Tag Archives: election

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Galations 1:11

But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles...

How can you **NOT** get election out of that?

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This is from Reclaiming the Mind - I'd rather comment there, but for whatever reason, my browser doesn't want to show me the combox...

This interaction was interesting.

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@MzEllen:

(I asked)Why does one fear Him and another does not? Intelligence? Random Chance?

(another answered)Have you had children? Have you examined your body and how incredibly it is made? Have you gazed at the starry host and wondered at the vastness of what God has created? Have you considered the amount of energy within a single atom and how it holds itself together? How about the energy present within the fabric we call space and often thing of as a vast expanse of nothing? I have watched the BBC Earth series and my jaw literally drops to the floor when I consider the incredible creation of God.

We have more information today than we have in the past, but all the big stuff is easily within reach. And you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to recognize the obvious about God.

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yes.  I have children.  Yes, we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

This is a wonderful answer...but I have no clue what the question was.

The answer given has ZERO to do with the question that I asked.

If our salvation depends on our decision to choose to accept Christ, why did I choose, and why didn't the person next to me in the pew choose?

What makes me so smart?  spiritual?  special?

If the answer to that was "because God chooses those who fear Him" - why do some fear Him, and others not?

If the answer lies with the person, what is the answer?

If the answer lies with God - isn't that "election"?

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Unconditional election...AKA predestination.  It is my second least TULIP doctrine to try to explain.

Based on the premise that "God is sovereign and He gets to pick - not only how, but who."

This builds on the "T" - total depravity.  Not that each peson is as totally depraved as they could be, but rather every part of each person's will is touched by Adam's nature (original sin).

How many people seek God?

The answer (as well as in other places, is answered in Romans 3:

"None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one."

If we don't seek God, how do we find Him?

Ephesians 1:3-6. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He 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, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved.”

Christ told His disciples,

You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide...(John 15:16)

But what about my will?

So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy (Romans 9:16)

But that isn't fair

But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, "Why have you made me like this?"  Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles? (Romans 9:20-24)