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Primum Mobile is a quarterly web magazine. This issue and all its contents are © Copyright 2004-2009 by the editors. All rights reserved.
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.
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Unconditional Election
by Paul Lytle
And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”
-Exodus 33:19
Did I earn His Grace by anything —
even the wisdom to answer His call —
or was His election of me wholly by grace?
I wonder why He called me. Really, I can think of better choices. If we are to believe the verses we looked at when examining the Doctrine of Total Depravity (and we should), we must believe that we are spiritually dead without Christ. So there I was, spiritually dead and without hope, and He chose me out for life.
The quest to understand why He chose me will lead us to our next Doctrine of Grace. See, I can probably list a great many people who would have made better choices for Christianity than me. Before Christ, I was a very selfish man, prone to anger, holding grudges with anyone. There are people who, even as non-Christians, were nicer than me. Wouldn’t they have been better suited for grace?
Or we can look at it from another angle. There are a lot of people with more money and more power than me. Imagine if God had chosen one of them instead of me! They could support missionaries all over the world with their money, or they could use their power to advance the Church. Wouldn’t they have made better choices?
But here we’re making the same mistake we made before learning about the doctrine of Total Depravity — that we could possibly do something to make ourselves worthy.
The Bible tells us that “without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). In other words, God doesn’t care if I’m the most generous person in the world if I don’t have faith, because if I don’t believe in Him, then who am I trying to honor? Am I trying to honor Him who deserves all honor and praise? Certainly not! I am trying to honor someone who does not deserve it: either myself or another sinner. Or worse still, I’m trying to bring honor to a false god or object.
Would a woman be impressed if her boyfriend bought a bunch of flowers for another woman? Would that please her? No, because it was not done for her. Why then would God be pleased with those actions done by someone who doesn’t have faith in God? Those actions are foreign of Him.
You may say, “Wow, this writer makes God seem rather jealous.” Which He is! But it is a good jealousy, a justified jealousy, like the jealousy of a wife who wants her husband’s affection. His affection is something she deserves, something to which she has a right, and so she is right to want it. God deserves our love and praise, and when we give it to something else, He has a right to be jealous. So if we do all these great things for something else — either ourselves, a false god, or another person — it doesn’t get us anywhere in God’s eyes.
So it cannot be something in me that God found so attractive. It is not my works, or my money, or my power that God wants. He is not saving me because of something I am, but because of who He is.
“Unconditional Election” teaches us that God has chosen us not because of something we did or are, but completely out of His own mercy and grace.
And this is very important — we are chosen by God for salvation. Our names were written in the Book of Life “before the foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:8). The Bible describes us as “predestined” (several passages, such as Romans 8:29) to become His children. As Jesus told His disciples: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide” (John 15:16).
Our salvation was by His choosing, from before the foundations of the world. It was by His sovereign guidance that our lives brought us to Him (Romans 8:28). While we were running headlong into death (as we learned when looking at Total Depravity), He snatched us from death and turned us toward life.
It is therefore an act of His wonderful grace and grace alone that I can claim to be His adopted son. It is through no effort of my own that I can claim this (Galatians 2:16, etc.), not even the wisdom or intelligence needed to figure out on my own that I need Jesus.
In mercy and love He saved me, as a free gift, not something I could earn or even figure out alone. It is a work of the Spirit in me, set in motion before Creation itself.
And can I say something about this briefly? This is the best way. If salvation came based on ability, most of us would be out of the loop. If it were based on power or wealth, then what happens to those of us who may not have very much? If it were based on how good we are, then we’re all in trouble, because God knows our thoughts. If your thoughts look anything like mine, we’re not going to be let in. And if we were let in with our petty disputes, our lusts, our pride, and greed, how long would it be before we turned Heaven into Hell? Or if everyone were allowed in, then the worst murderers, rapists, and tyrants would be allowed into heaven alongside the saints. Or what if it were based on some secret knowledge, that you have to know some specific prayer (even the Sinner’s Prayer!) or some sort of specific understanding? How is that fair? The most fair and just way for this to work is if the holy and perfect God make the choice. Better for all that salvation be given by Grace alone. It is better that He choose me, because I could not have done it otherwise.
