"Single" predestination

[FabiusMaximus]

Is there anyone here who is Lutheran who can explain why Lutherans believe that the faithful are predestined to heaven, but that those who do not believed are not predestined to hell? How does that work? If you predestine the faithful to heaven, aren’t the rest,* ispo facto*, condemned?

 

[Belloc_Fan]

Not necessarily. We Catholics believe in a sort of single predestination, as well. Basically, the saved are saved solely through the grace of God, while the damned are damned by their own free will.

Think of a pond in which there are two drowning men. You reach your hand out to one, he accepts it, and you pull him in. You saved him, he didn’t save himself. You reach your hand out to the other, and he pushes your hand away, and drowns. You didn’t kill him, he killed himself.

Grace works (somewhat) similarly: God is the primary actor, and our responsibility to accept His Grace and cooperate with it, rather than to resist or reject Him. So God’s predestination consists of:

(1) Perfect foreknowledge of who will accept or reject Him;
(2) A desire to save all (including those who will ultimately damn themselves);
(3) Active involvement in saving the saved.

So in regards to our salvation, we can say that God knew we would be saved, desired us to be saved, and brought it about. That’s predestination. But God doesn’t desire that the damned reject Him, anymore than you would desire a drowning man to refuse your outstretched hand. He simply respects their free will enough to permit them to damn themselves. In contrast, double predestination supposes that God wills the damned not to be saved.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

Not necessarily. We Catholics believe in a sort of single predestination, as well. Basically, the saved are saved solely through the grace of God, while the damned are damned by their own free will.

Think of a pond in which there are two drowning men. You reach your hand out to one, he accepts it, and you pull him in. You saved him, he didn’t save himself. You reach your hand out to the other, and he pushes your hand away, and drowns. You didn’t kill him, he killed himself.

Grace works (somewhat) similarly: God is the primary actor, and our responsibility to accept His Grace and cooperate with it, rather than to resist or reject Him. So God’s predestination consists of:

(1) Perfect foreknowledge of who will accept or reject Him;
(2) A desire to save all (including those who will ultimately damn themselves);
(3) Active involvement in saving the saved.

So in regards to our salvation, we can say that God knew we would be saved, desired us to be saved, and brought it about. That’s predestination. But God doesn’t desire that the damned reject Him, anymore than you would desire a drowning man to refuse your outstretched hand. He simply respects their free will enough to permit them to damn themselves. In contrast, double predestination supposes that God wills the damned not to be saved.

Doesn’t Lutheran predestination consider irresistible grace? If that’s true, then that assumes double predestination, doesn’t it? Because God can’t send a ‘thread’ of irresistible grace to everyone, because then everyone would be saved.

I accept that God comes to us, that he has foreknowledge, and that his role is important. But if I recall correctly Lutheranism takes it to the level of Calvinism while rejecting that the damned are predestined to damnation.

I could be wrong. If anyone wants to correct me?

 

[yobrosup]

Not necessarily. We Catholics believe in a sort of single predestination, as well. Basically, the saved are saved solely through the grace of God, while the damned are damned by their own free will.

Think of a pond in which there are two drowning men. You reach your hand out to one, he accepts it, and you pull him in. You saved him, he didn’t save himself. You reach your hand out to the other, and he pushes your hand away, and drowns. You didn’t kill him, he killed himself.

Grace works (somewhat) similarly: God is the primary actor, and our responsibility to accept His Grace and cooperate with it, rather than to resist or reject Him. So God’s predestination consists of:

(1) Perfect foreknowledge of who will accept or reject Him;
(2) A desire to save all (including those who will ultimately damn themselves);
(3) Active involvement in saving the saved.

So in regards to our salvation, we can say that God knew we would be saved, desired us to be saved, and brought it about. That’s predestination. But God doesn’t desire that the damned reject Him, anymore than you would desire a drowning man to refuse your outstretched hand. He simply respects their free will enough to permit them to damn themselves. In contrast, double predestination supposes that God wills the damned not to be saved.

How can God “know” (future tense, not present) or “God knew we would be saved” as he is outside of time and there is no “future” for God, or “past” either. God is Knowledge and knows (presently) everything.

