Free Resource: Common Grace and Biblical Counseling

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To download a free copy of my 90-page, 35,500-word PDF document on common grace and biblical counseling, go here:

Common Grace and Biblical Counseling: Wisdom from Reformed Theologians: PDF Document.

To read the 35,500-word blog post on common grace and biblical counseling, go here:

Common Grace and Biblical Counseling: Wisdom from Reformed Theologians: Blog Edition.

Some Recent History and Some Classic History 

In 2022, I began sharing posts where I collated quotes from Reformed theologians regarding common grace—and how it relates to biblical counseling. I’ve wanted to collate those quotes into one document and one blog post. Two years later I’ve accomplished that goal. Here are links to the original posts in the blog series:

1. What Is Common Grace?
2. 7 Reformed Theologians on “Common Grace.”
3. John Calvin on Common Grace.
4. John Calvin: “Integrationist?”
5. Herman Bavinck on “Common Grace,” Part 1.
6. Herman Bavinck on “Common Grace,” Part 2.
7. Abraham Kuyper on Common Grace.
8. Every Square Inch of Human Existence: Kuyper on God’s All-Encompassing Common Grace.
9. Van Til, Kuyper, Bavinck, and Biblical Counselors: An Assessment.
10. Cornelius Van Til on Common Grace: In His Own Words.
11. Cornelius Van Til: “Zombie-Infected”?
12. David Powlison on Common Grace, Biblical Counseling and Secular Psychology.
13. Powlison on Biblical Counseling and Secular Psychotherapy.
14. John Frame on Common Grace, Biblical Counseling, and Christian Integrative Counseling.
15. Common Grace and Biblical Counseling: Wisdom from Reformed Theologians.

Please note that each author wrote comprehensively on common grace. Even in a lengthy document, I am only able to provide samplers from each theologian.

Here’s the order in which you’ll find the quotes in the collated blog post and in the PDF document:

1. John Calvin
2. Herman Bavinck
3. Abraham Kuyper
4. Cornelius Van Til
5. David Powlison
6. John Frame
7. Charles Hodge
8. John Murray
9. Tim Keller
10. R. C. Sproul 

Why Common Grace? 

But why expend so much time and energy collating what Reformed theologians have taught about common grace? I’ve done this because common grace has become a major topic of discussion in the modern biblical counseling world. Some biblical counselors are seeking to minimize or even change how the historic Reformed doctrine of common grace has been understood and applied.

For example, Francine Tan, in her article in the ACBC’s Journal of Biblical Soul Care, Fall 2024, Vol 8 #2, “Common Grace in Debate,” suggested a major reworking and significant minimizing of the historic Reformed doctrine of common grace. Tan states,

“Thus, I propose that biblical counselors ought to revisit how we define CG and make a few qualifications to the traditional Reformed view of CG. When CG is defined as God’s non-salvific yet kind posture towards all mankind, displayed in the delay of final judgment, the restraint of sin’s full impact on the earth, and the bestowal of temporal gifts for the providential preservation of the world, the doctrine distinctly remains an expression of God’s communicable attributes of kindness and goodness. CG should not be understood as the positive contributions made by unregenerate men through discoveries, insights, or ‘good deeds’” (83).

This significant limiting of the Reformed doctrine of common grace is in opposition to Calvin (here and here), Bavinck (here and here), Kuyper (here and here), Van Til (here and here), Frame (here) and Powlison (here and here), to name just a few leading Reformed theologians and one leading Reformed biblical counselor.

A Comprehensive Understanding of Common Grace 

To relate common grace to biblical counseling, we first need to see, in a comprehensive way, how Reformed theologians have defined common grace. By comprehensive, I first mean a collation that gives voice to those Reformed authors known as having developed classic statements on common grace. This document does this by focusing on four classic Reformed developers of the doctrine of common grace: John Calvin, Herman Bavinck, Abraham Kuyper, and Cornelius Van Til.

Second, by comprehensive, I mean quoting Reformed theologians on what they said about common grace, instead of quoting them primarily or only on what they said about total depravity. As the quotes in this document demonstrate, Reformed theologians developed their biblical thinking on common grace because they recognized both the Bible’s teaching on the noetic effect of sin, and the Bible’s teaching on God’s gifts to non-Christians. Total depravity does not annul common grace. Common grace restrains total depravity. The Reformed doctrine of common grace explains how God sovereignly works in the lives and minds of totally depraved unregenerate persons. You’ll see this focus repeatedly in the primary quotations contained in this document. Yet, Reformed theologians understood that while the doctrine of total depravity and the doctrine of common grace surely overlap; they are still separate doctrines. Kuyper was quite definitive about this, stating:

“It would not be appropriate to insert a fundamental argument for the Reformed doctrine of sin into a study concerning common grace” (Common Grace, Vol. 2, 51).

Said practically,

Don’t quote Reformed theologians on total depravity and then claim that you have presented their position on common grace. Instead, quote Reformed theologians on common grace, knowing that they understood total depravity as they wrote about common grace.

Kuyper, again, explains this connection between these two doctrines, while clearly distinguishing between them.

“We teach, on the one hand, the total corruption of our nature by sin; this means that in its corruption, our nature, if left to itself, would immediately surrender itself as prey to eternal death. And we teach, on the other hand, that in the actual life of humanity we have our eyes open to the continuing rich development of which humanity proved capable and to so many beautiful things in humanity that come to manifestation. The dogma of the corruption of our nature through sin tells us what would become of us if God let go of us; the dogma of common grace tells us what can and does still flourish in our human race because God preserves us” (95).

Third, to relate common grace to biblical counseling, we also need to ask and answer a very specific question:

How have Reformed theologians applied the doctrine of common grace in relationship to the use of extra-biblical resources from non-Christians?

As Kuyper emphasizes,

“Common grace touches on the relationship between theology and secular scholarship” (Common Grace, Vol. 2, 214, emphasis in the original).

We can’t simply quote Reformed theologians on total depravity. We can’t simply quote Reformed theologians on common grace. If we want to relate common grace to biblical counseling, then we must quote Reformed theologians on what they said about their actual beliefs and practices concerning the Christian use of non-Christian common grace resources. This document does that repeatedly. It provides you with the first-hand, primary source material so you can make your own informed decisions about how Reformed theologians applied common grace resources in their ministries.