A friend came the other day, an old friend. I mean old in both senses, his years are many and so is our friendship. “So”, he declared, “what revelation has God given you lately?” I am a little wary of this man, him and I have laboured with long and sometimes animated discussions over differences in our theology. I was thrown somewhat off-guard with his question and because of other things on my mind did not respond to the gauntlet he had thrown down. It was, at the time much easier to let him unload his mind and so he told us a story that another friend had shared with him.
Long after he left his question remained- like a splinter in the finger that is right where you use it most. “So what revelation has God given you lately?” echoed in my mind.
Casting about in the muddied waters of my head I searched in vain for what I could answer that cheeky question with. This only bugged me more. In desperation I reiterated something that had been on my mind some weeks ago. At a loss for anything fresh I got at it again, gnawing on it like an old dog with his favourite bone.
(John 17:1,2,3) These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
God, who- by definition is all-powerful- has given Jesus, according to his own testimony, power over all flesh. So the power of Jesus is an unqualified power over all flesh. To what purpose did God give Jesus this power over mankind? …that he should give eternal life…
According to the verses above, Jesus claims that he has the power to give eternal life to as many as God has given him.
So far this was all going over old ground to me, but thinking about it again something fresh did come. I was chewing over the word “give”. Whatever is given is … well a gift. Wow great revelation I thought! Now I know my Arminian friends think of this in these terms: God has given a mandate to Jesus to offer eternal life to as many as God says. But it is always in the persons own control whether or not to accept that offer. That person always has the last, the final, the ultimate say whether to accept or reject that gift.
But when you think about it, that rather nullifies the statement that God has given him power over all flesh doesn’t it? I mean if a person can refuse what is offered then how can it be said truthfully that Jesus has power over all flesh? What would be the point of saying that Jesus had power over all? Power to do what? Power to give the choice of eternal life? Is that the sense of it? But if all had power to refuse eternal life how then could it be given? But how can we relate these terms without doing violence to the meaning of any of them? Eternal life is a gift, a gracious gift, undeserved. It would also be wrong to think of Christ not accomplishing the directive God had made Jesus responsible for, that is giving eternal life.
If Jesus merely offered eternal life he could not be said to have fulfilled his commission to give eternal life. Neither does it make any sense to talk of "power over all flesh"- what power is needed over anyone to offer them something? And just as surely it would be wrong to think that Christ’s power to give entailed forcing someone to accept what they did not want- against their will. It all hinges on the word "give". Whenever this subject is discussed (at least in the Arminian camp) the word “give” is always used in the way we think of any gift. It can be received or rejected, welcomed or left behind at will. No-one- I will be bold enough to say- ever thinks of it in terms of how a strong man would give a weaker one a black eye! If the stronger has in fact “power over” the other then all the refusing in the world will not stop him getting his black eye!
Well that would do justice to the idea of “giving” by someone more powerful, someone who truly had “power over”, but that would only give rise to another problem. Are people known to go kicking and screaming into heaven? Are people forced to have eternal life against their will? Is that what scripture means? Are we mere automatons? No, not by any means. How then does God -through Christ-give eternal life? He makes them willing. He necessitates their willingness. By the secret work of the Holy Ghost in their stony heart he gets to work and gives them a heart of flesh. So when they come to Christ they quite naturally feel that it is purely their own decision, their own choice, voluntarily, wilfully believing in the Son whom God had given. But the scripture is careful not to leave us under the illusion that this was primarily our doing alone. Is this not why Jesus said: Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you… (John 15:16) Is’nt this also why it is written: (Ephesians 2:8) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (Ephesians 2:9) Not of works, lest any man should boast. Is this not also why the scripture says: (Hebrews 12:2) … Jesus the author and finisher of our faith…
How does the scripture define this gift “eternal life”? That comes in the very next verse: (John 17:3) And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
Knowing God and Christ is eternal life. This knowledge is the inestimable gift of God through Christ. This is further attested to in the verse: (John 6:29) Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.
