Chosen

Not that Chosen

You may have seen the title of this blog and thought I was going to write about the show “The Chosen” but that is not the focus of this post. (Maybe next week!) Rather I am going to talk about what can be an even more controversial issue: the doctrine of election! I believe that this doctrine is only controversial because it is so offensive to human pride. It is also because, as fallen creatures, we often have a view of God and His character that is formed more by our own finite basis than by fidelity to the revelation of God in the Scriptures!

Chosen in the Old Testament

God’s people have always been a chosen people. In the Old Covenant, God’s chosen people were the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob even though God did graciously save gentiles who were saved in the covenant chosen people. People such as Rahab and Ruth are examples of gentiles who were chosen by God and providentially brought into God’s covenant people. These women were chosen individually out of all the other Gentiles, but they were also corporately included in the covenant people of Israel. It is important that we realize that from Adam forward the only true people of God have been believers. No one, whether of Hebrew or Gentile descent, has been saved apart from the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. Even under the Old Covenant, the redeemed people were the believers.

Chosen in Christ

In the New Covenant, God’s people are also chosen but no longer is the identification made with Israel, but with Christ. Not all those of Hebrew descent are the true Israel (Romans 9:6-7). The true Israel is the true Son, Jesus. 

Most people want to place God’s election in a passive state and man’s free will in the active state as definitive in the individual's conversion and regeneration. However, passive election would not be election at all. God is the active elector. Men are bound in sin and are thus free only to do what is dictated by our own sinful state until we are rescued and set free by God’s grace. 

The argument that I want to make today is that election is the only way for anyone to be saved. Sovereign election is the only way for the new covenant to actually work and genuinely save anyone. This is because the new covenant is not a simple offer of salvation, but rather the accomplishment of salvation for all the elect. The New Covenant has already been established and is in effect. For a covenant to be entered synergistically that covenant must be ratified and placed in effect after the mutually sovereign parties have both agreed and consented to the arrangement. But the covenant whereby fallen sinners are regenerated and redeemed by grace alone through faith alone was conceived before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4) and promised immediately after the fallen in the judgment upon the serpent (Genesis 3:15) and again to Abraham when he was called to follow God’s promise away from his family and homeland (Genesis 12:1-3).

Oftentimes people will argue that the use of election in the Scripture is referring to corporate election. This means that the election was of Israel in the Old Testament and Christ in the New Testament so anyone who does what is necessary to belong to those groups is included because God chose the group, not the individuals making up the group. 

But corporate election depends on the election of individuals, because God is not only sovereign over the ends and results, but also He providentially reigns over the means by which all things happen. 

Of course, God chose Israel in the Old Covenant and Christ in the New Covenant but in choosing them He sovereignly also chose those who make up those groups. In the passage already referred to above in Ephesians 1, Paul states that God chose us in Christ! Meaning that God chose us as the individual believers who would be in Christ and therefore receive the benefits of union with Christ. This election is consistent with the command upon all men to repent and believe this good news that God saves everyone who calls on the name of the Lord (Romans 10:13).

---