Cheap Christian Ebooks - Where Christians are edified, equipped and encouraged to build the Kingdom of God!

Get Cheap Christian ebooks on topics from salvation to sex, with clear, easy-to-follow explanations of difficult Bible passages.

Chapter 1

The Pleasure of His Will

Election is a very delicate topic in the body of Christ today and has been for a long time! There seems to be two major opposing positions concerning this issue.

One position says, “God chose us to be saved based on His own free will and good pleasure and nothing else!” Another position says, “God chose us because He first saw us choosing Him” or in other words, “He chose us because He knew that we would choose Him!” 

Which one is correct?

If we believe that God saved us because He foresaw us choosing Him, then we're saying we're the cause of our salvation. The responsibility for our salvation lies with us and not with Him.

Is this scriptural?

The scripture says, “Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,” Eph l: 5.

“In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who works all things after the counsel of his own will“, Eph l: 11. (Bold Type and Italics Mine)

The first scripture seems to say, the reason God willed our salvation is simply because it was His pleasure to do so, nothing else! The second scripture seems to show that God, in purposing our salvation conferred with Himself alone and was not influenced by any external considerations whatsoever! 

If my salvation begins with me, then it can also end with me. If this is true for me, then it is true for everyone else. And if it’s possible that everyone now saved can end his or her own salvation by rejecting Christ, then it’s also possible that God’s entire plan for the human race can come to a premature end right now.

I believe the answer to this question of election is clearly spelled out in scripture when Jesus said, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” John 15:16. You can choose to interpret this any way you want but when taken with Eph I: 5 & 11 above. I think it presents a pretty strong argument for election by grace alone! What do you think?

Now, I have purposely kept my explanation as simple as I could to facilitate the average explorer of the Bible.

But for the more in-depth Bible Student and those with particular interest in the ordering of the soteriological elements of God's eternal decrees with particular emphasis on the difference between supralapsarianism and infralapsarianism, I have included a chart below and a link to a web page that deals with this aspect of Election in more detail.

NOTE: See Chart and Link under ‘Summary of Views’ at the end of the book!