Cap. 7 Arg. 1: persons given to the Mediator—John 6 / 17 / Ephesians 1; Augustine

1. First here belong those places that mark the Father’s absolute will to give certain persons to the Mediator and as it were commend them, to this end: that from him and through him they may receive all things needful for salvation, and finally salvation itself. John 6:37, 39: “All that the Father gives me will come to me; and him who comes to me I will not cast out. This is the will of the Father who sent me, that of all he has given me I should lose nothing,” and so on. It is clear from this context that not all promiscuously, but certain persons, were given to the Mediator by the Father’s singular mercy, from a sure and gracious purpose of bringing those same persons infallibly and efficaciously to eternal life. Like texts are found in John 17:2: “You have given him authority over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to all you have given him.” This special donation can be understood as done in no other way than in eternal election. And that those so given to the Redeemer have a special prerogative in the very work of redemption no sane person will doubt. Certainly the Apostle marked it openly in Ephesians 1:4, 5, 6, and following: “He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world was laid. He predestined us to adoption as sons through Christ according to the purpose of his will.” Here you have that special donation of certain persons known to God alone. Then verse 7 shows that according to God’s purpose those same persons always obtain efficacious and applied redemption in the Mediator—“in whom we have redemption through his blood,” and so on. Therefore those specially given to Christ in election always draw faith, remission of sins, sanctification, and salvation from Christ’s death, the fruitful application of that same death being given them together with it. Saint Augustine understood by this donation nothing other than eternal election (On John, tract. 107): “The Father,” he says, “would not have given them to the Son unless he had chosen them.” The same Father, in On the Predestination of the Saints, chapter 16, shows that those so given to the Son are also called in that peculiar way, so that Christ crucified does not become to them a scandal or foolishness, but the power and wisdom of God for working faith and salvation efficaciously in them. See the author’s words, which for brevity I omit. Either, then, it must be denied that certain persons were specially given by God the Father to Christ the Mediator, or it must at once be granted that the Mediator in his offering had a special regard to those same persons.