Three Reasons Charismatic Churches Rarely Teach Election

The doctrine of election is not a Reformed novelty. Paul writes that God “chose us in him before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:4), that those he predestined he also called, justified, and glorified (Romans 8:30), and that salvation depends “not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy” (Romans 9:16). The Canons of Dort simply gather these texts and confess what Scripture plainly teaches: that God saves sinners by his sovereign, unmerited choice.

It must be said up front that not every charismatic person rejects this. There is a genuine Reformed charismatic stream — continuationists who hold the doctrines of grace without apology. But they are the exception. Across the broad charismatic and Pentecostal mainstream, election is conspicuously absent: rarely preached, rarely taught, and often quietly resisted.

Here are three potential reasons why.

01 / Feeling is given priority over the text

In much of the movement, the controlling question is not “What does this passage teach?” but “How will this make people feel?” The aim of a service is an experience: to be moved, encouraged, lifted, empowered. And measured against that aim, election is a problem, because it is an offensive doctrine.

It is meant to be. Election humbles human pride to the dust. It tells the congregant that he did not choose God; God chose him. It strips away the flattering idea that salvation rests on the strength of our decision, our sincerity, or our spiritual hunger. Paul anticipated exactly the offense it causes, writing, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?” (Romans 9:19), and he refused to soften it. A ministry committed to never wounding anyone’s self-regard cannot preach a doctrine whose first work is to wound it. So the doctrine is set aside — not because it has been weighed and found unbiblical, but because it does not feel good.

02 / It is perceived as a threat to growth

Where numerical growth is the measure of success, election looks like a liability. If the goal is to fill seats, secure decisions, and keep people coming back, then a doctrine that locates the decisive cause of salvation in God rather than in the appeal of the message removes the very leverage the model depends on. People begin to look like a market to be won, and the gospel like a product that must be made attractive enough to sell. The doctrine of election will not cooperate. It refuses to flatter the seeker, and it denies the preacher the credit for the convert.

The irony is that this fear rests on a misunderstanding. The most evangelistically fruitful eras of church history were driven by men who held election firmly — Whitefield, Spurgeon, Carey, and Judson. It was on the strength of God’s electing purpose that the Lord told Paul, “I have many in this city who are my people” (Acts 18:10), and that promise fueled his preaching rather than chilling it. Election does not kill evangelism; it guarantees that evangelism will not be in vain. But a ministry built on technique and growth metrics cannot afford to believe that, because it would mean surrendering control.

03 / The Bible is a backdrop, not the authority

This is the deepest reason, and it explains the other two. In much charismatic preaching, the text is not the thing being taught. The sermon begins with the point the preacher wants to make — breakthrough, favor, destiny, victory — and Scripture is recruited afterward to decorate it. A verse is lifted, often torn from its argument, to lend authority to a message it was never making.

Preaching like this can avoid election forever. You will never be cornered by a doctrine you never have to exposit. But expository, text-driven preaching does not grant that luxury. Work straight through Ephesians 1, Romans 8 and 9, John 6 and 10, Acts 13:48, or 2 Thessalonians 2:13, and election is simply there — unavoidable, demanding to be handled. The man who lets the Bible set his agenda will be forced to reckon with it. The man who only uses the Bible to back his own agenda never will. The doctrine is not refuted in these churches; it is simply never encountered, because the text is never genuinely opened.

The common thread

The three reasons are really one. In each case, man sits at the center — his feelings, his attendance, his preferred message — and Scripture is bent to serve him. Election offends precisely because it dethrones him. It declares that the Lord “will have mercy on whom I have mercy” (Exodus 33:19), that salvation is from first to last the work of God, and that he, not we, gets the glory.