17thMarch
Are some predestined for heaven and others for hell?
Categories: salvation | 2008 | by Ken Horn | 9 commentsThere is a teaching that some people are predestined for heaven and others predestined for hell. Doesn’t man have free will?
Here’s the short answer. Jesus died for everyone. God desires all to be saved. No one is predestined to heaven or hell. Everyone has a choice (free will) to accept or reject Christ.
Now here’s some detail.
The Assemblies of God has a position paper called “The Security of the Believer.” The following section addresses this issue:
Salvation is available for every man (2 Peter 3:9; John 3:16; Romans 10:11-13).
Two questions may be asked: “Are some predestined to be saved and others to be lost?” and, “Who are the elect?” The answer is clear when it is recognized that the message of the gospel is one of “whosoever will.” No one reading the New Testament can miss the impact of this great truth.
However, in Romans 9-11 there are some statements that seem to imply that man’s free will is excluded in the matter of the believer’s salvation and that God in His choice of the elect exercises His divine sovereignty entirely apart from man’s volition. For example:
(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;)…Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated…. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy…. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth (Romans 9:11, 13, 15, 16, 18).
When this passage is considered in the light of all that God’s Word teaches concerning election, however, it is evident that man’s will is involved in his election. Jacob was chosen before having done good or evil, but God’s choice was on the basis of what He foreknew Jacob would do.
This truth is brought out in Peter’s letter to “the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.” These believers were recognized to be “elect according to the foreknowledge of God” (1 Peter 1:1, 2).
This same truth is stated in Romans 8:29. Paul wrote, “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son.”
God determined beforehand the conditions on which He would show mercy. And on the basis of His foreknowledge believers are chosen in Christ (Ephesians 1:4). Thus God in His sovereignty has provided the plan of salvation whereby all can be saved. In this plan man’s will is taken into consideration. Salvation is available to “whosoever will.”
The paper also says, “The General Council of the Assemblies of God believes in the sovereignty and divine prerogative of God untainted by arbitrariness or caprice. It also believes in the free will and responsibility of man.”
Man has free will and God desires to save everyone. Though He has foreknowledge of the choices each individual will make, He does not predetermine those decisions.
Read the entire position paper here.
Ken Horn
So, if God truly knows (with certainty) the future free-will choice of every human being, then how can you get around God creating some human beings for the ultimate purpose of salvation (of course in accordance with the individual’s choice), and others for ultimate damnation (of course in accordance with the individual’s choice)?
i’m with you will, that’ll be tough to preach ehh?
About Predestination
“And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that he might be the firstborn among many bretheren. Moreover whom He predestinated, these He also called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these he also glorified.” (Romans 8:28-30)
The concept of predestination has confused and separated Christians for generations. Some claim that God, through predestination, is being unfair. Others would just rather leave it out of their Bible. Indeed, most modern churches have chosen to simply ignore it. Yet, all of the Protestant churches that came into being out of the Reformation held to the doctrine. But today, with so much humanism in the church, the idea of a sovereign God who controls all things is not popular. However, God’s sovereignty is spelled out for us throughout the entire Bible and so is predestination.
As a doctrine, predestination states that God sovereignly elects who is to be saved. He makes this choice totally independent of anything that we may do. He does not choose us based upon faith because our faith is a gracious gift of God to those He has chosen. Nor does He choose us based upon our good works. Nor does He look into the future to see who would choose to believe. He elects people to eternal salvation based purely on His own good pleasure. Those not elected are not saved. Does this sound a bit unfair? In reality, it’s just the opposite.
THE HIGHWAY TO HELL
Man is a sinner and the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23). Thus, all of us would be on our way to hell without the salvation graciously provided by God. “…Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. “As it is written: There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one.” (Romans 3:10-12).
Because of this situation, man is incapable of understanding the things of God. “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Corinthians 2:14). Thus, from his birth, man is on the highway to hell. He cannot and he will not, choose to come to God. So God “. . 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.” (Ephesians 1:4-5).
FOR WHOM DID CHRIST DIE?
God chooses us. We do not (for we cannot) choose him. Can you imagine the sovereign God of the universe sending his Son to die for sinners who may or may not choose to come to him? Does it make sense that, after His resurrection, Jesus sat down at the right hand of the Father and began to wait for sinners to choose whether or not to come to him? That would mean that, on the cross, Jesus died for no one in particular. But, that is not the case. Christ’s atonement was specifically for his people - “I lay down my life for the sheep” (John 10:15). He did not shed his blood for those who would not come to him. He has not paid the price for their sin - they will. “I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours.” (John 17:9).
