Because of this, there are a few times when we find John downplaying his ministry while proclaiming the ministry of the One to come. One such instance is recorded in both Matthew 3:11 and Luke 3:15:

Matthew 3:11

11 “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. (ESV)

Luke 3:16

16 John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. (ESV)

Luke records that John said this in response to people who wondered if John was the Messiah. John’s response is that no matter how impressed people might be with him, he is not even worthy to serve the one who was yet to come.

John’s statement also provides a brief summary of the ministry of Jesus: “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” John baptizes with water, which holds some significance, but it is nothing compared to the baptism which will come from the true Christ.

Many who read this passage conclude that Christian baptism carries with it two aspects: the Holy Spirit and fire, that when we are baptized with the Holy Spirit, we are also baptized with fire. That in itself has led to quite a bit of discussion – what does it mean to be baptized with fire? – and many people point to Acts 2:1-4 when the Holy Spirit descends on the day of Pentecost, appearing as wind and tongues of fire.

Despite the connection between the Spirit and fire in Acts 2, I don’t think John the Baptist had one baptism in mind when he mentioned baptism by the Spirit and fire. Instead, he is talking about two distinct kinds of baptism: some of you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit, others of you will be baptized with fire. Consider the very next thing he says:

Luke 3:16-17

16 John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (ESV)

In verse 17, John makes a clear distinction between two kinds of people: those who will be gathered into barn, and those who will be burned with unquenchable fire. His meaning is, “The Messiah to come will baptize some of you with the Holy Spirit and others with fire; he will secure some of you and judge the rest of you.” In other words, the ministry of Christ would be a ministry which would ultimately result in the salvation of some and the judgment of others. Jesus did not come into the world to judge the world (John 12:47), yet his very coming reveals the sinfulness of men and the justice of judgment (John 3:18-19).

There is a kind of baptism by fire that believers undergo, but it is not what John has in mind and is never explicitly called baptism. The biblical word for what believers undergo is ‘refining’:

Isaiah 48:9-11

9 “For my name’s sake I defer my anger,
for the sake of my praise I restrain it for you,
that I may not cut you off.
10 Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver;
I have tried you in the furnace of affliction.
11 For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it,
for how should my name be profaned?
My glory I will not give to another. (ESV)

This kind of refining with fire is not a mystical process, a charismatic experience of the power of God, but is the work of the Holy Spirit to sanctify believers throughout the course of life, transforming the Christian to be holy as God is holy, to live the life of Christ.

Looking back at the words of John the Baptist in Matthew 3:11 and Luke 3:15, we do not want the baptism by fire that he mentions for that is the fire of judgment, the unquenchable flame where the worm does not die (Isaiah 66:24, Mark 9:48). Next time you hear someone say, “We have been baptized with the Holy Spirit and with fire!” feel free to respond, “Thanks be to God, only the first is true of me!”

It is a great irony to me that Calvinists are stereotyped as logic-driven. For forty years my experience has been the opposite. The Calvinists I have known (English Puritans, Edwards, Newton, Spurgeon, Packer, Sproul) are not logic driven, but Bible-driven. It’s the challengers who bring their logic to the Bible and nullify text after text. Branches are lopped off by “logic,” not exegesis.

Who are the great enjoyers of paradox today? Who are the pastors and theologians who grab both horns of every biblical dilemma and swear to the God-Man: I will never let go of either.

Not the Calvinism-critics that I meet. They read of divine love, and say that predestination cannot be. They read of human choice and say the divine rule of all our steps cannot be. They read of human resistance, and say that irresistible grace cannot be. Who is logic-driven?

For forty years Calvinism has been, for me, a vision of life that embraces mystery more than any vision I know. It is not logic-driven. It is driven by a vision of the ineffable, galactic vastness of God’s Word.

Let’s be clear: It does not embrace contradiction. Chesterton and I both agree that true logic is the law of “Elfland.” “If the Ugly Sisters are older than Cinderella, it is (in an iron and awful sense) necessary that Cinderella is younger than the Ugly Sisters.” Neither God nor his word is self-contradictory. But paradoxes? Yes.

We happy Calvinists don’t claim to get the heavens into our heads. We try to get our heads into the heavens. We don’t claim comprehensive answers to revealed paradoxes. We believe. We try to understand. And we break out into song and poetry again and again.

Amen and amen.

The Calvinist response is irresistible grace, by which God regenerates sinners, taking away their dead hearts and giving them hearts of faith. The Arminian response is prevenient grace, by which God lifts all people out of their totally depraved state, bringing the conviction of sin and desire for holiness that makes it possible for individuals to respond to the gospel.

A recent post at the Evangelical Arminians (originally posted at The Arminian) blog explains the Arminian doctrine of prevenient grace. While the post does a good job of explaining the what and why of prevenient grace, it is weak in one area. After saying that “the Calvinistic claim is contrary to Scripture”, the writer nonetheless fails to show that prevenient grace is a biblical doctrine. It has been my contention that prevenient grace, while a useful theory that would reconcile the problem of total depravity, is not found in Scripture and as such is not an option available to us.

In fact, throughout the entry, the only verse cited to demonstrate prevenient grace is John 16:8:

John 16:8

8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: (ESV)

This verse is used to show that prevenient grace “is performed by the ministry and work of the Holy Spirit, who was sent by the Father and the Son to ‘prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment’.”

The main problem with using this verse to show the Spirit’s work in prevenient grace is a question of timing. In the above quote, a rather important part of John 16:8 is left out: “…when he comes, he will…” Jesus was telling the believers about an event yet to take place. The Spirit had not yet come, his special convincing work had not yet begun.

Human depravity did not begin after the time of Christ. Men were totally depraved from the time of Adam onward. Despite this depravity, we find people from the time of Adam onward, through Jesus, and on to our day, who have had faith in God and sought to walk in obedience. If John 16:8 demonstrates the Spirit’s work in prevenient grace, how did anyone follow God prior to the coming of the Spirit in Acts 2?

The Old Testament does not tell us what God did to change the hearts of the saints, but this is not altogether unusual. Many details are missing from the Old Testament which are later given in the New. One demonstration is with the Old Testament practice of sacrifice. The OT faithful were not told that the sacrificial system was not salvific in itself, that it pointed instead to a coming Messiah. Hebrews 8:5 says these practices were a “copy and shadow of the heavenly things.” Later in the Old Testament we receive a clearer revelation about the coming Messiah, but even with the prophecies of Isaiah 53 and some other passages, there is still a mystery which is only revealed after the revelation of Christ.

The problem with prevenient grace is not that it cannot be found in the Old Testament, but that it also cannot be found in the New Testament, and the only verse used as an example of the Spirit’s work in prevenient grace points clearly to the work the Spirit does only after Jesus has returned to Heaven. It does not and cannot be used to explain something that happens prior to the Spirit’s coming in Acts 2.

I continue to wait for a clear demonstration of prevenient grace from the pages of Scripture.

