MarcoPolo,
Not all the elect know they are elect. It is likely that some of God’s elect in the world are currently unregenerate (simply because He has not saved them yet). Of the elect who have been regenerated, it’s hard to say except on a case-by-case basis. 2 Peter 1:10 does mention “making one’s calling and election sure,” for what it’s worth.
However, I do think it’s important to note that I do not believe that people should write in their Bibles the date that they said the “sinner’s prayer” so they can be assured that no matter what occurs they’re just fine. Perseverance necessarily accompanies a true justification, according to Reformed theology.
Acts 17:30 expresses that God
commands men everywhere to repent. This does not imply that God desires all to be saved.
I dealt with 1 Timothy 2:4 above.
In the context of Romans 11:32, the stress is, again, on
particular love: “Just as
you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy,” v. 30; “as a result of God’s mercy to
you,” v. 31. More importantly, the entire context of vv. 25-32 is that of the
Jews and
Gentiles,
classes of people. This would give strong evidence, again, that v. 32 is referring to all men without distinction.
However,
even if you find this unconvincing, it is still far from evident that v. 32 teaches a strictly universal love of God towards all men without exception. That, just like the passages I exegeted above, makes for an abrupt shift in the flow of the passage. The one thing you might argue from v. 32 is that it is speaking of God’s having bound “all men to disobedience,” in which case it must be referring to every single person (because everyone fell in Adam), but that can easily be explained by what I have already said. It is the case that all men without exception fell in Adam, but the point of the passage is in God’s love for all types of people – and it is certainly the case that all men
without distinction were bound to disobedience. Thus the phrase “all men over to disobedience” is at worst inconclusive.
The first, is Paul’s musing of the phrases “what if God” made people for good or some for destruction (e.g. v. 22). By this hypothetical language, He simply demonstrates who is in command. The point being no one can supersede His will.
Are you
really trying to say that Paul spoke of “vessels of wrath fitted for destruction” and God’s choosing
just to establish that He is sovereign in a generic, unqualified sense?
Either way, the parts before that section are, in my opinion, more important – how God chose Jacob and not Esau, and how He chose them
irrespective of any works they might do, solely because of reasons within Himself.
Those whom He “foreknew” would cooperate therefore were His “predestined.”
This interpretation frankly does not work. (I’m sorry, but I don’t know how to say it more charitably.) First, the whole point of Romans 8:28-30 is in establishing the primacy of God’s sovereign hand in order to soothe God’s people (“all things work for good,” etc.). Second, it makes a mockery of the word “predestination” to suppose that God predestined someone
as a result of their doing something. That would more properly be termed
postdestination. Third, God does not foreknow
facts (i.e. “that person X will repent and believe”) but
persons. The point of God’s foreknowing His people is establishing His intimate love for them from before the foundation of the world, not of His impersonally looking down the corridors of time, seeing that they would choose Him, and then “predestining” them as a consequence of their choosing Him. It says “those” He foreknew, not “what” He foreknew.
And thus, in Romans 9, those whom He foreknew to cooperate correspond to the noble (v. 21) and the those whom He foreknew to not freely cooperate still entered time and served “dishonorable” purposes.
If this were the case, v. 19 would make very little sense:
"One of you will say to me: ‘Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?’ " The whole point is that reprobation and election are entirely by the sovereign decree of God and not by the choice of man. If they were by the choice of man, as you implicate, then it would be absurd to attempt to remove one’s own blame and say, “For who resists His will?”
) It was my understanding that a Catholic can affirm predestination however what was rejected was actually the errant belief of double predestination… which is people being predestined for damnation.
Even though it is credible.