By Marvin Duncan
Romans 8:29, 30 and Ephesians 1:5,11
A subject that has caused much concern within the Christian community is predestination. Some individuals reject all teaching of predestination as being unscriptural. Others teach that God has predestined every aspect of the Christian’s life from his salvation to his daily walk. Both of these positions are in error. The Scriptures do teach that God has predestined some things, but God does not predetermine every aspect of the Christian’s life.
This morning I would like for us to look into the Scriptures to see what God’s Word has to say about this subject of predestination.
What Is Predestination?
Before we get into the Scriptures that speak of predestination, let us define this word so we will all be thinking the same thing when we use this word. According to The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, the word, predestination, means: to foreordain by Divine decree or purpose; to predetermine; to appoint beforehand.
When we use the word, predestination, in this study, we will be talking about what God has predetermined to take place. There are two passages of Scripture in which Paul speaks of things God has predetermined will come to pass. In each of these passages it is clear what God has predetermined, yet, there are some who claim God has predetermined much more than what the Word teaches. Let us be careful when we read the Word of God to make sure we do not credit God with saying or doing things He has not said or done. Some of the errors being taught about what God has predestined are as follows:
Predestined To Be Saved
Often we hear sincere believers say things that do not have any foundation in the Scriptures. One of the most blaring distortions of the Word of God is the teaching that God predestines who will be saved. Some individuals claim that because God knows everything, He knows who will accept His offer of salvation. Because He knows who will receive His offer, He predestines these individuals to be saved. There is absolutely no Scripture that even suggests this is how individuals are saved. Others who teach that salvation is predestined arrive at their conclusion by reasoning that because God is Sovereign He alone determines who will share heaven with Him. Only the select few who God has predetermined to be saved will enjoy the blessings of Heaven.
The error of these positions is that both contradict the clear teaching that salvation is offered to whosoever will receive it. We have Scripture like John 3:16; Acts 2:21; 10:43; as well as Romans 10:11,13 that make it clear God’s salvation is determined by the individual’s personal choice. Were God to predetermine who would be saved, those individuals would be saved no matter what they wanted. If God predetermined who would be saved there would be no purpose in our presenting the Gospel of Salvation to anyone. Concerning the sovereignty of God, it is true that God is Sovereign and does whatever He desires It is the Sovereign will of God that the responsibility for being saved rests with the choice of each individual. God has offered salvation as a free gift and it is the responsibility of each person to receive or reject this gift. This is why we have been given the ministry of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:19-20). We see the personal responsibility of man clearly presented in Joh.n 3:18 and John 3:36. This personal responsibility goes back to the fact that Christ became man’s substitute Sin Offering on the Cross of Calvary. Every sin man was, or ever will be, guilty of was paid in full by Christ’s death. The sin question has already been answered. It is the Son question that must be answered today. God is asking man, What will you do with My Son? There is no restri1ction as to who can receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. The only thing that is needed for any son of Adam to be saved is to acknowledge he is the sinner for whom Christ died and accept Christ’s shed blood as the payment of his sin debt.
It is the teaching of Christ’s shed blood for the remission of sin that makes salvation by predestination an error. John 3:18 makes it abundantly clear that a man’s eternal destiny depends upon what he chooses to do with Jesus Christ.
The Christian’s Life Predestinated
A second error being taught concerns God’s predetermining every thing that happens in the life of the Christian after he is saved. There isn’t one verse of Scripture that would even suggest this to be true. This position is held by those who do not want to answer for the sin in their life now that they are saved. First Corinthians 3:9-14 teaches that God will reward the Christian for how he lives his Christian life. If God was forcing the Christian to live a predetermined way, what would be the purpose of these rewards? If a man had no choice in what he did after he was saved, how would he be worthy of a reward for doing what God made him do? Every individual has the power to choose how he will live his life, even after he is saved.
Satan’s Activities Predestined
A third error we should consider in this study is the teaching that God predestined Satan’s activities. This position is taken by those who conclude that because God is the Creator, He made everything according to His sovereign plan. They teach that God made Satan the way he is and therefore it is God who is responsible for what is happening in His universe. The end result of this thinking is that because God is responsible for creating sin, He is also responsible to see hat all of His creation, even Satan, is redeemed.