There once lived a man who held firmly to Calvinist theology. He believed the five points were fully biblical and took advantage of every possible opportunity to share Calvinism with the people at his church. He also had a growing conviction that evangelism was not a responsibility of believers. Since salvation is in the hands of God and God is guaranteed to save all those whom he has chosen, that leaves no room for human involvement through evangelism. He thought that evangelism did a disservice to God since in evangelism, the one witnessing claims some of the credit for saving people. Because of his view of evangelism, he always refused to participate in any evangelistic work and he encouraged other church members to adopt the same position. He never went on a mission trip, never gave to missions, never shared the gospel.

I wonder if you have ever met a person like this? Me either. While I know such people have existed and do exist, they are the exception, not the norm. The belief that evangelism is not part of the Christian life is not Calvinism, it is hyper-Calvinism.

(Aside: Some have tried to say that a hyper-Calvinist is anyone who holds to all five points; I assert that a five pointer is nothing more than a Calvinist and anything less than five (or four) points is not Calvinism in a meaningful sense. Hyper-Calvinism has a more definite meaning and relates to human responsibility in the face of God’s sovereignty.)

Why Evangelize?

There are three very simple reasons why believers should do the work of evangelism, and these are reasons which every faithful Calvinist would affirm.

First, we should evangelize because God commands it. At the end of the day, this is all we would need to say. God says it, that settles it. The God who created everything has called on his children to make him known. But even with that, we are not left alone. We have the power of God with us (Jesus’ promise to always be with us in Matthew 28:19-20), the Spirit within us, and the Word before us.

Second, we should evangelize because we love God and want to make him known. You celebrate and talk about that which you love, whether it be a football team or a spouse or a child. Spend enough time with a person and you will learn the sort of things that stir his passion. For believers, what should stir our passion more than Christ? The late Stephen Olford once lamented that people will shout themselves hoarse at a Saturday night football game but will barely utter a sound while worshiping on Sunday. This is a problem with believers of all sorts, Calvinist and otherwise – we are far more inclined to vocally celebrate the people, institutions, and achievements of this world when our greatest celebration should be directed toward God and sharing what he has done for us.

Third, we should evangelize because we love others. Regardless of whether or not people will ever respond to our proclamation, we ought to do what God has done in the universal offer of the gospel: call all men and women to come to Christ, knowing that any who come will be saved. Through Jesus we clearly see the love of God. He did not offer himself to all men out of hatred or spite but out of love for his creation. Can we do less than love that which God has loved? Can we offer them less than that which God has offered them – Christ himself? Lives are being destroyed through sin and darkness. If we care about those lives, those people, then we will share with them the one way they can find true, lasting peace and happiness.

Why Does God Use People?

The question of evangelism’s necessity belongs to every believer, not just Calvinists. After all, we worship a God who commands a host of untold numbers of angels. He can send angelic messengers anywhere throughout creation. He could position angels in the skies all around the earth and have them trumpet out the gospel message. He could send powerful dreams to all people. He could write the gospel out in the clouds for everyone to see. There are a million ways in which God could share his gospel without ever once involving human beings. In fact, of all the ways that God could do it, we are probably one of the most inefficient options.

God doesn’t tell us why he has chosen to use us, but we can point to some possible reasons.

First, God has given us the privilege of work that has eternal significance. All work is noble work if it is done for the glory of God, but it is astonishing to think that God has given us a role in his saving work. He does not need us, and what happens through us to others does not originate from us but from God himself who is at work in us through the Holy Spirit, but we get to be the agents, the conduits of the gospel, sharing words of life with the lost and, when God so ordains, being used to lead new children to the feet of Christ.

Second, we are in a position that gives us a unique perspective on God’s saving work. 1 Peter 1:12 speaks of those things that angels long to see – the gospel, the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ. We are mortal yet in our short lives we learn more about salvation than angels will ever know. Who is more qualified to sing the praise of firefighters, someone who has an abstract knowledge of their heroic deeds or someone who has been rescued from a burning house by a firefighter who gave his life in the process? We are those who have been rescued and we are more qualified than angels to tell others about the rescuer.

For the sake of length I’ll end there, but there are other possible reasons we could discuss: the glory God receives when his elect make him known; the original plan of God to work through Adam’s descendants to tend the garden of creation; etc. It is enough to know that God is pleased to work through his children to share his gospel. He has called us to make him known. The big question is not “why?” but “will we obey?”

Some contemporary Presbyterians such as R. C. Sproul, Jr. reject the notion that children below the age of accountability who die go to heaven.

The major problem with this claim is that Sproul didn’t say that, or anything like it, and yet people keep referencing Sproul’s article as proof that he rejects the possibility of infant salvation. But here is what Sproul actually said:

Compassion tells us not to sugarcoat, but not to supply a poison pill either. We cannot say for sure what happens to small children who die.

In other words, Sproul says that the Bible does not say enough to allow us to be dogmatic, it is an area of mystery. Sproul did not say he believes infants go to Hell. Nor did he say he believes infants go to Heaven. He says Scripture offers a few hints, but leaves the rest unspoken.

His criticism of Graham is warranted. Graham offered dogmatic assurances in an area that the Bible is largely silent. Views about original sin are almost irrelevant: the Bible does not make a case for an age of accountability nor does it guarantee the salvation of people under a certain age or mental condition.

Just a few days ago I listened to Sproul (from a July recording) address the question of infant salvation:

It’s the first question, so listen through the opening ad and you’ll reach it. Sproul says:

I don’t know any way to give an answer to this definitively. There are passages that could give a hint at an answer… but [they do not] specifically answer the question, so… I really don’t know… I leave this question up to the grace of God.

That matches perfectly with what he said in response to Graham. It does not match Lemke’s assertion. Sproul does not reject the possibility of infant salvation.

My take is similar to Sproul’s. The Bible simply does not say enough to be dogmatic. There are tantalizing hints (and I think Sproul missed the best one, Deuteronomy 1:39), but those hints are only hints. Ultimately, we must leave the matter in God’s hands and trust that his way is best.

An old joke tells of a man who walked into a barber shop one day for a shave. He went in, got his shave, and went on about his business. A day went by, then two, then three, and the man’s face remained clean shaven. He was astonished and finally returned to the barber shop and asked what had happened. The lady working asked him to describe the person who gave him the shave. “Oh, that was Grace who shaved you,” she responded. “She’s new here, but we’ve found that once you’ve been shaved by Grace, you never need to be shaved again!”

Such is the Calvinist doctrine of the perseverance of the saints: once saved, always saved. Once chosen by God, bought by Christ, and regenerated by the Spirit, we are eternally secure. We cannot give up our own salvation, and nothing can take it from us.

Arminian Ambivalence

Some people use the word ambivalent when they mean apathetic. To be apathetic is to not really care about something. To be ambivalent is to care deeply but to be pulled between conflicting opinions.

In the original Remonstrances, the Arminians adopted an ambivalent position on eternal security. On the one hand, they said no believer, while remaining faithful, can be removed from salvation. Satan cannot knock us from God’s grasp. But on the other hand, they left open the possibility that a believer might abandon faithfulness and so take himself from God’s grasp.

Later, John Wesley came along and took a firm position that believers might indeed lose their salvation, that those who once received grace and regeneration could fall so far into sin and faithlesness as to lose the salvation they had received and thus be liable to eternal judgment.

