Is predestination really about man’s free will versus God’s sovereignty?

Many people start their approach to predestination from a philosophical position rather than on the actual words and phrases the Bible uses about it. For instance, I asked one person how he begins his argument for predestination.

He said, “God knew all of us before we were born, right?”

I stopped him right there. “Aren’t you supposed to prove religious truth with the words God gave us in the Bible?”

The trouble with his approach is that he’s starting with an assumption that he already believes in, and is using an argument that will lead where he wants to go, which is a logical fallacy called a leading question. If you read Catholic literature trying to prove that Mary was always a virgin, you see this same approach. They start out with the assumption that she was already “ever virgin” and show how the verses could be read that way (like changing Jesus’ brothers into cousins), rather than produce the verses that actually shows she was “ever virgin” to begin with.

To get at a biblical truth, one needs to read the words and phrases God actually gave us about the topic. I seldom see that with regards to predestination. Articles on predestination frequently address God’s omnipotence and foreknowledge, and man’s free will or lack of it, and hopelessly confuse the subject. Is this the way God wants the subject to be approached? Well, what does the Scripture say?

My studies on predestination purely from the Word of God have unearthed an emphasis absent in debates on predestination. The Bible links predestination to a sanctifying process where one by faith becomes more like Christ. Let’s look at a few passages where predestination and this process are tied together.

When I was saved, I first turned to Psalm 23 and meditated on that for several days. Then I turned to the book of Genesis and started reading the Bible. What did I know — I was a bookworm who always read books from the beginning. I did not know you were supposed to jump all about the Bible to pick up theology. OK, sarcasm aside, it’s important to read the Bible like you would any other book, and begin at the beginning.

In this case, the first occurrence of the word predestination is found in Romans 8. Before we start in Romans 8, we need to start with Romans 1-7, in which is laid the framework by which we are to understand and build upon for any ideas about predestination.

In Paul’s epistle to the Romans, we learn that it is our responsibility to die to the flesh, to repent of sin, and turn away from dependence on our works for righteousness. We learn that if we don’t believe on Jesus, we’ll appear guilty before God (3:19–20), know God’s wrath (4:15), and if we don’t change our ways, we’ll sin to death (6:16, 8:13). God gives us enough free will to make decisions about which way we’ll go. We can live according to how we feel, or we can call upon the Spirit to help us cut off the flesh and live above it. This is implied throughout Romans, the same epistle where the word predestination occurs. Our free will is limited to doing whatever we want according to the flesh, or calling upon God to live the higher life, with subsequent sacrifices on our part.

So, faith in Christ is the only assurance we have of arriving before God’s throne in honor. So are we to have assurance because we’ve been chosen ahead of time to end in glory? This assurance does not follow Paul’s line of thought throughout Romans 1-7. Paul does not offer this assurance.

In Romans 8:29 we find foreknowledge and predestination linked to the process of “being conformed to the image of His Son.” Paul had first laid a foundation throughout chapters 1-7 of the law, the flesh, and works. He showed us the different results if we yielded to the flesh (death) or the spirit (made alive). If we follow the law, we will be condemned, but if we trust in God’s grace we’ll be helped. We learn that since our works will never take away sin and make us righteous, we turn to faith in God’s Son for righteousness.

Predestined means “to foreknow” (Vine’s Expository Dictionary of Biblical Words). What did God foreknow? Perhaps He saw that when Adam fell, he and those after him would need to follow a process to recover their faith and enjoy a relationship with God. Jesus’ life shows us what the end result of this process looks like — a loving relationship with God. God predestined a process: “to be conformed.” That process has an end in view: “to the image of His Son.”

“For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Romans 8:29).

In other words, when we choose to live by His grace, we are on the fast track of God’s process of conformity to Christ. If we choose to live by the law, we are outside of God’s predestined process of conformity to Christ. God has determined beforehand a process, not individuals! The process involves turning from confidence in works to confidence (faith) in God, from living according to the flesh to living according to the Spirit, and from reliance on Law for righteousness to resting in God’s grace for acceptance. In Romans, this is the salvation Christ won for us — that we could live as He lived, free from the slavery of the flesh, sin, and law: free to serve God from the heart.

We need the revelation of the Word to tell us these things, for logical arguments seldom get us there. After viewing all the images of death, dying, grieving families, corpses, and skeletons on television, how do we logically arrive at the idea that resurrection exists? We need God’s revelation to take us to that level. Even so it is with predestination.

Do other passages show that we’re expected to follow a process to be conformed to Christ? Yes; one such example is found in 2 Peter 1.

In 2 Peter 1:4 we find that we may be “partakers of the divine nature.” This phrase echoes Romans’ “image of His Son.” Furthermore, the next passages from 2 Peter 1 covers the sanctifying process: “But for this very reason [that we may be partakers of the divine nature], giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge . . . and to brotherly kindness, love” (2 Peter (1:5, 7). Because of the promise that we may be like Christ, God invites us to participate, with due (necessary) diligence, in working with Him to that end. So the Bible doesn’t teach us that predestination means a wonderful life with Jesus will happen no matter how we live. It is contingent on our response to God’s Word.

