Last week I was asked a question by a friend whether I was really a Calvinist or not and, if so, if I was a five-point Calvinist. I usually avoid the term Calvinist for a different term that is almost synonymous with it and that is Reformed faith or Reformed theology. The reason is because people have a kind of knee-jerk reaction to the term Calvinism because they’ve encountered some extreme forms, and I think this is part of what was motivating her question. So I tried to clarify for her what I actually meant by the fact that I was a Calvinist.
When someone asks, “Are you a five-point Calvinist?”, my response is that there is no other kind. If you understand accurately the convictions of those who are reformed in their thinking about salvation, which these so-called five-points actually refer to, you realize that they are all held together by a common concept that J. I. Packer has put like this: God saves sinners. That’s the single point of Calvinism.
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