What is often referred to as Total Inability is a teaching that man’s spiritual state is such that he is unable to believe in Christ or come to God on his own. I’d like to lay out the exegetical reasons that I believe this, and feel free to agree or disagree. I’d to read what you think pro or con.
In John 6:44, Jesus said to a group, “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him….” The specific wording Jesus used indicates an inability, “No one can [ability] come….” In both John 8:43 and 8:47, He also said the unbeliever cannot understand the Lord’s words. Jesus also said that those who commit sin are the slaves of sin (Jn. 8:34). In his portrayal of the human race, Paul described us as, “Separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, HAVING NO HOPE and without God in the world” (Eph. 2:12, emphasis added). He further stated in I Cor. 1:18 that when the unsaved hear the Word of God, it sounds like foolishness to them. The word is actually the Greek term where the English word moron comes from which indicates that the gospel sounds like nothing but moronic babbling in the ears of the unsaved. The Apostle also stated in 2 Cor. 4:3-4 that the unsaved are blinded to the gospel by Satan himself, and that the unsaved were dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1). (The word here is NEKROS meaning dead in the sense of unresponsive. It is the most common term used to describe a corpse. If you pinch, kick, or stick a needle in the arm of a corpse, nothing will happen.) If a person lacks the ability to come to Christ, is deaf and blind to the gospel message, without hope, a slave to sin, and is dead to any stimuli, how can he on his own, believe in Christ?
When Paul and his missionary team entered Europe for the first time in Acts 16:14, they brought the gospel to a group of women attending a riverside prayer meeting. One of the attendees was Lydia, and Luke records, “The Lord opened her heart….” (This is the usual word for open preceded in this instance by a preposition meaning “all the way.”) It was God who opened her heart and she believed in Christ. Would that indicate she was unable to do it herself?
I’m often reminded of the picture in Ezekiel 37 of the Valley of Dry Bones. Ezekiel is told to go to this valley and preach, and he does. While he is preaching to this dead audience, God performs a miracle of attaching bone to bone and covering the bones with flesh and giving these bones life. Isn’t that a great picture of salvation? The human preacher gives the word and God performs his miracle of salvation and giving eternal life.
In John 6:44, Jesus said to a group, “No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him….” The specific wording Jesus used indicates an inability, “No one can [ability] come….” In both John 8:43 and 8:47, He also said the unbeliever cannot understand the Lord’s words. Jesus also said that those who commit sin are the slaves of sin (Jn. 8:34). In his portrayal of the human race, Paul described us as, “Separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, HAVING NO HOPE and without God in the world” (Eph. 2:12, emphasis added). He further stated in I Cor. 1:18 that when the unsaved hear the Word of God, it sounds like foolishness to them. The word is actually the Greek term where the English word moron comes from which indicates that the gospel sounds like nothing but moronic babbling in the ears of the unsaved. The Apostle also stated in 2 Cor. 4:3-4 that the unsaved are blinded to the gospel by Satan himself, and that the unsaved were dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1). (The word here is NEKROS meaning dead in the sense of unresponsive. It is the most common term used to describe a corpse. If you pinch, kick, or stick a needle in the arm of a corpse, nothing will happen.) If a person lacks the ability to come to Christ, is deaf and blind to the gospel message, without hope, a slave to sin, and is dead to any stimuli, how can he on his own, believe in Christ?
When Paul and his missionary team entered Europe for the first time in Acts 16:14, they brought the gospel to a group of women attending a riverside prayer meeting. One of the attendees was Lydia, and Luke records, “The Lord opened her heart….” (This is the usual word for open preceded in this instance by a preposition meaning “all the way.”) It was God who opened her heart and she believed in Christ. Would that indicate she was unable to do it herself?
I’m often reminded of the picture in Ezekiel 37 of the Valley of Dry Bones. Ezekiel is told to go to this valley and preach, and he does. While he is preaching to this dead audience, God performs a miracle of attaching bone to bone and covering the bones with flesh and giving these bones life. Isn’t that a great picture of salvation? The human preacher gives the word and God performs his miracle of salvation and giving eternal life.