Lawson Romans 9

The Chosen Remnant – Romans 9:27-29

OnePassion Ministries April 25, 2019

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So I want to begin with a word of prayer, we’re going to dive right into this, alright? Father, as we begin this study today, we ask now that You would be our teacher, that You would illumine our understanding and likeness into Your Word. We are totally dependent upon Your Holy Spirit to guide us into all the truth. I think of what Jesus said to Peter, “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.” So Father in heaven, please make known to us with greater insight and clarity the truth of Your Word and also help us to live it that we can put it into practice. We pray this in Jesus’ name, Amen. All right, we are in Romans chapter 9, Romans chapter 9. And this morning there are three verses that I want us to look at, and I realize I may have slowed down a little bit, but Romans 9 is just so profound that I don’t want to miss anything that’s in this chapter. So, I want us to look at verses 27 to 29 today. The title of this is “The Chosen Remnant,” The Chosen Remnant. So, beginning in verse 27, “Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, ‘Though the number of the sons of Israel be like the sand of the sea, it is the remnant that will be saved. For the Lord will execute His word on the earth, thoroughly and quickly.’ And just as Isaiah foretold, ‘Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left to us a posterity, we would have become like Sodom and would have resembled Gomorrah.'” So the key word is found in verse 27, everything is revolving around the word “remnant.” You see that in verse 27, “it is the remnant that will be saved.” So what is a remnant? A remnant is a leftover. It’s a small leftover piece of something, maybe a piece of carpet, maybe a piece of cloth, it may be a part of a stone, but it’s a discarded piece of material, it’s a fragment that’s left over, it’s a very small part of the whole. And it’s really after the whole has been used, there will be some little portion, some tiny portion that was not used to make a coat, was not used to finish carpeting a room, was not used to finish making a countertop such as with stone, and it really would appear to be of no interest to anyone, almost unusable. And that’s what the word “remnant” means. Today you can go into a fabric store or a carpet store, and they have their best stuff in the front of the store. And in the very back there will be like a little remnant corner, and it’s just what was left over from a previous job that couldn’t be used, and so they’ll mark it down to half price, less than half price, and you can go back there and just buy a little strip. And it may be you’re trying to patch up something in the back corner of a closet or something that is almost out of view and out of sight. That’s what a remnant is, and that’s the word that is used here. And a remnant is that portion of a group of people that is left over after a catastrophic devastation. It’s what remains after divine judgment. It is after the invasion of a foreign army. It is the survivors. And that’s the meaning in verse 27. And in the historical background, these are two Isaiah quotations, Isaiah 10 and verses 27 and 28, Isaiah 1 and verse 29, and these two Isaiah passages they go back to the eighth century B.C., in a time of national apostasy. And Isaiah prophesies of the coming destruction of the nation. There will be the Assyrians who will come down and literally just level the nation. And the survivors will be those who will be taken off as slaves and captives to the Assyrian Empire. And it will be there that they will be so humbled, they will put their trust in the Lord. And they alone will be brought back because everyone else has already been slaughtered. And it’s the remnant that escapes the devastation of the catastrophe. The same will be true with the Babylonians when they will come and they will attack Jerusalem, Isaiah’s living in Jerusalem and he is a counselor to the king. He prophesied during the reigns of four of Israel’s kings, and he is foretelling because of the unbelief of the nation, because of their stubborn, uncircumcised hearts, because of their refusal to humble themselves beneath the mighty hand of God, that there is a catastrophe that is coming to the nation. And it will be the hand of God that will bring the foreign oppressors. And there will be a tiny remnant that will escape for their life and will be carted off through the wilderness all the way back to Babylon. And there they will be for seventy years, and only after seventy years in captivity will these survivors, this remnant, be allowed to come back. And as you remember, they came back in three stages under Zerubbabel, under Ezra, then under Nehemiah. So that is the meaning of this word “remnant.” And it is this chosen remnant that will be saved. This is such a dominant theme in the book of Isaiah, that Isaiah has been called “a miniature Bible,” in that there are sixty-six chapters, just like there’s sixty-six books in the Bible. The first thirty-nine chapters are chapters of woe and judgment, that the nation is headed for a catastrophic devastation. And then chapters 40 through 66, those twenty-seven chapters, much like even the New Testament, is the return of the remnant back to the Promised Land. And Isaiah had two sons and he was told by God to name one of those two sons, “the remnant will return.” And so, it is a testimony of God’s wrath and it’s also a testimony of God’s grace, because God had prepared the way back for the remnant even before they were carted off. Just like God’s grace and God’s mercy is already in play long before we even ever sinned and came under the wrath of God. So that’s what’s going on. Now let me give you one more bit of information by way of introduction why these verses are here. Here is really what Isaiah is addressing. In chapter 8 we saw that God is sovereign in salvation, “Those whom He foreknew He predestined, whom He predestined He called, whom He called He justified, whom He justified He glorified.” So, God is sovereign in salvation. It is an irresistible, sovereign, electing grace. The question then would be, “Then why are not God’s chosen people saved?” or “Why is Israel not saved?” If God is sovereign in salvation, why is Israel in apostasy? Why is Israel in unbelief? If God is so sovereign in salvation, can’t He even save His own people? So, these verses are addressed to explain why Israel is what Israel is in its spiritual state. Last week, we looked at verses 25 and 26, God’s saving of the Gentiles, “Those who were not My people became My people, and those who were not beloved became beloved,” remember? So now, we’re going to look at God’s dealing with Israel. And just for us to be reminded how God deals with Israel is much how He deals with us. So it would be a false step for us to say, “Well that’s Israel, that didn’t have anything to do with me.” Well, there’s only one way of salvation, and how God saves Israel is how God saves you. And so that there is much carryover here, okay? So we’re going to look at these three verses, I’ve got three headings, not eight, three. So in verse 27, I want you to see “The Surviving Remnant,” The Surviving Remnant, and that’s very obvious in the text, “it is the remnant that will be saved.” So, let’s look at this. He begins by saying, “Isaiah cries out.” Now just a footnote here, Isaiah was the major prophet of the Old Testament. He called “the evangelical prophet.” He is quoted in New Testament more than any other prophet. He is quoted sixty-five times, that’s a lot, in the New Testament, far more than any other prophet. So, Isaiah is a looming figure from the Old Testament. So, as Paul now quotes Isaiah, this is a major voice to be heard. This is not an obscure prophet that we know very little about. This is the major prophet among the seventeen books of prophecy of the Old Testament. Next thing I want you to note, “cries out,” please note the verb tense, present tense. He still cries out this very moment, through the pages of Scripture. The Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and he continues to cry out this very hour. What he wrote eight hundred years before the coming of Christ is just as relevant, just as pointed as when it was first written. It’s more up to date than tomorrow’s newspaper. Now note, “he cries out,” that’s a Greek word that means “to scream with a loud voice.” Isaiah is not whispering this, he’s not mumbling this, he is lifting up his voice and that “he cries out” means “this is of great importance.” He is crying out with great emotion, and he’s speaking with intensity and with urgency. So “Isaiah cries out concerning Israel.” The main focus of this entire ninth chapter, really nine through eleven, is “What is God going to do with Israel?” So, it concerns His chosen people, and again the question on the table is, “Has the Word of God failed, because God said He would save His people?” Has God’s sovereignty been resisted by even His own people? Why are His chosen people not saved? And the implication that could be in someone’s mind that Paul is addressing is, “What’s wrong with God?” Have God’s purposes failed toward His nation? So Paul, who is being directed and led by the Holy Spirit, as he is writing his magnum opus, the book of Romans, is a flash in his mind, he is led now to Isaiah 10 verse 22. This certainly speaks of the command that the Apostle Paul had of the Old Testament. And so in Isaiah 10 and verse 22, he now quotes, and we read, “Though the number of the sons of Israel,” and this is in contrast to the Gentiles in verse 24, “Though the number of the sons of Israel be like the sand of the sea.” So, though there be a vast number of Jews down through the centuries, and there’s really two figures of speech being used here, I’ll just draw this to your attention, the first is what we call “a simile,” which is making a comparison between two things using “like” or “as.” Like Psalm 42 verse 1, “As the deer pants after the water brook, so does my heart pant after you, O God,” so a comparison is being made here. But the second figure of speech is “hyperbole,” I mean, the number of grains of sand on all of the beaches of the world is a number far beyond the number of Jews that would be born. But he is using this hyperbole to make a dramatic impact on our thinking. That there will be a vast, large number of Jews. And this was first said in Genesis 22:17 after Abraham offers up Isaac and God intervenes and God makes this promise that though…”your descendants will be like the sands of the sea, so God will carry out His promises.” So, “though the number of the sons of Israel be like the sand of the sea,” here’s the point, “it is the remnant that will be saved.” God never promised to save the entire nation, that was never in the eternal counsel of God. That was never in the eternal purpose of God. All God said is that there will be a very significant remnant out of the larger number. This remnant is like a small nucleus, it’s like a tiny island in the midst of an ocean of apostasy. That there will be a fragment that God will save. So, God’s purposes have not failed. In fact, God’s purposes are precisely on track, because it is the remnant that will be saved. This remnant is the chosen remnant. These are the elect of God. We could say these are the elect of the elect, meaning they are those chosen for salvation within the larger circle of the chosen nation. It’s one thing to be a Jew; it’s something else to be a converted Jew. And so, this remnant are those who have been chosen by God before the foundation of the world to be saved. They had been called by God within the time, at the appointed time, into a saving relationship with Himself. They have believed upon the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ. They have been saved, and they are now being preserved by God and will be ushered into God’s presence one day in heaven. But the point is, “out of the larger number,” how large? Well, as large as the number of the sands, grains of sand on the beaches of the world, there will only be, in essence, a tablespoon. There will only be a small number that the saving purposes of God will be directed towards. Now, I want you to turn back to Isaiah with me, and we need to really walk around in Isaiah just a little bit. So I’ll do this as quickly as I can, Isaiah chapter 1. And as you’re turning to Isaiah 1, I just remind you this is how the book begins, this is put on the front doorstep, this is not an obscure thought, this is not a secondary truth that is hidden in some chapter at the back of the book. You open the book of Isaiah, boom…there it is, staring you square in the face. Verse 9, Isaiah 1 verse 9, “Unless the Lord of hosts had left us a few survivors,” that’s the remnant, “we would be like Sodom, we would be like Gomorrah.” The survivors are those that God has sovereignly, graciously intervened in their lives to save them. And if it hadn’t been for these survivors and God’s acting to save these survivors, the entire nation would have gone to hell and no one would have believed in the entire nation if God had not intervened with the remnant and the survivors. And verse 10, “Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the instruction of our God, you people of Gomorrah,” and he is likening Israel to Sodom and Gomorrah. I think we can relate to that in our country. Verse 11, “‘What are your multiplied sacrifices to Me?’ says the Lord.” “I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams.” One of my Bibles, I was looking at it, in the little heading. In fact, here it is right now, in my New American Standard, the heading on top of this paragraph is, “God Has Had Enough,” and it hit the point God had enough of the nation Israel. Verse 13, “Bring your worthless offerings no longer,” in other words, just stop even coming to church and playing religion. I’ve had enough of your hypocrisy. “Incense is an abomination to Me.” Tell the choir to stop singing, I don’t want to hear it. “New moon and sabbath, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure iniquity in the solemn assembly.” In other words, your gathering together to worship Me is nothing but rank iniquity. Verse 14, “I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts, they have become a burden to Me. I am weary of bearing them.” So when you spread out your hands in prayer, and you can just see one of the leaders in the temple lifting up their hands upward to God in such a pious stance, God says, “I will hide my eyes from you. Yes, even though you multiply prayers I will not listen. Your hands are covered with blood.” Verse 16, “Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean. Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight. Cease to do evil,” and verse 18, and how gracious of God, “‘Come now, and let us reason together,’ says the Lord. ‘Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool.'” Verse 20, “But if you refuse and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword,” in other words, that’s on you. So, these are strong verses, are they not? And it speaks to the fact that the vast majority of the nation brought the hypocrisy of their carnality into the public gathering and into the solemn assembly. And God just says, “I’ve had enough of you people,” and God will put a hook into the jaw of the Babylonians and bring them into Jerusalem and just level the city and just devastate and then take captive the survivors and take them off. So, what I want you to see is in verse 9, “the survivors,” that’s the remnant. Now come to chapter 10, Isaiah chapter 10, and this is the passage that Paul is quoting. And I want to begin in verse 20, “Now in that day the remnant of Israel,” you see that, “and those of the house of Jacob who have escaped,” escaped the onslaught of the foreign invaders, “will never again rely on the one who struck them,” they are putting their faith and their trust into foreign nations to provide them national security, when it’s these very foreign nations in whom they are trusting, will be the very ones who will come and destroy them. You’ve put your trust in the wrong place. You’ve put your trust in horses and chariots and not in the living God. So we go on to read, “will never again rely on the one who struck them, but will rely on the Lord.” It’s the remnant that will rely on the Lord. The rest will die and go to hell. So verse 21, “A remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. For though your people, O Israel, may be like the sand of the sea, only a remnant within them will return. A destruction is determined, overflowing with righteousness. For a complete destruction, one that is decreed, the Lord God of hosts will execute in the midst of the whole land.” What God will execute will be the destruction of the nation. And what God will execute is “only a remnant will be saved.” Now, as Paul will use this in Romans 9, and don’t go back to Romans 9 yet, but as he will use this in Romans 9, he’s not thinking of just physical enemies; he is speaking actually of the greatest threat to unbelievers that there is, God Himself and the wrath of God upon those who refuse to repent of their sin and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now turn one more chapter, Isaiah 11, Isaiah 11 verse…let’s just start in verse 11, “Then it will happen on that day that the Lord will again recover the second time with His hand the remnant of His people, who will remain, from Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam, Shinar, Hamath, and from the