Nobody can stop God from saving His people whom He has elected according to the good pleasure of His will.
Yet many claim that God is thwarted by the will of man.
But Paul teaches in Ephesians 1 that we are chosen unto salvation according to the good pleasure of God's will, and not of our own! It is God's purpose to save us, and not our own, that is determinative.
But since we are all dead in our sins, we cannot please God, or seek after Him, or trust in His promises, because we cannot do anything good or obedient to Him, according to Romans 3.
How, then, can we trust in Jesus when we are lost?
Jesus explained to Nicodemus that no man can even see God's kingdom, or the gospel, unless he be first born again, born of the spirit. The Holy Ghost regenerates us, or makes alive we who were spiritually dead in our sins.
But what if God does this good thing for us, and we still will not believe?
Scripture teaches that faith is not of our own making, but is given as God's gift upon our regeneration by the Holy Ghost. Only when we are raised from the dead can we believe on Jesus.
Our faith, our belief, is a consequence of our being raised from the dead. Trust in the savior is God's gift to us, as part of our new life in Christ.
Faith is not possible for the natural man, the man in the flesh, and not the spirit, the man who cannot please God.
But Paul tells us in Ephesians 2 that we are saved by grace through faith, and that is not of ourselves, it is the gift of God!
To trust in Christ is an obedience that unregenerate man cannot practice, but God changes our hearts in regeneration, and gives us faith to believe the promises of Jesus! |
