In the end, it’s not Calvin v. Arminius, it’s monergism v. synergism.
Mongergism means that God saved me, from start to finish.
Synergism means that, to borrow a line from an old commercial, “It’s Shake ‘n’ Bake and I Helped” (with my decision).
If I helped in any manner whatsoever wouldn’t that give me cause for boasting?
Isn’t having a cause for boasting in violation of Eph 2:8-9?
Food for thought and discussion, for the brave spirits among us.
While that might be true, it might not be the best way to ask the question, or discuss the issue. Passages that support the position that once a person believes in the person and work of Jesus Christ as God’s Son (has been ‘saved’ from condemnation), that person will remain ‘saved’ are these:
“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them , and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.” (John 10:27-29)
“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)
“We accept man’s testimony, but God’s testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which he has given about his Son. Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in his heart. Any one who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because he has not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.” (I John 5:9-12)
“I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.” (I John 5:13)
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade—kept in heaven for you. Through faith you are shielded by God’s power until the coming of salvation…” (1 Peter 1:3-5)
The above passages are often used to support the slightly broader subject of the ‘assurance’ of salvation, that we can know with certainty that, as believers, we are in fact children of God through Christ. They bring great comfort to us when the enemy brings doubt into our minds. Two passages specifically speak to what can be more properly termed the ‘perseverance’ of believers – that once a person belongs to God through Christ, he/she will always belong to God through Christ.
“My sheep listen to my voice; I know them , and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.” (John 10:27-29)
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade—kept in heaven for you. Through faith you are shielded by God’s power until the coming of salvation…” (1 Peter 1:3-5)
There is a subtle difference in saying “I was saved and I will always be saved.” or saying “The God who saved me can and will also keep me in His hand.” While both might be true, the focus of the former often becomes “I” and focus of the latter is God. The first often gives rise to boasting (or the appearance of boasting) while the second gives God all the credit.
The bottom line, no matter how we discuss the issue, Scripture simply rules the day!
By far the most popular interpretation of election, predestination, and the foreknowledge of God tells us that the ‘elect’ of God are those whom God, looking down the corridors of time, saw choosing Him, as an act of their own autonomous free will. It is those ‘foreknown’ ones whom God also predestined a plan for their lives. This post specifically addresses this issue, and well deserves our thoughtful consideration. If you are reading this, please set aside any presuppositions you might have concerning the owner of this blog.
Does God Elect Persons Based on Their Foreseen Faith?
By John Hendryx
The Scripture teaches that everything related to the gospel is designed to glorify Christ and abase man’s pride in thinking he can save himself. So it follows that anything that diminishes Christ’s glory is inconsistent with the true gospel. So my purpose in raising this issue is not to be contentious but to glorify God by aligning our thoughts with His. This short essay is meant to challenge the unbiblical position that some modern evangelicals hold regarding “foreseen faith”. Specifically, I would like to confront the position, held by some, which believes that God looks down the corridors of time to see who will believe and then “predestines” them based on the exercise of their autonomous free will to choose Him. I do understand that one of the main purposes that some Christians believe this concept is that they wish to preserve God’s indiscriminate love to all and can’t imagine a God whom would “arbitrarily” choose some and condemn the rest. If unconditional election were true, they reason, then why doesn’t God save everyone? Wouldn’t choosing some and leaving others make God arbitrary in His choice? These are understandable objections that I hope to address in what follows:
If I understand the “foreseen faith” position correctly, the following three ideas express the central concepts that this position holds:
1. The salvation of individuals is ultimately the result of their choice rather than divine appointment (alone).
2. Election is based upon God foreseeing the faith of certain individuals rather than only being in accordance with His pleasure and merciful will.
3. Election is conditional, based upon the acceptance of Jesus Christ and not the determination of God, even though God’s grace is certainly involved in this process.
Before we enter a discussion of the merits of the reasoning (logic) itself we should first consider that Christianity is not something we derive from mere speculative philosophy. God has indeed given us reasoning faculties and the tools of logic, but as Christians, these are always to be used within the biblical framework He has graciously given us. To think Christainly is to recognize that we can only know God as He has revealed Himself to us in the Scriptures, and the Scriptures themselves give no evidence of the “foreseen faith” position. So to base ones theology on unaided human reason alone is no less than deriving the deepest held presuppositions of our faith from extra-biblical sources.