islands of the sea.” What he is saying is that there will be a great ingathering of people from the corners of the earth at a future time. It’s a prophetic, I think, looking ultimately to the end of the age. But what you need to see, look at verse 16, I just need to quickly get to the verses we need to see, “And there will be a highway from Assyria for the remnant,” you see the word “remnant,” “for the remnant of His people who will be left, just as there was for Israel, in the day when they came up out of the land of Egypt.” There’s going to be a second exodus. Just like the first one, when they came out of Egypt, there’s going to be a second one when they come out of Assyria. And when they come out of Babylon to be brought back into the land, it will be as though God will pave a highway in the wilderness in order to bring them back. And it is the, really the providential hand of God that will bring them back. So who’s coming back? Well, it’s not the whole nation; it’s the remnant, it’s the survivors. Now, come to…go back to Isaiah 6 just for a moment. Isaiah 6, I just want you to see this. You’re very familiar with Isaiah 6, it’s the call of Isaiah into the prophetic office, it’s the vision of the holiness of God and in verse 8, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for Us?” “Then I said, ‘Here am I. Send me!'” In verse 9, Isaiah is now commissioned into the office of the prophet. “Tell this people,” and He is saying to Isaiah, as you go and preach, they’re not going to perceive, they’re not going to understand, in fact your preaching is going to harden their hearts. Your preaching, in verse 10, is going to render their hearts insensitive to the things of God. Your preaching is going to make their ears dull. Your voice will be so loud with the truth, it’s going to cause a hearing loss for Israel and the people of God. “And their eyes,” verse 10, “will grow dim.” It’s going to be like they’re staring into the bright light of the sun, and it will be the light of the truth of the message that you will bring will blind them. It’s the judgment of God upon His people. But look down at verse 13, “yet there will be a tenth portion in it, and it will again be subject to burning.” And Jerusalem was burned to the ground, it says, “it will be like a tree or a stump,” that is burned in the forest with a forest fire. That stump, there will be little twigs that will emerge from the charred stump. And that’s the remnant that will come back from the devastation that will be brought upon the nation Israel. Now the larger point that Paul is making is, do not think that it was the purpose of God to save the entire nation. From the very beginning, it’s only a remnant that will be saved. And every one of those whom God foreknew, He predestined, He called, He justified and they will be glorified. We’re not going to turn to it, but I’ll give you one more passage, which would be Isaiah 37 verses 4, 31, and 32. It’s just more of the same. So, I need to get us back into Romans 9 now, but we needed that historical background for what’s going on. And back now in home base, in Romans 9, the point that Paul is stressing and that he feels compelled, it’s almost as if Paul is reasoning, “I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that the purposes of God have failed towards Israel, and so I guess the Gentiles are plan B.” He is wanting us to know there is no plan B with God, there is only plan A. There is no alternate strategy, God’s not making this up as He goes, God is not calling…He’s not changing the play at the line of scrimmage. This was God’s eternal plan and purpose from before the foundation of the world, and it is being fulfilled before your very eyes. Now back in Romans 9, I just really want to draw to your attention some verses. Verse 6, Romans 9 verse 6, which we looked at a few months ago, “But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel.” Not all Israel is Israel. There’s a physical Israel, and there is a saved Israel within the physical Israel. So, Paul is saying in verse 6, “Don’t jump to the wrong conclusion that the Word of God has failed, because Isaiah said all along it’s only going to be a remnant that’s going to be saved.” In verse 13, even within Israel, “Jacob I loved, Esau I hated,” even within one womb not everyone was saved. In verses 21 and 22, “From one lump of clay, does not the potter have a right to make some to be vessels of wrath, and others to be vessels of mercy?” I mean, even within the same lump not everyone is a vessel of mercy. There are those that are a vessel of wrath, and that was according to God’s plan. Now, come to Romans 11 and verse 5, and really Romans 9 through 11 is just one larger section in the book of Romans. But in Romans 11 verse 5, “In the same way then, there has come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice.” So, God has always chosen only a remnant out of the nation, out of many families, out of the nation Israel, and it is a remnant according to God’s gracious choice or God’s choice by His grace. Now look at verse…as long as we’re in Romans 11, look at verses 8 and 10. This is as a result of Israel crucifying their Messiah which, by the way, was according to the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, Acts 2:23. But Romans 11:8, “God gave them a spirit of stupor.” That means God rendered their minds so that they were stupid and could not understand the gospel. It’s not the devil; it’s God. It’s a judicial hardening of their hearts. And then verse 8, “Eyes to see not and ears to hear not.” God has just blinded their eyes and deafened their ears so that they cannot see their need for Christ and so that they cannot hear the gospel call. Look at verse 10, “Let their eyes be darkened to see not, and bend their backs forever.” So, not only has God only chosen a remnant, but God has blinded and deafened the rest. This is the sovereignty of God in His grace and in His righteous judgment. Now, I want you to look at verse 26, Romans 11:26, because I do want you to know at the end of the age, there will be a great ingathering of Jews to faith in Christ. In fact, I’m going to start in verse 25, “For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery – so that you will not be wise in your own estimation – that a partial hardening has happened to Israel.” In other words, it’s not final and it’s not complete – it was only partial, “until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so, all Israel will be saved.” There is coming a day, and I would take the “all” to be in a hyperbolic way that a vast number of Israel will be saved, and the time of this will be at the end of the age. Before the end of the age it’s only a partial hardening, but at the end all Israel will be saved. So, come back to Romans 9, so that what we have just looked at is the surviving remnant. So in verse 28, I want you to see the severe judgment. In verse 28, he now quotes Isaiah 10 verse 23, if you have a Bible with margin references, you’ll see that on the edge of the page, “For the Lord will execute His word on the earth thoroughly and quickly.” Now let me tell you, when I first read this, I started reading this because I have been very busy from last week to this week, I started reading this like last Thursday and Friday, just scribbling out my observations. Actually, as I read verse 28, I actually took it as “God will execute His salvation.” I then consulted the commentators and was ashamed that I missed it, I’m confessing my sin right now, I missed it as far as you can possibly miss it. And it became obvious, when I went back to Isaiah 10:23 and read the context, what it says is God will execute, quote, unquote, “complete destruction.” This isn’t saying He’s going to execute salvation thoroughly and quickly, the way I was originally taking it. No, He will execute wrath and damnation thoroughly and quickly. Remember, it’s the remnant that is saved. Everyone else suffers the catastrophic destruction and devastation. So, let’s look at verse 28, “For the Lord will execute,” please note the divine certainty of this, “will execute,” it’s in the future tense, active voice, indicative mood meaning this is a statement of fact, this is what God will do. God will be active, the nation will be passive. God will act upon the nation with certainty, and He will execute. The word “execute” there, the idea is to bring it to pass, to accomplish it. “For the Lord will execute His word on the earth thoroughly.” The word “thoroughly” means completely, none overlooked, and none will escape this execution. “Quickly,” meaning it will happen swiftly and speedily, and there will be no time to repent, there will be no time to turn away from your sin, there will be no time to say, “O God, give me another chance.” There will be no time to offer some final confession. It will happen so quickly that it is irreversible. And God will do it without hesitation. God will not be slow to bring this about because it will be an expression of His perfect holiness. Now in the day of Isaiah, this verse that we just read in verse 28, this execution of severe wrath, refers to the coming invasion that will come by the Assyrians and come by the Babylonians. But in the day of Paul, this severe wrath was first mentioned in chapter 1 verse 18, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men,” it probably is looking ahead to 70 A.D. in the total destruction of Jerusalem, not one stone left upon another in the temple as the Romans will come, I think it was Vespasian who led the onslaught, and just literally devastate the entire city and scatter the Jews to the nations of the world and just remove them from their Promised Land. It also looks ahead to the final judgment as well. So, this is the severe judgment, and these are the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction that were mentioned just earlier in chapter 9 and verse 22 and 21. Now, let’s look at the last heading, verse 29, yeah, and this is sober, this is serious, this is somber, but let us remember it is deserved, but it is also gracious because God doesn’t have to even save a remnant. God would be just as holy and just as righteous and just as perfect if He just wiped the whole nation off the map. That there is a remnant speaks of unspeakable mercy and grace. So in verse 29, I want you to see “The Sinful Nation,” and just as Isaiah foretold, and he now quotes Isaiah 1 verse 9, which I read earlier, “Unless the Lord of Sabaoth” and that means literally “the Lord of hosts,” meaning the Lord who is leading legions and legions and legions of armies at His disposal, and this title for God is a title that identifies God as the one who is the all-encompassing sovereign, who holds every human life in His hands, who holds every human destiny in His hands, who has the whole world in His hands and can dispose of it how He pleases. “Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a posterity,” and this posterity is the remnant in verse 27. It’s the “vessels of mercy” in verse 23. It’s those “who are called” in verse 27. “Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a posterity,” and “a posterity” literally is the Greek word sperma from which we derive the word “seed,” the idea is an offspring, but it’s the remnant. “We would,” “we” referring to the entire nation of Israel, “would have become like Sodom, and we would have resembled Gomorrah.” I don’t need to tell you about Sodom and Gomorrah as it was overrun with its unnatural desires, men for men and even bypassing women to get to other men. Sodom and Gomorrah was so literally wiped out by God, it no longer exists. It’s probably at the bottom of the Dead Sea. God just brought fire down from heaven. He was so repulsed by the filth of the depravity that He just burned up those two cities to the point they no longer exist. I mean, you can’t buy a bus ticket to Sodom and Gomorrah. It’s not on the map anymore. And what Isaiah was saying and what Paul is saying is that if God had not intervened with the nation Israel, it had spiraled down into such apostasy that it would have reached the dregs of Sodom and Gomorrah, except God intervene to save a remnant. And it’s always been the remnant that God has set His heart upon. Think about this in the book of Genesis, in Genesis 6 before the flood, the entire world was so loathsome in the sight of God in its sin that God was grieved that He even made man. And He told Noah to build an ark and He said, “Get your wife, get your three sons, get their three wives onto that ark, and I’m going to wipe out the entire globe.” It was just a remnant that was saved. And then at the end of Genesis 11, a man named Abram who had become Abraham, he was a moon worshiper, he was an idolater who was living in the Ur of Chaldees. God calls Abram and Lot and Sarai to come out and to lead them to a place they had no idea where they were even going, until in Genesis 15 they came to a place where Abraham believed God, and God reckoned it to Him as righteousness. But out of that entire Ur of Chaldees, there’s only three people called out of there to become the fountainhead for the nation of Israel. Israel started with a remnant. Israel started with a moon worshiping idolater that God called out to begin His work. And then in Genesis 19, as they come to Sodom and Gomorrah, God sends two angels of war to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. And God says to Abram, “Come out and bring your family out, and bring Lot and his wife out, and don’t look back because what I’m about to do will be so devastating.” As you recall, the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah were banging on his doors, wanting to have sex with two angels. That’s how gross and filthy the city had become. And Abram says, “Oh no, don’t do that! Here, have one of my virgin daughters,” to try to hold off the homosexual rage and passion to have these relationships with angels. And so, God calls them out and, as you recall, Lot’s wife, she turned around and looked back with some longing and affection, and God just turned her into a pillar of salt. It was only that little remnant that escaped the fire from heaven that turned Sodom and Gomorrah into just ashes. So, as we think about God’s eternal purposes and plan, as we think about God’s dealings with Israel, know that the Word of God has not failed. Everything is right on track…right on schedule. There is a remnant and only a remnant that God will save, and you and I could preach until we’re blue in the face, and there’s not going to be one more extra saved because God has given a spirit a stupor, and God has blinded their eyes and deafened their ears. They were already that to begin with by total depravity, now it is a double total depravity and a moral inability. It’s only the remnant. Though it is a partial hardening and at the time of the fullness of the Gentiles at the end of the age, then the floodgates of God’s mercy will be released and all Israel will be saved. So, as I wrap this up and I intended to wrap this up earlier so we could talk about this, but here’s just a couple things you need to know. Number one, “the few.” History has always hinged with the few. If you’re looking for large numbers to go join be a part of a religious movement, you’re probably in the wrong movement. God has always worked through a remnant. And let me just remind you of Matthew 7 verse 14, “The gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and few that be who will find it.” Let me remind you of Matthew 22:14, “Many are called, few are chosen.” And let me remind you of Matthew 13, “the sower and the seed,” three were bad soil, only one of the four was good soil. And that was to prepare the disciples as they would be commissioned and sent out. “Don’t think that everyone is just going to come running to hear the good news. There’s only going to be a portion that God will prepare the soil of their heart.” And let me remind you of Luke 13:23 and 24, the disciples so understood this that they said, “Well, Master, are only a few being saved?” They understood incorrectly, “Are only a few being saved?” And Jesus said, “Strive to enter in to the kingdom of heaven,” meaning no one is just going to trip their way in, no one is just going to shuffle their feet to enter. No, you’re going to have to strive, agonizomai, the agony of repentance and confession of sin and committing your life to Christ. So just remember “the few,” and then remember “the focus.” That what God will do, He will do through the few. Large doors swing on small hinges, and large movements of history swing with the few. So, we just need to be faithful as even the Gentile remnant, to do God’s work where God has placed us, leave the results to God. But even among us are there just a few being saved. So that should cause every one of us to examine ourselves, “Lord, am I saved or am I just a part of a church, part of a religious movement, just part of a Bible study? If there’s just a few being saved, have I been born again, have I truly been birthed into the kingdom of heaven?” And that is a sovereign work of God’s grace in the heart that implants spiritual life in the one who is spiritually dead. If you are saved, and I would assume that most of us here today are, what a rare person you are. I mean, what a trophy of grace you are. We’re not meeting here at AT&T Stadium, okay? We don’t need to add on. It’s a few who are being saved. Obviously, there are more saved than are here present, and it doesn’t presuppose everyone here is saved. But what a rare person you are in the economy of God that you would be numbered among the Gentile remnant as well.

