God Describes His Version of Election AFTER He Has Captured Us!

God Describes His Version of Election AFTER He Has Captured Us!

Christians have been debating “Predestination or Free Will” probably starting the week after Paul wrote Romans 8-9! It probably raises more contention than any other topic Christians pick to argue about. In the Bluerint For a Revolution I have also presented my own understanding of the issue.

But those doing the debating do not seem to spend much time understanding the context in which Paul was writing those two chapters. He was not acting like a professional philosopher, whose profession is to prove abstract issues, such as “How do I KNOW that I actually exist.” To which René Descartes would reply, “I THINK, therefore I AM!” Most of the debating among Christians seems to take the form of an argument about such philosophical  abstractions, but Paul clearly was not doing that. As you can easily see fo yourself, In Romans 8, Paul was only writing to those who were ALREADY captured by the authority and Spirit of Jesus, and was explaining HOW He had made it happen for them.

Neither God nor Paul were out to satisfy your curiosity about how much “freedom of the will: you may possess. Rather, He first makes you His friend, and THEN He explains to you how it all happened:

“28 And we know that GOD causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. 29 For those whom HE foreknew, HE also  predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; 30 and these whom HE predestined, HE also called; and these whom HE called, HE also justified; and these whom HE justified, HE also glorified.”

Paul was giving Glory to God for God’s aggressive actions on Paul’s behalf, and exhorting them to do the same thing.

He dies for His friends “13 Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his FRIENDS.” (John 15)

“I no longer call you servants… but friends15 I no longer call you slaves, because a slave doesn’t know what his owner is doing; rather I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I heard from my Father. 16 It wasn’t you who chose me but I who chose you, and I appointed you so that you should go and produce fruit.” (John 15)

You and your salvation are HIS handiwork, and you are to see Him has hunting YOU down, no matter how much you experience at YOUR end about desiring and choosing Him. “20 I have been crucified with Christ, so it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me; what I now live in this body I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself in my place.” (Galatians 2).

“8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that NOT of yourselves; it [that “faith”] is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. 10 For we are HIS workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2)

“10 Not only that, but also when Rebecca had conceived twins by our forefather Isaac 11 (though they had not yet been born, not having done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls), 12 it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger”. 13 As it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”  14 So what shall we say, there is no injustice with God, is there? Of course not! 15 For He says to Moses: “I will have mercy on whomever I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I have compassion.” 16 So then, it is not of him who wills nor of him who strives, but of God who shows mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 So then, He has mercy on whom He wishes, and He hardens whom He wishes.  19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who has ever resisted His will?” 20 Really now, just who are you, O man, to talk back to God? What is formed will not say to the one who formed it, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? 21 Or has the potter no right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?  22 What if God, wishing to display His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 just in order to make known the riches of His glory on vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,…” (Romans 9; Paul is clearly calling YOU God’s “clay” if you are His!)

Paul did not write the above to provide ammunition for the academic, puzzle-solving debate between Arminians and Calvinists, about whether our salvation depends upon God OR upon our free will. He wrote it to those who were ALREADY captured by His grace to let them know how aggressively God pursued THEM and how much He regards them as His very own children, forming them diligently in taking after Him and correcting in them what needs to be corrected. We are not to think that He just did what He did in Christ and then left it all up to us humans to do all the rest on our own. Like us with our own children, we beget them but then raise them. We don’t raise them to be our puppets, we raise them to become adults who can make good decisions “free from the madding crowd’s” twisted influences.

The fruit of GOD’s version of Election OUGHT to be that you give Him ALL the glory for the marvellous destiny into which you have been brought. What can be wrong about giving HIM that glory rather than yourself?