Effectual Calling
Romans 8:30 Them he also called.
Quest. 20. What is effectual calling?
Answ. It is a gracious work of the Spirit, whereby he causes us to embrace Christ freely offered to us in the gospel.
In this verse is a golden chain of salvation, made up of four links; this is one vocation, Them he also called. Calling is nova Creatio, a new creation, the first resurrection. There is a twofold call: 1. An extrinsic or outward call; 2. An intrinsic or inward effectual call.
1. An extrinsic or outward call, which is God's offer of grace to sinners, inviting them to come in and accept of Christ and salvation (Matthew 20:16). Many are called, but few chosen. This outward call shows men what they ought to do in order to salvation, and renders them inexcusable in case of disobedience.
2. There is an intrinsic or effectual call, when God with the offer of grace works grace; by this call the heart is renewed, and the will effectually drawn to embrace Christ. The outward call brings men to a profession of Christ, the inward to a possession of Christ.
Quest. What is the means of this effectual call?
Resp. Every creature has a voice to call to us. The heavens call to us to behold God's glory (Psalm 19:1). Conscience calls to us, God's judgments call to us — Repent (Micah 6:9). Hear the rod. But every voice does not convert. There are two means of our effectual call:
1. The preaching of the Word, which is the sounding of God's silver trumpet in men's [reconstructed: ears]; God does not speak by an oracle, he calls by his ministers. Samuel thought it had been only the voice of Eli, that called to him, but it was God's voice (1 Samuel 3:6). So perhaps you think it is only the minister who speaks to you in the Word, but it is God himself who speaks. Therefore Christ is said (now) to speak to us from Heaven (Hebrews 12:25). How does he speak but by his ministers? as a king speaks by his ambassadors. Know, that in every sermon preached, God calls to you, and to refuse the message we bring, is to refuse God himself.
2. The other means of our effectual call, is the Holy Spirit. The ministry of the Word is the pipe or organ, the Spirit of God blowing in it, does effectually change men's hearts (Acts 10:44). While Peter spoke, the Holy Ghost fell on all them that heard the Word of God. Ministers knock at the door of men's hearts, the Spirit comes with a key and opens the door (Acts 16:14). A certain woman named Lydia, whose heart the Lord opened.
Quest. From what does God call men?
Resp. 1. From sin; he calls them from their ignorance and unbelief (1 Peter 1:14). By nature the understanding is enveloped with darkness, God calls men from darkness to light (Ephesians 5:8), as if one should be called out of a dungeon to behold the light of the sun.
2. From danger. As the angel called Lot out of Sodom, when it was ready to rain fire; so God calls his people from the fire and brimstone of Hell, and from all those curses they were exposed to.
3. He calls them out of the world, as Christ called Matthew from the receipt of custom (John 17:16). You are not of the world. Such as are divinely called, are not natives here, but pilgrims, they do not conform to the world, or follow its sinful fashions. They are not of the world, though they live here, yet, they trade in the heavenly country. The world is a place where Satan's throne is (Revelation 2:13), a stage on which sin every day acts its part; now such as are called are in, but not of, the world.
Quest. To what does God call men?
Resp. 1. He calls them to holiness (1 Thessalonians 4:7). God has not called us to uncleanness, but to holiness. Holiness is the livery, or silver star the godly wear (Isaiah 63:18). Knam kodsheca, The people of your holiness. The called of God are anointed with the consecrating oil of the Spirit (1 John 2:20). You have an anointing from the holy One.
2. God calls them to glory, as if a man were called out of a prison to sit upon a throne (1 Thessalonians 2:12). Who has called you to his kingdom and glory. Whom God calls, he crowns. It is a weight of glory (2 Corinthians 4:17). The Hebrew word for glory (Kauod) signifies pondus, a weight: the weight of glory adds to the worth. The weightier gold is, the more it is worth. And this glory is not transient, but permanent, an eternal weight: it is better felt than expressed.
Quest. What is the cause of the effectual call?
Resp. God's electing love (Romans 8:30). Whom he predestinated, them he also called. Election is the fountain-cause of our vocation. It is not because some are more worthy to partake of the heavenly calling than others (as the Arminians claim) — we were all in our blood (Ezekiel 16:6), and what worthiness in us? What worthiness was there in Mary Magdalen, out of whom seven devils were cast? What worthiness in the Corinthians, when God began to call them by his gospel? They were fornicators, effeminate, idolaters (1 Corinthians 6:11). Such were some of you, but you are washed, etc. Before effectual calling, we are not only without strength (Romans 5:6), but enemies (Colossians 1:21). So that the foundation of vocation is election.
