When we see the failings of our brothers and sisters, let our first inclination be to believe the promises of God for that saint, and to watch out for our own souls. Let us be willing to have the hard conversations, but let it be with clear eyes and a humble heart. Let our own forgiveness cause us to walk in holy fear, and let us extend the same grace that we have been so freely given.

If you, O LORD, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?
Psalm 130:3
Sometimes I get frustrated. I often see it as a holy frustration. (Of course I do). I find someone who is somehow unable to see what I can see so clearly, and I say to myself, “I can’t believe that those people would do/think that thing.” Sometimes I say it out loud. (Of course I do). Early on in my marriage was one of those times that I said it out loud.
I was perusing Facebook, sitting on the couch with my wife, and I saw a post from a Christian friend. Let’s just say it was less than Christ-like. My immediate reaction was, “I can’t believe so-and-so would post something like that. I just don’t know how this person can say this stuff with a good conscience. I don’t think this person will ever change.” And on-and-on I went I’m sure. My wife sat listening for a moment and said, “If the LORD should mark iniquities, who could stand?” Silence. “I’m gonna go take a shower now,” she said casually, as if she hadn’t just hit me with a healthy dose of theologically solid, gospel rich, humility-inducing truth.
When I got married, I realized that I was marrying up. Every now and then the Lord makes that abundantly clear.
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Unconditional election is a reminder that just as surely as God elected and then saved a Christian, He will bring about their conformity into the image of Jesus Christ by completing the good work He began in them (Phil. 1:6).  This frees me to preach expository sermons, trusting that the Lord can and will take my feeble efforts and use them to edify, strengthen, and conform the saints into the image of Christ. The edification of the elect is not an abstract possibility, but a definite reality. The chain of salvation is forever and always an unbroken chain.

Unconditional election, when rightly understood, is one of the most freeing doctrines for the under shepherd to embrace and one of the most assuring doctrines for the Christian to hold. It is beautiful because it reveals the beauty of our God whose grace is sovereign and whose mercies are new every morning. It reveals the immense power of a Father who has lovingly determined to give a certain number of sinners to His Son, Jesus, as an eternal gift (John 6:37). It proves that the Church is never in danger of failing, but always being built up as God has intended (Eph. 1:3-14, 2:19-22). Rightly understood, unconditional election is a powerful testimony unto the goodness of God and a tool for missions and evangelism. But what happens when it is ignored?
When Unconditional Election is Neglected
In my own experience, Calvinism is typically rejected because the rejecter cannot reconcile election with the free offer of the gospel. However, the result of rejecting Calvinism, or unconditional election, is usually detrimental to the pastor and his congregation.
I, unfortunately, write from experience. When I first started preaching, I was still young – both physically and theologically. I was sixteen years old and had grown up in Holiness circles which held firmly to a system of works-based-righteousness. Underneath this framework, I had been taught that it was basically up to sinners to save themselves through their own efforts and that salvation had to be maintained through a great deal of effort. One slip up, I had been taught, was enough to cast the saint away from Jesus. The Christian life became a game of hide and seek, where salvation was constantly lost and had to be found again.
The impact of this teaching upon my preaching at the time was obvious enough. I regularly preached doom and gloom sermons, warning of the wrath and judgment of God to come, but without any true lasting hope for the sinner; after all, salvation was likely to only be temporary until the next sin was committed. Similarly, I carried a very unnatural burden upon myself. I knew that Heaven and Hell were real destinations, and I even understood (at least fundamentally) that the gospel was the only real hope for sinners, but I thought the salvation of sinners literally depended on me preaching well.
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Foolish people have corrupted themselves and they do vile, rotten things.  The fool says in his heart that there is no God.  The psalmist observes that there are no good works among such people.  This serves to emphasize how this practical atheism isn’t an intellectual problem, but a moral one.  Humanity’s problem isn’t a lack of information, but a twisted, degenerate heart that results in reprehensible behaviour. 

You and I are atheists.  It’s true.  Let me explain.  We often think of atheism in terms of people who deny the existence of God, usually with their words and usually with some kind of intellectual reason to support their denial.  So how can I say I’m an atheist and so are you?  I mean, surely we believe he exists. I know I do and since you’re reading a Christian blog, it’s likely you do too. 
Here’s the thing:  atheism is more than a denial of God with our words.  It can also be a denial of God with our lives – with our thoughts, deeds, and words.  Atheism can also be a denial of God with what we do and what we leave undone.  Each time we sin, we actually deny God and his claims over our lives – effectively denying his existence.  All of us still have the remnants of the old nature, and we have to admit that those remnants stink with the rot of atheism. 
What we see in our lives is what we call practical atheism.  It’s not the intellectual atheism that has all sorts of arguments to refute Christian claims.  It’s a practical atheism which makes all sorts of rationalizations to excuse a life which fails to meet God’s standards.  This sort of atheism infects even Christians and it’s this sort of atheism that’s revealed by God as foolishness in Psalm 14:1, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’”
The word ‘fool’ in this passage isn’t an insult.  It’s an objective description of a certain kind of person.  In the Old Testament, a fool is someone who acts foolishly in a moral sense.  The foolish are those who reproach the righteous and blaspheme God.  Strikingly, the foolish are also usually part of God’s covenant people.  They know better.
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