Biblical View of Knowledge
While the Scriptures, in fact, do say, “… those whom He foreknew, He also predestined” (rom 8:29) but it would be poor exegesis to conclude that this must mean “foreseen faith”. It is a stretch well beyond what the text actually says and plainly a reading of ones theological presuppositions into the Text. Even those of the foreseen faith position will admit that it is placing an additional concept in the verse that is just not there. In fact the text in question does not say that God foresees some event (our faith) or action people perform, but rather, says “those He foreknew…” In other words Paul communicates that God foreknows people. In the Scriptures whenever it speaks of God “knowing” people it refers to those objects He has set His personal affection on. It expresses the intimacy of personal knowledge within the framework of the covenantal relationship between God and His people. The relationship implies a commitment on God’s part. There are many instances in the Scriptures where this kind of covenantal commitment is expressed by the word “knowledge”. An example of this can be found in Daniel 11:32:
“By smooth words he will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant, but the people who know their God will display strength and take action. Daniel 11:32
Here in Daniel those who broke covenant are set in direct contrast to “the people who know their God“. In other words, the concept of knowing God in biblical terms is to keep covenant with God. God has an oath-bound commitment to His people, so “to know” is obviously a great deal more than an an intellectual awareness of impersonal data about a person.
The same concept is also carried over to the New Testament. Jesus tells certain individuals that He never knew them (Matt 7:23). When speaking of not knowing them, Jesus is clearly referring to the idea that some are outside His covenant and He therefore has no commitment to them. Romans 11::1-2 gives further proof that foreknow really means “previous covenantal commitment” rather than an historical event. Here it reads, “God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew“. The obvious issue raised here is that God has not cast aside the previous covenantal commitment (those He foreknew) He made with Israel.
The Lord also says to Jeremiah, “”Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.” God has determined beforehand to affectionately set apart certain people, but not as a result of their decisions (Amos 3:2; Mt. 7:23; John 10:14; Eph 1:4,5). In fact the Bible teaches that God’s grace in choosing us is free, based on His gracious will alone and not influenced by the innate capacities, spiritual desire (ROM 9:16, John 1:13), religious merit, or the foreseen faith of the people He sets apart as His own (Eph 1:5, 2:5,8). Rather, God acts in accordance with his highest purpose, which is His own glory.
Everyone who is called by My name,
And whom I have created for My glory,
Whom I have formed, even whom I have made…” Isaiah 43:7
Logical Inconsistencies
But aside from the lack of biblical evidence by the “foreseen faith” camp I also wish to point out the fatal flaw and inconsistent logic of the unbiblical presupposition itself. While some portray “foreseen faith” as giving great liberty to every man’s free choice, upon greater reflection, this idea turns out to give no real freedom to man at all. For if God can look into the future and see that a person #1 will come to Christ and that person #2 will not come to faith in Christ, then those facts are already fixed, they are already determined. God’s foresight of believers’ faith and repentance implies the certainty, or “moral necessity ” of these acts, just as much as a sovereign decree. “For that which is certainly foreseen must be certain.” (R.L.Dabney) If we assume that God’s knowledge of the future is true (which evangelicals all agree upon), then it is absolutely certain that person #1 will believe and person #2 will not. There is no way their lives could turn out differently than this. Therefore it is more than fair to say that their destinies are still determined, for they could not be otherwise. The question is, by what are their destinies determined? If God Himself determines them then we no longer have election based on foreseen faith, but rather on God’s sovereign will. But if God does not determine their destinies then who or what determines them? Of course no Christian would say that there is some powerful being other than God controlling people’s destinies. Therefore the only possible alternative is to say they are determined by some impersonal force, some kind of fate, operative in the universe, making things turn out as they do. But of what benefit is this? We have then sacrificed election in love by a personal and compassionate God for a kind of determinism by an impersonal force and God is no longer to be given the ultimate credit for our salvation. (Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology)
Furthermore, no one could then consistently hold that God foreknew who would believe and be saved and then also preach that God is trying to save every man. If God knows who will be saved, then it would be absurd for Him to reason within Himself that more persons might be saved than the original persons He knew would choose Him. It would be inconsistent to assert that God is trying to do something which He already knew could never be accomplished. Likewise no one could consistently say that God foreknew who would be saved and then turn around and teach that the Holy Spirit does all He can do to save every man in the world. In this scheme, The Holy Spirit would be wasting time and effort to endeavor to convert a man who He knew from the beginning would not choose Him. The unbiblical system collapses in on itself.
