What is double predestination? Does God create some people for the purpose of sending them to Hell?

The reason Christians feel a difficulty as to the doctrine of election to eternal life, is because they do not see the extent of the fall of man, and his utterly lost condition. Were it not for election, and the prevailing grace that follows it, not one would be saved. Christ died for all, and the gospel is proclaimed to all, Rom. 3:22; Heb. 2:9; but alas, except for the election and grace of God, none would respond. Luke 14:18. God must have all the glory.

Another error that has caused a difficulty as to 'election ' is the idea which some maintain that as some are ordained to eternal life, others likewise are fore-ordained by God to perdition, called 'reprobation.' But this is not taught in scripture — God desires that all men should be saved, 1 Tim. 2:4, and His election to life ensures that some will be. It was not before Esau was born, nor until long after he was dead, that it was said he was hated of God. Malachi 1:3. Some even judge that it refers, not to Esau personally, but to his descendants after their deeds had been fully manifested. Cf. Oba. 10; Ezek. 35.

προορίζω. 'To mark out beforehand, predetermine.' In Rom. 8:29-30, it forms a link in the chain that connects the foreknowledge of God in the past with the glory in the future. Election is God's choice of individuals; predestination is to a blessing, as in Eph. 1:5, 11, believers are predestinated to the adoption of sons, according to the purpose of God. Predestination does not, as insisted on by some, imply reprobation of some to wrath. God "will have [or desires] all men to be saved," 1 Tim. 2:4; but to ensure some being saved, He predestinated, called, justified, and glorified them in His sovereign purpose.

The fifth verse takes up another side of the truth. Predestination is not quite the same thing as election, and here we have the Scripture account of it. We do well to stand clear of human exaggeration here. Election is to fitness for His presence in a nature like His own. Predestination is to a relationship, as like as possible to His Son's. But scripture carefully excludes any such human inference as God's predestination to hell fire. It is clearly revealed that such must be the unending end of the wicked. When the everlasting judgment comes, and they are judged, each according to their works, the book of life has none of their names written there, and they are cast into the lake of fire. But there is no predestinating decree of God in the case. Their own sins fitted those vessels of wrath to destruction.

This is a grave practical lesson, and Malachi, I think, is deeply interesting in this way. At the beginning of the history of Jacob and Esau we find the purpose of God before the children were born. Indeed to make election a question of the deserts in the two parties is simply to destroy its nature, if allowed in word. Election is necessarily from God entirely apart from those that are the objects of it, as it means the exercise of His sovereign choice. If there is the smallest ground in the party chosen because of which God chooses, it is not His choice, but rather a moral discernment, which, far from being sovereign, is only an appraisal whether the person deserves or not. One may hold then as strongly as the stoutest Calvinist the free sovereign choice of God, but the reprobation of the wicked which the Calvinist draws from it, as an equally sovereign decree, is in my judgment a grave error. I do not therefore scruple to say a word upon it now, inasmuch as it is an important thing in both doctrine and practice. The idea that, if God chooses one, He must reprobate another whom He does not choose, is a fallacy and without, yea against, scripture. This is exactly where human influence comes in; that is, the petty self-confidence of man's mind. Now I do not see why we as believers should be petty; there is every reason why we should gather what is great for God. To be simple is all well; but this too is a very different thing from being petty, and no reason why we should limit ourselves to ourselves; for what does God reveal His mind for? Surely that we should know Him, and be imitators of Him.

To my own mind then it is full of the deepest interest, that while God chose before the children were born, and decided what was to be the lot of the one relatively to the other, He never made any man to be a sinner. No doubt the children of Adam are conceived in sin and shapen in iniquity; mankind are born in that condition. Their whole being is lost in it. It is no question therefore of making man a sinner, because since the fall he departed from God and the race is evil without exception. Man belongs to a stock now wholly depraved — evil the sad and universal heirloom. God's election is entirely independent of what He finds, and spite of all evil. He elects angels no doubt that never fell: even so they had nothing to do with determining the rest who were not so kept. In every case it is simply a question of God's choice. But the fallen condition of man gives to God's election, where sinners are the only possible objects, an exceeding beauty and very deep moment. He chooses entirely apart from anything that deserves it, in the face of all that is out of harmony with Himself. It is not so where He judges and rejects.

