1. Predestination

Predestination

People who believe in PREDESTINATION are usually called Calvinists; though few know who Calvin was, where he lived, or what he taught. Calvin has been gone for over three centuries but PREDESTINATION is with us today. The Bible teaches it. The battle is with the living Bible and not with the departed Calvin.

PREDESTINATION should be viewed in its larger aspects. This world was created with a definite plan by a planner "who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will." That plan, toward which the whole creation moves, is PREDESTINATION. When God called Abram and said, "I will make of thee a great nation," that was PREDESTINATION for a certain family. When God said, "I will give unto thee and to thy seed after thee the land of thy sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession," that was, and is, for the land of Canaan, PREDESTINATION. It has been pledged to Abraham, that is a promise. It has been foretold to the world, and that is prophecy. Promise, Prophecy, and PREDESTINATION are three words that apply to the work of an omnipotent God and they can scarcely be separated.

We are told to take heed to the word of prophecy as unto a lamp shining in a dark place. PREDESTINATION is the dark place. The flickering light of prophecy illumines only a few of the many things that God has planned to do. For instance, "It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath set within his own authority." The time has been set in the plan of PREDESTINATION but prophecy has not revealed it. We pick up a few bright shells of prophecy on the shore of a vast ocean of future events which the Father hath set within his own authority and which he has not revealed to men, or perhaps, to angels. When Paul preached to the men of Athens he told them of a Great God, perhaps too great for sophisticated Athens to comprehend, a God that made the world and all things that are in it, "Seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not is temples made with hands: neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth to all life and breath and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed sad the bounds of their habitation," "The grandeur that was Greece and the glory that was Rome," were measured to the inch and ticked off to the minute by the God who appointed in advance their times and boundaries. As the shores of the seas were fixed, so was predestined the place in history of every nation. This is national PREDESTINATION on a world-wide scale. Paul did- not limit PREDESTINATION to Israel.

We are frail children of dust who know not what a day or an hour may bring forth. We are prone to think of God as being like ourselves; and living in breathless suspense while elections are held and battles fought. Sometimes we feel worried about God, himself. The Bible presents no such God; and that is one of the marks of its inspiration. Its great doctrines are very displeasing to men of all races and that is another indication that the Bible is not a human production. "We aim to please," is evident in all the works of man. Of all the unpalatable doctrines in the Bible, PREDESTINATION seems the most distasteful. A sovereign God, who is Lord of heaven and earth, who appoints times and boundaries, who leaves nothing to chance, and nothing to man, is not popular. The mother of Samuel prayed, "The Lord killeth, and maketh alive: he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich: He bringeth tow, and lifteth up. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory." (1 Sam. 2:1-10) In many Bibles the twenty-seventh chapter of Genesis is given a descriptive title, "The Stolen Blessing." It is the story of Rebecca and Jacob deceiving Isaac and obtaining a blessing which Isaac intended for Esau. "the reader should never lose sight of God’s intentions in the incident. The Lord gave that blessing to Joan before Jacob was born. "The elder shall serve the younger." A man cannot steal his, own blessing. It is a simple story of a collision with PREDESTINATION. Isaac had a feeling of responsibility and proceeded to do as he thought best about his sons. Rebecca and Jacob were not much better. "There is no great difference between men who think they can set aside the word of God as did Isaac and Esau, and those who tremble lest it be set aside, as did Jacob and Rebecca. That family was rather human on the doctrine of PREDESTINATION. The story of Joseph illustrates PREDESTINATION. The brethren sold him into slavery and that was wicked. The ingratitude of Potiphar was cruel. We sympathize with Joseph, forgotten in prison. Suddenly, within a few hours, he sits on a throne beside Pharaoh and we realize that God was in it all and we understand Joseph as he speaks to his brethren, "God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God." Behind the hateful brethren and the heartless Ishmaelites was the hand of God. Twenty years before the bread of Canaan was exhausted, God had been working all things after the counsel of his own will and had sent Joseph to Egypt to provide bread in the day of famine. Men were blind unconscious instruments of God. Blind unconscious men call themselves, "free moral agents."

