Election, Predestination & Our Will
God has chosen His elect from eternity and chooses them for eternity.
In His great love, grace, and mercy,
He gives a new heart to hopeless and helpless sinners,
making dead men alive by the blood of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit,
so we are then willing to surrender and obey,
take up our cross and His yoke and walk in humility and holiness,
loving God and our neighbor (Matthew 22:37-39),
holding fast to the Gospel by which we are saved (1 Corinthians 15:2-4)
...and live.
Galatians 1:15…1 Corinthians 1:9…Romans 8:29-30
God...set me apart and called me by His grace, [and] was pleased to reveal His Son in me. God has called you also into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ. Those He predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, He called...He justified.
God's Sovereignty
Exodus 3:7-8 I have seen the misery of my people...I have heard their cries...I have come down to rescue them...
Isaiah 42:6, 43:1b, 25 I, the LORD, have called you...I will take hold of your hand...I have redeemed you...I have summoned you by name, you are mine. I am he who blots our your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.
Jeremiah 1:5 I formed you in the womb...I chose you...I set you apart...
Zechariah 3:4b I have taken away your sin.
Psalm 3:8 Salvation belongeth unto the LORD (KJV)
From the LORD comes deliverance. (NIV)
C.H. Spurgeon Treasury of David
Search Scripture through, and you must be persuaded that the doctrine of salvation by grace alone is the great doctrine of the Word of God. Salvation from first to last belongs to the Most High God. It is God that chooses His people. He calls them by His grace; He quickens them by His Spirit, and keeps them by His power.
Psalm 65:3 (ESV) When iniquities prevail against me, you atone for our transgressions.
(NLT) Though we are overwhelmed by our sins, you forgive them all.
Psalm 71:3 You have given the command to save me...
Psalm 86:13b You have delivered me for the depths of the grave.
Ezekiel 16:63 I (will) provide you an atonement for all you have done.
John 6:37 (John 17:6, 9, 24) All that the Father gives me will come to me...
Acts 13:48 ...all those who were ordained (KJV) / appointed (NIV & ESV) (tássō: "marked out/set in place") to eternal life believed.
Romans 9:11,18 In order that God's purpose in election might stand...God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens (the heart of) whom he wants to harden.
1 Corinthians 1:30 It is because of Him (God) that you are in Christ Jesus...
Ephesians 1:4 (God) chose us in (Jesus) before the foundation of the world...
Galatians 1:15-16 (God)...set me apart before I was born, called me by his grace, (and) revealed his Son to me...
2 Thessalonians 2:13 ...from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. He called you to this through our gospel...
(ESV) God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.
1 Timothy 1:9 (God) has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began...
(NLT) God saved us and called us to live a holy life. He did this, not because we deserved it, but because that was his plan from before the beginning of time—to show us his grace through Christ Jesus.
1 Peter 1:3 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...
In Summary
1. Only they come to Christ who have been given to Him by the Father – John 6:37
2. No one can come of himself; he must first be drawn by the Father – John 6:44
3. The ability (willingness) to come to Christ is a gift of the Father, and the work of the Holy Spirit – John 6:65
4. Everyone given to the Son by the Father will come to Him – John 6:37
C.H. Spurgeon “Sovereign Grace and Man's Responsibility” on Romans 10:20-21
https://www.spurgeon.org/resource-library/sermons/sovereign-grace-and-mans-responsibility/#flipbook/
Men do not seek God first; God seeks them first; and if any of you are seeking Him today it is because
He has first sought you.
Our Responsibility
Deuteronomy 30:15, 19 I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. Now choose... (bachar - "select, decide")
Luke 9:23, Matthew 16:24 If any man will come...
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believe in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Revelation 22:17b Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.
Then surrender and reach out to our only Healer, Deliverer and Savior - Mark 3:10, 5:25-34, 6:56, Luke 6:19
A.W. Pink “Experimental Salvation”
https://www.the-highway.com/articleJan09.html
Salvation may be viewed from many angles and contemplated under various aspects, but from whatever side we look at it we must ever remember that “Salvation is of the Lord.” Salvation was planned by the Father for His elect before the foundation of the world. It was purchased for them by the holy life and vicarious death of His incarnate Son. It is applied to and wrought in them by His Holy Spirit. It is known and enjoyed through the study of the Scriptures, through the exercise of faith, and through communion with the triune Jehovah.
