THE GIFTS AND CALLING OF GOD ARE WITHOUT REPENTANCERom 11:29: For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.
This verse of Scripture has been interpreted by several ETM believers as: A person cannot have gifts and calling from God if he does not repent. The verse is further spun out to include that a born again believer must be in repentance before he can have a ministerial calling. They teach that the verse is primarily about the believer seeking God’s ministerial gifts and calling (the Ascension Gifts of Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers listed in Eph.4), and that he has to truly repent before he could be given “the gifts and calling”. The verse is made to read as “For the gifts and calling of God cannot be given without one’s repentance.”
It is truly amazing how a simple Scripture verse could be taken out of its context and spun into such a teaching. In simplicity, the verse is actually very straight forward. Paul was speaking of the Gospel of Eternal Life which was first given to the children of Israel. Because of their failure to see and receive the gift provided by the Son of God, God then provoked Israel to jealousy by turning to the Gentiles and calling them to the Gospel. Hence, “the gifts and calling of God are without repentance”. God does not have to repent His actions. He is God and He will do as He likes, according to His Wisdom. He will be gracious to whosoever He wishes.
God’s gifts are many. Whatever the gifts be – salvation, healing, faith, wisdom, prophecies, etc., God gives them out freely according to His will, and they are irrevocable. Everyone who has God’s gift, or gifts, is answerable to Him in how the gifts are used. You can find the example of it in the Parable of the Talents (cf. Mat.25:14-30). This also includes “the calling of God” to His ministerial offices of Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers. When God calls a man to be His servant, the gift(s) He bestows upon him is totally God’s doing; it has nothing to do with the man. God does not have to repent if a particular servant fails to carry out His Will and even to sin against Him. Did not God choose Saul to be king over His people, Israel? How did Saul perform? Did not God choose Elijah, a prophet who challenged 450 Baal prophets but ran from Jezebel? Did not God choose Jonah; only to find him disobeying His directive? Did not Jesus Christ choose Judas Iscariot, “the son of perdition”, to be one of His disciples? Did not Judas Iscariot later betray his Lord? There were many more men who were called of God and they had also failed Him. In all that did God repent; did He regret His action? God will deal with His servants accordingly even as He deals with all His children.
Rom 8:29: For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.
Isa 46:10: Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:
What about Gen.6:5-7? Why did God repent?
Gen 6:5: And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
6: And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.
7: And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.The statement in verse 6 is an expression, an “ascription of human passions or feelings to a being or beings not human, especially to a deity”. The Almighty is relating Himself to Mankind, as a Father to His children or as a Potter over the clay, showing His aversion and dissatisfaction to them because of their rebellion, wickedness and sin.
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