 

[Belloc_Fan]

How can God “know” (future tense, not present) or “God knew we would be saved” as he is outside of time and there is no “future” for God, or “past” either. God is Knowledge and knows (presently) everything.

When we refer to God’s perfect “foreknowledge,” we mean that it’s the future to us. You’re right: the reason He can do this is that He’s the Author of time, and time doesn’t control Him.

 

[tbuley]

The Solid Declaration of the Formula of Concord XI. Election bookofconcord.org/sd-election.php

 

[Contarini]

Doesn’t Lutheran predestination consider irresistible grace? If that’s true, then that assumes double predestination, doesn’t it? Because God can’t send a ‘thread’ of irresistible grace to everyone, because then everyone would be saved.

I accept that God comes to us, that he has foreknowledge, and that his role is important. But if I recall correctly Lutheranism takes it to the level of Calvinism while rejecting that the damned are predestined to damnation.

I could be wrong. If anyone wants to correct me?

You aren’t wrong about the Lutheran position. But I don’t think you recognize how close to Calvinism much of the traditional Catholic position is.

The point where both Lutherans and Calvinists break with Catholicism is on the bondage of the will. Lutheran “single predestination” is generally less philosophically rigorous than the version you find in someone like Aquinas, but it’s motivated by many of the same concerns.

Edwin

 

[hn160]

Doesn’t Lutheran predestination consider irresistible grace? If that’s true, then that assumes double predestination, doesn’t it? Because God can’t send a ‘thread’ of irresistible grace to everyone, because then everyone would be saved.

I accept that God comes to us, that he has foreknowledge, and that his role is important. But if I recall correctly Lutheranism takes it to the level of Calvinism while rejecting that the damned are predestined to damnation.

I could be wrong. If anyone wants to correct me?

The Lutheran Book of Concord in the Epitome states this:
XI. God’s Eternal Foreknowledge and Election
Affirmative
Pure and True Doctrine concerning this Article
2 1. To start with, the distinction between the foreknowledge and the eternal election of God is to be diligently noted.(tr-833)
3 2. God’s foreknowledge in nothing else than that God knows all things before they happen, as it is written, “There is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and he has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days” (Daniel 2:28).
4 3. This foreknowledge extends alike over good people and evil people. But it is not a cause of evil or of sin which compels anyone to do something wrong; the original source of this is the devil and man’s wicked and perverse will. Neither is it the cause of man’s perdition; for this man himself is responsible. God’s foreknowledge merely controls the evil and imposes a limit on its duration, so that in spite of its intrinsic wickedness it must minister to the salvation of his elect.
5 4. Predestination or the eternal election of God, however, is concerned only with the pious children of God in whom he is well pleased. It is a cause of their salvation, for he alone brings it about and ordains everything that belongs to it. Our salvation is so firmly established upon it that the “gates of Hades cannot prevail against” it (John 10:28; Matt. 16:18).
6 5. We are not to investigate this predestination in the secret counsel of God, but it is to be looked for in his Word, where he has revealed it.
7 6. The Word of God, however, leads us to Christ, who is “the book of life”7 in which all who are to be eternally saved are inscribed and elected, as it is written, “He chose us in him before the foundation of the world” (Eph. 1:4).
8 7. This Christ calls all sinners to himself and promises them refreshment. He earnestly desires that all men should come to him and let themselves be helped.8 To these he offers himself in his Word, and it is his will that they hear the Word and do not stop their ears or despise it. In addition he promises the power and operation of the Holy Spirit and divine assistance for steadfastness and eternal life.
9 8. Therefore we should not judge this election of ours to eternal life on the basis either of reason or God’s law. This would either lead us into a reckless, dissolute, Epicurean life, or drive men to despair and waken dangerous thoughts in their hearts. As long as men follow their reason, they can hardly escape such reflections as this: “If God has elected me to salvation I cannot be damned, do as I will.” Or, “If I am not elected to eternal life, whatever good I do is of no avail; everything is in vain in that case.”
10 9. We must learn about Christ from the Holy Gospel alone, which clearly testifies that “God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all” (Rom. 11:32), and that he does not want anyone to perish (Ezek. 33:11; 18:23), but that everyone should repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Tim. 2:6; 1 John 2:2).(tr-835)

 

[hn160]

Doesn’t Lutheran predestination consider irresistible grace? If that’s true, then that assumes double predestination, doesn’t it? Because God can’t send a ‘thread’ of irresistible grace to everyone, because then everyone would be saved.