If it were true, as Calvin says, that those who perish were destined to destruction by the will of God, the case were hard indeed. But scripture never really speaks thus, and the language of the texts usually cited in support of such a decree, when closely as well as fairly examined, invariably avoids such a thought, however near it may seem to approximate.

On the side of judgement, the apostle cites the instance of Pharaoh. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, For this very thing have I raised thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my name might be declared in all the earth. Nor, in fact, could any dealing be more just; for Pharaoh had derided and denied the right of God over His own people. He was a proud and rebellious man against God, who righteously made an example of him. Hardening came on him judicially, and in the end utter ruin. Therefore has He mercy on whom He will, and whom He will He hardens. On a large scale, it was so with Israel, (Isaiah 6) and it will be so with Christendom. (2 Thess. 2) Man is wicked and rejects God, who thereon — according to His sovereign wisdom — can and does give men up to hardness. Though election belongs to the eternal will of God, it is occupied with man under sin, since it settles for him the question of mercy or judgement. It is not the less sovereign for that. If God were to show His glory in the place where we are, for instance, and were suddenly to take to Him one or two persons, that act would be as sovereign as if He had decreed it thousands of years before. Observe, too, that while God hardens whom He will, He does not render wicked; but He may take a wicked man to make an example of His justice in his case. Had God created man evil, there would not have been room for a fall, and in that case man might have fairly complained.

Rom. 9:19-29. But man does complain, and a second objection is: Since the sovereign God decides everything, why does He any longer find fault? For who has resisted His purpose? And what I am, I am: I can only be what He pleases. Nay, but thou, man, says the apostle, who art thou that answerest again to God? Does the creature of the dust dare to judge the Creator? God does what He will, and renders account of His acts to none. Thus man complains of God's righteousness when it touches himself, as he dislikes the grace which justifies others freely and absolutely. And to this indeed the question will be found to come: Is God to judge man? or is man to judge God? In the entire answer there are three propositions. First, as we have seen, the apostle maintains, in all its strength, the right of the sovereign God — the authority that He has to do just as He will with His creatures. Has not the potter power over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honour and another for dishonour? Next, he comes to the facts, and sets before us, that God, even when minded to show his wrath and make His power known, endured with much long-suffering vessels of wrath fitted for destruction — vessels which He did not fit, but had long endured. Thirdly, there is the revelation that He had afore prepared for glory vessels of mercy. The vessels of wrath were fitted by themselves — by their sins — for wrath; but the vessels of mercy were prepared of God, for in truth no man is prepared of himself for glory: grace alone effects His work in favour of the elect. The passage is written, if we may so say, carefully, by the Spirit, that we should not impute the fitting of the wicked to God. His title to act sovereignly is asserted as a general and abstract truth in Rom. 9:21. But when we come to the facts as they are, Paul declares that it is not by God's act that they are fitted to destruction. On the other hand, it is expressly said that God endured vessels of wrath, (Rom. 9:22) and that he prepared vessels of mercy. Such are the cases supposed. Who or what, then, prepared those vessels of wrath? Sin, without doubt. Nevertheless, the word on this point preserves silence. What profound revelations result from the existence of sin — from God's way for us and for His own glory in respect of it! God alone suffices to Himself, and His power is necessary to the maintenance of everything, as it was needed to create all. The creature can only fall, if it be not sustained. The moment it seeks an independent existence it is fallen, and that even before committing a positive act of sin.

(Vv. 22, 23). The way God uses this absolute power is seen in His actings towards the vessels of wrath and the vessels of mercy. As regards the vessels of wrath, it truly says "they are fitted for destruction", but it does not say that God fitted them for destruction. He made His power known, not by fitting them for destruction, but, by enduring them with much longsuffering. As regards the vessels of mercy, it does say of such He "had afore prepared to glory". God endured the Amorites of old with much longsuffering until they fitted themselves for destruction by their iniquities being come to the "full". Then the judgment fell. (Gen. 15:16).