If we are participating in this process, we are responding to God’s calling, and confirming that our “calling and election [are] sure” (2 Peter 1:10). We are making God’s purpose our own. Then we will enter the coming kingdom with abundance. If we are not dealing with sin, and desiring to be conformed to the image of His Son, we have forgotten how deep-seated sin is: “But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins” (2 Peter 1:9). We will not be diligent to make God’s promise our own. Then we will enter the judgment with loss of reward and with shame.

Of course, in our own strength we are weak in our battle against sin. But rather than say we don’t have enough free will to deal with sin, we are to choose to pray and ask the Father for the Holy Spirit’s power and presence to empower us against sin. This is how lack of man’s free will ceases to be an issue: we choose to participate in God’s purpose by His power. This praying for the power of God is how we address man’s corrupted nature: even in our depravity, we do have enough sense to ask for help when we are helpless.

God has predestined a people who will be like His Son. Therefore it’s inappropriate to judge who is predestined based on the beginning of the Christian life, or on whether one has received Jesus some time in the past. Assurance of one’s election will be found in one’s participation in the sanctifying process. If I am resting on merely being a good person, but not being conformed to the image of His Son, I have no assurance of entering the everlasting kingdom with abundance (2 Peter 1:11).

Do other passages regarding predestination support the above assertions? Let’s look at a popular passage in Ephesians chapter 1.

In Ephesians 1:4-5 we find that God has “chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world” for a purpose: “that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love.” Here are the entire two verses:

“According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,” (Ephesians 1:4-5.)

God has chosen us before the foundation of the world. If we add “individually and by name” to this portion, then we corrupt the text with our own ideas, which is called eisegesis, reading foreign ideas into the text. If we start with Romans and its foundation of personal responsibility, of personal choices regarding the flesh and faith, then we see a process is involved for bringing us to be holy and without blame before Him in love. So we can’t say that God chose us in advance that we’ll inevitably end up in love before the judgment seat. He chose us with the expectation that we’ll follow the process and through it inevitably come to the expected end.

His process, walking by faith, always ends in being holy. Walking by sight and worrying over our circumstances never leads to holiness on their own. Acknowledging sin and dealing with it always leads us to being without blame before Him. But refusing to hear criticism in humility and defending one’s pride never leads there. Actually, according to 2 Peter 1 mentioned above, if we do not deal with sin, we are proving that we will not be predestined to be conformed into the image of God’s Son; we are working at cross-purposes to God’s revealed will.

So, God did not choose us individually, but chose a class of people who will participate in the process of sanctification that leads successfully to appearing before the Judgment Seat in holiness and love. Before He created the world, He had already laid out the path we’ll use to surely and victoriously escape the results of sin. That’s why we were saved, isn’t it? If you were hired to be a car mechanic, wouldn’t you use the tools at the garage to help you do your job?

Christ’s commission to His followers in Matthew 28:19-20 goes further than calling us to tell others about Jesus. He calls us to make disciples and teach them His commandments. Jesus is looking for people who will go through the process — who will deny themselves, take up their cross and follow the Lord. As they follow Him, they’ll learn what eternal life really involves, and will turn from law to grace, from flesh to Spirit, from works to faith.

Let’s clear up a couple of issues that have been raised.

Some argue that we cannot save ourselves because our wills are too depraved and corrupted by sin; so we are entirely dependent on God’s choice, which was already determined before we were born and in force in spite of all our current efforts. With this scenario, we must wait until the judgment before we know we are saved. But Scriptures show that we should consider our participation in the sanctifying process rather than conjecturing about whether God has chosen us or not, or whether we have enough free will or not. If we are undergoing the process of being conformed to the image of God’s Son, we are already ahead of the game.

What about the “purpose of God according to election” in Romans 9:11? Context gives us the answer. In Romans chapters 1-8 we learned that we cannot be saved by following the Law. Sin has condemned us. All our efforts to follow The Ten Commandments cannot remove the condemnation. Only faith in Christ saves. Then what about the Israelites who have been adhering to the laws all these centuries? Has it been in vain for them? In Romans 9:6-8, Paul notes that “they are not all Israel who are of Israel. . . . That is, those who are the children of the flesh [of mere ethnic offspring], these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted as the seed.” Of those Israelites who let the law lead them to faith as it did Paul in Romans 7, they are children of God, and are counted as the seed.

God chose Jacob over Esau before either had done good or bad (Rom. 9:11-13). Before either had followed the commandments, God in mercy (Rom. 9:15) chose Jacob. God has determined that the elect will come through Jacob, not Esau. Literally and figuratively, they will be of the seed of Isaac (Rom. 9:7). God gave Isaac to Abraham because Abraham and Sarah believed God’s promise (“At this time I will come and Sarah shall have a son”–Rom. 9:9). In the same way, God imputes righteousness to us when we believe God’s offer of salvation through faith in Jesus. By believing God’s promise, we and the Jews become “children of promise.”

In Romans 9:30-32, we learn that Israel did not attain righteousness because they did not seek it by faith. Neither predestination nor election are listed as reasons for their lack of righteousness. If the Israelites would seek righteousness by faith as the Gentiles have, they would be righteous.