Since Jesus is God it seems rather strange to think that there was something He could not do. After all He spoke the word and brought the universe into existence. He even died and came back to life. But I think Philip Yancey stated the case well concerning what Jesus could not do as follows: “Jesus never met a disease he could not cure, a birth defect he could not reverse, a demon he could not exorcise. But he did meet skeptics he could not convince and sinners he could not convert. Forgiveness of sins requires an act of will on the receiver’s part, and some who heard Jesus’ strongest words about grace and forgiveness turned away unrepentant.”1
For you see as much as Jesus loves you and wants to save you from eternal damnation, He will not violate your own personal will. God chose to create us as free moral agents with the capacity to love Him and obey His commands or to go our own sinful way and become disobedient to His wonderful and perfect will for us.
But while He won’t violate and override our free will He, I believe, does everything possible to draw us away from our sinful lifestyle to faith and repentance in Him. But there is a mystery here that only God can truly unravel. For you see the Bible says in (Ephesians 2:1): “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins.” In other words, we are spiritually dead before we come to Christ. So, the question is how can we come to Christ if we are spiritually dead and as it says in (Romans 3:0-11): “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God.” If we are spiritually dead and incapable of seeking after God, in a sense, Jesus must resurrect us from the dead, spiritually speaking, so we can seek after Him. Just how and why He did this for me, and not for so many others, is a mystery I can’t really fathom.
While the Bible says that Jesus chose me before the creation of the world for salvation, (Ephesians 1:4-6) I can only conclude it was because of His glorious grace. My response is to praise Him and work to glorify Him for such an incredible gift. I didn’t deserve salvation. I certainly, on my own, would never seek to accept Jesus into my heart. And I can’t reconcile the sovereignty of God and my personal responsibility, yet I believe that both play a role in my coming to Christ. What I really think God wants from me is not to try to analyze to death this impossible dilemma, but to just be thankful and love Him with all my heart. The reality is that there are just some things we as finite humans will never be able to fully understand about our infinite God. But one thing I do know, Jesus is worthy of my highest praises now and for all eternity!
1 Inspirational Quotes by Philip Yancey – page 3 (bibleportal.com)