Most Baptists lean the other way, and this is the only point that clearly distinguishes most non-Calvinist Baptists from classical Arminians: while Arminius was ambivalent, most Baptists take a firm position that believers cannot lose their salvation. The Baptist Faith and Message, the confession for the Southern Baptist Convention, states:

All true believers endure to the end. Those whom God has accepted in Christ, and sanctified by His Spirit, will never fall away from the state of grace, but shall persevere to the end. Believers may fall into sin through neglect and temptation, whereby they grieve the Spirit, impair their graces and comforts, and bring reproach on the cause of Christ and temporal judgments on themselves; yet they shall be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.

This is essentially the same as the Calvinist view of perseverance, a similarity which has led some people to refer to themselves as 1-point Calvinists.

Eternal Security

There are many, many places to go to show eternal security. In my previous post I mentioned that Philippians 1:6 is one of my favorite verses. It is also one of the best to show security:

Philippians 1:6

6 And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. (ESV)

What God has started, he will complete. Neither Satan nor ourselves are powerful enough to undo the work of God. If he has begun to save a person, he will complete that salvation, leading us safely across the Jordan and into the promised land.

For the Calvinist, this promise is rooted on God’s initiative and God’s grace. We cannot lose what we did not begin. God began the work of salvation, God holds it, God will complete it.

In Romans 8:37-39 Paul writes to give assurance to suffering believers. His immediate context is to reassure believers that nothing coming against them is able to overcome the work of God. In the midst of this reassurance he gives a general word about our security in Christ:

Romans 8:37-39

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (ESV)

In Christ, we are more than conquerors. In Christ, we are victors, children of grace, heirs of salvation. In Christ, nothing can separate us from the love of God. Nothing. Nothing in the spiritual realm, nothing in the physical realm, nothing in all creation can remove us from God’s love. This includes we ourselves – there is no way that we can fall away from the grace of God. If we are in Christ, we cannot cause ourselves (nor would ever want to cause ourselves) to be removed from the love of God.

This message is repeated several times (the following references taken from John Piper’s booklet on TULIP):

1 Peter 1:5

5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (ESV)

Jude 1:24-25

24 Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, 25 to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (ESV)

1 Thessalonians 5:23-24

23 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it. (ESV)

1 Corinthians 1:8-9

8 who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. (ESV)

The prevailing pattern is that God holds his people secure. We do not do it, God does it. We did not cause it or earn it, we cannot lose it. Just as Jesus took hold of Peter’s hand so that he would not plunge beneath the waves, he holds us so that we do not plunge to judgment. Were he to release his hold, we would certainly be lost. In 2 Corinthians 5:5 we are told that the presence of the Holy Spirit is our guarantee that God will do what he has promised. God is dwelling within us to ensure we arrive safely home.

The Evidence of Faith

Scripture repeatedly states that our assurance rests in God’s hands. We will persevere because God holds us and keeps us and secures us. This does not mean nothing is required of us, but it does mean God will provide whatever is necessary, even that which is necessary from and through us.

What is necessary is our perseverance in faithfulness and obedience. He is no Christian who claims Christ only to turn to and remain in a life of sin.

Paul offers a strict warning in Romans 11:22: Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off. He says it is not enough to claim Christ, there must be a continuing in him, a life lived in light of his kindness, otherwise even those who profess Christ will be cut off.

Jesus warns us agains those who talk the talk but do not have the heart:

Matthew 7:21-23

21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ (ESV)

Being a believer isn’t about walking an aisle or praying a prayer, nor is it about being busy with things we might consider religious or noble. Being a believer is about having our lives transformed by Jesus Christ, with a new heart replacing our old hearts of stone. As believers, we are not free from sin, but our lives should show a gradual growth in sanctification as we become more like Christ. Even in this growth, sin is a lifelong struggle, but as the struggle continues, our lives give continued evidence that the trajectory is being set by God. Jesus says that only those who do the will of the Father will enter Heaven. In the ultimate sense, this was accomplished in Christ who fulfilled perfect righteousness on our behalf, covering us with his righteousness so that we might stand before the Father and have no lack. But there is a sense in which as believers we continue to have this obligation of obedience to the Father’s will.

Some Christians will stumble when they read these words in 1 John 3:6: No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. It could be all the more puzzling to find this verse in the same letter that tells us If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us (1 John 1:8). The answer to the puzzle of 1 John 3:6 is found in 1 John 3:4-5: Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. The picture goes on from there to tell us that John is not expecting sinless perfection, but he is expecting that believers will have lives which show that we put off sin and put on Christ. No one who makes a practice of sinning, or no one who goes on sinning is of the Father.

When we become Christians, something changes. Regeneration, or the new birth, takes what was dead and makes it alive. In the words of the Old Covenant prophecy:

Ezekiel 36:25-27

25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. (ESV)

When God brings forgiveness and regeneration, we become new creatures with new hearts, filled with the Spirit of God. Thus Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. A real, definite change accompanies conversion. If that change, evidenced by a life that shows a growing desire and pursuit of holiness and righteousness, is not present, the claim to conversion is suspect.

In Philippians 2:12-13, Paul tells us, Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. With fear and trembling we are to work out our salvation. There is work involved in salvation. It is fearful work. This is a matter of terrible importance, for eternity is at stake. But Paul assures believers that God is at work in us, turning our will and our work to the pleasure of his good will. The work we are to do is work that God does through us. This is one assurance we can have of salvation – that we see God’s hand at work in our lives.

They Were Not Of Us

What, then, of those who do not grow in holiness, who do not show God’s hand at work, who do not hold to the path? What about those who fall away into a life of sin while still claiming to be believers? Even more, what about those who once seemed so faithful but now abandon Christianity altogether? What happened to their security?

John had to deal with this question in his first epistle. There had been Christians who had turned from faithfulness to heresy. This would raise questions in the minds of others – if they could fall away, how do I know I am secure? Did they lose their salvation? Were they cast aside for some reason? But John offers this assurance:

1 John 2:19

19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. (ESV)

Yes, John says, these people went out from us. But they were never really part of us. They were not fully integrated members of the body of Christ, healthy branches attached to the vine. They did not have regenerated hearts, transformed minds. We know all of this because they left us. Had they truly been part of the body, they never would have left. John is so convinced that God holds his children secure, that any who leave the body give evidence that they were never God’s children. So it is with all today who might claim Christ yet live like the world, or those who say they were once believers but now pursue other religions or no religion at all. They came from us, they once walked with us, but they were never part of us.

This is an important point to note. While I believe there are carnal Christians – regenerate believers who have nonetheless fallen into a period of turning – I believe such periods will always be brief and always end with repentance. If someone claims to be a Christian but lives a life of perpetual sin, there is no reason to believe his claim. He needs evangelism. He needs the gospel. He needs salvation.

Well this wraps up the five points of Calvinism. In the next few posts I want to chase a few rabbits and deliver a final thought or two to the Calvinists and non-Calvinists of the SBC.

A few days behind schedule, but here at long last is the fourth point from the T.U.L.I.P. acronym. The post for the final point has already been written and will be posted tomorrow at 6:30 am. After that, just a few more posts to tie up some loose ends, and this series will be history!

I once heard the story of a man who had faced a lifelong addiction to cigarettes. From time to time he would try to quit, but every attempt would result in quick failure. Then one day he changed his approach and began to pray earnestly for God to remove his taste for cigarettes. To his delight, God answered his prayer and what he once found irresistible he now found revolting. Whereas once he could not help but pick up a cigarette, now he could not make himself smoke one.

