Is Predestination Unfair?
Is Unconditional Election Fair or Unfair?
A common objection to unconditional election is that it’s unfair. Isn’t God unfair to choose to save only some humans not based on any human condition but solely on his sovereign good pleasure? Isn’t there injustice on God’s part that some people are not elect?
Paul directly answers this objection in Romans 9:14–18, and Jesus indirectly answers it in Matthew 20:1–16.
God Is Fair When He Sovereignly Has Mercy on Whomever He Wants (Rom. 9:14–18)1
Paul anticipates that Romans 9:6–13 may provoke some to object that it would not be right for God to sovereignly and decisively choose to save only certain individuals and not others. So in 9:14–23, Paul argues that God has the right to do whatever he wants with his creatures.
In Romans 9:14–18, Paul answers the objection that it’s unfair for God to choose to save individuals unconditionally. It is wrong to infer from Romans 9:6–13 that there is injustice on God’s part (Rom. 9:14). In the four sentences that follow (Rom. 9:15–18), Paul supports that statement with two proofs and draws inferences from those proofs.
Predestination
Andrew David Naselli
In this addition to the Short Studies in Systematic Theology series, Andrew David Naselli carefully examines the doctrine of predestination and encourages believers to respond in worship.
What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. (Rom. 9:14–18)
Sentence 1 (Rom. 9:15) = proof 1 that there is no injustice on God’s part.
“For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion’” (Rom. 9:15). Paul quotes Exodus 33:19 to prove that God can have mercy on whomever he wants. God would be just if he did not show mercy to a single sinful human. None of us deserves God’s mercy.
Sentence 2 (Rom. 9:16) = inference of Romans 9:15.
“So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy” (Rom. 9:16). The word “it” refers to God’s showing mercy and compassion to save individuals (Rom. 9:15). What is decisive in whether an individual receives mercy is not “human will or exertion.” In other words, what is decisive is not your unfettered will or your vain effort to advance spiritually. What is decisive is “God, who has mercy.”
Sentence 3 (Rom. 9:17) = proof 2 that there is no injustice on God’s part.
“For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth’” (Rom. 9:17). Paul quotes Exodus 9:16 to prove that God can harden whomever he wants in order to accomplish his purposes. God raised up Pharaoh to show his power in Pharaoh. The purpose (and result) was that others would proclaim God’s name in all the earth.
Sentence 4 (Rom. 9:18) = inference of Romans 9:15–17.
“So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills” (Rom. 9:18). God has mercy on whomever he wants, and he hardens whomever he wants.
So “Is there injustice on God’s part?” (Rom. 9:14). No, God is fair when he sovereignly has mercy on whomever he wants.
None of us deserves God’s mercy.
God Is Fair When He Is Undeservedly Kind to Some and Not Others (Matt. 20:1–16)
Some people reject unconditional election because they presuppose that God does not have the right to treat one person differently from another. Does God have the right to treat one person differently from another? God himself says that he does. And God—not our sense of justice—is the standard for what is right.
When God deals with people, the following two statements are true:
1. God is always fair. That is, God is always righteous or just. God is never unfair, unrighteous, or unjust.
2. Sometimes God is undeservedly kind. That is, sometimes God is merciful and gracious to people who are both undeserving (i.e., they don’t deserve God’s kindness) and ill-deserving (i.e., they deserve the opposite of God’s kindness; they deserve God’s wrath).
Does anyone deserve God’s kindness? No. When God is undeservedly kind to some people but not others, he is still fair to all people without exception. God does not have to be undeservedly kind to everyone equally in order to be fair. To be fair, God needs only to give people what they deserve. God is always fair: “all his ways are justice” (Deut. 32:4).
A standard way to define equity is the quality of being fair and impartial. More recently some people have redefined equity to refer to equal outcomes. So some people think that God is unfair if there are unequal outcomes. But we must distinguish between impartiality and equal outcomes. God is impartial, but that does not mean everyone experiences equal outcomes because God has the freedom to show undeserved kindness to whomever he wants.
Jesus’s parable of the laborers in the vineyard illustrates that God is always fair and that he is sometimes undeservedly kind:
For the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and to them he said, “You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.” So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, “Why do you stand here idle all day?” They said to him, “Because no one has hired us.” He said to them, “You go into the vineyard too.” And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, “Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.” And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, saying, “These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.” But he replied to one of them, “Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?” So the last will be first, and the first last. (Matt. 20:1–16)
The master gives each laborer what he deserves, and he gives some laborers more than they deserve. It is not unfair to give extra to some, even when they are less deserving than others. Note the words I have emphasized: “I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?” (Matt. 20:14–15). As long as God gives each person what he deserves, he is not unfair when he sovereignly chooses to be undeservedly kind to some and not others. And not one of us deserves God’s kindness. It is reasonable to ask, “Why did God choose to save some and not others?” But it is better to ask, “Why did God choose to save any?” As John Bunyan says, “The least of mercies are not deserved by the best of sinners.”2 God is not unfair when he is undeservedly kind to some and not others.
Notes:
- This section updates Andrew David Naselli, Romans: A Concise Guide to the Greatest Letter Ever Written (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2022), 119–20.
- John Bunyan, “Reprobation Asserted: or, The Doctrine of Eternal Election and Reprobation Promiscuously Handled, in Eleven Chapters Wherein the Most Material Objections Made by the Opposers of This Doctrine, Are Fully Answered; Several Doubts Removed, and Sundry Cases of Conscience Resolved,” in The Whole Works of John Bunyan, Accurately Reprinted from the Author’s Own Editions, 3 vols. (London: Blackie and Son, 1862), 2:346.
This article is adapted from Predestination: An Introduction by Andrew David Naselli.
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