I hope you were able to catch Dave’s sermon last week. If you missed it, I highly recommend that you give it a listen on our Web site. Dave laid out a very very helpful overview of what is going on with Romans 9. I am excited to continue that discussion today.
As Dave mentioned, Romans 9-11 are perhaps some of the most intimidating, and contested passages in the entire Bible. I thought it was amazing that in a 40 year ministry, Dave had never preached on this passage, and in fact had never heard a sermon on it! Indeed it is often avoided by churches, because of it’s difficulty and potential for divisiveness.
But we are convinced that it is critical for us as a church to deal with this passage, as it is the word of God, and vital to your growth in faith.
Let's be honest and just say that this passage is tricky, and will raise some difficult questions for you (in fact the format of the passage is a difficult question and answer format!) – We are going to have a Q&A session, and further discussion this coming Wednesday from 7pm to 8pm (or whenever we finish) here in the auditorium. I hope you will join us.
This passage says some very scary things and asks some very provoking questions, that I think we need to deal with head-on, so I wanted to give you some background into my thinking about the scriptures in general, about my relationship with God, and about how I’ve approached difficult passages and questions like this in the past, and still through today. Maybe if you see into my head a little bit, some of the things I say today will be a bit more clear.
INTRO: MY QUEST FOR WHY.
I was one of those kids who asked "WHY" incessantly. Still am, in many ways. I have to know how things work and why they work. I am incessant, and I understand a little annoying about logical consistency, about careful and deep and sustained thinking. There is something in me, probably part character defect, and part gifting and wiring, that has a hard time accepting things at face value. This has its ups and its downs.
I also resolved a long time ago to NEVER FEAR TRUTH. I don't always act consistently this way, but it is a driving force in me. Jesus said "you will know the truth and the truth will set you free." For a long time I have wanted to know what is real. I want to conform my life to the way reality operates, whatever that is.
All of this centers around a desire to KNOW GOD. I remember Brad asking me a few years ago "what do you want to do when you grow up?" (Something like that. I think the question was actually, what are your goals in life.) My answer has been for a very long time: TO KNOW GOD. I want to know him. I want to know about Him, and I want to know Him. All of my theological geekiness, all of my reading, all of my diving in to old books and new books, all of my listening to sermons and lectures from a wide variety of sources are in an effort TO KNOW GOD.
God reveals Himself PRIMARILY and most clearly through the scriptures, and through nature. So, theology and science are two pursuits, when rightly oriented, aimed at understanding the heart and mind of God.
All of this leads to a deep and abiding fiery passion to understand the scriptures. And to never fear what it has to say.
Do Not Be Afraid
Romans 9-11 says some things which, understood at even a basic level, cut to our hearts. The words of scripture are meant to shape us. Meant to change us. Meant to conform to be like Christ. This is, at times, going to make us very uncomfortable. It is going to at times say things that are very contrary to prevailing cultural assumptions. Things that go against the little truisms you learned growing up in school.
The scriptures ultimately bring us spiritual comfort and peace, but this spiritual comfort and peace often only comes after taking us through refining fire which burns away our worldly presuppositions. This experience can be scary.
Romans 9-11 might be one of the most challenging and scary passages in scripture for this reason. Romans 1-8 has taught us that every single one of us in this room and on the planet is a rebel against God, and deserving of His wrath, and totally incapable of fixing this situation on our own. And Romans 9-11 teaches us that we are completely and totally dependent on His choice to have mercy on us, and that this choice has nothing to do with our heritage, moral excellence, or even our will or effort.
This is an intimidating position to be in. And if we do not trust that God is who He says He is: kind and loving in addition to wrathful and just, the teaching of this passage of scripture is terrifying.
So my big point today as we study is to not fear. We serve a merciful God. We serve a God who has made a way for us. Only one way, His way, no substitute way that we concoct does any good, but He has promised a way, and we can trust Him. That way is through Christ. So as we study this hard, hard teaching today, do not be afraid, but trust the one who sacrificed His only son so that he might remain just and righteous, and also be the one who solves the problem and offers mercy.