While it is true that Holy Scripture insists on man's responsibility, and that all through them God deals with the sinner as an accountable being; yet it is also true that the Bible plainly and constantly shows that no son of Adam has ever measured up to his responsibility, that every one has miserably failed to discharge his accountability. It is this which constitutes the deep need for God to work in the sinner, and to do for him what he is unable to do for himself.
God will turn rebels over to the consequence of their choice
John 5:40, 12:37, Matthew 19:22, 23:37 You refuse to come to me to have life...(you) would not believe...you were not willing...
Romans 1:24, 26, 28 God gave them over...
2 Thessalonians 2:10-11 They refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth...
"Turning over"/Preterition is NOT "Double Predestination"
https://www.gotquestions.org/preterition.html
St. Augustine
Of the Predestination of the Saints
https://www.logoslibrary.org/augustine/predestination/08.html
Faith, then, as well in its beginning as in its completion, is God’s gift; and let no one have any doubt whatever, unless he desires to resist the plainest sacred writings, that this gift is given to some, while to some it is not given.
“The First Book”. 1, Addressed to Prosper and Hilary
https://www.apuritansmind.com/arminianism/the-predestination-of-the-saints-by-augustine/
Chapter 37
God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, predestinating us to the adoption of children, not because we were going to be of ourselves holy and immaculate, but He chose and predestinated us that we might be so. Moreover, He did this according to the good pleasure of His will, so that nobody might glory concerning his own will, but about God’s will towards himself. He did this according to the riches of His grace, according to His good-will, which He purposed in His beloved Son, in whom we have obtained a share, being predestinated according to the purpose, not ours, but His, who worketh all things to such an extent as that He worketh in us to will also.
Chapter 38
(The Pelagians) think that “having received God’s commands we are of ourselves by the choice of our free will made holy and immaculate in His sight in love; and since God foresaw that this would be the case,” they say, “He therefore chose and predestinated us in Christ before the foundation of the world.”
He chose us, not because we believed, but that we might believe, lest we should be said first to have chosen Him, and so His word be false “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.” (John 15:16) Neither are we called because we believed, but that we may believe; and by that calling which is without repentance it is effected and carried through that we should believe.
Martin Luther, Luther’s Small Catechism, “The Third Article”
I believe that by my own reason or strength I cannot believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him. But the Holy Spirit has called me through the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, and sanctified and preserved me in true faith.
1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith "Of Effectual Calling"
1. Those whom God hath predestinated unto life, he is pleased in his appointed, and accepted time, effectually to call, by his Word and Spirit, out of that state of sin and death in which they are by nature, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ; enlightening their minds spiritually and savingly to understand the things of God; taking away their heart of stone, and giving unto them a heart of flesh; renewing their wills, and by his almighty power determining them to that which is good, and effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ; yet so as they come most freely, being made willing by his grace.
2. This effectual call is of God's free and special grace alone, not from anything at all foreseen in man, nor from any power or agency in the creature, being wholly passive therein, being dead in sins and trespasses, until being quickened and renewed by the Holy Spirit; he is thereby enabled to answer this call, and to embrace the grace offered and conveyed in it, and that by no less power than that which raised up Christ from the dead.
Westminster Shorter Catechism Q. 31
Effectual calling is the work of God’s Spirit whereby, convincing us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our wills, he doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ, freely offered to us in the gospel.
Thomas Goodwin Justifying Faith
When you believe, God the Father rose up in heaven...and said: 'Son, yonder is a soul which I have given you from everlasting (John 17:6), which you died upon the cross for; now is the fullness of time for you to have mercy upon him; go take him and own him for your own, and now actually possess him.' The Father likewise whispers to the heart of the sinner and woos him to come to Christ. We come to the Father through the Son, being led by the Spirit.
Richard Sibbes The Soul's Conflict With Itself
If we choose him, we may conclude he hath chosen us first: 'If we love him, we may know that he hath loved us first.' (1 John 4:19) If we say to God, "I am thine", it is because he hath first said unto us, "Thou art mine".
As God offers, so faith receives; but God offers himself in particular to the believing soul by his Spirit, therefore our faith must be particular. The first spring of all God's claim to us as his, is in his election of us. We were by grace his, before we were. Those that are his from that eternal love, he gives to Christ. This is hid in the breast of God, till he calls us out of the rest of the world into communion with Christ. In answering of which call, by faith, we become one with Christ, and so one with him.