We hear stories such as these and rejoice at God’s mercy to remove sinners from their sins and temptations. Rarely will anyone say, “What? God changed this man’s desires so that he hates what he once loved and thus compelled him away from cigarettes? What a violation of this man’s free will!” Yet this is precisely the charge often leveled against Calvinists for their doctrine of irresistible grace.

Irresistible grace is another point which could do with a better name. It is possible for people to resist God’s grace, people resist every day! Also, this point does not teach that God drags sinners, kicking and screaming, against their will, to the throne of grace. Rather, this point speaks of effectual grace, the work of grace that God does in his elect which changes their wills, causes them to be born again, and fills them with faith. It is effectual because it is effective, bringing new life to the recipient. It is grace because we in no way deserve it.

In a nutshell, irresistible grace is the belief that God accomplishes salvation in all of his elect. There will be no unsaved elect at the last day; all those chosen by God will be saved. Their salvation will not come because they have completed something necessary for salvation but because God’s effectual grace has transformed them. As the song says:

I sought the Lord and afterward I knew
He moved my soul to seek him seeking me.
It was not I that found O Savior true
No, I was found of thee!

Thou did reach forth thy hand and mine enfold
I walked and sank not on the storm vexed sea
Twas not so much that I on thee took hold
As thou, dear Lord, on me!

- Always Thou Lovest Me

The Universal Call of the Gospel

Some have mistaken the Reformed notion of predestination to imply that only the elect are offered salvation. This is not the case. Scripture is clear that God has issued a call to all people. In Matthew 11:28 Jesus says, Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. The offer is given to everyone: come unto me.

Because God’s call is universal, the church’s call should also be universal. Believers are charged with spreading the gospel throughout the earth. We are to preach the gospel wherever we go, sharing the good news of Christ with all people.

This universal offer is a fair offer. It is for any who would believe, as Jesus tells us in John 3:16. Any who believe in the Son, any who come to him, any who seek his salvation, will receive eternal life. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness and any who would gaze upon that serpent were saved (Numbers 21:9), so it is now: any who will look upon the Son will be saved. God will not turn away anyone who faithfully responds to this offer.

There will be many who appear to respond yet continue to hold back from full faith and commitment. Like the man at the wedding feast who had on no wedding garment, many will go through the motions of being part of God’s people but will have experienced no true change (Matthew 22:11-14). But everyone who would call upon the name of the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).

This is where we hit the problem. The call has gone out to all the earth: a price has been paid, a cross has been carried, sin has been atoned for, now come to Christ! But when this offer is made to a world of people who are dead in their sins, spiritually blind, enemies of God, and lovers of evil, there will be no response to the gospel. Dead men cannot move. Dead men will not respond to the gospel.

Put another way, if Jesus stood before Lazarus’ tomb and called out, “Lazarus, come forth!” but then waited for Lazarus’ corpse to decide whether or not to receive this call to life, he would still be standing before the tomb. Lazarus rose from the dead because Jesus’ call for him to come was filled with resurrection power. Lazarus could no more ignore the words of Jesus than a cat can ignore the sound of a can opener.

Why the Call Goes Ignored

It ought to be noted that when people ignore the universal call to salvation, it is not because of a deficiency in the call but because of sin in the hearer. Every individual is responsible for how he answers this call to repent and be saved. Sin has made men dead and deaf so that, left to ourselves, we will not hear the call, but this is a problem we have brought on ourselves. We are guilty of this sin, we are guilty of this blindness and death.

Some would say that the Calvinistic notion is unjust because it means God offers something he knows man cannot do, as though man were a helpless victim. An analogy might be if I told my 4-year-old daughter to drive to the store and pick up some milk, then spanked her for not obeying. She is unable to drive, so it would be unjust of me to make such a request. But an analogy of that sort does not compare to the human situation. In our case, we have created our inability. We have cut off our ears and gouged out our eyes by our love of sin. In Adam, the human race fell into sin. Ever since Adam, we have continued our love affair with sin.

A better analogy would be of a man who cuts off his own arms then complains that he is unable to drive a car. He is unable, but he is responsible for his inability.

God created us with the capacity and moral freedom to obey or disobey. In Adam, we chose disobedience and in our sin we have made ourselves unable and unwilling to respond to any good from God. It is not God’s fault that we have made ourselves unable to respond to his call.

If our own self-imposed inability were not enough, we also have an enemy who wants to keep us from God. 2 Corinthians 4:4-6 tells us of the global influence of Satan to blind people from the truth:

2 Corinthians 4:4-6

4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (ESV)

So people reject the universal call, first, because of their own sin, and second, because of the blinding influence of Satan. But sin and Satan do not get the final word. In fact, the solution is contained in 2 Corinthians 4:6.

The Effectual Call of the Gospel

In addition to the universal call given to all people is the effectual call given only to the elect. This effectual call is the same as God’s irresistible or effectual grace: the means by which God penetrates our dead, blind hearts and gives us saving faith.

In 2 Corinthians 4:6 the effectual call is described this way: For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. God, who can create light in darkness, has created light in the hearts of believers, giving us the knowledge of the glory of God, knowledge and glory we see most clearly in Jesus Christ. We would not open the door to let this light in. We would not seek the light of Christ. Dead in our sins and blinded by Satan, we would continue in ignorance until judgment day unless God shone this light into our hearts.

While some dispute terms such as Calvinist/non-Calvinist/Arminian/etc, there is a classic distinction we can make that does a good job of showing two basic camps: monergism and synergism.

Synergism is a view that God and man work together, a synergistic partnership in which God accomplishes everything necessary for salvation except for the last step. God offers salvation, then waits for our response (this is a little simplistic: most synergists would speak of the continued work of the Spirit to woo and convict, but such wooing and convicting remains a work the Spirit only takes so far: an offer made, to which we must take the initiative to respond). Man cooperates with God by exercising faith, a faith we form as we become convinced of the foulness of our sin and our need for a savior to pay our debt and make us righteous.

Monergism is the Reformed view. In monergism, God does everything necessary, from the work of the cross to the work of faith. There is nothing man can or will offer to salvation. If we must cooperate, we would never be saved. Instead, God takes us and changes us and fills us with faith and it is with the faith God gives us that we trust in Christ for salvation.

Calvinists do believe that man must respond to Christ, that we must receive him by faith, that we must exercise the will to pursue the forgiveness and righteousness of Christ. But Calvinists recognize that we would never generate such faith or movements of the will on our own: they must come from God. What we do in response to God, we only do because of God at work in us.

There are several passages that demonstrate this:

John 1:12-13

12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (ESV)

1 Peter 1:3

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, (ESV)

Acts 13:48

48 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. (ESV)

2 Timothy 2:24-25

24 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, (ESV)

Philippians 2:12-13

12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (ESV)

Hebrews 12:2

2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (ESV)

Ephesians 2:8

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, (ESV)

The common thread in each of these passages is God doing something for us that we could not do for ourselves: he willed our new birth; he caused us to be born again; he granted repentance; he authored and gave us our faith. These are not isolated passages but a repeated theme in the New Testament: that which we need for salvation, all the way down to new birth and faith, we receive from God and not from ourselves. Left to ourselves, we would never have faith. But God has not left his elect to themselves; he has caused new birth, given faith, and granted repentance to those whom he has chosen.