So the work of God is not only the revelation of the knowledge of Christ in the Bible, or in history- but it is the personal revelation of the knowledge of Christ in your heart- your faith in him is the result of God at work in your heart to believe. As also it is written here: (Philippians 2:13) For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. God in Christ has worked a willingness in you to believe and so do his good pleasure. Of course it felt like your own choice, of course it did not feel forced or coerced because the work went on inside you, not externally like some great bouncer forcing you out of the kingdom of darkness and into the light.
Well all this I have covered before elsewhere, what’s new? Well there is never anything new according to Malcolm Muggeridge it’s just old news given to new people! But this distinction came quite strongly to me. That is, the distinction between giving and offering. See here now the difference between Abraham offering and God giving. What I mean is- they both had an only son. And they both were given to be a sacrifice, or were they? Look carefully at the verses and note the distinction.
(Genesis 22:2) And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.
Abraham offered up his son on the altar of sacrifice and that is precisely what God had required of him. In the final analysis his life was offered not given. Despite him being an only child of his beloved, the only one promised, just as Christ was the fulfilment of promise so too was Isaac and Abraham dutifully offered him up. But not so with Christ-
(John 3:16) For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Christ was not only offered he was given. Eternal life was not offered it was given. Christ- we are specifically told, and in the same context- had power over all flesh to give (not merely offer) eternal life to as many as God had given him.
(2 Corinthians 4:6) For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
When you shut your eyes you can effectively shut out the light, you can deny the knowledge of it, you can remain ignorant of whatever the light would make manifest- but what of it when the light shines in your heart where there is no hiding place left? It cannot be denied, Christ will not be denied. When the light comes on inside of you, shutting your eyes has no darkening effect.
When someone is said to know something it is understood that what is known is true, ie, knowledge is that which corresponds to reality. To make this clearer, one cannot know what is not true. For instance one cannot know that the Earth is flat. One can think they know that it is, believe that it is, one can assume that it is, imagine that it is, even hope that it is, but one cannot know this, because it is untrue. In this way we get a truer- indeed a Biblical- understanding of what it means to know something.
When one keeps this in mind it is easier to see the Biblical understanding when we read: (John 17:3) And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. (Emphasis mine) To know God truly is the gift of God through Jesus Christ and this knowledge is actually expressed here as eternal life. In the verses we have been discussing (John 17:2,3) we see that having the lights turned on inside of us with regard to who Jesus really is, and the true nature of God is not our work at all in one sense, but we, in essence, become His workmanship. So in one sense it is our work since it's going on inside us, we are thinking and knowing, and in another, more ultimate sense it is the work of grace, alone, through scripture alone, through Christ alone.
The word of God bears cogent witness to the truth of this understanding when in (Romans 9:23) it says:
And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,(Emphasis mine)
To "make known", in this sense is to bring a person infallibly to acknowledging and understanding of the truth. To make human choice ultimate here is to misunderstand the import of these verses and amounts to saying one can thwart God's plan, and purpose. To "make known" in this way is to ensure the object (the one hearing it) becomes subject to that knowledge. Of that knowledge- one cannot pretend, or claim ignorance or disown that knowledge, and neither can knowledge in this sense fail to conquer and subdue its object. but more than that, with this gift of knowledge ones heart is also warmed by it, no even more- Life comes with it- Eternal life. All humans can do as his disciples, is to merely proclaim that word, and to the best of our exegetical skills explain that word- but sovereign God alone by his Spirit keeps for himself the ability to "make known" the riches of his Glory.
This understanding is also attested to here in John 1:17,18 and the New International Version is clear in this regard:
For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.(Emphasis mine)
This is not merely the sense of say, a King charging a town crier with the job of making known the edicts of said King as he rings his bell and stands in the city square, scroll at arms length. No, this is knowledge imparted to those dead in trespasses in sins, who at the hearing of faith come forth as Lazarus did from the tomb! As someone wisely said: Christ did not come to make bad men good, but to make dead men live!
We see here the difficulty and inadequacy of language to express an idea that does not fall into extremes of one sort or another. The word "made" is all too strong a word when we fall into the trap of understanding it as compulsion or force- outside of our will or against our will. And yet again it becomes all too weak a word when we understand it as knowledge that God has made known to us without the effect of conforming our will to that knowledge, as if it were merely a matter of our own will whether to come to faith- or not.
