Which is it? Did you first accept/believe Jesus and then God saved you? OR did God save you first and then you accepted/believed Jesus?
(Related post: Jonah: an Introduction.)
Not a new question. Throughout church history , Christians have explained salvation in 2 predominant ways. Those who emphasized God’s sovereign grace or divine election have been called Calvinists (after John Calvin), or Augustinians (after St. Augustine), while those who objected to this emphasis and contented for a rational doctrine of free will have been called Arminians (after James Arminias) or Wesleyans (after John Wesley). It is important to note that both perspectives are compatible with traditional orthodox Christianity. Thus, Calvinists and Arminians are friends in Christ, not angry argumentative combatants, just as George Whitfield a Calvinist was friends of John Wesley an Arminian. A “3rd category,” which is non-Christian, is Pelagianism (after the heretical monk Pegagius who was excommunicated from the church), because they reject that man is a sinner and deny the need of grace for man’s salvation. Finneyism (after Charles Finney of the 2nd Great Awakening) has also been regarded by some to be non-Christian because of his vagueness about salvation through justification, and his narrow and primary focus on man’s free will in determining his salvation.
Jonah and salvation. The story of Jonah sheds considerable light on how salvation happens—on God’s sovereignty in salvation. Charles Spurgeon, a Calvinist, joked that the great fish that swallowed Jonah was an Arminian, because right after Jonah prayed, “Salvation is of the Lord,” the great fish vomited him out onto dry land. Let’s see how salvation plays out in the book of Jonah. From Jonah we see that salvation is:
- began by God,
- sustained by God,
- completed by God.
Before creation and before time began. Paul says that he is “set apart for the gospel of God” (Rom 1:1). The gospel of man’s salvation is of God, not of man’s origin or effort. Paul also says that our salvation in Christ (election, adoption, grace) was decided “before the creation of the world” (Eph 1:4), “before the beginning of time,” (2 Tim 1:9), and “has been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will” (Eph 1:11). This is the emphasis of the Bible. The plan of salvation originated in the counsel of God’s will, according to his own purpose, by his predestination, and even before Genesis 1:1. This is not to please man, but “to the praise of his glorious grace” (Eph 1:6). From the very outset, the plan of “salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 1:9).
Salvation is God's plan and doing. The Bible or the Christian gospel does not consist of instructions for what we might do to achieve our own salvation. Rather it is the proclamation of what God has done for us through his incarnation (Jn 1:14), his birth (Lk 2:11), born under law to fulfill the law for us, directed to the cross to offer his life as a sacrifice by shedding his own blood for our sins (1 Pet 1:19; 3:18; 2 Cor 5:21), raised from the dead to conquer not only sin but even death for us (Acts 2:23-24). Man can do nothing of his own to remedy the problem of sin. Man cannot offer an acceptable sacrifice nor offer any good works, for all our works are corrupted by the sin that pollutes our very being. What we could never do, God has done for us, for “salvation is of the LORD” (Jonah 1:9), both in its initiation and achievement.
God's intervention to save Jonah each step of the way. Jonah provides a choice example of God as the source, origin, initiator of salvation from the beginning. What has Jonah contributed to his salvation? Only his unbelief, rebellion, disobedience, folly, and sin. According to his own will, Jonah did everything he could not to be saved (1:3). But God had willed that Jonah would be saved: God appointed and “hurled a great wind” (1:4), rebuked him through a pagan (1:6), convicted him when they cast lots so that he would confess his identity, his faith (1:7-9), his sin (1:12), appointed a great fish (1:17), and later appointed a vine (4:6), a worm (4:7), an east wind (4:8). Realizing God’s sovereign initiative in his deliverance, Jonah prays for the 1st time in a long time (2:1).
II. Salvation is Sustained (Empowered) by God
What about free will? Arminians will argue that yes, God offered salvation by his own initiative, but then we must still take the initiative to receive this salvation in order to be saved. So, though God sent the great fish, Jonah sill had to respond by changing his heart to turn back to God. What does Jonah say? The conclusion of Jonah’s prayer says, “Salvation belongs to the Lord!” or that salvation is wholly of the Lord. Thus, not only did God initiate/begin his salvation, but that God also provided the power to receive it. It does not say that salvation is God’s offer and that it requires the sinner’s own will to receive it and sustain it.
