Arminianism vs. Calvinism: Does it matter?
I can remember my freshman year at Bible College spending hours arguing over which dogma was correct, Calvinism vs. Arminianism. I grew up Wesleyan and was firmly in the Arminian camp. However, all my housemates were Baptists (rare at a Wesleyan College) and they were all Calvinists. We would go back and forth, each of us quoting Scriptures that supported our claim and there were many on both sides. I have since come to the conclusion that while an interesting intellectual exercise, neither of us could definitively prove our point. At the end of the day, we were Christians and agreed on the basic tenets of the faith. There is a quote often attributed to St. Augustine that says, “In the essentials unity, in the non-essentials diversity, and in all things charity (love).” To put it a different way, Wimber used to say that in the Vineyard we wanted to stick with “the main and the plain” of the Gospel. Things like Arminianism and Calvinism are dogmas extrapolated by men which became