INTRODUCTION
- Do you remember the days on the playground when a couple of self-appointed or duly elected captains chose members of their kickball, dodgeball, or, for some, chess teams?
- Maybe you were up for an award, and you won.
- Do you remember when your name was announced, how good it felt to hear your name called?
- I remember playing sports and the rush I felt when my name was called over the PA system as one of the starters.
- How good did it feel to be chosen?
- Being chosen is something that makes us feel special.
- • Today, we will venture into a short passage that, because of differing theological views, has been clouded in meaning today.
- When all is said and done, how many people will be saved, and who are one's
- How is one’s salvation determined?
- Did God randomly choose who would be saved and who would not be saved for reasons unknown to anyone?
- Does the Calvinist TULIP have validity?
- Or do we have free will, with the ability to choose Jesus?
- TOTAL DEPRAVITY (We are so sinful we are not capable of choosing Jesus)
- UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION (God chooses who will be saved and who will not be since we cannot choose for ourselves)
- LIMITED ATONEMENT (Jesus only died for the elect)
- IRRESISTIBLE GRACE (God brings his Elect to salvation through an internal call, which they are powerless to resist)
- PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS- (Once saved, always saved)
- My goal is not to criticize others' erroneous teachings but to let the passages speak for themselves.
- To give the message context, I would like to read Matthew 22:1-13, then we will move to verse 14.
- Let’s begin our journey together.
- READ FROM THE BIBLE.
Matthew 22:14 (NET 2nd ed.)
14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”
I. The call.
- Jesus tells a parable about a King planning a large wedding feast for his son.
- The King sends out his servants throughout the land to invite folks to the wedding.
- To the king's surprise, no one wanted to go.
- This upset the king, who once again sent out his servants to plead with the guests he invited to come.
- The king said he had slaughtered the oxen and the fattened calf.
- Everything is ready!
- Come to the banquet!
- The plea to come did not work; the servants were ignored.
- Some folks went to their farms, while others went back to their businesses, yet some decided to seize, mistreat, and then kill the servants.
- The King was angered, so he sent his troops to kill the murderers and burn down their city.
- Those who were first called, who slighted the invitation and insulted the king, represented the Jews.
- These were destroyed and may refer to the destruction of Jerusalem.
- Now, the king gathers more of his servants and tells them that the banquet is ready and that those invited first are not worthy of the invitation.
- Then the king instructs the servants to go out and seek and invite everyone!
- Those who were called from the highways may represent the Gentiles.
- In the parable, we are told that the servants found evil and good and invited them!
- Now the banquet hall was full of people!
- We need to agree that everyone receives an invitation, no matter how you stand on the theological implications of election and predestination.
- From the parable and a plethora of other passages, everyone is invited to the great wedding feast—HEAVEN!
- Everyone has an invitation to be saved, not just a chosen few or only certain individuals whom God, for whatever reason, chose to be saved.
- If God chose only certain people to be saved, that would contradict many passages that tell us that God wants ALL to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.
1 Timothy 2:3–4 (NET 2nd ed.)
3 Such prayer for all is good and welcomed before God our Savior,
4 since he wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.
John 3:16 (NET 2nd ed.)
16 For this is the way God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
- All in the Timothy passage means ALL!
- EVERYONE in John 3:16 means EVERYONE, no exceptions.
2 Peter 3:9 (NET 2nd ed.)
9 The Lord is not slow concerning his promise, as some regard slowness, but is being patient toward you, because he does not wish for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.
- No, if God picked individuals whom He wanted to save and chose those whom He would exclude from being saved, none of these passages make sense, and they are lying because if God decided the individuals who would be saved, He did not want all to be saved.
- If that were the system God chose, then ALL would be saved no matter what.
- Why would God want the gospel proclaimed to every nation if the choice as to who is saved has already been made?
Matthew 28:19 (NET 2nd ed.)
19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,
- Although people are not predestined to salvation, the plan to save them was predestined before the foundation of the world!
1 Peter 1:19–21 (NET 2nd ed.)
19 but by precious blood like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb, namely Christ.
20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was manifested in these last times for your sake.
21 Through him you now trust in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.
- Those who chose Jesus are the chosen ones.
