07-29-26

ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
July 29, 2026
In a couple of recent Etchings, along with my sermon on Sunday, I talked about predestination and free will. As you might have guessed, I am not a person who believes in the traditional predestination, specifically Calvin’s Double Predestination. There are others who see predestination a little differently. They suggest that God sees our future, and because of our faith and deeds, God predestines us based on what God sees in our future. That sort of seems strange for us to create a theological concept for something that only God can see. At the end of the day, does it really matter?

If I were to use the word predestined, it would be to suggest that God has predestined all to be saved and to find wholeness within God. In Ephesians 1:9-10, we read:

God has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

In Colossians, Paul writes about reconciling “all things” to God through Jesus Christ. Building on this language of “all things,” predestination becomes shorthand for, “God wins!” In the end, God brings all things into the fullness of God, and this choice of God does not undermine human free will. On a personal level, I sort of like the idea that God’s redemptive and saving love is not only unconditional, but unrelenting. God’s love will not lose what God loves.

Thank you, O Lord of Heaven and Earth and all other places, for a love that is beyond anything I could imagine. It heals brokenness, reconciles separation, and finds a way of bringing all things unto you. I am in awe! Amen.