Divine Certainty – Romans 9:25-26

OnePassion Ministries April 18, 2019

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We are in Romans 9 and I need to begin in a word of prayer. So, let me pray: Father, as we begin this study, we ask that You would open our eyes to see and behold the truths in Your Word. We pray that You would work it into our hearts and into our souls that we would be affected both even in our emotions but even in the challenge to our will as a result of these words. And I pray that as we leave in a bit that we will be transformed, that we will leave different even than when we came in. I thank You for these men who are here. I thank You for all who are watching by livestream, I pray Your blessing upon them. And I ask now that You would fill me with Your Spirit and use me to teach Your Word. So, Father, we commit this hour to You in Christ’s name. Amen. Alright, I want to invite you to take your Bible and turn with me to Mount Everest, to Romans chapter 9, and we are going to scale a bit of Mount Everest again. This chapter, Romans 9, just rises above the landscape of Scripture and points upward to God and in a very majestic way. This morning, I want us to look at verses, just two verses, verses 25 and 26, verses 25 and 26, and the title of this is “Divine Certainty,” and I think it will be apparent why I have called it this. Beginning in verse 25, “As He says also in Hosea, ‘I will call those who were not My people, ‘My people,’ and her who was not beloved, ‘beloved.’ And it shall be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ there they shall be called sons of the living God.” What leaps off the page to me is the divine certainty with which God is carrying out His eternal purpose and plan in matters of salvation, and this divine certainty makes our salvation unalterable and unstoppable in the will of God. This truth comes out loud and clear, and I want to draw to your attention if you would look at it one more time in verse 25 when God says, “I will,” and in verse 26, “It shall be,” and again in verse 26, “They shall be.” In verse 27, “That will be,” and in verse 28, which we will look at next week, “The Lord will.” When God says, “I will,” He will. When a man says he will, I mean, what is it good for? He says he will do a certain thing and he may do it; he may not do it. There may be reasons beyond his control that prevent him from doing what he says he will do or he just may have a change of heart and a change of mind. After having announced what he will do, he may just change his plans and go in a totally different direction, but it is never that way with God. When God says He will do something, God will do it, and there is nothing that can circumvent the fulfillment of the will of God as it relates to matters of salvation. And so, as I look at these verses just by way of introduction, I just love it when God says, “I will,” because when God says, “I will,” He will. God keeps His word and God executes His will and God fulfills His purpose and God saves His elect. And so, that is what we are going to look at. Today, we are going to look at verses 25 and 26, which deals with the salvation of Gentiles. And I say this by way of introduction, you and I can put ourselves in verse 25 and 26, and that is no stretch of the imagination. You and I, for the most part, we do have one Jew here, who is a converted Jew, Dan. So, Dan, you are next week, okay? You are going to be verses 27, 28, and 29, okay? We’ll get to you, alright? You are at the very tip peak of Mount Everest, okay? But for the rest of us, we are on the upward slopes. But we find ourselves in verses 25 and 26. Your conversion is the fulfillment of verses 25 and 26. You and I are Gentiles who have been called by God out of a strange land into a saving relationship with the Father through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. So, this should be very personal to you and to me. So, as we walk through these verses, I have got several headings. It seems like the fewer the verses, the more the headings, but this outline will help you track with me as we go through this. I remember when I was in seminary, the first class I had was a class called “Bible Study Methods,” and the very first assignment that was given to us was Acts 1:8. And, the professor said, “Take just that one verse and come back with forty observations from Acts 1:8. And so, the first ten were very easy, the next ten were a little harder. By the time I got to the next ten, I am shaking my Bible trying to get more observations to come out. But it was a lesson with a purpose. It was to teach us to look at every little detail in the passage of Scripture. There are a lot of teachers and preachers who just hydroplane over the surface. The pearls are at the bottom. The pearls are not floating on the surface of the water. We have to go down into the text. We have to dig them out of the dirt. And so, that is what we are going to do today. We are going to look at a lot of what might appear to be minute observations, but every jot, every tittle is inspired by God and shall be fulfilled. And so, I want us to get down into the text. So, I have got eight headings that I want to set before you. Yeah, Kent just went, “Ooooh!” So, the first is “The Speaker.” As we begin verse 25, “As He says also in Hosea,” The million-dollar question is, who is the “He”? The “He” is God the Father. It is the One who has chosen His elect. It is the One who has predestined our salvation. It is the One who has sent His Son into this world to die for the elect upon the cross. It is the One who has sent the Holy Spirit into the world to be the mediator of this call to come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. So, “He,” please note the next word, “says.” I want to draw to your attention that is in the present tense. Now, Hosea was written thousands of years ago. It was written a long time ago, centuries and centuries ago, but this is in the present tense. And what this tells us is what God said so many, many centuries ago He is still saying today. “The Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword.” This book is still speaking, and God is still speaking through His Word. So, that is important to draw to your attention. He says even today, this hour, this very moment. The word “also” is important because God is speaking not only in the book of Hosea, He is speaking in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, etc., all the way to Malachi, all the way now to Revelation, every book in the canon of Scripture. So, that word “also” is very important. God’s speaking in this present hour is not restricted to the book of Hosea. He is speaking through every book in the canon of Scripture. And then He says, “In Hosea.” So, what is important is this is not literally Hosea speaking. Hosea is only the messenger. Hosea is only the scribe. This is God speaking “in Hosea.” Do you see that? So, what will follow is critically important because it will actually be the voice of God that will be speaking to us through this quote from Hosea, and it will be God Himself who will bring to pass what He commands in this verse, and so this voice that we will look at is so powerful. When God speaks, God brings it to pass. And I want you to just keep your finger here quickly, Romans 4 verse 17. I just want you to see this that when God speaks God brings it to pass. And at the end of Romans 4 verse 17, it says that “God who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist.” When God calls, He raises the dead. When God calls, He brings into existence saving faith that did not previously exist. He brings into existence repentance that did not previously exist. And so, God is not just speaking; God is calling, God is commanding, and God brings to fulfillment all that He says. So, that is critically important. Alright, come back now to Romans 9. So, we have seen the speaker, which is God, and we should give the most careful attention to whatever God says. Second now, “The Summons.” “I will call those who were not My people, ‘My people.'” This is a quotation from Hosea 2 and verse 23. And the “I” is the same as the “He” at the beginning of the verse. It is God the Father. This is God the Father who is the speaker saying, “I will call those who are not My people, ‘My people.'” When God says, “I will call,” this refers to what we looked at in verse 24, “Even us, among whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.” This is what theologians call the “effectual call.” This is the sovereign irresistible call of God that will always be answered when God issues this call. It is the call out of darkness into light. It is the call out of the grave of sin into new life in Jesus Christ. This call has been emphasized by Paul already. We saw that a couple of years ago when we began this study in chapter 1 verse 6, “Among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ,” Chapter 1 verse 7, “To all who are beloved of God in Rome, called as saints.” And that has already been mentioned in Romans 9 and verse 11, “Though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls.” And then, in verse 27 which I have already just read, “Even us among whom He called.” So, in verse 25, when He says, “I will call,” He is not saying, “Well, I’m just going to name you, ‘My people.'” He is saying, “I will call you to be My people. I will summon you. I will subpoena you. I will arrest you. I will lay hold of you, and I will draw you out of your life of sin and I will bring you to My Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.” So, that’s what this call is. And, let me just tell you this, if God didn’t call, you would have never answered. If God had not called effectually and irresistibly, you would still be in the world. You would still be living as a slave of sin. You would be imprisoned in your sins. You would have been unable to answer the invitation of the gospel. There had to be more than just the truth of the gospel presented to you. God had to issue a call to your heart and literally apprehend you and draw you to His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. So, that is this “summons.” And this call is not an audible voice. As I have said before, it is much louder than that. It is a call that is so powerful that it will secure the result that God intends it to have in your heart. And He will overcome your resistance, and He will make you willing in the day that He calls you to Himself. And you will not come to Him one day before He calls, and you will not come one day after He calls. You will come in that moment when He calls you to Himself. So, that is “The Summons,” and I want you to not pass that over quickly. Now third, “The Stress,” and I want to make this a heading unto itself because I want to bring to your attention something here. I still want to look at these first three words, “I will call.” As Paul is quoting this from Hosea 2 and verse 3, in fact just keep your finger here and turn to Hosea 2 and verse 3. And if you have forgotten where Hosea is, it is the first of the minor prophets. It is right after Daniel and it will be before Joel. And then the second chapter is right after the first chapter. So, Hosea 2 and verse 23, I want you to see this because Paul is stressing something here. He is doing something very intentional. And what Paul is doing and you are going to see it here in chapter 2 verse 23, once Kent finds Hosea, Table of Contents, alright. Paul is flipping the verse as he quotes it in Romans 9. He is inverting the order. For example, in the way this is laid out, there is an A line and a B line. Paul is flipping it in Romans 11. He is putting the B line first and the A line second. Why is he doing this? It is to draw attention to what is in the second line, the B line. He is moving it to what we call the “emphatic position” in a text of Scripture, to frontload it and put it at the very beginning. So, we could easily miss this but I want you to see this. So, in Hosea 2 and verse 23, “I will sow her for Myself in the land. I will also have compassion on her who had not obtained compassion. I will say to those who are not My people, ‘You are My people!’ And they will say, ‘You are My God!'” Please note at the end of verse 23 is where we read, “I will say to those who are not My people, ‘You are My people.'” As Paul quotes this verse now in Romans 9 and verse 25, he inverts the order as he is citing this because he wants to draw our attention to the call. And if you still have your finger in Hosea 2 verse 23, you will also note that Paul exchanges a word. At the end of verse 23 he says, “I will say to those who were not My people, ‘You are My people,'” Paul will take out the word “say” and he will insert the word “call.” And writing under the inspiration of Scripture and as an apostle, he has the right now to write as he writes the book of Romans to lay stress on something in Scripture as he cites it from the Old Testament. And so, in Romans 9 and verse 25, he doesn’t say, “I will say.” He says, “I will call.” “Call” is much stronger than “say,” and so Paul injects, as it were, a steroid of emphasis into the word “say” and blows it up and inserts the word “call” to stress that no one would ever believe the gospel unless God called them to Himself. And not everyone is called. Matthew 22 verse 14 says, “Many are called, few are chosen.” That call is the external call of the gospel, but everyone to whom is extended the internal call God will apprehend them, as I have already said, and bring them to Himself. So, I am calling this heading “The Stress” because I want you to see what Paul is stressing. He is putting his finger on a very important doctrine and a very important truth here. So, I want you to think about your salvation. I want you to think about your conversion, where you were. What was the passage of Scripture? Who was the teacher? Who was the preacher? Were you by yourself? Were you in a church service? Was it in the parking lot after church was over? Were you at a camp? Where were you when God called you to Himself? Everyone who is in the kingdom of God has been individually and personally called by name. “Whosoever will,” is the external offer of the gospel, but when He calls you into His kingdom, He calls His sheep by name. “Matthew, follow me,” “Zacchaeus, come down. I must dine with you tonight,” “Lazarus, come forth!” He calls us individually and personally and powerfully. So, that is “The Stress.” Now, number four, “The Subjects,” and it could be “The Strangers.” I go back and forth, which “S” word to use. But we are going to land on “The Subjects.” Who did God call? So, we see in verse 25, “I will call those who were not My people,” where Paul as he writes this, this refers to Gentiles. The previous verse in the context makes this clear to us because verse 25 is not the start of a new sentence. Verse 25 is the continuation of the previous sentence in verse 24 when he was talking about calling not only Jews, but also Gentiles. And when He says, “Those who were not My people,” He is referring to those who are outside of Israel, outside of the commonwealth of Israel, those who were non-Jews, not of the chosen race of Israel. And for Hosea, when he wrote this, it referred to the ten northern tribes of Israel who were taken captive by the Assyrians and carted off to Assyria into exile and into a land of captivity. And there they were in unbelief, there they were in apostasy, and there they were, spiritually speaking, “Not My people.” For Paul, as he is using this, it is a reference to the Gentiles. This has been a dominant emphasis in the book of Romans already. And I want you to turn back to Romans 1. I am going to do a jet tour here very, very quickly, but I want you to see this, this emphasis on the call being extended beyond Israel but to Gentiles. And at the end of verse 5 of Romans 1, he talks about, “We have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles,” and then in verse 6, “Among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ.” So, he is calling out not only Jews, a remnant out of Israel, but also Gentiles from among the nations of the world. At the end of verse 13, he says, “Even among the rest of the Gentiles.” In verse 14, he differentiates among the Gentiles, “the Greeks,” that is the upper class, “the barbarians,” that is the lower class. And it is the full spectrum of Gentiles; those who are rich, those who are poor, those who are learned, those who are unlearned, those who are at the top of the ladder, those who are in the basement. God is calling Gentiles out of not only every nation but out of every walk of life. In verse 16, he says, “Not only to the Jew but also to the Greek,” and so we see that “the Greek” there referring to the Gentiles. If you would come to chapter 2 and verse 10, “Glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” Verse 12 talks about those who are “without the Law,” that is the Gentile. In verse 14, “For when Gentiles who do not have the Law,” and in verse 26, “the uncircumcised man,” that is the Gentile. So, what I want you to see is that Paul is talking here now about those who are “not My people,” he has already laid the foundation for this. I mean, there has been a buildup beginning in chapter 1 in the prologue extending into chapter 2. Now in chapter 9, that those whom God will call to Himself there will be many who were “not My people.” And that refers to those who were unconverted, those who were in darkness, those who were spiritually dead, i.e., that would be you and me that God has extended that call to us. Now, come to Ephesians 2 very quickly. I know I am taking us to a lot of verses, but hey, this is a Bible study, okay? So, Ephesians chapter 2, I just want you to see this, verse 11. Paul is saying the same thing here in in the book of Ephesians chapter 2 verse 11, “Therefore, remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who were called ‘Uncircumcision’ by the so-called ‘Circumcision.'” So, he now describes in verse 12 these Gentiles before they were called. Verse 12, “Remember that you were at that time:” Number one, “separate from Christ.” Number two, “excluded from the commonwealth of Israel.” Number three, “strangers to the covenants of promise.” Number four, “having no hope.” Number five, “without God in the world.” In verse 13, “Those who were far off.” In verse 17, “those who were far away.” Verse 19, “those who were strangers and aliens.” That is referring to every Gentile before their conversion. This was true of us. We were without God. We were without hope. We were strangers to the covenants of God and the Word of God. We were far away from God. And it is these whom God has called. This is so like God because God receives all the glory for going after those who would be the hardest to convert, who are the furthest away. It magnifies His grace and His glory. And you and I are a part of this. You once were not the people of God. Even if you were a member of a church, if you were unconverted, you were not the people of God. Your name may have been on a church roll, but you were not the people of God. You may have even professed Christ, but you didn’t possess Him until you were converted. So, this now leads to number five, “The Salvation,” and it is at the end of this line, these two words, “My people.” “I will call those who are not My people, ‘My people.'” And what is implied is, “I will call those who are not My people to be My people.” You could just insert, it is implied, the “to be.” And, in Hosea 2 verse 23 it actually says, “You are My people.” It is God Himself who has issued this call, and it is God Himself who has produced the response in the heart. And to be “My people” means that you have come into a saving relationship with God, that you have been born again into the family of God. You have been sovereignly birthed by His grace and you have been adopted and made an adult son with all of the rights of an adult son in the family of God. And it happened suddenly. It wasn’t a process by which you became a child of God. It happened in a moment, in the moment that God called, just like Saul of Tarsus on the Damascus road. It was in that moment. It was just like on the day of Pentecost. It wasn’t “the month of Pentecost.” It wasn’t “the year of Pentecost.” It wasn’t “the decade of Pentecost.” It was on “the day of Pentecost” that there were three thousand souls that God called to Himself, and they immediately responded the moment that call was issued. It was the same with the Ethiopian eunuch as Philip hopped up into the chariot and explained to him Isaiah 53. And in that moment, God called him and he was immediately baptized. It was the same in Philippi when Paul went to the riverside and Lydia was there and some other women. She was a seller of purple. And Paul explained the gospel to her, and God opened her heart and called her to Himself. It happened immediately. And a church was planted, and it created a riot in town, and they drug Paul through the streets of Philippi and they threw him into the prison cell. And at midnight, God sent an earthquake that threw open the doors of the prison. And remember the Philippian jailer said, “What must I do to be saved?” And Paul said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.” And that very night he was called and converted and even baptized that very night. And so, the point that I want to stress is we become the people of God suddenly, instantly, dramatically in the moment that God calls us to Himself. Like a magnet drawing a piece of metal to the magnet, so we were drawn to personal relationship with Jesus Christ. So that is “The Salvation” and that is your testimony if you are in Christ. Now, I need to keep going. Number six: “The Scorn.” I want you to note the next line. It says, “And her who was not beloved, ‘beloved.'” This again refers to Gentiles who were outside the kingdom of heaven. In Hosea’s day, again it referred to those that were carted off into captivity into Assyria. Paul here assigns it its place here to refer to Gentiles. You will note, when we were not the people of God, we were not beloved. This is a long way again from, “Smile, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” No, He didn’t. You didn’t enter into the sphere of His love until He called you. You were under His wrath before He called you, and we were not beloved. That is what it says. And in verse 13, we see that “Jacob I loved and Esau I hated,” and we were standing in the very same place as Esau stood under the wrath of God, and not beloved, not standing in the experiential love of God in our life. And that was the scorn. In Hosea 2:23, it says, “Who had not obtained compassion.” So, I think this is very important for us in our witnessing as we are talking to people. They need to understand that, yes, God has demonstrated His love toward us in that “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us;” and yes, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but have eternal life.” But there is more to the story than just that, that there is what Romans 1 verse 18 says, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men.” And so, that is what we see here. “And her who was not beloved,” please note, ‘beloved.’ There was a change in status. There was a change from the frown of God to the smile of God. There was a change from the anger of God toward us to the love of God being placed in our heart and enveloped over our lives. And so, if you are a believer, this is the dramatic change that has taken place in your life. You went from being “not the beloved” to “the beloved.” You went from being “not the people of God” to being “the people of God.” And it was all effected by the call of God upon your life as He called you out of darkness unto Himself. Come to 1 Peter 2, 1 Peter 2, and there is the very same quotation that we see here, verse 10, 1 Peter 2 verse 10, “For you were once not a people,” meaning My people, “but now you are the people of God,” meaning My people, “and you had not received mercy.” In other words, You were not the beloved. “But now, you have received mercy.” Now, you are the beloved. There could not be a more catastrophic change in status as well as in experience that occurred when we were called. Now, look at the previous verse in verse 9, 1 Peter 2 verse 9. He traces all this back to what Paul has been belaboring in Romans 9 to sovereign election. Flowing out of sovereign election is the effectual call which has produced this dramatic change in our lives. So, look at verse 9. “For you are a chosen race,” referring to the believers in the church, “a royal priesthood,” meaning we have direct access to the Lord Jesus Christ now. We do not need a priest. We are a priest. We have a Priest and we have been made a priesthood. “A holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” So, first, there was God’s sovereign election in eternity past before the foundation of the world. Then, within time, at the appointed time, whether you were a teenager, whether you were in your adult years, that call, the effectual call was extended to all who were chosen. And those who were far away now became very near, and those who were “not My people” became “My people.” And those who were “not beloved” became “beloved.” So, even Peter picks up on this very truth that Paul is teaching. So, come back to Romans 9. So, in Romans 9, I want to look at verse 26 now with you, and I want you to note number seven, “The Separation.” And Paul shifts his focus now from the person to the place, the place where they were when God called them. So, verse 25 focuses upon the person who is called. Verse 26 focuses upon the place where the person was when they were called. So, we read in verse 26, “And it shall be,” and again here I just love this divine certainty. When God says, “It shall be,” mark it down. “It shall be that in that place where…” Now, let us just stop there. When Hosea first wrote this, and this is Hosea 1 verse 10, when Hosea first wrote this, this was a prophecy of the Jews in the ten tribes in the Northern Kingdom. They would be taken captive by the Assyrians and literally uprooted out of their land and dragged back to Assyria to a different place, to live in a different land, to be far away from the Promised Land, to be far away from hearing the voice of the prophets, to be far away from the Word of God, to be far away from the place of blessing which was in the Promised Land. They now have been taken into exile to a different place. And as Paul, now uses this here, the reference is to you and me, but it is not to a geographical place; it is to a spiritual place. That you and I once were in a place, just like the ten tribes of the north were, we too once were far away from God, and we once too were removed from the saving blessings of God. We once too lived in darkness and we were in captivity and we were in spiritual bondage held in chains of our own sin. And so, when he says, “It shall be that in that place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people.'” Now, the Jew still continued to be the Jew physically, but what God was saying to them in Hosea’s day, “You are living just like the world. Most of you are a part of the world. You are unconverted and you are unregenerate and you are not My people.” Now, there was a remnant within Israel who remained “the people,” but by and large it was an apostate nation that was living in unbelief. And rightfully did God say, “You are not My people spiritually.” The application as Paul intends it to be understood is for you and me as Gentiles. Even if we were brought up in a Christian family, even if we grew up going to church, even if we were put in a Christian school, if we were unconverted, we were not the people of God. We were just like these tribes living in a faraway place. We were in a place of darkness. We were in a place of sin, even on the front row of the church, until the day God called you out of darkness into the glorious light of His presence. And that is the point that Paul is making here in this monumental chapter of Romans 9. As you now find yourself in Christ, the way you got here is God took the initiative. And God laid bare His mighty right arm, and God opened His mouth and called you. And with His mighty right arm, He brought you out of darkness into the light of His presence. And you may have been unaware at that moment of how God-centered that was, but the more you study your Bible and the more you read of how God operates in salvation, you learn that it is more and more of God and less and less of you until you reach the point where you say, “It was all of God. Salvation is of the Lord, and the only thing I contributed to this was my sin that was laid upon the Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross.” So, I have got one last point to put before you and it is “The Sonship.” And that is the second line in verse 26, “There,” and I just can’t go past the word “there” without pausing to reinforce that place where you once were living, that place of spiritual darkness and spiritual separation from God. Paul is using Hosea to focus upon the place where you once were. “There they,” and the “they” refers to those who are elect Gentiles, those chosen by God before the foundation of the world, who are non-Jews. “There they shall be called.” Everyone whom God chose shall be called, and this call again is the effectual, powerful, saving, individual, irresistible call of God. “They shall be called,” and we see what Paul is emphasizing here again is the call as he is cherry-picking out of the book of Hosea just the verses that he wants to weave into the tapestry of Romans chapter 9 to build his argument that salvation is by the sovereign will of God. So, “There they shall be called sons of the living God.” Formerly, we were strangers; now we are sons. Formerly, we were enemies and now we are joint-heirs. Formerly, we were estranged from God and hostile towards God and God towards us, “You are not My beloved. You are not My people.” But now that God has called us to Himself, His arms were open wide and He received us into His family. He put a ring on our finger. He put a robe on our back. He put shoes on our feet. He gave us a seat at the table. He made us joint-heirs with His Son. He has opened the treasure vault of heaven. He has put His Holy Spirit within us. He has clothed us with the perfect righteousness of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He has erased all of our sins and sent them far away. He has put His Word within our heart. He has given us a new mind. He has given us new affections. He has given us a new disposition. He has put us on a new path. He has given us new brothers and new sisters. He has given us a new elder Brother, and He has given us a new life direction and a new life purpose, and He is now preparing for us a new place in heaven where we will live in the New Jerusalem, and there we will be with the Lord forever and ever and ever. We have been called to be sons of the living God. And the fact that it is the living God, I think in an indirect way is just a hint of this, but is emphasizing it is only the living God who calls. Dumb idols don’t call. Statues of gold and silver cannot call anyone. They cannot speak, but the living God calls strangers to be His sons. And His voice is so powerful that in the day that this living God calls, He brings us all the way into His family. I intended to take us through verse 29, but the more I was on the bottom of the ocean looking for pearls, the more I saw there is more here than what I saw on the surface. And I wanted us to really extract from this something of the full impact. And I will have to tell you in years past I have just kind of skimmed over those two verses to get to some of the next verses and these verses kind of are in the shadow of the previous verses about the potter and the clay, and Jacob and Esau, etc. These have just kind of, for me personally, have kind of been over here on the sidelines and the others have been out in the middle of the field that drew my attention. It has been good for me to park on these verses and to give more careful attention to this call of God and the divine certainty that it produces in our salvation As I close this, and then we will do application, I just want to restate to you this is your spiritual autobiography, this is your testimony. I mean, the next time you are asked to give your testimony in church or in a Sunday school class or you are sitting at a table with someone who is not a believer and you are giving your testimony, you could very easily just turn to Romans 9:25 and 26, and say, “Let me tell you my story, because I once was not beloved and I was once not the people of God, but God called me. And when He called, I became the people of God and I became beloved and I became a son of the living God. And that is what I would want for your life, but it is something that only God can do and something that God must do if you are to be a part of His family.”

