Freedom to Claim

October 6

Most Biblical concepts are quite clear. The law of God is emphatic and immutable. We who are willing to read the scriptures understand the principles contained within the law and the prophets and the literature and the gospels. There is no wiggle room for sin, nor is there a stumbling block for confusion.

On one matter, however, there is much dispute and that regards the topic of predestination. Some believers think the scriptures are quite clear in the matter while others consider the topic to be extremely contradictory. John 6:44, for example says, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

This verse seems to state that our Heavenly Father draws certain men to Himself through Jesus while others do not feel His compulsion to come. We can counter that verse with another that says, “Whosoever will may come,” Revelation 22:17. In fact, the wording is quite emphatic: “The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that hears say, ‘Come!’ And let him that is athirst come.”

The Holy Spirit is drawing men. The bride (the church of the Living Christ) has been witnessing His salvation message through the Church Age. Anyone who hears is invited to join the chorus of those inviting the lost to come. And anyone who thirsts for the peace and salvation Jesus brings is invited to come and “drink of the water of life freely,” Revelation 21:6. The One who is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, has Himself extended the invitation to all of us.

Romans 3:11-12 says, "There is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all gone out of the way; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one." This affirms that all men are candidates for salvation. Nobody who has ever walked the planet is worthy of Heaven. None of us can make it to the realm of glory on our own merits. Because all are sinful, all need the Savior.

II Peter 3:9 states, “God’s desire is that no one should perish but that all should come to a knowledge of the truth and the power of God.” I Timothy 2:4 says virtually the same thing, “Our God wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

So how can it be that some are destined for damnation? Jesus Himself gives great insight into the reason behind the fact that “broad is the gate that leads to perdition but narrow is the way that leads to life,” Matthew 7:13, 14. In John 5:39-40 He says, "You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life."

This brings us back to the original premise of man’s free will. God who knows the heart of everyone who has ever lived may have foreknowledge of each man’s decision regarding the Salvation that Jesus offers, but that in no way precludes each man from the right he has to make that decision.

We must accept the freedom He has given us to claim Christ’s “unspeakable gift” (see II Corinthians 9:15) in order that we may be cleansed from sin and restored to right fellowship with the God who fashioned us to dwell with Him eternally. May we allow no doctrines of man or confusion of the enemy of our souls to rob us of the reality that none should perish but all should come to a knowledge of truth as Peter stated so clearly in the third chapter of his second book.