Grace presupposes predestination:
Thoughts from Augustine of Hippo
Augustine's doctrines of sin and grace are inseparable from his
doctrines of predestination and perseverance.
Since man is dead in trespasses and sins, he is completely dependent
upon God's initiative. "There is none that seeks after God; all
have turned aside, there is none that does good, not even one."
Such is the prognosis of man, man apart from God.
But in grace, it pleased God to reach down, to condescend to man, to
command life unto him, just as he commanded light by the word of his
power, "Let there be light." God makes himself known to man,
through the mediatorship and redemption wrought by his Son, applied by
the Spirit.
Evidently, not everybody is enjoying this high privilege. How come?
What makes man to differ from another? Is it anything in him? Not at
all. "One can receive nothing except it be given him from
heaven" (John 3:27). "What have you that you have not
received?" (1 Corinthians 4:7). A simple but devastating questions
that admits of one answer: “We Christians have received everything.”
All is of grace! But if it is of grace, then it is bestowed and shown to
particular persons.
But is grace given because of anything done by man? Is it given
because he believes? Quite the contrary! Our faith, our good works, our
repentance, anything good that we do, we do it by the grace of God
operating in us. We love God because he loved us first. He did not love
his own because he foresaw something good or commendable in them.
Believers were at one time children of wrath, like the rest of mankind
(Ephesians 2:1ff). All Christians were at one time disobedient,
rebellious, lost, God-haters, like the others.
Then what makes the difference? According to Augustine, and before
him pre-eminently the Apostle Paul (Romans 9-11), it is because of God's
love in predestinating those who should be saved. This is the
fountainhead of all blessings, including the ineffable blessing of
salvation itself. God manifests his grace, but grace is selective,
"I will show mercy to whom I will show mercy, and will show
compassion to whom I will show compassion." "Jacob I have
loved, but Esau I have hated." Why so? Because God, the sovereign
God, has the exclusive right to draw unto himself those he desires,
having chosen them in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world,
having bestowed grace upon them from eternity (2 Timothy 1:9). Man has
no right whatsoever to God's grace; if man can appeal to God for
anything, it is only his condemnation that he can legitimately ask for.
Nothing else: man has forfeited every right to any divine blessing.
"God has consigned all men to disobedience that he might have mercy
upon all."
So if God brings salvation to particular persons, then it means to
God is determined to bring those persons to glory. "His gifts and
his calling are without repentance." The Bible teaches that there
is an unbroken and infallible chain of blessings reserved for God's
elect. Those he foreknows (loves beforehand) he predestines and
eventually calls and sanctifies and glorifies. No exceptions. "He
who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of
Christ." "I give them eternal life and they shall never
perish."
Since God predestines (and his purpose is never thwarted) he also
necessarily preserves his own. "The Lord knows them that are
his." "We are kept by the power of God through faith unto
salvation." If any one of the elect, even one, fails to reach
glory, then God's predestination is dependent upon the creature and
therefore fallible.
But Augustine rightly asserted that salvation, from beginning to end,
is God's sole accomplishment. In asserting this Augustine said nothing
novel; Jonah’s testimony was virtually the same: "Salvation is
the Lord's." In its conception (in eternity), its accomplishment
(Christ's coming, particularly his death and resurrection), and its
application in time (to particular persons, by the Spirit, to bring them
to faith), it is God's work for man and in man: God working in us both
to will and to do according to his good pleasure.
Sinful man needs grace first and foremost; grace is given
selectively, because God has already determined who will be partakers of
Christ, and those who are appointed to eternal life not only believe but
continue to the end. Thus the sinner, as Augustine explains it, is
constantly cast upon the grace of God. The same almighty power which
converts him is needed to keep him, and that alone infallibly secures
him everlasting redemption.
If Augustine was correct in these affirmations, why has the church
largely abandoned the heritage he left her? When we hold on to God’s
predestination, we magnify his grace. In this we are humbled and,
rightly believed, we become increasingly grateful to God who did
marvellous things on our behalf.
In following Augustine in this matter we follow Paul, and in
following Paul we follow Christ.
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