The great reformer Martin Luther also struggled with language (in this case the German language) to adequately express the meaning conveyed in these verses, to adequately express this truth. Remember, also that Luther was no stranger to the German language, having been credited by many to have unified the German language for the first time, through his translation of the Bible into his native tongue. Here is an excerpt from a good translation of his magnum opus, "The Bondage of the Will" (Henry Cole, c1923)
"James get off that x-box and tidy your room right now...please" J.J. nods impatiently without averting eyes from screen, yanks vigorously on his console while screwing it to the right, his fingers chattering on the buttons. Several seconds pass. Dad, ramping up the volume repeats his request. Time passes like an eternity, nothing changes... (Up to this point there is nothing here that the average person could not understand.)
Suddenly with a knowing look Dad reaches into his pocket and pulls out... a remote! He points it towards the recalcitrant J.J and pushes the prominent red button. Actually he is aiming it at the closet in a direct line beyond J.J. Immediately the closet door is smashed to pieces from the inside and a massive robot stomps in J.J.'s direction. The floor shakes with each footfall as he advances menacingly towards J.J. Now if you have seen the movie Avatar you will immediately recognize the type of robot I am speaking of. It is the AMP suit of Colonel Miles Quaritch. But with a difference...
In the following quote from the Westminster Confession (Ch, III, sec.I) one can see in the language the care that has been taken to preserve the immutable, infallible, will of God but also to convey the true condition, responsibility and limited sovereignty of the creature.
(Isaiah 46:10,11) Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure… yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it.
For further discussion of this subject: "As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him."
Long after he left his question remained- like a splinter in the finger that is right where you use it most. “So what revelation has God given you lately?” echoed in my mind.
Casting about in the muddied waters of my head I searched in vain for what I could answer that cheeky question with. This only bugged me more. In desperation I reiterated something that had been on my mind some weeks ago. At a loss for anything fresh I got at it again, gnawing on it like an old dog with his favourite bone.
(John 17:1,2,3) These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
God, who- by definition is all-powerful- has given Jesus, according to his own testimony, power over all flesh. So the power of Jesus is an unqualified power over all flesh. To what purpose did God give Jesus this power over mankind? …that he should give eternal life…
According to the verses above, Jesus claims that he has the power to give eternal life to as many as God has given him.
So far this was all going over old ground to me, but thinking about it again something fresh did come. I was chewing over the word “give”. Whatever is given is … well a gift. Wow great revelation I thought! Now I know my Arminian friends think of this in these terms: God has given a mandate to Jesus to offer eternal life to as many as God says. But it is always in the persons own control whether or not to accept that offer. That person always has the last, the final, the ultimate say whether to accept or reject that gift.
But when you think about it, that rather nullifies the statement that God has given him power over all flesh doesn’t it? I mean if a person can refuse what is offered then how can it be said truthfully that Jesus has power over all flesh? What would be the point of saying that Jesus had power over all? Power to do what? Power to give the choice of eternal life? Is that the sense of it? But if all had power to refuse eternal life how then could it be given? But how can we relate these terms without doing violence to the meaning of any of them? Eternal life is a gift, a gracious gift, undeserved. It would also be wrong to think of Christ not accomplishing the directive God had made Jesus responsible for, that is giving eternal life.
If Jesus merely offered eternal life he could not be said to have fulfilled his commission to give eternal life. Neither does it make any sense to talk of "power over all flesh"- what power is needed over anyone to offer them something? And just as surely it would be wrong to think that Christ’s power to give entailed forcing someone to accept what they did not want- against their will. It all hinges on the word "give". Whenever this subject is discussed (at least in the Arminian camp) the word “give” is always used in the way we think of any gift. It can be received or rejected, welcomed or left behind at will. No-one- I will be bold enough to say- ever thinks of it in terms of how a strong man would give a weaker one a black eye! If the stronger has in fact “power over” the other then all the refusing in the world will not stop him getting his black eye!
