Thoughts on Election
Some Thoughts on the Doctrine of Election
Before we continue on in our study of Romans 9, I want to provide some commentary on the Doctrine of Election. I believe this transition article is important because it will help us keep in perspective the scripture we are reading. Election is a topic that can be at times mystifying. Even now, after reading various Bible studies and articles on election, I find the topic to be rather mysterious. Still, it is important that I not be confused into thinking it is untrue on those grounds alone. No, if it be untrue, it must be on the grounds of scripture alone.
There seems to be two aspects of this topic present in scripture. There are verses which when read in context uphold the Calvinist view of election, which would include one of his points, irresistible grace. There are, however, other verses that seem to indicate another aspect of this topic. Consider the following quote from John MacArthur on Romans 9 and 10:
So why does God still find fault in unrepentant sinners when He didn’t choose them? Doesn’t this deny human responsibility? Is it fair for God to still hold them accountable?
Paul answers all such questions with a rebuke-”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?” (v. 20). Does the clay jump up and ask the potter why it looks the way it does? Not at all.
Some believe that is terribly cold and calculating. But that is only one side of God’s sovereign election. Paul continues in the next chapter by saying, “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved … for ‘whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved’” (10:9, 13).
How these two sides of God’s truth-His sovereignty in choosing us (Rom. 9) and our responsibility to confess and believe (Rom. 10)-reconcile is impossible for us to understand fully. But Scripture declares both perspectives of salvation to be true (John 1:12-13). It’s our duty to acknowledge both and joyfully accept them by faith.
I should point out that John MacArthur is a well noted Calvinist. Dr. MacArthur is reliable as a Calvinist and thus, it shows the dilemma that we have to come to terms with in this view. We find in election a seeming paradox that we cannot fully reconcile in our minds.
Take for instance Matthew 23:37, where Jesus says, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.” Or for instance, take 2 Peter 3:9, which says, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” I have heard explanations for these passages that dismiss them as not relevant to the Calvinist view, but I did not find those explanations satisfactory. At the very least, we have to acknowledge the many passages like these that seem to suggest at least a desire by God that is rejected by man. I am not arguing that we have to remedy them necessarily; we cannot as it were make God fit into a box that is comfortable for our human thinking. No, we again have to commit to an understanding that is Biblical, but that is also willing to concede those areas where our minds simply don’t have the capacity to understand. Of course, we do that naturally with things link the omniscience of God. We cannot fully fathom it, but we accept it based on the Biblical explanation of it.
Even Peter acknowledges the difficulties with these concepts in 2 Peter 3:16, where he says of Paul, “He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.“ Peter acknowledges that some of the things Paul speaks of are “hard to understand.” Let us then be certain that we are not dogmatic about doctrines that we do not fully understand ourselves. We should also make sure that we ourselves are not those “ignorant and unstable” people that Peter speaks of. Certainly, election is a real concept presented in the Bible. However, it is also something that only makes sense from God’s eye. The Calvinist view may in the end be entirely right. God may in fact choose some and reject others purely by his own sovereignty. That I do not deny and I humbly acknowledge that only God can make that choice and only he can understand it. Still, even if true, it does not alleviate us from the directive to proclaim the Gospel.
So, as we move on in this study of Romans 9 and beyond, it is important for us to understand that at some level God does elect some and not others. The Apostle Paul himself is an example of election when God intervened on that road to Damascus. And yet, we as Christians have every duty as the elect to proclaim the Gospel to the lost. Whether or not someone responds is ultimately in the hands of God.
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