Who Chose Who? Part 1.7

Well, I fibbed. I've cooked several dinners since my last post. Let's try again.

Referring to my previous post, we've seen that all people are born with the inability to choose God, love God, and obey God. We are enslaved to sin. We cannot free ourselves from its fetters. We are hostile to God and we cannot submit to his laws. Our hearts are deceitful and sick. Since I last posted I've thought of verses that speak of us being "dead" in our trespasses and sins.

"And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience--among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. " --Ephesians 2:1-3

Why did Paul say we were dead in our trespasses and sins. Well, what do dead people do? Nothing! Do they act in any way as a living person does? No. Paul was saying, while we were spiritually dead, we did nothing that a spiritually alive person does. We did not because we could not. And the fact is true in both cases, dead people cannot raise themselves to life. Christ is the only source of life, spirtual and physical. He exemplified this truth with the raising of Lazarus. Lazarus was rotting in his tomb. He didn't move a muscle until Christ spoke life into his body. Before a person can have faith (choose) and obey Christ they must be "born again," "made alive" in Christ

Paul continues in Ephesians like this

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ--by grace you have been saved-- " --Ephesians 2:4-5

Who made us alive? God did in his mighty grace! Who can take credit for this grace and the channel through which it flows called faith?

"For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." --Ephesian 2:8-10

God alone can take the credit! It is all a gift. If God chose us because we first chose him, we have reason to boast of our own faith. But this is not true. We are God's "workmanship, created in Christ Jesus..." He chose to have mercy on us first. He loved us for no reason of our own (Romans 9:11-15), simply according to His good pleasure and will. We choose Him because He first chose us.

More still to come.