Afterwards, in justification, we feel God experimentally to be reconciled unto us, whence arises joy and inward peace. And then, upon further sanctification, God delights in us as his, bearing his own image, and we from a likeness to God delight in him as ours in his Christ, and so this mutual interest betwixt God and us continues, until at last God becomes all in all unto us.
We have no ground to trouble ourselves about God's election. 'Secret things belong to God', (Deuteronomy 29:29). God's revealed will is, 'that all that believe in Christ shall not perish,' (John 3:16). It is my duty therefore, knowing this, to believe. For all that believe in Christ are Christ's, and all that are Christ's are God's. It is not my duty to look to God's secret counsel, but to his open offer, invitation, and command, and thereupon to adventure my soul.
David Dickson The Psalms on Psalm 47:9a “The princes of (all) peoples gather as the people of the God of Abraham.”
It is a point of Christ’s praise in the conversion of men, that his omnipotency maketh men voluntary subjects, and to come in to him as by invincible power on his part, so also deliberately with a free election, and hearty consent of will on the converted man’s part.
Thomas Doolittle, Jeremiah Smith A Complete Body of Practical Divinity, “The Covenant of Grace”, 1723
https://books.google.com/books?id=8fNeAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA121&lpg
For as I could never have loved God at all, except he had first loved me (1 John 4:19), so could I never have chosen God for my God, except he had first chosen me for one of his people (Ephesians 1:4-7, 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14).
Jonathan Edwards, Works, Vol. 2, “Concerning Efficacious Grace”
https://ccel.org/ccel/edwards/works2/works2/Page_557.html
In efficacious grace we are not merely passive, nor yet does God do some, and we do the rest. But God does all, and we do all. God produces all, and we act all. For that is what he produces, viz. our own acts. God is the only proper author and fountain; we only are the proper actors. We are in different respects, wholly passive and wholly active.
Augustus Toplady, The Doctrine of Absolute Predestination Stated and Asserted
https://ia800700.us.archive.org/30/items/doctrineofabsolu01zanc/doctrineofabsolu01zanc.pdf
How is it possible for us to render unto God the praises due to the glory of his grace, without laying this threefold foundation?
(1.) That whosoever are, or shall be saved, are saved by his grace alone in Christ, in consequence of his eternal purpose, passed before they had done any one good thing.
(2.) That whatsoever good thing is begun to be wrought in our souls (whether it be illumination of the understanding, rectitude of will, or purity of affections), was begun altogether of God alone; by whose invincible agency, grace is at first conferred, afterwards maintained, and finally crowned.
(3.) That the work of internal salvation (the sweet and certain prelude to eternal glory) was not only begun in us, of his mere grace alone; but that its continuance, its progress, and increase, are no less free, and totally unmerited, than its first original gift. Grace alone makes the elect gracious; grace alone keeps them gracious; and the same grace alone will render them everlastingly glorious, in the heaven of heavens.
J.C. Ryle
“An Estimate of Manton”, Ryle's Preface in the 1871 release of Thomas Manton’s Works
Manton held strongly the doctrine of election. But that did not prevent him teaching that God loves all, and that His tender mercies are over all His works.
Manton held strongly the need of (prevenient) and (effectual) calling grace. But that did not hinder him from inviting all men to repent, believe, and be saved.
Manton held strongly that faith alone lays hold on Christ, and appropriates justification. But that did not prevent him urging upon all the absolute necessity of repentance and turning from sin.
Manton held strongly the perseverance of God’s elect. But that did not hinder him from teaching that holiness is the grand distinguishing mark of God’s people, and that he who talks of ‘never perishing,’ while he continues in willful sin, is a hypocrite and a self-deceiver.
Old Paths
Faith is simply the grasp of a contrite heart on the outstretched hand of an Almighty Saviour (Matthew 14:30, Philippians 3:12b "Christ has taken hold of me"). It is the hand of the drowning man which lays hold on the rope thrown to him. Cast away all idea of work, or merit, or doing, or performing, or paying, or giving, or buying in the act of believing on Christ. Faith is not giving, but taking; not paying, but receiving; not buying, but being enriched.
(C.H. Spurgeon: I do not come into this pulpit hoping that perhaps somebody will of his own free will return to Christ. My hope lies in another quarter. I hope that my Master will lay hold of some of them and say, "You are mine, and you shall be mine. I claim you for myself." My hope arises from the freeness of grace, and not from the freedom of the will.)
