I don't personally believe in that view as you said in post #1, mainly because to me it is a backwards way of looking at things. eg. a person is a christian because God chose them. Or, a person isn't a christian because God didnt choose them. The correct way to say it is , a person is a Christian, because God chose them, and they responded to God's call by faith. It takes God and us , not God alone, and not us alone. Well, lessons learnt from evangelism, sometimes persistence and lots of prayer is required for a certain individual to be saved, it may take years. We must assume that every person is chosen and not deny salvation to anyone on the basis of "not being chosen". The fact is God has chosen everyone for salvation, because Jesus died for all. Jesus did not die just for certain chosen people. But why some people never come to Christ and some are irrestibly drawn and cannot escape, is God's business to explain not ours. I believe God's specific calling and election of certain individuals (or ****ation for others), does happen and works within the wider framework of desiring all men to be saved. So the two seemingly opposite viewpoints, do ring true depending upon which angle you look at it from.