Bible Study, Triniy Bible Church Cypress, May 24, 2026

III. Unconditional Election

A. Summary Statement

“God the Father chose to save specific individuals without basing his choice on the condition of faith.”[30]

B. Alternate Names

• Sovereign election
• Divine initiative
• Monergism (vs. synergism)

C. Scriptural Basis

John 1:12–13; 6:44, 63, 65; 15:16; Rom 8:28–29; 9:10–14; 1 Cor 1:26–28; Eph 1:4–11; 2 Thess 2:13; 2 Tim 1:8–11; Jas 1:18; 2:5; 1 Pet 1:1–4; 1 John 5:1, 4.

D. Explanation

Several of these passages we’ve already looked at in our NT survey, so I will lean on those classes. You can find them online. Let me just remind you with the following slide from last week.

New Testament Survey (Epistles)
Rom 8 – golden chain of redemption; Who will charge “God’s elect”?
Rom 9 – election “depends not on human will or exertion, but on God”
Eph 1 – predestined “according to the good pleasure of His will”
2 Tim 1 – called “according to… His own purpose and grace”
Jas 1; 2 – born “in the exercise of His will”; chosen “to be rich in faith”
1 Pet 1 – chosen “to” obedience, “caused… to be born again”

But we will add to these a few texts.

John 1

John 1 – ¹¹ [Christ] came to what was His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. ¹² 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, ¹³ who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

Now, the grammar is not decisive here as to which happens first: receiving Christ, becoming children, believing, or birth. Let’s not get off track there. Yet, notice how John homes in three times on what new birth isn’t. It is “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh.” Clearly this is spiritual birth, not physical. Then, is it “nor of the will of man, but of God.” Clearly, it is spiritual birth—but one that is divinely monergistic. That is a term meaning “the lone effort of one (person).” That person we learn in John 3 is the Holy Spirit. The new birth is not synergistic, meaning “the combined effort of multiple (persons).” In other words, only the will of God is the cause of this new birth.

Imagine a child giving effort in their own birth. The idea is impossible. Fathers cannot even claim to contribute to the delivery of a child. We support the mothers (as do doctors and nurses and midwives, etc.). But the imagery is of a single person’s effort, not two, and especially not the child.

1 John 5

One more text should show us that regeneration (the new birth) precedes faith.

1 John 5 – ¹ Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the One who gives new birth loves also the one who has been born of Him.

John speaks of being born of God in two different verb tenses (i.e., timeframes). “Believes” is in the present tense, but “has been born” is in what we call the perfect tense. That simply means something viewed as a whole as being done in the past. John Stott writes in his commentary,

The combination of present tense… and perfect is important. It shows clearly that believing is the consequence, not the cause, of the new birth. Our present, continuing activity of believing is the result, and therefore the evidence, of our past experience of new birth by which we became and remain God’s children.[31]

The apostle John states this chronological order again in v. 4:

⁴ For everything that has been born of God overcomes the world; and this is the overcoming that has overcome the world—our faith.

Being “born of God” precedes faith in John’s theology.

Now, the reason this order matters is that the classical Arminian explanation of human free will is that the latter chooses God (i.e., believes, converts) before God makes the person fully alive. Yet, John 1 shows that human will is not a factor in the new birth, and 1 John 5 shows that human faith is not the cause of it either.

If we keep with the biblical illustration, try to imagine an infant choosing its parents before its birth. Infants cannot choose their parents, much less even to be born. That seems to be why God chose this picture for the miracle of regeneration. It is a miracle that He works in us alone. We cannot choose our Father; He must choose us.

Now, again, to some objections from our siblings who see things differently.

E. Implications and Objections

1. What does “foreknowledge” mean?

Arminian scholar Roger Olson writes….

Who is included in the elect? All who[m] God foresees will accept his offer of salvation through Christ by not resisting the grace that extends to them through the cross and the gospel. Thus, predestination is conditional rather than unconditional; God’s electing foreknowledge is caused by the faith of the elect.[32]

Pastor Ken began to answer this idea of “foreknowledge” already. Let me repeat and continue that line of argument.

