Responsibility and election are two lines of truth which run side by side in the Word of God. To our natural minds it may seem that one is not in accord with the other, but we must remember that we are finite in our understanding while God is infinite. Our minds are at peace in these matters when we bow to God's revelation and accept the truth of His Word. In Isa. 55:8,9, we read, "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." With the Lord's help may we seek to learn about God's thoughts and ways as revealed in His Word, and we will see how consistent they are, for as Prov. 8:9 says, "They are all plain to him that understandeth, and right to them that find knowledge."
Back in a past eternity God had His purposes, as we read in Eph. 3:11, "According to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord." Here we can see that God's purpose came before man's responsibility, for God would not be God if He did not know the future (Acts 15:18). He made this world to be the platform to accomplish and display His purposes (Prov. 8:22-36), and He placed a man and a woman here, and put them in a place of responsibility. We know the story of Adam and Eve and of how they chose to disobey God, and so in responsibility all was spoiled. Was God to be frustrated in His purposes? Never! So He acts in grace, and clothes Adam and Eve in coats of skin. God made the coats of skin through the death of a substitute, for an animal must die. This was God's sovereign grace to them, not because they deserved His gracious provision, but because He is love as well as light. He cannot pass over sin, and so though they must be driven out of the garden, they go out clothed through the death of a substitute which had died in their stead, "Without shedding of blood is no remission." Heb. 9:22.
As we read on in God's Word we find this wonderful grace of God acting according to His own sovereign choice, and reaching out to man through the sacrifices of Abel and Noah. Abram is called out from idolatry, and Jacob is chosen instead of Esau. Judah was chosen to be the tribe from which Christ would be born. Each of these men we have mentioned were responsible, and each failed, but they were chosen and blessed according to God's plan. It is not for us to question God's way, for "Who art thou that repliest against God" Rom. 9:20. Again in Job 33:13, "Behold in this thou art not just: I will answer thee, that God is greater than man. Why dost thou strive against Him? for He giveth not account of any of His matters." Our peace and blessing is in accepting His grace and goodness provided for us through the work of redemption, accomplished on the cross of Calvary by His beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
God's character is unchanging. He is light as well as love. He must punish sin, but He delights in mercy. He offers salvation to all, but when all refuse (for left to ourselves we would all refuse) then He acts according to His sovereign choice. There is no one who is elected to be lost, for God's salvation is offered to all, to "whosoever will", but if a sinner refuses God's offer of pardon, he will have to meet God as a Judge, and he, as a responsible person, will be judged for his sins and for his own decision to reject Christ.
But can we who are saved boast that we are better, or that we are more wise than others, or that of our own free wills we accepted Christ and God's offer of pardon? No! Here sovereignty and election come in. We were "chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world" (Eph. 1:4), and so we cannot glory in ourselves or in our good choice, but "He that glorieth let him glory in the Lord." 1 Cor. 1:31. "Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." John 1:13. Again we read, "No man can come unto Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him." John 6:44. There had to be a work of God in us by the Holy Spirit, as well as a work of God for us through the redemptive sacrifice of the Lord Jesus at Calvary, or we would never have been saved. This does not set aside or change man's responsibility, but it is when all has failed in our responsibility, that God steps in with His sovereign choice for blessing. God created men and women as responsible beings, and it is sad when they blame God for the choice they make to go on in their sins and reject His goodness. If they would only come, He says, "Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out." John 6:37.
Some may say that they will wait to see if they are elected to be saved, but if they will come as sinners, they will receive a welcome and a pardon through the precious blood of Christ. Then they will know that they were chosen, elected and predestinated for blessing. If they refuse, they will decide their own case, for they, as responsible people, have refused God's pardon. God who knows all beforehand, knows where you will be tomorrow, but as a responsible person you must use the means He has provided for your life day by day, and how much more you should avail yourself of His wonderful provision for your soul's salvation. "Be not faithless but believing." John 20:27.
It is remarkable how consistent the Scriptures are in connection with the work of Christ on the cross in this matter. We read that Christ died for all (2 Cor. 5:15), and that He gave Himself a ransom for all (1 Tim. 2:6). He is the propitiation (mercy seat) for the whole world (1 John 2:2), but the Bible never says that He bore the sins of all. It says He bore the sins of "many" (Isa. 53:12, Heb. 9:28). If He had borne the sins of all, no one would be in hell, for God is righteous, and if the sinner's debt of sin were paid by the Lord Jesus, God would not require a second payment. Here the truth of election and responsibility come together. God would not be God if He did not know the future, nor could we rely upon the prophetic Scriptures.