(V. 24) The vessels of mercy are seen in those called by the gospel in sovereign grace, not of the Jews only but also of the Gentiles. Once allow that all blessing rests upon the sovereignty of God, the Gentile must be admitted to the blessing as well as the Jew.

But there is a shade of difference as distinct as it is refined and profoundly true which no reader should overlook. The vessels of wrath are said to be "fitted for destruction." But it is neither said nor implied here, or anywhere else, that God fitted them for it. They were fitted by their sins, and most of all by their unbelief and rebelliousness against God. But when we hear of the faithful, the phrase is altogether different, "vessels of mercy which he before prepared for glory." The evil is man's, and in no case is it of God; the good is His and not our own. Not the saints, but God prepared the vessels of mercy for glory. More strictly He prepared them beforehand with a view to glory. That is, it was not their preparation while on earth, His only when the glory arrives. The apostle affirms here that God prepared them before unto glory. It was His doing. None doubts that they became by grace obedient, holy, and thus morally conformed to His nature; but it seemed good to the Holy Spirit to dwell here only on God's preparation of the vessels of mercy beforehand for glory. Thus the riches of His glory are made known upon the vessels of mercy, for so they are called, not vessels filled with these or those spiritual qualities, however true this might be, but vessels of mercy.

We shall again quote from a more sober author: "Sinful men thus living in enmity against God are here styled 'vessels of wrath,' on the one hand; as those who believe are designated, vessels of mercy' on the other. . . . But there is a shade of difference as distinct as it is refined and profoundly true which no reader should overlook. The vessels of wrath are said to be 'fitted for destruction.' But it is neither said nor implied here, or anywhere else, that God fitted them for it. They were fitted by their sins, and most of all by their unbelief and rebelliousness against God. But when we hear of the faithful, the phrase is altogether different, 'vessels of mercy, which He had afore prepared unto glory.' The evil is man's, and in no case is it of God - the good is His and not our own. Not the saints, but God prepared the vessels of mercy for glory. More strictly, He prepared them beforehand with a view to glory.... Thus lost man will 'in the end be compelled to justify God and to take the entire blame on his own shoulders, who preferred to trust Satan as his friend and adviser rather than God; while the saved, however dwelling in bliss, will know and make known all as the riches of His glory, themselves debtors to His unfailing and unfathomable mercy." And from the same writer: "To me I confess it looks like the blinding influence of falsehood when men overlook the difference of vessels of wrath fitted on the one hand to destruction, and vessels of mercy which He on the other hand before made ready for glory."

We will quote from still another source: "While it is true that Christians are 'chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world' (Eph. 1:4), it would never be right to say that lost sinners were in a parallel way elected to reprobation. . . . In the case of the wicked, so far from being elected to eternal misery, we find that God endures them [while on earth] - vessels of wrath - with much longsuffering, fitted not by Him but by their own deeds for destruction. The word katartizo* (Rom. 9:22) means to correct, repair, mend; then in its participial form, fitted, prepared. The word does not suppose a decree of God, but a work of man." Nevertheless, Mr. Pink says, "He fits the non-elect unto destruction by His fore-ordaining decrees." p. 118.

NOTE It is deeply interesting to mark the way in which scripture guards against the repulsive doctrine of reprobation. Look, for example, at Matthew 25:34. Here, the King, in addressing those on His right hand, says, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." Contrast with this the address to those on his left hand: "Depart from me ye cursed [He does not say 'of my Father'] into everlasting fire, prepared [not for you, but] for the devil and his angels." So also, in Romans 9. In speaking of the "vessels of wrath," He says "fitted to destruction" — fitted not by God surely, but by themselves. On the other hand, when He speaks of the "vessels of mercy," he says, "which He had afore prepared to glory." The grand truth of election is fully established; the repulsive error of reprobation, sedulously avoided.