God must take the initiative in saving lost sinners. In our state of separation from God — lost, blind to truth and spiritually dead — we are helpless to save ourselves, would not know how to seek after God if we even had the impulse to do so, which we do not. Therefore, God takes the initiative. This initiative is called prevenient grace.
In his wonderful hymn, “Amazing Grace,” John Newton wrote,
“‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear and grace my fears relieved
how precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed”
Newton was expressing the marvelous truth that before grace appeared or became apparent to him, grace had been at work in his life. Before he was aware of the presence of God, God was present, seeking to unlock and awaken his heart. This grace that impacts us before we are aware of God’s presence is called prevenient grace.
Prevenient grace:
the lovingkindness of God that calls to us before the divine call;
the grace that approaches us before we are aware that God is approaching
the grace that comes before grace
the grace that opens us to grace, prepares us for grace
the grace that awakens us to grace,
the grace that enables us to respond to grace
The doctrine of prevenient grace is our attempt to express God coming to us before we know Him, love Him or in any way honor Him. Before God ever asks any response of us, He first approaches us with faithful love and mercy, lavishing His grace upon us.
The word prevenient comes from old English (from a Latin word) meaning anticipating, coming before or preceding. It is the grace that comes before saving grace, preparing a sinner for salvation and enabling a sinner to turn from sin and believe the gospel of Jesus Christ. Prevenient grace is the first action of God on a human heart, awakening the beginning consciousness of sin, the dawning awareness of having offended God, of being separated from God.
In our natural state, sinful humanity is dead in sin, separated from God by sin and under God’s judgment because of sin (Eph. 2:1-3). A dead person cannot will or do anything, humanly speaking. Lazarus could not come out of his tomb until Jesus called to him, raising him from the dead. In the same way, we cannot come out of our sins until God raises us out of the death sleep of sin. It is an act of grace whereby God calls us out of sin and death.
In our natural state, we are blind to spiritual truth, unable and unwilling to understand truth about God (I Cor. 2:14 2 Cor 4:3,4 Psalm 14:1-3). In fact, separated from God, sinful humanity does not even seek the true God, There is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God (Rom. 3:11). We are unable by our own works, even our religious works, to reconcile ourselves to God (Rom. 3:20, Isa. 64:6).
In our lost state we do not know God and are unwilling and unable to seek Him. So God comes to us and in an act of grace, prepares us for saving grace. This preparation involves removing the veil from our eyes, so we can begin to perceive the truth of our sin that has separated us from God. It involves a softening of the heart so that we can feel a sense of responsibility for that sin and its grievousness to God. It is an almost imperceptible touch, awakening us to the reality of sin and the possibilities of forgiving grace.
This prevenient grace is available to all. However, we are accountable to respond to the quickening approach of God. If we respond by turning to God, we experience God’s saving grace. If we refuse to respond, we continue in our state of separation from God, miss all of the blessings of His grace and experience fully and completely the everlasting death which separation brings.
In the Garden of Eden before the fall, Adam and Eve had the freedom of will whereby they could choose to sin or not to sin. But after they fell from grace, their human nature was corrupted and they lost the freedom to choose not to sin. They were sinners by nature. And so with all their fallen sons and daughters. We are born with a sin nature, a nature that wills to sin.
Prevenient grace is God seeking the sinner and restoring the sinner’s freedom or capacity to sense God, to seek God, to turn and respond to God. This grace is available to all people. When anyone humbly responds to this approach of grace, God will then grant repentance, the capacity to realize our sins, to grieve them and to turn from them, turning to God. God then grants saving faith, the capacity to believe that God can deliver us from sin and reconcile us to Himself; in particular, the ability to believe God’s means for accomplishing this, which is Jesus, the holy sacrificed Lamb of God and Risen Lord.
God’s instrument in bringing us to repentance and saving faith is the word of the cross which is the power of God for salvation (Rom. 1:16). That message powerfully awakens and pierces the heart. But only a heart awakened by grace can respond to the message of grace.
Prior to grace, the human heart does not want God to be God. Rather, we wish to be God. Prior to grace, the human heart does not desire to worship or love God; rather, desires to worship and love self and any created thing which captures or seduces our attention. Prior to grace, we invent gods of our own imagination and devise religious and philosophical constructs to support our idols. This creates a downward spiral into darkness and depravity (see Rom. 1:18-32).
Obviously then, the first action of grace on the human heart is not caused by human will but by God. The operation of grace is not motivated by any human merit or activity but by the mercy of God. But we must respond by choosing to accept and cooperate with the grace of God. God by His grace awakens our will but we must exercise our awakened will.
We saw this in Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus. Jesus said, Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must be born again (or born from above).’ The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit (Jn. 3:3,5-8). We cannot control the wind nor can we initiate the prevenient approach of the Holy Spirit.
But we must respond, as Jesus said to Nicodemus, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life (Jn. 3:14,15). Having been awakened by the Holy Spirit, we must respond by looking up in faith to the crucified Savior. Faith is God’s gift to those who respond but we must respond by accepting God’s gift.