PREDESTINATION is one of the most interesting doctrines in the Bible. It should be taught in the kindergarten. When Soul, the son of Kish, went out to search for his father’s asses, he was a mature man, his family was prominent in Israel, and yet, apparently, he had never seen the prophet Samuel who had been the leader and judge of Israel for a long lifetime. We teach our tiny children about Samuel but, in his own day, Saul knew him not. Saul seems to have known little about prophets or God. Within twenty-four hours he learned much and the first lesson could well be entitled PREDESTINATION.

Saul was searching for asses. He was a long way from home, weary, discouraged, and God was not in his plans or thinking. His state of mind was very much like any American farmer or business man struggling with adversity who assures himself that the job is up to himself and that God has nothing to do with such ordinary things as lost asses or lost money. Such is the human side of the picture and the human viewpoint. From the viewpoint of the Bible, and from the Lord’s side, the picture is different. The previous day, the Lord had said to the prophet: "Tomorrow about this time I will send thee a man out of the land of Benjamin and thou shalt anoint him to be captain over my people because their cry is come unto me." On the strength of this information, Samuel prepared a feast, invited the chiefest of the city, and instructed the cook to set aside a choice portion for the guest of honor, when he should arrive. Saul thought he was looking for lost asses, nothing more; but the Lord was sending him to be the guest of honor at a feast, to commune with Samuel, the prophet, and to be anointed captain over Israel. The next morning he was given a second lesson in PREDESTINATION. Saul was still in the kindergarten learning the A, B, C’s of serving God. As he leaves, Samuel tells him, "When thou art departed from me today, then thou shalt find two men by Rachel’s sepulcher in the border of Benjamin at Zelzah; and they will say unto thee, The asses which thou wentest to seek are found and thy father hath left the care of the asses, and sorroweth for you, saying, What shalt I do for my son? Then shalt thou go on forward from thence, and thou shalt come to the plain of Tabor, and there shall meet thee three men going up to God to Bethel, one carrying three kids, and another carrying three loaves of bread, and another carrying a bottle of wine; and they will salute thee, and give thee two loaves of bread; which thou shalt receive at their hands. After that, thou shalt come to the hill of God, where is the garrison of the Philistines: and it shall come to pass, when thou art come thither to the city, that thou shalt meet a company of prophets coming down from the high place with a psaltery, and a tabret and a pipe, and a harp before them; and they shall prophesy: and the Spirit of the Lord shall come upon thee and thou shalt prophesy with them, and shalt be turned into another man. And let it be, when these signs are come unto thee that thou do as occasion serve thee, for God is with thee." "And all those signs came to pass that day." (1 Sam. 10:2-9) The pace men traveled, the parcels they carried, the journeys they made, the words they spoke, prearranged by the Lord, that is PREDESTINATION. The curtain was lifted for one day and Saul saw himself, a tiny mite, in a universe managed and planned by an omnipotent God. It is easy to underestimate God but it is impossible to overestimate his wisdom, his power or the range of his sovereignty from micro-organisms to heavenly princes, from atoms to celestial systems. Perhaps Saul’s servant would insist that he himself persuaded Saul to enter the city and consult the seer and that the Lord had nothing to do with it. But the Lord had said unto Samuel, "I will send thee a man." Notice, this is not foreknowledge, this is PREDESTINATION, "I will send." The three travelers may have set the date for their journey to Bethel a year before and might well insist that God had had nothing to do with it. "Verily thou art a God that hidest thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour." (Isa. 45:15) Is there anything that God does not plan? When the Lord Jesus. would enter Jerusalem he sent two disciples saying unto them, "Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied and a colt with her: loose them and bring them unto me. And if any man say ought unto you, ye shall say, The Lord hath need of them; and straightway he will send them." (Matthew 21:3, 3).

Some five hundred years before, Zechariah had prophesied that the meek and lowly king would ride into Jerusalem on a donkey. When the hour arrived, the donkey was waiting. We see predestination is the life of a donkey. When he would eat the Passover he sent Peter and John, "Behold when ye are entered into the city, there shall a man met you, bearing a pitcher of water; follow him into the house where he entereth in. And ye shall say unto the good man of the house, The Master with unto thee, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples? And he shall show you a large upper room furnished: there make ready." (Luke 22:10-12) Think of the man making the trip to the well at a certain moment and of all the details that must have been prearranged, by God himself. As they sat at the table Jesus told them of his predestined death; and John who heard these things, afterward wrote of him as, "The lamb slain from the foundation of the world." The Lord sent Judas to do his betraying. Then he told the disciples that all of them would be offended and that Peter would deny him three times before the cock crew. Yes, we can see predestination in the life of a rooster.