Well that would do justice to the idea of “giving” by someone more powerful, someone who truly had “power over”, but that would only give rise to another problem. Are people known to go kicking and screaming into heaven? Are people forced to have eternal life against their will? Is that what scripture means? Are we mere automatons? No, not by any means. How then does God -through Christ-give eternal life? He makes them willing. He necessitates their willingness. By the secret work of the Holy Ghost in their stony heart he gets to work and gives them a heart of flesh. So when they come to Christ they quite naturally feel that it is purely their own decision, their own choice, voluntarily, wilfully believing in the Son whom God had given. But the scripture is careful not to leave us under the illusion that this was primarily our doing alone. Is this not why Jesus said: Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you… (John 15:16) Is’nt this also why it is written: (Ephesians 2:8) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (Ephesians 2:9) Not of works, lest any man should boast. Is this not also why the scripture says: (Hebrews 12:2) … Jesus the author and finisher of our faith…
How does the scripture define this gift “eternal life”? That comes in the very next verse: (John 17:3) And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
Knowing God and Christ is eternal life. This knowledge is the inestimable gift of God through Christ. This is further attested to in the verse: (John 6:29) Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.
So the work of God is not only the revelation of the knowledge of Christ in the Bible, or in history- but it is the personal revelation of the knowledge of Christ in your heart- your faith in him is the result of God at work in your heart to believe. As also it is written here: (Philippians 2:13) For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. God in Christ has worked a willingness in you to believe and so do his good pleasure. Of course it felt like your own choice, of course it did not feel forced or coerced because the work went on inside you, not externally like some great bouncer forcing you out of the kingdom of darkness and into the light.
Well all this I have covered before elsewhere, what’s new? Well there is never anything new according to Malcolm Muggeridge it’s just old news given to new people! But this distinction came quite strongly to me. That is, the distinction between giving and offering. See here now the difference between Abraham offering and God giving. What I mean is- they both had an only son. And they both were given to be a sacrifice, or were they? Look carefully at the verses and note the distinction.
(Genesis 22:2) And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.
Abraham offered up his son on the altar of sacrifice and that is precisely what God had required of him. In the final analysis his life was offered not given. Despite him being an only child of his beloved, the only one promised, just as Christ was the fulfilment of promise so too was Isaac and Abraham dutifully offered him up. But not so with Christ-
(John 3:16) For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Christ was not only offered he was given. Eternal life was not offered it was given. Christ- we are specifically told, and in the same context- had power over all flesh to give (not merely offer) eternal life to as many as God had given him.
(2 Corinthians 4:6) For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
When you shut your eyes you can effectively shut out the light, you can deny the knowledge of it, you can remain ignorant of whatever the light would make manifest- but what of it when the light shines in your heart where there is no hiding place left? It cannot be denied, Christ will not be denied. When the light comes on inside of you, shutting your eyes has no darkening effect.
When someone is said to know something it is understood that what is known is true, ie, knowledge is that which corresponds to reality. To make this clearer, one cannot know what is not true. For instance one cannot know that the Earth is flat. One can think they know that it is, believe that it is, one can assume that it is, imagine that it is, even hope that it is, but one cannot know this, because it is untrue. In this way we get a truer- indeed a Biblical- understanding of what it means to know something.
When one keeps this in mind it is easier to see the Biblical understanding when we read: (John 17:3) And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. (Emphasis mine) To know God truly is the gift of God through Jesus Christ and this knowledge is actually expressed here as eternal life. In the verses we have been discussing (John 17:2,3) we see that having the lights turned on inside of us with regard to who Jesus really is, and the true nature of God is not our work at all in one sense, but we, in essence, become His workmanship. So in one sense it is our work since it's going on inside us, we are thinking and knowing, and in another, more ultimate sense it is the work of grace, alone, through scripture alone, through Christ alone.
The word of God bears cogent witness to the truth of this understanding when in (Romans 9:23) it says:
And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,(Emphasis mine)
To "make known", in this sense is to bring a person infallibly to acknowledging and understanding of the truth. To make human choice ultimate here is to misunderstand the import of these verses and amounts to saying one can thwart God's plan, and purpose. To "make known" in this way is to ensure the object (the one hearing it) becomes subject to that knowledge. Of that knowledge- one cannot pretend, or claim ignorance or disown that knowledge, and neither can knowledge in this sense fail to conquer and subdue its object. but more than that, with this gift of knowledge ones heart is also warmed by it, no even more- Life comes with it- Eternal life. All humans can do as his disciples, is to merely proclaim that word, and to the best of our exegetical skills explain that word- but sovereign God alone by his Spirit keeps for himself the ability to "make known" the riches of his Glory.
