Election and Faith
What need of faith is there if one has been elected by God in eternity past? If one is born into the world, and God has predestined her to be in His kingdom, what does she need to do to recognize her election?
The salvation of God is known to God, who is the Alpha and Omega, knowing, even declaring the end from the beginning. God has communicated His salvation to man by His Word. The Bible is the Word of God, which reveals what God would have men to know of Himself and His works.
Election is a key revelation of God’s salvation. Election is God’s choosing a people for His own possession, selected in eternity past, before Creation. God’s motive in predestination of this select group is love (Eph 1:4,5; Jn 3:16; Rom 5:8). Clearly, God, who knows all things, was choosing many, but not all people, who He would create in time. Thus, some were created for mercy and glory, while others were created for wrath and destruction (Rom 9:22–23), according to God’s will, which is the revelation of His eternal good pleasure (Eph 1:11).
God’s eternal purpose in Christ Jesus (Eph 3:11) was to save His elect people (Mt 1:21), lost in the sinful, fall of man. To make enemies, true worshipers in Spirit and truth, would illumine His glory in the midst of darkness.
Reprobate sinners serve as a foil to God’s elect people, so that God’s salvation, by His grace, would make known His glory (Rom 9:22–23). God is a God of mercy, revealed by His choice to have mercy upon whom He wills (Gen 17:7; Rom 9:15).
Faith is a spiritual gift, allocated by God’s Spirit (Gal 5:22), who grants it by His grace (Phil 1:29), “But the Scripture has shut up all men under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe (Gal 3:22).” Who actually believes in Christ? Why is faith required in them?
Elect souls are born into the world as offspring of their natural father Adam, who sinned in unbelief, not obeying the Word of God (Gen 3). They inherit sin and the status of enmity with God, as they enter the world in the flesh (Ps 51:5; Rom 5:12). With a sin nature (Eph 2:3), the sons of Adam, being sons of disobedience (Eph 2:2), walk in the darkness of spiritual blindness (2 Cor 4:4). The elect, like the reprobate, are dead in trespasses and sins (Eph 2:1). They are not good in God’s assessment, nor do they do good works. They do not seek God in any way (Rom 3:10–12).
It is in this helpless, hopeless state that God’s Spirit comes to visit them at God’s appointed time (Eph 2:12). He transfers them from the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of God’s beloved Son (Col 1:13), by calling them out of darkness with His Word. God’s Word is preached in their hearing, and the grace of faith is given to them to believe. Thus, faith is not generated by them (Heb 12:2); it is manifested in them, by the indwelling Holy Spirit (Jn 14:17; Rom 8:9, 11), who has caused them to be born of God (Jn 3; 1 Pet 1:3).
Faith is a work of God’s Spirit, even as election was a work of God the Father. Both are related to one another in the work of God’s salvation. Faith, that is, true faith produced by the Spirit in the born again believer, is evidence of God’s election. Faith does not provoke nor produce election; it reveals it. Faith is allotted to the elect in the measure of His choosing (Rom 12:3).
No one has the ability to see election, but faith is seen in the works of the Spirit, in and through the Christian (Jas 2:14–26). Works reveal faith; faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word preached by sent messengers (Rom 10:17), men of God, called to proclaim Christ and Him crucified (1 Cor 2:2).
The disobedience of Adam is over-ridden by the obedience of Christ. The failure of faith, in the flesh of Adam, is over-ridden by faith in the Spirit. In this act of God, the giving of faith, in time, to the elect, God is revealed and trusted as the One who elects. This is revealed in the faith of those in Christ, the obedient second Adam (Rom 5:12–21).
Thus, we can conclude that the presence of faith is the reverse of the curse of Adam’s unbelief. It only appears in God’s elect people, in Christ. It serves to show the glory of God in election and His giving faith to those chosen by Him to be His people (Eph 1:4–5; 1 Pet 2:9). Faith glorifies the grace of God because some (the elect) have received it as a gift, while others remain in unbelief (Jn 10:26; Eph 2:8–9). If you have faith in Christ, you have been elected by God. Rejoice!
David Norczyk
Spokane Valley, Washington
November 2, 2021