- We will see that in our next point.
Matthew 22:14 (NET 2nd ed.)
14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”
II. The answer.
- The second thing we can agree on is that even though everyone has an invitation, not everyone responds in the same way.
- In the parable, we see some people ignore the invitation, some violently oppose the invitation, and others accept the invitation to the feast.
- The ones who are chosen are the ones who respond positively to the invitation.
- Each person has to make that choice; you cannot make that choice for your spouse, friends, or children.
- God does not take away your free will; He does not force you to make a choice because doing so would not be an act of love.
- C.S. Lewis stated in The Case of "Christianity:
- “God created things which had free will.
- That means creatures which can go wrong or right.
- Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong, but I can't.
- If a thing is it's to be good it's also free to be bad.
- And free will is what has made evil possible.
- Why, then, did God give them free will?
- Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.
- A world of automata (AH TOM A TA) -of creatures that worked like machines- would hardly be worth creating.
- The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water.
- And for that they've got to be free.
- Of course God knew what would happen if they used their freedom the wrong way: apparently, He thought it worth the risk. (...)
- If God thinks this state of war in the universe a price worth paying for free will -that is, for making a real world in which creatures can do real good or harm and something of real importance can happen, instead of a toy world which only moves when He pulls the strings- then we may take if it "s worth paying.”
- We should not confuse God’s foreknowledge with a lack of free will.
- God’s foreknowledge allows Him to know who will and who will not choose Him, but the choice is still ours.
- From the beginning, God gave us the freedom to choose.
- Remember Genesis 1:26-27?
Genesis 1:26–27 (NET 2nd ed.)
26 Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, after our likeness, so they may rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move on the earth.”
27 God created humankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them.
- We are created in the image of God!
- To be one of the chosen ones, one who was predestined for salvation, the bible teaches us that we are to respond to the invitation by placing our faith in Jesus. (Romans 10:17)
- We are to confess Jesus as our L rd. (Romans 10:9)
- We then are called to repent and be baptized (immersed) into Jesus. (Acts 2:38, Romans 6, Galatians 3:27, Colossians 2:12)
- So we all are invited, but not all will choose to accept.
Matthew 22:14 (NET 2nd ed.)
14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”
I. The responsibility.
- A choice to accept the invitation has responsibility attached to it.
Matthew 22:11–13 (NET 2nd ed.)
11 But when the king came in to see the wedding guests, he saw a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes.
12 And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ But he had nothing to say.
13 Then the king said to his attendants, ‘Tie him up hand and foot and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’
- Here, the king finds a person who showed up but was not ready for the wedding.
- We are called to live up to the invitation we accepted from God.
Philippians 1:27 (NET 2nd ed.)
27 Only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ so that—whether I come and see you or whether I remain absent—I should hear that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind, by contending side by side for the faith of the gospel,
1 Peter 1:15–16 (NET 2nd ed.)
15 but, like the Holy One who called you, become holy yourselves in all of your conduct,
16 for it is written, “You shall be holy, because I am holy.”
- I cannot accept the invitation for salvation and not be prepared to go to the feast.
John 15:8 (NET 2nd ed.)
8 My Father is honored by this, that you bear much fruit and show that you are my disciples.
- My decision to accept the invitation is not the end of the journey, it is the beginning!
- God has a plan for your life!
- God knows your past, present, and future.
- In the Bible you will see that God predestined certain people to tasks, but not to salvation.
- The implication is we are called to service to God.
CONCLUSION
- So what?
- What does predestination and election have to do with me, how does it impact me?
- If you think you have NO part in the salvation process, you will live your life that way because what is the point of doing otherwise?
- If we think we were picked ahead of time to be saved at the exclusion of others, we will not make much of an effort to reach others.
- Once you realize the invitation is open to you and that it is up to you to respond, you change.
- By the way, everyone who I have encountered who follows the TUPIL plan, thinks they are one of the chosen.
- How would you know?
- Jesus told a group of folks who claimed to know Him to depart from Me; I never knew you. Matthew 25:31-46.
- Are you ready to begin your adventure with Jesus?
- Or maybe today is the day for those who have drifted off the path to get back on track.