Grace is not irresistible. We may resist and reject grace. Grace will bring us to salvation but only if we choose to accept it. By analogy, if we are blind, mere light will not restore our vision. We must receive the healing of our eyes before the light will do any good. In the same sense, sin has destroyed our ability to know or love God, created a self love / creature love that becomes selfish and idolatrous. We need the recreation of the human soul to rightly love.
Prevenient grace is the action of God on the human heart which is so gentle that our heart is not even aware of God’s presence. In this action of grace, God is turning the heart to Himself, opening the heart to Himself, restoring the capacity of the soul to respond to Him. It is not just the shining of His light or entrance of His love into the soul. It is a recreating of the soul’s capacity to turn, to know light, to love beyond itself and beyond mere self-serving creature love.
John Wesley said that prevenient grace inspires “the first wish to please God, the first dawn of light concerning His will, and the first slight transient conviction of having sinned against Him.”
Wesley wrote, “The condition of man after the fall of Adam is such that he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his own natural strength and works, to faith and calling upon God; wherefore we have no power to do good works, pleasant and acceptable to God, without the grace of God by Christ (acting on) us.”
Prevenient grace is that grace which acts upon our will, awakens our will, enabling us to turn and hear and understand the Good News that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their sins against them (2 Cor. 5:19). It enables us to begin to respond to the Good News.
Whereas in our state of separation from God we could not cooperate with God in any way, prevenient grace restores our capacity to respond, to surrender, to yield, to cooperate with God’s grace revealed in Christ. God acts upon the sinner’s will, enabling the sinner to respond to His gracious approach.
There is no question of God’s sovereignty in the process of salvation. It is God, and God alone, who approaches the lost sinner. Scripture is filled with references to God’s initiating work in saving lost sinners:
Through Jeremiah the Lord said, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with lovingkindness (Jere. 31:3). It is the Lord who draws us to Himself.
Through Ezekiel the Lord said, For thus says the Lord God: Behold, I, I Myself will search for my sheep and will seek them out ... I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak (Ezkl. 34:11,16).
It is the Lord who searches, seeks and brings us back as Jesus said, For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost (Luke 19:10).
All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out … This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day (John 6:37,39). Who comes to Jesus? Those whom the Father has given and drawn to Jesus. No one can come unto Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him (John 6:44).
For this reason I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him by the Father (John 6:65).
And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself (John 12:32).
As Peter preached on the day of Pentecost and the people, under the conviction of the Holy Spirit cried out, Peter called them to repent and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself (Acts 2:38,39).
It is God who comes seeking the lost sinner and it is God who calls us, draws us to Himself.
Six Questions:
1. What motivates the approach of grace?
Paul reminds us, The kindness of God leads you to repentance (Rom. 2:4).
The Apostle John reminds us, We love him, because He first loved us (I Jn. 4:19).
It is the incomprehensible love of God that motivates God to seek lost, rebellious, God-denying, God-rejecting sinners. There is no question that we did not seek God. It is God who has come seeking us, loving us, drawing us to Himself. God’s motive is love.
2. Whom does God approach with saving grace?
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men (Titus 2:11). Whom has God approached with the Gospel? All people.
3. Why does God come to us?
Because He is not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). God approaches us with grace because it is His desire that all would know Him and none would perish in separation from Him.
4. To whom is grace offered?
To whomever will receive it: Jesus said to Nicodemus, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up; that whoever believes will in him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes on Him is not judged: he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God (John 3:14-18).
For whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).
Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life: he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die (John 11:25-26).
Among the last words of the Bible, The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come’. And let the one who hears say, ‘Come’. And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who wishes take the water of life without cost (Rev. 22:17).
Grace is offered freely to all. All are invited to come and partake of the gift: For the wages of sin is death but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 6:23).
God sovereignly approaches the sinner, awakens the sinner to the grievousness of our sin, offers the gift of salvation, arouses the sinner from the sleep of death, removes the veil of spiritual blindness so we can comprehend the truth of our sin and the truth of God’s grace, opens our eyes and quickens our hearts to receive His gift.
5. What happens when we respond positively to the approach of this God of grace?
Paul said, If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved (Rom. 10:9)
Paul said to his jailer, Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household (Acts 16:31).
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God (Jn. 1:12,13).
6. What is God’s instrument in this work of grace?
The preaching of the Good News which is the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul said, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek (Rom. 1:16 ).
Prevenient grace provides the reconciliation of these two truths:
1. Salvation is God’s sovereign work from beginning to end because in our natural state, we are dead to sin, unable and unwilling to seek God, find God or know God.
2. God does not violate the human will but turns our will, awakens our will enabling us to exercise our will in receiving His saving work.
Prevenient grace is awakening grace. We are dead in sin and must be awakened. It is grace that awakens us to our lostness, our separation from God, to the reality of our sin, of God’s horror toward sin and His response to sin, which is righteous judgment. It is grace that awakens us to the presence of God, His gracious love toward us and His gracious, merciful offer of forgiveness through Christ.