(We do not ‘accept Jesus’ or ‘ask Jesus into our hearts’; we believe, cry out, and surrender to the One who is the only means of a dying man’s deliverance and salvation.)
God has been pleased from all eternity to choose certain men and women out of mankind, whom by His counsel secret to us, He has decreed to save by Jesus Christ. None are finally saved except those who are thus chosen.
Those men and women whom God has been pleased to choose from all eternity, He calls in time, by His Spirit working in due season. He convinces them of sin. He leads them to Christ. He works in them repentance and faith. He converts, renews, and sanctifies them. He keeps them by His grace from falling away entirely, and finally brings them safe to glory.
None ever repent, believe, and are born again, except the Elect. The primary and original cause of a saint’s being what he is, is eternal God’s election.
The Upper Room, Being a Few Truths for the Times, Chapter XIV 2 Samuel 23:4-5 “Without Clouds”, a message delivered at the opening of the Chapel of the Turner Memorial Home of Rest, the Dingle, Liverpool, October 16th, 1885
https://www.ccel.org/ccel/ryle/upper_room.xvi.html
There is unspeakable consolation in the thought that the salvation of our souls has been provided for from all eternity, and is not a mere affair of yesterday. Our names have long been in the Lamb's book of life. Our pardon and peace of conscience through Christ's blood, our strength for duty, our comfort in trial, our power to fight Christ's battles, were all arranged for us from endless ages, and long before we were born. Here upon earth we pray, and read, and fight, and struggle, and groan, and weep, and are often sore let and hindered (by our sins) in our journey. But we ought to remember that an Almighty eye has long been upon us, and that we have been the subjects of divine provision though we knew it not.
Martin Luther
99 Propositions
The law of God and the will of man are two adversaries, that without the grace of God can never be reconciled.
Ian Hamilton on Martin Luther’s De servo arbitrio, or The bondage of the will written in 1525 in response to
Desiderius Erasmus’ Diatribe sue collation de libero arbitrio (Discussion concerning free will), 1524.
If we have some virtuous capacity to will and to choose in our sinful natures, then self-confidence and self-righteousness are inescapable concomitants. But if our wills are wholly in bondage to sin and Satan, then salvation must wholly be of God and the glory completely his. God will have ‘no flesh’ to boast in his presence (1 Corinthians 1:29).
It is, then, fundamentally necessary and wholesome for Christians to know that God foreknows nothing contingently, but that He foresees, purpose, and does all things according to His own immutable, eternal and infallible will.
(Acts 2:23, Acts 4:28, John 18:37b, Ephesians 1:11, 1 Corinthians 2:7
God creates faith in the human heart the same way that He created the world; ex nihilo. He found nothing and created something.
I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord, or come to Him.
When God works in us, the will, being changed and sweetly breathed upon by the Spirit of God, desires and acts, not from compulsion, but responsively.
Bernard of Clairvaux
Percutit ut faciat voluntarios, non salvet invitos—When God smites the consciences of men with the terrors of his threatenings, it is to make them willing, not to save them against their wills.
John Bunyan The Work Of Jesus Christ As Advocate adapted in Voices From The Past - Puritan Devotional Readings
https://www.monergism.com/work-jesus-christ-advocate-ebook
Romans 8:33 "Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies."
God has engaged himself, having chosen a people for himself, and secured them from all that any can do against them. Election is as eternal as God is, without variableness or shadow of change, and thus is call 'an eternal purpose', and it must stand (Ephesians 3:11, Romans 9:11).
It is absolute and unconditional. No works were foreseen in us that were the cause of God's choosing us; and no sin in us shall frustrate or make election void (Ephesians 2:8-9, 2 Timothy 1:9). By the act of election, we are wrapped and covered in Christ; he has chosen us in him; not in ourselves, not in our virtues, no, not for or because of anything but his own will (Ephesians 1:4-11). By the act of electing love, it is concluded that all things whatsoever shall work together for good to those called according to the eternal purpose of God (Romans 8:28-30).
The eternal inheritance is by a covenant of free and unchangeable grace signed over to those who are chosen. It secures them from the (eternal punishment) of sin, and from the malice of Satan. The covenant is sealed by the blood of our advocate the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the mediator of this covenant and the guarantee for us in the great day of judgment (Romans 14:10, 2 Corinthians 5:10). We are safe and sound before the Father's face (Romans 9:23, Hebrews 7:22, 9:15, 13:20, John 10:28-29).
