Unconditional Election
Tom Shrader examines the doctrine of unconditional election, focusing on Romans 9 and the story of Jacob and Esau. He explains that God's choice to save certain people is based entirely on His sovereign mercy and good pleasure, not on any foreseen faith or merit within the chosen. This is part four of a series on the five points of Calvinism, emphasizing that salvation is wholly God's work from beginning to end.
“You are lost in your sins and trespasses, you cannot come to the Father, you will not come to the Father, you have no interest in spiritual things.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: God's Plan for Salvation (EVBC) (2002)
Recorded: June 23, 2002
Duration: 1 hr 19 min
Themes: salvation, sovereignty, grace, mercy, election, choice, authority, scripture, questioning salvation, new believer, seminary student, pastor, facing opposition, defending faith, bible study leader, struggling with doubts
Scripture: Romans 9:10-23, 1 Corinthians 2:14, John 6:44, Ephesians 1:3-4, 1 Thessalonians 1:4, 2 Timothy 1:9, Acts 13:48, Acts 16:14
Theological Themes: unconditional election, calvinism, predestination, divine sovereignty, biblical authority, soteriology, romans nine, total depravity
Full Transcript
We look at today what I think is session four in this series titled God's Plan for Salvation. What we're looking at is how were you saved from a biblical view, from God's view. We're trying to understand what the Scripture has to say about your salvation and mine.
Here are the ground rules we laid out at the very beginning for this study, and let me talk a little bit about the first one. The Bible is our final authority. There's a young lady last night who came up after the service and said she was raised in this teaching that we're doing now. She believes it. She embraces it. She has been able to fight her way through opposition from others who don't accept it, but she's been away doing some training, and she's been around a lot of Christians who would totally reject our view of salvation.
She said one night one of the professors gave her this argument. He said, "Listen, you can make somebody obey you, but you can't make somebody love you. So God can't make somebody love Him." She said she didn't know what to do with that. I said, "Well, let's go back to the first rule. I didn't hear a Bible verse in there. I didn't hear any scriptural support for that."
The Problem with Human Arguments
That's what happens so often in your discussion and mine. We'll be talking to somebody about how God saves us, and then they'll come with all sorts of these analogies that are filled with either human experience or emotionalism. There's nothing from Scripture that we have to deal with there. That doesn't address anything that we're talking about. That is, the boy downstairs plays baseball, meaning it has nothing to do with anything. It's just a total throwaway statement. It doesn't mean anything. "Can't make anybody love you." Whatever. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about what does the Scripture say about salvation.
I have to go back to that again and again. Here you go. This is the anthem that we have shouted for the last four weeks: Let God be God. That's what we're talking about. Let's just let God be who He really is. It's important for you to understand the culture you're in, and by that I mean the evangelical culture, the church culture. The church culture right now is not letting God be God. Man is magnified. God is minified. We need to understand that.
The Five Points Framework
I'll always be at the forefront. We subtitled this series, The Five Points of Calvinism, and we said we're going to teach from these. Let me explain to you, and again this is the 50th time, but I really need you to grasp this. We don't study this stuff because Calvin said it, or Luther, or Augustine, or Edwards, or all of the great minds basically saying the same thing. It's not because they say it that we study it. They didn't invent God's plan for salvation. It flows from the Scripture. They helped put it in a system. They helped clarify it for us.
These are the things we look at. We've looked at total inability, or total depravity, or the radical depravity, the radical nature of man. Man's lost. Here's what we said: As a result of Adam's sin, all mankind is spiritually dead, unable to comprehend and believe spiritual truth. Man is blind and deaf to the message of salvation. That is so important. That is our concept of original sin. That's our concept of the condition of man. Your view of that issue right there is going to have an enormous effect on how you see God's working in salvation.
Addressing the Arminian View
That is the view that we've talked about that's the Calvinistic view. The other side that we identify is the Arminian view. Michelle was shouting from her cubicle the other day, and she said, "Come here and look at this website." I said, "Can you get this so we can get it up on the screen on Sunday?" She said, "Absolutely."
Here's what she got. It's the Arminian archive, the biblical evidence supporting an Arminian view. You might not be able to see it in the small print. It says, "If you so freely will, click the Bible to discover everything in the Bible that supports Arminian theology." So you put your little cursor up there, and you put it on the Bible, and you click, and here's what comes up [empty page]. There's a little humor there.
