Grace and election

It starts with God

When Christians tell how they came to faith, they usually begin with themselves: a sermon heard, a decision made. Scripture tells the story from further back. Jesus told his disciples, "You did not choose Me, but I chose you" (John 15:16). As the lesson on original sin showed, people bound by sin cannot free themselves, so if anyone is saved, it is because God moved first.

The Bible's word for this is grace, in Greek charis (χάρις): favour given freely to people who have no claim on it.

For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast.

Ephesians 2:8-9

So Paul can say, "there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if it is by grace, then it is no longer by works. Otherwise, grace would no longer be grace" (Romans 11:5-6). The Greek behind ‘chosen’ is eklogē (ἐκλογή), a selecting or picking out, from which ‘election’ comes. Election is grace traced back to its source in God's heart. And this grace is not stingy: "the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to everyone" (Titus 2:11).

What Scripture says

Paul opens Ephesians with a hymn of praise that reaches back before time.

For He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless in His presence. In love He predestined us for adoption as His sons through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of His will,

Ephesians 1:4-5

The choosing is in Christ and in love, and its goal is holiness and a place in God's family. In Romans 8 Paul links the whole of salvation in one chain: "those He predestined, He also called; those He called, He also justified; those He justified, He also glorified" (Romans 8:30). In Romans 9 he notes that God spoke about Jacob and Esau "before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad, in order that God's plan of election might stand" (Romans 9:11), and concludes that salvation "does not depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy" (Romans 9:16). Jesus says the same: "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him" (John 6:44).

Yet the same Scriptures speak just as plainly of God's love for all.

This is good and pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

1 Timothy 2:3-4

The Lord is "not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance" (2 Peter 3:9). Through Ezekiel he swears, "I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked should turn from their ways and live" (Ezekiel 33:11). So the gospel goes out to everyone. Jesus calls, "Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened" (Matthew 11:28), and God "now commands all people everywhere to repent" (Acts 17:30).

The Fathers held both together. Augustine, on John 6:44, writes: "This is the doctrine of grace: none comes, except he be drawn … if you are not drawn, pray that you may be" Augustine. Between these words he warns us not to presume to decide whom the Father draws, or why. In the same passage Chrysostom answers the Manichees, who said that nothing is in our power, by insisting that the Lord's words "do not destroy our free agency, but only show that we need Divine assistance" Chrysostom.

What does God's choice rest on?

Faithful Christians have long answered differently how these passages fit together. The heart of the question is what God's choosing rests on.

The Reformed and Presbyterian churches, following Augustine, confess unconditional election. God did not choose people because he foresaw that they would believe; he chose them out of free grace and his good pleasure, and faith is the fruit of his choosing, not its condition. The Synod of Dort set this out in 1619 Canons of Dort, First Head, and the Westminster Confession says that God chose "out of his mere free grace and love, without any foresight of faith, or good works" Westminster Confession, ch. 3. They point to Romans 9, John 6 and the note that "all who were appointed for eternal life believed" (Acts 13:48). Both documents insist that God is not the author of sin, that the will is not forced, and that the guilt of unbelief lies with the sinner.

The Arminian and Wesleyan traditions read it another way. The Remonstrants of 1610, followers of Jacob Arminius, confessed that God decreed from eternity to save in Christ those who, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, would believe in him and persevere in faith Articles of Remonstrance, art. 1. As they read "those God foreknew, He also predestined" (Romans 8:29), election follows God's foreknowledge of who will believe. Yet faith is no human achievement: fallen people cannot turn to God by themselves, so God gives everyone prevenient grace, the grace that goes before, which makes a free response possible Wesley, The Scripture Way of Salvation. They read 1 Timothy 2:4 and Ezekiel 33:11 as God's sincere will for every person.

Lutherans walk a third path. The Formula of Concord (1577) confesses that election is wholly of grace and is a cause of the salvation of God's children, yet that God predestines no one to damnation: those who are lost perish through their own unbelief, though God earnestly calls all Formula of Concord, art. 11. Why some believe and others do not, Lutherans leave unexplained, urging believers to seek their election not in God's hidden counsel but in Christ and the promises of his word.

The Catholic Church holds a range of views within firm limits. The Second Council of Orange (529) confessed that even the beginning of faith is a gift of grace, and rejected the idea that anyone is predestined to evil Council of Orange. Within that frame, Thomists, following Thomas Aquinas, stand close to Augustine: God's choice is the cause of every good in those he saves. Molinists, following the Jesuit Luis de Molina, stress God's knowledge of how each person would freely respond to grace. In 1607 Pope Paul V allowed both schools to teach and forbade either to condemn the other. The Orthodox, who never had this Western debate in the same form, follow John of Damascus in saying that God foreknows all things but does not predetermine all things, and they speak of grace and human freedom working together John of Damascus, Exposition of the Orthodox Faith.

What all confess together

These differences are real; in the seventeenth century they divided churches. Yet the common ground is wide. Every tradition confesses that salvation is entirely of grace, so that no one can boast. All say that God is not the author of sin, that the gospel must be preached to all and its invitation is sincere, and that this doctrine is given for humility, assurance and worship, not for guessing who is chosen. The Westminster Confession says that "this high mystery" must be handled "with special prudence and care" Westminster Confession, ch. 3. Paul's long argument ends not in a formula but in a song.

O, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and untraceable His ways! … For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever! Amen.

Romans 11:33-36

So election is not a riddle to solve before you may come to Christ. Calvin, who taught it as firmly as anyone, told anxious believers to look not into God's hidden decree but at Christ, the mirror in which we see our election Calvin, Institutes 3.24. And Christ promises, "the one who comes to Me I will never drive away" (John 6:37). If you have come, thank God who drew you; if you hesitate, Augustine's advice stands: ask to be drawn. For more, see What is predestination? and What is grace?; the next lesson asks how this grace makes a guilty sinner right with God.

Practice