What is predestination?

by R. C. Sproul ------------------------------------------------------------------------

When the Bible speaks of predestination, it speaks of God's sovereign involvement in certain things before they happen. He chooses in advance certain things to take place. For example, he predestined creation. Before God created the world, he decided to do it.

Usually when people think of predestination, they think about whether or not somebody was hit by an automobile on a given day because God had decided ahead of time that that should happen on that day.

Theologically, the principal issue of predestination in the Bible has to do with God selecting people for salvation beforehand. The Bible clearly does teach that somehow God chooses people for salvation before they're even born. Virtually every Christian church believes that, because this concept is so clearly taught in Scripture.

Paul refers to Jacob and Esau. Before they were even born, before they had done any good or evil, God decreed in advance that the elder would serve the younger: "Jacob have I loved; Esau have I hated." The point there is that God had chosen certain benefits for one of those two before they were even born.

The real debate is, On what basis does God predestine? We know that he predestines, but why does he predestine, and what is the basis for his choices? Many Christians believe that God knows in advance what people are going to do, what choices they're going to make, and what activities they're going to be involved in. As he looks through the corridor of time and knows what choices you will make, for example, he knows that you will hear the gospel. He knows whether you will say yes or no. If he knows that you are going to say yes, then he chooses you for salvation on the basis of his prior knowledge. I don't hold that position. I think that God does this sovereignly, not arbitrarily, not whimsically. The only basis I see for predestination in the Bible is the good pleasure of his own will. The only other reason is to honor his only begotten Son. The reason for his selection is not in me and not in you and not in some foreseen good or evil, but in his own sovereignty.

Reprinted by permission of Ligonier Ministries from "Now That's A Good Question" by R.C. Sproul.----------------

Why does God Let Random Shooting, Fatal Accidents, and other Horrible Things Occur? by R. C. Sproul ------------------------------------------------------------------------

Since we believe that God is the author of this planet and is sovereign over it, it's inevitable that we ask where he is when these terrible things take place.

I think the Bible answers that over and over again from different angles and in different ways. We find our first answer, of course, in the book of Genesis, in which we're told of the fall of humanity. God's immediate response to the transgression of the human race against his rule and authority was to curse the earth and human life. Death and suffering entered the world as a direct result of sin. We see the concrete manifestation of this in the realm of nature, where thorns become part of the garden and human life is now characterized by the sweat of the brow and the pain that attends even the birth of a baby. This illustrates the fact that the world in which we live is a place that is full of sorrows and tragedy.

But we must never conclude that there's a one-to-one correlation in this life between suffering and the guilt of the people on whom tragedies fall. If there were no sin in the world, there would be no suffering. There would be no fatal accidents, no random shootings. Because sin is present in the world, suffering is present in the world, but it doesn't always work out that if you have five pounds of guilt, you're going to get five pounds of suffering. That's the perception that the book of Job labors to dispel, as does Jesus' answer to the question about the man born blind (John 9:1-11).

On the other hand, the Bible makes it clear that God lets these things happen and in a certain sense ordains that they come to pass as part of the present situation that is under judgment. He has not removed death from this world. Whether it's what we would consider an untimely death or a violent death, death is part of the nature of things. The only promise is that there will come a day when suffering will cease altogether.

The disciples asked Jesus about similar instances—for example, the Galileans' blood that was mingled with the sacrifices by Pilate or the eighteen people who were killed when a temple collapsed. The disciples asked how this could be. Jesus' response was almost severe. He said, "Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish," again bringing the question back to the fact that moral wickedness makes it feasible for God to allow these kinds of dreadful things to take place in a fallen world. Reprinted by permission of Ligonier Ministries from "Now That's A Good Question" by R.C. Sproul.

The problem with Sproul and most strict Calvinists is that they fail to recognize that the good pleasure of God's will can be accomplished by His recognizing in advance and ordaining the choices that he commands us as men to make and that we ultimately make in response.

Certainly everything is predestined. It is predestined because God knows how everything is going to turn out. And God has assured us that everything is going to turn out just fine-- according to the good pleasure of his will.

But the Calvinist perspective logically makes God not only the author and finisher of our faith, but also makes him the author and finisher of our sin, and the author and finisher of our damnation. That is a contradiction that cannot be reconciled. God is Good. God is not bad.

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Marlowe

The problem with Arminians is that they do not recognize God's sovereignty over ALL things.

And they are wrong about that, aren't they? But does God's soverignty include being the author and finisher of our damnation and the author and finisher of our sins? I think not. God's soveringty is infinite. His love is infinite. His mercy is infinite. His grace is infinite. If you recognize that, then you must recognize that God could not possibly be the "author" of our sins nor the "author" of our eternal damnation. It simply would not fit into "the good pleasure of His will."

