Last week my pregnant wife tested positive for cholestasis (a liver condition resulting in too much bile in her blood) and needed to be induced within twenty-four hours because the condition could’ve been very dangerous to our baby boy, possibly even leading to stillbirth if left too long. She found out on Thursday at 5 p.m. and the induction was scheduled the next morning at 8 a.m.
As you can imagine, my wife was nervous about the ordeal for numerous reasons: the health of our baby boy was at the forefront of her mind while the whole process of delivery loomed at the back.
When early Friday morning came around, while still in bed she opened up John Piper’s Solid Joys devotional app on her phone (as she often does), and she read something there that gave her immense comfort in the midst of this all. But the truth that gave her great encouragement in the devotional was something many of us wouldn’t expect to be so comforting…
The Bedrock of Her Assurance
The short devotional my wife read was titled “The Bedrock of Your Assurance.” It taught about assurance in salvation—assurance that you’re saved, assurance that God is faithful to you, that God is for you, that God is committed to working in you. So far the encouragement makes sense: it is comforting to be reminded of God’s assurance and love.
But that wasn’t the article’s main point; neither was that the main truth that encouraged my wife. Rather, Piper’s main point in the article was about God’s election. Specifically, God’s unconditional election of individuals (like my wife). Piper argued from Scripture that unconditional election is “the bedrock of your assurance.” He writes,
“Our election is unconditional in the strictest sense. Neither our faith nor our obedience is the basis of it. It is free and utterly undeserved…Divine election is the foundation of God’s commitment to save me, and therefore that he will undertake to work in me by sanctifying grace what his electing grace has begun…Assurance is rooted in our election.”
The devotional taught that we see evidence we are chosen by sanctification in our lives—this is true and biblical (Piper shows so from 2 Peter 1:10)—but this isn’t the bedrock of our assurance. Instead, the reality that assures us that God is for us is our unconditional election—God’s loving choosing based not on our works (although they prove our election) and not even based on our faith.
Unconditional election, therefore, is not mainly a theological debate. It’s not tertiary to our hope. It radically assures and comforts. That was Piper’s point, and it’s what gave my wife immense comfort.
Why This Gave Her Unique Comfort
Why did unconditional election give her such comfort? The article reminded her that God was totally for her that day, not because of anything in her, not because she’s earned it, and not because of her faith. He was for her because he’s always sovereignty been for her.
This meant that as she entered the hospital—and the trial of trust it brought—she could know that she was chosen, that she was on God’s side, that she was saved, not because God saw anything commendable in her (if that were the case she’d have to keep being commendable), and not because he foresaw her faith, but strictly because he chose to love her (see Deuteronomy 7:7-8). In doing this, she was finding comfort in the totally unconditional love of God—a love which sovereignty chose her to be in Christ before the foundation of the world.
The devotional taught that she could look to her faith, her changed heart, and good works as evidence that God chose her (again, 2 Peter 1:10). But that wasn’t her hope. Instead, my wife knew God was totally for her as she went to the hospital, not because she did anything to earn this, not because her faith gained her access to his love, but because of his sovereign, loving, unconditional election.
In brief, God being totally for her—before the foundation of the world up to that hospital day—was a rock solid reality as she went to the hospital because it was grounded in his sovereign love. If it was grounded in anything else, even her own faith, it’d be on shifty sand.
Comfort Only Sovereign Election Can Bring
In this my wife found comfort. It was 6:30 a.m. and we were leaving for the hospital in an hour. She read that “the bedrock of her assurance” was in the electing love of God from before the foundation of the world, and she was reminded that God is totally for her; he always has been. And he is totally for her simply because he chose to be totally for her; he chose to fully love her. She didn’t earn the choosing. He didn’t foresee her faith and then decide to choose her. He just sovereignly chose to love her.
Reminded of her God’s electing love, she entered the hospital, with his sovereign, secure, comforting hand by her side. May we too find comfort in the same unconditional election of our God.
