Can We Not Also Say That It Is God That Caused or Made the Unbeliever to Choose Not to Believe?
1) Direct Answer
No—not in the same way. God is not the author of unbelief or sin. Unbelief springs from man’s own fallen heart and love of darkness. Yet the Bible also shows that God judicially blinds and hardens those who refuse the truth, and He withholds saving revelation from those who are not His sheep.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- James 1:13: God “tempteth no man.” He does not create evil in the heart.
- John 3:19–20; John 5:40: Men “loved darkness rather than light… Ye will not come to me.” The refusal is theirs.
- Acts 13:46: “Ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life.”
- John 10:26: “Ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep.” Those not given do not believe.
- John 12:39–40 (Isaiah 6): “Therefore they could not believe… He hath blinded their eyes.” Judicial hardening after rejecting light.
- 2 Thessalonians 2:10–12: Because they “received not the love of the truth… God shall send them strong delusion.” Judgment fits their chosen unbelief.
- Romans 1:24–28: “God gave them up” to their own desires.
- Romans 9:18: “He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.”
- Acts 13:48: “As many as were ordained to eternal life believed.” God grants faith to His own.
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- God positively grants faith to His sheep; that is grace.
- Man, left to himself, already loves darkness and will not come.
- God never forces a willing heart to reject Christ; rather, He righteously leaves some to their own choice and then seals that choice in judgment (hardening/blinding).
- So we must not say, “God made them not believe,” but rather, “God did not give them saving grace, and He judicially hardens those who reject the light.”
4) Reinforcing Statement
Now notice, the Gospel separates: as many as are ordained to life believe, and those who spurn the light are blinded by the very light they refuse. God authors faith in His own; unbelief is man’s sin, and hardening is God’s righteous judgment.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Blind Bartimaeus
54-0402 §42
How do you do, sister? Do you believe Him now with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind? Believing God is going to do this for you? Such great faith. You believe the asthmatic condition's going to leave you, don't you? All right. You go ahead now. You're healed. Got spinal trouble, haven't you? Do you believe God's going to make you well? You're a stranger too, here. Do you believe God will tell me where you're from? If I will, would you stand and accept your healing? You're from Michigan. Sta...
A Testimony
53-0607E §44
Come, lady. Do you want to get over...? Well, my. Don't look like you'd have TB, but you have. You know that? You're conscious of it? ["Since my 'unclear words'."] My. Certainly don't look like it---looking outward---but you are. Yes, sir. The other day, when you heard that I was coming up here, you knelt in a room and said if you could ever get up on this platform, you'd be healed. Is that right? ["Yes, sir."] All right. Now, you can go your way... Your husband, also, is sick. Go tell ... just go tell him he's hea...
Unbelief does not hinder God
62-0128M §43
Now ... just destroys the unbeliever. And it did just that in the days of Noah. Noah was a preacher of righteousness who heard the Word of the Lord, and prepared an ark for the saving of his household. And what did he do while he prepared this ark? He preached to the unbelievers. Now Noah was a critical radic up to those unbelievers. But the only thing their unbelief did was bring judgment on the earth. And the very judgment that destroyed the unbeliever was the only means of saving Noah. The very waters of judgmen...
Unbelief does not hinder God
62-0128M §53
Now Jesus, when He came into the world, He came in the time of a massive unbelief. That's right. He came in such a way that it caused the unbeliever to disbelieve more. God just pulled the... He's such a wonderful Father! Brought right in the time, and give Him the ... (as the people thought) an illegitimate child, and never sent Him into any schools, and so forth. And He was a odd sort of a boy. But yet there was something about Him that seemed to be that what He said was truth. What He spoke, it was so.
Pardoned
63-1028 §12
And now may the blessings of God rest upon you. And if you have your Bible, I would like to get quickly to the Word, because I know many of you work tomorrow. And I will speak to you tonight from a scripture that I want to read out of the book of Romans--Romans the 8th chapter. And we want to begin at the 28th verse and read down to 32nd verse inclusive. Romans 8:28: And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are ... called according to his purpose. For whom he did forekno...