Arminianism is wrong inasmuch as it denies the absolute soverignty of God. Calvinism is wrong inasmuch as it denies that God really does gives man a choice when he commands man to "Choose life." (God does not draft illusory contracts).

Man's ultimate free will and God's absolute soverignty are no more mutually exclusive than the fact that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God and yet, there is only one God.

Of course I disagree with you on this PM...

I was at a Baptist Bible study tonight (Arminian Baptist) A question of sin came up and one man went on and on how the devil made us do it..

This is a man that can quote scripture..but fails to see that man desires sin ..the devil does not have to make him do it..( I was new tonight so I did not take him on this)

But to blame the devil (or God ) for our sin fails to take into account our free will and our carnal hearts

God does not have to make us sin..we can do that very well on our own thank you::>) He knows us and He knows what sins we will commit and He works them like all things for the good and for His plan...

Marlowe....as I listened to the stories of the survivors of the Twin towers and how many were saved by "coincidences" ..... God knew that was going to happen ..no one died that God did not intend to die..no one was saved by accident...God is in complete control..that is why we call Him God

Are there "accidents" ...Do things happen for "no reason"

Your question is ambiguous, because the word "reason" can have several different meanings in the context of the question. By a reason do you mean a teleological one, or do you mean a "cause" which reason can understand, for example.

If you mean reason in a teleological sense, that would imply that everything that happens does so because it was intended by someone (God), and therefore was simply the revelation of a fully scripted play, where "cause and effect" were nothing more than an illusion of the play.

If you mean simply, every event has a cause, you are describing the strict naturalist view which cannot include any teleological aspect at all. Every event can be fully understood in terms of all the events the preceded it as the cause of that event. Nothing else is needed.

This, of course, presents a dilemma. If the world is teleological in nature, cause and effect must be an illusion. But that would negate all scientific knowledge, and, in fact, all knowledge based on observation. It would mean that no prediction of anything in the future could be certain, because nothing could depend on cause and effect, only on whatever was in the script. The sun might not rise tomorrow, and the simplest thing you are sure of, might never happen. Tomorrow, your corn flakes might taste like fish and be poison.

But, if everything is simply a cause-and-effect inevitable chain of events, there is no room for the teleological at all; no room for any purpose, any value, or any meaning. Everything that is would just be because it is, and everything that happened would happen because that is what had to happen given the chain of events that led to it.

Something is wrong with both of these views. It cannot be a script, because we know things are caused. If they were not, we could not hold anyone responsible for anything. If pulling the trigger of a gun was not the cause of its firing, who could be tried for murder with a gun?

But if everything is caused, how can there be any purpose or meaning, and how could we know it, since even our thoughts would only be caused events, with no more validity than a sneeze.

There must be something else. And there is. It is called volition. What is volition?

Well, first of all, that is the question you should have asked. Volition is the faculty that enables the rationally conscious to choose their behavior, which includes both thinking as well as overt acts. Volition means those conscious choices that are neither scripted or caused. It is that aspect of human nature which God gives to every human being that enables them to choose, by whatever means they choose, what they will do.

Volition applies only to that which is possible, that is, what is physically and intellectually possible. A human being cannot choose to do what is physically impossible for him to do, and he cannot choose what is intellectually impossible to do, that is, he cannot choose what he cannot know, or is incapable of understanding.

Volition makes man morally responsible, but moral responsibility only pertains to volition, and therefore, to what it is possible for a man to choose. If any aspect of his life is determined by anything other than volitional choice, such as a "script" or a "cause," that aspect lies outside the province of moral responsibility. No man is morally responsible to make any choice it is impossible for him to make.

So, whatever you decide predestination means, the one thing we know it cannot mean, is that any man is morally responsible for anything that happens in his life because it was predestined (by script or cause), and God does not judge any man for what is impossible for him to choose.

Hank

By your post you admit the evil that is in mens hearts, but by your Calvinism you assert that the evil that is there is because God wants it there.

You might as well say that God was flying the planes when they flew into the towers. You say that nobody died that God did not intend to die. IMHO the proper emphasis is that no one died that God did not allow to die. It is true that no one was saved by accident. It is also true that the men who drove those planes were not acting in accordance with the "good pleasure" of God's will, but instead they were acting in accordance with their own evil intentions and their own dastardly free will in accordance only with the permissive will of God.

Would you go so far as to say that it "pleased" God that 3000 people were killed by Islamic terrorists last year? Or would you say that it probably grieved God, yet he still permitted it?