But the Scripture says He died for all. No sinner will be sent to hell because he was born in sin (Psa. 51:5), for the blood of Christ is on the "mercy seat" and the way of access into the presence of God has been provided for every man and woman, for God is "not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." 2 Peter 3:9. If a person refuses the way of access that has been provided, then he must be punished for his sins, for Christ did not bear them. If a baby or child dies before it can make its own decision, then he or she comes into the blessing of the Father's will, for "it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish." Matt. 18:14. Christ's death was necessary to save that little one, for He came not only "to seek and to save" (the adults, see Luke 19:10), but also to save these little ones who had not gone astray by their own wills. (Matt. 18:11). His death and blood shedding opened up the way of blessing for all who would not refuse His pardon.
Now it is important to see that the Lord must have ALL the glory, and so it is not only His sovereign will that draws us to Himself, but also that keeps us in His hands, "For I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand." John 10:28. It is true that we, as believers, are responsible to read His Word and keep near to Him, but it is His power that preserves us, and will bring us safely home to glory. So we read of our responsibility in Phil. 2:12, "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" and then in the next verse "For it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." (verse 13). Would any Christian want to take the credit to himself that, after God had chosen him and saved him by sovereign grace, then from that point on it depended on his own faithfulness? We are most surely responsible to live to please the Lord Jesus, but here again we have the sovereign goodness of God that works this in us. Both go together in the Word of God, and one is never out of harmony with the other. Would any devoted Christian take credit for his own faithfulness, or would he not, while feeling his responsibility, say that he just praised the Lord for putting right desires in his heart and giving him the power to please Him? Even at the judgment seat of Christ when the Lord rewards any faithfulness to Him, we will cast our crowns at His feet saying, "Thou art worthy, 0 Lord, to receive glory and honor and power." Rev. 4:11.
There is of course the government of God in our lives as believers for self will, and God our Father may have to chasten us in love for our profit (Heb. 12:10). His sovereign love to us is unchanging, but privilege brings responsibility, so that, even though saved by grace, every act in our lives has its present as well as its eternal consequences in loss or gain (1 Cor. 3:14,15). While all our sins were borne by the Lord Jesus on the cross and will never be charged against us in judgment, they will surely be accounted "loss" in the day of manifestation if, as believers, we have lived unto ourselves and not unto Him. We were chosen for blessing, but here again responsibility comes in, for they run together in our lives even as believers.
As to the preaching of the gospel, since the message of salvation and pardon is to all, we are responsible to proclaim it to all. "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God." 2 Cor. 5:20. Only God knows who are the elect, but He wants all to know of His love and His willingness to pardon. The sweetness of God's love is to be made known to all, even if it is refused by many, so Paul could say, "We are unto God a sweet savor of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: to the one we are the savor of death unto death; and to the other the savor of life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things." 2 Cor. 2:16,17. In Acts 13 God's servants preached the Word, and those who refused it are said to, "judge themselves unworthy of eternal life." Acts 13:46. They, as responsible people, refused God's offer of salvation, and then God acted in sovereignty and, "as many as were ordained to eternal life believed." Acts 13:48. This did not hinder the apostles from continuing to preach (verse 49) and as they "so spake" the gospel in love, God granted His blessing, and "a great multitude of the Jews and also of the Greeks believed." Acts 14:1.
One feels that the knowledge of these things, both as to salvation and as to our walk as believers, is very important. The truth of God always exalts and honors the Lord Jesus Christ, as we read in John 16:13,14, "When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth... He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall show it unto you." Man's thoughts always bring some glory to himself, even in the things of God, but as we learn the truth of God we see that, while leaving man fully responsible, it gives all the glory to God and to the Lord Jesus Christ. "According as it is written," He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord," 1 Cor. 1:31. "That no flesh should glory in His presence." 1 Cor. 1:29. "For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen." Rom. 11:36.
"O mind divine, so must it be
That glory all belongs to God:
O love divine that did decree
We should be part through Jesus' blood.
O keep us, love divine near Thee
That we our nothingness may know,
And ever to Thy glory be
Walking in faith while here below."
G.H.H.
Foreknowledge - God knows everything beforehand.
Election - God chooses whom He wishes for blessing.
Predestination - God orders the eternal destiny of those whom He chooses in grace.
Responsibility - Man is responsible if he refuses God's offer of pardon to "Whosoever will."
He then decides his own destiny.
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