God’s Plan Of Salvation – God’s Role In Salvation Part 2

Bible study notes courtesy of West Valley Bible Church

Pastor/teacher Skip Ast — Please visit the link to the church at the bottom of study

6. Why doesn’t He choose everyone?

Romans 9:22-23; Ephesians 3:8-10

Judas (Acts 1:15-20); Paul (1 Timothy 1:12-16)

♦ How many people have or will receive injustice from God?

Some receive mercy, some receive justice, no one receives injustice!

♦ The real question: Why did I receive mercy?

7. What about passages that seem to contradict election like 1 Timothy 2:3-4 and 2 Peter 3:9? There are some things God desires that He does not decree.

Ezekiel 18:23, 32; 33:11 23“Do I have any pleasure in the death of the wicked,” declares the Lord GOD, “rather than that he should turn from his ways and live?

32“For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies,” declares the Lord GOD. “Therefore, repent and live.”

11“Say to them, ‘As I live!’ declares the Lord GOD, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?’

♦ Consider: Abraham, Sarah & Hagar; Jacob & Esau; Sampson (Judges 14:1-4); David & Bathsheba; Judas; religious leaders & Pilate (Acts 4:27-28)

8. If God chooses then why pray?

♦ Prayer is commanded – Eph. 6:18; 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

♦ Prayer gives glory to God – John 14:13-14; Daniel 9:16-19

♦ Prayer aligns us with God’s will – Psalm 37:4; 1 John 5:14-15

♦ God answers prayer – 2 Samuel 21:14; 24:25; Matthew 7:7-8; Luke 18:1-7; James 4:2; 5:16

♦ It’s sin not to pray – 2 Samuel 12:19, 23; James 4:17

♦ Prayer deepens intimacy with God – Psalms 16:11; 145:18; Isaiah 30:18; Jeremiah 33:3

9. If God chooses then why witness?

♦ Witnessing is commanded – John 14:15; 20:21; Matthew 28:19-20; Acts 1:8

♦ God ordains the means as well as the ends – Romans 10:14-15; Galatians 1:15-16

♦ Witnessing increases intimacy with God – John 14:21; 1 Corinthians 9:23; 2 Timothy 2:21

♦ Hell is real and people are going there – Matthew 25:31-34, 41, 46; Luke 19:41-42; Romans 1:16; 9:1-3; Acts 21:28

10. If God chooses then doesn’t that make us robots? NO…just the opposite!

♦ John 10:10; 1 Corinthians 2:9; Ephesians 3:20

♦ Romans 5:1; 6:6-7, 17; Ephesians 2:3-5

John 8:31-32, 36 31So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; 32and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

36“So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.

General verses of God’s sovereignty:

1 Chronicles 29:10-12 10So David blessed the LORD in the sight of all the assembly; and David said, “Blessed are You, O LORD God of Israel our father, forever and ever. 11“Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, indeed everything that is in the heavens and the earth; Yours is the dominion, O LORD, and You exalt Yourself as head over all. 12“Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might; and it lies in Your hand to make great and to strengthen everyone.

Job 42:1-2 1Then Job answered the LORD and said, 2“I know that You can do all things, And that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted.

Psalm 115:3 3But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases.

Psalm 135:6 6Whatever the LORD pleases, He does, in heaven and in earth, in the seas and in all deeps.

Proverbs 16:4 4The LORD has made everything for His own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Proverbs 16:33 33The lot is cast into the lap, But its every decision is from the LORD.

Ecclesiastes 7:14 14In the day of prosperity be happy, but in the day of adversity consider- God has made the one as well as the other so that man will not discover anything that will be after him.

Isaiah 14:24 24The LORD of hosts has sworn saying, “Surely, just as I have intended so it has happened, and just as I have planned so it will stand,

Isaiah 14:27 27“For the LORD of hosts has planned, and who can frustrate it? And as for His stretched-out hand, who can turn it back?”

Isaiah 46:9-11 9“Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, 10Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, ‘My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’; 11Calling a bird of prey from the east, The man of My purpose from a far country. Truly I have spoken; truly I will bring it to pass. I have planned it, surely I will do it.

Isaiah 55:11 11So will My word be which goes forth from My mouth; It will not return to Me empty, Without accomplishing what I desire, And without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.

Jeremiah 32:17 17‘Ah Lord GOD! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and by Your outstretched arm! Nothing is too difficult for You,

Daniel 4:35 35“All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, But He does according to His will in the host of heaven And among the inhabitants of earth; And no one can ward off His hand Or say to Him, ‘What have You done?’

Matthew 19:26 26And looking at them Jesus said to them, “With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

In Order to What?

Ephesians 1:12 12to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory.

Ephesians 2:10 10For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

John 15:16 16“You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you.

WHAT MATTERS SUPREMELY, therefore, is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it-that He knows me. I am graven on the palms of His hands. I am never out of his mind. All my knowledge of Him depends on his sustained initiative of knowing me. I know Him because He first knew me, and continues to know me. He knows me as a friend, one who loves me; and there is no moment when His eye is off me, or His attention distracted from me, and no moment, therefore, when His care falters. This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort…in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love and watching over me for my good. This is tremendous relief in knowing that His love is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery can disillusion Him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench his determination to bless me.

—J.I. Packer, Knowing God

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