No Man Can

I have claimed on more than one occasion that the nature of the unregenerate Man (Natural Man) lacks the ability in himself to choose God. Understandably, I suppose, I am consequently ordered, "Show me where it says no one can choose to follow God." So let's see what the Bible says on the subject.

First, look what Jesus says to His disciples. "You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you ..." (John 15:16). Well, now, that's interesting, isn't it? I mean, aren't we the ones that choose Him? So how would Jesus make such a claim? But He did, so we know it's true. But ... okay ... this has no bearing on whether or not we can choose. So let's dig deeper.

As it happens, the text that says "No man can choose to follow God; no, not one" is found in my favorite book of the Bible -- Hezekiah. Right there in Hezekiah 5:8. Okay, no, that text doesn't exist. But we aren't going to settle for "The precise words don't exist, so the statement isn't true," are we? Because "God is three in one" and other essentials of the faith are not stated explicitly in the Bible. They are, nonetheless, there. So can we find my assertion there, too?

First, we actually can find biblical claims limiting natural human ability. We find, for instance, that no man can come to Christ unless the Father draws him (John 6:44). That is a universal negative -- "No man can." And if the exception -- "the Father draws him" -- exists in all cases, the statement is meaningless. That is, if the statement is to have any meaning at all, there must be some who cannot. To put it another way, that there are some who can come to Christ is the exception, not the rule^[1]. Another biblical "cannot" is found at the end of the same chapter. Explaining why it is that some do not believe, Jesus says, "There are some of you who do not believe ... This is why I told you that no one can come to Me unless it is granted him by the Father" (John 6:64-65). There it is again -- that universal negative, "No man can." Again, if the text is to have any meaning, there must be some -- many -- who cannot come to Christ because it is not granted them by the Father. "No man can." So the Scriptures do comment on the ability -- the lack of ability -- of Man to do what he ought.

Note, by the way, that "Come to Christ" is not a recommendation; it is a command. The lack of ability is by no means an excuse. And that there is a lack of ability has just been established.

That was biblical text. Now let's look at biblical logic. What is required to choose something? First, there must be an inclination. You can't choose something toward which you have no inclination. If you are terrified by heights, climbing a tall ladder is outside of your ability to choose because it violates your natural inclinations. Second, there must be ability. Choosing to do that which you cannot do will not result in doing that which you cannot do. You can't choose, as a example, to climb that ladder if you have no arms and no legs. That's a different kind of "cannot", but it is an impossibility. Choose all day long; you won't climb. So you require both the inclination (the will) and the ability (the power). Does the Bible talk about these? In fact, it does. Here's what the Bible says about our natural inclinations.

The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually (Gen 6:5).

"The intention of man's heart is evil from his youth" (Gen 8:21).

For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God (Rom 8:7-8)^[2].

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience -- among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind (Eph 2:1-3).

There's a sampling of the biblical expressions of human inclinations. "Only evil continually", "evil from his youth", "hostile to God", "dead in sin" -- these are the types of descriptions of Natural Man in Scripture^[3]. The inclination, then, required to choose God would appear to be lacking in the Natural Man. To do so would require that the continually evil inclination that occurs from childhood and the natural hostility toward God that is part of the flesh and the spiritually dead condition in which we find ourselves as born sinners would have to change. Without that change, Paul says,

The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned (1 Cor 2:14).

And, once again, we have that "not able", that "cannot". A lack of ability. What, in this case, is the missing element that would enable the choice? It is spiritual discernment. And it is not available to Natural Man.

Contrary to this, in the regenerated we find that "It is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Phil 2:13). See that? In this case, the two necessities for making the proper choices are provided. God works in the believer to have both the will and the ability. This constitutes a change in Natural Man.

It would appear, then, both from the explicit texts that say that there is a universal negative -- "no man can" -- unless there is a particular exception made as well as the biblical logic based on the conditions required to make the proper choice versus the condition of Natural Man that the unregenerate human lacks the necessary conditions to choose God.

There are a couple more items that need to be said before concluding here. First, note that I did not suggest that Natural Man lacks the ability to choose God. The Bible doesn't suggest that he is prevented from choosing God. The Bible says that he cannot because he will not. It would violate his own nature. What is required is a change of nature. So I don't think the Bible is saying that Man lacks the ability to make the choice, but the will.

The other issue is the claim that "God commands us to choose, so we must have the ability to do so." This is a problem. It is a problem of language. You see, verbs (like "choose") have "moods". In New Testament Greek, there are four moods: 1) Indicative (certainty), 2) Subjunctive (probability), 3) Optative (possibility), and 4) Imperative (command). A command (imperative) is not an indication of a possibility, but an indication of a command. "You must do X" is simply a statement of what you must do without any indication of whether or not it is certain, probable, or possible. This is standard English. A biblical example of an imperative is in Paul's "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" (Phil 2:12). That is a command. It doesn't say that you can or will, but that you must. Indeed, he explains the apparently impossible command in the next verse by telling us that it is God who does the work in us (which indicates that we do not have the inherent ability to carry out the command). The famous and beloved, "For God so loved the world, that He gave his only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16) is an indicative, telling about the method of God's love for whoever believes, but not about who that "whoever" will be. It does not say nor does it require "everybody can" to be a truthful, indicative statement. The command to "choose" does not require the ability to choose. Further, as I said, the Bible does not indicate an incapacity, but an unwillingness. So the "It's not fair of God to command something we can't do" doesn't quite work when the only thing preventing the unregenerate is himself.

The biblical description isn't actually that we cannot, but that we will not. Because to choose to follow Christ would violate the nature of the Natural Man, he cannot because he will not make that choice. That appears (at least to me and many others) to be the biblical position.
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^[1] Please note: Included in that text is the certainty that those whom the Father draws will come to Him because Jesus concludes, "And I will raise him up on the last day." No question.

^[2] Paul goes on to say what determines the difference between "the mind that is set on the flesh" and the mind set on the Spirit in the next verse: "You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you" (Rom 8:9). Thus, the difference between the mind set on the flesh and the mind set on the Spirit is not a matter of choice or effort, but the indwelling of the Spirit.

^[3] See also Isa 64:6; Jer 17:9; Jer 13:23; Matt 7:17-18; John 3:3; John 6:63; Rom 3:10-11; Rom 6:17-18; 2 Cor 4:4; Eph 4:17-18.