A. They that are effectually called do in this life partake of justification, adoption, sanctification, and the several benefits which, in this life, do either accompany or flow from them.

I have said many times that biblical theology is like the pieces of a puzzle, and systematic theology is like the process of matching the pieces to the picture on the box top. 

Handling the order of salvation in a practical way requires deep theologizing. It is aimed at putting the pieces of a massive puzzle together. The puzzle is there whether we like it or not. Whether we do theology systematically or not, the pieces are in danger of scattering and appearing to conflict with each other. 

So, one of the most common mistakes, as one moves through texts in the New Testament, is to discover all kinds of things (individual scattered puzzle pieces) that are “necessary” to be saved and to have no other categories but that these either 1. cause salvation, or else 2. are being presented for comparison to some state of perfection or else 3. against other saints who manifest these in different ways and degrees. There are several errors packed into this one larger error, but the root error behind the whole is a failure to distinguish between kinds of necessities. The concept of necessity is like a larger section of the completed puzzle that can be seen on the box top. 

Another problem that results is reductionistic views of '“Which comes first?” So, for example, which comes first: repentance or faith? Our answer depends on the angle from which we approach the question. Viewed from the gospel call especially, one may think that repentance ought to come first. But there is an important sense in which faith must always come first. At the very least, repentance cannot be viewed as a “precondition” for coming to faith. The Westminster Confession of Faith XV calls repentance unto life “an evangelical grace” for this reason. But what’s the real trouble here? “Repentance” has been defined up front as that first turning from sin, as a thing which “gets you in” once. 

The Order of Salvation

The classic ordo salutis passage is Romans 8:29-30.

“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.”

There are several ways to describe the order of salvation. Romans 8:29-30 gives one way to look at that and Ephesians 1:3-14 gives another. These are two perfectly consistent, but different, perspectives on the same whole of salvation. We can say it this way. Ephesians 1 is giving us the “eternity’s eye” view where the missions of the Son and Spirit follow election. This brings all of eternity, time past, and our ongoing time into view. Whereas Romans 8 is giving the cross-section of the how election cuts in more specifically to the Spirit’s application of redemption. 

Wrong orders of salvation actually create whole different doctrines of salvation. How so? It is because wrong orders of salvation actually create different grounds of saving. When people try to demote the doctrine of salvation to a non-essential matter, I cringe. The Bible does the exact opposite. When Paul runs into a church with an arrogance and division problem, like Corinth, how does he diagnose their problem? First, the gospel has not been understood. Right out of the shoot, he says, “For consider your calling, brothers … And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord’” (1 Cor. 1:26, 30-31).

An objection to the orthodox order of salvation came from the Prescient View. This view is so named because of its focus on God’s fore (pre) knowledge (scientia). They will say, “Oh, sure, predestination is a biblical word, but all that it means is that God looks down the corridors of time, to see who will respond to his call in faith. It is those that he chooses.” Interestingly, this view sees Romans 8:30 as an opportunity to make their case. In particular, Paul places foreknowledge before predestination. There you have it! Predestination leans back on what God foreknows!

Sproul responds to this with two cardinal difficulties for the prescient view. One of these involves a decision as to whether Paul implies the word “some” or “all” about these links on the chain. Paul does not use either word and so one must make a reasonable inference. On the one hand, if we read Paul to be saying only “some,” then, 

“If some of the predestined are being predestined without being called, then God would not be basing his predestination on a prior knowledge to their response to his call. They could have no response to a call they never receive! God cannot have foreknowledge of a person’s non-answer to a non-call.”1

Now Sproul left out one possibility, although the same difficulty will still emerge. The one who holds the prescient view may complain that they only mean “Some” about the link between the calling and faith, since we would all acknowledge that not everyone who is called by the gospel responds in faith. The first trouble there is that you have to be selective. There seems to be no reason in the text itself why only the call would imply “some” but all of the other links would imply “all.” However, the basic problem remains in either direction.

If it is only in that link where “some” apply, and some that are called are justified, then all that are predestined are still called—and you’ve made this call the general, gospel call. So, then everyone who hears the gospel is still predestined!

In fact, in the selective-some view, you still have to make the second and third links “some.” But then “some who he predestined”? That doesn’t fit the view. The whole point was to redefine predestination to foreknowledge! In other words, no matter how you expand the scope of “some” to the links on the chain, Paul’s basic order will absolutely not allow the prescient view to fit. It runs into a contradiction in every direction. 

