Vital Truth by Wright Nigel G.;

Author:Wright, Nigel G.; [Wright, Nigel G.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781498225755
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Published: 2015-11-30T08:00:00+00:00

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God’s Gracious Election

According to John’s Gospel, Jesus said to his disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last” (John 15:16). In saying this, Jesus was restating a conviction that is fundamental to the vision of God and of God’s activity in the biblical revelation, namely, that before any of us ever made any kind of movement towards God, God had already moved towards us. God chose us before we chose God. More than this, any kind of response that we make towards God is a result and consequence of God’s first having taken the initiative in drawing near to us. The Bible bears witness to a God who first initiates the work of creation and then the work of salvation, and does so not because God is asked or persuaded to do so but out of sheer, unmerited love that arises solely from within God’s own self. We call this the “grace” of God and its distinguishing mark is not simply that it is more than we deserve but that it is the precise opposite of what we deserve.

Universal and particular

The God who created us and all things did so for a purpose. This purpose is most plainly spoken of in Ephesians 1:8–10, which asserts, “With all wisdom and insight he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” God’s ultimate purpose is to restore all those things that are currently broken and fractured into a new unity in Christ so that there is one whole, healed, and harmonious universe in him. It is towards this final goal that God is currently working in the church and in history, even though much of the time God’s providential rule is not obvious to us. The means by which God is working this purpose out is that of election, the choice of a people who will uniquely represent God’s revelation of God’s own self and so be witnesses of it to the nations of the world. It should be stressed that God’s intention is universal, to bless all the nations, but the means towards this goal is particular, through the choice of specific groups and persons who will be witnesses to the whole world of the grace of God, firstly the people of Israel and then the varied and scattered communities of the Christian church. The people of Israel and the church together are at the centre of God’s saving purposes for the world. From before the foundation of the world God has chosen them and called them for this particular purpose, and so it can be said that God has “foreknown” them and “predestined” them to play this part in the divine plan (Rom 8:28–30).

The priority of divine grace, the fact

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