Now I didn't make this up. Last time we used this, somebody got mad. How do you get mad at that? I didn't make that up. That is an actual website that we came across. I like that, but let's be honest here. There is some biblical evidence. There are some verses that present problems to what we believe. Isn't God willing that none should perish? That's what Peter writes. Didn't Paul write to Timothy, "I desire that all men would be saved"? Sure he did. We think there's real easy explanations and answers to that, easy in the sense that once we put them in context and compare them to the balance of Scripture.
Monday Night Forum
That's why the forum exists for you on Monday night. If you are one of those people who are really navigating your way through these waters for the first time, and you're struggling in some of these areas, join us on Monday night. It's an open forum discussion. You raise issues. We try to answer those questions to the best of our ability.
If you've already got this settled, Monday night's probably not a great night for you. You're more than welcome to come, but we're really targeting those of you who are struggling with this, or kind of have it settled, or just this is killing you, and you've got questions, and maybe you don't even want to ask them. You just want to hear the dialogue. You ought to join us tomorrow night, seven o'clock, up in room 100.
Two Critical Questions
Here are the two questions we ask, as we ended a couple weeks ago. Can fallen man, that's natural man, that's man, woman, boy, girl, apart from Christ, man in his natural state, can he do anything that's spiritually profitable? The answer to that is no. God doesn't stutter here. God's Word is not confusing here. He says this in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, verse
The Natural Man Cannot Receive Spiritual Things
"The natural man does not receive the things of God, for they are foolishness to him, nor can he know them, because they're spiritually discerned." When we say as Christians that the Holy Spirit lives in our life, so often we say that and find great comfort in it, and there is. There's great comfort in that, great benefit in that.
Our God's not a distant God. Bette Midler sang that song. God's not a distant God. He indwells you through the Holy Spirit. Part of what that Spirit does is open your eyes so that you can see spiritual truths. Natural man, without the indwelling Holy Spirit, does not receive spiritual things and cannot receive them, meaning he can't understand them.
So here's a logical question: Can natural man find within him the ability to come to Christ, make a decision for Christ, to receive Jesus as Lord and Savior? Is that possible? Can natural man do that?
No One Can Come Unless the Father Draws Him
Again, the Scripture is not silent, and Jesus does not stutter. No one can. No one has the ability. No one has the desire to come to Christ, unless there has to be a pre-existing condition, unless the Father who sent me draws Him.
We said that word "draws" appears two other times in the New Testament. Once in the book of James, as James talks about the rich dragging the poor to court. Another time in the book of Acts when Paul and Silas are dragged into the marketplace. It's not the idea that God is just gently wooing. Unless God is in a man's life and gives that man a new heart, a new understanding, a new desire, he will never come. That's the condition of man.
That issue, it seems to me, is settled. I have not yet heard the argument on the other side that is at all persuasive. There hasn't been anybody who has tried, at least that I'm aware of, in our meetings or in my email, to justify that natural man has the ability to do a spiritual thing. They can't. You can't. How are you going to make that argument in light of this? You can't.
It's always something that you back into, and generally flows out of this: Why would God hold man responsible for something he couldn't do? Therefore, he must be able to do it. Which sounds sweet logically, but has no biblical support.
Defining Unconditional Election
What we look at today is the U in the tulip: unconditional election. Whenever we talk about Calvinism, or whenever people talk about East Valley Bible Church, it isn't long before they start to talk about how we are those people who believe in election. Well, let's define some terms, and let's just take it head-on. I'm comfortable with that.
What we mean by election is this: God chooses to save certain people, and that choice was based on nothing within these people, but solely rests on God's good pleasure.
So when somebody says to you, "I don't believe in election," what I think they're saying is, "I don't accept that." This is a huge point. Every person who's a Christian, within anything close to the normal definition of the word, every person who's a Christian believes in election. They believe either that man chooses God, or God chooses man.
Every Christian Believes in Election
Every Christian believes that we have somehow moved from the position of sinner to saint, that our destination has been changed from hell to heaven. The question is, how'd that happen? Who does that choosing? You cannot get away from the Scripture that talks about God's elect, and God chooses. So you have to give some definition to that.
