Its Claims
The nature and extent of the atonement
Christ died for all people without exception, and his death made salvation possible for every hearer; it becomes effectual in those who believe. Work on this claim in the Workshop
Election and predestination
God elects to salvation those whom he foreknows will believe in Christ and persevere, so election is conditioned on foreseen faith that grace makes possible but does not coerce. Work on this claim in the Workshop
Grace and free will
The grace by which God calls sinners is real and necessary, and it can be resisted and finally rejected; God does not save by overriding the human will. Work on this claim in the Workshop
Regeneration and new birth
Since the fall no one can turn to God unaided; prevenient grace goes before every good movement, restoring a measure of freedom so that the gospel call can be answered. Work on this claim in the Workshop
Perseverance and assurance
It remains possible for a true believer to fall away finally and perish, so the warnings of scripture address real believers and perseverance is conditioned on continuing faith. Work on this claim in the Workshop
Historical Development
Condemned at Dort, the position survived in the Dutch Remonstrant Brotherhood and in Episcopius's and Limborch's systematic work. Through John Wesley it became the soteriology of Methodism and, by influence, of much of the Holiness and Pentecostal world and of many Baptists. Nineteenth-century Arminian theologians such as Richard Watson gave it full systematic form; twentieth-century defenses by Clark Pinnock and others, and the founding of the Society of Evangelical Arminians (2006), mark its contemporary evangelical presence.
Interpretive Foundations
The position reads the universal texts (John 3:16, 1 Timothy 2, 2 Peter 3) at face value as expressing God's will for all, and reads Romans 9 as concerning the historical service of nations and the terms of covenant membership rather than the eternal destinies of individuals. Its controlling conviction is that a grace that cannot be refused would not be grace toward a person but the management of an outcome.
Biblical Evidence
The readings this position gives the foundational passages. The full evidence stands on the Scripture evidence index.
Romans 8:28-30
Foreknowledge is read as God's knowing persons in covenant love beforehand, and the chain as the path of those who love God: the passage comforts believers with God's purpose without teaching that the purpose bypasses the faith it everywhere presupposes.
Romans 9
The chapter is read within Paul's history of Israel: election in the chapter concerns the choice of peoples and persons for covenant service, Pharaoh's hardening a historical judgment within the story, and the potter image an echo of Jeremiah's conditional word to the nation.
John 6:37-44
The drawing of the Father is read with John 12:32, where the lifted-up Son draws all people to himself: God's drawing is universal and resistible, as Israel's Scriptures and Jesus' own lament over Jerusalem show, and the 'given' are those who, drawn, come.
Ephesians 1:3-14
The blessings are 'in Christ' fourteen times over: God chose the body in its head before the world, and persons are elect as they are found in the Elect One by faith. Election is first of Christ and of the people in him, and individual participation follows incorporation.
1 Timothy 2:3-6
'Who will have all men to be saved' is read with its own scope: all men, without the restriction the opposing reading imports. The one mediator gave himself a ransom for all, and prayer for all, kings included, rests on a will for all.
1 John 2:1-2
'He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world' is read as the extent question's plainest text: the apostle's own contrast is between the believing community and the whole world beyond it, and the propitiation is stated for both.
Principal Objections
The position is objected to for resting God's eternal decree on a human act foreseen, for making the decisive difference between believer and unbeliever lie finally in the believer, and for weakening assurance. Its defenders answer that foreknowledge is not causation, that grace remains the source of the very faith God foresees, and that assurance rests on present union with Christ rather than on a decree hidden in eternity.
Limitations of This Record
The position describes the classical Remonstrant and Arminian mainstream. It does not describe Open Theism, which some heirs of the tradition adopt and others reject, nor Wesley's stronger doctrine of entire sanctification, which is carried on the Wesleyan-Arminian record, nor the many popular forms that state the position without its doctrine of prevenient grace.
Sources
Primary: James Arminius, Declaration of Sentiments (1608); Remonstrance of 1610, Five Articles; Simon Episcopius, Apology or Confession of Faith (1622).
Secondary: Roger E. Olson, Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (IVP Academic, 2006); Keith D. Stanglin and Thomas H. McCall, Jacob Arminius: Theologian of Grace (Oxford University Press, 2012).