Jacobus Arminius on Those Whom Christ Calls to Himself

        Christ says that he came not to call to repentance ‘the righteous’, that is, those who esteemed themselves as such, but ‘sinners’,  that is, those who owned themselves, or who, on his preaching, would own themselves to be of that description (Matt. 9.13). Christ calls to himself those who are fatigued, weary, heavy-laden, and oppressed with the burden of their sins (Matt. 11.28), but drives away from him those who are proud and puffed up with arrogance on account of their own righteousness (Lk. 18.9).[1]

 

Jacobus Arminius, ‘A Dissertation on the True and Genuine Sense of the Seventh Chapter of St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans’, in The Works of James Arminius, trans. James Nichols and William Nichols, London edn, 3 vols. (repr., Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press, 1986), 2.592

Note

        1. In order to bring the text to better conformity with modern English orthographical standards, I have taken it upon myself to alter the punctuation in a few places and updated the scriptural references from Roman to Arabic numerals.  —J. D. Gallé