Guest Blog: Scriptural and Theological Foundations of Reformed Soteriology

This week I have allowed a special 'guest blogger,' my good friend and brother in Christ Andrew Barber. Andrew is an active apologete for the Reformed branch of the faith and has spent much time compiling the essay that you will find below. He and I agree on almost everything political and theological, so you can assume that what he says here more or less accurately represents my beliefs as well. Here, I believe you will find the importance of Reformed theology, especially the doctrines of 'predestination' and 'total depravity' have on the content, meaning, and practicality of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I have written here an outline of what I believe is the Biblical doctrine of predestination. I will do as little of my own writing as possible (until the final Why Is It Important section) and allow God’s word to do the talking and my writing will be strictly for drawing out or emphasizing what is already in the verses listed. I would like to state for a reminder that the only time we are supposed to have a truly open mind is in the face of scripture (I have to remind myself of this every time I open my Bible), as it is the one and only rule of faith for our lives. To gain a grasp on predestination, we must first recognize how utterly sinful we are, which is something that has been overlooked in many churches.

I. Utter Depravity
Ephesians 2:1—“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions
and sins…”
Proverbs 14:12—“There is a way that seems right to a man, but in
the end it leads to death.”
James 2:10—“For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at
just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. For he who said, “Do not
commit adultery,” also said “Do not murder.” If you do not commit
adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.”
The importance here is that firstly we can do naught but sin (we were dead in…sins) and secondly that not only have we all sinned, but we are all equally lawbreakers (whoever…stumbles at just one point is guilty). While the examples in James 2:10 seem extreme (adultery and murder), Christ spends a good deal of the gospels trying to convey to us how immensely sinful we are and how impossible it is to keep the law. Remember that according to Christ “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago ‘Do not murder,’ and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment. But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment” (Matthew 5:21-22) as well as “You have heard that it was said ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Obviously no one has upheld the law. But just in case that still doesn’t convince us, God’s word tells us that everything done “out of selfish ambition” (Phil. 2:3) is sin, that everything not done to God’s glory is sin (Colossians 4:6), that “anyone…who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins” (James 4:17), and that we are to “Be joyful always, pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18). This is pretty tough stuff. How many of us pray every second of the day? And how many of us, when we pray, have a perfect attitude, being joyful and giving thanks? Remember that the standard is to be perfect (Matthew 5:48). The extent of our sin is so great that the point of James 2:10 is that all of us have broken the law, urging Paul to write that “There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:22-23). Without God, “All have turned aside, they have together become corrupt, there is no one who does good, not even one” (Psalm 14:3). No one does good and we are all equally condemned. Since accepting God as our savior is a good thing, we cannot do it without divine intervention. We cannot even seek after God (Romans 3:11).

II. God Chose Us
Ephesians 1:11—“In him we were also chosen, having been
predestined according to the plan of him who works out
everything in conformity with the purpose of his will…”
1 Peter 2:9—“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a
holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the
praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful
light.”
John 15:16—“You did not choose me, but I chose you and
appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last.”
2 Thessalonians 2:13—“But we ought always to thank God for
you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God
chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit
and through belief in the truth.”
Matthew 22:14—“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”
Romans 8:29—“For those God foreknew he also predestined to
be conformed to the likeness of his Son…”
1 Peter 1:1-2—“To God’s elect, strangers in the world, scattered
throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who
have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the
Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience
to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood.”
Mark 13:20—“If the Lord had not cut short hose days, no one
would survive. But for the sake of the elect, whom he has chosen,
he has shortened them.”

