1. Various Meanings:
The whole conception of God, of His relation to Israel, and of His action in history indicated above, constituted the religious heritage of Jesus Christ and His disciples. The national conciousness had to a considerable extent given place to that of the individual; and salvation extended beyond the present life into a state of blessedness in a future world. But the central ideas remain, and are only modified in the New Testament in so far as Jesus Christ becomes the Mediator and Agent of God's sovereign grace. Eklego and its derivatives are the words that generally express the idea in the New Testament. They are used (1) of the general idea of selecting one out of many (Lu 14:7); (2) of choosing men for a particular purpose, e.g. of the church choosing the seven (Ac 6:5); of the choice of delegates from the Council of Jerusalem (Ac 15:22,25; compare 2Co 8:19), cheirotoneo; choose by vote (the Revised Version (British and American) "appoint") (compare Ac 10:41), procheirotoneo; (3) of moral choice (Mr 13:20): "Mary hath chosen the good part" (Lu 10:42); (4) of Christ as the chosen Messiah of God (Lu 23:35; 1Pe 2:4 the King James Version); (5) of Christ choosing His apostles (Lu 6:13; Joh 6:70; 13:18; 15:16,19; Ac 1:2,24); Paul (Ac 9:15; compare Ac 22:14 the King James Version), procheirizomai; Rufus (Ro 16:13); and Paul chose Silas (Ac 15:40), epilego; (6) of God (a) choosing Israel (Ac 13:17; compare Ro 9:11), (b) choosing the Christian church as the new Israel (1Pe 2:9 the King James Version), (c) choosing the members of the church from among the poor (Jas 2:5), the foolish, weak and despised (1Co 1:27-28), (d) choosing into His favor and salvation a few out of many: "Many are called, but few are chosen"' (Mt 20:16 (omitted in the Revised Version (British and American)); Mt 22:14); God shortens the days of the destruction of Jerusalem "for the elect's sake, whom he chose" (Mr 13:20).
2. Of God's Free Grace:
In Eph 1:4-6 every phrase tells a different phase of the conception: (1) God chose (and foreordained) the saints in Christ before the foundation of the world; (2) according to the good pleasure of His will; (3) unto adoption as sons through Jesus Christ unto Himself; (4) to be holy and without blemish before Him in love; (5) to the praise of the glory of His grace; (6) which He freely bestowed on them in the Beloved. And in Re 17:14, the triumphant church in heaven is described as "called and chosen and faithful." God's sovereign choice governs the experience and testing of the saints at every point from beginning to end.
Thus in the New Testament as in the Old Testament (1) God's covenant of grace is free and unconditional. It is unto all men, now as individuals rather than nations, and without distinction of race or class. It is no less free and sovereign, because it is a father's grace. (2) Israel is still a chosen race for a special purpose. (3) The church and the saints that constitute it are chosen to the full experience and privileges of sonship. (4) God's purpose of grace is fully revealed and realized through Jesus Christ.
3. Ultimate Antinomies:
This doctrine raises certain theological and metaphysical difficulties that have never yet been satisfactorily solved. (1) How can God be free if all His acts are preordained from eternity? This is an antinomy which indeed lies at the root of all personality. It is of the essence of the idea of personality that a person should freely determine himself and yet act in conformity with his own character. Every person in practice and experience solves this antinomy continually, though he may have no intellectual category that can coordinate these two apparently contradictory principles in all personality. (2) How can God be just, if a few are chosen and many are left? And (3) How can man be free if his moral character proceeds out of God's sovereign grace? It is certain that if God chose all or left all He would be neither just nor gracious, nor would man have any vestige of freedom.
4. Election Corresponds to Experience:
The doctrine describes accurately (a) the moral fact, that some accept salvation and others reject it; (b) the religious fact that God's sovereign and unconditional love is the beginning and cause of salvation. The meeting-point of the action of grace, and of man's liberty as a moral and responsible being, it does not define. Nor has the category as yet been discovered wherewith to construe and coordinate these two facts of religious experience together, although it is a fact known in every Christian experience that where God is most sovereign, man is most free.
For other passages, and the whole idea in the New Testament, see ELECTION.
T. Rees