Thread: Does God love and hate the elect prior to salvation?

Ephesians 2:1-6

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience- among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loves us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

This passage of scripture tells us that at one time we were dead in trespasses and sins, and by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. It also states that because of the great love with which he loves us, even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive.

So if he loved us while we were dead in trespasses, does that mean he loved and hated us at the same time?

Not in the same sense.

One in Adam. One in Christ.

In Adam we are all dead in sin.

In Christ we are made alive.

In the Beloved we are loved.

In Adam we are fallen.

Etc.

The LORD hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee. (Jeremiah 31.3)


Being children of wrath in Adam does not negate the everlasting love of God to His elect. If He did not love us, He would not draw us to Himself.

I remember it said on some post a while back that, it's not like his love or hate causes him to turn towards us or to not turn towards us, but rather his turning towards or not-turning towards us is the expression of love or hate towards us. Love is defined as his showing favor to us, and hate is defined as his not showing favor towards us. And so, the order of the train and caboose are to be switched.

But, as far as the verse goes in the OP, my opinion is that, when he turns his favor towards us, he no longer has dis-favor towards us. When he turns towards us, it encompasses the act of placing us in Christ and making us one with him. And so, we are now seen as Christ is seen. And, the condition we were in prior to his turning of his favor towards us was that of "ungodly".

God so loved the world...
the fallen sinful world.

As the old cliche goes: God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.
If it weren't for the Love and Grace of God, we would all perish.
I mean, the only way the effectual calling of God could work is to
call sinners out of the mire of sin...

As it says in the Westminster Confession:
"All those whom God hath predestinated unto life, and those only, He is pleased, in His
appointed and accepted time, effectually to call, by His Word and His Spirit, out of that
state of sin and death, in which they are by nature, to grace and salvation, by Jesus Christ..."

God so loved the world...
the fallen sinful world.

As the old cliche goes: God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.
If it weren't for the Love and Grace of God, we would all perish.

Originally Posted by AThornquist

God so loved the world...
the fallen sinful world.

As the old cliche goes: God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.
If it weren't for the Love and Grace of God, we would all perish.

How have I opened up a can of worms? Please explain. Thanks.

I think he is just waiting for someone to "jump" on the cliche...


Please fix your signature, see the link in my signature for instructions. Thanks

Originally Posted by Contra_Mundum

I think he is just waiting for someone to "jump" on the cliche...

Thanks...I anticipated that, and so my reason for submitting the statement from the Westminster Confession. I am not Methodist!
That is also why I was quick to mention the effectual calling of God...

At second blush, you are right, it does sound clicheish...

Originally Posted by C. Matthew McMahon

Not in the same sense.

One in Adam. One in Christ.

In Adam we are all dead in sin.

In Christ we are made alive.

In the Beloved we are loved.

In Adam we are fallen.

Etc.

That's exactly what I believe!

On a superficial front it seems sometimes he sustained me more abundantly whle I was unregenerate, perhaps that's just my sinful nature taling, but my reprobate mind was less stressed than my reborn one; perhaps that is a correlation between having been a child while unsaved and a young adult while given salvation.

All the same, sinfully perhaps, i sometimes long for the blue pill if you will.

Thomas Goodwin wrote,

"Look, as God did not, in his decrees about creation, consider the body of Adam singly and apart from his soul, nor yet the soul without the body (I speak of his creation and state thereby) neither should either so much as exist, but as the one in the other: so nor Christ and his church in election, which gave the first existence to Christ as a head, and to the church as his body, which each had in God's decrees." Exposition of the First Chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians, London, 1681, Pt. 1, p. 72.

C. H. Spurgeon,

But there are one or two acts of God which, while they certainly are decreed as much as other things, yet they bear such a special relation to God’s predestination that it is rather difficult to say whether they were done in eternity or whether they were done in time. Election is one of those things which were done absolutely in eternity; all who were elect, were elect as much in eternity as they are in time. But you may say, Does the like affirmation apply to adoption or justification? My late eminent and now glorified predecessor, Dr. Gill, diligently studying these doctrines, said that adoption was the act of God in eternity, and that as all believers were elect in eternity, so beyond a doubt they were adopted in eternity. He further than that to include the doctrine of justification and he said that inasmuch as Jesus Christ was before all worlds justified by his Father, and accepted by him as our representative, therefore all the elect must have been justified in Christ from before all worlds. Now, I believe there is a great deal of truth in what he said, though there was a considerable outcry raised against him at the time he first uttered it. However, that being a high and mysterious point, we would have you accept the doctrine that all those who are saved at last were elect in eternity when the means as well the end were determined. With regard to adoption, I believe we were predestined hereunto in eternity, but I do think there are some points with regard to adoption which will not allow me to consider the act of adoption to have been completed in eternity. For instance, the positive translation of my soul from a state of nature into a state of grace is a part of adoption or at least it is an effect at it, and so close an effect that it really seems to be a part of adoption itself: I believe that this was designed, and in fact that it was virtually carried out in God’s everlasting covenant; but I think that it was that actually then brought to pass in all its fullness. So with regard to justification, I must hold, that in the moment when Jesus Christ paid my debts, my debts were cancelled — in the hour when he worked out for me a perfect righteousness it was imputed to me, and therefore I may as a believer say I was complete in Christ before I was born, accepted in Jesus, even as Levi was blessed in the loins of Abraham by Melchisedec; but I know likewise that justification is described in the Scriptures as passing upon me at the time I believe. “Being justified by faith,” I am told “I have peace with God, through Jesus Christ.” I think, therefore that adoption and justification, while they have a very great alliance with eternity, and were virtually done then, yet have both of them such a near relation to us in time, and such a bearing upon our own personal standing and character that they have also a part and parcel of themselves actually carried out and performed in time in the heart of every believer. I may be wrong in this exposition; it requires much more time to study this subject than I have been able yet to give to it, seeing that my years are not yet many; I shall no doubt by degrees come to the knowledge more fully of such high and mysterious points of gospel doctrine. But nevertheless, while I find the majority of sound divines holding that the works of justification and adoption are due in our lives I see, on the other hand, in Scripture much to lead me to believe that both of them were done in eternity; and I think the fairest view of the case is, that while they were virtually done in eternity, yet both adoption and justification are actually passed upon us, in our proper persons, consciences, and experiences, in time, — so that both the Westminster confession and the idea of Dr. Gill can be proved to be Scriptural, and we may hold them both without any prejudice the one to the other. "Adoption", Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Vol. 7