Our response to salvation is the power of God. Why is even the receipt of salvation the work/power of God and not the result of man’s free will? It is because of how the Bible explains and describes man’s impotent and powerless condition in sin (John 8:34; 1 Cor 2:14; Eph 2:1; Rom 3:10-12; Jer 17:9; Gen 6:5; Rom 7:14-15, 18-20, 23-24). Our human free will, under sin, is not free to turn to God on its own. Therefore, even in receiving the gospel, the power to believe is “of the Lord.”
Man's free will is captive to and subject to sin. A major point of debate in the Protestant Reformation is the argument of Roman Catholic apologists against salvation by grace alone by arguing the point of free will. This is Martin Luther’s response: “Free will, after the fall, exists in name only… For the will is captive and subject to sin. Not that it is nothing, but that it is not free except to do evil.” Luther also quoted Augustine in his earlier struggles with Pelagius and other heretics: “Free will without grace has power to do nothing but sin… You call the will free, but in fact it is an enslaved will.” Our condition in sin and with regards to our salvation is like that of dead Lazarus. We are saved not by our free will but by the power of God at work in the soul through the effectual call of the gospel (Rom 1:16; Jn 11:43-44; Mt 9:9). Even our faith in Jesus is not a result of our free will but “the gift of God” (Eph 2:8).
Jonah was as good as dead in the fish. Jonah in the great fish might be a perfect picture of a man dead in sin. He was determined to run away from God (1:3) and even to be killed rather than to obey God (1:12). But by God’s doing and by God’s leading, he remembered God (2:7) and acknowledged and exclaimed that “Salvation is of the Lord!”
Jesus the sign of Jonah. Jesus labeled his own death as “the sign of the prophet Jonah” (Mt 12:39). The power of both Jonah’s deliverance and of Jesus’ death and resurrection is “of the LORD.” A motto for the whole of Christ’s saving work is “salvation is of the Lord!” It is never the power of man that accounts for salvation at any point, but only the power of God. As the power of God turned Jonah’s heart in the darkness of the fish back to God, it is God‘s power that turns sinners’ hearts to faith today in the shadow of the cross.
III. Salvation is Completed by God
How do we remain saved? The last question to ask is: Having been saved by sovereign grace, do we remain saved by our own efforts or by that same sovereign grace of God? From Jonah we can say that his salvation was not only began by God, and sustained by God, but also completed by God, for “the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land” (Jonah 2:10).
Faith: passive and active. That God completes our salvation does not at all suggest or imply that Christians are inactive in their faith. Salvation by faith (justification) is passive faith, but advancing in salvation (sanctification) is an active faith that works, that perseveres (Phil 2:12-13; Col 1:21-23; Rev 2:10). But God’s people do not work, serve (1 Pet 4:11), persevere, mature, grow in their own strength and power, but in the grace of God (2 Pet 3:18) and by beholding the glory of Christ (2 Cor 3:18). For this reason, the only solid ground of assurance of salvation is a present, active faith in Jesus Christ.
Dependent on God's grace and mercy to the end of our days. Even our active faith is “of the LORD” (Phil 1:6; 1 Pet 1:5; Jn 10:27-28; Eph 1:13-14). Jonah modeled his prayer on the psalms, from one of David’s affliction psalms, when his son Absalom rebelled against him (Ps 3:1,3,7-8). David’s hope and Jonah’s hope and future was in God. Interestingly, Jonah did not pray that God deliver him from the great fish, but instead thanks God for the deliverance he has already gained; a deliverance from his folly and sin. Yet God completed his salvation by delivering him from the fish. Likewise, our salvation will be complete when God delivers us out of this dark and evil age to arrive safely on the shores of heaven. Our only hope is to rest in the God who will save us from the beginning to the end. Martin Luther says, “It is the Lord alone that saves and blesses: and even though the whole mass of all evils should be gathered together in one against a man, still, it is the Lord who saves: salvation and blessing are in his hands. What then shall I fear?”
Response to salvation: Idolatry and a vow. In conclusion, what should be our response to God’s sovereign grace of salvation? It is to acknowledge the vanity/vileness of our idolatry (Jonah 2:8), and to make a vow to God (Jonah 2:9; 1:16), which is a universal response of all who are saved. Idolatry blinds us to the beauty of grace. Making a vow enables us to let our faith work out our salvation with fear and trembling. It is a commitment to surrender the rule of our life into God’s sovereign rule (Mt 6:9; Lk 11:2).
Do you know that salvation is of the Lord? Does grace empower you to overcome idolatry and to make a vow?
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