I accept that God comes to us, that he has foreknowledge, and that his role is important. But if I recall correctly Lutheranism takes it to the level of Calvinism while rejecting that the damned are predestined to damnation.

I could be wrong. If anyone wants to correct me?

Lutheran Book of Concord continued:

1. The doctrine of God’s eternal election is profitable and comforting to the person who concerns himself with the revealed will of God and observes the order which St. Paul follows in the Epistle to the Romans. He there directs men first to repent, to acknowledge their sins, to believe in Christ, and to obey God, and only then does he speak of the mystery of God’s eternal election.
   12 11. The passage, “Many are called, but few are chosen,”9 does not mean that God does not desire to save everyone. The cause of condemnation is that men either do not hear the Word of God at all but willfully despise it, harden their ears and their hearts, and thus bar the ordinary way for the Holy Spirit, so that he cannot work in them; or, if they do hear the Word, they cast it to the wind and pay no attention to it. The fault does not lie in God or his election, but in their own wickedness.1
   13 12. The Christian is to concern himself with the doctrine of the eternal election of God only in so far as it is revealed in the Word of God, which shows us Christ as the “book of life.” Through the proclamation of the Holy Gospel, Christ opens and reveals this book for us, as it is written, “Those he predestined, he also called.”2 In Christ we should seek the eternal election of the Father, who has decreed in his eternal counsel that he would save no one except those who acknowledge his Son, Christ, and truly believe on him. The Christian should banish all other opinions since they do not proceed from God but are inspired by the evil foe in an attempt to weaken for us or to rob us entirely of the glorious comfort which this salutary doctrine gives us, namely, that we know that we have been elected to eternal life out of pure grace in Christ without any merit of our own, and that no one can pluck us out of his hand. God assures us of this gracious election not only in mere words, but also with his oath, and has sealed it with his holy sacraments, of which we can remind ourselves and with which we can comfort ourselves in our greatest temptations and thus extinguish the flaming darts of the devil.
   14 13. Furthermore, we are to put forth every effort to live according to the will of God and “to confirm our call,” as St. Peter says.3 Especially are we to abide by the revealed Word which cannot and will not deceive us.
   15 14. This brief exposition of the doctrine of God’s eternal election gives God his glory entirely and completely, because he out of pure grace alone, without any merit of ours, saves us “according to the purpose” of his will.4 Nor will this doctrine ever give anyone occasion either to despair or to lead a reckless and godless life.(tr-837)

 

[JoshuaNY]

Not necessarily. We Catholics believe in a sort of single predestination, as well. Basically, the saved are saved solely through the grace of God, while the damned are damned by their own free will.

Think of a pond in which there are two drowning men. You reach your hand out to one, he accepts it, and you pull him in. You saved him, he didn’t save himself. You reach your hand out to the other, and he pushes your hand away, and drowns. You didn’t kill him, he killed himself.

Grace works (somewhat) similarly: God is the primary actor, and our responsibility to accept His Grace and cooperate with it, rather than to resist or reject Him. So God’s predestination consists of:

(1) Perfect foreknowledge of who will accept or reject Him;
(2) A desire to save all (including those who will ultimately damn themselves);
(3) Active involvement in saving the saved.

So in regards to our salvation, we can say that God knew we would be saved, desired us to be saved, and brought it about. That’s predestination. But God doesn’t desire that the damned reject Him, anymore than you would desire a drowning man to refuse your outstretched hand. He simply respects their free will enough to permit them to damn themselves. In contrast, double predestination supposes that God wills the damned not to be saved.