So many will say, "Well, listen, here's what happens: man ultimately makes that choice. God does all this work. Boy, He does a lot of it. Let's make certain. In fact, He does most of it. He does almost all of it, but man has to choose."
The Practical Side: My Personal Testimony
Any of you who know me know that I am not a scholar, and I'm not that interested, unfortunately I guess, in scholarship, and certainly not scholarship for scholarship's sake. So I want to know the practical side of this. I'll give it to you from my own life.
For years, I thought that I had a mustard seed of faith that I had produced. That had been my experience after all. I had chosen Him. I had that mustard seed of faith, and I produced that mustard seed. So here's what happened: For years, my God was diminished in His glory by my believing in the fact that I generated that faith. God shrank. I got bigger.
When I read the scripture and all of a sudden understood that salvation is totally an act of God from beginning to end, at that point, all of a sudden, God becomes bigger, and I become smaller. Let God be God. That's the cry. Don't elevate yourself.
The Evidence of Our Depravity
Let the scripture say what it says, and here's what it says: You are lost in your sins and trespasses. You cannot come to the Father. You will not come to the Father. You have no interest in spiritual things.
Some of you are rock-solid bored right now. You're not Christians, and you're here for whatever reason. Somebody you know or love cared enough to invite you or bring you here, or your parents made you come, and you are bored stiff right now. That's evidence of how lost you are, because this is good stuff. That's evidence of how depraved you are.
God Saves Sinners: A Simple Sentence
Here's a simple sentence that, again, almost all Christians will agree on: God saves sinners. Not complicated. Three words. It's a sentence.
When I was in school, they used to make us diagram sentences. I think now they're just pleased if you can read them, but when I was in school, you had to diagram a sentence, and I just thought it was the dumbest thing I'd ever heard. I used to go home. I went home once, and I said to my dad, "Hey, dad, today at the bank," that's where he worked, I said, "did you diagram a sentence?" And he said, "No." And then I said, "I don't understand why we've got to do this." And he said, "Bam, because they told you to." And I said, "Oh, yeah, that's right, because they told me to."
Well, you know what? Those nuns, their work paid off, because me working with you to diagram this sentence, I think, opens up the sentence.
God saves sinners. Let's get the terms clear. God—that's the triune God. We're talking about election today. You understand that election didn't save anybody. Election determines those who'll be saved. Election and salvation are part of the work of the triune God. The Father chooses those He will save. The Son comes and sheds His blood for those that the Father has chosen. Then the Holy Spirit comes and applies that to a person's life.
God. So if we're going to diagram the sentence, the subject, the noun, the actor is God. The predicate, the verb, the action is saves. God does everything. God saves sinners.
I looked, and we weren't trying to trick you today. I'm not that clever, but you were singing "It's All About You." I looked around to make sure lips were moving. You sang it. It's all about You. It's not about me.
I don't mean this critically, but I want you to see it. The Arminian sings "It's Some About You and Some About Me." It's about us. It's about You and what You did, but it's about me and my contribution. It is all about Him from beginning to end.
The Direct Object in God's Salvation
Sinner. That's in the sentence that we diagram. That's the direct object. You put your name in there. If you're a Christian, God saves Tom. I always said if I was in a sentence, you know what I want to be? I want to be a direct object. They have no responsibility. They're not the actor. They're not the action.
What's a direct object do? Nothing. They're just proud to be part of the sentence, and that's what I am. I'm just proud to be part of that. Do you see that? That direct object doesn't do anything. I throw the ball. What's the ball do? It just goes. God saves sinners. He saves us.
See how words become so important to us? You can get a hundred Christians today, and almost all of them will say "God saves sinners," and the minute you define it, ninety percent of them say "I don't agree with that." That's what the Bible teaches.
Building the Logical Case
There's a reason that we're moving logically. I know this is painfully slow in a very fast-paced world to move slowly and logically, but there's a reason for it, and that's because this case builds logically.
After the fall and mankind's death in Adam, man simply could not save himself. You need to come to grips with that. That's the condition of man. Get everything else out of the way for now. That's man's natural condition in his natural state. He's lost. He needs a Savior. He needs to be born again. He needs a remedy. He needs a sacrifice for his sin, but there's nothing he can do about it.
