How does a lost person become willing to actually hear and listen to God drawing or beckoning them to come to Him? Man, made in God’s image, like God, has free-will, but God has foreknown who will come to Him.

1. “And when he is come, he (the Spirit) will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment (due)” (Jn. 16:8). In this verse, we see a three-fold work and ministry the Spirit will perform in relation to the unsaved. The Holy Spirit will “convict” the world; that is, He will “reprove” it, expose it to be wrong. This reproof will target three areas in which the world needs admonishing: sin, righteousness, and judgment. The word “reproves” in the Greek are “elencho,” which means “to convince someone of the truth; to reprove; to accuse, refute, convict, or cross-examine a witness.” The Holy Spirit acts as a prosecuting attorney who touches our conscience to expose our sin, reproving or warning us, convincing us that we need Christ, the righteous “Savior.” David, whose heart was convicted, wrote; “Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight…” (Psa. 51:4)

2. Then the fact is that God has “FOREKNOWN” every believer from “before the foundation of the world.”

The key to correctly understanding the age old question of predestination is found in this word “foreknow” in Rom. 8:29 (below). If you “foreknow” something, it does not mean you predestined or caused it to happen. In the case of the salvation of the lost, God ‘foreknows’ exactly who will respond to the hearing of the gospel “in faith” and who will not.

“(Concerning members of “the body of Christ”) 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.” (Romans 8:29)

“(Paul to Christians) According as he hath chosen us in him (in Christ) before the foundation of the world, that we should (thereby) be (counted as) holy and without blame before him in love: (Eph. 1:4)

“(Peter to Israel’s believers as) elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification (the setting apart) of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (1Pet 1:2)

The fact is that the Lord Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. The Lord is all-knowing and works in the lives of those whom He has “foreknown.” He works to set the circumstances and situations that provide the ‘foreknown ones’ an opportunity to “hear” the “gospel of Christ” in their hearts. He knows they will respond in “faith” … to receive Jesus Christ as their Savior.

His Spirit may speak into our hearts through the circumstances of life to cause us to ponder the important matters of life; or perhaps while reading the Bible verse or reading words of truth that may gained by an article — any time the true “gospel (good news) of the grace of God” is made known there is the potential and also the “power of God” present to kindle saving “faith” in them.

When the Spirit enables a man to see that he fails to live up to God's holy law, man will despair of himself and recognize his need of the Savior. Then, as Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892), known as the “Prince of Preachers,” said:

“... the Holy Spirit comes and shows the sinner the cross of Christ, gives him eyes anointed with heavenly eye-salve, and says, “Look to yonder cross. That Man died to save sinners; you feel you are a sinner; He died to save you.” And then the Holy Spirit enables the heart to believe, and come to Christ.”

The Lord is always beckoning the foreknown ones to come to Him… by His Spirit speaking into their hearts, individually. Every “foreknown” lost person will hear “the gospel” and respond in “faith,”