Hear, Hear. Well said :tiphat:

Maybe this will help the OP, it is from the LCMS website.
Would you explain the LCMS position on “predestined” in Romans 8 and Ephesians 1? If one is
predestined to be adopted as a redeemed child of God, then does it follow that another is predestined
to not be adopted and therefore damned?
A: The LCMS believes that Scripture clearly teaches (in passages such as those mentioned in your question) a predestination to salvation by God’s grace in Jesus Christ alone. The LCMS does not believe that Scripture teaches a predestination to damnation: God desires all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Tim. 2:3-4). Like so many teachings of Scripture (e.g., the Trinity, eternity, the two natures of Christ, the love of a holy God for rebellious sinners), this teaching seems contradictory
and is incomprehensible to human reason. We believe it not because it “makes sense” to human reason, but because this is what we find taught in the pages of God’s holy Word.

We beleive it because that is what the Lord taught us. Just as we beleive that the Body and Blood is our Lord Jesus Christ becuase He said it was.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

Hear, Hear. Well said :tiphat:

Maybe this will help the OP, it is from the LCMS website.
Would you explain the LCMS position on “predestined” in Romans 8 and Ephesians 1? If one is
predestined to be adopted as a redeemed child of God, then does it follow that another is predestined
to not be adopted and therefore damned?
A: The LCMS believes that Scripture clearly teaches (in passages such as those mentioned in your question) a predestination to salvation by God’s grace in Jesus Christ alone. The LCMS does not believe that Scripture teaches a predestination to damnation: God desires all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Tim. 2:3-4). Like so many teachings of Scripture (e.g., the Trinity, eternity, the two natures of Christ, the love of a holy God for rebellious sinners), this teaching seems contradictory
and is incomprehensible to human reason. We believe it not because it “makes sense” to human reason, but because this is what we find taught in the pages of God’s holy Word.

We beleive it because that is what the Lord taught us. Just as we beleive that the Body and Blood is our Lord Jesus Christ becuase He said it was.

But I’m thoroughly confused.

This is what I’m understanding so far from the Lutheran perspective (feel free to correct me):

All men have fallen nature, and thus we are so fully depraved, that we cannot make a choice for God on our own. The result? The Lord opens himself up to us so that we may see him and we believe because of a form of irresistible grace, correct? A real Christian doesn’t choose, it’s all in God’s hands and he will have his elect.

If that is the case, then how is an unbeliever condemned entirely on his own volution? There doesn’t seem to be a way around this. If the believers are elected, chosen by God, then the rest are condemned by default. They must be. There’s no other way around this, is there?

I’ve always understood it from the Arminian perspective. We are totally depraved, therefore we cannot get up and say ‘I choose God.’ However, God sends his grace (previent grace), which enables us to have the faith we need. This will lead to salvation unless the person resists it, and therefore loses the faith and is damned.

I’m fairly sure what I just describe is rejected by Lutherans.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

The Lutheran Book of Concord in the Epitome states this:
XI. God’s Eternal Foreknowledge and Election
Affirmative
Pure and True Doctrine concerning this Article
2 1. To start with, the distinction between the foreknowledge and the eternal election of God is to be diligently noted.(tr-833)
3 2. God’s foreknowledge in nothing else than that God knows all things before they happen, as it is written, “There is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and he has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days” (Daniel 2:28).
4 3. This foreknowledge extends alike over good people and evil people. But it is not a cause of evil or of sin which compels anyone to do something wrong; the original source of this is the devil and man’s wicked and perverse will. Neither is it the cause of man’s perdition; for this man himself is responsible. God’s foreknowledge merely controls the evil and imposes a limit on its duration, so that in spite of its intrinsic wickedness it must minister to the salvation of his elect.
5 4. Predestination or the eternal election of God, however, is concerned only with the pious children of God in whom he is well pleased. It is a cause of their salvation, for he alone brings it about and ordains everything that belongs to it. Our salvation is so firmly established upon it that the “gates of Hades cannot prevail against” it (John 10:28; Matt. 16:18).
6 5. We are not to investigate this predestination in the secret counsel of God, but it is to be looked for in his Word, where he has revealed it.
7 6. The Word of God, however, leads us to Christ, who is “the book of life”7 in which all who are to be eternally saved are inscribed and elected, as it is written, “He chose us in him before the foundation of the world” (Eph. 1:4).
8 7. This Christ calls all sinners to himself and promises them refreshment. He earnestly desires that all men should come to him and let themselves be helped.8 To these he offers himself in his Word, and it is his will that they hear the Word and do not stop their ears or despise it. In addition he promises the power and operation of the Holy Spirit and divine assistance for steadfastness and eternal life.
9 8. Therefore we should not judge this election of ours to eternal life on the basis either of reason or God’s law. This would either lead us into a reckless, dissolute, Epicurean life, or drive men to despair and waken dangerous thoughts in their hearts. As long as men follow their reason, they can hardly escape such reflections as this: “If God has elected me to salvation I cannot be damned, do as I will.” Or, “If I am not elected to eternal life, whatever good I do is of no avail; everything is in vain in that case.”
10 9. We must learn about Christ from the Holy Gospel alone, which clearly testifies that “God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all” (Rom. 11:32), and that he does not want anyone to perish (Ezek. 33:11; 18:23), but that everyone should repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Tim. 2:6; 1 John 2:2).(tr-835)