He promises to. But here's the thing, He's always promised this, which is why Paul understands that His teaching in Romans is going to be perplexing.
GOD’S WORD HAS NOT FAILED.
Romans 9-11 is answering a very important question. Paul spends 8 chapters explaining how righteousness is not on the basis of the law, but on the basis of faith in God’s messiah. That God’s people are those who have faith, not those who, like the Jews thought, adhered to the demands of the laws of the Old Testament. This posed an interesting problem. It would appear that God had switched the requirements of being part of God’s people.
This issue obviously had massive implications for the Jewish people. But it also has huge bearing for gentiles. Paul just gets done making mountainous statements about nothing being able separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Some of the most crucial, faith building, hope giving, promises in the entire Bible!
But if God’s promise to His covenant people, Israel, has failed, what hope could we gentiles possibly have?
Paul explains how God’s promises to Israel had not, in fact failed. The problem is misidentification of who Israel is.
Romans 9:6–13 (ESV)
6 But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, 7 and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring. 9 For this is what the promise said: “About this time next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son.” 10 And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, 11 though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls— 12 she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
Being a child of God does not have to do with physical descent, or good deeds (to be included) or bad deeds (to be excluded) – It has to do with God’s CHOOSING (electing) – who are God’s children. And it is the children of the PROMISE that are God’s offspring.
What Promise?
CHILDREN OF THE PROMISE
Genesis 15:5–6 (ESV)
5 And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” 6 And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
ANOTHER ISRAEL
This phrase in Romans 9:6: “Not all who are descended from Israel (Jacob) belong to Israel (God's people)," is a critical phrase. There is a subset of Jacob’s descendants that are the “true Israel” – those with faith in God’s promise, rather than those who are relying on their nationality, or conformity to the law. This idea of "True Israel" is one Paul has taught previously and elsewhere, to the church Galatia for example:
Galatians 4:22–26 (ESV)
22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman. 23 But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through promise. 24 Now this may be interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. 26 But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.
So God has not been unfaithful to His promise, nor has His word failed, rather, we have failed to understand who Israel really is. Being part of Israel doesn't have anything to do with your ethnicity, heritage, or deeds. It is not something you are born into. (There is an application here for Christians. No one has "always been" a Christian.)
Being part of "true Israel" is a matter of God's choice, irrespective of anything about us.
At this point in discussion with people, I usually get a reaction. In fact some of you might be reacting to the statement I have just made. The reaction is usually somewhere in the neighborhood of "well, that doesn't seem very fair of God!" If you are having this reaction, that means you are following Paul's argument so far. He anticipates your question.
IS THERE INJUSTICE ON GOD’S PART?
Romans 9:14-18 (ESV)
14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part?
By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.
It is interesting how Paul answers the accusation that God's choice of who to have mercy on seems unfair or unjust. He doesn't try to explain away, or soften the blow. In fact Paul goes to scripture to crank up the force of his statement!
What is the “it” in verse 16: “It does not depends not on human will or exertion”? The answer is God’s choice of who will be His children.
What great news! If it depended on our willing or our efforts to win God’s favor by our actions, we would all be doomed, because left to ourselves, apart from the working of the Holy Spirit in us, none of us will exert ourselves toward pleasing God. What do we do instead? We learned in our Titus series what we were like, prior to the Holy Spirits work in our life to regenerate us:
Titus 3:3–7 (ESV)
3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. 4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
I want to pause here for a moment and look at verse 3 because I'm not sure this is the way many of us see ourselves. Think of yourself prior to God saving you, if you are a believer. This is how the Bible describes you. It is very important for us to believe what the scriptures say is true about us and not attempt to explain away or blunt the force of its statements. The scripture sees us more accurately than we see ourselves, and we are to submit our judgement to its judgement.
There is no injustice with God, precisely because none of us deserve mercy. Some get mercy, some get justice. No one gets injustice.