The classic Reformed formula is, Regeneration Precedes Faith. In other words, before we can have faith in Christ, we must be born again. A dead heart cannot believe in God. An enemy will not love that which he fights against. God must first change us, then he must give us faith.

1 John 5:1 is perhaps the clearest place to see the new birth coming before faith: Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him. John tells us that if you believe in Jesus, if you trust him by faith, then you have been born of God. Not that new birth follows faith, but faith is the evidence of new birth. Putting it in the form of a question: How do you know that you have been born of God? If you believe that Jesus is the Christ, you show that you have been born of God.

Following the new birth comes new faith. In the passages above I included Hebrews 12:2 and Ephesians 2:8. Both of these refer to faith as something that comes from God and is given to man. It does not originate from us, it originates from God who gives it to us as a gift of grace. In Ephesians 2:8, we are told we are saved by grace through faith, and this does not come from us but is a gift from God. The whole package is a gift: that God saves us by grace, and the faith with which we receive his grace.

This gift of God will accomplish what God intends. It will bring about the salvation of the elect. In the Arminian system, God initiates a salvation that is possible for everyone but certain for no one. God desires the salvation of everyone in the same way but fails in his desire when many reject him and remain in their sins. In the Calvinist system, there is a degree to which God desires the salvation of all but a more specific desire, will, and plan of God to accomplish the salvation of some. (For more on this, see Piper’s writings on Two Wills in God. If time and motivation allows, I may add an additional post to this series on the Two Wills view. Piper’s article gave me tremendous help and comfort when I was wrestling with the question of why God does not save everyone.)

One of my favorite verses is Philippians 1:6: And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. This is God’s promise to finish what he started. He will see his work to completion. In the area of salvation, he does not begin the good work of salvation in all people and leave it in our hands; he finishes the work of salvation in those whom he is saving.

We see a similar picture in John 6. We said a lot about John 6 when talking about election; it also has a word for us about God’s effectual grace. Note the following: John 6:37, All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out and John 6:44: No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. There is a certainty in these verses: No one goes to the Son unless the Father first draws him, and everyone drawn to the Son by the Father will be received by the Son, never cast out, and will be raised to life on the last day. The Father must issue the effectual call for the elect if they are to believe in Jesus Christ. But all those who receive this call, this drawing, will respond to the gospel and will be saved. The call accomplishes its purpose.

We also see this in John 17:1-3:

John 17:1-3

17:1 When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, 2 since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 3 And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. (ESV)

The Son has been given authority over all people, authority to save all those whom the Father has given the Son. In John 17:6 Jesus shows us that while the Father has given him authority over all flesh, the Father has not given every person to the Son, but that out of the world the Father has given some to the Son. Those the Son has received will be given eternal life. Eternal life is described as that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. This is eternal life because this is the means by which life in Christ is received: faith and trust in him. So the Father gives to the Son a certain number of people from among all the people of the world. The Son receives them and gives them the means by which they receive eternal life: faith in the one true God and the one true Son of God. The Son accomplishes his purpose among the elect.

The same picture is seen in Romans 8:29-30:

Romans 8:29-30

29 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. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. (ESV)

This has been called the golden chain of redemption. Those foreknown by God for salvation (as discussed before, this is not his knowledge of what men would do but his knowledge of what he would do with men) are predestined to be saved, will be called (the effectual calling), will be justified (made right with God), and will be glorified (experience the future glory of the presence of God in eternity). The assurance offered in Romans 8 is that God is the sovereign Lord of all creation, no challenge or suffering or struggle or enemy can overcome his work, and it is his plan to bring salvation to his elect. Nothing can pluck you from his hands. If he has chosen you, he will save you and he will lead you safely home. His grace is not weak or incomplete, it accomplishes all that it is intended to do.

Because this work of grace is fully in his hands, we are secure and will remain faithful until the day we are called home. In my next post, we will look at the Calvinist doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints.

Well, I fell behind. This has been a busy week, not the least because my wife and I celebrated our eighth anniversary this week (I love you, Sandra!). There is a fair chance that tomorrow’s post will also need to be delayed, so we will see at least one, perhaps two, of the posts on the five points put off until next week.

The most hotly debated point in Calvinism is Limited Atonement. If someone describes himself as a four-point Calvinist, you can bet this is the missing point. The concern is understandable. God’s love for all people is clear from Scripture, as is the universal call of the gospel and God’s desire to save the lost. It can seem difficult to reconcile God’s love and offer of salvation with the Calvinist claim that Jesus’ work on the cross does not extend to every individual in the same way. Nonetheless, it has often surprised me that Limited Atonement has caught so much flack. Before jumping into a longer discussion, let me summarize the view.

In some ways, the term Limited Atonement is unfortunate. Though it fits the TULIP acronym, it doesn’t precisely match the doctrine. Some suggest the term particular, or definite, atonement as a good alternative, but since no one goes around picking tupips or tudips in a garden, Limited Atonement has remained in use.

Limited atonement is the belief that while Christ’s death at the cross was sufficient to cover every sin of every person who would ever live, it was only efficient/effective/actual for those specifically chosen for salvation. Putting it in terms of money, Jesus’ death put more than enough money in the bank to pay for every sin of every person, but that money was only actually used to pay the bills of those who would be saved, the elect.

Understanding limited atonement requires understanding what Jesus did at the cross, so that is the first thing we will look at.

What Happened at the Cross?

While there are many views of the atonement, there is only one biblical view. I draw a pretty firm line on the atonement. The Bible teaches repeatedly and firmly that Jesus died as an atoning sacrifice, taking our place, receiving punishment due to us, paying for our sins, and breaking the bondage of sin and death.

This view is known as Penal Substitutionary Atonement. Penal, because it involves a legal event – the death of Christ satisfying (so the view is sometimes known as penal satisfaction) the justice of God which requires blood be paid for sin (Hebrews 9:22). Substitutionary, because Jesus was our substitute, taking our place to pay what we could not pay. Atonement, because it brings God and man together (literally, at-one-ment), mending a void created when mankind rebelled in the garden of Eden.

Perhaps the clearest text on penal atonement is Isaiah 53. Notice a few passages:

Isaiah 53:4-5

4 Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his stripes we are healed. (ESV)

Isaiah 53:10

10 Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him;
he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. (ESV)

It was the will of the Father to crush the Son who bore our griefs and was wounded for our transgressions.

Jesus’ sacrifice at the cross was depicted for us long before his birth and long before the prophet Isaiah was born. The Old Testament sacrificial system contained a number of pictures of what God would ultimately do in Christ. The animals were atoning sacrifices, taking the place of the guilty people. But the animal sacrifices were imperfect, not actually able to atone for anything, and they had to be offered year after year throughout the ages.

