“John Calvin used terms like "total depravity" to mean that, despite the ability of people to outwardly uphold the law, there remained an inward distortion which makes all human actions displeasing to God, whether or not they are outwardly good or bad. Even after regeneration, every human action is mixed with evil.”
Calvin went on to tell us how man is after regeneration SO I will too, I guess. Dealing with what Calvin calls totally depravity. I SAY a man, any man is totally depraved in God’s eyes whether he is totally depraved or partly depraved in man’s eyes. He IS totally depraved SINCE God HATES with a passion ALL sin.
NOW I ask, "Do you know any human being living that doesn't have sin in their life? DO you KNOW any Christian or Calvinist who doesn't have any type of sin in their life? There are so many sins that we probably could NOT count them. Before the Reformed Church came into existence God was accepting all kinds of people into his fold in the OT and in the NT before Calvin and the reformers. God DID NOT need or want a reformed church. He said the gates of hell could not stand against his church he founded in the book of Acts and it is still here BUT I will agree that a lot of members of the true church, the body of Christ, fell away at different times through history. Now let’s go back to my thoughts. So if God cannot use man to reach man then he is the liar and we have big problems. God said in many places in the word that he wants to use man to reach man. I will give one illustration to show you my point and you can find many more that agree with this scripture.
Ezekiel 22
30 And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none.
John the Baptist was going around telling people to repent in their fallen state and many did. Jesus Christ told them if they did not repent they would perish and many under Jesus repented such as the adulteress thrown at the feet of Jesus. Even some that did repent went back to their old ways John Calvin defined totally depraved (above) and IF he can give a definition for total depravity THEN I can too in a different format than I did above. Danny Bunn uses terms like "total depravity" to mean a man or woman can use his God given free will that Satan warped in the garden to still act of what God told them to do as shown by Ezekiel (above) and other places. He gives people the power to repent when in their fallen state SINCE all mankind is in a fallen state even as a Christian as Calvin said above also. I will now give a couple of illustrations
Acts 2
38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Acts 3
19 Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord.
Peter told one important point here and that is to repent. Repentance is tied in with believing. As God reveals your condition to you, he makes you capable of repenting as he does all through his word. Repentance and believing is tied in together. AND when they truly believed they repented and were baptized into the body of Christ.
So in the scriptures above we see that God calls on unregenerate man to repent when a Calvinist THINKS that he can’t do that UNTIL he is regenerated WHICH IS the born again experience. Born again and regeneration is one and the same thing.
God HAS continually used fallen man despite their fallen nature. Words are important and when someone sees the words “totally depraved”, it automatically hits them as they went too fall and God cannot reach them BUT Calvinists use it in this way, “Mankind is in such a bad shape there is nothing he can do to be saved OR even want to be saved without God doing EVERYTHING to save them, hence the select group of people he selects are the ONLY ones who will be saved.” That is basically what Calvinism teaches. So repentance or believing is really only words with NO meaning in Calvinism SINCE that person IS saved because before the foundation of the world God decided who he wants and who he doesn’t want. He just wants a small select group and even though a Calvinist will tell you that God does not select on what you have done or not done, God just randomly selects them NOT based on anything they have done. What is strange to me IS that God usually chooses those in the same physical family units MOST of the time from what I have seen.
So if you are totally depraved or a little depraved there is hope in Jesus and ALL mankind is depraved without the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ. Turn to God in faith, repenting like he tells you to do and you will experience his life. God wants ALL to be saved including you.