Quest. What are the epithets or qualifications of this call?
Resp. 1. It is a powerful call. Verba Dei sunt opera, Luther: God puts forth infinite power in calling home a sinner to himself: He does not only put forth his voice, but his arm. The Apostle speaks of the [Greek text], the exceeding greatness of his power he exercises towards them that believe (Ephesians 1:19). God rides forth conquering in the chariot of his Gospel, he conquers the pride of the heart, and makes the will, which stood out as a Fort-Royal, to yield and stoop to his grace; he makes the stony heart bleed: It is a mighty powerful call. Why then do the Arminians seem to talk of a moral persuasion? That God in the conversion of a sinner does only morally persuade, and no more. He sets his promises before them, to allure them to good, and his threatenings to deter them from evil; and here is all he does. But surely moral persuasions alone are insufficient to the effectual call. How can the bare proposal of promises and threatenings convert a soul? This amounts not to a new creation, or that power which raised Christ from the dead. God does not only persuade, but enable (Ezekiel 36:27). If God in conversion should only morally persuade, that is, set good and evil before men, then God does not put forth so much power in saving men, as the Devil does in destroying them. Satan does not only propound tempting objects to men, but does concur with his temptations, therefore he is said to work in the children of disobedience (Ephesians 2:2). The Greek word [Greek text], to work, signifies imperii vim, Cameron, the power Satan has in carrying men to sin. And shall not God's power in converting be greater than Satan's power in seducing? The effectual call is mighty and powerful; God puts forth a divine energy, indeed, a kind of omnipotency. It is such a powerful call, that the will of man has no power to resist.
2. It is a high calling (Philippians 3:14). I press toward the mark for the price of the high calling of God. It is a high calling, first, because we are called to high exercises of religion. To be crucified to the world, to live by faith, to do angels' work, to love God, to be living organs of his praise, to hold communion with the Father and the Son (1 John 1:3).
2. It is a high calling, because we are called to high privileges; to justification and adoption, to be kings and priests to God; We are called to the fellowship of angels, to be co-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17). They who are effectually called, are candidates of heaven, they are princes in all lands (Psalm 45:16), though princes in disguise.
3. It is an immutable call (Romans 11:9). The gifts and calling of God are without repentance; that is, those gifts which flow from election, (as vocation and justification) these are without repentance. God repented he called Saul to be king; but he never repents that he calls a sinner to be a saint.
Use 1. See the necessity of the effectual call, a man cannot go to heaven without it. First we must be called before glorified (Romans 8:30). A man uncalled can lay claim to nothing in the Bible but threatenings; a man in the state of nature is not fit for heaven, no more than a man in his filth and rags is fit to come into a king's presence: a man in his pure naturals, is [Greek text], a God-hater (Romans 1:30), and is he fit for heaven? Will God lay his enemy in his bosom?
Use 2. Of trial. Whether we are effectually called? We may know it by the antecedent, and consequent of it.
1. By the antecedent. Before this effectual call, a humbling work passes upon the soul. A man is convinced of sin, he sees he is a sinner, and nothing but a sinner; the fallow-ground of his heart is broken up (Jeremiah 4:3). As the farmer breaks the clods, then casts in the seed; so God by the convincing work of the law breaks a sinner's heart, and makes it fit to receive the seeds of grace. Such as were never convinced, were never called (John 16:8). He shall convince the world of sin. Conviction is the first step to conversion.
2. By the consequents: two. 1. He who is savingly called, answers to God's call. When God called Samuel, he answered, Speak Lord, your servant hears (1 Samuel 3:10). When God calls you to any act of religion, you do run at God's call (Acts 26:19). I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. If God calls to duties contrary to flesh and blood, we obey his voice in every thing. True obedience is like the needle which points that way which the lodestone draws. Such as are deaf to God's call, a sign they are not called by grace. 2. He who is effectually called does stop his ear to all other calls, which would call him off from God: as God has his call, so there are other contrary calls; Satan calls by a temptation, lust calls, evil company calls: But as the adder stops its ear against the voice of the charmer; so he who is effectually called stops his ear against all the charms of flesh and devil.