In mercy Jesus came to us and didn’t wait for us to somehow find a way to Him. In mercy He died upon the Cross for our sins, though we did not deserve it. In mercy He has chosen us, and the Holy Spirit gives us the ability to repent and turn to Him.
This mercy is far greater than for us to be given some task to accomplish, or some problem to solve, or some moral standard we must achieve. This mercy relies only on He who died for us. On His righteousness are we saved. In His perfect righteousness may we rest.
What I Am NOT Saying
It is here that many people stumble, because they feel that if God is choosing us for Himself, that takes away our own free will. Well, I’m not so sure how “free” our will is in the first place, since we are all predisposed to sin. But they believe that if God makes a choice, then that makes us puppets, dancing to His whim.
I believe that God is powerful enough to allow both predestination and our own will to exist at the same time. To which many will scoff, because they are thinking in human terms. This is not something we could do, but we are not God. When you read the Bible, you will find remarkable stories of men having their own will upon the world, and yet God moving those events at the same time. Joseph was a victim of countless sins, of countless men having their own dark will against him, but we see at the end that God was moving it all to save the lives of millions. Have you read his stunning words at the end of it all? “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good” (Genesis 50:20). How appropriate a verse for our purposes, for we see in it that men have purposed something in an action, and that God purposes something in the very same action. Both God and man have a will, and both are simultaneously exerted.
Is God to blame for the sins of those men? Remember that God does not tempt a man to sin (James 1), so He is no puppeteer here, forcing these men to sin. And yet He is credited as the cause of it all, the hand that guided Joseph to that place at that time.
Likewise, Jesus was crucified because of the will of men, but God was also moving everything to bring about the greatest act of love this world has ever seen.
So I am not saying that we have no choice in this world. It is true, in one sense, that the Spirit brings it about that I kneel before Jesus. That is completely true. It is also true that I knelt. It was my choice. Both coexist, and God is powerful enough to allow both to exist without contradiction.
It is not something we will fully understand in this life, and I do not want to spend too much more time on it, since it is not the purpose of this exploration. But I have written more about God’s sovereignty in an essay from a previous issue, if you would like to reach more.
But even the assertion that our “free” will is somehow sacred concerns me. Honestly, if my will was directing me to Hell (and it was), I’m not so sure I would be too angry if someone took away my freedom. Are we so set in our own supposed independence that we do not even want the Spirit of God to have influence over our will? To hold so tightly onto that part of yourself is, frankly, rebellion against God. You are trying your best to hold Him away from your will.
The Bible teaches us to submit to His Will, not our own. That’s exactly what the Spirit does. The Spirit softens our hearts and tilts our will to the Father. In that renewed will we choose Him, all according to His sovereignty.
Scriptural Support
It is God who chooses whom to save, and the choice is made for His Glory.
You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.
-John 15:16
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
-John 1:12-13
[T]hough they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad — in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls — she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
-Revelation 9:11-13
For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy.
-Romans 9:15-16
Then Isaiah is so bold as to say, “I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me.”
-Romans 10:20
Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not part of my flock. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.
-John 10:25-29
In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.
-Ephesians 1:4-6
And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.
-Exodus 33:19
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.
-1 Peter 2:8
All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.
-John 6:37-39
[S]ince you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.
-John 17:2
So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.
You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory 1 — even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?
-Romans 9:16-24
Those chosen are appointed for life. They are often referred to as “the Elect” or those “predestined.”
For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
-Romans 8:29
And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed.
-Acts 13:48
And if the Lord had not cut short the days, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, whom he chose, he shortened the days.
-Mark 13:20
Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.
-2 Timothy 2:10
This choice was made before the foundations of the world.
[E]ven as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight.
-Ephesians 1:4-8
[A]nd all who dwell on earth will worship it, everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain.
-Revelation 13:8
The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to rise from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world will marvel to see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come.
-Revelation 17:8
We do not earn this by anything we do or by who we are. It is a gift of God.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
-Ephesians 2:8-9
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
-1 Corinthians 1:27-29
who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began.
