Understanding Predestination: God's Sovereignty and Grace

I think that the doctrine of predestination is difficult, and it causes a great deal of perplexity and bewilderment whenever it is discussed and whenever it is studied. And it's a question that requires, I think, not only caution, care, and diligence, but also a special measure of patience with each other as we struggle over the manifold implications that can easily be drawn from it. [00:56:40]

Martin Luther, for example, when he was engaged in the leadership of the Protestant Reformation, of course focused his teaching on the central issue of that time, the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and Luther said of that doctrine, namely justification by faith alone, that it is the article upon which the church stands or falls. That is, he was trying to underscore, as emphatically as he knew how, the importance of the doctrine of justification to the Christian faith. [01:11:55]

The reason I'm convinced that millions of Christians still adhere to the doctrine of predestination is because the Bible teaches it, and I might add the Bible teaches it clearly and unambiguously. So clearly and unambiguously, dear friends, that virtually every denomination in church history that has taken the time to articulate their confession of faith, to write a creed of their beliefs, has been constrained to confess some statement about predestination. [05:35:32]

Let me direct your attention for a moment to Paul's letter to the Ephesians, in the first chapter where Paul in giving his greetings to the saints at Ephesus says: "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him, in love. [10:12:10]

Now what the concept of predestination means is that our destiny, our destination, in some sense, has been decided in advance -- pre-destination. And as we read in these confessions, it's simply a reflection of what the Apostle is telling us in Ephesians that the "pre-," the reference point of the "pre-" is defined biblically as being from the foundation of the world. That before the world was created God had a plan, and that plan, according to His secret counsel and according to the good pleasure of His will, He made a decision to do something, a sovereign decision to do something, namely to predestinate something for some reason. [13:07:20]

But where it gets sticky, where it gets controversial, is when we ask the question, "On what basis does God make His choice?" How and why, and upon what conditions does God determine who will receive this amazing gift of saving grace? Does God potentially predestine everyone to salvation, or does He only predestine some to salvation, and if so, what about those who aren't predestined to salvation? Do they have no chance, no opportunity, no hope? [16:29:70]

Pelagius responded in outrage to a statement that Augustine had made, and that statement that Augustine had made and it taught was this, it was in a prayer, really. Augustine had written, "God, command what Thou wilt and grant what Thou commandest." "Command what Thou wilt and grant what Thou commandest." And what Pelagius didn't like about that was that it seemed to suggest that God required from people something that they wouldn't be able to do unless God gave them extra grace to make it possible. [19:29:56]

Jesus, teaching and debating with the Pharisees on the extent of the fallenness of the human race, made this extraordinary comment, "No man can come to Me unless it is given to him by the Father." Now let's look at that for a minute. "No man can come to Me." The term "no man," if we would set that in a propositional phrase and apply the rules of logic and the rules of immediate inference to it, we would immediately identify the statement, "No man," as a universal negative. [21:21:78]

And a grace that is given on the basis of human merit is not grace. A grace that is dispensed on the basis of human works, if the human works are the ground of that is not grace, and certainly there would be nothing amazing about it. But the amazing thing about grace is that it is altogether gracious. Now the difficulty is that the Bible is saying that there is a kind of grace that God gives to people to save them, to bring them to faith in Jesus that He doesn't give to everybody. [30:40:46]

Because it will not take seriously the dimensions of the fall of man that have brought us to the place where we are morally and spiritually dead, and that only the electing grace of God can save us in our spiritual death. In order that God's purpose, according to His choice, not because of works, but because of Him who called. Is there any injustice in God? May it never be! For He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." [45:51:49]

I urge you, my beloved brothers and sisters, that if you find this doctrine distasteful, look at it again. I just got a letter from a fellow the other day who said he hated this doctrine. He read my book Chosen by God, and I was so glad it was useful to him. He said, "I picked it up." He said, "I want to find the flaws so I can refute it." He said, "I took copious notes, I underlined everything." I got to the last page and I said, "Gee, I couldn't find it!" [51:14:85]

But God, who is rich in mercy, brought us into His kingdom, not kicking and screaming against our will, because what electing grace does is to make us willing and eager to pursue the Christ we formerly hated, to love the Savior we formerly despised, to embrace the truth we previously ran from. That's what predestinating grace is all about. And once we understand that, and once we discover it we get on our knees and we say, "O God, command what Thou wilt and grant what Thou dost command." [52:57:59]