I just don’t understand it. If you are predestined to salvation, then the rest are not rejected out of their own personal and deliberate rejection of God. They are predestined to hell ipso facto, because they are not predestined to salvation. It doesn’t make sense to me any other way.

 

[tbuley]

Jordan does a good job on his blog breaking it down and clear. justandsinner.blogspot.com/search/label/Predestination%20and%20Free%20Will

 

[Contarini]

I just don’t understand it. If you are predestined to salvation, then the rest are not rejected out of their own personal and deliberate rejection of God. They are predestined to hell ipso facto, because they are not predestined to salvation. It doesn’t make sense to me any other way.

Well, with all due respect, you need to listen to the great theologians of the Western Church a little more carefully. Aquinas is, as usual, a good place to start. “Not predestining someone to salvation” does not, in Aquinas’s way of thinking, force them do anything.

Edwin

 

[tom25]

If it helps, at seminary this topic was brought and the two points that summed up the Lutheran among classmates and faculty were

1 - Salvation is all of God and damnation is all of man

2 - Salvation is analagous to normally living. No one can will themselves into existence, however, people do have the ability to will themselves out.

 

[Bob_Crowley]

It seems to me we’re forgetting the third party in all this, namely the devil and his demons. If either single or double predestination were operative as stand alone facts, there would hardly be any need for a war between God and the Devil. What would they be fighting about, if the outcome in each and every human case is already decided?

I have another personal issue with the business of predestination, since my own father turned up the night he died. During the ensuing conversation, at one time he blurted out with something like alarm that “I always was doomed! I didn’t really have any choice!”

Yet during the same exchange, he admitted, “I served the devil” and “I was WILLING” (to be cruel, stupid, bad-tempered and vindictive).

This doesn’t leave me much wiser about the whole thing. However I’ll give one peculiar example why I think God can override free will in some extremely subtle way.

My father died at number seven (7) in a certain street in Nundah, a suburb in Brisbane.

One night I was driving a cab (part time) when I happened to be nearby and drove up the street. This would have been around late 2005. Since there’s a certain amount of frustration in the business of my father’s apparition (and some of the dire warnings he gave in the process), I prayed as I drove for some sort of “sign” that the apparition was real, and that there was a good purpose for it. I got this sense I ought to know better than to ask for a “sign”, but I asked anyway.

Later that same night I was at a cab rank in the City, waiting for a fare, when a bloke finally came along, a bit the worse for wear, hopped in and said, “Nundah!” I asked whereabouts. He replied, “Just drive. I’ll tell you where to go.” So off we went,

We finished at number six (6) in the same street in Nundah, directly across the road from where my father died. I even saiid to the passenger, “Hmpph! That’s where my father died.” I think he thought the subject matter was a bit morbid as he was keen to get out …

However as far as I was concerned I got my sign. Now I’d had free will all night as to where I’d drive, how fast etc. My passengers all had free will, and their choices finally led me to the spot directly across the road from where my father died, and from which he had appeared to me in a flat sixteen or so kilometres away as the crow would take if he was driving instead of flying. How did God do it? And I’ve had other experiences likei it.

