Totally depraved, wonderfully made

For some time now, my mind has been crunching over the idea of total depravity and its implications for self-esteem, which, at the secular end of the scale, is based on the humanistic belief that "people are fundamentally good" or, in its Christian formulation, is based on the belief that "God does not make junk".

Theologians who have articulated what total depravity means in regards to the love of God will formulate the idea through examples of people loving the utterly unlovable. My theology-student housemate describes the typical Calvinist position in terms of God being like the father of an axe-murderer: though the son is utterly unloveable, the father loves him nonetheless, not at all because of anything that he is or does but because he chooses to love him. This isn't to say that the axe-murderer son has no qualities. But, where secular counselling for instance might emphasise appealing to the son's deeper good, a more theologically reformed view might appeal instead to the radical nature of a love which accepts him despite how reprehensible he is and everything he represents.

For those among us, however, who struggle with self-esteem, we are presented perhaps with a problem. Many will try to cheer up someone who is down on themselves with encouraging words about how good that person is - and I am a little dubious about how appropriate this is as a way of encouraging. Isn't it more powerful to say, "God loves you regardless of your flaws?" On the other hand, as a notorious self-condemner, I know that I buy into a lot of lies about myself. When I condemn myself, it isn't necessarily because of a healthy view of my own sinfulness but because I listen to voices that tell me I am worthless - and, whatever the Bible says about our depravity, it never once says that we are worthless.

Take as an example the master craftsmen who goes into an antique store and buys the thing that everyone else rejected in order to restore it. If he denied that it was damaged or totally in need of repair, he would be having himself on. But this is not the same as saying that it is only worthy of the scrap heap. This is not how God sees us; if it were, He would never have gone to Calvary for us. But He does see that, without His intervention, the scrap heap is the only place we will ultimately be going.

There is a subtle distinction within reformed theology between being totally depraved and utterly depraved, and this distinction might be helpful here. R.C. Sproul articulates it like this:

We must be careful to note the difference between total depravity and "utter" depravity. To be utterly depraved is to be as wicked as one could possibly be. Hitler was extremely depraved, but he could have been worse than he was. I am sinner. Yet I could sin more often and more severely than I actually do. I am not utterly depraved, but I am totally depraved. For total depravity means that I and everyone else are depraved or corrupt in the totality of our being. There is no part of us that is left untouched by sin.

(Sproul, 1992, The Essential Truths of the Christian Faith)

So here the line that "God does not make junk" is perhaps worth reiterating, though it might be better reworded as "God does not redeem junk", or "God does not die to save junk". There may be nothing in me that is not corrupted by sin, but that does not mean that I am not still made in God's image. It does not mean that, when He looks at me, He does not see something worth redeeming.

We would do well to remember, I think, that the same book of the Bible which contains the words "Surely I was sinful at birth" (Psalm 51:5) also later declares, "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139:14). Both are true, and, praise God, in the death of Jesus, the tension that exists between the two is overcome. Like the fallen yet beautiful creation which God will restore, we too are fallen, yet beautiful, and by grace are being restored.