real difference between Finney’s views and the doctrine of original sin at all; in fact I have no doubt but that someone who holds to original sin has already at some time or another argued physical depravity as the mechanism of universal moral depravity. I know I had thought of it before I read this in Finney, and when I used it on some Moral Government people they were silent as if they hadn’t known it. They seem to have overlooked this explanation Finney offers as a supposed alternative to original sin and adhere strictly to the bare assertion that man is not born in sin or with anything like a nature that leads him to sin. It took me hours one time to get the tiniest acknowledgment from a Moral Government teacher that there is, well, maybe some kind of something one might call a “tendency” to sin in man from birth-but not sin.

Finney even has the audacity to charge those who have sought to reconcile original sin with personal responsibility with what he himself is guilty-“removing the problem one step back” and “subtlety and refinement:” To say that God is not the direct former of the [man’s sinful] constitution, but that sin is conveyed by natural generation from Adam, who made himself sinful, is only to remove the objection one step back, but not to obviate it (p. 185)….Do these writers think by this subtlety and refinement to relieve their doctrine of constitutional moral depravity of its intrinsic absurdity? (p. 186)

I don’t understand why Finney, if he is as brilliant a theologian as some claim, couldn’t see that he himself does this very thing-removes the objection one step back instead of doing away with it-and through an equal amount of lawyerly subtlety and refinement. If the doctrine of constitutional moral depravity or original sin is intrinsically absurd (which I deny), the intrinsic absurdity remains. A major part of Finney’s denial of original sin is his insistence that sin is only an act of the will and has no existence otherwise:

We deny that the human constitution is morally depraved, because it is impossible that sin should be a quality of the substance of soul or body. It is, and must be, a quality of choice or intention, and not of substance. To make sin an attribute or quality of substance is contrary to God’s definition of sin. ‘Sin,’ says the apostle, ‘is anomia,’ a ‘transgression of, or a want of conformity to, the moral law [1 John 3:4].’ (p.185)

We are not forced, as Finney supposes, to take 1 John 3:4 as the exclusive or sole definition of sin. In many other texts of the Bible sin is spoken of as a power or principle that rules men. For example, verses five and six of 1 John 3 continue:
And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him. (KJV)


“In Him,” that is, in Jesus Christ, is no sin. Does he mean simply that Jesus never committed sin in the past? No, in addition to that, there is no sin in Him in the present. But if we must think of sin exclusively as transgression of the law, does this mean there is no present act of sin being committed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore no act of sin being committed by the believer who abides in Him? Of course not. Therefore, even the apostle John, in the very next verse after saying sin is the transgression of the law, speaks of sin as a power or principle, that there is no sin dwelling in Jesus (how could an act dwell in anyone any length of time?). And this is the grounds on which the believer who abides spiritually in active union with Him does not commit sin. Finney continues:

But how came Adam by a sinful nature? Did his first sin change his nature? Or did God change it as a penalty for sin? What ground is there for the assertion that Adam’s nature became in itself sinful by the fall? This is a groundless, not to say ridiculous, assumption, and an absurdity. Sin an attribute of nature! A sinful Substance! Sin in substance! Is it a solid, fluid, a material, or a spiritual substance? (p. 186)

Yes, of course Adam’s first sin changed his “nature.” And this, even according to Finney unless we buy all the subtleties of his semantics:

Adam, being the natural head of the race, would naturally…greatly affect for good or evil his whole posterity. His sin in many ways exposed his posterity to aggravated temptation. Not only the physical constitution of all men [which always leads to moral depravity, remember] but all the influences under which they first form their moral character, are widely different from what they would have been, if sin had never been introduced. (p. 191)

If “physical depravity” (“lapsing, falling, departing from right or straight; deterioration, or fall from a former state” including the mind and sensibility) is the legacy of Adam’s fall through natural generation to all men, then certainly it was the state of Adam himself after he sinned. And this physical depravity, according to Finney, is the occasion of moral depravity. There is no real difference between physical depravity as Finney himself defines it and a “change of nature,” and this physical depravity is the cause of and only one step removed from sin, which, he says, will certainly follow. Finney has not disproved the doctrine of original sin at all, but has done nothing more than offer an explanation of how sin is transferred from Adam to all his descendants.

By rhetorical questioning-Is sin a solid, liquid, or gas; (come in quarts, pounds, or volts)?-Finney attempts to demonstrate that sin must not have any real existence outside an actual act. But there are many things that we know exist that we cannot measure. We don’t know what spirits consists of, how they can move or think or see or hear or speak, given that they have no organs for these activities; but we know spirits do exist and are quite capable of doing all these things. The fact is that the Scripture often speaks of sin apart from an actual act. The “absurdity” rests with them:


Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” (John 8:34-36)

What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. (Romans 3:9)

For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin. (Romans 6:6)

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace. (Romans 6:12-14)

Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey-whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. (Romans 6:16-20)

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.…As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.…Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. Thanks be to God-through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. (Romans 7:14, 17, 20-23, 25)

Because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. (Romans 8:2)


But the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe. (Galatians 3:22)

These Scriptures clearly represent sin as more than an act of the will-they represent it as a power that indwells and enslaves men. Finney and those who hold to his theology usually respond that these verses are speaking of sin in a poetic sense. This might work with a book like Psalms, but John is a Gospel and Romans is a didactic Epistle. Of course, even non-poetic books of the Bible may contain poetry, mainly in quotations from the Old Testament books of poetry. But there is no indication whatever that John 8 or Romans 5-8 is poetry. It is true that sin is personified in these passages as a slave master; however, the use of personification does not take away from the fact that it is a real power, but serves only to underscore it. Paul calls the power of sin “the law of sin” and “the law of sin and death.” He is using the word “law” not in the sense of a command but in the sense of a ruling principle. This confirms that the personification of sin as a slave master is not to be taken only “poetically.” Yet neither Jesus nor Paul offers any explanation of just how sin exists as a power or ruling principle; they only affirm that it does. Finney’s quarrel is with Scripture itself, not the theology of those who say sin is a nature or power.

I must bring this opening article on the theology of Charles G. Finney to a close. One’s views on original sin, depending upon what they are, may or may not be serious error. I have started with Finney’s views on original sin because they are linked to his views on salvation. Far more serious are Finney’s errors concerning the atonement, justification, and regeneration. These subjects are at the heart of the Christian faith. Error here is devastating to the whole of it and a far more serious matter. These are the things we will take up next.

Until next time, may God lead you by His Word and Spirit in His truth, is my earnest prayer.
Pastor Leon Stump.