The Potter and the Clay – Romans 9:19-24

OnePassion Ministries March 28, 2019

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This is an incredible passage of Scripture that we are looking at it in Romans chapter 9, and so I need to begin in a word of prayer. Father, as we look now into Your Word, I pray that You would instruct us and teach us regarding who You are and how You deal with humanity. Lord, we see that You are sovereign and we gladly acknowledge that, that You are supreme in Your authority over all the earth and You have appointed the eternal destiny of every man. And so, Father, enlarge our understanding today, and more than that, enlarge our heart for You and deepen our humility before You. Use this even to mature us and to develop us further into men of God. We pray this in Christ’s name. Amen. Alright, we are in Romans chapter 9, and today I want us to look at verses 19 and I think through verse 24. We will see how far we can progress, but these are weighty, heavy verses that should produce some sobriety in our hearts. So, beginning in verse 19, Paul writes, “You will say to me then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?’ On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, ‘Why did you make me like this,’ will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.” As we wade yet deeper out into this vast ocean of Romans 9 that teaches the sovereignty of God, we have come to yet greater depths in our understanding of who God is. And in this passage, God is represented as the potter and all of humanity is represented as a common lump of clay, and out of this common lump of clay God sovereignly chooses to make some to be vessels of honor and others for vessels of dishonor. This analogy rightly represents God as the potter, the maker, that He can do with the clay whatever He wants to do with it. And He is not accountable to the clay for how He chooses to fashion and make some to be certain vessels and others to be other vessels. It is very appropriate that all of mankind is pictured as clay, one lump of clay, because clay is dirty, clay is filthy, clay is marred, it is filled with many flaws. And that is what humanity is in its total depravity. Because of the fall of Adam, the entire human race has been plunged into sin, and so the analogy of clay is very appropriate. And then for God to make two different kinds of vessels, one is honorable, the other is dishonorable. And as we shall see, the honorable would be like today a fine piece of china, a beautiful vase, and the dishonorable, as we will see, will be like a toilet, will be like a privy, will be like a trash can to hold refuse and to take out of the house and to dump behind the house. The contrast is very stark and is very vivid. Yet, this is what the Bible teaches and this is what the text teaches. So, I want us to walk through this passage, and the intent of this passage is to put God in His rightful place, to acknowledge God in His rightful place as sovereign over the eternal destinies of the creation that He himself has made. So, as we walk through these verses beginning in verse 19, I want you to see first the resistance in verse 19 because Paul anticipates the pushback from what he has just said in verse 18 that He has mercy on whom He desires and He hardens whom He desires. And as soon as Paul says that, Paul anticipates the objections that are going to be raised, that if God is this sovereign, how can He hold anyone responsible for the choices that they make if ultimately God is the one who is making the choices. And so, Paul anticipates this imaginary objectioner. And so, in verse 19, he actually records what they would be saying and it is a question that no doubt would be in our minds as well. But it’s not just the question, it is the way the question is asked that Paul will react to in verse 20 very strongly. But we are in verse 19. “You will say to me then.” And the “you” represents this imaginary objectioner, “You will say to me then.” He now quotes what he believes to be on their mind. “Why does He still find fault? Question mark. For who resists His will?” Question mark. And so, Paul is getting it out on the open. Paul puts it out on the table. Paul does not just pass on, speed quickly onto the next subject. No, Paul pulls over and parks and actually raises this question that I know that many of you are thinking. And so, the question restated is if God shows mercy to some and He hardens whomever He wills regardless of their merit or of their effort or their choice, then how can God possibly assign blame to people for their choices? I mean, that is the question that’s on the table and any thinking person is going to think this question. The rebellion is not to think the question; what we will see is there will be arrogance behind the question that Paul will sharply respond to in the next verse. And so, I want to proceed now to the next verse. After the resistance, now comes the rebuke. And in verse 20, Paul rebukes this hypothetical imaginary questioner who would call God into account to give an answer for how and why God does what He does. And so, in verse 20, “On the contrary, who are you, O man?” And that is a stinging rebuke that Paul fires back at the person who is thinking this and asking it in a prideful, arrogant way, in which he is demanding of God this answer and calling God into account and calling God into the courtroom of a person’s thinking and putting God on the witness stand and demanding of God the answer for this. And Paul begins this by saying, “Who in the world do you think you are O puny little man, you little fleck of dust, you presumptuous, prideful man to require of God an answer for why God has done what God has done?” And he goes on to say, “Who are you, O man, who answers back to God?” So, this is more than just honestly with humility asking God. There is a stubbornness in this imaginary questioner, just like there was stubbornness once in my heart when I rejected and resisted the truth of the sovereign election of God. I didn’t realize what pride there was in my heart, what arrogance there was in my heart. I mean, I thought I had done God a big favor just to believe in His Son and I thought I had done God a favor to leave the bank and to go to seminary and to give my life to ministry as if God had received now some lottery pick for His team. There was so much pride, stinking pride in my heart, and it was this truth that exposed it. And there are so many times as I teach this truth, even recently, where after I teach, there will be a dialogue with someone who will come up and ask me questions. There is nothing wrong in asking the questions, but I can tell by the tone of the voice that they don’t like this truth and they want me to give an account for God. And as I said to them, “You go read Romans 9 three or four times. You come back and you tell me what you think this chapter says, because you need to humble yourself beneath the mighty hand of God and your push back is a reflection of the arrogance that is inside your heart and soul.” That is the arrogance that we see here, and Paul calls it out, “Who are you, O man, who answers back to God?” This is more than just asking God. And the objection is irreverent, it is foolish, it is blasphemous. And what Paul will say in essence is, “Young man, you just crossed the line with God. You have gone way too far in your challenging God, ‘Is this just? Is this fair? Is this right? And how in the world can you still hold us accountable when You are the one who is making all the choices?'” And it comes from a heart that is above God and looking down upon God for God to give an account. And so, what is being represented here is, when he says, ‘who answers back to God,’ that really means who snaps back at God, who pushes back, who calls God into account, who demands answers from God, who questions God and even passes judgment on God. And so, verse 20 goes on to say, “The thing molded will not say to the molder, ‘Why did you make me like this,’ will it?” And so, here is this analogy of the potter and the clay, and what Paul is saying is the clay has no right to call the potter into account for what the potter does with the clay. The question goes way too far. The question is out of bounds. God is unaccountable to any of His fallen creatures for the choices that He makes. No man may call God into account and demand an explanation or even an apology for what God has done. And as Paul uses this analogy of the potter and the clay, the molder and the thing molded, it is drawn from the Old Testament. And in Isaiah 29:16, we see this, in Isaiah 45:9 through 11 we see this, in Isaiah 64 verse 8 we see this, and in Jeremiah 18:1 through 6 we see this. So, this is not a new teaching that has come into play. In fact, why don’t we just turn back and look at a couple of these? Isaiah 45 verses 9 and following, we read, “Woe to the one who quarrels with His Maker—an earthenware vessel among the vessels of earth! Will the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you doing?’ Or the thing you are making say, ‘He has no hands’? The clay may not call into account the potter and say, “What are you doing? What have you done with my life? And what are you doing with everyone else? I need answers. I need an explanation.” No, it goes way too far. And as long as we are in Isaiah, Isaiah 64 verse 8, Isaiah 64 verse 8, “But now, O Lord, You are our Father, we are the clay, and You are our potter; and all of us are the work of Your hand.” And only because the next book is Jeremiah, just turn over to Jeremiah 18:1 through 6, as long as we are this close to Jeremiah. And in Jeremiah 18, beginning in verse 1, “The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord saying, ‘Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will announce My words to you.'” Verse 3, “Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, making something on the wheel. But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so, he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make. Then the word of the Lord came to me saying, ‘Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?’ declares the Lord. ‘Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.'” So, what Paul is saying here in Romans 9 is he’s just drawing upon this very Old Testament imagery that represents the sovereign will of God over the destinies of mankind and represents the supreme authority of almighty God over all humanity to make of them as He would so choose. So, such an accusation against God is intolerable, to demand of God an account for His sovereign election. God will not be subpoenaed and brought into the courtroom of any of our puny little minds with our inferior thinking, and God will not be put on the witness stand and be cross-examined by any man so that we can render our verdict on God whether He is found acquitted or guilty by us of injustice. God is not the one on trial; we are the one on trial. And God owes us no further explanation than what He chooses to give to us. And in this Romans 9, Paul does not attempt to resolve the tension between divine sovereignty and human responsibility. He offers no explanation to unravel this mystery. We must be content simply to accept what God has given to us that He is the potter and we are the clay. Now, this leads to verse 21, the right. And in verse 21, we see that God has the right to do with His creation as He pleases. And so, in verse 21, we read, “Or does not the potter have a right?” Now, let me just stop right there. This word “right” is a Greek word exousia that means “supreme authority over others.” It means the power of choice. It means liberty to do as one pleases. That’s what this word “right” means. In fact, it is translated in Matthew 28:18, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and earth.” And so, it is synonymous with supreme authority or the familiar word, “sovereignty.” That is what this word “right” means. “Or does not the potter,” that is God, “have a right over the clay,” that is all mankind, “to make from the same lump,” this one batch of clay, “one vessel for honorable use and another vessel for common use?” And it is the same thought that we saw earlier in verse 11 that from the same womb God can make one twin to be the object of His love and God can make the other twin to be the object of His hatred, all from the same womb. And here the idea is the same; from the same lump of clay, God can sort it out and separate it with different purposes for the different objects that He makes. And so, God is like a potter who possesses and exercises uncontested authority over one lump of clay, which is humanity. And as I said in the introduction, mankind is like clay, dirty, flawed, filthy, marred, and each individual is like a vessel. Some are made for very fashionable use, and others are made for very dishonorable use. So, let us think about this. Look at verse 21 again, “To make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use.” Let us just talk about this. A vessel here, it is a broad term, but it can be used of an object that is made by a potter, and when it is an honorable vessel, that would be like a piece of pottery. It would be like a beautiful piece of pottery. It would be like a vase, a very intricate beautifully painted vase. And this honorable vessel would be used to put out in the house to enhance the beauty of the house. It would be put on the table and food would be put into this honorable vase, like a bowl, and you would serve food to your family with it. And it would also represent, let’s say a cup, that you would pour something to drink in and you would drink from it, and it would be also like a dish that you would put food on and you would eat from it, and it would be your very best pottery. If you were to come over to my house and for dinner and if it was a special occasion and if I wanted to honor you, we would pull out our finest china that has come from my wife’s grandmother and mother and has been passed down. And we only bring it out for very special occasions, like someone’s birthday, and that is the imagery here. This word “honorable” is a Greek word that means “valuable,” “highly esteemed,” because of the inherent beauty of it. And so, this represents those whom God has chosen to save. This represents those whom God has chosen to set His distinguishing love and affection upon them from before the foundation of the world. Those whom He chose in Christ, He has chosen to put on display the attribute of His mercy and His grace and His love and set them into the house which would represent the church and even for the world to see the beauty of God’s grace at work in their life. And it would be a reason that honor would be given to the potter that this Potter is so skilled and is so excellent in His ability that He could take from a piece of raw clay, this filthy, dirty clay that is so marred, that this Potter is so good and He is so proficient that He can shape it and mold it and bring it into a state that is spectacular, that radiates with its beauty, and it is a source of bringing praise to the Potter that He could fashion such a piece of pottery. So, that is one vessel for honorable use. But then he goes on to say in verse 21, “And another for common use.” Now, this word “common” is the very same word in the Greek that was used for “honorable” earlier in the sentence. It just has the prefix “A” or “a-” in front of it that makes it a negative. For example, in the English language, a museum is a place you go in to muse, you go in to think. You ponder things in a museum. You look at beautiful works of art and you muse in a museum. When you put the “A” in front of it, “a-musement,” it is an activity where you unplug your brain and you do not think. That is really what the word “amusement” means. It is the lowest level of an activity that requires no profundity of thought whatsoever; you are just entertained. Well, this word for “common” in the New American Standard and in the ESV, it actually is rendered “dishonorable.” It is just the negative prefix in front of the very same word. And what this word means, “common” or “dishonorable,” it means unattractive and unpolished, and it means even vile and disgraceful and shameful. And so, when the potter takes this clay and he begins to fashion it, he just leaves it in its natural earthy state. And he will fashion it also into a bowl-like object, but it will not resemble a spectacularly beautiful piece of pottery. No, this bowl will just be left unpolished. It is unattractive and what it will be used for in the house is to be a garbage can to put trash into it. And it is actually hidden in some corner of the church because it is so repulsive-looking that you do not want your guests when they come over and when they are eating from the china, you don’t want them to see this dishonorable vessel, much less smell it because there is a foul odor to it because of the trash that’s in it. Worse than that, before there was indoor plumbing, in these early biblical days, it was used to hold human excrement and human dung, and people would relieve themselves into this earthen bowl and then it would be carted outside and the contents would be dumped away from the house so that the foul odor would not drift back into the house. So, that is the idea here in God’s working. So, those that are a common vessel or dishonorable vessel are those whom God has chosen to pass over from setting His grace and mercy upon them, and He leaves them in their sinful, filthy, dirty state, but He has a purpose for them as well. And Proverbs 16 verse 4 says, “God has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.” And God uses them but for different purposes, in a different way. Oh, they are still useful, but it is a dishonoring use that God has. So, as we continue to walk through this, look at verse 22 now, and I want you to note the reprobate in verse 22, because Paul now deals with those whom God chooses not to save, those whom God chooses to harden their hearts. And in verse 22 he tells us it is not for no reason that God has passed them over. No, God actually has an intention for them as well. And so, in verse 22, “What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?” Here is the purpose that God has for the one whom He passes over, that He chooses for them to be simply left in their natural dirty state. God will put certain attributes on display in them that will reflect His glory. God is glorified in them as well. And the attributes, there are three attributes that are mentioned here in verse 22 that reflect the glory of God, that reflect the character of God. The first is wrath. The second is power, and the third is patience. You see that right in your text. And God has chosen to magnify His own name by causing His wrath to be shown in these vessels of dishonor. This wrath is His fierce, righteous, holy indignation and anger that is unleashed rightfully so upon them. This word “wrath,” just to remind you, is a Greek word orge from which we derive the English word “orgy” that means “heated passion.” It refers to God’s violent emotions towards the reprobate. God is not stoic. God is not impassive. God is passionate in His wrath towards the ungodly. And then the word “power” refers to His power to damn them, the power to take, if you will, a piece of clay, a clay bowl left in its natural state and to smash it into a thousand pieces, just like Psalm 2 verse 9 and 10, God commands the Son to take the rod of His anger and to crush those who are outside of Him. And then, the attribute of patience, that God for so long endures the rebellion and the unbelief and the sinfulness and the blasphemy and the cursing and the swearing, that the patience of God is seen that God would allow this to go on as long as it does. So, God is glorified even in the reprobate as these character qualities of God are very vividly put on display. And we would add, and rightly so, there is no apology for the wrath of God. There is no apology for His power to damn that which deservedly is under His anger, and there is no apology for His patience to endure such sinful creatures. So, that leads now to verse 23, the rescue. And in verse 23, we see another purpose for the reprobate. And in verse 23, the New American Standard reads, “And He did so.” The ESV says, “In order to make known.” This is introducing what we call “a purpose clause.” And so, the purpose that is stated in verse 23 is flowing out of verse 22. It is yet another purpose for why God has passed over certain vessels and chosen to deal more graciously with other vessels. In verse 23, “And He did so.” So here is the reason why He did so: “to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory.” Now, here is what is going on in the brilliance of Paul’s mind as he is being led by the Holy Spirit to reveal the mind of Christ and the mind of God in this text. What Paul is making known to us is that the saving grace and the saving mercy that is bestowed upon vessels of honor shines all the more brightly and is magnified and is seen to be all the more glorious when it is compared to this trash can, when it is compared to this toilet bowl. If there was no toilet bowl and if there was no trash can, the beautiful china, the beautifully painted vase would not seem to be as pretty until it is compared to the ugliness and the foulness of the vessel of dishonor. And I have used this illustration with you before. I promise I won’t use it again. Just bear with it one more time. But when I bought my wife’s engagement ring, I went to downtown Dallas, went up several floors to some building there, went into a kind of a private jewellery store. The salesman brought out a diamond, put it on the counter. I was basically unimpressed with the diamond. I said, “Do you have any others?” And he brought out some others, and I just thought, “It’s okay.” He then brought out a black velvet pad and put it down on the counter and then with those tweezers picked up the diamond and placed it on the black velvet pad. And that diamond exploded with color as all the lights overhead in the ceiling were, as it were, just sucked through the diamond and the diamond began to sparkle and there were different colors that would be seen in the diamond. It just radiated light and became instantly beautiful. And it was the black pad that made the diamond sparkle. That is the idea of what Paul is saying as we transition from verse 22 to verse 23, that the purpose of the black pad in verse 22 is to cause the diamond in verse 23 to sparkle all the more brightly. So, the genius of God, the brilliance of the eternal purpose and plan of God is so far above us that we barely can even just glimpse some of the reasons for which God is doing what God is doing. And God is so infinite in His wisdom that even if God was to explain it to us, we are too finite in our fallen state right now, redeemed that we are, though, to even be able to grasp how all these wires have been connected in the mind of God what God has chosen to do from eternity past. And so here in Romans 9, Paul has only just pulled back the veil just ever so slightly, just for a slight ray of truth to come shining forth from the throne of God to us here to let us know why God has done what God has done. So, He did so to make known, or in other words, He did so in order to make known the riches of His glory, not just of His glory, the fabulous multiplicity, abundance of His glory. And the glory here refers to all of the attributes of God, the sum and the substance of all who God is and for it to be the riches of His glory. This is unfathomable because God possesses incomprehensible glory. He has chosen to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy which He prepared beforehand for glory. The second use of “glory” here refers to glory as a synonym for heaven and glory as also a synonym for our being glorified when we step into glory in heaven above. And so, the end of verse 23 is really teaching the sovereign election of God, God’s sovereign choice of those whom He prepared beforehand for glory that we would be vessels of mercy. And mercy is the theme that is running through Romans 9. Just to draw this to your attention, in verse 15, “He says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.'” In verse 16, it depends on God who has mercy. Verse 18, “So then He has mercy on whom He desires.” And now again in verse 23, “To make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy,” mercy here representing really the totality of His saving grace, His electing love that He has set upon us. And lest we think that this is a limited grace, he adds in verse 24. We will end with verse 24, “Even us.” And when he says “us,” he is opening it up to the whole world, “whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.” And we will get into that next time we meet. But what I want you to see in verse 23, if you are a Christian, if you are born again, if you are a genuine authentic disciple of Jesus Christ, if you are a true bonafide believer who has repented of your sins and put your trust in the saving arms of Jesus Christ, it is because God prepared you to be a vessel of honor like a beautiful piece of china from which His glory, His attributes which shine brightly that the attention would be brought to the Potter that He could take a piece of clay so dirty and so marred and so filthy, and in His hands He can reshape it and remake it and put it there on the table and it is so spectacularly beautiful that there is a sense of awe at the ability of the Potter to transform it into such a beautiful object that reflects His perfections and His own excellencies. And were you to walk into the next room and to relieve yourself into just a clay pot that is left in its marred, dirty, filthy state that God has hardened so that it will contain the refuse that is put in it, and when you see that object and in your mind then compare it with the beautiful object that is on the table, it would cause you all the more for your jaw to drop and for your eyes to pop and for your mind to be expanded. How great must this Potter be that He could take a piece of clay and fashion me to be an object of mercy and to be a vessel for common use! We all deserve to be toilet bowls. We all deserve to be trash cans. We all deserve to be hardened, a hardened piece of dirt to be used to showcase God’s wrath and His power and His patience, but for reasons known only to God, for us to pull back the veil just ever so slightly and to have some brief glimpse of what is going on in the mind of God, for us to see that God has chosen to use me in a way I do not deserve should drop us to our knees and we never get up, that we have been prepared for glory, something that we do not deserve and something that others have not received. This should cause our hearts to be grateful. It should cause our hearts to be thankful. It should put a certain sobriety in us because as we stand at this verse, we have climbed to the top of the mountain in Romans 9. And the profundity of these verses is just absolutely astounding and astonishing. And so, no wonder later when we get to it, Paul will say in Romans 11:33, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counselor? Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to Him again? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To God be the glory forever and ever. Amen.” So, men, this is a very tall truth that we have looked at today, and I can see in your faces and in your countenance that you feel the weightiness of this. And that is good for us to feel the weightiness of it, because ultimately your eternal destiny is in the hands of the sovereign God who has made choices in eternity past and has chosen for those of us who are in Christ to have mercy upon us.