This understanding is also attested to here in John 1:17,18 and the New International Version is clear in this regard:
For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.(Emphasis mine)
This is not merely the sense of say, a King charging a town crier with the job of making known the edicts of said King as he rings his bell and stands in the city square, scroll at arms length. No, this is knowledge imparted to those dead in trespasses in sins, who at the hearing of faith come forth as Lazarus did from the tomb! As someone wisely said: Christ did not come to make bad men good, but to make dead men live!
We see here the difficulty and inadequacy of language to express an idea that does not fall into extremes of one sort or another. The word "made" is all too strong a word when we fall into the trap of understanding it as compulsion or force- outside of our will or against our will. And yet again it becomes all too weak a word when we understand it as knowledge that God has made known to us without the effect of conforming our will to that knowledge, as if it were merely a matter of our own will whether to come to faith- or not.
The great reformer Martin Luther also struggled with language (in this case the German language) to adequately express the meaning conveyed in these verses, to adequately express this truth. Remember, also that Luther was no stranger to the German language, having been credited by many to have unified the German language for the first time, through his translation of the Bible into his native tongue. Here is an excerpt from a good translation of his magnum opus, "The Bondage of the Will" (Henry Cole, c1923)
I could wish, indeed, that we were furnished with some better term for this discussion, that this commonly used term, necessity, (by this word he means force or compulsion) which cannot rightly be used, either with reference to the human will, or the divine. It is of a signification too harsh and ill-suited for this subject, forcing upon the mind an idea of compulsion, and that which is altogether contrary to will; whereas, the subject which we are discussing, does not require such an idea: for Will whether divine or human, does what it does, be good or evil, not by any compulsion, but by mere willingness or desire, as it were, totally free. The will of God, nevertheless, which rules over our mutable will, is immutable and infallible; as Boetius sings, "Immovable thyself, thou movement giv's (movement) to all." And our own will, especially our corrupt will, cannot of itself do good ; thererfore, where the term fails to express the idea required, the understanding of the reader must make up the deficiency knowing what is wished to be expressed- the immutable will if God, and the impotency of our depraved will ; or, as some have expressed it, the necessity of immutability, though neither is that sufficiently grammatical, or sufficiently theological.I think the difficulty in accepting the understanding of this teaching lies chiefly in our human limitations. Let me put this in much more contemporary terms. Imagine this scenario: James senior (the father) walks past the open door of James junior's room. J.J. is seen totally absorbed in front of his x-box. Strewn around him is a mess. The remains of a previous dinner on the dresser is starting to look distinctly furry around the edges, school clothes lie in various states of disarray throughout the room, toys are strewn about in various stages of abandonment, a waft of stale air emanates from the scene. I think you get the picture.
"James get off that x-box and tidy your room right now...please" J.J. nods impatiently without averting eyes from screen, yanks vigorously on his console while screwing it to the right, his fingers chattering on the buttons. Several seconds pass. Dad, ramping up the volume repeats his request. Time passes like an eternity, nothing changes... (Up to this point there is nothing here that the average person could not understand.)
Suddenly with a knowing look Dad reaches into his pocket and pulls out... a remote! He points it towards the recalcitrant J.J and pushes the prominent red button. Actually he is aiming it at the closet in a direct line beyond J.J. Immediately the closet door is smashed to pieces from the inside and a massive robot stomps in J.J.'s direction. The floor shakes with each footfall as he advances menacingly towards J.J. Now if you have seen the movie Avatar you will immediately recognize the type of robot I am speaking of. It is the AMP suit of Colonel Miles Quaritch. But with a difference...
