Bible Lesson 168
PREDESTINATION
“In Him (Christ) also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him (God) who works all things according to the counsel of His will” Ephesians 1:11
‘The only people who believe are those who had been appointed to eternal life. God only grants the gift of faith to those who are predestined to salvation. He choose us, and to those he has chosen he gives the power to believe.’ (Acts 13:48) John McArthur
This is a Bible Study that should, and I believe, will get a lot of attention because most people today want to think that they can be saved anytime they decide to believe. The visible churches of our day really believe, or really want to believe it is true, that men can somehow manipulate God into giving them salvation, whenever and wherever they decide to believe. These are people who are ignorant of the Word of God because you cannot find that kind of thinking in the Bible. It should be sufficient to look at where we all begin our lives here on this planet that we call earth. We are all born with a nature that is in rebellion against God, since we are born with the nature of Adam.
God spoke to us through the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 2:1 and reminded us, as he reminded the Saints that he spoke to in Ephesians 1:1, that they had to be made alive, because they were born in the flesh, dead in trespasses and sin! God goes on there in that chapter of Ephesians, to say, that these very people who were referred to in the previous chapter, had been before God saved them by His grace’.people who followed the devil, were disobedient, and were children of God’s wrath. So we have to begin, by understanding that we are lost when we are born. We are born in a desperate state, having no ability to desire God or connect in any way with Him.
We are dead, and dead men can not do one thing because they have no life in them to actuate them to do anything. That was a condition passed on to us by our forefather Adam. So how can any of us ever come out from under the wrath of God and be assured of heaven’ The same way that the saints that Paul wrote to there in chapter two of Ephesians chapter 2 and verse1; God must quicken, or give us new life, before we can even see our need.
Our subject for this lesson is Predestination and can be better understood if we break it into it’s two parts, Pre meaning before and destine meaning destiny. God is an All knowing and sovereign God who before the foundation of the world predestined a people’from every tongue, tribe and nation to be saved in time while they lived here on the earth. God predestined individuals as we said from every tribe, tongue, and nation, without distinction but not without exception.
That means every body was not chosen by God for salvation, some were left to follow their own way and to spend eternity in hell. Now, that breaks the egg that turns most people off when they begin to try to understand the truth about God’s Grace and His sovereignty in everything, especially in salvation. Why would God elect or chose some and not chose others’ Because, He is God and that is what He chose to do. What we must remember is that God did not put any mark on those whom He chose or elected, nor did He mark those that He passed over. What He did was to make us all responsible by having the Word of God the Bible preached to every creature. None of us were saved, or changed from that creature that was under God’s wrath when they were born. We all begin this life even on level ground. God as He always does in everything that He does, had a plan that was from eternity to save those who would be the people of Christ; and we must deal with what we do with Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, who came and died on the cross for those who would obey Him. There have been millions upon millions who have stood in the valley of decision about what they will do with God’s gift of redemption, and have refused to budge until they know why God chose some and not others. In other words they get so involved with God’s business that we chose not to flee to the cross of Christ and fall and cast our selves on the only remedy that exists’.and we bleat like sheep ‘why did God chose some and not others’.
Yes, God did elect some from before the foundation of the world, back in eternity past, when there was only God’.no world and no people (Ephesians 1:3-5; Romans 8:28; 1st Peter 1:2-4; Ephesians 1:11). Too many even say of God that He is not fair to chose some and not choose others. Some say that God just set up a potential at the cross of Christ’that anyone who wanted to be saved in time, would be complete by choosing to be saved. That is accusing God of being slack and having given His One and Only Son, Jesus Christ, not knowing or possibly not caring if anyone would choose, what He did for their salvation. Others say that it would have been unfair of God to choose particular people and not choose everyone; but we know that God and what He has said and done is the standard set for us to follow. We are not greater than The One who Created us in the beginning, and we are not allowed to change anything that God has done or said (Matthew 5:17-20; Psalms 119:89; 1st Peter 1:24-25; Revelation 22:18-19). It would be well for us to remember that God is the Creator (Potter), and we are the clay, He made us, we did not make Him, and He can do with us as He pleases (Romans 9:21-26; 2ndTimothy 2:19-26). That is the problem with the society that we live in and have lived in for many years, people have become enamored with themselves and they deem themselves equal in some way with God; however I would invite you, to look back to that man Job who the Bible says was a blameless and upright man who feared God and shunned evil, and whom God allowed to be attacked by Satan. It might interest most who read this lesson to go back and read the little book of Job, because God protects and enriches him, but puts him in his place’.which is where we need to be put on occasion.
(Job chapter 38:1-42:6).