Something has to happen to man. Got the scene? Man's dead in his sin and trespasses. He's broken a law, therefore he's guilty of the whole law. He's as guilty as he can be. He might be able to sin more than he really does, but he's as guilty as he can be, and the wage of sin is death, and man's separated from God, and there's nothing man can do.
God's Three Options
So at this point, it's up to God. Cut me some slack here, because God operates in infinity, and there's not this time and space and all that other thing, but at this point, God's got choices, it seems to me, regarding salvation. He has three of them. He could save no one. He could save everyone, or he could save some.
All you have to do is look around and see that the first two aren't true. There are people here today who are very confident, based on God's Word, that heaven is their destination, that you're children of God. So we understand that there are some saved, at least, but we also understand that there are those who want nothing to do with these things that clearly aren't saved, very confident that there are people who are in hell.
So what we see is God could have saved no one, or he could have saved everyone, but what he decided to do was to save some.
God's Sovereignty in Salvation
God's sovereign. That's why he can do that. He's God. Webster defined sovereignty this way: above or superior to all others, supreme in power and rank. He's independent of all others. Let God be God! There's the cry. Let God be God. He's not dependent on you. He's not dependent on me. He's not restricted as we are. He is the sovereign one.
So when it comes to salvation, we can summarize it this way. As we look at God in salvation, we see this: He can do whatever He pleases. He does not need anyone's permission to do anything. He's under no obligation to save anyone.
He could have sent every person that ever lived to hell and be absolutely just in doing it. That's what you deserve. When you say "I just want what I deserve, I just want what I've earned," hell's what you've earned. He could have done that, and His justice would have been maintained.
The Sufficiency of Christ's Sacrifice
He could have saved everyone. The blood that Christ shed was sufficient to pay the price for all the sin of all people who've ever lived, if God wanted it to. There was no more blood for Jesus to shed to save one more person. The sacrifice was perfect. There was enough blood, in fact, to be the propitiation of the whole world, if that was God's design. It wasn't.
He would have been perfectly just in choosing any of these three options, but He chose to save some. And with that choice to save some, there's no obligation to save others.
That's one of the arguments you hear. You got a guy here, and you got a guy here. Well, if you're going to save this one, then you have to save this one. No, not at all. God will never act in a way that's unjust. This person gets mercy. This person gets justice. No one gets injustice.
No Obligation for Universal Mercy
The fact that God extends mercy to one person does not in any way obligate Him to extend mercy to every person that's ever lived.
So when we talk about unconditional election, here's what we're saying. That God chose to save certain individuals, and that choice was based on nothing within these people but rests solely on God's good pleasure.
If you're here today, and you're a Christian, and all of a sudden you're thinking, "Well, gee, that must be something really special. There must have been something..."
really enticing about me that God chose me. No. That's what the unconditional part of this means. There was nothing in you. You are as putrid as the guy next to you whom He didn't choose. Do you get that? That's your case.
That's why when you start to feel good about yourself, when you've got this world shouting at you, "feel good about yourself," what are you supposed to feel good about? I did a talk in Tucson one night, and there was a woman who called in on a Christian talk show to a Christian guy. She said, "My husband's left me, my daughter's pregnant, and I'm living with another guy." The guy said to her, "You should feel good about yourself." That's the first thing he said.
So I said this: what should she feel good about? That her marriage had fallen apart, that her daughter was pregnant, or that she was a slut? Well, when I said slut, there was a guy in about the fifth row who'd been pretty much asleep. He woke up and said, "Where's the slut? Who's the slut?" He's looking all over. It was one of those situations, because I was a guest at another church, I could just see the words and I thought, "Oh, there they go," and I wished I could take them back. That wasn't a very good thing, that was a bad thing.
It's interesting, the next week I got a letter. A guy gave me this note on pink stationery, and it was from a girl who was there at that Thanksgiving Eve service. She said, "When you said slut, I've been in church for months, but when you said slut, all of a sudden I realized that's exactly what I was. I went back to my boyfriend and I told him, 'We're off, we're done, move out.' He said, 'I won't.' And the next day, the day after Thanksgiving, I went and got an apartment."
