Ephesians 1:1-23
…even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will… (vv. 4-5) I don’t get into “predestination” discussions much. Bible scholars and preachers in other denominations have much more to say on this topic than I. But the one thing of which I am certain is that we have free will, that we are not anything like robots moving around on this Earth at God’s whim. And if we have free will, then it’s our decision to choose Jesus or how to choose Him; essentially we are choosing our own eternal destiny. I can’t believe that God has “predestined” anyone to Heaven or to Hell.
That said, however, what is my take on predestination? I guess I like to think of Paul’s use of “we” and “us” in the verses above as being a universal humanity. What are the other options? The Jewish people…? They were not very “holy and blameless”. Christians? We’re also not very “holy and blameless”. But we do fit Paul’s “adoption to Himself as sons” phrase. But then again, so would all humanity who accept Jesus as Lord.
Finally – David was always good about pointing out “so that” verses – the closest thing that I can see to “so that” is verse 10: as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth. The phrase “all things” clearly includes all humanity. So my take is that any mention of predestination has to do with God’s creating us humans, with a desire that we would share with Him the love that the Trinity had known in Themselves since before the beginning of time. My thoughts…
See also: August 29 / Ephesians 1:1-14; August 30 / Ephesians 1:15-23
Hmmm… Perhaps we should let Scripture shape our beliefs rather than trying to twist the language to suit our preferences. When you say that you “can’t believe that God has ‘predestined’ anyone to Heaven or to Hell”, what you really mean is that you believe God is just (Good!), but you imagine that any such predestination would be inherently unjust. You are thereby putting God in a small, human-sized box. You seem to believe that God cannot predestine anyone justly. But why should we ever think that our sense of justice with free will is better than God’s, even with predestination? Maybe, just maybe, God is wiser (and more just) than we. Maybe, just maybe, He can predestine people justly — and do so fully consistently with what appears to be free will on our side. Let’s not set ourselves up as judges of God. God is God. And if God says He predestines us, well, then, He predestines us, whether we can understand that or not. Read Romans 9 again, slowly and carefully — and humbly.