Truly the hand of God predestinating human affairs is seen from Genesis to Revelation and yet the word, itself, is used only four times, and these four references are definitely applied to New Testament believers. In the same fashion that Saul found himself anointed captain while searching for asses; that a water carrier found himself host to the Lord Jesus; so we find ourselves children of God by the good pleasure of his will. "Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will" (Eph. 1:5) Some suggest that God predestinates the church, or body of Christ, but not the individuals who compose it. This is too farfetched to discuss. A little farther on we read of salvation by grace and if salvation by grace is for individuals, so is predestination.

Predestination covers all things. There is no spot where God does not operate. Wherever God operates, there is Predestination. "Being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will." (Eph. 1:11)

God is not a passive spectator of the future, but the planner and predestinator of the future. "For whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate." "Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called." (Rom. 8:30)

All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. (Rom. 8:28) "Called according to his purpose" is identical with Predestination. The Lord’s predestined purpose in calling Paul was announced before his blinded eyes were opened. "He is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel: for I will skew him how great things he must suffer for my sake." (Acts 9:15, 16) Paul was anything but a professional preacher who "made good" with the public: he was a chosen, predestined vessel, with his work and sufferings publicly proclaimed at the threshold of his career: he was called according to God’s purpose. Paul applied this truth to every man called of God.

Cyrus, the Great; and Josiah, king of Judah; were named centuries before their births. At least nineteen hundred years before he appears, the career of a great world ruler, the Beast, of Revelation, as described and the exact length of his reign of terror is set. God needs no recording angel to keep the records of mankind. We may well believe that when the books are opened before the great white throne, men may hear their deeds recounted from records written before the foundation of the world. The power to tell Peter, "Before the cock crows, thou shall deny me thrice," (Matthew 26:75) could have been used to give the same information a thousand years before Peter’s birth. God, and only God, could do either. Who set the exact time for the questions which aggravated Peter? Who made the cock crow? In the service of Christ, it is as sweet to rest on Predestination, and Election, and the Calling according to his purpose, as it is to rest on the merits of Christ for salvation. It makes real the words, "For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Matthew 11:30)

Bible students are apt to be critical of what a man teaches on justification. If his views on the atonement are clear, he is rated as orthodox. Why should clear views on justification excuse the teacher who utterly ignores the truth of a living God who calls a man to be justified, and calls according to his own purpose? How much is orthodoxy worth that lifts salvation out of its setting of foreknowledge, predestination, and calling?

Some rage and others scoff at the idea that God predestinates some to be saved and others to be lost. Can it be that there are disturbing statements in the Bible that few are willing to accept? "And as many as were ordained to eternal life believed." (Acts 13:48) A discussion of this problem comes more properly under the subject of Election. Does God choose?

Some who are more interested in prayer than in what the Bible teaches about prayer, protest that Predestination cuts the nerve of prayer.

If Predestination cuts the nerve of your praying, we suggest that your prayers need revising. Probably a better statement would be that a lot of praying cuts the nerve of Predestination. Prayer that defies plain doctrines of the Bible is not worth a great deal. Paul’s prayer to God for Israel was that they might be saved, but he had no difficulty in understanding why they rejected the gospel and those who preached it. "God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see and ears that they should not hear unto this day." (Rom. 11:8)

Human prayer may flounder around in its infirmities, "We know not what we should pray for as we ought"; (Rom. 8:26) and do violence to the doctrines of Grace, Security, the Coming of Christ, and Predestination. The doctrines are not wrong but human prayers are faulty. By the mighty doctrines of the Word of God our lives and prayers are pruned. Let the nerves be cut! The most widespread attitude toward Predestination can be stated in three words: Predestination is limited. We quote from an article in a Bible study magazine, "God’s foreknowledge comprehends all things, the truth of Predestination involves only some things." "At no time does God impose his will upon individual man." "God respects the power of choice resident within man." These are simply bold assertions without any Bible foundation. Such assertions do not describe the call of Saul of Tarsus or his years of service as a bond-slave of Jesus Christ: nor do they aptly describe the experiences of Jonah. God does impose his will upon individual man. God took David from the sheep fold. God slew King Saul at Mount Gilboa and told him the night before that he was going to do it. God sent Joseph into Egypt. God sent the seven years of plenty and the seven years of famine. God does not respect the power of choice resident in man.