Is God’s Choosing Fair? – Romans 9:14-18

OnePassion Ministries March 22, 2019

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Let us start with a word of prayer: Father in heaven, as we now come to Your Word, we know we are stepping onto holy ground. You speak continually to us through Your word that is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword. We pray that You would open our eyes that we would behold wondrous truths in Your Word. And as we look into Your truth, I pray that You would shape us, mold us, make us, prune us, nurture us, grow us, develop us, for Christ’s sake. Amen. Okay, we are in Romans chapter 9, and today we are going to be looking at verses 14 through 18, Lord willing, and you have heard me say, “We’re playing big boy football.” Well, this is smash-mouth football, okay? So, we are upping the ante here a little bit. If you are taking notes, the title of this is simply this, “Is God’s Choosing Unfair?” Is God’s Choosing Unfair? So, beginning in verse 14 we read, “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be! For He says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ So then it at it does not depend on the man who wills or on the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.’ So then, He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.” So, for most of us the first time we heard the doctrine of sovereign election our immediate response was, “That’s not fair” And if you are really thinking, that is an initial thought to have. Maybe, that was your initial response. It certainly was mine. I mean, I wrestled with this like Jacob wrestling with the angel of the Lord. It was a soul-searching time for me when I first was confronted with this, and I thought, “How can God choose to give salvation to some but not to others?” That just seemed so unjust to me. And so, this teaching created great trauma and turmoil for me, and that was good because I needed to be humbled. I needed to be brought low before the Lord, and I needed to be reminded that God is God and that God will do what God will do, and it will be perfect whatever God chooses to do. In these verses in Romans 9, the Apostle Paul addresses this head on. And one great thing about the Bible is the Bible never tap dances around difficult issues. The Bible takes them on directly. The Bible tells it like it is, and the Bible speaks very pointedly to the most controversial of subjects. In fact, the Bible creates controversy. It doesn’t pull the plug from controversy. The Bible actually generates controversy, and it confronts controversy but it also gives us the answers that we need. The Bible does not give politically correct answers. It gives truthfully correct answers. And that’s exactly what we are going to see in this passage as the Bible tackles the sticking point without any equivocation, “Is God’s choosing some for salvation, is that unfair? Is that unjust?” So, I want us to walk very deliberately and carefully through these verses, verses 14 through 18, and I have got six headings that I want to set before you.  I want to take this like a piece of pie and just slice this up very carefully into smaller bite-size pieces. And the first is the accusation. At the beginning of verse 14 is the accusation. So, let me read it again. “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there?” Question mark. So, Paul here is like a skilled debater who anticipates the objection of his readers. He knows what we are thinking. He is out ahead of us. And when he says, “There is no injustice with God, is there?” he knows that there is this natural accusation that people will raise against God accusing Him of injustice and accusing Him of being unfair. And so, rather than hide this dilemma, Paul actually brings it to the surface and puts it right there in the middle of the table for us to stare at. Rather than push down the accelerator and just speed past this difficult thorny issue, Paul actually pulls over and parks and says, “No, we’re going to talk about this. We’re going to deal with this.” So, I love this about the Bible. The Bible never tries to cover up difficult thorny issues or just to try to explain things away just to salve our own understanding. No, the Bible digs into it. So, this is the accusation. He knows that there is this accusation being brought against God as soon as the truth of sovereign election is brought up. So, that brings now, second, the repudiation. Paul just slams that door shut at the end of verse 14, and Paul says, “May it never be!” And you need to know this is the strongest negative denial in the Greek language. It is translated in the King James, “God forbid!” And to transliterate it in a colloquial way we could just say, “No. No. A thousand times, no! God is never unjust. God is never unfair.” So, let’s just think about this now. What Paul is saying is that God is perfectly just to choose some for salvation and not to choose others. He does not owe salvation to anyone. “Fair” is to give someone what they deserve. There is not a one of us in this room that want that. We don’t want “fair.” “Fair” would be to go to hell. That is what you deserve. That is what I deserve. Every one of us deserves condemnation. Salvation is actually God giving to you what you do not deserve. That is unfair. “Fair” is hell. In a sense, “unfair” is heaven. So, when Paul says, “May it never be!” what is going on in his mind is that none of us deserve salvation. So, if God gives salvation to any person, He’s not being unjust. And for God to pass over someone, He’s not being unjust. So, we need to have the right perspective, the right framework. And let me say it again. We don’t want fair; we need mercy. So, this leads us now to the third main heading which is “The Explanation.” I don’t think I have ever moved this fast through these points. So, this leads now to the explanation, and Paul being the master teacher that he is, doesn’t just answer the question; he now explains his answer. And so, you notice verse 15 begins with the word “for,” F-O-R, and this introduces an explanation. You can read back through the book of Romans and see how many verses begin with the word “for.” It is all through Romans chapter 1. And Paul now will explain what he just said, and he does so by quoting from the Old Testament, Exodus 33 verse 19, “For He says to Moses.” And the “He” refers to God the Father. Remember, our emphasis on God the Father through all of this, “For He says to Moses.” And please note the verb tense on “says.” He doesn’t say, “He said,” pointing back thirty-four hundred years ago, but no, it is in the present tense. And the idea here is God is always speaking through His Word. And, “For He says to Moses.” And what God said thirty-four hundred years ago, He is still speaking today, present tense. So, He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” Several things to note here. First of all, the speaker is God, is God the Father. It is not Moses. It is God the Father. And you will note the word “I,” the first-person singular pronoun “I” four times in this one verse: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” God is emphatically saying, “I am the one dealing the deck on this. I by My sovereign will and by My sovereign grace, I will dispense salvation as it pleases Me.” You will note it does not say “we” as if we had a part in this. It doesn’t say, “We will have mercy on whom we will have mercy,” as if this is a joint decision between God and us. No, it is “I” to emphasize God’s supreme authority in making His sovereign choice. Now, when He says, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy,” we need to understand that the word “mercy” here means to show compassion on one who is afflicted. It means to provide relief for the destitute. So, God looking upon the entire human race that has fallen into sin because of Adam’s original sin, God looking upon a human race that is perishing in its sin, God chooses to have mercy on those whom He will have mercy to pull them out of the human race that is headed towards destruction, on the broad path headed for destruction. How merciful of God to do this! And then He says, “I will have compassion.” And the word “compassion” means God’s tender feelings towards those who are suffering. It means for God to have pity. And these two words, mercy and compassion, are virtually synonymous though there is a distinction. Mercy refers primarily to God’s intervening action, for God to step in and to relieve the misery of the one who is suffering. So, mercy focuses upon God’s action. Compassion focuses upon the attitude behind the action. So, it is God’s compassion that is driving His mercy. It is the attitude of compassion, the deep feelings of God towards those whom He chooses to save, He acts with mercy. And so, what we see here is sovereign mercy and sovereign compassion. So, God is free to bestow mercy and compassion upon whomever He so desires because no one can lay a claim to His mercy and to His compassion. For example, a week from today is Kent’s sixtieth birthday, okay? So yes, his sixtieth birthday, so make those checks payable to Nevada Bob’s Golf Discount. Okay, so we are going to have a birthday party right here in this Herb’s House. Everyone is invited, okay? #benicetokent. So, it is once a year we are nice to Kent, alright. I am coming and I am bringing a birthday gift for Kent, which he has dropped multiple hints that he would like to have. For me to give a gift next week to Kent, no one else can come up to me and say, “Hey, where is my gift?” because it is a gift. Because it is a gift, I am free to give it to whoever I want to give it to and I am free to withhold it from whomever I so desire to withhold it. If you had come over to my house and cleaned the carpet and washed the walls, you could then come up to me and say, “Hey, where is what’s coming to me?” but it wouldn’t be a gift. It would be wages that you have earned. But a gift does not operate on the basis of working for something. A gift is given to someone who has done absolutely nothing to deserve it, okay? In fact, it is in spite of the person that we give the gift, right? Can I get an “Amen”? Amen. Okay. So, for God to give the gift of salvation, He is free to give it on whomever He so desires and no one can say, “Hey what about me?” If we were to give you what you deserve, it wouldn’t be a gift; it would be wages. “The wages of sin is death.” You would be sentenced immediately to hell. So, we must have the eternal perspective. We must have the divine perspective on this, that God is free to give mercy and compassion to anyone. So, if God only chose one person out of the entire human race in all of human history to give mercy and compassion to, that would be mind-boggling. That would be amazing grace if there was only one person in the history of mankind to ever receive this, but the fact is that God has chosen a vast number, a vast multitude that no one can number. This is mercy upon mercy and compassion upon compassion. This is actually the most loving doctrine that there is. This is what even set the cross in motion. This is what set the work of the Holy Spirit in motion in the new birth. This is the taproot. This is the fountain from which every blessing of saving grace is flowing from. So, never think of the doctrine of election as a harsh doctrine. And when I first heard it, I thought this was the harshest thing I have ever heard. I had it totally backwards. This is not the harshest truth. This is the most loving truth that God has chosen not to leave us in our sin, but to choose us for salvation. So, this now leads to number four, “the implication.” Paul in verse 16 now spells out what is the implication of what he just said. In other words, if A and B is true in verses 14 and 15, then C must be true logically and rightly in verse 16. So here is the necessary implication of what he just said in verse 16, and he will do it as the master teacher that He is; negative denial, positive assertion. He will begin with negative; he will conclude with positive. He will start with “not” and then he will transition to the “but.” This is very effective teaching. It is a sharp two-edged sword that cuts both ways. So, let me tell you how this does not work out, then I will tell you how it does work out. So, there can be no misunderstanding by any one of us on this. So, he begins with a negative denial, verse 16, “So then.” And so, the “so then” really is to draw the consequence of what he just said. “So then, it,” referring to salvation, “does not.” Just underscore the word, “not.” “Does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs.” If there was ever a verse that is a deathblow to the pagan myth of free will, this is it. It does not depend on the man who wills. Now, you want to know why? Because the will of every lost man is dead and it is inoperative and it is inactive toward God. Now, horizontally, it can make decisions like which tie will I wear, but vertically towards God, the human will is in bondage to sin. Now, just think of the total person: mind, affections, and will. The mind of the unconverted person is darkened in sin. It cannot see the truth nor its need for the truth. The heart is defiled and does not desire the truth and does not desire a relationship with God, and the will is therefore dead. The mind is darkened. The heart is defiled. The will is dead. Now, you need to understand that the will is simply the handmaiden of the mind and the heart. Wherever the mind and the heart goes, the will follows. The will is not driving anything. The will is the caboose on the train. The engine that is driving your life is your mind and your affections, your desires. Your will simply chooses what you desire. You are not choosing contrary to your desire. R.C. Sproul uses this illustration, that if a man comes up to you and puts a gun to your head and says, “Give me your money or I’ll take your life!” you may say, “Well, I don’t want to give my money.” But you still reach into your pocket and you hand the guy your money, why? Because you love your life more than you love money. Your will make the choice that it wanted to make. It doesn’t make a choice contrary to what it wants. It always makes the choice in accordance with. So, when he says, “So that it does not depend on the man who wills,” of course, it does not depend upon the man who wills, because no man wills to believe in Jesus Christ, apart from the sovereign intervention of God. We only will to believe when God changes our will, and God must change our will by His sovereign will. So, he says, “So that it does not depend on the man who wills.” Most accurately translated out of the Greek, it reads, “So then it does not depend on the man who wills.” It translates exactly as it reads. So, the implication of this is it is the goodness of God’s sovereign will that overcomes the resistance of our fallen will, and God gives the gift of faith and He gives the gift of repentance to those who do believe in Jesus Christ. You see, faith does not originate within any one of us. Faith comes down from above. All faith in God is faith that has come from God. God is both the source and the object of saving faith. Hebrews 12 verse 2 says that Jesus is the author and perfecter of faith. We are not the author of our own faith. We simply exercise the faith that God gives to us. So, that’s why in verse 16 we have to bring really the entire teaching of the Bible, the whole counsel of God, in order to understand verse 16. So, it doesn’t depend on the man who wills because fallen man would never will to believe in Jesus Christ apart from sovereign mercy and sovereign compassion. And then he adds, “Or the man who runs.” And when he says this, he is referring to it is not by man’s efforts, it is not by man’s doings, it is not by his good works, it is not by his merit, and it is not by his will. George Whitefield, the great English evangelist, put it this way, “Man has a free will to go to hell but none to go to heaven.” And I think that is stated correctly. Free will is found nowhere in the Bible except in the book of Leviticus as a “freewill offering” that would be over and above the normal tithe. Other than that, it is imposed upon the Scripture. And back in Romans 3 and verses 10 and 11 and 12, I mean we see man left to go his own way. This is what we have, Romans 3 verse 10, “There is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God; all have turned aside, together they have become useless; there is none who does good, there is not even one.” That is the indictment of God on the entire human race. So therefore, if God did not choose some to be saved, no one would ever be saved, no one would ever choose to believe the gospel. So, this is the implication of what he has just said put in the negative. Now, he puts it in the positive at the end of verse 16, “but,” and now this goes in the positive direction, “but on God who has mercy.” And we could add “but on God who wills to have mercy.” So, you may be thinking, “Well, I thought I really did choose to believe in Christ. I mean, was someone else in the room and did that for me? Was it done by proxy? I mean, how did that happen? I just remember praying and committing my life to Christ. And the answer to that is, “Yes, you did. You actually did choose to commit your life to Christ, but it was only because God was previous and God was already at work in your heart.” And it was God who was convicting you of your sin and bringing pressure to bear upon your soul that you need to be made right with God. And it was God who drew you out of your sin to Christ, and it was God who gave you the gift of repentance and faith. It was God who opened your eyes to see Christ and the beauty of who Christ is. It was God who opened your ears to hear Him calling to you. It was God who opened your heart like He did Lydia’s in Philippi that you would receive the gospel message, and it was God who gave you a new heart with which to believe in the gospel. It was all of God. And the longer you study your Bible and the more careful you study your Bible, you discover that it was more and more of God and less and less of me until you realize that my salvation is of the Lord. So, you really did believe upon Christ, but it was God who induced the labor. It was God who brought you out of the womb and into His kingdom. And so, that’s why when we get to heaven and there is a crown put on your head it will be there for one millisecond, and you will cast it back at His feet in recognition that it has all come from God, and even this crown must now go back at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ because my salvation is the result of God’s being at work in my life. So, verse 16 is totally congruent with the entire rest of the Bible. “So then it does not depend upon the man who wills or upon the man who runs, but upon God who has mercy.” This is why all praise goes to God. This is why we don’t pat ourselves on the back for our salvation. This is why we sing, “How great Thou art!” because of His sovereign election. So, this now leads to verse 17 to number five, “The Reprobation.” The Reprobation. And Paul now addresses those not chosen for salvation. He now speaks of those who are passed over. And so, in verse 17, “For the Scripture says,” and please note again the verb tense for “says,” it is in the present tense. The Scripture continues to speak in this present hour to each and every one of us. “For the Scripture says to Pharaoh.” You remember he was the ruler of the Egyptian dynasty in the time of Moses. And he now quotes Exodus 9 and verse 16, “For this very purpose.” Now, let us just stop right there. Please note how purposeful God is, how intentional God is. Nothing is random in His selections. He is not flipping a coin in heaven and nothing is capricious. God has divine design for everything in the entire universe, even those who are passed over and God allows to remain in their sin. And let me give you a cross reference at this point, Proverbs 16 verse 4, “The Lord has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil,” close quote. Now, let us be clear. God is not the author of evil. God is not the author of sin, but God is the author of a master plan that includes evil and includes sin. And God has created everything, even the wicked for the day of evil, yet God is not charged with being the author of evil but let us be absolutely clear He is the author of the plan that includes evil. The mystery of all mysteries that no one can answer is the origin of evil. Every theologian has a mystery point, and we must be careful where we put that mystery point. And for us who are careful students of the Scripture, the mystery point is the origin of evil, but God is not the author. He has not created evil in the heart of Pharaoh. So, let us look at this verse again, “For this very purpose.” So, this is not something again that happens haphazardly; no, God very purposefully, “I raised you up to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” Again, God is the speaker and please note these personal pronouns: I, My, again My. This is very much God. And please note, this is not Satan saying this. This is not the devil saying this. This is God saying this. You know, I used to see the bumper sticker, “God votes for you, the devil votes against you, and you have the deciding vote.” Well, nothing could be more contrary to the Bible and to the truth of the Word of God. All that matters is, what does God vote? The world is not being run by democracy; it is being run by a theocracy, the vote of One, that being God Himself. So notice, “I raised you up,” and He is speaking to Pharaoh. God raised Pharaoh up to be the ruler of Egypt and God raised Pharaoh up to be the object of His wrath and His judgment. God is the one who raised him up. Why did God raise him up? That God would be glorified even in Pharaoh by putting the power of His judgment on display in Pharaoh.  “I raised you up to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” We are still talking about Pharaoh. We are still talking about what God did with Pharaoh. And God is glorified. We see the power of God unleashed in Pharaoh’s life. We see God’s wrath and His vengeance and His fury, even His long-suffering and patience to endure and put up with a sinner like Pharaoh. And yet, God raised him up that God would use him in order to release the people of God in the Exodus so that they would be free now to go to the promised land. And so, in this verse we see the doctrine of reprobation. So, this is what theologians call “double predestination.” Double predestination is, not only has God chosen some to be saved, but God has passed over others to suffer the torment of their own devices and their own choices. If some are elect, others are non-elect. It has to be that way. If there is a Jacob whom I love, there is an Esau whom I hated. If there is a Moses upon whom God has shown mercy, there is a Pharaoh whom God has raised up actively to be put under His wrath. So, this is double predestination, and I want to clarify that the non-elect are already sinful and are already filled with all sorts of evil. God is hardening those who are already sinful. God is not creating sin and putting it into the heart of Pharaoh. God is not creating evil and depositing that into the soul of Pharaoh. No, there is evil and there is sin already in Pharaoh because he was conceived in sin. He came forth from his mother’s womb speaking lies. The sin of Adam has already been charged to his account. The sin nature of Adam has been passed down through each successive generation to Pharaoh. Pharaoh entered into this world with his mind already darkened, his heart already defiled, and his will already dead. God is now hardening the one who is already sinful and already evil, and God is hardening Pharaoh in his own willful sin. It is the doctrine of reprobation. So, everyone in heaven is there by God’s sovereign will. Everyone in hell is there by their own will and by their own choice. So, it is a careful distinction. So, this leads now to number six, “The Conclusion.” Paul now synthesizes the point that he has been making starting in verse 14 in addressing the issue, “Is God’s choosing unfair?” So, now the conclusion, verse 18 begins, “So then,” and that has a conclusion feel to it, doesn’t it? “So then,” and I want you to note now how many times the word “He” is mentioned in verse 18. “He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.” Four times in this one verse Paul says “He” and each mention of “He” refers to God the Father. It is the doctrine of election, “He has mercy on whom He desires,” and it is the doctrine of reprobation, “and He hardens whom He desires.” So, with these two doctrines we see that God is free in dispensing His sovereign mercy as He desires, and God is free to leave others in their own sin and hardening them in the sin that they have chosen. I would remind us of Romans 1:24, 26, and 28, “God gave them over.” God gave them over three times. Here, God is hardening those whom He has given over to their own sin. So, this clearly teaches the sovereignty of God in salvation, right? I think of two verses, Psalm 115 verse 3. It says, “God does whatever He pleases.” God does whatever He pleases. God does all that He pleases. God does when He pleases, with whom He pleases, how He pleases, where He pleases. Psalm 115 verse 3, “For our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases.” And Psalm 103 verse 19…I remember one time R.C. Sproul asked me to preach on this verse. R.C. told me, Dr. Sproul told me, he said, “The sovereignty of God is God’s favorite doctrine.” And he said, “It would be your favorite doctrine if you were God because it means you are totally in charge of everything.” Psalm 103 verse 19, here is the text he gave me to preach. “The Lord has established His throne in the heavens, and His sovereignty rules over all.” So, God by Himself has established His own throne of sovereignty. No one voted Him in, and no one will vote Him out. No one ushered Him in and no one will impeach Him from His throne of sovereignty. God has established His own throne in the heavens and His sovereignty rules over all. So, what is the application for this? I want to leave you with three “so what’s.” So what do we need to take from these verses? Number one, these verses give us correct thinking about God. And I would remind you what A.W. Tozer said: “The most important thing about you is what comes into your mind when you think of God.” Everything else is an overflow of what is at the epicenter of your heart and soul. It’s what comes into your mind when you think of God. What we have just looked at has to be at the very center of what we think about God. It is not everything about God. There are many attributes of God, but this is a part of what must be in our knowledge of God, and any knowledge of God that is without this is an inadequate and insufficient understanding of who God is. And so, these verses give us the picture of God’s supreme authority over His creation to deal with his creation as He pleases. That is number one. Number two. These verses humble hearts before God. They humble our hearts before God. If you are a believer in Jesus Christ today, I can tell you, you are a believer not because this originated with you to believe in Christ. This originated with God for you to believe in Christ, and this should drop us to our knees this day that God did not pass us over. He would have been perfectly just if He had left us as we were, but that God chose to have mercy upon us. Every one of us in our heart right now this moment should say, “Why me,” comma, “Lord?” Question mark. And for reasons known only to God, based upon nothing that was any good within us because there was nothing morally good within us, God chose to have mercy and that mercy was motivated by His compassion toward us. So, it would be an oxymoron for us or oxymoronic for us to be proud and arrogant because we know this. No, we should be the most humble people, that God has opened our eyes and opened our hearts to behold this. And the last thing that I want you to see is not only should this correct our thinking about God and humble our hearts before God, but this should strengthen our faith in God, that it is this God who is it work within us both to will and to work for His good pleasure, being “confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you shall perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” This sovereign God who chose you in eternity past now within time will never abandon you. He will never walk away from you. He will always be at work in you, and He will accomplish good things through your life. This sovereign God who has laid hold of you will never let go of you, and He will accomplish all of His good pleasure in your life. He has foreordained good works for you to walk in, and this God who has called you to Himself now walks with you to enable you. He goes before you to open whatever doors need to be opened, to remove whatever obstacles need to be removed. He comes behind you to protect you from any ambush. He is under you to uphold you. He is over you to sustain you. He will provide everything that is necessary in your Christian life for you to advance and to be used by Him. So, this truth of the sovereignty of God in your salvation should bolster your faith and your confidence in Him. Further, it should give you great assurance of your salvation because you wouldn’t even be here today, you wouldn’t even have love in your heart for God, you wouldn’t even have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ if God had not chosen you from eternity past and worked within your soul within time. Because it is all of God should give you greater confidence in your salvation. If it was dependent upon me, I would be second-guessing myself. I would be wondering, “Am I in? Am I out? Have I done enough?” If it was eighty percent God and twenty percent me, then I would still be in Nowheresville about any assurance. There would still be gaps in my confidence. But the fact that “from Him and through Him and to Him are all things,” I now have confidence in my salvation that it is God who has begun this work, and it is God who is at work within me, and it is God who will bring this work to completion. So, this truth gives us great confidence that God will see us all the way through to heaven. What He started in eternity past, He will bring to completion in eternity future, and there will be no dropouts along the way. No one will slip through the cracks. God is God, and God will see this through. So, is there any unfairness with God? The answer is no. Genesis 18:25 says that God does only what is right. And so, with us He has chosen to have mercy. On others, He has hardened their hearts. We will not censor God in this Bible study. We will not edit the Bible. The Bible speaks pure unvarnished, unadulterated truth. And so, “Let God be God and let every man be found a liar” as Romans 3 verse 4 says. So, Kent will take some questions however you feel like we should do this. Let me just say we will be here next week. And Paul doesn’t take his foot off the gas pedal. Next week is, “God is the potter and we are the clay,” and He will make from the same lump vessels of mercy and vessels of wrath, and it will only intensify yet further.