Which raises the next question, which you are probably feeling about now. Why do some get mercy and others do not? If we are all hopelessly lost without the Holy Spirit intervening, why does God blame us. Aren't we just hopeless? Doesn't He understand what we're like?
If this is the kind of question you are asking, again, you are tracking with Paul's argument.
WHY DOES GOD STILL FIND FAULT?
A few years back, I was teaching about sin at The Rock. About our innate rebelliousness against God. Basically about the kinds of things that Titus 3 speaks of. A brother, son of a pastor at another church, came up to me afterward with a furrowed brow. He said He felt like God wasn't a very fair God. That it is almost like, when we are born God holds us out over a pit of mud and as He drops us in says "don't get dirty!" And then blames us when we do. I prayed for a minute and then said "it sounds a bit like you are asking the question – "why does God still find fault with us, because who can resist His will?" –
He said "well, that's a funny way of wording it, but yes, basically." – So I asked him when the last time he had read Romans was. And he gave the reply you give when you actually haven't read something "oh, it's been awhile…" – so I showed him verse 19.
Romans 9:19-24 (ESV)
19 You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?”
I asked him, "Do you remember how Paul answers this question?" He said no.
20 But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? 22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, 23 in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory—
I asked him "what do you think this verse is telling you" – He said "That I am clay." That's right! "And I don't like that." – So I said, "then brother, you have something you need to pray about."
We are a creation. God is the creator.
Vessels of Wrath, Justice, and Mercy
Now, I'm not going to deny the alarming wording here. Nor am I going to try and blunt the force of it. I want us to courageously, with everything Paul taught in Romans 8 about nothing separating us from the love of God through Christ, look boldly at what this is teaching.
1) We are all made of the same clay.
Jew, non-jew, barbarian, Scythian, man, woman, child, Chinese, American, Syrian, Iranian, African, Korean, Japanese, Muslim, Buddhist, Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist, Arminian, Evangelical, Mainline, Republican, Democrat, Home schooler, public schooler, High schooler, college student, engineer, mother, accountant, web designer.
All made of the same clay. All in need of mercy, all in need of faith in Christ.
2) We have all gone astray from the potter's design
An important note on the potter and clay analogy. The analogy does not mean that God created some vessels in order to destroy them. It means that God created vessels. All of us class vessels went astray and deserve destruction. God is going to destroy some of them, giving them the justice they deserve, and have mercy on others, according to His choice.
3) God is the creator, we are the created.
This is the main thrust of this passage. The way Paul answers the question about injustice on God’s part is an appeal to the source of the justice being God! It is not as though there is an external standard of justice that God must match up to, according to our judgement, in order for Him to be just!
We are a created thing. We are meant to stand in awe of our creator's purpose and design. It is those creatures who do not who are set aside for destruction. We do not control God. There is nothing we can do to obligate Him to ourselves. We cannot hold anything over God as if He owes us something.
This is our application for today. Stand in awe of your creator. Go deeper in your realization that you are a created thing, and He is your creator. Go deeper in your realization that you deserved wrath but He has shown you mercy.
God is God. We are not. Will you worship Him by faith in His grace toward us sinners through Jesus? Or will you rage against Him, demanding that you do not need a savior because you can do it on your own?
Next week we are going to move through the rest of chapter 9 into 10 and learn that God has mercifully chosen His children, the true Israel, from among all nations, including gentiles, and that He has chosen them by Grace, not on the basis of anything about them inherently, or about their works.
This is good news for you and me, and it answers the distress the teachings of chapter 9 can cause. Lest you be worried about whether you are chosen or not, hear this preview from chapter 10:
"For the Scripture says, "everyone who believes in [Jesus] will not be put to shame." For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is the Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." Romans 10:11-13
This is the promise of the Old Testament, and is why God's word has not failed, and the same promise carries through to the new testament and to all of us today.
Let's pray and then sing one final song together, calling out to the Lord.