Use 3. Of comfort to them who are the called of God; This call evidences election (Romans 8:30). Whom he predestinated, them he also called. Election is the cause of our vocation, and vocation is the sign of our election. Election is the first link of the golden chain of salvation, vocation is the second; he who has the second link of the chain, is sure of the first link. As by the stream we are led to the fountain, so by vocation we ascend to election; calling is an earnest and pledge of glory (2 Thessalonians 2:13). God has chosen you to salvation through sanctification. We may read God's predestinating love in the work of grace in our heart.
Branch 2. To such as are called, to be thankful to God for this unspeakable blessing; be thankful to all the persons in the Trinity, to the Father's mercy, to the Son's merit, to the Spirit's efficacy. To make you thankful, consider, when you had offended God that he should call you, that when God needed you not, he had millions of glorified saints and angels to praise him, yet he called you. Again, consider what you were before God called you, you were in your sins; when God called Paul, he found him persecuting; when he called Matthew, he found him at the receipt of custom; when he called Zacchaeus, he found him using extortion. When God calls a man by his grace, he finds him seeking after his lusts, as when Saul was called to the kingdom, he was seeking the donkeys. That God should call you when you were in the hot pursuit of sin, admire God's love, exalt his praise. Again, that God should call you, and pass by others, what mercy is this? (Matthew 11:26) Even so Father, for so it seemed good in your sight. That God should pass by the wise and noble persons of sweeter disposition, acuter parts, guilty of less vice, and that the lot of free grace should fall on you, O astonishing love of God. It was a great favour of God to Samuel, that God called to him, and revealed his mind to him, and passed by Eli, though a priest and a judge in Israel (1 Samuel 3:9), so that God should call to you, a flagitious sinner, and pass by others of higher birth, and better morals — here is that which calls aloud for praise. As God so governs the clouds, that he makes them rain upon one place, and not upon another, so does he dispense his grace; it shall drop its sweet dew upon one, and not another. Two at a sermon, one whose heart the Lord opens, the other is no more affected with it, than a deaf man with the sound of music. Here is the banner of free grace displayed, and here should be the trophies of praise erected. Elijah and Elisha were walking together, on a sudden there came a chariot of fire, and carried Elijah up to Heaven, but left Elisha behind; so when two are walking together, husband and wife, father and child, that God should call one by his grace, but leave the other, carry one up in a triumphant chariot to Heaven, but let the other perish eternally: O infinite rich grace! How should they that are called be affected with God's discriminating love; how should the vessels of mercy run over with thankfulness; how should they stand upon Mount Gerizim, blessing and praising God: O begin the work of Heaven here! Such as are patterns of mercy, should be trumpets of praise: Thus Saint Paul being called of God, and seeing what a debtor he was to free grace, breaks forth into admiration and gratulation (1 Timothy 1:13).
Use 4. To the called, walk worthy of your high calling (Ephesians 4:1). I beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation with which you are called; in two things:
1. Walk compassionately, pity such as are yet uncalled: Have you a child that God has not yet called, a wife, a servant? Weep over their dying souls. They are in their blood, under the power of Satan; O pity them! Let their sins more trouble you than your own sufferings: If you pity an ox or donkey going astray, will you not pity a soul going astray. Show your piety by your pity.
2. Walk holily; yours is a holy calling (2 Timothy 1:9). You are called to be saints (Romans 1:7). Show your vocation by a Bible-conversation. Shall not flowers smell sweeter than weeds? Shall not they who are ennobled with grace, have more fragrancy in their lives than sinners? (1 Peter 1:15) As he who has called you is holy, so be you holy in all manner of conversation. O dishonour not your high calling by any sordid carriage. When Antigonus going to defile himself with women, one told him, He was a king's son: O remember your dignity, called of God! of the blood-royal of Heaven; do nothing unworthy of your honourable calling. Scipio refused the embraces of a harlot, because he was general of an army. Abhor all motions to sin, because of your high calling. It is not fit for them who are the called of God, to do as others: though others of the Jews did drink wine, it was not fit for the Nazirite, because he had a vow of separation upon him, and had promised abstinence. Though pagans and loose Christians take liberty to sin, yet it is not fit for them who are called out of the world, and have the mark of election upon them, to do so: You are consecrated persons, your bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost, and your souls must be a sacrary, or Holy of Holies.