The book of Hebrews is essentially an extended exposition on the superiority of Jesus over every Old Testament type and shadow. Many of the ritualistic aspects of Old Testament Israel were given as pointers to the future coming Messiah. Jesus is that Messiah and perfectly fulfills what the Old Testament rituals could only prolong. Hebrews 9:25-26 tells it this way:

Hebrews 9:25-26

25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. (ESV)

By sacrificing himself on the cross, Jesus paid the full price for sin. Under the Old Testament system, when a sacrifice is made, those who offer the sacrifice receive the benefit and the benefit of forgiveness is accomplished and applied by the blood of the sacrifice. With Christ, God himself offers the sacrifice and he has beneficiaries in mind: his elect children. Just like the Old Testament sacrifice, the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross accomplishes and applies definite benefit to those for whom it was intended.

Does the Cross Save Anyone?

The Arminian position (seen in Article II of the Remonstrances) is that Jesus’ death accomplishes salvation for everyone – Jesus paid for the sins of all people – but the benefits are only applied to those who pursue Christ. On Jesus’ side, everything necessary for the salvation of all people has been accomplished, but on the individual’s side, there must still be repentance and faith.

There are three options for the cross:

1. Jesus’ death guarantees the salvation of all people and will ultimately bring everyone to saving faith, since Jesus has paid for the sins of everyone.
2. Jesus’ death does not guarantee the salvation of anyone but makes salvation possible for everyone. The cross opens a door we could not open, but the cross does not guarantee that anyone will step through that door.
3. Jesus’ death guarantees the salvation of the elect.

Going back to the question of what Jesus accomplished at the cross, if Jesus actually paid for the sins of sinners, then the cross has done something definite, not simply made something possible. If all the cross does is make salvation possible, then Jesus did not pay for all sins at the cross. God will not demand double payment for sin. That which Jesus has paid, is paid. If Jesus died for your sins, then when you stand before the Father, you will owe no price for your sin. It will have been paid in full.

I have already compared Jesus’ death to the Old Testament sacrificial system in which atonement was not simply made possible but was made actual by the sacrifice; the cross is no different. At the cross, Jesus paid an actual price and has removed the debt from individuals. Hebrews 9:12 gives us a hint of this: …he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. The writer does not say that Jesus merely made eternal redemption possible; the work of Christ secures redemption. It makes redemption actual, definite, accomplished and applied. It is applied not to everyone, but to the elect.

Atonement Made for the Elect

The only sense in which the atonement is limited is in its application. Jesus’ blood is of infinite value and could pay for every sin. But his blood is only applied to those who will actually be saved. Put this way, even non-Calvinists could (and I think should) hold to limited atonement: the actual saving, atoning work of Christ was carried out at the cross for those who would be saved, and they are saved by means of this work.

But Calvinists take it one step further to say that Jesus died for the elect, those specifically chosen for salvation. I dealt with election in my last post, so I won’t rehash it here. But I do want to mention some passages which at least hint at the definite, particular nature of the atonement, and/or show its application to the elect.

Looking again at Hebrews 9, in Hebrews 9:15 we read that he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. Note two things:

1. Something occurs for those who are called
2. A death has occurred which redeems them from their transgressions. This is not the language of possibility but actuality: Jesus has accomplished the redemption of those who are called.

Some would respond that the calling here is universal: Christ has called everyone to come and receive salvation. One problem with this is it would leave us universalists. Hebrews 9:15 says that the death of Jesus definitely redeems the called from their transgressions. Another problem is seen if we tie in Hebrews 9:28: …Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many… While there are passages which might appear to present a universal atonement (and I’ll address them in a moment), there are others which seem to limit the application of the atonement. We see that in verse 28: Christ was not offered to bear the sins of all, but to bear the sins of many. Jesus himself says the same thing in Matthew 26:28: …this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. Why was his blood poured out? For the forgiveness of sins. Who was it poured out for? The many. In speaking of his own sacrifice for sins, Jesus says his blood was shed for many, not for all. (Also Matthew 20:28.)

Sacrifice Made for All

While Jesus’ atoning work was specifically applied to the elect, there are ways in which we can speak of Jesus’ death being for everyone. Not everyone receives salvation, but everyone does receive grace and mercy. By his common grace, God gives life to all people. The sun shines and the rains fall on both the just and the unjust (Matthew 5:45). At the cross we have a clearly visible public declaration of the universal call of the gospel: Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest (Matthew 11:28). In 1 Timothy 4:10, Paul goes as far as to call Jesus the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. The cross has meaning for everyone. But that last passage is particularly important, for while it notes that Jesus is the savior of the world, it also makes clear that Jesus is not the savior of all people in the same way.

What About John 3:16?

But what about those passages which seem to indicate that Jesus made atonement for everyone? I won’t try to look at them all, but let me mention two that are frequently raised.

One verse often cited is John 3:16 itself: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. Doesn’t this tell us that because of God’s love for the world, he gave his son to make salvation possible for everyone? Yes and no. Yes, it speaks clearly of God’s love for the world – meaning the people in the world. While I would argue that God does not love everyone in exactly the same way – there is a distinction between those who are his children and those who are not his children – I fully acknowledge the biblical teaching that God loves everyone in some way. But this verse does not say that Jesus died for everyone, just that God loves everyone. What Jesus did is to guarantee salvation for all who believe. Pointing back to the posts on Total Depravity and Unconditional Election, who are they who believe? Those who have been elected and regenerated by God. The elect. Only the elect, those drawn by the Father, will believe in the Son, and the work of Christ guarantees salvation only for those who believe.

Another passage often mentioned is 1 John 2:1-2:

1 John 2:1-2

2:1 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world. (ESV)

The word propitiation means atoning sacrifice. In the Old Testament, the lid of the Ark is known as the mercy seat, a phrase coined by William Tyndale to note that it was here on the ark, the footstool of the throne of God, that mercy was received when the priest cast the blood of the atoning sacrifice on this part of the Ark. But the literal Hebrew name is place of propitiation or cover over sins (כַּפֹּרֶת, meaning propitiation or cover over sins, Brown-Driver-Briggs; the NT Greek word is ἱλαστήριον, defined in BDAG as place of propitiation). Jesus is the substitution, the sacrifice offered that pays for and covers over our sins.

But if the atonement is applied to particular individuals, why does John say that Jesus is the propitiation for our sins, and for the sins of the whole world? Here is one place where I believe whole world is used with geographic or ethnic extent rather than individual extent. In other words, John is saying that Jesus is not just the propitiation for the Jews, but for people all over the world!

One reason I believe this is because of the nature of John’s argument. He is a Jew writing about a propitiatory sacrifice: language quite familiar to Jews enmeshed in the Mosaic sacrificial system. Jews and Gentiles alike knew the Jewish sacrificial system was intended for Jews – those natural descendants of Abraham and those who later adopt the faith. Speaking of Jesus as a propitiation would lead Jews to believe that this Jewish Messiah was intended only for them and those who became like them. This is precisely the challenge Paul addresses again and again with the Judaizers, Jewish believers in Jesus who thought Christians should still adhere to the law (many modern Messianic Christians have taken over the work of the Judaizers). When Peter says that Jesus is the propitiation for us and for the whole world, he means that Jesus is not simply the Jewish Messiah. This sacrifice is made for people of every tribe and tongue. Jesus is Messiah for both Jews and Gentiles.

Note that if Jesus was, in fact, a propitiation for every individual, how would anyone go to Hell? If he is the atoning sacrifice for all people, covering the sins of all, offering propitiation for every individual, Hell would be empty and Revelation 20:15 would be meaningless.

