How many things are truly irresistible? Some might say a decadent Chocolate Mousse Cake is irresistible. Or others might say winning an exotic trip of a lifetime is irresistible. You of course could think of something that might be more difficult to resist. The idea behind something that is irresistible is that it is too good to resist, too desirable, too wonderful. The dictionary defines irresistible as “something impossible to resist successfully.” Almost by implication what we resist is something that might not be the best for us. I think that is why we do not eat Chocolate Mousse Cake all day long. Otherwise wouldn’t we just embrace it from the start? Our topic today is that of Irresistible Grace. Grace is not something we need to resist, but the word irresistible helps to explain God’s sovereignty.
Before we take up that, we need to review the four previous topics. Some have called these five points of Calvin the doctrine of Grace. I want to be clear that you are not expected to subscribe to these beliefs, and you can be a true Presbyterian and take issue with Calvin. Each one of the five points helps us to clarify what we believe and how the reformed church came into being. Calvin first starts with the fall and how the disobedience of Adam has a corrupting effect on us all, that sinfulness is our nature, highlighting our desperate need for God. Secondly we have the idea of Unconditional Election where it is solely up to God who will receive salvation and who will not, rather than being based on our merit or our works. Limited Atonement is the process of our salvation. By Christ’s work on the cross some are justified into the righteousness of God, their sins paid. I think we gratefully receive forgiveness and celebrate atonement, at-one-ment; it is the limited part that causes pause. When we start looking at them in concert, they start to fit into a coherent model for salvation.
This brings us to Irresistible Grace. The first question is why in the world would we want to resist the grace of God? We wouldn’t. So Effectual Grace might be a better way of understanding this idea. Is it what we do or what God does that makes God’s grace work? If it were up to us to earn God’s grace, then we would always be uncertain about our relationship with God. What if we made a mistake, what if we fall short? Well of course we fall short- that is the premise of Total Depravity- but the solution is not up to us, but God. With Irresistible Grace God is the source, God is the originator, God is the giver of Grace. It is God’s sovereignty that determines who receives this gift. God’s sovereignty makes grace effectual. The sovereign will of God determines who will be elect, who will remain sinners; God’s sovereignty decides who will receive God’s grace.
You might say, well I repented and turned to God, how in the world is that an issue of grace. Calvin said that “repentance is an external profession” of what God has accomplished in us through grace. The author of Titus declares, “God has saved us, not because of any works of righteousness that we have done, but according to his mercy, through the water of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit. This Spirit God poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our savior, so that having been justified by his grace we might become heirs to the promise.” The rebirth or renewal by the Spirit is what Calvin calls the regenerate soul, the one who has come to faith. That faith is a result of God’s grace, God’s love and God’s purpose.
Now you might be sitting there thinking, “How am I to know that God’s election and grace apply to me?” For you to even contemplate God, seek to follow God, means that God has already extended grace to you. God claimed us, elected us. Christ died for us and it is the Holy Spirit whose power is poured on us in the form of Grace. For Calvin, if we are not joined with Christ, what Christ did on the cross has no effect on us. Because of the Holy Spirit working in our lives we share in the saving effects of Christ’s life, death and resurrection.
Before the reformation grace was thought of as an infused substance that was given through communion. The grace of Christ was provided through the body and blood of the sacrament. Hence one would take communion as often as possible. With the Reformation, Luther and Calvin argued that grace was a freely given gift from God, not something given based on merit or works or only coming from the sacrament. Calvin believed grace, like election, to be given first by God. The word for that is prevenient grace meaning that grace precedes any action on our part, based on the perfect will of God. Calvin standing on the shoulders of Augustine believes, “Man is morally helpless in himself and wholly dependent on divine grace” (Institutes lvii.)
Irresistible grace, as one commentator wrote, does not mean that we are forced to receive grace, but rather “Grace is irresistible in the sense that by it the knee is bent which otherwise would not bend; the heart is softened that otherwise is hard as stone. Nor is there anything which can prevent accomplishment of that purpose of God to save His people by His grace.” That’s what makes it irresistible. In fact, another commentator writes, “the heart of irresistible grace is the transforming power of the Holy Spirit whereby He takes a man dead in his trespasses and sins and gives him spiritual life so that he can recognize the surpassing value of God’s offer of salvation. Then, having been set free from the bondage of sin, that man willingly comes to Christ”
No discussion of grace would be complete without mentioning it in relation to the law. For centuries the Jews believed their relationship with God was based on adherence to the law, specifically the Ten Commandments. The new covenant of Christ brought grace beyond the law. Then during Reformation three uses of the law were developed by Martin Luther and John Calvin. The first use of the law is civil order, that all of society must follow certain rules- hence most western cultures have incorporated laws to create civil order- laws that have their roots in the Ten Commandments. The second use to the law is to show people their sins, to hold a mirror up and say what you are doing is wrong. It is the third use of the law that Calvin emphasized. This is a teaching tool, to help all who are regenerate, already in the faith to know how to live their lives. Calvin swore, “Not one of us can escape this necessity. For no man has attained such wisdom as to be unable, from daily instruction of the law, to make fresh progress toward a purer knowledge of the divine will.” Later he writes, “…the law has a way to pinch them awake to their imperfection.” For once we have received this wonderful gift of grace there is a moral responsibility to live as God has called. That’s why we come to church, read scripture, share in community of faith to encourage us in our seeking of God’s will and to live faithful lives.
Grace and the third use of the law working in tandem leads the believer to greater clarity of faith. Calvin wrote, “The third use of the Law. . . has respect to believers in whose hearts the Spirit of God already flourishes and reigns. . . . For it is the best instrument for enabling them daily to learn with greater truth and certainty what the will of the Lord is which they aspire to follow, and to confirm them in this knowledge. . .” (Inst. 360) So our response to God’s amazing grace is to pursue God’s will with all our heart mind and soul, to look to scripture for guidance and to strive for our will to be in line with God’s.
Yet the irresistible grace of God truly is a gift of our salvation. This is because everything pertaining to salvation, including the faith to believe, is an act of God’s grace. For Paul writes, “by grace you have been saved…so that God might show the immeasurable riches of God’s grace in kindness toward us in Christ. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God…to be our way of life.” We receive the gift; we respond to God, we seek God’s will through engaging with the law. For how else are we to know God’s will, how else can we respond to this immeasurable gift?
In closing I want to share the story of one man and his journey toward grace. John Newton grew up at the knee of his Godly mother who, despite fragile health, devoted herself to nurturing John’s soul. She taught him Bible verses and many hymns before she died when John was only seven. After her death, John alternated between boarding school and the high seas, wanting to lead the good life but nonetheless falling deeper into sin. Pressed into service with the British Navy, he deserted, was captured, and after two days of suspense, was flogged. His subsequent thoughts vacillated between murder and suicide. “I was capable of anything: he recalled. More voyages, dangers, toils and snares followed. It was a life unrivaled in fiction. Then one night, John only 23 years old was jolted awake by a brutal storm. The next day, with the storm raging and still in great peril, he cried to the Lord. He later wrote, “The lord came from on high and delivered me out of the deep waters.” The next several years saw slow, halting spiritual growth in John Newton, but in the end he became one of the most powerful evangelical preachers in British history and the author of hundreds of hymns.” Now I don’t know when God’s grace came to John, maybe it was before he was born, maybe at his mother’s knee, maybe in his darkest moment. Without a doubt John Newton knew God’s Irresistible Grace for he was the one who wrote our final hymn, Amazing Grace. Amen.