God’s Love-Hate Relationships, Part 2 – Romans 9:13

OnePassion Ministries February 28, 2019

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Alright guys, we are in Romans 9, Romans 9, and we are going to look at one verse today, which we started to look at two weeks ago, but Romans chapter 9. I just want to read the one verse, put it back before your eyes, and I think you know what it is. Romans 9 verse 13, “Just as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'” I really want us to get our arms around this verse and really understand and I don’t want to belabor this. I want to keep our pace going through Romans. However, we come to certain verses that really require some explanation more so than other passages. And this just happens to be one of those verses that I think we really need to just pause for a moment because there are so many strands of theology that run through this text and intersect with this verse that we really need to have, I think, an accurate understanding of what this means. We have already looked at the first part of this verse. I said the authority Paul quoted, “Just as it is written,” and the affection God has, “Jacob I loved.” But now Roman numeral III, the animosity God has. “He says, “but Esau I hated.” And I want to just jump into this without much of an introduction at all because I don’t know that I even have time to squeeze all this in, because there is so much to be said. Let us just walk through this. Second half, it is a quote from Malachi chapter 1 verse 3. The second half begins “but,” which is a sharp contrast with God’s love for Jacob. It is antithetical. It is the opposite of what He has for Jacob. He says, “but Esau,” and just to remind you Esau is the older twin brother of Jacob. He says, “I.” The “I” is God the Father. So, this is God the Father personally, directly, perfectly saying, “but Esau.” God is the speaker. “But Esau I hated.” It is a strong statement. It is a Greek word miseo, which means “to detest, to have hostility for, to have animosity toward.” It is the very opposite of “love.” And I admit every time I read this, this is still somewhat shocking, if not stunning and sobering. So, the question is how are we to understand this? Well, there are many things that God hates. Let us just begin here, because God is a holy God. God hates false worship. Deuteronomy 12:31, God says, “Every abominable act the Lord hates.” God hates idolatry, Deuteronomy 16:22, “You shall not set up for yourself a sacred pillar, which the Lord your God hates.” God hates all unrighteousness, which is meaning all sin. God hates all sin. Proverbs 6 verse 16, “There are six things which the Lord hates, yes seven which are an abomination to Him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil, a false witness who utters lies and one who spreads strife among brothers,” close quote. Got hates all those sins. God hates pride. Proverbs 8 verse 12, “The Lord hates evil;” semi-colon, “pride, arrogance, and the evil way, the perverted mouth, God says, ‘I hate.'” So, God has to hate sin in order to be a holy God. If God ever was less than hate toward sin, it would water down and dilute His holiness. God hates hypocrisy, Isaiah 1 verse 14. God just interrupts the worship of His people and He says, “Bring your worthless offerings no longer. Incense is an abomination to Me. I cannot endure iniquity. I hate your new moon festivals. They have become a burden to Me. So, God hates hypocrisy in worship, and He hates wrong forms of worship. Amos 5:21, “I hate, I reject your festivals, nor do I delight in solemn assemblies.” So just to put this out on the table, let us just be reminded that God hates all sin. It is repugnant to His holy nature. Psalm 45 verse 7, “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.” If we want God to love righteousness, He must by necessity hate wickedness. So, God is not indifferent towards sin. He is not neutral towards what is contrary to His holy character. But here is the sticking point. Here is the bone in the throat. Here is the conundrum. We know that God hates sin. Here is the question. Does God hate the sinner? We know God hates sin. Does God hate the sinner? And sometimes we hear, “Well, God hates the sin but He loves the sinner.” So, we have to ask ourselves the question, “Does that pass the test?” So, there are two possibilities. Number one possible interpretation: This means to love less. For example, in Luke 14 verse 26, Jesus said, “If anyone comes to Me, he must hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters – yes even his own life, or he cannot be My disciple.” The interpretation of that verse is found in Matthew 10 verse 38 where Jesus Himself tells us that we must love Him more than mother or father or wife or children or brother or sister. So, in that comparison, it actually does mean to love less. So, that is one possibility. And to take that into this text, then the interpretation would be that God simply loved Jacob more than He loved Esau, that He loved Esau less than He loved Jacob. So, that’s possibility number one. And there are countless formidable theologians who interpret it that way. So, they are heavyweights. They are not lightweights, and they base their interpretation on the Luke 14 and the Matthew 10. Now, here is the other option, that hate actually means “hate,” that it is a very straightforward statement. And this is how I take it, and I want to support and substantiate why I take it this way. Now, this is not a matter of orthodoxy. It is an in-house debate among Bible teachers and theologians. However, I think it is a very important issue. It is a very important issue in evangelism. It is a very important issue in missions. It is a very important issue even in how we couch the gospel and what our motivation is to help reach people for Christ. Because if we just go up to someone and say, “Smile! God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life,” hey, my mother loves me too. You know, my wife loves me. So, what is the big deal God loves me? It is a whole different ball game if the point is God is angry with the wicked, but this God who is angry with the wicked extends love in the cross. That has a whole different impact and would cause the person who hears this to run to Christ. If I am under the wrath of God and I must find refuge this moment, and I hear that love is extended to me in the gospel and in the cross that God shows love towards those whom He hates, that makes this amazing grace. But if you are extending grace to those you already love, well that is nice. So, I want to give you a bunch of reasons why I think it is this way. I have got nine reasons. So, you can just number these as we go through this. Number one, holy God hates everything contrary to His own holy nature. Now, I have already stated that, but just to reinforce that here at the beginning, God loves righteousness, but He hates iniquity. That is the character of God. That is the very nature of God. God is not ambivalent towards that which is contrary to His holy nature. Second, sin and the sinner cannot be separated. It is a false dichotomy. God doesn’t send sin to hell; He sends the sinner to hell. You can’t dissect the two. And I want to give you some verses for us to think about. You may or may not want to turn to these. But in the book of Hebrews, Hebrews 3 and verse 7, we see that the wrath of God is upon the sinner. It is not just that it is upon the sin, but the wrath of God presently is upon the sinner, and the wrath of God is an expression of His holy anger and righteous indignation towards the sinner. So, we must understand that. So, in Hebrews 3 and beginning in verse 7, the Scripture says, “Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says,” and he now quotes Psalm 95, “Today.” There is a sense of urgency. “Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as when they provoked me.” “They” is a personal pronoun. It is the person that has provoked God because of their sin. It is not just that the sin has provoked God, but God is neutral towards the sinner or loving towards the sinner or has no animosity towards the sinner but only hates the sin. No. Hebrews 3 verse 8 says that that God is provoked by the sinner. Then, in verse 9 of Hebrews 3, “where your fathers tried Me by testing Me and saw My works for forty years.” It was the forefathers who actually tested God because of their sin. Then in verse 10, “Therefore, I was angry with this generation.” “Generation” refers to the people. God was angry with the people. You can’t give a free pass and say, “Well, God was only angry with the sin, but He was just lukewarm towards the sinner.” No, this text says God was angry with this generation and said, “They always go astray in their heart, and they did not want My ways.” Verse 11, “As I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.” And this word for “wrath” is the Greek word orge. We talked about that in the past. It comes into the English language as “orgy,” which is “heated passions,” like in a sexual orgy.  In this case in a positive direction, God’s heated passion against sinners. So, there is no false dichotomy between the sinner and the sin. We can’t separate those two. Further, in Hebrews 10 and verse 26, another warning passage in the book of Hebrews. Hebrews 10 verse 26, “For if we,” referring now personal pronoun “we,” “if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.” God’s wrath is not going to consume just the sin; God’s wrath is going to consume His adversaries. That is, the sinner. We come down to verse 29, “How much severer punishment do you think he,” that is a personal pronoun. Not “it.” “He.” “How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve, who,” that is another personal pronoun. “Who has trampled underfoot the Son of God and regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant.” So, God’s severer punishment rests upon the person, not just the sin. And then in verse 30, “For we know Him who said, ‘Vengeance is mine; I will repay,’ and again, ‘The Lord will judge His people.'” Not just judge the sin. It says here very clearly, He will judge His people. So, you can’t segment, you can’t separate. Then verse 31, “It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. And by the way, that is in the New Testament. It is not sin that is going to fall into the hands of the living God; it is the sinner with his sin that will fall into the hands of the living God. So, that is the second reason why I can’t go with “love less,” because God is angry with the sinner. Now, the third reason. I have got nine of these so hang in here with me. The third reason, and this to me is an extraordinary argument. Number three, the psalmist clearly states that God hates the sinner, not just the sin. So, come with me to the book of Psalms, and you are actually going to want to come with me for this because I may camp here for a moment. And by way of introduction, what I want to bring to your attention is we are going to look at Psalm 2, Psalm 5, Psalm 7, and Psalm 11. And I want you to just even hear as I say those Psalms where they are placed in the book of Psalms. The book of Psalms is not arranged in chronological order. Psalm 90 was the first Psalm to be written. Psalm 126 was the last psalm to be written. These were compiled years after they were written, and they are placed in a certain order intentionally. There is an intentional frontloading of the book of Psalms of God’s anger towards sinners who are outside of His grace, and it is to awaken them to their need to depart from the way of the wicked and enter to the way of the righteous, which is what Psalm 1 talks about. It is contrasting the way of the righteous and the way of the wicked. That is Psalm 1. As soon as you just come to Psalm 2, there are threats to the wicked of God’s anger towards them intended to move them off of the way of the wicked onto the way of the righteous. So, in Psalm 2 for example, “Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing?” This refers to all of the nations of the world, and it refers to all of the nations of the world in every generation, that there is a global conspiracy against God. There is a global rising up among the nations and among the peoples against God. It is true of every generation of human history, and peoples and nations are intentionally in the plural. Verse 2: “The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together.” They are presiding over the nations and over the kings of the earth, and here is the conspiracy against the Lord and against His Anointed. “His Anointed” refers ultimately to the Lord Jesus Christ. “Anointed” means “Messiah,” mashiach. Initially, it refers to the anointed king of Israel, the surrounding nations around Israel and their revolt against God’s people, but it refers ultimately to Christ, and it is quoted that way in the New Testament. So, this is what they say in verse 3. “Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us.” The idea is they don’t want to be tied down with God’s moral law. They don’t want to be tied down with God’s design for the family. They don’t want to be tied down with ethical and moral issues. They want to be free to go their own way. They don’t want the constraints of God to be upon them. So, that is what they are saying in their heart and with their mouth. Men, we are living in this generation. We don’t want the Ten Commandments. We don’t want to be told how to live. We want to be free to go our own way. So, how does God respond to this in verse 4? “He,” that is God, “who sits enthroned,” sits in the heavens, “laughs.” It is not the laughter of hilarity; it is the laughter of scorn. It is the laughter of ridicule. The Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in his fury saying, “But as for Me, I have installed my king upon Zion, my holy mountain.” “Despite your rebellion,” God says, “I have enthroned My Son at My right hand and I will execute My purposes on the earth, and it is utterly laughable that you think you could throw off My sovereign reign over the earth.” All of the nations together, God laughs at it. “You puny little man think you can override My sovereignty,” and God scoffs and God mocks and God speaks to them in His anger and terrifies them in His fury. This is a long way from “Smile! God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” So, continue to look. Verse 7, “I will surely tell the decree of the Lord: He said to me, ‘You are My Son, today I have begotten you. Ask of Me, and I will surely…'” This is the Father speaking to the Son. This is an inner-Trinitarian conversation. “Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance and the very ends of the earth as your possession.” So, the Father says to the Son, “Just ask Me because I am going to give it. Just ask Me for the nations.” Now, sometimes missions conferences will use this text as their missions conference. You don’t want to use this for a missions conference because verse 9 is what the Father commands the Son to do with the nations. “You will break them with a rod of iron; you shall shatter them like earthenware.” God is angry and He gives them to the Son. They are like an earthen pot, and the Son is commanded by the Father to take a rod of iron and come down with omnipotence and to smash into a million pieces the nations in the fury of His anger. Look at verse 10, “Now,” and here is the mercy of God. Here is the grace of God. He shows grace to those to whom He is angry. So verse 10, “Now, therefore, O kings,'” and it is also directed to all the peoples under the kings, all the citizens, “show discernment.” In other words, this is insane for you to try to reject God and refuse God. He is not a docile grandfather up in heaven. “Show discernment; take warning O judges of the earth.” Why? Because the Judge of heaven and earth is about to judge the judges, the Supreme Court of heaven and earth is about to be in session. “O judges, take warning.” Verse 11, “Worship the Lord with reverence and rejoice with trembling.” There is a crack in the door. There is a moment in time for you to turn from your rebellion and turn to this God who is angry with you, but now is showing mercy and grace to you. Verse 12: “Do homage to the Son.” I like the Old King James that says, “Kiss the Son.” And the picture is not just run up to the throne of God, hop in His lap, and kiss