# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1947_S488
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

488 INTERSYNODICAL AND DOCTRINAL MATTERS

faith of the elect were to be placed before their election; but
according to Scripture the faith which the elect have in time
belongs to the spiritual blessings with which God has endowed them
by His eternal election. For Scripture teaches, Acts 13, 48: “And
as many as were ordained unto eternal life believed.” Our
Lutheran Confession also testifies (Triglot, p. 1065, § 8; M., p. 705):
“The eternal election of God, however, not only foresees and fore-
knows the salvation of the elect, but is also, from the gracious
will‘and pleasure of God in Christ Jesus, a cause which procures,
works, helps, and promotes our salvation and what pertains thereto;
and upon this our salvation is so founded that the gates of hell
cannot prevail against it, Matt. 16, 18, as is written John 10, 28:
‘Neither shall any man pluck My sheep out of My hand’; and again,
Acts 13, 48: ‘And as many as were ordained to eternal life
believed.’ ”

37. But as earnestly as we maintain that there is an election
of grace, or a predestination to salvation, so decidedly do we
teach, on the other hand, that there is no election of wrath, or
predestination to damnation. Scripture plainly reveals the truth
that the love of God for the world of lost sinners is universal, that
is, that it embraces all men without exception, that Christ has fully
reconciled all men unto God, and that God earnestly desires to
bring all men to faith, to preserve them therein, and thus to save
them, as Scripture testifies, 1 Tim. 2,4: “God will have all men to
be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.’ No man
is lost because God has predestinated him to eternal damnation, —
Eternal election is a cause why the elect are brought to faith in
time, Acts 13, 48; but election is not a cause why men remain
unbelievers when they hear the Word of God. The reason assigned
by Scripture for this sad fact is that these men judge themselves
unworthy of everlasting life, putting the Word of God from them
and obstinately resisting the Holy Ghost, whose earnest will it
is to bring also them to repentance and faith by means of the
Word, Acts 13, 46; 7,51; Matt. 23, 37.

38. To be sure, it is necessary to observe the Scriptural dis-
tinction between the election of grace and the universal will of
grace. This universal gracious will of God embraces all men; the
election of grace, however, does not embrace all, but only a definite
number, whom “God hath from the beginning chosen to salvation,”
2 Thess. 2, 13, the “remnant,” the “seed” which “the Lord left,”
Rom. 9, 27—29, the “election,” Rom. 11, 7; and while the universal
will of grace is frustrated in the case of most men, Matt. 22, 14;
Luke 7, 30, the election of grace attains its end with all whom it
embraces, Rom. 8, 28—30. Scripture, however, while distinguishing
between the universal will of grace and the election of grace, does