Wesley Corpus

22, sec. 1.) Friend.--And do not you think that reprobation, at least, is grounded on God’s foreknowing men’s sins? Pred.--No indeed: “God of his own good pleasure ordains that many should be born, who are from the womb devoted to inevitable damnation. If any man pretend that God’s foreknowledge lays them under no necessity of being damned, but rather that he decreed their dammation because he fore knew their wickedness, I grant that God’s foreknowledge , alone lays no necessity on the creature; but eternal life and death depend on the will rather than the foreknowledge of God. If God only foreknew all things that relate to all men, and did not decree and ordain them also, then it might be inquired whether or no his foreknowledge necessitates the thing foreknown. But seeing he therefore foreknows all things that will come to pass, because he has decreed they shall come to pass, it is vain to contend about foreknowledge, since it is plain all things come to pass by God’s positive decree.” (Ibid., c. 23, s. 6.) Friend.--But if God has positively decreed to damn the greater part of mankind, why does he call upon them to repent and be saved? Pred.--“As God has his effectual call, whereby he gives the elect the salvation to which he ordained them, so he has his judgments towards the reprobates, whereby he executes his decree concerning them. As many, therefore, as he created to live miserably, and then perish everlastingly; these, that they may be brought to the end for which they were created, he sometimes deprives of the possibility of hearing the word, and at other times, by the preaching thereof, blinds and stupifies them the more.” (Ibid., c. 24, s. 12.) Friend.--How is this? I say, if God has created them for never-ending death, why does he call to them to turn and live? Pred.--“He calls to them, that they may be more deaf; he kindles a light, that they may be the more blind; he brings his doctrine to them, that they may be more ignorant; and applies the remedy to them, that they may not be healed.” (Ibid., b. 3, c. 24, s. 13.) Friend.--Enough, enough. Yet you do not make God the author of sin!