The basis for this teaching that God is responsible for Satan’s activities is that these individuals say God needed a contrast to show His Righteousness. It was this need to display His goodness against a background of sin that He created Satan to bring rebellion into the universe. Because God also needed a way to express His Grace He set the program of sin in motion so He could offer salvation to its victims.
The error of this teaching that God is responsible for Satan’s rebellion, is seen in the fact that Satan was created perfect. Ezekiel 28:11-19 speaks of Satan’s creation and verse 15 shows that God is not responsible for Satan’s actions. This 15th verse says:
“Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou was created, till iniquity was found in thee.”
Both the angels and man were created as free moral agents. That is, the angels and man were given the ability to choose for themselves what they would or would not do. Because of his wisdom and beauty (Ezekiel 28:17), Satan wanted to be worshipped by all creation (Isa. 12-14). This is why Satan rebelled against God. God is not responsible for what Satan did as a result of his pride and selfish desires. The same is true of man. Adam knew God’s command concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:16-17) but Adam chose to do what the woman wanted rather than doing what God said (Gen. 3:6).
In giving His creatures a free will, God was potentially opening a door for His creatures to choose the wrong thing. Yet how could any creature show their loves for God unless it did so from a free desire to express its emotions to God? Had God programmed His creation to love and worship Him, what joy would this bring to God? Giving His creation a free will, God’s heart is touched when a sinner comes to Him for salvation then lives a life of worship and love toward Christ.
What Has God Predestined?
There are some things that God has predestinated but you will never find God forcing His desires upon any of His creatures against that creature’s will. The only things that have been predestinated are those things that are for God’s redeemed for the Body of Christ. It is only to those who have already exercised their free will to accept God’s salvation who receives what God has predetermined for the Body of Christ.
An illustration I heard some years ago may help us to identify the cause of much of the confusion now existing over this subject of predestination. “A man is walking down a street when he comes to a building with a sign over the door which read, whosoever will may enter. He decides to go in. Once on the inside, he looks back at the door and sees a sign over the door that reads, chosen in Christ from before the foundation of the world.” This pictures perfectly the Body of Christ. God chose the Body of Christ before the foundation of the world but He did not choose who would be saved and made a member of this Body. Our problem with predestination comes when we, who have freely entered the “building,” take the sign off the building and put it around our neck. That which was predestined was not US. It was the building, that is, the Body of Christ. If we recognize this truth and associate all that has been predestinated with the Body, we will have very few problems with what has been predestined by God.
The Image of His Son
There are two things that God has predestined for the Body of Christ. One is found in Romans 8:29. Here Paul says that every member of the Body of Christ (everyone who chooses to enter this “building”) will be “conformed to the image of his Son.”
Paul shows how this sovereign will of God ia carried out for each member of the Body of Christ. In Galatians 2:20, Paul speaks of his Christian life and says: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, Who loved me, and gave Himself for me.”
We are conformed to the image of God’s Son as we allow Christ to live His life in us. At salvation, every Christian is given a New Life. This new life is Christ living in us. The more we yield to His living His life in us, the more conformed to His image we will become.
The Adoption Of Sons
The second thing God has predestined for the Body of Christ is found in Ephesians 1:5. This verse tells us that God has predestined the members of the Body of Christ “unto the adoption of sons.” The word, son, is the title of an heir – the one to inherit the father’s estate. At the moment of salvation, every Christian was made a son in the family of God and an heir who will inherit co-equally with Christ, the eternal Son. We see this promise of our being co-heirs with Christ in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Ephesians 3:6 tells us: “The gentiles should be fellow heirs (joint-heirs)…And partakers (joint-partakers) of His promise in Christ by the Gospel.”
The members of the Body of Christ are joint-heirs with Christ and will inherit everything Christ will inherit. This Son ship is not because we deserve it, but because God has predestinated it. It is a gift of His Grace.