Spurgeon’s Arminian Prayer

Published March 14, 2012

The Prayer Of Those Who Believe In The False “Free Will” Gospel

self-righteous pharisaical arminian free-will prayer

Charles H. Spurgeon, a famous reformed (Calvinistic) Baptist preacher of the 1800s, is quoted in the following prayer. Spurgeon made up this “pharisaical prayer” in order to illustrate the human pride underlying the idea of an unsaved, ungodly, rebellious – and spiritually dead – sinner exercising his “free-will” to choose the Lord Jesus Christ as his Savior, i.e. to come to Christ of his own free-will.

“Lord, I thank thee I am not like those poor presumptuous Calvinists [who think you chose them to salvation]. Lord, I was born with a glorious free will; I was born with power by which I can turn to thee of myself; I have improved my grace. If everybody had done the same with their grace that I have, they might all have been saved. Lord, I know thou dost not make us willing if we are not willing ourselves. Thou givest grace to everybody; some do not improve it, but I do. There are many that will go to Hell as much bought with the blood of Christ as I was; they had as much of the Holy Ghost given to them; They had as good a chance, and were as much blessed as I am, It was not thy grace that made us to differ; I know it did [accomplish] a great deal, still I turned the point; I made use of what was given me, and others did not – that is the difference between me and them.”

May the above prayer never be our prayer!

And folks, if you are thinking that it is YOUR faith that does the saving, think again. Faith, repentance and imputed righteousness are GIFTS of salvation received upon regeneration by the Holy Spirit, which is what is meant by Ephesians 2:8-9 – “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”. The kind of faith it takes to know and to believe in the REAL Jesus of the Bible is not a faith you are born with. Hence, the declaration of our Lord that “Ye must be born again” to even see the kingdom of God (John 3:3), let alone enter into it! More food for thought on this subject from Scripture:

“For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?” – 1 Corinthians 4:7

“Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil.” – Jeremiah 13:23