1. First, “foreknowledge” in English is an accurate translation of the Greek word.

The Greek word is proginōskō, meaning “to know beforehand.” It does not mean to “foresee,” that would be Greek prooraō, which we also have in the NT, in Galatians 3:8.

And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, proclaimed the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “All the nations will be blessed in you.” (Gal 3:8)

The subject foreseeing is impersonal (“Scripture”), so the meaning is figurative. Scripture does not have eyes, and so cannot see. Scripture foresees by prophesying or anticipating something that would come about later. The thing foreseen in this case is a fact, the fact of what God would do (“justify the Gentiles by faith”). Scripture foresaw this fact by preserving God’s promise to Abraham, that in him “all the nations will be blessed,” not just Abraham’s descendants (Gen 12:1–3). What Scripture foresees here is not the fact of what man would do, but what God would do. Therefore, this verse should not confuse the meaning of “foreknowledge” when it comes to God’s election. “Foresight” and “foreknowledge” really are distinct meanings.

2. Second, every time the NT says God “foreknew,” in the context of election, it is always with a person as the object, not a fact or an event.

In other words, it is personal knowledge not factual.[33] A prime example is Romans 8:29, but, again, this is always the case, without exception.

Those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son… (Rom 8:29)

3. Third, the noun prognosis in Acts 2:23 is used with respect to an event, but it is parallel to “predetermined plan.”

“This Man, [Peter says,] delivered by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of lawless men and put Him to death.” (Acts 2:23)

Thus, without God’s predetermining foreknowledge, not only would I not be elect, none of you would be saved, because Christ would not be crucified. “Foreknowledge” in our Bibles with respect to election cannot mean clairvoyance or prescience but must mean predetermination.[34]

4. Fourth, the exact Arminian scenario is precluded in Matthew 11.

Remember, the Arminian definition of election is conditional. That is to say, God in eternity past looks down the corridors of time and sees in advance who would, of their own free will, influenced by prevenient grace, believe in Christ. Then, God elects that person to be adopted and redeemed. In other words, God knows all potentialities and therefore provides the adequate prevenient grace for the cooperative sinners to repent and believe. To quote Olson again,

Prevenient grace does not interfere with the freedom of the will. It does not bend the will or render the will’s response certain. It only enables the will to make the free choice to either cooperate with or resist grace. … God does not make this decision for the individual; it is a decision individuals, under the pressure of prevenient grace, must make for themselves.[35]

Matthew 11 paints a different picture of God’s interaction with the potentialities He knows.

Matt 11 – ²¹ “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had occurred in Tyre and Sidon which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. ²² Nevertheless I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. ²³ And Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will descend to Hades; for if the miracles had occurred in Sodom which occurred in you, it would have remained to this day. ²⁴ Nevertheless I say to you that it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for you.”

Christ is not saying here that Tyre and Sidon and Sodom will not be judged. They were judged and will be judged on the final day of judgment. But those unbelieving cities that witnessed the miracles of Jesus—which Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom did not have access to—they will receive a greater condemnation (cf. Mark 12:40). How tragic it is, Jesus implies, for His hometown and neighboring cities of Capernaum, Chorazin, and Bethsaida to not believe, when even Sodom would have believed, had it seen Jesus’s works.

The implication is inescapable. If election is conditioned on God’s foreseeing a person’s response to prevenient grace, Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom should have been saved. According to the Arminian schema, God considers the potentiality of all persons’ faith in response to His influence and “pressure.” Then, knowing that Sodom would have believed at some critical mass of prevenient grace, He should have provided them that grace in full. For, He knew it would help their wills to believe. However, the people of those cities stand condemned, because they did not believe. God’s foresight of potential human faith contingent on His grace cannot, therefore, be the condition of His election.

