Many of you here assume that men can, if they so choose, to come to Christ whenever they please. They need only to believe, and they will know Him. How do you reconcile that belief with such scripture as:

"No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day." - John 6:44

“This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” - John 6:65

"All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." - Luke 10:22

Sure he can, once his will has been made free. Until then, he doesn't even want to come to Christ.

If man can come to Christ apart from God, why pray for God to change hearts and save souls? And the corollary statement, if man is not responsible to seek out his salvation, why preach to them? God is 100% sovereign in the salvation of man, and man is 100% responsible for his own condition. There is an apparent set of overlapping responsibilities that may not be fully grasped this side of eternity, yet it exists.

If we take an example of the person of Christ it becomes clearer:

We know that the Bible teaches that Christ is fully God and fully man. If I were to overemphasize either of these attributes at the expense of the other, I would have had to have denied Christ at some point. To limit one's theology to Calvinism's TULIP might be akin to denying the humanity of Christ, while holding to Arminianism could be akin to denying the divinity of Christ. How the two natures of Christ are merged together is a mystery to us, yet we must stand on them as foundational truths. Likewise, how the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man are merged is a mystery to us, yet we must stand on them as foundational truths as well. To attempt to delineate them perfectly, naturally must cause man to reject (or explain away) some portion of God's word.


CRP