Some will answer that it is neither election not foreseen faith but somewhere in the middle. But this option is excluded, by definition, unless you believe that God is somehow ignorant of the future. In other words, the only way the “middle position” could be true in this case is if you limit God’s omniscience, (an impossibility). Either God knows and decrees the future or He does not. If God knows the future and your position of foreseen faith is true, then God has left us in the hands of impersonal fate. Our choice would then be prearranged by an impersonal determinism. Your “middle ground” position could theoretically be true only if you fastened ignorance on God about the future, but then God would not know who would choose Him and your whole theory would break down since it was based on foreseen faith to begin with. To conclude, unless you are willing to believe that an impersonal force determines our salvation, and that God does not know the future (the Open Theism heresy), the foreseen faith position is both biblically and logically impossible. In order to honor God we must, at this point, derive our authority from the Scriptures and be careful not rely merely on what we have been taught at our church.
Is God Arbitrary
First I would challenge you to wrestle with the following verse. Paul encountered the very same argument against election; that it would make God unjust and arbitrary.
Romans 9:18-23
18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”
20 On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it?
21Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?
22 What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?
23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,
To begin with, Paul would not ask this hypothetical question unless He believed the ultimate determination of ones salvation to be in the hands of God alone. Paul is saying that God has the sovereign right to do with us whatever He wants. Will you deny Him this right? Furthermore, since we know the character of God we must not think that, on His side, God had no reasons or causes for saving some and not others – – “since the divine purpose always conspires with His wisdom and does nothing without reason or rashly; although these reasons and causes have not been revealed to us. In His counsels and works no cause is apparent, it is yet hidden with Him, so that He has decreed nothing except justly and wisely according to His good pleasure founded on His gracious love towards us.” (Heppe, Reformed Dogmatics) Just because we don’t know why He chooses some to faith and not others is not reason enough to reject it. In the absence of relevant data, we, therefore, have no reason whatsoever to assume the worse, so there are no legitimate grounds for doubting the goodness of God here. Therefore, to doubt that God can choose us based solely on his good pleasure, is to doubt the goodness of God. The “foreseen faith” people are, in effect, saying that they cannot trust God in making this choice and prefer it to be left up to the fallen individual, as if he would make a better choice than God. Let’s summarize then the response to the charge of God being arbitrary:
“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law.” Deuteronomy 29: 291. Election is grounded in God’s moral character (i.e., goodness, compassion, empathy, integrity, non-duplicity, non-favoritism, justice, etc.)
2. God does have “causes and reasons” for His choices, though these are “internal” to God (i.e., not found in the creature). We know He is good and therefore can trust that He would make a better choice than we would.
3. He ‘does NOTHING without reason’ — He ‘does NOTHING rashly’. He has simply not revealed these reasons and causes to us–although they certainly exist. Since they haven’t been revealed, we cannot try to figure them out but since we know the trustworthiness of God we can rejoice in His wisdom. God does not ‘lack just reasons’ for His actions. These ‘just reasons’ are merely hidden from us.
4. Salvation is not conditioned upon anything that God sees in us that makes us worthy of His choosing us. NONE of His decrees were done except justly and wisely”.
We must always keep in mind that God is obligated to save no one and that we all justly deserve His wrath. Therefore, if God saves anyone, it is purely an act of His mercy. All evangelicals agree that it would have been just of God to wipe out all mankind in judgment, so why, then, would it be unjust for Him to judge some and have mercy on the rest. If six people owe me a debt, for example, and I forgive four of them their debt but still require the remaining two to pay up, I am totally within my right. How much more so God? (Read The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard: Matt 20:1-16)
“It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy” (ROM 9:16).
Related Articles
Prayer of the Synergist by John Hendryx
Synergism & Freewillism Commonly Taught in Modern Pulpits by John Hendryx
Conditional Election by Ra McLaughlin
Those Whom He Foreknew He Predestined by John Piper
The Enormous Ignorance of God When God Doesn’t Know the Future Choices of Man by John Piper
Justice and Election Is it Fair for God to elect some and Not Others? Gregory Koukl
Sounds like a simple question, but is it?
Many of us have memorized and even frequently quote Ephesians 2: 8-9:
“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
We tend to focus on the gift of grace, and sometimes ‘assume’ whatever it we assume about faith. We are told to place ‘our’ faith in Christ to receive the gracious gift of salvation.
So the question for consideration is where do we get ‘our’ faith? Are we born with it, or does the faith we place in Christ originate elsewhere?
We would love to see a survey of professing Christians in which the above question appeared, either as a stand alone question, or with multiple choice answers.
Does these passages give us a clue to the main reason God forgives and saves sinners?
