Crux Theologorum

For centuries theologians have struggled with the question, "Why are some saved and not others?" One answer is that some people choose to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior, and others reject Him. This contradicts the clear biblical teaching that no one can choose to become a Christian, and that we are dead in sin.

Another answer to the question is that God chooses to save some, and chooses to damn others. This is the Calvinist position, but it contradicts that clear biblical teaching that God wants all to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth, and that Jesus yearned for the unbelievers to repent and be gathered to Him.

So what do we do with this illogic? Lutherans just say simply, "Well, God chooses some to be saved. Those who are damned made their choice to reject Him."

But that doesn't make SENSE!!

Okay, right. I learned that long ago, and it's not earth-shattering news to me. But I found a quote from Scaer* that just summed it up so nicely. After saying that 1) we cannot say God doesn't desire the salvation of all, and 2) we cannot say people have any choice in their own conversion, he states that this is within the hidden will of God (the voluntas absconditus):

The hidden will of God must remain hidden and it is sheer folly to claim knowledge of it from experience and history when our conclusions are so diametrically opposed to the revealed will. It is far better to take the Bible at its word and to have unresolved rational problems than to resolve these tensions by contradicting one or another part of Scripture.


*In "The Nature and Extent of the Atonement in Lutheran Theology" by David P Scaer, published in The Bulletin of the Evangelical Theological Society in 1967.