God by His grace moves upon the human will but does not violate human will. Rather, God awakens human will which can then resist and reject or surrender and cooperate with grace.
Prevenient grace is enabling grace. In our natural state we are unable and unwilling to respond to the call to salvation but the Holy Spirit, acting through the Word of God, enables us to embrace the gift of grace.
God in His grace prepares us for grace and draws us to grace. The 18th century English pastor John Gill said, “This act of drawing is an act of power, yet not of force; God in drawing of (the) unwilling, makes willing in the day of His power: He enlightens the understanding, bends the will, gives a heart of flesh (a soft heart), sweetly allures by the power of His grace, and engages the soul to come to Christ, and give up itself to Him; he draws with the bands of love.”
God in resurrection power awakens the dead sinner but does not force the sinner to awaken or to respond to the awakening. God in mercy causes the unyielding will of the rebel to yield, but does not require the rebel to yield. God in truth enlightens the darkened mind but does not force the mind to reject darkness or embrace light.
The preaching of the cross is essential in all of this. God awakens us from spiritual death, blindness and rebellion through the message of a crucified and risen Savior. The Holy Spirit takes that living, dynamic, powerful, creative Word and pierces our hearts with gracious power, enabling us to respond.
Jesus said, And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself (John 12:32). When Jesus is lifted up in the preaching of the Gospel, God draws near to us and draws us to Himself. Those who humbly respond are convicted of sin and convinced of grace. God moves our will to cooperate with His will.
A good example of prevenient grace is found in the Septuagint version of Jeremiah 38:11-13 (the Septuagint is an early Greek translation of the Old Testament). Jeremiah had been left in a pit to die but his rescuers, pulled (or drew) Jeremiah up with the ropes and lifted him out of the cistern. The Greek verb helko is used for the action which his rescuers performed — they pulled or drew him up out of the pit and thereby rescued him from the sentence and place of death.
This same Greek verb is used in John 6:44, when Jesus said, No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him. No one can be lifted out of the pit of death to which our sin and the wrath of God assigns us, unless God draws us out.
However, Jeremiah’s rescuers could not have lifted him out of the pit if he had not voluntarily secured the ropes under his armpits. It was the rescuers who sovereignly delivered Jeremiah from death. But this rescue was certainly performed in cooperation with Jeremiah’s will.
There is a mystery here which we cannot resolve with our limited human minds. Jesus said, And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself (Jn 12:32). But this drawing must be resistible since many do resist. If the call is truly irresistible, then all humanity would come to Christ and be saved. But obviously all are not saved. So either the drawing is resistible, or God wills to draw some people but not all.
Yet we know that God does desire to draw everyone, for God is not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9).
We know that God wants to save sinners and is sovereign in saving sinners. Yet we see some sinners being drawn by grace to salvation and some resisting grace and being lost forever. How do we resolve this dilemma?
We cannot. Rather, we recognize these two truths: the sovereignty of God in saving sinners and the necessity of the awakened sinner to turn and believe.
How can the sovereign God, possessing all power, approach the human will with grace, awaken the dead sinner and enable a spiritually dead, rebellious heart to receive and believe His gift of grace through faith in Jesus, the holy Lamb and risen Lord, yet at the same time, not violate the human will, allowing the human will the capacity to reject or accept the His gift of grace?
Evidently, the sovereign God limits His sovereignty, allowing the awakened human will to accept and cooperate or resist and reject the sovereign purpose of Almighty God.
The fact that we cannot fully understand this proves that our finite, limited human mind cannot understand or grasp all that is true in the mind of God. What God knows and understands is vastly beyond us, a depth of wisdom which we cannot reach. Humility requires that we accept as true these two truths: God is sovereign in saving sinners and yet limits the exercise of His sovereignty so we can exercise our awakened will.
Once I quoted to a professor the words of the Apostle Paul, Work out your salvation with fear and trembling (with reverenrt humility) (Phlp. 2:12). I said, “That’s a lot of responsibility.” The professor replied, “What did Paul say next?” For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure (Phlpn. 2:12,13).
Read again John 6:37, All that the Father gives Me will come to Me. The Father gives us to Jesus but we must come.
If we are among those who with awakened will have received the gift of grace, if we have experienced the forgiveness of our sins and have been reconciled to God, then there are only two adequate responses:
1. We give God praise and thanks for the inexpressible gift of His redeeming grace. With the Apostle Paul we rejoice, Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! … For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen (Rom. 11:33,36).
2. We proclaim Christ throughout the nations, that all may hear and those who will believe, will be saved.
An anonymous poet wrote these words:
I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew
He moved my soul to seek Him, seeking me;
it was not I that found, O Savior true;
no, I was found of Thee.
Thou didst reach forth Thine hand and mine enfold;
I walked and sank not on the storm-swept sea
'twas not so much that I on Thee took hold,
as Thou, dear Lord, on me.
(anonymous writer)
Study Questions
1. What is prevenient grace?
2. Having been awakened by God, is there a necessary human response?