Arguably, the Arminius of our day is Norman Shepherd, who, like Arminius, sought to revise fundamentally Reformed theology from within as a minister and as a professor in a Reformed theological faculty. Like Arminius, Shepherd gave birth to a movement, the so-called, self-described “Federal Vision” theology. The movements associated with Norman Shepherd remain important examples of this impulse within the conservative and confessional Presbyterian and Reformed world.

The Remonstrants were dissatisfied with the basic insights of the Reformation and thus of the Reformed faith. They did not agree with the Protestant articulation of the gospel, that Christ came for his elect, to be their obedient, righteous substitute, to die for them, to be raised for them and to save them utterly and only by grace alone. They did not accept the Protestant definition of faith as resting in, receiving, and trusting in Christ alone for our salvation. The Synod of Dort met to defend those basic convictions against the Remonstrants. As we celebrate the 400th anniversary of the Synod of Dort we should recognize, however, that the impulse that animated the Remonstrants still exists. Obviously, it is preserved among those who openly identify with the Remonstrant cause and theology, e.g., the remaining Remonstrant congregations in the Netherlands and among those who identify as Arminian or Wesleyan. Less obvious, however, are those movements, like the original Remonstrants, who self-identify as Reformed but who seek to revise Reformed theology, from within, along the same lines as Arminius, Episcopius et al. In one way or another, they seek to make salvation partly by grace and partly by works. By definition any such scheme, whatever its source, is a denial of salvation sola gratia and sub-Reformed and sub-Protestant.

Arguably, the Arminius of our day is Norman Shepherd, who, like Arminius, sought to revise fundamentally Reformed theology from within as a minister and as a professor in a Reformed theological faculty. Like Arminius, Shepherd gave birth to a movement, the so-called, self-described “Federal Vision” theology. The movements associated with Norman Shepherd remain important examples of this impulse within the conservative and confessional Presbyterian and Reformed world. The Federal Vision theology, which continues to find adherents in the CREC, the ecclesiastical home of the Federal Vision, and in orthodox, confessional Reformed denominations represented in the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council (NAPARC). Further, there are those who do not want either to be identified as Federal Visionists any longer (but who openly confess the same doctrine), e.g., Douglas Wilson or who deny being Federal Visionists but who support Federal Visionists, their institutions, and who, in any disagreement, always find themselves supporting the Federal Visionists. They have believers elect, justified, united to Christ, and adopted by virtue of baptism. They confess this openly:

We affirm that apostasy is a terrifying reality for many baptized Christians. All who are baptized into the triune Name are united with Christ in His covenantal life, and so those who fall from that position of grace are indeed falling from grace. The branches that are cut away from Christ are genuinely cut away from someone, cut out of a living covenant body. The connection that an apostate had to Christ was not merely external.

We deny that any person who is chosen by God for final salvation before the foundation of the world can fall away and be finally lost. The decretally elect cannot apostatize.

There are two great errors under this head of Federal Vision theology: the rejection of the biblical and confessional Reformed distinction between an external relationship to the covenant of grace (e.g., through church membership or baptism) and an internal relationship to the covenant of grace by grace alone (sola gratia), through faith alone (sola fide) by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit (John 3). The Apostle Paul teaches this distinction in Romans 2:28–29:

For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God (Rom 2:28–29; ESV).

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