By God's choice, purpose, and decree, the elect have been allotted in Christ a sufficiency of grace to bring them through all difficulties to glory. Every one of them, after the first act of faith - which also they shall certainly attain - shall receive the earnest and firstfruits of the Spirit into their souls which is part of the promise (Ephesians 1:13, 2 Corinthians 1:22).
William Gurnall The Christian in Complete Armour
We are justified not by giving anything to God of what we do, but by receiving from God what Christ hath done for us. All the blessed privileges which believers are instated into, they are the fruits of Christ’s purchase, not of our earnings. The great design God hath in justifying a poor sinner is to magnify his free grace. God chooseth a person to be his, and on this foundation he builds, and bestows all his further mercy upon the creature, as one that is his.
Every one that believes, believes willingly. But he is beholden, not to (his natural desire), but to grace, for this willingness. None are willing till ‘the day of power’ comes (Psalm 110:3), in which the Spirit of God overshadows the soul, and by his incubation (incubare "to lie upon" in creative action), as once upon the waters, new‑forms and moulds the will into a sweet compliance with the call of God in the gospel.
On Psalm 81:11-12 (NKJV) "But My people would not heed My voice, And Israel would have none of Me. So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart, to walk in their own counsels."
Nemo amittit Deum nisi qui dimittit eum. None loseth God but he that is willing to part with Him.
(Quoted by C.H. Spurgeon in Treasury of David on Psalm 81:11 "My people would not harken to My voice...", and on v. 13 "None are found in the ways of God but those who have hearkened to His words.)
John Knox Predestination
The doctrine of God’s eternal predestination is so necessary to the church of God that, without the same, can faith neither be truly taught, neither surely established; man can never be brought to true humility and knowledge of himself, neither yet can he be ravished in admiration of God’s eternal goodness, and so moved to praise him as appertaineth.
C.H. Spurgeon
When we are brought to see our own utter ruin and ill desert, and the justice of the divine verdict against sin, we no longer cavil at the truth that the Lord is not bound to save us; we do not murmur if He chooses to save others, as though He were doing us an injury, but feel that if He deigns to look upon us, it will be His own free act of undeserved goodness, for which we shall ever bless His name. How shall those who are the subjects of divine election sufficiently adore the grace of God? They have no room for boasting, for sovereignty most effectually excludes it.
I know nothing, nothing again, that is more humbling for us than this doctrine of election. I have sometimes fallen prostrate before it, when endeavouring to understand it. "God hath from the beginning chosen you unto salvation," (2 Thessalonians 2:13) I was staggered with the mighty thought; and down came my soul, prostrate and broken, saying, 'Lord, I am nothing, I am less than nothing. Why me? Why me?"
"Why Some Seekers Are Not Saved"
https://www.spurgeon.org/resource-library/sermons/why-some-seekers-are-not-saved/#flipbook/
This is the doctrine that we preach; if a man be saved, all the honour is to be given to Christ; but if a man be lost, all the blame is to be laid upon himself. You will find all true theology summed up in these two short sentences: Salvation is all of the grace of God. Damnation is all of the will of man.
Thomas Guthrie & William Blaikie, Saving Knowledge: Addressed To Young Men, “Man’s Inability To Save Himself”, 1870
https://books.google.com/books?id=_ZdUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA75&source
Charles Hodge, Exegetical Lectures & Sermons on Hebrews, Hebrews 4:14-16
It will one day be made manifest that those who perish under the sound of the gospel, perish not because there is no way of access to God, nor because that way is not freely open to them, nor because Jesus the Son of God refused to act as priest on their behalf, but because they refused to accept and confide in him.
A.W. Pink The Attributes of God "The Foreknowledge of God"
http://www.pbministries.org/books/pink/Attributes/attrib_04.htm
God’s "foreknowledge" is not causative, that instead, something else lies behind, precedes it, and that something is His own sovereign decree. Christ was "delivered by the (1) determinate counsel and (2) foreknowledge of God." (Acts 2:23). His "counsel" or decree was the ground of His foreknowledge. So again in Romans 8:29. That verse opens with the word "for," which tells us to look back to what immediately precedes. What, then, does the previous verse say? This, "all things work together for good to them. . . .who are the called according to His purpose." Thus God’s foreknowledge is based upon His purpose or decree.