There are other passages people raise to challenge the notion of limited atonement, but similar responses could be offered for each of them.

What Limits The Atonement?

One issue people struggle with is the question, what limits the atonement? What keeps some people from being saved? The simple answer is sin. Our default state is sinful depravity. We are born in sin, we continue in sin, we love our sin. Left to ourselves, no one would ever seek God and the atonement would not just be limited, it would be nonexistent. But God in his mercy has come and brought some out of their sinful state. Those rescued from sin are redeemed, atoned for. The only reason there is an atonement is because God is gracious enough to choose to save some.

If the Arminians are right and the atonement is somehow a universal offer, already accomplished and only applied if people believe, then no one would ever be saved. No one seeks God, no one walks in righteousness, no one goes to the Son unless drawn by the Father. The only hope we have of salvation is if Christ takes us and changes us and saves us.

In the next post, we will look at this saving work of Christ: his Irresistible Grace, by which he takes sinners and turns us into saints.

Several thousand years ago, a man in the wilderness city of Haran heard the voice of the Lord. This voice said to him, Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. (Genesis 12:1-2) Thus began God’s eternal relationship with Abraham and his descendants.

God’s election of Israel is one of the clearest biblical demonstrations of sovereign, unconditional election. Abraham was not chosen because he was seeking God. In fact, we are never told why God chooses Abraham. Some time later (Deuteronomy 7:7-8), God would say to Abraham’s descendants, It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. His faithfulness to the later Israelites was due to his faithfulness to Abraham, but we are not told why he chose Abraham.

In this post, we will look at the Calvinist doctrine of Unconditional Election. Unconditional election is the point that most closely relates to discussions on predestination, for this is the point which addresses God’s sovereignly choosing some for salvation and others for judgment. The Calvinist belief is that God, before the creation of the world, has determined or elected those whom he would save. Election is unconditional because it is not influenced by anything within people – no character trait, ethnic consideration, intelligence level, racial quota, or personal belief influenced God’s choice. But God’s choice in election was not arbitrary. He knows why he has elected those whom he has elected, but as with Abraham, he has not revealed that reason to us.

Unconditional election follows the doctrine of total depravity. If we are so corrupted by sin that we would never seek God, God must seek us. If we would not choose him, he must choose us. As we will see later when we tie in Irresistible Grace, he must not just seek us, he must win us or we are hopeless.

Sought and Drawn

An old proverb says it is better to be sought and drawn than drawn and quartered.

No one in the Bible says more about God’s sovereign hand in salvation than Jesus Christ. His message was clear and consistent: he came to seek and save his lost sheep. These sheep are people given to him by his Father, drawn by the Father to embrace the Son.

Many of Jesus’ clearest teachings about God’s electing work are found in the gospel of John. These teachings begin in John 1:11-13:

John 1:11-13

11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (ESV)

Note the steps here:

1. His people (the Jews) rejected him
2. Whoever did receive him (Jew or Gentile) and believe in him was given the right to be children of God
3. These children were not birthed by blood or flesh or the human will, their birth is a work of God.

While #2 says that belief is the precondition to be children, #3 says their birth is not a matter of physical cause and effect or a movement of the will but is solely a work of God. No one causes his own birth through an act of his own will; rather, because we are born, we are able to will.

Jesus says more about this birth in his conversation with Nicodemus in John 3. The key discussion is in John 3:3-8:

John 3:3-8

3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (ESV)

There are two parts of this passage significant for election. The first is verse 6: that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. In other words, flesh only creates flesh. To have something of spirit, the Spirit must be at work. Spiritual birth can never come through an act of the flesh, it can only come through an act of the Spirit. This is why only God could cause the birth of his new children in John 1:11-13.

Later, in a chapter we will see much more of, Jesus says, It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all (John 6:63). If the flesh is no help at all, then the flesh cannot even contribute to the condition of John 1:12. The human mind, the human will, is of no help when it comes to receiving the life offered through the Spirit. One reason the flesh is no help is because the flesh is thoroughly corrupt. As we saw in the last post, Romans 8:8 tells us that those who are in the flesh cannot please God. So we cannot in our flesh meet the condition necessary for the new birth.

Despite our inability, Jesus says there are those who experience the second birth, those born of the Spirit. This second significant part of the passage is seen in John 3:8: The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. From the last part of the verse, we see that there are those who have been born of the Spirit. From the first part of the verse, we see something about divine, unconditional election.

The flesh is of no use in our salvation, so God must do a work if we are to be saved. Jesus tells us that the Spirit works to bring the new birth. But where does the Spirit work? Who does he bring to salvation and new birth? Jesus tells us we have no way of knowing. You can hear the wind, you can see the effect of the wind, but you cannot predict the wind. Its swirls and eddies take it who knows where. That is not to say that the movement of the wind is random, since modern meteorology can do a lot to predict the wind, but to the people of Jesus’ day, the wind, however orderly and reasonable its movement might be, was unpredictable to human eyes. So it is with the Spirit. We do not know where the Spirit will move, who he will cause to be born again. His actions are not random or capricious but the work of the Spirit is beyond our ability to anticipate.

Earlier I mentioned John 6. It was John 6, together with Ephesians 2, which finally sealed the deal for me. I know many people have read Jesus’ words in John 6 and continue to reject unconditional election, but to me it appears inescapable.

In John 6:22-59, people following Jesus are hoping for a handout. They had seen Jesus feed the multitude and they were hoping the food supply would continue. Jesus responds that he is the true bread, the bread of life, the sustenance they really need. This leads to grumbling, but even before the grumbling begins Jesus has already laid a foundation to explain the grumbling that will come. In John 6:37-40 Jesus offers the following:

John 6:37-40

37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 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. 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (ESV)

Jumping to the end, in verse 40 Jesus again names the condition: you must believe in the Son, receiving him, looking upon him, in order to have eternal life and the promise of resurrection. But there is a problem. The problem is seen in verse 44: No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. We must believe in the Son to have life, yet no one goes to the Son on his own. We only believe if the Father first draws us. Backing up again to verse 37, we see that the Father does, in fact, draw certain individuals: All that the Father gives me will come to me… These are all definite terms. The Father has given specific individuals to the Son, and these individuals will come to the Father.

Some have said that the drawing of the Father is a kind of wooing invitation. This is not an indication of God acting upon the elect, but of God issuing a universal call to all people, extending salvation and waiting for us to respond. But Jesus is clear that these people drawn by the Father and given to the Son will be saved, will not be lost, and will be raised up on the last day. In saying this I am giving away a few points about Irresistible Grace, but even as we see the certainty of man’s response, we see the execution of God’s election. The Father has individuals in mind to give to the Son. He gives these specific individuals to Jesus, and these individuals are saved and secured.

A short time later, Jesus gathers with what remains of his disciples. Following his hard teachings of John 6:22-59, many abandon him. Those who remain gather around him and in John 6:60-71 we have a brief report of their conversation. They want to understand why Jesus would issue such a hard teaching. Jesus responds by saying that life must come by the Spirit. He then says, in verse 65, This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father. Very specifically, from the mouth of Jesus, we have election. No one can come to the Son unless it is granted by the Father. And who does the Father grant to come to the Son? He grants those already mentioned in 3:37. Those given by the Father to the Son have been granted salvation by the Father. The Son receives them, and they will be saved.