Now let us read the text most naturally, where Paul quite clearly implies “all” at each link. What follows? A second cardinal difficulty. Sproul puts it in this way:

“If all who are called are justified, then the passage could mean one of two things: (A) All who hear the gospel outwardly are justified; or (B) All who are called by God inwardly are justified. If we answer with option A, then the conclusion we must reach is that everyone who ever hears the gospel is predestined to be saved … That leaves us with option B: all who are called inwardly by God are justified.”2

Once we have the higher necessities of the order of salvation in place, we are better prepared to situate the more dependent necessities that we run into in those scattered “puzzle piece” texts. So, for example, baptism, repentance, forgiving others, picking up our cross, etc. 

How does one resolve the question of union with Christ in the ordo salutis context? In other words, are we united to Christ at regeneration, and thus prior to faith? Or must we not receive the Spirit “through faith” (Gal. 3:5, 14)? The Puritans developed what was called a threefold union with Christ, divided between an immanent, transient, and applicatory work. Beeke and Jones explain this:

“‘Immanent union’ refers to being elected in union with Christ from all eternity, before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4); ‘transient union’ refers to believers’ union with Christ in time past, in His mediatorial death and resurrection (Rom. 6:3-11); and ‘applicatory union’ refers to the believer’s experience of union with Christ in the present time (Eph. 2:5-6).”3

The Benefits of Salvation in this Life

The essential benefit that contains all others is union with Christ. To be united to Christ is to possess all that He is and all that He has, at least in the sense that is fitting for the creature. This is the meaning of being “heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:17). Paul speaks of an inheritance in Ephesians 1, and this is essentially to have all that the Father gives to the Son (beginning with God himself: see Jn. 17:3, 1 Pet. 3:18), but extends to all things (1 Cor. 2:15) or the whole world (Rom. 4:13).

There are practical—even psychological—realities that this truth helps us with. This past year, there was an article that received a lot of press and talk, which questioned the idea of finding our identity in Christ as just one more modern psychologizing of the gospel. 

But what does it really mean to root our identity in Christ? It is a gospel issue: that is, seeing ourselves as Paul talks about in Romans 6, united to Christ in his death and his resurrection. That implies seeing ourselves as God now sees us according to the performance of his Son in our place. 2 Corinthians 5:14-21 is another good text to read on this, as well as Philippians 3:8-9. But this is why I can’t quite get on board with that critique, because Scripture itself puts our standing with Christ in “individual identity” terms. Paul is getting us to “see ourselves” in a particular way because of our union with Christ. 

In addition to eternal life itself and a new identity in Christ, a third massive benefit is ours in Christ—assurance. Now this can be misunderstood. That assurance is available to all of God’s children does not mean that each experiences it at the same time or to the same degree. And right back to those puzzle pieces, how much we care to look at that box top really determines how many of the pieces we are able to put together. 

We can bring together a mature order of salvation with a pastoral approach to simple, practical questions. Suppose someone asks us: “When we believe and repent, did God forgive us of all our future sins as well before we even committed them?” Because God is not bound to time, and yet salvation comes down into history, there are two ways to look at this: both accurate. 1. We could take the most technical and literal approach, and get used to dividing up the different aspects of the whole doctrine of salvation: in eternity, history past, and appropriated in the present. 2. On the other hand, a simple new believer’s approach is where we take the sense in the biblical text that is addressed to our responses. In our experience, future sins will still be repented of (see 1 John 1:9 for example). We could also speak of the differences here between the objective, legal work of the cross, which is perfect, versus the subjective, experiential disruption of fellowship due to our daily sins. 

Finally, there are the “tenses of salvation” that we have to get used to. Another misconception can occur here in the fear that any talk of a “final salvation” is somehow in conflict with a “once for all salvation,” already accomplished. The Bible speaks about both. That, again, is because salvation is a broad concept. While Christ’s work is absolutely perfect and guarantees salvation for his people (Heb. 10:14, Jn. 19:30), there is a “salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5, cf. Heb. 9:28).

As another example of this, we might hear about a future “day of redemption,” and become unnerved again. The word “redemption” can refer specifically to that work of Christ, whereby God purchases sinners to become his people (see Ephesians 1:7, Galatians 3:13, 4:5). However, there is a lesser-used but clearly defined “day of redemption” (see Isaiah 63:4, Ephesians 4:30) that has in view the Last Day, where our salvation comes to perfection. Romans 8:23 even adds to this idea the aspect of our glorified bodies being revealed as redemptive. The language of the “sealing” of the Spirit in Ephesians 4:30 points back to 1:13-14 of that same letter. Here the work of the Spirit is like a deposit, applying to our hearts what Christ has purchased by his blood. So there is a guarantee that redemption accomplished on the cross will result in that glorious appearing on the “Day” of redemption. 

____________________

1. Sproul, Chosen by God (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale, 1986), 133.

2. Sproul, Chosen by God, 133, 34

3. Beeke and Jones, A Puritan Theology, 482.