Intrinsic
to the idea of predestination is the belief in Irresistible Grace.
Obviously, the term suggests that if God has chosen us, we cannot
turn away from His election. However, irresistible grace runs a
little deeper than that. We've already talked about the fact that
carnal man does not want to come to God. We are totally depraved –
not only are we not able to come to God, we completely lack the
desire. However, if God has elected us, we come willingly to Him.
So He gives us not only the ability to call upon His name but an
irresistible desire to do so.
Consider
these two verses:
Ephesians
2:8-9, For by grace you have been saved through faith.
And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result
of works, so that no one may boast.
John
1:12-13, “But as
many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of
God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of
blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of
God.”
According
to Ephesians, not only are we saved by faith, one understanding of
the verse is that even the faith is not your own – it is the gift
of God. So even the ability to call on Him comes from Him.
The
verse from John suggests something similar. Note that it says those
who believe in His name were not born of blood, nor of the will of
the flesh, nor of the will of man. Instead, it says rather clearly
that God Himself gave them the right to become His children. In
other words, we believe in Him not because of our will but because of
His will.
I
would not describe myself as a Calvinist but certainly I'm
sympathetic to Calvinism. It's a doctrine that is not completely
without merit and there are many verses that have caused me to
seriously consider the issue. However, there is one verse especially
that gives me pause. I find it completely incompatible with
Calvinism in general and the point of irresistible grace in
particular.
Matthew
23:37, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and
stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your
children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings,
and you were unwilling.”
Jesus
uttered those words before making His triumphant entry into
Jerusalem. He knew that the crowds who flocked to see Him and hail
Him as their Messiah would soon be shouting for His death. It says
very plainly that Jesus longed for those Jews to embrace Him and that
it was they who rejected Him.
Yet
men wiser than me have read this same verse and still view is as
compatible with Calvinism. While commenting on this verse, Charles
Spurgeon wrote:
The
great destroyer of man is the will of man. I do not believe that
man’s free will has ever saved a soul; but man’s free will has
been the ruin of multitudes. “Ye would not,” is still the solemn
accusation of Christ against guilty men. Did he not say, at another
time, “Ye will not come unto me, that ye might have life?” The
human will is desperately set against God, and is the great devourer
and destroyer of thousands of good intentions and emotions, which
never come to anything permanent because the will is acting in
opposition to that which is right and true.
I
agree with his comments to a point and I can see how this verse could
be used in defense of Calvin's first point, the total depravity of
man. Yet I still can't see how this verse can be reconciled with the
idea of irresistible grace. Matthew still says that Jesus desired
them to come and they, by their own will, would not.