God did not elect any sinner because He foresaw that he would believe, for the simple but sufficient reason that no sinner ever does believe until God gives him faith; just as no man sees until God gives him sight. Sight is God’s gift, seeing is the consequence of my using His gift. So faith is God’s gift (Ephesians 1:8,9), believing is the consequence of my using His gift. If it were true that God had elected certain ones to be saved because in due time they would believe, then that would make believing a meritorious act, and in that event the saved sinner would have ground for "boasting," which Scripture emphatically denies: Ephesians 2:9.
God’s purpose is the ground of His prescience. If then the reader be a real Christian, he is so because God chose him in Christ before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4), and chose not because He foresaw you would believe, but chose simply because it pleased Him to choose: chose you notwithstanding your natural unbelief. This being so, all the glory and praise belongs alone to Him. You have no ground for taking any credit to yourself. You have "believed through grace" (Acts 18:27), and that, because your very election was "of grace" (Romans 11:5).
A.W. Tozer
The Pursuit of God
God will not hold us responsible to understand the mysteries of election, predestination and the divine sovereignty. The best and safest way to deal with these truths is to raise our eyes to God and in deepest reverence say, `O Lord, Thou knowest.' Those things belong to the deep and mysterious Profound of God's omniscience. Prying into them may make theologians, but it will never make saints.
Renewed Day by Day
According to the teachings of Christ no one will or can come and believe unless there has been done within him a prevenient work of God enabling him to do so. In the sixth chapter of John, Jesus teaches as that no one can come of himself; he must first be drawn by the Father. "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing," (John 6:63) Jesus said. Before any man or woman can be saved, he or she must feel a consuming spiritual hunger. Where a hungry heart is found, we may be sure that God was there first - "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you" (John 15:16).
On John 6:65 "No one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him."
Men are willing to be saved by grace, but to preserve their self-esteem, they must hold that the desire to be saved originated with them.
The Divine Conquest
(A modern evil)...is the habit of languidly "accepting" salvation as if it were a small matter and one wholly in our hands. Men are exhorted to think things over and "decide" for Christ, and in some places one day each year is set aside as "Decision Day," at which time people are expected to condescend to grant Christ the right to save them, a right that they have obviously refused Him up to that time. Christ is thus made to stand again before men's judgment seat; He is made to wait upon the pleasure of the individual, and after long and humble waiting is either turned away or patronizingly admitted. By a complete misunderstanding of the noble and true doctrine of the freedom of the human will salvation is made to depend perilously upon the will of man instead of upon the will of God.
God has lent to every man the power to lock his heart and stalk away darkly into his self-chosen night, but while the "no" choice may be ours, the "yes" choice is always God's. He is the Author of our faith as He must be its Finisher. Only by grace can we believe...
The Warfare of the Spirit
Men are indeed accountable for their sins, and their responsibility is twofold. First they are morally obligated to choose the good and reject the evil, and they will be brought to severe and certain judgment for their failure to do it.
Second, because God has in Christ provided a cure, they are responsible to humble themselves and seek forgiveness and cleansing at the fountain opened for all men by the hard dying of Jesus Christ on the Roman cross.
Knowledge of the Holy
God sovereignly decreed that man should be free to exercise moral choice, and man from the beginning has fulfilled that decree by making his choice between good and evil. When he chooses to do evil, he does not thereby countervail the sovereign will of God but fulfills it, inasmuch as the eternal decree decided not which choice the man should make but that he should be free to make it. If in His absolute freedom God has willed to give man limited freedom, who is there to stay His hand or say, ‘What doest thou?’ Man’s will is free because God is sovereign. A God less than sovereign could not bestow moral freedom upon His creatures. He would be afraid to do so.
"Was A.W. Tozer A Calvinist?"
https://johnharmstrong.typepad.com/john_h_armstrong_/2008/06/was-a-w-tozer-a.html
James P. Boyce’s Abstract of Systematic Theology
See http://www.reformedreader.org/rbb/reisinger/gwmwfwch05.htm
God (who and not man is the one who chooses or elects), of his own purpose (in accordance with his will, and not from any obligation to man, nor because of any will of man), has from Eternity (the period of God's action, not in time in which man acts), determined to save (not has actually saved, but simply determined to do so), and to save (not to confer gospel or church privileges upon), a definite number of mankind (not the whole or a part of the race, nor of a nation, nor of a church, nor of a class, as of believers or the pious; but individuals), not for or because of any merit or work of theirs, not of any value of him of them (not for their good works, nor their holiness, nor excellence, nor their faith, nor their spiritual sanctification, although the choice is to a salvation attained through faith and sanctification; nor their value to him, though their salvation tends greatly to the manifested glory of his grace); but of his own good pleasure (simply because he was pleased so to choose).
