Predestination

Wow! I've been looking at this controversial topic for Doctrine 2, and it's great to read what others have written and to take joy in those passages of the Bible that teach about God choosing people for salvation. That's what predestination is: God choosing people, before they were even born, to be part of His kingdom. He doesn't choose people according to any merit in them, but only because of His sovereign and good pleasure. God was pleased to choose people like you and me to be part of His eternal plan of redemption. It really is mind-blowing!

Romans 9

The really central Bible passage that deals with this whole topic is Romans 9. But you can't really take Romans 9 on its own without the context of the rest of Romans. It is a weighty letter of Paul's, and it deals with massive subjects such as the way humanity has rejected God, the way we all stand guilty before Him, and the way we have been redeemed in Christ. In Romans 8, Paul assures us that NOTHING can separate us from the love of Christ. ALL THINGS work together for good for those who love Him. And yet, from the amazing high of this truth, Paul then moves to the agonising question of what has happened to Israel, his own people.

Many of Paul's generation, as of our own, did not accept Jesus as their Saviour. And Paul felt terrible grief for them, knowing that they were not righteous in God's sight because they sought to establish their own righteousness on the law, not on the work of Christ. Paul knew that it was a hopeless pursuit (see Rom 9:30-32)

But in Romans 9, Paul reminds us that God has been a God who chooses from the beginning. In the Old Testament, He chose Abraham (Neh 9:7). He chose the people of Israel (Deut 14:2). But even within the nation of Israel, He chose some to truly know Him and follow Him whilst others disobeyed Him and were destroyed.

God didn't choose some and not others because of moral goodness. He chose Jacob rather than Esau while they were still in the womb and had not done anything good or bad (Rom 9:11). He chooses simply for His own good pleasure. John Piper emphasises that God's electing love is absolutely free. 'It is the gracious overflow of his boundless happiness guided by his infinite wisdom.'

Is God fair?

This obviously raises the question, is God fair? As David Seccombe writes, Paul's answer is that salvation operates in the realm of mercy. As in the parable of the workers in the vineyard, God is master of his own generosity and mercy and will exercise them at his own pleasure. God is free to exercise his mercy as he sees fit.

But it is also important to note the way that Scripture emphasises that God chooses so that He gets the glory. In Luke 10, Jesus rejoices that the Father has revealed the truth of salvation to 'babes'. In 1 Cor 1, Paul emphasises that 'God chose what is foolish... weak... low and despised in the world... so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.'

As Piper writes, 'the goal of God in election is the elimination of all human pride, all self-reliance, all boasting in man.' That's why God has pleasure in election: it magnifies His name!

What about those who aren't saved? Does God delight in their condemnation?

Piper argues that there is a complexity in God's emotions that we cannot understand. At one level, God does not delight in the death of the wicked. Yet at another level, he does delight in the justice that ordains the judgement of unbelievers. He has a real and deep compassion for perishing sinners. But he is governed by his wisdom through a plan that no ordinary human deliberation would ever conceive.

Perhaps the greatest illustration of this is in the death of Christ. It involved great sin, putting an innocent man to death, and Judas was influenced by Satan to betray Jesus. And yet, God planned it. As Marshall writes: 'We must certainly distinguish between what God would like to see happen and what he actually does will to happen.'

Piper uses the illustration of God's narrow and wider lens. When he looks at tragedy and sin through the narrow lens, he is angered and grieved. But in the wider lens, when he sees it in connection with everything before and after it, he delights in the mosaic of eternity.

Does this make us puppets?

Well, the Bible presents the entire outworking of our salvation as something brought about by a personal God in relationship with personal creatures. God's act of election was permeated with personal love for those whom he chose (Eph 1:5; Grudem).

We need to challenge the idea that a choice is not genuine if it is not absolutely free. We might ask where Scripture ever says that our choices have to be free from God's influence or control in order to be real or genuine choices. It does not seem that Scripture ever speaks in this way. (Grudem again)

Why does it matter?

Many Christians see predestination as an optional extra. But Piper puts forward strong arguments why it is important that all Christians embrace the sovereign right of God to choose those who are saved:

• It's biblical
• It humbles sinners and glorifies God
• It preserves the church from slipping towards false philosophies of life
• It is good news of salvation that is not just offered but effected
• It enables us to own up to the demands for holiness in the Scripture and yet have assurance of salvation
• It gives us the overwhelming experience of being loved personally with the unbreakable electing love of God
• It gives hope for effective evangelism and guarantees the triumph of Christ's mission in the end

Rather than making us apathetic when it comes to preaching the gospel, predestination gives us a reason to do it!!! Look at the example of Paul in Corinth (Acts 18)- he was told by God that He had many people in this city. Paul stayed there a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them. God's election did not exclude Paul teaching and preaching the gospel; rather, that was His chosen means of saving the elect!