This is why so many abandoned Jesus. Being dead in their sins, blinded by the corruption of sin, they could not see the goodness of his teachings, the mercy of his gospel. The opening of eyes and raising of the dead is the work of the Spirit upon those granted (chosen, elected) by the Father, and all those granted by the Father will be saved by the Son.

God’s Sovereign Mercy: Romans 9 and Election

Another strong case can be made for sovereign, unconditional election in Romans 9:9-24. In many ways, this passage is even more compelling than John 6. The question at hand is, “Why have so many of the Jews rejected Christ? If the Jews are the chosen people of God, why have they rejected their Messiah?” There are several layers to Paul’s answer, but in Romans 9 he presents a compelling case for unconditional election.

Paul begins with a look back in the history of Israel. Going back to the days of Abraham and Sarah then Isaac and Rebecca, he recalls God’s promise to Rebecca that the older will serve the younger (Romans 9:12). God let it be known that his covenant promises would be passed down through Jacob, not Esau, and Esau would be Jacob’s servant.

Many have said that God spoke these words because of his foreknowledge, that God chose Jacob because he knew that in the end Jacob would be a faithful servant of God. This view cannot be sustained because it flies in the face of what Paul had said just one verse earlier, Romans 9:11: …though 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 his call… Paul wants to be absolutely, unmistakably clear. God chose Jacob over Esau:

• Before they were born
• Before they had done good or bad
• For God’s own elective purpose
• Not because of any works
• Solely because of his call

Jacob was chosen because God chose to choose Jacob. Once again, we can state that God had a reason for choosing Jacob, but that reason had nothing to do with Jacob himself. That is why Paul stresses that the choice was made before his birth, before he could do good or bad, and without any regard to his future works. For reasons he does not disclose to us, God chose Jacob and rejected Esau.

This understanding of Romans 9:9-13 is all the more believable because of what follows. Paul knows how people will respond to this teaching: “That is not fair! God is not just! How can he choose one and not another? Can he really be loving if he chooses Jacob while rejecting Esau?” These questions get asked of Calvinists all the time, and Paul anticipates them here. The main part of his answer is given in verses 14-18:

Romans 9:14-18

14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. 17 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.” 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. (ESV)

The key phrase is in verse 15 where God says, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. I will say more later in this post about the justice of God in choosing some and not others, but at the least we can acknowledge that God himself defends his right to extend this electing mercy wherever he wills. He says something similar a few verses later, in Romans 9:19-21:

Romans 9:19-21

19 You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” 20 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?” 21 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? (ESV)

We are the clay, he is the potter, and the potter has absolute authority to do as he wishes with his clay. But one thing we know about our potter is that he is good, he is just, he is righteous. He will never do anything unjust. His purposes in election must be good, or he would not be good.

In our depravity, we are hopeless and helpless. We would never seek God, never even realize our own spiritual bankruptcy. But in his mercy, God has chosen to break through the blindness for some of his creatures. We are chosen by God for salvation, given by the Father to the Son, so we have full assurance of salvation. His choosing is unconditional. If there were conditions, we would never be able to meet them.

Foreknowledge versus Foreordination

Some have said that God’s election is based on his foreknowledge. He knows who will choose him, he knows who will receive the gospel, if given an opportunity. So he chooses those who are foreknown by him to accept his gospel, and he names them his elect.

The merit of this argument is that it takes seriously the places in Scripture which speak of God’s foreknowledge in connection to election and salvation (Romans 8:29; 1 Peter 1:2). The weakness is it overlooks all that the Bible has to say about unconditional election. Perhaps worse, this view then speculates about what the Bible does not say. We are never told that foreknowledge is God’s act of looking into the future to see who it is that will accept him. This understanding of foreknowledge is speculative at best.

It is better to understand foreknowledge with an eye to a passage such as 1 Peter 1:20. In this passage, Peter has been offering a description of Jesus. What he says in verse 20 is significant:

1 Peter 1:20

20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you (ESV)

Just a few verses before, in 1 Peter 1:2, Peter had said that we are elect according to God’s foreknowledge. Now he says that Jesus was foreknown before the foundation of the world. The Father’s foreknowledge of the Son was not a look into the future to see whether or not the Son would be obedient. Rather, foreknowledge is God’s definite choosing. He knows in advance what he will do. From the foundation of the world, God knew that he would send his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. From before the foundation of the world, God knew who he would elect to salvation.

Both of these ideas are brought together for us in a surprising place – Revelation 13:8: 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. Note the different elements:

1. Everyone whose name is not in this book will worship the beast
2. This book was written before the foundation of the world.
3. This book has a name. Its name, from before the foundation of the world, was the book of the life of the Lamb who was slain. From before the foundation of the world, God knew who he would save and how he would save them. This is the meaning of his foreknowledge.

Is Predestination Double?

One question often asked of Calvinists is whether they hold to single or double predestination. Single predestination is the view that God only elects some to salvation; he does nothing with the rest. In double predestination, God elects some to salvation and the rest to judgment.

I hold to double predestination, partly because single does not make sense. Can we really say that God makes no particular electing choice regarding those not elected to salvation? He is choosing to leave them to judgment by his very act of not choosing to save them.

But there is also a biblical case to be made for double predestination. There are many verses that point to it. One which we have already seen is Romans 9:18: So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. When God hardens someone, he is not turning off a heart that would otherwise beat for him. He is doing for them as he did for Pharaoh: keeping them from seeing even a hint of the grace they have and would continue to completely reject. God rejects them for salvation and consigns them to the coming judgment.

Can Such a God be Just?

Sometimes people describe predestination as the belief that God refuses to save those who want to be saved. One story tells it something like this: “Bill went to church on Sunday and heard the gospel powerfully preached. He fell under conviction and prayed for forgiveness and salvation. But poor Bill is not among the elect. He went knocking on Heaven’s door, only to be turned away. Bill wants to be saved, but he is not chosen, so he will have to go to Hell.” There are a few problems with this caricature of Calvinism. One of the chief problems is that Bill would never fall under conviction unless God was the one convicting him. Since we are all dead in our sins, none of us will ever want forgiveness unless God is drawing us.

Furthermore, predestination is not about God choosing some to get the Heaven they deserve while forcing others to get the Hell they don’t deserve. We are all sinners. We all – every single person on this planet – deserve Hell. No one deserves the mercy of God. No sinner is in Hell because God put him there; everyone in Hell is there because his sin and rebellion put him there. No saint is in Heaven because his righteousness put him there; everyone in Heaven is there because of the righteousness of Christ.

No one deserves salvation. God does not have to save anyone. Any act of mercy is strictly a gift of his grace. This is why he can say what he does in Romans 9:15: I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. Modern minds think it unfair for one person to receive something good and another person be passed by, but the God of the universe does not operate by modern rules. When no one deserves salvation, God would be just in consigning all to Hell. When we all deserve Hell, it is nothing but extravagant grace when God chooses to save any.

But how does God save people? What is the means by which our sins are forgiven, and which people are the recipient of those means? We will take up these questions in the next post as we look at Limited Atonement.