That's you. You know that whole thing, "There but the grace of God go I"? That's a true statement. I think we say, "There but the grace of God go I," but inside we're going, "I don't really believe that for a second. I'm way better than that guy." No, you're not. There was nothing in you that would entice God.
What the Bible Says About Election
Here's what the Bible says about election. God does the choosing. Paul writes to the church at Thessalonica, and he says, "We constantly bear in mind your work of faith, your labor of love, your steadfastness of hope in Christ, knowing, beloved brethren, your election by God." We thank God for you, because God has chosen you. God's the one who does the choosing.
This choice was made before the foundation of the world, before the world's creation. Ephesians chapter 1, verse 3: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundations of the earth, that we would be holy and blameless before Him." That's your call, to live a life that's distinct and different.
You are a display case for God's good work. You were lost and wretched. You didn't care about God or the things of God, but God works in your life. Now there's holiness. Now there's desire. There's desire to study His word. There's desire to worship Him. There's desire to be with His people.
Some of you in this last year, some of you in this very room here, have experienced radical life change. Your parents or your children or your friends or your co-workers or your fellow students, they can say to you, "I've seen the change." Why? God's chosen you for salvation, and the evidence of that is your life becomes holy. Not perfect, but holy. You become His display case, the display for God's majesty and glory in this world. You're His display case.
God's Display Case
John chapter 9. Remember the story? Jesus and the disciples are coming into the city, and there's the man who's blind. The disciples say, "Who sinned, this guy or his parents, that he's blind?" Jesus said, "Neither one, but that the great works of God might be displayed in him." I think of him as a display case.
Every time I go into the mall, I always say the same thing. Every time we walk into a department store—Dillard's, Robinson's, Macy's, Nordstrom's—you walk right into the cosmetics. I say, "Here's the prime space. There must be so much profit in cosmetics. They must make a fortune in cosmetics, the markup," because they're all bright, and these women with their hair all pulled back are putting you in this light, and you go, "Oh, you look beautiful," and you go outside, and you go, "That's ugly."
But when I go to the jewelry store, there they are, and they take a piece of jewelry, and they display it as perfectly as they can to entice you. Their object is for you to buy it. What I think of is that you're God's display case to demonstrate to the whole world His grace and His mercy.
Not Based on Merit
Here's the third thing. This choice was not based on any merit within those who were chosen. Paul writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:9: "God who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and His own grace." This has nothing to do with us, not according to any of our works. He chose us according to His good pleasure.
An illustration that we'll look at in a minute is in Romans 9:11. Paul's writing about Jacob and Esau, and they're in their mother's womb. They haven't done anything, and they're chosen "that the purpose of God, according to election, might stand not of works, but of Him." God chooses.
Now, I've added this to break this out. God's choice is not based on man's unforeseen faith. We understand that it's not based on any work. There's nothing meritorious in your life. There's nothing you would do that would cause God to choose you. But I break this out because we
I hear this argument all the time, that God, here's how He chose. I believe in election. I believe that God looked down the corridor of time, saw those that would choose Him, and those are the ones that He chose. You hear that? You've heard that. Maybe you've said that.
Well, let's think about it a minute. If God looks down the corridor of time, and there are billions and billions and billions and billions of people left to their own desires, their natural fallen man, God looks down the corridor of time. He sees billions of people. He sees the gospel being preached. I'm not sure by who yet, but He sees the gospel being preached. He sees the Word being studied. He sees all this going on. He sees the invitation go out.
God looks down the corridor of time to see who would choose Him. How many would He see choose Him? None. That's what we started with. No natural man has the ability to choose God. God didn't look down the corridor of time and saw billions of people going, eh. That's what He saw. He didn't see anybody saying, put me down for a yes. He didn't see anybody choosing me. That's what God saw in natural man.
God's Sovereignty in Salvation
Romans 9:16: So then it depends not on man who wills or man who runs, but on God and His mercy. Acts 13:48, make a note of that, because you need to spend a little time on that one. John MacArthur says, this is one of Scripture's clearest statements on the sovereignty of God and salvation, that God chooses man for salvation, not the other way around.