UNDESERVED MERCY
Is that unfair? Hardly. Fairness is that we all go to hell. All men are sinners and deserve to go to hell. God owes us nothing. Yet, God has chosen to save some from that eternal punishment. C. H. Spurgeon said, “The amazing thing is not that everybody isn’t saved, but that anybody is saved.”
Instead of being unfair, this is mercy at its utmost. God does not have to show mercy to any one. “For He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion.” (Romans 9:15). “Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?” (Romans 9:21)
GOD IS IN CONTROL
With a closer look, predestination is not seen as the unfair doctrine that so many would claim it to be. Predestination is the result of God’s mercy and love. It guarantees the salvation of the ones He has called. It reveals the true nature of man to be sinful and rebellious toward God.
It puts God in total sovereign control, where He belongs. It removes man’s ability to take any credit for his own salvation, because even the act of believing can not be created in a sinful free will. It allows the saved to rest assured in the knowledge that it was God himself who made their salvation sure.
I have been studying the word and have just come across this information.. Through my hunger for the the word this truth has been uncovered to me… I thought this was unfair of God at first. This is the natural instict of man. The bible says we are not of man. It says we are of Christ. The ones that God has chosen. So yes, some are not chosen. People can say that it is not fair. But, who are we “the created” to say what is unfair of “The Creator”. This gives us even the more reason to praise God for choosing us.
I’ve been struggling with these two concepts - predestination vs. free will.
If the doctrine of predestination is correct, how does one get saved and have assurance of it? If Jane Doe was predestined by God for salvation and her husband John was not, how does either one of them know? Both have a heart for God, are in a Bible teaching church, try to be obedient and serve etc. Does predestination conclude that God has John wasting his time on earth since he is predestined for hell? I’m not being facetious; I really would like to know. How does anyone who concludes that they were among the predestined really know it? I know that there are many verses discussing predestination and the elect. I’d really like to know biblically, how someone who believes in predestination came to the knowledge that he was one of the elect and what biblical assurance he has of his specific election so that I can understand where his hope comes from. Please explain.
Shawn, when you believed in your heart and confessed with your mouth the Lord Jesus, you were saved, born again, regenerated by the Spirit of God. As long as you continue in faith and repentance you will be in Christ. Jesus is the elect, and you are elect as long as you are in him. Should you stop believing and/or repenting you would fall away from Christ and die spiritually. Then you would no longer be among the elect because you would no longer be in the elect one, who is Christ. From the beginning, God predestined salvation for all those who are in Christ - not any particular persons, but he will be faithful to ALL those who are faithful to him. Know of a certainty that you are not wasting your time serving Christ.
One example is Judas Iscariot. Jesus said to the twelve apostles, “I have chosen YOU twelve, and one of you IS a devil.” This was said near the end of Jesus’ ministry. He knew by the Spirit of prophecy from the beginning of his ministry that Judas would BECOME his betrayer, but when he chose the apostles, Judas was a true believer in Jesus who would do miracles in Christ’s name and was told to rejoice because his name had been “written in heaven”. It was not God’s predestinating, but covetousness that CHANGED Judas into a thief who took money from the apostolic treasury bag, opening himself up to the devil. He “by transgression fell.” Until it happened, there was no prophecy in scripture that the betrayer would be one of the apostles, only that he would be Messiah’s “own familiar friend.” Judas was not even the closest friend to Christ among the apostles, and Jesus had other friends, like Lazarus of Bethany, for instance. God is not unfair - or unjust.
Shawn - you have asked an excellent question and one that I, too, am grappling with. It would seem that we CANNOT know this side of the grave, as even some of those who serve the Lord for years and have all the outward evidences of being saved (and they would say inward assurance too) in the end fall away. It is concerning that no one has asnwered your question.