The external call (proclamation) of the Gospel...meets no success because of the willful sinfulness of man, although, in itself, it has all the elements which should secure its acceptance. God knowing that this is true, not only of all mankind in general, but even of the elect whom he purposes to save in Christ, gives to these such influences of the Spirit as will lead to their acceptance of the call. This is called Effectual Calling.
Sinclair Ferguson, Devoted to God, “The Ground Plan” in The Banner of Truth, Nov. 2016
1 Peter 1:1-2
“To those who are elect…according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ…”
God’s foreknowledge of us is the love which he set upon us long before we responded to him. He chose us in love. Here Peter and Paul are at one in stressing that holiness finds its ultimate source in God’s loving election. (Ephesians 1:4; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14)
Peter does not mean that God chose to save those he knew would want to be saved. For one thing that would make our salvation dependent on something in us, when Scripture tells us there is nothing in us that would constrain God’s choice. Such a view also operates with an inadequate understanding of sin. We are spiritually bankrupt; we are also God’s enemies. (Romans 5:10). There is nothing in us that could qualify us for the loving election of the Father. We are ‘by nature children of wrath...’ (Ephesians 2:3)
Neither our good living nor our ability to make good choices causes divine election. They are the result of it. In fact, says Peter, this divine choice had in view the sanctifying work of the Spirit which in turn would lead to our obedience to Jesus Christ. God chose us in order to sanctify us.
Divine election is the foundation of sanctification—not the other way around. Everything depends upon God taking the initiative.
J.I. Packer
Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God
"Puritan Evangelism"
http://www.the-highway.com/articleJune09.html
Grace is irresistible, not because it drags man to Christ against his will, but because it changes men’s hearts so that they ‘come most freely, being made willing by his grace’ (Westminster Confession, X.1).
“Divine Sovereignty and Evangelism”
https://www.monergism.com/divine-sovereignty-and-evangelism
(God’s) calling creates the response which it seeks, and confers the blessing to which it invites.
Recommended Resources by R.C. Sproul
Willing To Believe
Faith Alone: The Evangelical Doctrine of Justification
Chosen By God
Charles Simeon in a sermon on Isaiah 61:9
We must not … be afraid of speaking as the Scripture speaks. God did most assuredly know from all eternity who were, or should be, his: and he did ‘choose them in Christ before the foundation of the world,’ and ‘predestinate them to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself;’ (Matthew 25:34, Ephesians 1:4-5) and ‘he gave them to Christ,’ to be redeemed by his blood, to be saved by his grace, and to be made heirs of his glory: yea, he ‘wrote their names in the Lamb’s book of life before the foundation of the world.’ How truly blessed then must they be!
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
God’s Ultimate Purpose: An Exposition of Ephesians 1 "Chosen in Him"
https://www.monergism.com/chosen-him-ephsians-1-4
A man does not become a Christian by making a decision. He is made a Christian by God, who had marked him out before the foundation of the world and sees to it that he is born and see to it that he believes.
Romans 10, “Saving Faith”
There is a general call of the gospel, and there is a special call. The universal invitation goes out but all do not obey. Who are those who obey? They are the one who are the called of God, those who receive this effectual call, this result of the election of grace.
Saved in Eternity: Studies in John 17, “John 17:1-5”
The astounding thing is that this eternal, absolute Being is interested in me, even me, as an individual and as a person, and that I was in his mind when he conceived this amazing plan that includes the incarnation and the cross, and the resurrection and the ascension, and the reign of his Son at his side that is going on now.
What a staggering, yes, but what a glorious thought!