God chooses to use us, in all our weakness, to spread the message of life in Christ all over the world, so that His church grows. That is something to rejoice in!

Tiger Woods' "Confession"

I find the British media coverage of Tiger Woods' public confession of his unfaithfulness, and his apology to the world, really interesting. In 'The Guardian', Owen Gibson's straightforward account of events was relegated to p3, whereas Zoe Williams' 'sketch' version was on the front page. It seems that many Brits just can't understand why Woods did this. Firstly, it insults our notions of being reserved and private about such matters. Secondly, we have so divorced sexual morality from the public sphere that many people are thinking: 'Why did he need to apologise?'

Gibson quotes Woods:

"I knew my actions were wrong but I convinced myself normal rules didn't apply. I never thought about who I was hurting. Instead I thought only about myself. I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to. I felt I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me... I was wrong. I was foolish. I don't get to play by different rules."

In many ways, I'm sure we can all relate to what he said. There are times when we know something is wrong, but we go ahead and do it anyway. Our motives are purely selfish. But sometime or other, there are consequences for our actions. For Tiger Woods, those consequences erupted unpleasantly when he crashed his car. Soon evidence for a string of affairs was uncovered by the media. But there are other times when our wrong actions go undiscovered.

The Bible tells us plainly that all of us will have to stand before God and give an account of our lives (Matthew 12:36). God sees everything we do, say and even all that we think as well (Gen 6:5, 1 Chron 28:9, Psalm 139:2, Mt 12:25). It's not our place to make the rules about what's right and wrong. That was Adam and Eve's mistake in Eden: God declared that taking the fruit was wrong, and they decided otherwise. But the result of this was that sin and death came into the world. The existence of death, suffering and pain points us towards the fact that we stand under God's judgement. Why? Because we've pushed God out of His rightful place. We've snatched His crown and tried to put it on our own heads. We've rejected His right to rule in our lives.

But even if we go through life rejecting God's rules, they will still apply to us in the end. We don't get to play by different rules. There will be a Judgement Day, and if we've rejected God, then we face an eternity of being rejected by Him (Matthew 7:23).

There is punishment for those who reject God. But when Jesus died on the cross, He made a way for us to be set free. We have two choices:

1. Take God's punishment on ourselves
2. Let Jesus take God's punishment for us

If we truly believe and trust that Jesus has died for our wrong attitude towards God, then we can be reconciled to God through Him. Although we have rejected God in the past, we can become friends with God... even more than that, we can become children of God. (Eph1, 1 John 5)

The main criticism of Woods made by Williams' sketch was that many doubt the sincerity of his apology: 'He sounded as though he had zoned out a bit, as if he was reading out the rules of a sport.' And God doesn't want a sham-apology from us. God wants real faith and real repentance, and He Himself gives us His Spirit so that, supernaturally, we are given the ability to believe and to please God by living radically different lives. This is why living as a Christian is not like life in black-and-white. It's not a boring, textbook life. It's full blown technicolour! It's life when you finally see things as they truly are. You not only see the truth, but you live it as well. You are given power to live it through God's Spirit, working in you. (2 Peter 1:3)

Living life by your own rules isn't real life. You're playing a game, and a dangerous one at that.
Living life with God at the centre is where you find true joy and fulfilment (John 10:10).

Why were the Israelites exiled out of the Promised Land?

I've been putting together my notes for OT2 and this is such a huge question, covering all of the Former Prophets.

1. Rebellion against the Lord.

This began even as Moses led them out of Egypt: 'the whole community grumbled' (Ex 16:2). They spent 40 years in the wilderness because of this!

At the end of the book of Joshua, he gives the people a strong reminder that they need to obey the Law (Josh 23:6). If they fail, the consequence will be exile:
'If you violate the covenant of the Lord your God, which He commanded you, and go and serve other gods... the Lord's anger will burn against you, and you will quickly perish from the good land He has given you.' (Josh 23:16).

During the time of the Judges, as Joshua's generation dies, 'another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what He had done for Israel. Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals.' (Judges 2:10-11). Consequently, they were routed by their enemies and God raised up Judges to save them. 'Yet they would not listen to their judges but prostituted themselves to other gods and worshipped them.' (Judges 2:17)

Even the Judges themselves were dubious heroes; Gideon lacked decisive faith and made a golden ephod which became a snare to Israel, Jephthah made a rash vow which resulted in him killing his own daughter, and Samson's life was full of compromise instead of being a true Nazirite.