Him. No. When a conquered king would suffer an ignominious defeat, he would be drug back to the conquering king’s palace. He would enter into the palace and the victorious king would have his throne elevated such that anyone who would come into his palace would have to look up to the king. And when the defeated king would come into the palace, he would have to go to his knees and get on all fours and kiss the feet of the victorious king to show his submission to the victorious king. So, in verse 12 when it says, “Kiss the Son,” it is not kind of a warm fuzzy kiss; it is to acknowledge that you are in subjection to the King of kings and to the Lord of lords. “Do homage to the Son.” Please note, “lest He become angry and you perish in the way, for His wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!” So, this God is extending mercy towards those with whom He is angry. So, there is this love-hate relationship. Now, come to Psalm 5, and I think it becomes more specific or clearer rather. Psalm 5 verse 4, “For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness.” God is not in moral no man’s land towards wickedness. God takes no pleasure in wickedness. Why? “No evil dwells with You.” Verse 5, “The boastful shall not stand before Your eyes. You hate all who do iniquity.” Please note He doesn’t just hate the iniquity; He hates the one who practices and commits the iniquity. “You hate all who do iniquity.” Verse 6: “You destroy those who speak falsehood. The Lord abhors the man of bloodshed and deceit.” That is why I cannot go with “love less.” These are very strong heated passions that God has towards those who are in their sin. Now, just so you know the word “abhors,” I looked it up. It means “to loathe, to detest, to reject, to treat as abhorrent.” Now, come to Psalm 7. Psalm 7 and verse 11, “God is a righteous judge.” So, you know what that means? Righteousness means you reward obedience, there is retribution for disobedience, that it cuts both ways. God is a righteous Judge and a God who has indignation every day. Now, we normally think of indignation on the last day. We normally think of God’s indignation throughout all eternity future, but this says God has indignation this day. God has indignation every day. God doesn’t suddenly become indignant on the last day, something other than what He is now today. What God feels on the last day is exactly what He feels on this day. He has indignation every day. So, it misrepresents the point to just say to everyone, “Smile! God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” That is a distortion of reality. No, He has indignation every day. Now, look at the next two verses. God is represented as a divine Warrior who is at war with sinners, and God is pictured as this moment now ready to unleash this wrath, not having to wait to the last day. So, notice verse 12, “If a man does not repent, He,” God, “will sharpen His sword.” In other words, the sword must be so razor sharp that it will pierce through the soul all the way down to the bone. “He,” God, “has bent His bow and made it ready.” In other words, it is not laying over there on the shelf and at the end of the age God will walk over for the Great White Throne Judgment and then pick up the bow, but right now God is just docile. No, it is already in God’s hand, the bow. It is already bent. The arrows of His wrath are already loaded in the arrow, and it is aimed at the center this very moment. So, please note verse 13. “He,” God, “has prepared for Himself deadly weapons.” He is not going to wait till the last day to prepare these weapons. He has already taken action and they are now prepared. He has made deadly weapons. Not little flesh wound weapons, a little slap on the wrist, but deadly weapons to take down the one that it is directed towards. Now, the end of verse 13, “He makes His arrows fiery shafts.” In other words, it is not just enough that He propels an arrow into the soul of the sinner. That is not enough. He torches the shaft of the arrow so that it is on fire so that when it plummets into the heart of the sinner it will explode with wrath. And as Charles Haddon Spurgeon says in Treasury of David God never misses the target. We have to have room in our understanding of God for an angry God. God is angry with the wicked every day. And I want to remind you these are not backloaded, Psalm 144, 145, 143. We kind of hide God’s anger. These are frontloaded. As soon as you come into the book of Psalms, “Wow! I need to take God serious.” Alright. Psalm 11, Psalm 11 beginning in verse 4. “The Lord is in His holy temple; the Lord’s throne is in heaven. His eyes behold. His eyelids test the sons of men,” meaning God is auditing the hearts and the motives of all upon the earth. “The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence His soul hates.” God doesn’t just hate the violence; He hates the one who loves violence. We have got to have this adult understanding of who God is. And Psalm 95 verse 10, I will just read it quickly. “For forty years, I loathed this generation. I swore in My anger, ‘They will not enter My rest,'” God angry with the sinner. This actually intensifies the love of God and the grace of God that, He would show mercy toward those with whom He is rightly angry. Number four, I may have to pick up the pace, the wrath of God. And I have already said this, but I am going to make this a separate heading here. The wrath of God rests upon the unbelieving sinner, not merely his sin. I have already said this, but let me just take you to John 3 and verse 36, John 3 and verse 36. I have just enough time to read the end of verse 36. “He who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides,” present tense verb, “on him.” The wrath of God right now this very moment is upon all who are outside of Christ. Now, number five, the Malachi context indicates this is real hatred. So, if you want to turn to Malachi chapter 1. It is the last book in the Old Testament, the Italian prophet Malachi. I had to break the ice here just for a moment under this intense teaching. You imagine somebody who’s just turned in and has never watched one of our men’s studies before and we are just like going through this. Alright, Malachi 1 verse 2, “I have loved Jacob,” now verse 3, “but I have hated Esau.” Now, context, context, context helps us interpret Scripture. So, we need to see what follows. “But I have hated Esau,” and this word “hate” by the way is a Hebrew word sane, which means “to personally hate.” God is the speaker, “I have hated Esau.” Now, notice what follows. “I have made his mountains,” Esau’s mountains, and it is referring to the territory of ancient Edom. “I have made his mountains a desolation, appointed his inheritance to the jackals of the wilderness,” which just means a barren wasteland. Verse 4, “I will tear down the people toward whom the Lord is indignant forever.” This hardly sounds like “loves less” to me. I mean, this isn’t that God loves Esau less; this is God is pretty furious with Esau. And He has every reason to be furious with Esau because Esau is a sinner just like Jacob was a sinner. What is hard to understand is how God could love Jacob. It is not hard to understand how God would hate Esau. I get how he hates Esau. Esau is a sinner. What I don’t understand is the infinite mercy and grace of God to love Jacob. And this word “indignant.” Do you see it in verse 4, that the Lord is indignant forever? I looked up this word, zaam. It means “to foam at the mouth.” It means “to be enraged.” It means “to abhor.” It means “to be angry.” And please note for how long God is indignant. Forever. Esau was a reprobate. So, to interpret Romans 9:13 by going back to the original context in Malachi 1 verses 3 and 4, the context screams, no, this is not “love less.” This is a holy God violently reacting against the one who is contrary to His own nature. Now, number six. What follows in Romans 9 hardly seems like “loves less.” So, come back to Romans 9 and we will look at the context of Romans 9, which will be an extension of what we read here in verse 13 of Romans 9, “Esau I hated.” So, what do the following verses say that would give some indication, is this love less or is this actually a righteous anger? Well, I will point us to two verses. The first is verse 18. “He, God, “hardens whom He desires.” That is a personal pronoun “whom.” Not He hardens “what” He desires. He hardens “whom” He desires. It is the person. And then in verse 22, it becomes all the more obvious to me, “vessels of wrath prepared for destruction.” That hardly seems like “loves less.” That sounds pretty strong to me. Vessels deserving the wrath of God that were prepared by God’s sovereignty for destruction. Number seven. An unbeliever cannot be loved by God in this world but then suddenly be hated by Him five seconds after his death. I mean, death doesn’t change how God sees the person. You can’t be the object of His saving love in this world, but you just reject it in unbelief; you die and in five seconds now He hates you. No, there is continuity. What He feels for you after death is what He feels for you before death. And Malachi 3 verse 6 says, “I the Lord do not change.” It is the immutability of God. If He loves you now, then He is going to have to love you in hell. That is kind of a strange teaching. No, what He feels now will be unleashed in its expression, “after death.” Number eight. In the book of Revelation, it hardly seems that God loves the unregenerate sinner in the last days in this life within time. In Revelation chapter 6 and in verse 12, and I take the book Revelation in a futuristic way describing the end of the age, but it doesn’t change if someone has an amillennial view or a postmillennial view. That doesn’t change. In fact, it would only intensify this all the more. Verse 12, “I looked when He broke this sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood; and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, ‘Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of their wrath has come, and who is able to stand?'” It is a rhetorical question, the answer of which is, “No one outside of Christ will be able to stand in the great day of His wrath.” That is referring to human history. That is referring to present time, space, dimension history. It is not referring to hell one day, that God’s wrath poured out upon a planet that has been in defiant rejection of Him since the beginning of time. It has been building and it has been building. Revelation 8:12 and 13, Revelation 14:9 through 11, “Then another angel, a third one, followed me, saying with a loud voice, ‘If  anyone worships the beast and his image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he will also drink of the wine of the wrath, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of His anger; and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they have no rest and day and night, those who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name.” This is God’s wrath unleashed upon this world at the end of the age, and it will then descend down into hell and the floodgates of His wrath will be opened in fullest measure. Finally, Revelation 16:4 through 7. It is the third bowl of His judgment. I am not going to read it, but it is just there. You can read it on your own. I mean, we cannot lose sight of this aspect of God and who God is, that God is not ambivalent or indifferent towards the sinner and his sin in this world. That is why someone who is outside of Christ should flee to Christ, should run to Christ to find refuge and to find protection from this wrath of God. So, I believe that in Romans 9 and verse 13 when He says, “but Esau I hated,” I think there is an aspect of the holiness of God that finds the sinner abhorrent in his sin. But God has demonstrated His love toward us, in that “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” It is with this black velvet backdrop of His anger towards sinners that God has taken the diamonds of His grace and mercy and placed them upon the black velvet backdrop. And it is the black velvet backdrop that causes the diamond to shine so brightly. I have told you before; I will tell it again. I promise I won’t tell it again. This will be the last time I use this illustration, that when I asked my wife to marry me here in Dallas, I went downtown and someone pointed me to a jeweler. I got in an elevator, went up to some floor, walked in. “I’d like to buy a diamond for the engagement ring for my wife to be.” The counter salesman on the other side pulls out a drawer, begins to put diamonds onto the counter. I looked at those diamonds. Nothing really leaped off the page to catch my attention. Nothing really stood out. “Have you got any more?” And he reaches down, puts some more out. They just kind of all looked mediocre to me. He said, “Well, wait just one second!” He reached under the counter and he pulled out a black velvet pad. He puts the black velvet pad down and with tweezers he picks up a diamond and places it on the pad. And there were all these lights overhead. And when that diamond got onto the black pad, it was like that diamond exploded with light because all of the light in the room, it was as though it was being sucked in and through the diamond, and it just began to sparkle and radiate and it was just so beautiful. It was like this diamond was on fire. Well, what was the difference? It was the black velvet backdrop underneath that made the diamond seem so beautiful. It is the same with God’s love and grace. If you just say, “Hey, smile! God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life,” I mean, I need almost NoDoz to keep me awake when I hear that. Yeah? Okay. So what? So what He loves me? What is the big deal about that? Now, you put that black velvet backdrop. God is angry with you because you have lived in rebellion against Him. You have been in defiance of this God. And God in heaven is a holy God and God is angry with the wicked every day, and He has bent His bow, and He has fiery shafts that are aimed at your soul this very moment. But He is a God of love who extends grace and mercy to you this very moment. You need to run away from His wrath and run to His arms of forgiving mercy, and He will receive you and He will save you from His wrath. You see, salvation is salvation from God. You and I need to be saved from God, and there is only One who can save from God and that is God Himself. It is the mercy of God that saves us from the wrath of God, and it is only the mercy of God that can save you from the wrath of God, and it is only the wrath of God that makes the mercy of God have great value to you. So, I have wanted to take this time to talk about this verse because I think it is a major theological point. I am going to stop a few minutes short. I have got in my notes here Jonathan Edwards’ Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, but I think you got the point. You can Google search Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. I think Jonathan Edwards hit the nail on the head, and I think that is one reason why the greatest movement of the Spirit of God on American soil in all of American history was in The Great Awakening because it was preaching that preached the full counsel of God. And God was so drawn to bless that kind of preaching that Jonathan Edwards brought, that George Whitefield brought, that the other preachers of The Great Awakening as they preached not just a loving God, but they preached an angry God as well. And it is as if there were “amens” from heaven and God sent the power the Holy Spirit upon that kind of teaching and preaching. So, we need that back in the pulpits of our churches again. We need that back on the streets. We need that in the psyche and the mindset of people that God is not a doting aging grandfather up in heaven just patting people on the head, but He is angry with the wicked but He extends mercy and grace to those towards whom He is angry. It makes the cross of Jesus Christ shine brighter than ten thousand suns in the sky above. So, alright, I know this was heavy. I know this was a big one, but I did not want us to just speed past verse 13. I am not going to micro-exegete the rest of the book of Romans like this. We will pick up the pace, but ever so often we just need to slow down to make sure we see what we are passing and for it to be in us.