James Senior clicks another button- (if we had actually been there and had been closely watching we might have read the label on this button as "REVERSE MORPHE") and the AMP suit immediately transforms into something akin to a housefly and about the same size. Now, instead of being an extension of the human body it morphs into- something you could call an unknown will- which utilized the human mind as an extension of itself. It flys, sorry, flies straight to the back of J.J.'s startled head and starts implanting electrodes on his scalp. J.J.'s Dad repeats his imperative: "James get off that x-box and tidy your room right now...please"
"Yeah, sure Dad, whatever you want, funny I was just thinking what a waste of time it is sitting on this x-box when I could be doing something really interesting and useful like tidying my room, I don't know what got into me". Dad grins and carries on past the room pocketing with a flourish his "piece de resistance". In no time at all J.J.'s room is a picture of order, except for the shattered door on the floor which J.J. seems incapable of comprehending, ignoring it completely. The "fly" retreats to his wardrobe and if you or I were actually present we might observe that just as it re-entered the closet it transformed again into something akin to a dove. Miraculously the shattered door reassembles itself just as if someone was rewinding the video and presto it's back in its frame. J.J takes one long satisfied look at his work and reluctantly consigns himself to finishing his game on the x-box.
Now I hope everyone has continued to follow and understand the import of this little parable. And there are a couple of things that I wish to bring to your attention. Firstly- notice the satisfaction on the face of J.J. after he completed the work, this occurred after the fly returned to its place. It's real and it's his own. While he was busy working on his room J.J. was completely conscious that what he was doing was completely voluntary, not forced, although deep in the recesses of his own mind he was sort of puzzled as he realized that he had had a complete change of heart towards the state of his room, not to mention a change in attitude towards his fathers invitation to take responsibility for his life. Also notice, that having completed this particular work he carried on with his game. Although conversion is a complete instantaneous work in one sense, it takes a lifetime of change to work itself out in our salvation. Now I to turn to those who wish to impose on us the idea of absolute human autonomy. Did you have a choice on who were your parents? No. Did you have a choice on where you were born? No. Did you choose the point of history when you were born? The color of your hair, (originally). Etc. etc. In the experience of humanity, that is in terms of imperical verifiability, there are only two options open to an earthly father. Firstly we use a moral imperative, we inherently understand our moral nature and if we want another to do something we simply- and respectful of their human sovereignty- we simply ask. This pays us the inestimable complement of assuring us that the person asking is aware that we are not an animal, or perhaps even less than an animal, that we are moral agents and capable of listening to reason. For humanity the only other alternative to impose their will is to force someone against their will using physical, emotional, or any other coercive means, but in such away that even though the request is granted the one on the receiving end is acutely aware of their will being violated. Knowing that only these two alternatives are open to humanity, it is a paradigm shift of major proportions to realize that God is not restricted by our humanity. Neither has he made us mere automatons.
For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ....It is not by force nor by power but by his spirit...that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.
For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ....It is not by force nor by power but by his spirit...that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.
I love C.S Lewis's turn of phrase where in recounting his own conversion to Christianity he says: "The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation.”
In the great controversy thrashed out at the Synod of Dordt in 1619 the Church authorities overwhelmingly rejected the Arminian views of the Remonstrants out of which came the five doctrines affirmed by the reformed (protestant) Churches. These are popularly known by the acronym TULIP – The “I” standing for irresistible grace. When God has chosen to save someone, He will.
In 1643 the English Parliament called upon "learned, godly and judicious Divines", to meet at Westminster Abbey in order to provide advice on issues of worship, doctrine, government and discipline of the Church of England. Their meetings, over a period of five years, produced the Confession of Faith, as well as a Larger Catechism and a Shorter Catechism. For more than three centuries, various churches around the world have adopted the Confession and the Catechisms as their standards of doctrine, subordinate to the Bible.(Quote from wikipedia.org)
In the following quote from the Westminster Confession (Ch, III, sec.I) one can see in the language the care that has been taken to preserve the immutable, infallible, will of God but also to convey the true condition, responsibility and limited sovereignty of the creature.
God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsover comes to pass: yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.In the light of this discussion I hope and pray that it is abundantly clear that the will of God is the prime mover, indeed the author and finisher of our faith, our willingness to follow Christ, but also that it is equally clear but not equally necessary that the human will is involved in our choice of Christ. As God has ordained human will as contingent second cause in salvation.
(Isaiah 46:10,11) Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure… yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it.
For further discussion of this subject: "As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him."
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