That’s why I’m a bit wary of these neat doctrines, which attempt to box God into a tidy little box. I find they don’t match my experience.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

If it helps, at seminary this topic was brought and the two points that summed up the Lutheran among classmates and faculty were

1 - Salvation is all of God and damnation is all of man

2 - Salvation is analagous to normally living. No one can will themselves into existence, however, people do have the ability to will themselves out.

I’m sorry but that doesn’t make logical sense.

If you’re predestined, according to Lutheranism and Calvinism, then your fate is sealed. No way out.

I think it’s too much of an attempt to illustrate God’s sovereignty. If you’re predestined to salvation then you will go to heaven because God chose you. I haven’t seen anyone dispute this from either a Lutheran or a Calvinist perspective. You can’t ‘will yourself’ out of it, because otherwise God didn’t predestine you.

I can’t really buy the whole ‘well we don’t go any further because even though it doesn’t make sense, that’s what the word says.’ It looks like a cop out to me.

 

[JonNC]

I’m sorry but that doesn’t make logical sense.

**If you’re predestined, according to Lutheranism and Calvinism, then your fate is sealed. No way out.

I think it’s too much of an attempt to illustrate God’s sovereignty. If you’re predestined to salvation then you will go to heaven because God chose you. I haven’t seen anyone dispute this from either a Lutheran or a Calvinist perspective. You can’t ‘will yourself’ out of it, because otherwise God didn’t predestine you.**

I can’t really buy the whole ‘well we don’t go any further because even though it doesn’t make sense, that’s what the word says.’ It looks like a cop out to me.

Let me try.
The Augsburg Confession

Article XII: Of Repentance.

1] Of Repentance they teach that for those who have fallen after Baptism there is remission of sins whenever they are converted 2] and that the Church ought to impart absolution to those thus returning to repentance. Now, repentance consists properly of these 3] two parts: One is contrition, that is, 4] terrors smiting the conscience through the knowledge of sin; the other is faith, which is born of 5] the Gospel, or of absolution, and believes that for Christ’s sake, sins are forgiven, comforts 6] the conscience, and delivers it from terrors. Then good works are bound to follow, which are the fruits of repentance.

7] They condemn the Anabaptists, who deny that those once justified can lose the Holy Ghost. Also those who contend that some may attain to such 8] perfection in this life that they cannot sin.

The Formula of Concord

1. Accordingly, we also believe, teach, and confess that when it is said: The regenerate do good works from a free spirit, this is not to be understood as though it is at the option of the regenerate man to do or to forbear doing good when he wishes, and that he can nevertheless retain faith if he intentionally perseveres in sins.

From a Lutheran perspective, one can certainly, once regenerate, reject faith and therefore salvation.

Jon

 

[FabiusMaximus]

Let me try.
The Augsburg Confession

The Formula of Concord

From a Lutheran perspective, one can certainly, once regenerate, reject faith and therefore salvation.

Jon

So you are saying that grace is resistable, right?

Are we all by default ‘predestined to salvation’ and then we individually either remain or fall away? Because I still see a void for those who aren’t predestined to salvation.

 

[Tony888]

Is there anyone here who is Lutheran who can explain why Lutherans believe that the faithful are predestined to heaven, but that those who do not believed are not predestined to hell? How does that work? If you predestine the faithful to heaven, aren’t the rest,* ispo facto*, condemned?

Interesting OP. I didn’t know previously that Lutherans were somewhere in the middle of the Calvinist vs. Arminian debate

From wiki

Lutherans believe that the elect are predestined to salvation. Lutherans believe Christians should be assured that they are among the predestined.
However, they disagree with those who make predestination the source of salvation rather than Christ’s suffering, death, and resurrection.

Unlike Calvinists, Lutherans do not believe in a predestination to damnation. Instead, Lutherans teach eternal damnation is a result of the unbeliever’s sins, rejection of the forgiveness of sins, and unbelief.

Martin Luther’s attitude towards predestination is set out in his On the Bondage of the Will, published in 1525. This publication by Luther was in response to the published treatise by Desiderius Erasmus in 1524 known as On Free Will. Luther based his views on Ephesians 2:8-10, which says: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”