We have, as my Mother used to say when I stepped out of line, gotten too big for our britches. We have desired a God that we can control, a God that is subject to our whims and wishes. We now have that little God and we like Morgan Freeman, who said recently that he ‘was god ‘, cling to this little god that has never done anything except lead us to hell, can never do anything to cause us to be better, or save us from anything, including eternal condemnation and suffering in hell. What about you this morning, who is your God’ Is He a God that will answer to your every prayer or request, including to allow you to lead Him instead of Him leading you’ Is your God able to create anything’ Can your God make it rain or snow or cause the gentle breeze to blow’ Can He give you joy in utter ruin and grief’ I know The God who is sovereign in all things, and He can do and has done all of that and more. But He is not a God that can be lead around on a string by the very creatures that He formed from the dust of the earth! The true God Jehovah, the God of the Bible, does exactly what He wants to do, when he wants to do it! The wonder of that is that whatever He does is right and just what we need from Him,
(Romans 9:14:16). Look at the condition of a society that has seen it’s people pass from God fearing, hard working, loving and compassionate people who get along in their society by following tried and tested ways that are set by the Creator: to a lazy, alcoholic and drug craving, always looking for some form of handout that they call entitlement, people who are afraid to stand up and stand out, but rather choose to use the internet to curse and accuse and sully everything that is right and good. It once was that the church of the living God was at least for the most part, the true church, and it lived what it preached, and more or less kept the communities that they lived in places where peace and tranquility existed. However, in our day this 21st century, the church has decided to move God aside and to go into business on it’s own, to grow congregations that would meet the desired budget. Some of these Churches amass fortunes that lie in the bank, instead of doing what God would have us to do with our money. The Government which is in place to either punish the people that it governs or bless the people that obey it’s laws saw that it could supplant the church, which refuses to do it’s job, and it slowly but surely became all things to all people.
You may ask, what has that to do with predestination’ I answer that predestination is of God and we live and thrive, or refuse to live and die, within the parameters of God’s eternal predestination. God predestined in eternity past, before the foundation of the world, what would happen in detail at this particular time. We are living out the destiny of the world and most people today have missed it completely. God has told us many (not nearly all) of His secrets and we know enough or would if we studied that Word of God the Bible, to know that the Judgment is on our street, if not at our door. God has told us that in the end, we would be making merry, giving in marriage and going about our business doing everything that we desire. He told us that there would be those who would hold themselves and the world would see them as messiahs (saviors). That the whole world would receive them, serve them and eventually worship them. One person (or probably several persons) will so enrapture the masses that they would do whatever he said to do. That will require a common worship (Satanic worship), a common form of exchange (the dollar, the Euro or the like), a common mind set (antinomian) which we are seeing come into view in our day. All of this togetherness ,and sordid living, will end until God says enough and sends Judgment on all those who have not stood firmly on God and His Word and Way. (Read Revelation 10:1-22:21).
We know what God would have us to do, and we neglect it, reject it, refuse it, and misuse it, without ever coming to the knowledge of the truth that it contains. We insist upon rationalization of it and make it rational in our limited minds, instead of receiving it and believing it and acting according to it. We have make gods in our own image but none of these have ever been able to save us and make our lives worthwhile. God has set forth within His Word a mold that we as His creatures can conform to and live a happy, joyful and productive life as we become fit for God’s heaven. But we have thought to make God come to the bar of our understanding rather than our obediently coming to God’s. God has set down a life that will glorify Him, and dignify the one that follows His rules. As we strive to understand the reality of predestination we will, of necessity, have to understand other doctrines that are related to it. Words like election, foreordination, foreknowledge, ordained or preordained. God is the master-builder and has planned and put into effect all that is needed to change a sinner into a saint. We know that God elected, chose, selected all who will ever be saved, before the foundation of the World. God does not change, or readjust, or reconsider, as we are so accustomed to do. We are finite creatures, created by an infinite God. He has predetermined our lives to the ultimate degree. Nothing happens by accident, it was all predestined to happen, and it all plays into God’s eternal plan. God not only predestined all things, He decreed or set in place that it all comes to pass as He planned it. That does not mean that God simply predestined that you would come to know Him in forgiveness, He predestined the when, the where, and the how of it all’and what happens to us as we live here on the earth. We serve a God who is Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent, which means that He is everywhere at once, and that He knows everything that is going to happen because He decreed that it would happen, and all powerful which means that it will happen regardless.
