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Speaking of faith, trusting God and honoring His majesty demands that we leave many mysteries to Him. Perhaps chief among these mysteries is the problem of why God allows (but is never the originator of) evil. It is to be expected that if God can create this entire vast universe with all the complexities of physics and biology and humanity in just six days, He certainly perfectly understands a great many things that are beyond human understanding. The term, Elect appears frequently in this Sum, a term that is right at the heart of of questions regarding God’s sovereignty and human responsibility.
Why is one child born into a well-off family of two loving parents in America while another child is born to a destitute drug-addicted single mother in a third-world dictatorship? Why does one senior die peacefully in comfort in his own bed while another is wracked with terrible agony from the disease that will soon kill him? Clearly, God does not treat all people “equally” in the physical world. Why then should we expect that God must treat all people “equally” with respect to salvation? The Apostle Paul, speaking for God, sternly rebukes those who would complain that God is somehow not fair or somehow does not “respect” our own choices: “But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” (Romans 9:20 ESV).
The Holy Bible clearly teaches that:
All of us are conceived in original sin, sinners, and rebels against God. Of ourselves, we are dead in our sins and thus incapable of exercising saving faith and repentance by our own strength.86
But God, even before the creation of the world, in His unfathomably rich grace87, did elect, that is choose, some people to receive the gift of regenerated hearts. The regenerated heart is thus capable of saving faith in Jesus Christ alone and saving repentance. This gift of salvation is called in Scripture being born again / from above.88
The rest of mankind, those not chosen, not elect, God simply passed over, leaving them to the just consequences of their sins. Everyone who goes to Hell does so only because of his or her sinful, wrong choices.
How God’s sovereignty and our responsibility are compatible with one another is God’s problem, not ours. Our duty is to obey God. Each of us has the duty to obey God and repent of our sins and believe and accept Jesus Christ as our own Lord and Savior. We also have the duty to help propagate the saving Good News of Jesus Christ to those who are on the horrible road to Hell.
The reader is now equipped to understand the frequent use of Elect in this Sum.
As a practical matter, all true Christians do believe in and accept God’s sovereignty and right to order things as He sees fit. All of us have unsaved family and friends who are clearly on the road to Hell. When we pray for their salvation, do we want God to “respect their freedom,” or do we want God to lovingly reach down, grab hold of them, and save them—whether they like it or not? (And once saved, they will like it and greatly rejoice and thank God!)
86 To repent means much more than sorrow or remorse over earthly consequences for sin. To repent of sin means to resolutely turn away from the sin and to God for grace against committing that sin again. Saving repentance is a wholesale resolute turning away from all sins and to God for grace.
87 Grace, in theological contexts, refers generally to any gift from God. Any gift from God is of His free choice and completely undeserved and unearned by any person. This was even true of Adam prior to the fall. Now, after the fall, since all people are sinners (even the Elect), any gift from God is even more contrary to what we deserve. The term grace emphasizes that God’s gifts to us are given to us purely because of God’s love and mercy and in spite of the fact we do not deserve anything but wrath from God.
88 The Greek can mean either again or from above. Given the richness of the Greek language, this editor contends that Scripture intends both meanings to be true; the “ambiguity” is deliberate.
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