The Function of Divine Election: Part 2
For my first post, see here.
The really surprising thing about divine election in the Bible is that it is consistently spoken of as if it were practical. In our endlessly heated and stuffy academic debates about predestination, we easily forget that this doctrine is supposed to be useful–in a rugged, bottom-line kind of way–to those who are feebly trying to follow Jesus more authentically and faithfully.
Yet most Christians I have conversed with do not, admittedly, possess this sort of nitty-gritty, beneficial experience with election. Hence my aim is to explore the function of being chosen by God (rather than its meaning) in the Scriptures, in the hope that this might win us a new angle of fresh insight into this ignored theme. Leaving to the side, for the time being, what election is, I now follow up on last week’s initial three observations with three more things election does (or at least ought to do) in the Christian life:
4.) Divine Election is meant to provide deep-rooted assurance of salvation for individual Christians. To know myself to be chosen by God is to realize that I have been loved from everlasting to everlasting. Just as this love had no beginning, neither will it have an end. Before the foundation of the world I belonged to God, and I will be His forever, world without end. I may say truly that God loves me, but I can never say that God loves me because…for there is no reason other than His own good pleasure and mercy. Thus, nothing will ever separate me from His love, nor will anyone be able to bring any charge against God’s elect (see Romans 8:28-39). Compare also Ephesians 1:3-14.
This assurance stands in marked contrast to the empty philosophical speculation and frivolous, soul-numbing doubt that twisted, sub-biblical understandings of election have sometimes produced in God’s people. If election produces mental or spiritual instability in a believer, they simply do not understand election. To such at these the advice of M’Cheyne is apropos:
“‘If I knew I were one of God’s elect, I would come to Christ; but I fear I am not.’ To you I answer: nobody ever came to Christ because he knew himself to be one of the elect. It is quite true that God has of His mere good pleasure elected some to everlasting life, but they never knew it until they believed in Christ. Christ nowhere commands the elect to come to him. He commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel. The question for you is not, ‘Am I one of the elect?’ but ‘Am I a sinner?’ Christ came to save sinners.” (Robert Murray M’Cheyne)
The tricky question here, of course, is how one comes to know his or her elect status. Do we find this lofty, esoteric information in the hidden, mysterious, eternal counsels and decrees of God? Do we find it through morbid, ruthless introspection? Me genoito. Instead, election is personally recognized and known in two corresponding ways in the New Testament, both of which are focused upon Jesus. Election, we must never fail to insist, bears the indelible mark of a Christ-centered stamp in any truly Christian theology.
a.) Election is known and acknowledged retrospectively after we come to faith in Christ. In other words, the believer’s election is known indirectly and derivatively in Christian theology—not directly, intuitively, or mystically. We see our election in Christ. As Paul writes:
“For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.” (I Thessalonians 1:4-5)
If you ask who the chosen people are in the world, the New Testament is crystal clear: look for those who adore Jesus and follow him. If you are drawn to Jesus, it is because God has first wooed you. When you ponder if you are one of the elect, simply look to Jesus. Do you love what you see in him? Then you are chosen. Calvin puts it this way, highlighting Jesus as the “mirror” of election:
“But if we are elected in him, we cannot find the certainty of our election in ourselves; and not even in God the Father, if we look at him apart from the Son. Christ, then, is the mirror in which we ought, and in which, without deception, we may contemplate our election. For since it is into his body that the Father has decreed to ingraft those whom from eternity he wished to be his, that he may regard as sons all whom he acknowledges to be his members, if we are in communion with Christ, we have proof sufficiently clear and strong that we are written in the Book of Life.” (John Calvin, The Institutes of the Christian Religion 3.24.5)
b.) Election is confirmed and validated prospectively as we continue to walk by faith with perserverance, living in obedience to our crucified and risen Savior and seeking His glory and will in all things. As Peter puts it:
“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (II Peter 1:3-11)
Election assures us that we are loved by God in Christ.
5.) Divine Election functions as a confident foundation for evangelism of unbelievers. This aspect, no doubt, is completely unexpected and utterly counter-intuitive to modern sentiments. Yet listen to this:
“Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in my gospel, for which I am suffering, bound with chains as a criminal. But the word of God is not bound! Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.” (2 Timothy 2:8-10)
Arguably a similar function (i.e. the invincibility of God’s saving purposes in the world giving rise to bold, risk-taking mission) is ascribed to divine election in John 10:16, 27-30 and Acts 18:9-11. Think about it: if we are saved completely by grace, then neither our good qualities nor our bad deeds serve to either attract or repel God’s favor to us. On the one hand, therefore, let no one presume anything apart from Christ. For who sees anything different in us? Yet on the other hand, let no one ever despair that they are beyond redemption or outside of hope. Such dark ruminations too quickly forget the logic of divine election. Election frees us to proclaim the gospel confidently to those who are still in darkness, knowing that their faith rests ultimately not in our wisdom but in God’s power.