I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins. (Isaiah 43:25)
For your name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my guilt, for it is great. (Psalm 25:11)
Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name; deliver us, and atone for our sins, for your name’s sake! (Psalm 79:9)
Though our iniquities testify against us, act, O Lord, for your name’s sake; for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against you. (Jeremiah 14:7)
We acknowledge our wickedness, O Lord, and the iniquity of our fathers, for we have sinned against you. Do not spurn us, for your name’s sake; do not dishonor your glorious throne. (Jeremiah 14:20-21)
God put [Christ] forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:25-26)
Your sins are forgiven for his name’s sake. (1 John 2:12)
As evangelical Christians, we are charged with spreading the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The manner in which we carry out that charge, the reasons we give for trusting in and receiving Christ as Savior and Lord, will always communicate to the hearers why God desires to save their souls. After all, we all have reasons for why we do what we do and for the decisions we make. We will always give reasons why our hearers should choose Christ.
The challenge for all of us who are carriers of the good news of Christ is to communicate the right WHY. It is even possible to determine if we in fact are communicating the right ‘why’. We can examine how we present the gospel and ask ourselves if our how communicates the why.
Food for thought. . .
Romans 8:29-30 is called The Order of Salvation (Ordo Salutis), as well as the Golden Chain of Redemption (terms not specifically in Scripture). Textually, these two verses are Paul’s logical explanation of why ‘all things work together for those who are called according to His purpose’ (Rom 8:28). Let’s take a look:
“And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. (v. 28)
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. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” – (vv. 29-30)
Why does everything that happens to us work together for those who love God and are called according to His purpose? Because God determined in eternity past to accomplish certain things on behalf of those who would come to believe in, trust, and love His Son. We just need to read all three verses (vv. 28-30) and not just quote v. 28. The why is in the text – that little preposition ‘for’ is key.
For those He foreknew would become His children, that were ‘called according to His purpose’:
Without getting into a debate about links in a chain (not the intent here), we know from the text, that God (He) accomplished four things. Note the past tense, it’s important.
Looking at the ‘fabulous four’ things that God did, can we apply a sense of human ‘our time’ ? While God accomplished certain things in eternity past, do any of the ‘fab four’ actually occur in ‘our time’ – during our temporal lifetimes?
We suggest that while God’s choosing (predestining) those who would become His people, for His glory, happened before our world was created (read Eph 1-2), and that our glorification will happen at the resurrection of believers, ‘calling’ and ‘justification’ occur in ‘our time’. We who who hear the gospel and believe in the Son ‘experience’ the call of God and are ‘justified’ before God, because of Christ’s righteousness, from the moment we believe and trust in Christ.
Food for thought………..
It is a ‘given’ that a relationship with God, through the crucified and risen Christ will drastically change one’s life.
It is also a ‘given’ that a life changed life is an important part of what we share with non-believers when pointing them to the Savior.
A changed life, in and of itself, is however not the core message that we must share with those we would lead to Christ. The Apostle Paul declared:
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” – Rom 1:16
Paul also declared:
“Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you–unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,” – 1 Cor 15:1-4
No matter where Paul traveled and preached, he always centered on this core message. The only thing in question is exactly when the core message was delivered during an evangelistic encounter.
Often, we believers make a ‘changed life’ the centerpiece of our ‘gospel sharing’, followed by an invitation to Christ based on personal benefits to be obtained in this life, rather than Paul’s core message of the death and resurrection of Christ for our sin – the message that actually contains ‘the power of God for salvation!
Been there, done that!
Food for thought. . .
“The doctrine for which we contend is that Christ hath so perfectly satisfied divine justice for all our sins, by one offering of himself, and not only for our guilt but also for both temporal and eternal punishment, that henceforth there are no more propitiatory offerings to be made for sin, and that though, for the promotion of their penitence and sanctification, God often chastises his people, yet no satisfaction is to be made by them either in this or a future state of existence.”
– Francis Turretin, The Atonement of Christ, page 68.
Blogged Bible Study
These two verses present an awesome picture of God’s sovereignty in the salvation of His people. Here are seven translations/versions including a couple of paraphrases (one good and one not so good):
“…even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, …” – ESV
“For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—…” – NIV
“…just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will,…” – NKJV
“For he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we may be holy and unblemished in his sight in love. He did this by predestining us to adoption as his sons through Jesus Christ, according to the pleasure of his will –…” – NET
“… just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,…” – NASB
“Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!)” – MSG
“Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.” – NLT
Questions for the week:
NOTE: That men are responsible to believe is not in question. ‘How’ we come to believe is also linked to God’s sovereignty, and is another worthy discussion.
It seems that these days you can ask any amount of Christians/Christ followers/believers “What is the Gospel?” and get a lot of different answers, I thought I would post sermons/teachings that focus specifically on that question. Here is the first, by D. A. Carson. Click the link below to listen with Quicktime. Right Click and select “Save As” to download the file to you computer.
NOTE: You might end up just listening the first time and listening to it while taking notes the second time. I did.
The Battle Cry 