Here's what Luke writes: as many as been appointed to eternal life believed. It's not that they believed and they were appointed to eternal life, but they had been appointed to eternal life, therefore they believed. Acts chapter 16, verse 14. We'll spend more time on this verse and this lady in the coming weeks. Certain woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple fabrics, a worshiper of God, was listening, and the Lord opened her heart. And nothing to do with her face. God opened her heart. You have been granted the ability to believe.
God's Choice Based on Sovereign Mercy
Here's the last thing. God's choice is based on His sovereign mercy. Open your Bibles if you would. We've got three minutes. We'll take seven, okay? Sorry. It's in Romans chapter 9.
Romans chapter 9, verse 10. This is Paul arguing, I think, for election, and he's not arguing corporately. He's arguing individually, and it seems to me it's the most compelling of Paul's arguments. It's an illustration.
Here it is. He says this, Romans 9:10. Not only this, and he's made the point that not all of Israel was Israel. Not all the Jews were Jews. Not all the Jews really were chosen or believed. Not only this, there was Rebekah also. And when she'd conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac, for though the twins were not yet born, and had not done anything good or bad, in an order that God's purpose according to His choice might stand, not because of works, but because of Him who calls.
Let me make sure we understand where we are. Because there were some who were saying, well, I'm born into this. It's my ancestry, or it's my lineage, and here's what Paul's saying. Here's Rebekah. Here's Isaac. They come together. They've got the same mom, same dad. And you get these twins, so it's not lineage. If he's going to argue for works, he takes all those away, saying they're still in the womb. They haven't done anything. Yeah? Got that?
Jacob and Esau: An Illustration of Divine Choice
He said this is according to God's purpose, God's choice, verse 12, it was said to her, the older will serve the younger, just as it is written, Jacob I loved, and Esau I hated. Before they'd done anything, God had made a decision to show mercy to one and justice to the other.
Don't think for a second God intervened and put hate in Esau's heart. He didn't do that. All He did was remove favor. He showed no favor, no special favor to Esau. He decided that He would give mercy to Jacob, and He would give justice to Esau.
Well, I'll tell you what. When you hear that, you go, that's not fair. Paul knows that. That's why he said, what should we say then? There's no injustice in God, is there? You're not sitting there, He's saying this, you're not sitting there saying that's not fair, are you? Because if you're saying that, then you're saying God's unjust. We know God's not unjust. May it never be.
For God said to Moses, I'll have mercy on who I'll have mercy, I'll have compassion on whom I'll have compassion. So it doesn't depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. God says, I'll have mercy wherever I want to have mercy.
The Proper Response to Divine Mercy
If you're sitting here today and this makes sense to you, if you're sitting here today and you took communion, Jesus is your Lord and Savior, it's because He shows mercy on you. Why? Because He decided to show mercy on you. And rather than say, that's not fair, how could He save me and not save him? Your answer to this should be, why did He save me? Why me?
See, shouldn't that take your worship and praise to a whole new level? When we talk about thankfulness and thanksgiving, shouldn't this take thanksgiving to a whole new level?
The Example of Pharaoh
He says, I'll give you an illustration, verse 17, for the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I raised you up. And he's talking now about the Exodus and him trying to not let the people go. He said, I raised you up to demonstrate my power in you, that my name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth. So then He has mercy on who He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.
You'll say to me then, why does He still find fault? In other words, here's what he said. How does God harden somebody's heart? Exodus tells us ten times God hardened Pharaoh's heart, God hardened Pharaoh's heart. Well, did God come in and make Pharaoh do something he didn't want to do? Absolutely not. All God did was say this, Pharaoh, be Pharaoh. You do what you want to do. And the more he got involved in sin, and the deeper he sank, the more his heart was hardened. Sometimes I hear this, wait a minute,
The Question About Those Who Want to Choose God
You're telling me that God chooses some and not others. Well, what about those people who want to choose Him, but they're not elect? I hear that all the time. What about those people who want to come to Christ, but they're not chosen?
Well, you know the answer to that. Is there anybody who wants to come to Christ that isn't chosen? No! They're natural men. They don't exist. A man or woman, boy or girl, who wants to come to Christ that's not elect doesn't exist.
The Sod Stretcher Illustration
When I was in college, my dad got me a job at the end of my senior year in high school. He got me a construction job. My dad knows me very well, because I wasn't sure I needed college. One week of that, and I said, where's that application for this college thing somewhere?