III. Only Through the Gift Of The Holy Spirit Are We Saved
Romans 10:9—“…if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
1 Corinthians 12:3—“Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus be cursed,’ and no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.”
Ephesians 2:8-9—“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.”
Romans 11:36—“For from him and through him and to him are all things.”
Acts 17:25—“And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.”
Ezekiel 36: 26-27—“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful in keeping my laws.”
1 Corinthians 2:14—“The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
John 6:65—“This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.”
1 Peter 1:1-2
John 11:38-46
These verses take a small amount of easy connect the dots work, and I will do it here. The first two verses illustrate that we are only saved by saying and believing that “Jesus is Lord” and yet we cannot do it without the Holy Spirit, which is a gift from God (Acts 2:38). This faith that saves us is a gift, and while some may say that all are given this gift, but maybe some choose to deny it, that will be handled in the final section. Faith wipes out any hope of a works-driven salvation (which is no hope at all), and is not the idea that we choose to pray a prayer for salvation still a work that we must do? Though it is a shorter check list that many religions, is it not still a check list? Pray towards Mecca three times a day, try to visit Mecca once in your lifetime, etc, and go to heaven; pray a prayer accepting Christ and go to heaven; both are things that we must do. While Christians must do things to achieve salvation (such as believing in Christ), we make the mistake when we say that it is us doing it and not the Holy Spirit in us (“For from him and through him and to him are all things.”). Lastly is the story of Lazarus, the physical representation of our spiritual lives. We are dead in our sins as Lazarus was dead. Lazarus was not capable of beating on the stone of his tomb and asking for salvation, Jesus simply had to save him. So it is with us. God chooses whom He will save from our spiritual deadness and than calls us to himself without any help from us. Romans 8:30 reveals that the calling to him is irresistible (“And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.”). This along with the idea that we are all equally lost in sin brings about the beautiful doctrine of equality in Christianity. All men are equally lost and saved without anything to do with themselves and their good works are the result of the Holy Spirit. If we can do good things without the Holy Spirit, why do we need it and what does it do?

IV. God Condemns Men For His Glory
Romans 9:10-24—Not only that, but Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?” But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?
What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory… (Italics added)
1 Peter 2:8—“They stumble because they disobey the message—
which is also what they were destined for.”
Ephesians 2:3—“All of us also lived among them at one time,
gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its
desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects
of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in
mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in
transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.”
This is a fairly heavy message, that God predestines some to hell, but this is not an act of God forcing man to sin, but God leaving man to his natural state, which leads to hell. The key is that this forces us to look at God’s glory. Doesn’t God love the whole world though? Firstly note Ephesians 2:3 which reveals that we are objects of wrath but that God had great love for people he called to be his children, not for the people referred to as the rest. It only makes sense that God could not send those he loves to hell since hell is an expression of his total anger. What about John 3:16? Many scholars have interpreted the words “the world” as an expression meaning all types of people groups, not every individual person and have shown other places in the Bible where “the world” is used that way. The question can be made that if God wills the denial of Him to glorify Himself (For “the Lord works out everything for his own ends” [Proverbs 16:4]) then does God will other sins? Most definitely.
First up is Samson. God had ordered his people not to intermarry with other peoples (Exodus 34:11 “Obey what I command you today. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land where you are going, or they will be a snare among you…And when you choose some of their daughters as wives for you sons and those daughters prostitute themselves to their gods, they will lead your sons to do the same.” Deuteronomy 7:2 “…and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn you sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.”) yet God wills Samson to intermarry (Judges 14:2 “When he returned, he said to his father and mother, ‘I have seen a Philistine woman in Timnah; now get her for me as my wife.’ His father and mother said, ‘Isn’t there an acceptable woman among your relatives or among all our people? Must you go to the uncircumcised Philistines to get a wife?’ But Samson said to his father, ‘Get her for me. She’s the right one for me.’ [His parents did not know that this was from the Lord, who was seeking an occasion to confront the Philistines; for at that time they were ruling over Israel.]”) God is sovereign over sin and evil, as shown through the book of Job and 1 Samuel 16:14 (“Now the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.”), Exodus 10:20 (“But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go.”), 1 Samuel 2:25 (“His sons, however, did not listen to their father’s rebuke, for it was the Lord’s will to put them to death.”) and 1 Kings 22:20 (So now the Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouths of all [Ahab’s] prophets…”).
The best explanation I have read comes from John Piper’s Desiring God in the first chapter:
When God looks at a painful or wicked event through His narrow lens, He sees the tragedy of the sin for what it is in itself, and He is angered and grieved: “I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord God” (Ezekiel 18:32).
But when God looks at a painful or wicked event through His wide-angle lens, He sees the tragedy of the sin in relation to everything leading up to it and everything flowing out from it. He sees it in relation to all the connections and effects that form a pattern, or mosaic, stretching into eternity. This mosaic in all its parts—good and evil—brings Him delight.


V. God’s Sovereignty Over The Rest Of Our Lives
Proverbs 16:9—“In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.”
Proverbs 21:1—“The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases.”