Some say, "God foreknows but he does not predestinate." The Bible says that God does both, "Whom he did foreknow, he did predestinate." Why accept one and deny the other? Foreknowledge is not a refuge from the implications of Predestination. Foreknowledge cuts the nerve of some prayers as cleanly as Predestination. If God by foreknowledge knows that a certain thing will come to pass, can all the prayers in the world change the course of events? If foreknowledge can be upset, how much is it worth? Every charge leveled against Predestination can be leveled against foreknowledge.

Others say, "Predestination makes man a mere automaton."

Man is predestinated. Big bad words do not change the situation. Someone might hurl the charge of "automaton" against Lazarus, bound hand and foot in grave clothes. We would prefer to be a live automaton by the grace of God than a dead "go-getter." There was not much free will and personal initiative in the earthly life of our Lord. "All things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and in the prophets, and in the psalms concerning me." (Luke 24:44) As God in prophecy predestinated, so our Lord and Saviour walked. And then there is the childish prattle, If God predestinates, why send missionaries and support preachers?

God predestinates! That is settled! Send missionaries who believe it as Paul believed it; and support preachers who preach it as Paul preached it. Missionary work that denies Predestination or any other great doctrine is a poor investment. The man who says, If God predestinates, why send missionaries? is exactly like the man who says, If salvation is not of works, why go to church? One man thinks that missionaries save people: the other thinks that salvation is earned by church going: both think of salvation as proceeding from man and fail to comprehend, "Born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." (John 1:13) And is it true that God predestinates no man to be lost? The Beast who is to rule the world just previous to our Lord’s return, and his false prophet, are certainly men; and are predestined to the lake of fire. Judas was lost, the son of perdition, that the scriptures might be fulfilled. His betrayal of our Lord was foretold like Peter’s denial. (John 6:70, 17:12) Why limit predestination?

Thanks be to God, for the privilege of believing the Bible! And what shall we say more of predestined men and nations? Of Ishmael, "He will be a wild man: his hand against every man?" Of Jacob, "Thy seed shall lie as the dust of the earth? Behold I am with thee and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest and will bring thee again into this land" Of Abraham, "Thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them: and they shall afflict them four hundred years; and also that nation whom they shall serve, will I judge?" Of Nebuchadnezzar, "And all nations shall serve him, and his son, and his son’s son, until the very time of his land come: and then many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of him?" Of the ten kings of Revelation 17:17, "For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast until the words of God shall he fulfilled?" The men of this ungodly world have no objection to Predestination provided it does not come from the Bible. Homer has few readers but is proclaimed to be the greatest poet of all time. When Achilles is dipped in the river Styx and his heel is left un-wet, every yokel waits with breathless interest for the moment when he will be wounded in the heel, and die! Predestination according to Homer! The story of Achilles is real to soldiers on the battlefield; as real as cold steel.

Shakespeare did not go to college but he is the idol of the classrooms. Macbeth is predestined to glory and then to doom. Predestination brewed by witches is a thrilling work of art. Shakespeare also broadcast the idea, "There is a destiny that shapes our ends, rough hew them as we may." Men believe that something called Destiny does things like that; but they do not believe that God does them. The man on the street, without benefit of Homer, Shakespeare or the Bible, has a witches’ brew of his own concoction. "Yer aint going to die till yer time comes. Aint it the truth?" He is a fatalist. Fatalism is predestination without a God even as evolution is creation without a Creator. Fatalism gets its name from "fate" and has no answer to the question, Who determines fate? The man on the street sees Predestination at work: little men become great: great men crash in disgrace: death misses by a hair’s breadth: and Hitler, the paper hanger, shakes the world. He is frightened by what he sees: and is as superstitious as a pagan in a primeval forest: to pierce the veil of fate he spends millions on witch doctors, palmists, mediums and fortune tellers. As long as preachers run from predestination like scared rabbits, folks who go to church are fairly safe from the Doctrine of Predestination; but Shakespeare may get them even there.