Predestination is a biblical term, referring to anything that God, in advance, has purposed and planned to bring about. Here are some examples found in the Bible:
Luke 22:22: “‘For indeed, the Son of Man is going as it has been determined; but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed!’”
Acts 2:23: “‘This Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.’”
Acts 4:27-28: “‘For truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur.’”
Romans 8:29: “For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren.”
1st Corinthians 2:7: “But we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory.”
Ephesians 1:5-6: “In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.”
Ephesians 1:11: “In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory.”
Biblical “predestination” can deal with either God’s eternal plans for Christians or instances involving specific events, such as Calvary, in which God’s plans utilize His omniscient “foreknowledge,” evident from Acts 2:23. After all, why wouldn’t God use His omniscience in all of His activities? Certainly, God does have this ability. If Jesus knew the future free choice of Peter, in that he would deny Him three times before the rooster crows (John 13:38), it would only seem reasonable that God would use His limitless knowledge of all things (actual and potential) as a basis for His own interactions to steer all things forward toward His predetermined objective.
While the terms “pre-destine” and “fore-ordain” indicate pre-determination, the terms “destine” and “ordain” without a prefix can imply contingency planning. For example, Isaiah 65:12 states: “I will destine you for the sword, and all of you will bow down to the slaughter. Because I called, but you did not answer; I spoke, but you did not hear. And you did evil in My sight and chose that in which I did not delight.” So, if God destines something, it could still have been conditional.
The difference with Calvinism is that non-Calvinists believe in conditional predestination, that is, God contingently planning events based upon His foreknowledge of the thoughts and intentions of those involved.
What do Calvinists believe?
R.C. Sproul: “In summary we may define predestination broadly as follows: From all eternity God decided to save some members of the human race and to let the rest of the human race perish. God made a choice—he chose some individuals to be saved unto everlasting blessedness in heaven, and he chose others to pass over, allowing them to suffer the consequences of their sins, eternal punishment in hell.”436
Our reply:
In other words, “predestination” broadly means what is narrowly defined only in Calvinism. The reality, though, is that there is no aspect of biblical predestination that deals with God allegedly choosing certain unbelievers to make into believers.
Adrian Rogers: “What is Predestination? Predestination is not God saying from eternity that one man’s going to heaven and another man is going to hell. Predestination deals primarily with what God intends to do for those who trust Him and what God will do for saved people. Predestination teaches me on the authority of God that when I’ve trusted Christ as my personal Savior and Lord, I will be like Jesus Christ.”437
Adrian Rogers: “When God sees me receiving Christ as my personal Lord and Savior, He predestines me to be like the Lord Jesus Christ. … When God made the decision to conform me to the image of Christ, it started with my decision to accept Jesus as my Savior.”438
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436 What is Reformed Theology? (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1997), 141.
437 Adrian Rogers, What We Have in the Lord Jesus, Ephesians 1:1-12, 1995.
438 Foundations For Our Faith: A Solid Word For An Unsure Age, Vol. II, A Study In Romans Chapters 5-9 (Memphis, TN: Love Worth Finding, 1998), 105, 106.
[This post has been excerpted with permission from Richard Coords, Calvinism Answered Verse by Verse and Subject by Subject, © 2024.]