VI. Why Does This Matter?
According to J.I. Packer this doctrine was essentially the basis of the Reformation, that “in asserting the helplessness of man in sin, and the sovereignty of God in grace, [all the leading Protestant theologians of the beginning of the Reformation] were entirely at one. To all of them, these doctrines were the very life-blood of the Christian faith.” Martin Luther, a major advocate of predestination, even said in The Bondage of the Will that “this is the hinge on which our discussion turns, the crucial issue between us; our aim is, simply, to investigate what ability ‘free will’ has, in what respect it is the subject of Divine action and how it stands related to the grace of God. If we know nothing of these things, we shall know nothing whatsoever of Christianity, and shall be in worse case than any people on earth! He who dissents from that statement should acknowledge that he is no Christian; and he who ridicules or derides it should realize that he is the Christian’s chief foe.” It is important because it takes the center of thought from humans to God. God’s grace is easier to accept because it has nothing to do with us. Most Christians will deny a works-driven faith but do not realize that they are living that kind of life, a life wherein it is up to the individual to pray and accept Christ. Granted, the checklist for works is much shorter than many other religions, but it is still a checklist. So many Christians live on a works basis, wherein they believe that if they do not read their Bible five times a week, pray before bed-time, that God will be angry at them. What was the point of Christ’s sacrifice? So we could remain in a works-driven society? If God can still be angry with us, what happens if we die in a moment of his anger? Hell? How could he be angry at his own righteousness, which we have become (2 Corinthians 5:21)? God has already chosen us and is sanctifying us at this very moment. He has imputed Christ’s righteousness to our lives (Check out Romans 4:22)! Legally we have the account of Christ! That is the only way he can love us! We need to realize how miserably short we fall everyday, that everything done “out of selfish ambition” (Phil. 2:3) is sin, that everything not done to God’s glory is sin (Colossians 4:6), and that the standard is to be perfect (Matthew 5:48). Some people believe that this radical grace, wherein God is never angry at us, could cause more sin, but God’s Holy Spirit will sanctify his children. A youth pastor on a youth retreat once painted it as this: What if you wife told you that she would never divorce or leave you? Would you then rejoice because she wants you to be happy and go live it up, having sex and drinking and forgetting responsibility? I think not. I think your loyalty and devotion would be strengthened, and you would live in gratitude and awe at the love that you are in.
This truth has caused an avalanche in my own life which has, ironically, led me to more works. I find myself doing things no longer out of necessity, but out of joy for what God has done for me. I now earnestly want to share the gospel because I know that it is good. I know that I am not leading people into a relationship with a works-based God who will be angry at them for the rest of their life, but a God of love who in sovereignty chose them for salvation. J.I. Packer painted the picture of a sovereignty-based person the best in his 1961 book, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God (published by Inter-Varsity Press, England):
Previously…man had been central in their universe, and God had been on the circumference. They had thought of Him as a Spectator of events in His world, rather than as their Author. They had assumed that the controlling factor in every situation was man’s handling of it rather than God’s plan for it, and they had looked upon the happiness of human beings as the most interesting and important thing in creation, for God no less than for themselves. But now they see that this man-centered outlook was sinful and unbiblical; they see that, from one standpoint, the whole purpose of the Bible is to overthrow it, and that books like Deuteronomy and Isaiah and John’s Gospel and Romans smash it to smithereens in almost every chapter; and they realize that henceforth God must be central in their thoughts and concerns, just as He is central in reality in His own world. Now they feel the force of the famous first answer in the Westminster Shorter Catechism: ‘Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and (by so doing, and in so doing,) to enjoy him for ever.’ Now they see that the way to find happiness that God promises is not to seek it as an end in itself, but to forget oneself in the daily preoccupation of seeking God’s glory and doing His will and proving His power through the ups and downs and stresses and strains of everyday life. They see that it is the glory and praise of God that must absorb them henceforth, for time and for eternity. They see that the whole purpose of their existence is that with heart and life they should worship and exalt God. In every situation, therefore, their one question is: what will make most for God’s glory? what should I do in order that in these circumstances God may be magnified? (30-31)
Thus I hope that some light has been shed onto what could be a frustrating circumstance but what is actually a beautiful expression of God’s glory.