Excellent Spurgeon post above, J.M.!!! Several things are said in there that would be beneficial towards shedding light on some of the questions that others have mentioned in threads these past few months, such as those on the topic of when we are justified, and of God's love towards the elect before they were called. He speaks of eternal realities, and our experiences of those eternal realities, in a very beautiful and balanced way. Thank you for sharing that!

Blessings!

I would say that He always loves the elect. After all, why would He die on a cross for those that He dose not love. The fact is, that He chose us, we did not choose Him. He knew us before we were even born, and He has ordered all things in our lives so that we would come into fellowship with Him. He does all these things because He has loved us before the foundations of the world. And I agree with the what one of the previous poster had said, that prior to us coming to acknowledge Him as our Savior and Lord he has often times kept us out of harms way, and then again he has put some of us in harms way so that we would turn to Him. It's in our day to day lives as we see Him work that we can see how loving He truly is.

Of course the cross was not an after thought after the fall with God.

Originally Posted by Adelphos

I am not Methodist!

That's good to know.

I'm likely treading on theological grounds I have no business approaching, but this seems similar to the "well meant" or "serious" gospel call in RT. Hoekema has a good discussion of this in Ch. 5 of Saved by Grace. I'm sure Owen, Sibbes, Henry, Goodwin, and all the other Puritan powerhouses said the same earlier and better, but I'll leave that to those who really know.

Thomas Goodwin wrote,

"Look, as God did not, in his decrees about creation, consider the body of Adam singly and apart from his soul, nor yet the soul without the body (I speak of his creation and state thereby) neither should either so much as exist, but as the one in the other: so nor Christ and his church in election, which gave the first existence to Christ as a head, and to the church as his body, which each had in God's decrees." Exposition of the First Chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians, London, 1681, Pt. 1, p. 72.

That's an amazing thought; thank you for posting it.

As for the cliche: As the old cliche goes: God hates the sin, but loves the sinner.

Does anyone have any scriptural support for this?

I think that a lot of people get the word love confused between the noun and the verb. example.

I may tell my daughter that I am going to get rid of our dog because no one cares for it. She exclaims "You can't get rid of my dog, I love him". My response is "no you may have have feelings that you like to have the dog around and you like to show off your dog in front of your friends, but you don't walk your dog, your don't brush your dog, you don't pet your dog, nor do you pick up after your dog. You may like who your dog is, but you don't "LOVE" (or exrpress love TO or toward) your dog.

There is nothing left in man for God to love or have fond feelings of. The only thing that remains in man is the faint image of the creator as the result of creation.

"But God commended his love toward us (To all that be in rome, BELOVED of God) in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us"

and "For God so LOVED the world"

I believe that LOVED is the verb in the aorist tense indicative mood, denoting a simple act occuring in past time. It was the act of God expressing LOVE toward us in predestinating us in eternity past. (but I am not a greek expert)

For the rest, His wrath and anger rests upon the reprobate. His anger rests upon the sinner, not upon the sin itself. It is not the action of the sinner that God hates, it is the source of the action, the evil heart of the sinner that God hates.

Otherwise these scriptures would contradict these:

"The foolish shall not stand in thy sight: thou hates all workers of iniquity. Thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing: the Lord will abhor the bloody and deceitful man" and "The Lord is in his holy temple, the Lord's throne is in heaven; his eyes behold his eyelids try the children of men. The Lord trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul hateth" Psalms 2 and 5

Note, it is not the the acts of the wicked that the Lord hates, but the wicked themselves. God does not have strong feeling FOR something that is totally depraved. The Lord can not have strong feelings for someone whom His Son identifies as being evil.

Others thoughts?

JMHO

Nope, you can't be right. The Bible is clear:

"Jacob I loved and Esau's sin I hated."