Predestination

Calvary Chapel explicitly and publicly rejects Calvinist predestination, particularly the doctrines of unconditional election and irresistible grace. Chuck Smith's Calvary Chapel Distinctives argues against a theological system that would predetermine who is saved and who is lost without regard to human response.

Calvary Chapel holds that God's foreknowledge is real but does not override human freedom. Election is understood in terms of God's foreknowledge of who would freely respond in faith, not as an unconditional decree. This Arminian-leaning position is central to Calvary Chapel's identity, though it avoids fully aligning with classical Arminian theology and its possibility of losing salvation.