We worship a God that has always been in charge, a God that chooses to elect or choose those who will occupy heaven with Him for eternity. God chose to create the heavens and the earth, He chose to Create all that we know from nothing. God chose to give the first man (Adam) a free will, and chose to allow him to chose whether he would obey God’s command, not to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
God chose to promise us a Messiah that would come and defeat Satan and death and hell for those whom He chose. God chose Abraham to produce and head the nation that he would choose to be His people (The Jews). That was the only national election that God chose to chose. God chose Noah, to prepare an ark that would save those who would believe when God sent the universal flood. God chose to divide the people and confuse their language at the time that the people began to build the tower that would reach to heaven, we call it Babel, and the Lord divided them and confused their languages. God chose to destroy Sodom, Gomorrah and the other cities of the plain, but God chose to take Lot and his daughters out before he rained fire down on it. God chose to use Moses to lead the chosen people out of Egyptian bondage. God chose to give the people the law that would characterize His Glory, the Ten Commands. God Chose to cast the angels out of heaven when they left their first estate to follow Lucifer. God chose to send His One and Only Son, Jesus Christ to mark the New covenant, with His chosen people. God chose the way and the day that His Son, who was God in the flesh, would die for those and those alone who would obey Him (Hebrews 5:8-9).God has chosen some to be saved and some to receive the justice for the way they ignored God’s gift of love and who loved the world and the things of the world more than they loved God (2nd Timothy 3:1-5).
God has chosen the date and time of your death, and He will judge your deeds while you lived on this earth, and reward you according to your works. Contrary to popular belief, you are not in charge of your life here on the earth, God is! God does not make you sin or disobey, but he already knows that you will because of the choices that He made before the foundation of the world. God foreknew you and that means that God in eternity, loved us, but there were some that He chose to elect to be part of the people that God would give to His Son Jesus Christ. Apparently God knew (since He knew all things), that many would not like to spend their eternity in heaven, would not like to have to worship God forever and serve Him as they enjoyed the bliss of heaven in the presence of God, the Father, and so there will be untold millions who will go to hell. (Matthew 7:13-14. We are placed here on earth, just like Adam and Eve were placed in that Paradise called the Garden of Eden. God has decreed what our lives will be like, without telling us about what he had planned. God has a book about me and you in heaven and as we live out our daily existence, we are following that book that God wrote before the beginning of time. I firmly believe that there are some people that would not be happy if God snatched them around the judgment and took them to heaven. Heaven is about worshiping and enjoying and serving God and if we don’t like it, enough to do it here on the earth how in the world would we enjoy doing that for eternity. Now, I am fully aware that there are many who refuse to believe in predestination; and I cannot take that freedom away from you. We will leave that in God’s hands; however, the problem at hand is whether God predestined it or you just happen to stumble over it, the important matter is have you and I both somehow come to the realization that we were under the wrath of God, with no help or hope, unless God takes some action to save us. I believe in predestination because the Bible teaches it in many different places. If you come to understand your problem, which is that you are a sinner, and if you are sick and tired of being a sinner against God, and if you give up what you think is control of your life and trust what Jesus Christ did on Calvary as sufficient to redeem you and give you standing before God, then it doesn’t matter (at least I don’t think it matters) whether you believe that God predestined that you would ‘before the foundation of the world.
I believe that the Bible teaches that we are saved by Grace through Faith (Ephesians 2: 8-9), and the Bible teaches that faith is the free gift of God (Romans 6:23). The Bible teaches that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Romans 10:17). The very heart of forgiveness is Jesus Christ, who came and took the place of those who would believe on the Cross, came and died having been predestined (delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, (Acts 2:23-24). We are told by God in Ephesians 1:3-5, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Him-self, according to the good pleasure of His will.” In the Book of Genesis, God spoke to Abram and said ‘.”Get out of your country, from your family and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; And you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. There in Genesis 12:1-3, God shows that He chose the families of Abraham and he predestined the nation of the Jews to be a nation of priests (Exodus 19:5-6). Think about the twins of Rebecca, Jacob and Esau. God told Rebecca that “the Older (Esau) shall serve the younger (Jacob) and this before they were born. We have the promise of predestination in Ephesians 1:11, where God speaks to us through the Apostle Paul and says, “In Him (Jesus ) also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will.”
God does not want us to wander around confused, as we walk here as His representatives. God speaks to us through the Prophet Isaiah and says “I am God, and there is no other; I am God and there is none like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, My counsel shall stand and I will do all My pleasure.” (Isaiah 46:9-10). The purpose of dealing with doctrines like predestination, is to insure that you have a proper understanding and appreciation of God’s Amazing Grace. God could and would be perfectly Just and Gracious, if He sent us all to hell for eternity. That is what we deserve; but before the foundation of the world, God in eternity past gave of Himself to provide forgiveness and salvation for some from every tongue, tribe and nation. That is because He is merciful! Does that mean that he injured those whom He does not save’ No, it means that He is Sovereign, Just and Holy and we are the clay and He is the Potter. We all are His creatures; but not all are His children. So the only way that you will ever know if God elected you in eternity past, is for you to be able to cast yourself on Jesus Christ, giving up all of your plans and prejudices, moving off the throne of your life and beseeching God to save you. Today is the day’.don’t put it off or attempt to convince God of anything other than what He has already said’
Until next time,
may God bless and keep you
This is Bro. Bob