What I really struggle with is this issue: no matter how we try and dress it up or use clever arguments, if God created everything and knows everything and is all poweful (all of which He is), then he brought/allowed evil into existence, with all the pain and suffering that flows from that, in particular eternal unceasing torment in hell. Free well arguments don’t help here either - if I allow a dog to run free and it runs in front of a car and gets killed, the ultimate responsibility is mine for allowing the situation to develop in the first place. It would seem the biblical answer is that He is doing it all for His glory (Eph 1), but what glory is there in creating people, knowing they will become sin hardened, and then sending them to hell? I think of Judas, whom Jesus said would be better off not having been born. But he did not ask to get born. Nor did he ask to be chosen as one of the twelve (scripture teaches that he was specifiaclly chosen or elected as one of Jesus’ 12 disciples. And his punishment in hell will be WORSE because of all the teaching he heard from Jesus. And this was all pre-planned (!) Will we be praising God for this one day? These are difficult issues (which most Christians shy away from but which are clearly in scripture). Can anyone help with this. Please don’t cite the classic “free will” arguments or the “Calvinistic” arguments. I know them both, and they both leave more questions unanswered than answered. The best “solution” I can find is that Jesus’ death was equally unfair and that that somehow “undoes” the unfairness of us inherting Adam’s sin. So it is our own fault for not accepting Christ. But the point here is that my sin nature does not want to accept Christ (and some would say CAN’T accept Christ), so it is up to God to overcome that and save me. Which then brings us back to the issues raised above (how just is it to have allowed this situation to develop in the first place?) Timothy
In my previous effort, I attempted to answer Shawn’s questions. Timothy has raised the same ones, but has gone further, and raised the ultimate issues. What does God know and when did he know it? Just how important to a loving God is his own glory ?
The Lord is omniscient and omnipresent, but how is he so? If he is just playing back everything that he has predetermined, or even foreknows will happen, he must be in a constant state of Déjà vu. If he has known from the beginning everything that will happen to and through everyone and everything, how could he have repented that he had made man upon the earth? Did he also repent that he had created Lucifer so beautiful that his beauty corrupted his wisdom, or did he predetermine - or even foreknow - that one third of the holy angels would be corrupted and rebel? Of course he knew it could happen, and he was ready for it. Similarly, he knew Adam and Eve could possibly fall, and the plan of salvation was in place in that contingency, but free will is always tested. The test is to love the Lord thy God with all the heart, mind, strength and soul so he can reciprocate that affection.
I see the Lord’s omniscience as knowing everything that has ever happened to the smallest sparrow, (and insect?), as well as all that is happening in the present. In his wisdom he also knows what all this could cause to happen in future moments and even millennia to come. Of course this includes the thoughts and plans of all his creatures.
In his omnipotence, he restrains and controls, overrides and overturns, as well as inspires, convicts and reveals himself in miraculous power. He does all this without violating the will of angel or man. They are free to decide whether to do right or wrong, but though man devises his way, the Lord directs his steps and controls all events as he deals and strives by his Spirit with the hearts and minds of his creatures.
Jacob and Esau provide an example. The Lord wanted the elder to serve the younger, not based upon what either child would do, but to show that God is not bound in his choices by heredity and that he chooses whom he will to use. If the Lord was blessing Jacob because of any foreknowledge of what the man would do, all he had to do to was enable Jacob to win that last wrestling match in the womb and be born first - even if he had to pull Esau back from victory like Perez did to Zerah. (Genesis 38: 27-30) Then the blessing would have been Jacob’s traditionally, as the firstborn son.
Keep in mind that the blessing was the subject of the dispute, not the eternal salvation of either boy. Yes, Esau was a profane man who didn’t deserve the blessing, especially after he sold his birthright. However, he did get a second blessing, albeit an inferior one to Jacob’s. If Jacob had not pulled the scam he did, an angel might have been sent to warn Isaac to bless Jacob as Balaam was commanded to bless Jacob’s descendants centuries later. Not only that, if Isaac had spoken his first blessing over Esau, in the flesh, (It would not have been in the Spirit would it?), the Lord could have blessed Jacob above whatever minor blessing Isaac would have proclaimed over him. Let’s remember also that Esau forgave his brother, and though the Lord said, “Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated”, (or loved less), we’ve no indication that Esau’s soul was lost. Only in a specious effort at typology could one apply the prophetic blessing of one man to the predestined damnation of another’s soul.
In short, the Lord is a loving, just and good God who is building his kingdom in the hearts and minds of willing, obedient sons and daughters. He is determined that his predestined plan will be fulfilled without his having PREdetermined that any particular person will repent and be saved or rebel and be lost; and I believe his promise that his table will be filled with guests. He is inspiring and leading us to bring in the full number of the Gentiles, and then - it’s suppertime.
The question of whether men are personally predestined hinges on God’s priorities. There are many priorities in the mind of our heavenly Father, but let us compare just two of them. Glory or love, which is more important to God? Which is his highest priority - expressing, giving and receiving love or being praised and glorified for his power and greatness as well as for his love and grace? Is being glorified for his love more important to the Lord than the loving itself?