The ending of the book shows moral chaos in the gruesome story of the Levite and his concubine, which threatens to destroy the unity of Israel by causing civil war and the near cutting-off of the Benjaminites.

2. Lack of godly leadership.

The chaos in Judges is attributed to the fact there is no king; 'everyone did as they saw fit' (Judges 21:25).
The people in 1 Samuel demand a king. As Samuel presents Saul to them, he gives them a solemn warning:
'if both you and the king who reigns over you follow the Lord your God- good! But if you do not obey the Lord, and if you rebel against His commands, His hand will be against you.' (1 Sam 12:14-15)

No sooner is Saul declared king than he goes against God's Word and offers up the burnt offering himself instead of waiting for Samuel, the priest. Samuel tells him that because of this his kingdom will not ensure and God has sought out 'a man after his own heart' (1 Sam 13:14). Saul repeatedly tries to do things his own way, instead of obeying God. In the rest of 1 Samuel, we see his deterioration into madness, paranoia and murderous thoughts towards David, despite David's righteous conduct and refusal to touch the Lord's anointed (see 1 Sam 24).

When David finally becomes king, and he is the best of the kings, he commits adultery and murder in a terrible sequence of events (2 Sam 11).

The majority of the kings in 1 & 2 Kings commit terrible acts in the eyes of the Lord, and lead the whole nation into apostasy. Ahab, king of Israel, did more evil than all before him (1 Kings 16:30). He and his wife Jezebel persecute Elijah and install Baal worship as the norm. Even after the glorious display of God's power at Mt Carmel, they remain unchanged.

3. Ignoring the Prophets.

Not only does the dramatic revelation of the reality of God as Lord leave Ahab unmoved, but repeatedly he is shown to ignore and despise God's prophets.

In one incident, a prophet comes to tell him that God will give him victory over Ben-Hadad (King of Aram), and Ahab decides to let the king go. In another incident, Ahab desires Naboth's vineyard (which, according to the distribution of the land and to the inheritance laws, he had no right to claim), and allows Jezebel to have Naboth killed so that he can seize it. Elijah comes to rebuke him for this dreadful action, and Ahab greets the prophet by calling him his 'enemy' (1 Kings 21:20). God says through Elijah 'you have aroused my anger and have caused Israel to sin' (1 Kings 21:22), and the incredible thing is that Ahab does then humble himself. In great mercy, God decides to bring disaster upon Ahab's son instead of Ahab himself.

And yet how much has Ahab really changed? Not much it seems, because when the godly king Jehoshaphat of Judah comes to help him against the king of Aram, Jehoshaphat insists upon seeking counsel from a 'prophet of the Lord', not just a phoney prophet who says whatever the king wants to hear. Ahab acknowledges that there is a true prophet, but he hates him because he never prophesies anything good about him (1 Kings 22:8). Jehoshaphat's reply 'The king should not say such a thing' highlights how wrong Ahab's attitude is towards the prophets and thus towards God, as the prophets speak God's Word to him.

4. Forgetting the Law.

In Josiah king of Judah's day, the Book of the Law is found as they repair the temple. This is a sad indication of how God's Word has been forgotten over the reigns of so many godless kings. Josiah is a great reformer, but he recognises that it is too late: they stand under God's wrath for disobeying His commands (2 Kings 22:13), which the prophet Huldah confirms.

5. Lack of godly parenting.

'Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen... Teach them to your children and to their children after them.' Deut 4:9

Closely linked to the people forgetting the Law is the fact that parents were not training their children in the ways of the Lord, and this is why there was so much moral chaos and apostasy.

Even the God-fearing men were at fault here: Eli was challenged by God ('why do you honour your sons more than Me?' 1 Sam 2:29) and David did not have effective control of his family- the incident of Amnon raping his half-sister Tamar, and David's lack of decisive action to intervene which causes Absalom to act in bloody vengeance, is a prime example of this (2 Sam 13).

6. God keeps His covenant promise.

God had made it clear that if Israel were not obedient, He would send them into exile. That is why the exile happened.

'Therefore the Lord rejected all the people of Israel; He afflicted them and gave them into the hands of plunderers, until He thrust them from His presence.' 2 Kings 17:20


And yet, in all of this, there is hope in God's grace. Not all the kings were bad (Josiah and Hezekiah stand out as really godly leaders), and Isaiah prophesies the future fall of Sennacherib (king of Assyria) in 2 Kings 19, and reminds the people that God is in control:
'Have you not heard? Long ago I ordained it. In days of old I planned it; now I have brought it to pass.' v25