-2 Timothy 1:9
Objections
Doesn’t God want everyone to be saved? 2 Peter 3:9 says that God is “not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
This verse must be read in context. When people quote it, they are so quick to cut off half of the sentence, as well as the rest of the paragraph. Peter is telling the Church to not be discouraged when evil men and false prophets say that Jesus will not return. Be patient, he tells them. “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
Is the promise of life for everyone? No, only those who repent. Is Peter speaking to every person who ever lived here? No, just the Church (who are the people who have or will repent). So this promise is really directed at the Church. In reality, this verse is saying the same thing as Acts 13:48 does when it talks about “as many as were appointed to eternal life believed.” There are those who are appointed to life, and Peter is telling us that God is patient so that all of these may repent.
But I am the one who chose Jesus! Not the other way around!
Really? What wisdom do you have that your neighbor the non-Christian does not? In what way are you smarter than so many scientists, philosophers, and professors who have not seen the truth? How can some men study religion all their lives and not figure out what you figured out?
While the claim brought in this objection seems an innocent one, it is not, for when you claim credit for your own salvation, you take the glory from God and place it on yourself. In addition, you attempt to add a requirement to grace that the Bible does not support — the very wisdom to figure it out for yourself. (Not to mention that true wisdom comes from God; see James 1:5.) But grace does not require grace and anything at all, not even intelligence.
Jesus thanked God for hiding “these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children” (Matthew 11:25), and yet this objection subtly makes the claim that you must be wise to enter the Kingdom — wise enough to figure it out! In truth, the answer is “revealed,” just as this verse suggests, and just like true wisdom always is.
If God chooses one person for Heaven, doesn’t that mean He chooses another for Hell?
Yes and no. The answer is yes in that God is sovereign, so no one could go to Hell without Him allowing it. He does allow many to have the fate they chose in eternal damnation.
But this passive choice is not made in the same way as the choice He made for some to have life.
We have chosen ourselves for Hell in sin and rebellion against God. We have earned that ourselves — each and every one of us, even the Elect. God does not damn anyone; we have damned ourselves in lust, pride, hatred, and selfishness. We have all rejected Him in our sin. We have rebelled against Him. And without His Spirit, we would keep on rebelling until we lock ourselves into Hell, and we would do it willingly rather than to acknowledge Him. Do you want proof? I imagine that there are a relative few people in the world who have not heard the warning of Hell. Yet how many people have still refused to acknowledge Jesus as their Lord and Savior? What makes anyone think they would stop their rebellion once they reach the gates of Hell?
We have earned our fate, but God, in love and mercy, saves some. Does that mean He is responsible for the fate of the others? No. If a governor chooses to pardon one prisoner, is he then responsible for the crimes of all the other prisoners? Of course not! To claim otherwise would be foolishness. So then why, if God chooses to save one, do you blame Him for another’s damnation?
Why does He choose one person and not another?
Because it falls within His plan. I wish I could give a better answer, but the Bible itself tells us that this isn’t something we are meant to understand in this world. Please read the Romans 9 passage above, though I will present one verse from it again: “So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills” (Romans 9:18).
The whole of history moves in such a way as to give Him the most glory. Ultimately, everything that happens is according to His sovereign plan, which is made for our good and His glory.
If God chooses us, do we really need to evangelize? Can we really do anything to help someone repent?
God does ordain the ends, but He also ordains the means as well. Just as He supernaturally put Philip on the path of the Ethiopian in Acts 8, so too does He ordain that we should preach the Word for His Elect to repent. Remember the statement of Paul when he said, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth” (1 Corinthians 3:6). Let us not be confused: we cannot save anyone. We are called to plant seeds, and God will bring about salvation.
But Calvinism has a wonderful effect on evangelism, despite our first instinct. Those who deny this doctrine must believe that it is up to them alone to save others. What a terrible burden! It can only lead to frustration and misery as people turn away from your message! But if it is only our job to plant, then I can plant and pray and let God work from there. I can speak of Jesus with anyone without placing the burden of their eternal souls on my own shoulders. I do not have to worry about saying the right thing to make the gospel attractive to each and every person — I only give it, and God will work in their hearts what He will.
You see, if you reject Calvinism, then the Christian becomes a salesman for the Gospel. If I word it like this or pitch Heaven like that, someone will buy my product. But that’s not the way it is. God is the one who convinces the heart, and He does it through witnesses, not salesmen. We are to tell the world of what we have seen, and God uses that witness to reveal Himself to people.
We begin to see the wonder of how God saves His people rather than worrying about doing God’s work ourselves.
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