Does God's sovereignty extend to his perfect "good will" being accomplished in evil men comitting genocide?

God's soveringty is infinite. His love is infinite. His mercy is infinite. His grace is infinite. If you recognize that, then you must recognize that God could not possibly be the "author" of our sins nor the "author" of our eternal damnation. It simply would not fit into "the good pleasure of His will."

Scream that from the roof tops and I'll Amen ya till you come down. :)

I cannot repeat often enough that election is God’s choosing us in Christ. I emphasize again that men are not lost because they have not been elected. They are lost because they are sinners and that is the way they want it and that is the way they have chosen. The free will of man is never violated because of the election of God. The lost man makes his own choice. “If there be not free will grace in God, how can He save the world? And if there be not free will in man, how can the world by God be judged?” Here again is Paul’s strong statement, “What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid” (Rom. 9:14). Now if you think that there is some unrighteousness with God, you had better change your mind.

BigMack

If the world is teleological in nature, cause and effect must be an illusion.

I don't understand this comment. As I see it (paraphrasing Aristotle) efficient and final causes are not contradictory, they are complementary. For example, if I walk to a cafe for lunch, the efficient cause of my arrival is my feet moving me. But the final cause is my desire for lunch. How does the one negate the other?

Isn't it entirely possible that efficient causes are how God makes things happen, and final causes are why he makes them happen?

By the way, if you follow mainstream Christian theology, God does not have "foreknowledge" of anything. God exists in aeternam, outside of time; time is part of the created order, coextensive with the Universe. God therefore has only knowledge, timeless perfect awareness of all things. St Augustine argues this better than I can, but I hope the point is clear.

So, God doesn't know today what you will do tomorrow. He knows what you are doing tomorrow, because he sees yesterday, today, and tomorrow all as one. Again, I don't see how that has any relevance to the issue of free will.

By your post you admit the evil that is in mens hearts, but by your Calvinism you assert that the evil that is there is because God wants it there.

If God did not choose to leave it there could it be there? Did God foreknow the fall? Did God foreknow 9/11? Or is the devil a co equal god that sometimes surprises and overtakes god?

Do you believe in duelism?

Would you show me the doctrine of God's permissive will in scripture?

Would you go so far as to say that it "pleased" God that 3000 people were killed by Islamic terrorists last year? Or would you say that it probably grieved God, yet he still permitted it?

Marlowe God foreknew 9/11 . With God knowing and not acting IS acting.. .No one was killed or lived that day outside the express will of God ( or he would have prevented it )

Mack ya need to not take a verse out of context...that is the strongest chapter in scripture teaching election...

Rom 9:10   And not only [this]; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, [even] by our father Isaac;

Rom 9:11   (For [the children] being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;)

Rom 9:12   It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.

Rom 9:13   As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.

Rom 9:14   What shall we say then? [Is there] unrighteousness with God? God forbid.

Rom 9:15   For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

Rom 9:16   So then [it is] not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

Rom 9:17   For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.

Rom 9:18   Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will [have mercy], and whom he will he hardeneth.

Rom 9:19   Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?

Rom 9:20   Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed [it], Why hast thou made me thus?

Rom 9:21   Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

Rom 9:22   [What] if God, willing to shew [his] wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:

Rom 9:23   And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,

Rom 9:24   Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?

Rom 9:25   As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.

Rom 9:26   And it shall come to pass, [that] in the place where it was said unto them, Ye [are] not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God.

Rom 9:27   Esaias also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved:

Rom 9:28   For he will finish the work, and cut [it] short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth.

Rom 9:29   And as Esaias said before, Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we had been as Sodoma, and been made like unto Gomorrha.

Rom 9:30   What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith.

Rom 9:31   But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness.

Rom 9:32   Wherefore? Because [they sought it] not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone;

Rom 9:33   As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.

The twins neithor being born..neithor having done good or evil...God elected the one HE loved...
He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy...Does that make God unrightoeus Paul asks ..Of couse not ...God is the potter He can doas HE chooses

Mack God selected you before you were born..not because you are bright or educated or white or a biker or because you are holy..He chose you because he chose you...as Ephesians says it was His "good pleasure" fall on your knees in graditude Mack....It was ALL Him

I agree...I see lots of man made doctrine and "beliefs " ( and one misused scripture:>) It is best to use Gods word...it is profitible for doctrine.,.One of my favorites on this topic


Eph 1:3   Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly [places] in Christ:

Eph 1:4   According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

Eph 1:5   Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

Eph 1:6   To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.

Eph 1:7   In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;

Eph 1:8   Wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;

Eph 1:9   Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:

Eph 1:10   That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; [even] in him:

Eph 1:11   In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

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