Are you bothered when some doctrines of the Bible are not logical? How can there be one God who is three persons? How can Jesus be true God and at the same time true man? How could this God-man die?

The biblical doctrine of predestination seems to be one of those illogical doctrines of the Bible. Why does God get all of the credit when someone goes to heaven, but when someone else goes to hell, that person gets all of the blame?

It is clear that before the creation of the world, God chose us to be saved, not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. But when you study the doctrine in the Bible, you may be led to ask, “Why some rather than others?”

The logical answers to that question are wrong. It would be logical if God used his foreknowledge to see who would believe and then chose those people. But the Bible is clear. He has chosen us, but not because of anything we have done or anything that God saw we might do.

If God chose us because of something in us, then our salvation would not be certain; it would not be by grace. We would always have to wonder if we could lose that special something. That thought comes especially when things go wrong for us. Just when we need to hear and trust God’s promises, we would be tempted to doubt. Just when we need assurance that God chose us, we would find no comfort.

We might ask why God would leave such an illogical truth in his Holy Word. One answer is that our God, who created us and knows us better than we know ourselves, is very practical. Illogical answers may bother our reason, but they match our human nature. The illogical answers God gives about predestination are very practical.

Our human nature would like to take some credit for our salvation. But there is nothing good in that sinful human nature, and giving it any credit would lead to a false hope of heaven for us. It is much more practical and beneficial to trust God entirely for our salvation.

It also would be logical to say that if God chose some to be saved, then he chose others to be damned. That idea also would be wrong. God wants everyone to be saved. He would be contradicting his own will if he predestined some to hell.

Our human nature would like predestination to hell to be true so that we could give up on the crabby people who do not believe and oppose the gospel and Christians. But because predestination to hell is not true, we do not give up on people. We know that God’s law and gospel apply to everyone we meet. We continue to pray for unbelievers and provide a witness to God’s love in Jesus.