Chosen to Salvation
2 Thes. 2:13 “But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth:” Some have thought this verse to teach that this is the way that God choses people to be his people. Some in an effort to make this verse say something that it does not teach go further and say that God looked down through time and determined who would be believe him and then he chose them to be his.
God did indeed look down through time upon the children of men, but this is what he saw recorded for us in Ps. 14:2, 3 “The LORD looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.” Thus, the idea that God looked down through time and chose those that would believe the gospel to be his is destroyed by what we read in Ps. 14:2, 3. Before a person can believe and obey the gospel, he must first be born of the Spirit. Thus, the gospel cannot be a means of being born of the Spirit.
In 2 Thes. 2:13, the subject is “God.” The verb is “hath chosen.” The object to which they were chosen is “salvation.” The means through which God chose them was “through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.” Therefore, the ones chosen to this salvation were first born of the Spirit and believed the truth. They were born of the Spirit and believed the truth as a cause for God choosing them. Obviously, the salvation to which they were chosen cannot be the New Birth. It was through the Spirit sanctifying them (New Birth) and their belief of the truth that they were chosen to salvation. It stands to reason that you cannot be chosen of God to be born again through the Spirit causing you to be born again by believing the truth. Yet, if the salvation in 2 Thes. 2:13 is the New or spiritual birth, then the sentence would be non-sense.
Rather than the New Birth, the salvation in 2 Thes. 2:13 is deliverance (salvation) into the service and true worship of God. The only ones who can truly serve and worship God in Spirit and in truth are those who are already born of the Spirit and then believed the truth. When an individual, who has been born of the Spirit, hears and believes the gospel and then obeys the gospel, he is chosen of God to carry on the service and true worship of God in the gospel Kingdom of God. Thus, God from the beginning of their hearing, believing, and obeying the gospel, chose them to be delivered (saved) to the true worship and service of God through the sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.
This is in contrast to the many of God’s children who do not ever hear the gospel. In addition, there are many who do hear the gospel who do not believe the gospel, but rather are captured into a perverted gospel and false worship system. Also, there are those who hear and believe the true gospel of Jesus Christ, but who do not obey the gospel and submit themselves to water baptism and the service and true worship of God in his church kingdom here on earth. None of these is chosen of God to carry on the true worship and service of God in his church kingdom. Only those who believed and obeyed the truth are chosen to carry on in the true worship and service of God in his church kingdom.