The result is, as J. I. Packer put it, “Where the Arminian says: ‘I owe my election to my faith,’ the Calvinist says, ‘I owe my faith to my election.’”[36]

2. But isn’t a genuine relationship precluded?

Baptist Arminian scholar Roger Olson writes this:

The main reason Arminians reject the Calvinist notion of monergistic salvation, in which God unconditionally elects some to salvation and bends their will irresistibly, is that it violates the character of God and the nature of a personal relationship. If God saves unconditionally and irresistibly, why doesn’t he save all? Appeal to mystery at this point does not satisfy the Arminian mind because the character of God as love showing itself in mercy is at stake.[1]

This, I believe, is the central issue of disagreement between Arminians and Calvinists, so it is of great importance. There are several problems with Olson’s argument:

1. First of all, he says Calvinists believe God “bends their will irresistibly,” as if to mean that He breaks their will, in order to save them.[2]

But most Calvinists believe God’s sovereignty is compatibilist. That He frees, heals, and persuades the will. The Puritan Thomas Watson illustrates God’s providence like the gears in a clock.[3] They all seem to be moving in various directions. But the central wheel is God’s providence that turns them all, so that they all work in accordance with God’s plan, including calamity, evil, and human will.

2. Then, as I mentioned last week, appealing to mystery is exactly what Paul does in Romans 9–11, as do many other authors of Scripture.

“Why doesn’t he save all” is a charge that God would be unjust in unconditional election. Which, ironically, is like the devil’s advocate question Paul asks in Romans 9:14 and 19:

Is there any unrighteousness in God? May it never be! (Rom 9:14)

You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault?” (Rom 9:19)

In other words, why doesn’t he save everybody? Scripture’s answer, we saw, is ultimately a question to us: Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? Doesn’t the potter have authority over the clay? What if God has reasons in His glory? Could you defeat Him with the moral high ground? Olson’s objection seems based in presumptions that no mystery should remain before us in this matter, that we are fit to judge God’s fairness in it, and that that autonomous free will is inviolable. But these principles are nowhere laid down in Scripture.

3. Thirdly, genuine relationship with God in the eternal state will not be based on man’s ability to choose (Rom 8:23; 1 Cor 15:42; 1 Jn 3:2–3).

All Christians believe that we will be in a state of confirmed righteousness in our resurrected bodies for all eternity. We will no longer have the moral ability to desire sin, though we’ll still have the natural ability to choose our desires. That’s one of the things I look forward to most about heaven. I will no longer sin and grieve my Lord! Don’t you eagerly wait for the day you won’t be able to sin against Christ anymore? Would anyone say that means our relationship with God is shallow or fake? We cannot define the concepts of God’s love or true relationship by anything other than what we read in Scripture. What we read in Scripture means the Arminian view can’t be true.

Now, in the same way that total depravity necessitated unconditional election, unconditional election necessitates our next point.

Endnotes

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[30] Naselli, Predestination, 16.

[31] John R. Stott, The Letters of John, TNTC 19 (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 172.

[32] Olson, Arminian Theology, 35.

[33] Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Zondervan, 2004), 676–77. Geerhardus Vos, speaking on Romans 8:29–30, writes, “It is something like what a father feels toward his son, his future son. It is a knowing of love. Since behind God’s purpose such a fatherly love functioned with respect to the elect, it ordained the form of son for all those who were the objects of its free choice.” Reformed Dogmatics 1.5.10 (cf. 8–10). J. I. Packer (Concise Theology, 57) says it’s as if it means “forelove” (Rom 11:2; 1 Pet 1:2, 20).

[34] “πρόγνωσις,” BDAG, 866.

[35] Olson, Arminian Theology, 36.

[36] J. I. Packer, “Introductory Essay,” The Death of Death in the Death of Christ, John Owen (1684; repr., Banner of Truth, 1959), 7. Thomas Aquinas made the same argument against Pelagianism, that it confuses the “effect” of predestination with its “cause” or reason (Summa Theologica I q.23 a.5).

[1] Olson, Arminian Theology, 38.

[2] Olson mischaracterizes what the Canons of Dort meant by regenerating grace bending the will “sweetly and powerfully” (3.16). They expressly meant that God makes a dead sinner alive, and by virtue of that new life, has made the sinner willing to believe. In the words of Packer (“Introductory Essay,” 8), “Grace proves irresistible just because it destroys the disposition to resist.”

[3] Thomas Watson, A Body of Divinity (1692; repr., Banner of Truth, 1983), 125.