God is glorious, radiant, splendorous, effulgent, brilliant. These are all adjectives describing God, but none of them defines his character. Love does; for God is love, and love is of God.
The Lord glorifies his name in many ways; in fact everything that happens will finally end up glorifying God. The final judgment, when all iniquity receives its true and complete reward, will be the ultimate demonstration of the Deity’s power and the glory of his justice. Even though the rebellion and evil of angel and man are a disgrace and pollutant upon the entirety of the creation of God, the end of it will be the total triumph of good over evil - and it will be an eternal triumph, for the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched.
However, the love of God and the love of man are an even greater and just as unending glory to God. Just the fact that the holy and unapproachable Creator and Sustainer of all things is mindful of the worms that we all are and grieves and repents that he ever made us upon the earth because of the inglorious, iniquitous way we have treated each other is glorious proof positive that his heart is larger than his universe. How much more does his desire and purpose and determination to translate us back into sonship and daughterhood reveal the endlessness of his grace and redound to his glory.
Even greater will be the glorification of God revealed in the reward he bestows upon those who receive his love, sinners though they have been. Surely the Light of the New Jerusalem will shine brighter to the glory of God than even the holiness and justice of his eternal wrath deployed in the lake of fire -the unending death and dying of the wicked and the formerly unbelieving.
Some who say that God’s most treasured desire and purpose is his own glory say so because their doctrine demands it. Since they believe that the eternal destiny of each and every soul is predetermined and that the vast majority are, by the will of God sentenced aforehand to damnation, then they cannot allow that the main and utmost desire of the Creator is to love every one of his creatures and to bring them all to repentance. Therefore, they trumpet the idea that God’s glory is more important to him than his love, since that would be the only plausible reason for creating souls for the sole purpose of damning them.
However, if the Lord of Glory’s chief aim is to hear his own praises sung and his name exalted, then the vast majority of the human souls he has created are expendable in attaining that purpose. After all, are not the voices of the praisers most loud when they recall that they are redeemed from the wrath and judgment of him who sits on the throne and of the Lamb at his right hand?
Contrariwise, if the tremendous love of our gracious God is the underlying reason that he accepts glory and praise, and if his glorification is secondary to his affection for his creatures, and if he glorifies himself primarily because it is the only way he can draw people into believing in his grace, so that he can make them worthy to be in his presence and to receive and reciprocate his love, then why would he predetermine the vast majority of them to damnation?
So it’s a doctrinal issue that sees God as primarily interested in impressing his creatures; and it’s a teaching that glorifies men - not man as a race but only a certain comparatively small minority of humanity. If I am predestined for Heaven and if I am one among the few, by comparison to the numbers of the majority, then even though I bathe myself in the ashes of humility and give all glory to the grace and mercy of God, I am still one of those chosen to be among the exclusive beneficiaries of that grace. Exclusivity has always been a tempting prospect for human beings.
Glorifying certain human beings in this way diminishes the glory of God by presenting a diminished view of his love, the love that he is, and the love he has for every one of his creatures. The glory of love is God’s greatest glory. His sovereignty, his omnipotent power to create and destroy, his wisdom and even his holiness are all wrapped in his love. An atonement offered to only a limited few would reveal a limited love from the God who is love.
The doctrine of personal predestination predisposes God to love certain ones above all others without regard to their faith or their works. It binds his love and limits his compassion. It dilutes his glory by diminishing the most glorious thing about him and that is his all-encompassing love and the grace he gave his only begotten Son to sincerely and honestly extend to every sinner in all the world.
The Deity who would purpose to love only to gain glory for himself would be a smaller, less glorious God than the One who truly does glorify himself in order to reveal his attractiveness and gain lovers of God and of his other creatures in order that he may shower, yea deluge his love upon them and have it be reciprocated, insomuch as they are enabled by his revelation of himself to them.
A deity, who loved and hated for glory would be supremely inferior in glory to the one true God who is love and hates only sin and only punishes sin and has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
Indeed he would be hypocritical to ask men to love their enemies when he has arbitrarily chosen to hate and destroy people he has never even met, nor even yet created. Indeed it would have been the purpose of such a being to create billions and billions of souls for the sole purpose of gaining glory in their eternal damnation and torment.
So is the love of God of more importance to him than his glory? That begs the question, for love is the greatest part of his glory. Let not the doctrines of men dilute his glory in favor of their own supposed exclusivity.