WARNING
John Newton
Memoirs of the Life of the Late Rev. William Grimshaw, 1799
They who avow the doctrines distinguished by the name of Calvinistic, ought, if consistent with their own principles, to be most gentle and forbearing of all men, in meekness instructing them that oppose. With us, it is a fundamental maxim, that a man can receive nothing but what is given him from heaven (John 3:27). If, therefore, it has pleased God to give us the knowledge of some truths, which are hidden from others, who have the same outward means of information; it is a just reason for thankfulness to Him, but will not justify our being angry with them; for we are no better or wiser than they in ourselves, and might have opposed the truths which we now prize, with the same eagerness and obstinacy, if His grace had not made us to differ. If the man, mentioned in John 9, who was born blind, on whom our Lord graciously bestowed the blessing of sight, had taken a cudgel and beat all the blind men he met, because they would not see, his conduct would have greatly resembled that of an angry Calvinist.
On Controversy
Of all people who engage in controversy, we, who are called Calvinists, are most expressly bound by our own principles to the exercise of gentleness and moderation.
If, indeed, they who differ from us have a power of changing themselves, if they can open their own eyes, and soften their own hearts, then we might with less inconsistency be offended at their obstinacy: but if we believe the very contrary to this, our part is, not to strive, but in meekness to instruct those who oppose.
“If peradventure God will give them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth.” (2 Timothy 2:25)
If you write with a desire of being an instrument of correcting mistakes, you will of course be cautious of laying stumbling blocks in the way of the blind or of using any expressions that may exasperate their passions, confirm them in their principles, and thereby make their conviction, humanly speaking, more impracticable.
I am afraid there are Calvinists, who, while they account it a proof of their humility that they are willing in words to debase the creature, and to give all the glory of salvation to the Lord, yet know not what manner of spirit they are of. Whatever it be that makes us trust in ourselves that we are comparatively wise or good, so as to treat those with contempt who do not subscribe to our doctrines, or follow our party, is a proof and fruit of a self-righteous spirit. Self-righteousness can feed upon doctrines, as well as upon good works; and a man may have the heart of a Pharisee, while his head is stored with orthodox notions of the unworthiness of the creature and the riches of free grace.
Spurgeon's defense of Calvinism, “Exposition of the Doctrine of Grace”, The New Park Street and Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, “Opening Meetings of Metropolitan Tabernacle”, April 11, 1861
https://www.spurgeongems.org/sermon/chs364A.pdf
https://www.spurgeon.org/resource-library/sermons/exposition-of-the-doctrines-of-grace/#flipbook/
The controversy which has been carried on between the Calvinist and the Arminian is exceedingly important, but it does not so involve the vital point of personal godliness as to make eternal life depend upon our holding either system of theology. I think we are free to admit, that while John Wesley, for instance, in modern times zealously defended Arminianism, and on the other hand, George Whitfield with equal fervour fought for Calvinism, we should not be prepared either of us, on either side of the question, to deny the vital godliness of either the one or the other.
That doctrine which is called "Calvinism" did not spring from Calvin; we believe that it sprang from the great founder of all truth. Perhaps Calvin himself derived it mainly from the writings of Augustine. Augustine obtained his views, without doubt, through the Spirit of God, from the diligent study of the writings of Paul, and Paul received them of the Holy Ghost, from Jesus Christ the great founder of the Christian dispensation. We use the term then, not because we impute any extraordinary importance to Calvin's having taught these doctrines.
Some tell us that we preach the wicked and horrible doctrine of sovereign and unmerited reprobation. “Oh,” say they, “you teach that men are damned because God made them to be damned, and that they go to hell, not because of sin, not because of unbelief, but because of some dark decree with which God has stamped their destiny.” I hold God's election, but I testify just as clearly that if any man be lost he is lost for sin; and this has been the uniform statement of Calvinistic ministers. I might refer you to our standards, such as “The Westminster Assembly's Catechism”, and to all our Confession, for they all distinctly state that man is lost for sin, and that there is no punishment put on any man except that which he richly and righteously deserves.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones What is an Evangelical?
I am a Calvinist; I believe in election and predestination; but I would not dream of putting it under the heading of essential. I put it under the heading of non-essential… You are not saved by your precise understanding of how this great salvation comes to you. What you must be clear about is that you are lost and damned, hopeless and helpless, and that nothing can save you but the grace of God in Jesus Christ and only Him crucified, bearing the punishment of your sins, dying, rising again, ascending, sending the Spirit, regeneration. Those are the essentials… While I myself hold very definite and strong views on the subject, I will not separate from a man who cannot accept and believe the doctrines of election and predestination, and is Arminian, as long as he tells me that we are all saved by grace, and as long as the Calvinist agrees, as he must, that God calls all men everywhere to repentance. As long as both are prepared to agree about these things I say we must not break fellowship.