6.) Divine Election is not an end in itself, but is for the sake of the world. God does not choose a people for Himself, out of all the nations of the earth, so that they can contentedly pat themselves on the back and enjoy cheap, selfish comforts at home as the rest of the world suffers tragically under the curse of Adam. The first human God called and chose in the biblical narrative is the archetype of all the elect who come after him. Abraham was called out of futile idolatry and chosen by God, in order that the world might be blessed through him. So are Christians. In John 17, we see both aspects of this dual reality: particularlity for the sake of universality. Jesus expressly refuses to pray for the world, but only for “those the Father has given him.” Yet he prays for them (i.e. the elect), in order that they might be one and that the entire world might know that the Father has sent the Son through their unified witness. Election, therefore, is always the beginning of mission.
Does election perform these functions in our lives? If not, why not?
[...] 2 comments Update: “The Function of Divine Election: Part 2″ now available. The Fish Tank (the blog of the Harvard Ichthus) has an insightful piece on the [...]
Nick, this is really good and interesting stuff! I was particularly amused by the “Me genoito.”
Just a couple comments and questions:
1. In John 17, Jesus first prays not for the world, but for those whom God has given him (v. 9). Then, in vv. 20-26, he prays for another group of people, “those who will believe in [him] through [the original disciples'] word” (v. 20). This leads me to believe that you cannot identify the people for whom Jesus prayed in v. 9 as the elect, because those mentioned in v. 9 are only a subset of believers.
2. I understand that you are trying to steer clear (temporarily) of questions about election’s meaning to focus on its function, but I have to think that our answers to questions about the former will inform our understanding of the latter. (4), for example, brought all sorts of questions about perseverance of the saints to my mind.
Hey Joseph, thanks for the feedback! I agree with you on #2–ultimately function and essence, role and meaning are so intertwined that we cannot keep them separate and compartmentalized for long. Still, I wanted to delay the inevitable as long as I could, since we so rarely stop to think about the practical purpose of election in the Christian life!
As for #1, I would actually argue that the (future) group of people Jesus moves on to pray for in the final part of his high priestly prayer are a subset of “those the Father has given to the Son”, not of the world. In praying for them (in the future), Jesus IS praying for “those the Father has given to me.” They just don’t exist yet. I don’t, then, think he is going back on not praying for the world; that always remains true in the sense of this prayer’s ultimate purpose. He prays for his own, that they might go into the world and bless it. And within that world are sheep of Jesus’ fold who have not yet come home…but who will (John 10:16ff).
2. I don’t see how that makes sense of v. 20: “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.”
Hey Joseph, in my mind what makes the latter group Jesus also prays for different is NOT that they are not “given” to Jesus by the Father, but rather that they simply don’t exist yet (i.e. you and me from the standpoint of Jesus’ historical situation!). It is not that Jesus has changed his mind and is now praying for both the world and those the Father has given him, against 17:9. In this prayer, it is only those the Father has given him that are the focus of Jesus’ intercession.
Throughout the Gospel of John, the group of people that the Father has “given” to the Son is a broader category than just the disciples who are actually following Jesus during his lifetime. Yet, on your reading, “those the Father has given to the Son” would have to be limited to the 12 disciples (or at least only those who believed during Jesus’ ministry). I don’t think that does justice to this theme in John’s Gospel overall, nor to the theme of the prayer in John 17 (which picks back up after v. 20 with referring to even this latter group as those the Father has “given” to the Son in v. 24). Here are some examples:
“All that the Father GIVES me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has GIVEN me, but raise it up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:37-40)
“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has GIVEN them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.” (John 10:27-30)
And again, even in John 17, Jesus begins by noting that “you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have GIVEN him”, which de facto includes anyone who comes to believe and who enjoys salvation (just as in 17:24).
So I’m still persuaded that the not-yet-existing believers in 17:20ff are a subset of this larger Johannine category of the elect, of those the Father has given to the Son.
On the contrary, I would say that those for whom Jesus prays in 17:6-19 are a subset of those for whom he prays in 17:21ff. I agree with your understanding of the broader Johannine theme, but what Jesus says in v. 12 (“While I was with them…”) and vv. 14-15 (“I have given them your word…”) indicate to me that he is speaking of his current disciples; conversely, Jesus’ second-prayer is very future-oriented.
I apologize for being so stubborn about this, but I think it ultimately is important given my (current) belief that everyone might be, in some sense, “elect.” Of course, that’s a whole ‘nother discussion…