Irresistible Grace

What do we mean by irresistible grace?  This needs to be qualified.  Men reject the grace of God all the time.  Those who are set on the flesh are hostile to God, and such men are not even able to submit to the Law of God (Rom 8:5-8), so it is very clear that men do resist God's grace.  One must remember that men reject the grace of God because they are blind to the gospel and are dead in trespasses and sins (Eph 2:1).  Men inherently desire sin and are not seeking after God (Rom 3:11).  For this reason, God must intervene; otherwise, men will never seek God, much less be saved.

In the context of speaking to His disciples, Christ is explicit in that they did not choose Him, but rather He chose them, and He did so in order that they would bear fruit for God; even more so, He made this statement after Judas left to betray Him, so Judas is not considered among the chosen sheep of God (Jn 15:16).  Remember, Satan entered Judas (Lk 22:3), and Satan desired to sift Peter like wheat, yet Jesus prayed for Peter (Lk 22:31). Jesus prayed for Peter because he was His sheep and not because there was something better about Peter than Judas. If this does not speak of God's Sovereignty in Election, then one is totally denying the plain teaching of Christ here.  Therefore, we can say dogmatically that God chooses, and none resist His will (Rom 9:19). 

When the eyes of men are opened to believe the gospel, this is not done through kicking and screaming.  May it never be! Amen!  On the contrary, when a man is born of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit gives the man power to repent and put his faith in Christ because such a man, for the first time, now possesses both the desire and will to repent (Jn 3:3-8).  The man whose eyes have been opened by the Holy Spirit is confronted with an incredible conviction of sin as he sees clearly, for the first time, just how wretched of a man he is against the infinite backdrop of God's Perfect Holiness.  This grace is then irresistible because the man now no longer attempts to justify himself based on his own vile self-righteousness (Is 64:6). Rather, he weeps at His sin and flees to Christ.  The Apostle Paul is a vivid illustration of this in Act 9:1-19. Paul went from an incessant desire to kill Christians to fleeing to Christ for salvation!  The Spirit made Paul born anew by the will of God, and the same thing happens to each of God's sheep, though not necessarily in the same fashion as Paul (i.e. a visible bright light and such).  

Let us be thankful for such irresistible grace when our eyes were opened by the Spirit of God.  When a man's eyes are opened to the light of the gospel, he is never the same again; he is changed forever as he now despises his sin and hungers and thirsts for righteousness (Matt 5:6).  To Him be the glory forever! Amen!