Well, the first day there, they said, hey, college boy, come here, go back and get the sod stretcher and bring it out for us. I said, yes, sir. So I'm back there about a half hour, and I come back out. I said, you know, I can't find the sod stretcher. Did you look out in the back? Yeah, I looked everywhere. I can't find the sod stretcher. That's because there's no such thing as a sod stretcher.
Really important here. There's no such thing as somebody who wants to come to Christ that's not elect.
Paul's Response to the Objection
So Paul raises this question, then how can you hold him responsible? It's a good question. You thought that, haven't you? I've heard it for two nights up here in the open forum. Well, wait, that's not fair. How can that possibly be? How can He hold me accountable for something if I don't have the ability to do it?
I think we're getting into mystery here, because Paul says this. On the contrary, who are you, old man, who answers back to God that the thing molded will not say to the molder, why did you make me like this? Or does the potter have the right over the clay? The potter is the one who determines what that clay will be. The clay doesn't say, why'd you make me this way? Why'd you make me this pot? I wanted to be this great, big, huge thing. That's the way it is with God.
God's Glory Revealed
Verse 23, and He did so. He does all of this in order that His might might be made known in the riches of His glory, even in us, whom He also called. God's called you for His honor and His glory. And you say, God, why? God, who?
The Example of Job
I think of Job. Job has all these things that come into his life, and finally Job has reached this point where he can't take it anymore. He says, God, I got some questions for you. And God said, all right, Job, just a second. And God fires off two and a half chapters of questions. Where were you, Job, when I made the earth? Job, how's an eagle fly? Hey, Job, can you speak and let the lightning directly hit where you've called? Job, where do we keep the snow? What about the hail?
He's all done with that. He says, okay, Job, what was it? And Job said, you know, I'm going to have to get back to you. I forgot what it was. I wasn't looking for anything. Actually, what Job says, I am nothing. See, there you go. You see that? And it's at the end of that, when Job's gone through all of those things, in chapter 42, Job said, before I'd heard about you, now I've seen you. Now let God be God. That's what He's saying.
The Reality of Your Salvation
New stuff for many of you. You're a Christian today because of God's work in your life. You didn't choose Him. Ultimately, you did choose Him, but only because He chose you and He worked in your life. Well, that raises all sorts of questions. Does He choose everybody? Does He work in everybody's life?
But before we get there, we gave you a little tip today. Election didn't save anyone. Christ's death on the cross saves us. If you had a hard time with this, next week could be a real interesting week for you, because next week we're going to talk about the atonement. We're going to talk about redemption.
Let me invite you one more time, especially if you're skeptical or especially if you're struggling with this, be here tomorrow night, seven o'clock. We want to start by addressing, doesn't God desire all to be saved? Isn't God willing that none should perish? We'll address those. As you leave this afternoon, let me remind you of the CDs out there. Stop and grab a handful of them, and then go over and register for adult education. The elders will be up in front to pray with you or to talk with you after this service.
Father, please open our eyes to embrace this truth. God, let us be men and women who worship you for who you really are. Let us be people who truly do let God be God. God, do that work in our life. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.
I notice that the transcript you've provided appears to be in Welsh and contains significant repetitive text that seems to be corrupted or incorrectly transcribed. The content doesn't appear to be a coherent English sermon transcript about Romans 9 - Unconditional Election.
To properly edit a sermon transcript for publication, I would need:
1. A clear English transcript of Tom's actual sermon
2. Coherent spoken content with identifiable ideas, arguments, and scripture references
3. Recognizable sermon structure and flow
Could you please provide the correct English transcript of the sermon? I'm ready to clean and format it according to your specifications once I have the proper source material.
I notice that the transcript you provided appears to be in Welsh and consists of the same phrase repeated multiple times. This doesn't appear to be a sermon transcript about Romans 9 and Unconditional Election as indicated in the title.
The repeated Welsh phrase roughly translates to something about "resources" and "during the manuscripts/prescriptions, all the formers need to secret a few resources."
Could you please provide the actual English sermon transcript for "Romans 9 - Unconditional Election Part 8 of 8"? I'd be happy to clean and format it according to your editing guidelines once I receive the correct content.