God’s Love-Hate Relationships, Part 1 – Romans 9:13

OnePassion Ministries February 14, 2019

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Alright guys, let me start with a word of prayer: Father, as we look into Your Word, give us clarity of insight and discernment, understanding, and then more than that, may these truths have great impact upon our soul, shape us, mold us, conform us yet further into the image of Christ. And so, we commit this to You. I pray for those who are watching by livestream and who watch this later as it is posted. May this lesson have eternal impact. We pray this in Christ’s name. Amen. All right, Romans chapter 9. Here we go sports fans. We are going to look at one verse, and I don’t know whether to apologize or not, but it is probably going to be one half of one verse. So, let me just read Romans 9 and verse 13. “Just as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'” I am slowing down, as Kent would say, “tapping the brakes,” to look at this one verse because there are so many threads of theology that are woven through this verse, which is why I don’t think I can get it all in. This is one of those verses you open the door, you think it’s a closet door and you open it and you look in and it is the astrodome. You know, it gets bigger the more you look at it, and so it is certainly one of the most controversial verses in the entire Bible and yet here it is. And we are Bible believers so what do we do with this. And this text is hard-hitting, it is shocking, and I am not going to apologize for it. I am not going to soften the blow of what it says. There will be no censoring of this or editing of this, but the real issue is what in the world does this mean and how does this square with John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” And yet here I read, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” I mean, does God love some more than others? Does God actually hate people? Those are some real questions that arise from just anyone reading this verse, and so I really want us to take our time. And as I look at verse 13, a lot of times what I do I just take a verse and I draw a little diagonal line where I see the divisions are. And so, as I look at verse 13, I see three divisions. So, “Just as it is written,” and then there’s a little diagonal line, “Jacob I loved,” diagonal line, “but Esau I hated.” So, three sections. Sinclair Ferguson once told me about Alexander McLaren that he had the golden hammer. He was a nineteenth century Scottish preacher. He could just tap a text and it would break out into three equal parts. So, I have unsheathed the golden hammer and I have tapped the text. And “just as it is written,” that is the authority Paul quotes. Then, “Jacob I loved,” that is the affection God showed. And then, “but Esau I hated,” that is the animosity God has. So, this verse easily divides out. So, I think we will have time to look at the first two of those headings, and a week from today, unless I go through this more swiftly than I think, we will look at the animosity next week. But it is all woven together and we can’t even understand the second half of this verse until we understand the first half. So, here we go guys. Let us start with the authority Paul quotes. Paul begins verse 13, “Just as it is written.” And so, he now quotes Malachi 1 verses 2 and 3. As I told you last week, this entire ninth chapter of Romans is just a series of Old Testament quotations. So, this is one of like fifteen Old Testament direct quotations in Romans chapter 9. So, Paul is like firing these Bible verses from the Old Testament like he has got two six-gun shooters in both hands and he is just firing these Old Testament passages. And this is just one of those from Malachi 1, and the impact of this is it is really a double authority. It would be enough if Paul just said it because he’s an apostle who speaks directly from the head of the church, the Lord Jesus Christ; but for an apostle to quote the Old Testament, that just doubly reinforces the authority of what is being said here.  And so, however we interpret this, it is irrefutable and it is authoritative because Paul is citing Old Testament Scripture, and to disagree with the rest of verse 13 would actually be to disagree with God Himself. So, before we even try to untie the knot here and understand what is being said, I mean let us remember that this is the Word of God and we cannot play fast and loose with this and we can’t shave the rough edges off of this. This is the Word of God and Paul is quoting this as the Word of God. And so, before I go any further, let me just make this point of application. Would you be open to what this says? And will you embrace the rest of this verse after we have seen that it is a direct citation from the Old Testament? Are you willing to be taught by God? And would you be willing to set aside any preconceived notions about what you think this says and embrace whatever is the true interpretation of this passage of Scripture? That’s a question that each one of us must answer. I graduated from seminary when I was thirty years old. I am now sixty-seven. I have found over those thirty-seven years that once someone hits forty-five years of age they have lost all capacity to think, and there is a hardening of the categories that has set in and your mind is made up.  “Don’t confuse me with the facts.” And when I have taught this to people in their twenties and their thirties, they go to the mission field, they go to seminary. They are all in with what this says. So, I don’t know how old you are or where you find yourself, but once you hit a certain age you have got blinders on. And I want you, if you are over forty-five, to take those blinders off and to deal honestly with this passage of Scripture. Let the Word of God speak for itself. So that is the authority Paul quotes, which leads now into the very heart of this. Second, the affection God showed: “Jacob I loved,” just three words. Let me make some observations. It is an unusual sentence in that it begins with the object of the sentence, then the subject, then the verb. Normally, when we talk, we go subject, verb, object. “Jacob I loved.” But this moves Jacob to the beginning of the sentence purposefully. It is called the emphatic position. If you want to emphasize a word you move it to the very front. And so, as we look at this, Paul in quoting Malachi, the emphasis here is on Jacob. Jacob? You kidding me? The deceiver, who connived the birthright from his older brother and tricked him, conned him? God chose to love Jacob? I mean, there should be a sense of astonishment as we see even the name Jacob here. And so, it is emphasized by being moved to the beginning of the sentence. Second word: “I.” “Jacob I.” The “I” refers to God the Father and we already talked about in Romans 8:29 and 30, “Those whom He foreknew He predestined, and those whom He predestined He called, He justified, He glorified.” The “He” refers to God the Father. So, I want you to hear me say one more time the forgotten member of the Trinity is God the Father. Strangely enough. Everything is flowing from God the Father, and it is God the Father who chose to love Jacob. The word “loved” means God chose to set His affections upon Jacob and God did so not on the basis of anything good in Jacob’s life. I mean, he was a sinner like his brother Esau was a sinner. And a case can be made he was just as much of a sinner as his brother was a sinner. So, this choice has nothing to do with Jacob himself. It is simply the sovereign will and good pleasure of God the Father just like it was in your life in eternity past when God chose to love you and when God chose to set His heart upon you in eternity past, that you weren’t any better than your brother or your sister who is still outside of Christ. You weren’t any better than who you went to school with, who lived next door to you, who may be outside of Christ. It is simply because it pleased God. It all originates with God. It has nothing to do with any foreseen good works. I mean, he has already made that point so abundantly clear. Verse 11, “For though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him,” God the Father, “who calls.” So, this is all according to the discretion of God. Now, a careful distinction needs to be made here between two aspects of God’s love. R.C. Sproul, I have told you before, has told me several times theologians have to make very careful distinctions. You can’t become an omelet in your mind. You have got to make careful distinctions. So, I want to make a distinction here between two aspects of the love of God or you are going to lose your ball on the weeds, okay? Kent? Number one, there is God’s general love for all mankind. And then number two, there is God’s saving love that is reserved exclusively for the elect. Those are two different aspects of God’s love and I want to walk us through both of those right now. This is an important theological distinction we are making. So, number one, there is God’s general love for all mankind. It is God’s general goodness that is just poured out on the entire world, upon the world population whether you are a believer or an unbeliever. There is God’s goodness that is poured out even on the animal kingdom, upon the earth itself. God has lavished His goodness, His kindness, His general love upon all, and it gives temporal blessings, temporal blessings. And some people receive more of these temporal blessings than other people receive. Some people are born in more advantageous positions in the world. Some people are born with better health. Some people are born with better lot in life. Some people are born with a higher IQ. Some people are born with physical handicaps, etc. So, there are all different levels of this general love that God has splashed and poured out upon the human race. It is a non-saving love. There are no eternal benefits or blessings that come with this general love, okay? Now, I want us to turn to a passage, and I want to stay here just for a minute or so, to Matthew 5, to Matthew chapter 5. And this is probably the signature text on this. Matthew 5 verse 43, Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said.” Now, stop right there. What they have heard said was the Pharisees’ wrong interpretation of the law. And so, Jesus will correct their wrong interpretation. “You have heard that it was said, but I say unto you,” and when He says, “but I say unto you,” He gives the correct interpretation. It is not a new interpretation; it is just the correct interpretation that they should have had all along. So, verse 43, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor.'” That is a direct quote from Leviticus 19 verse 18. And then they throw in this, “and hate your enemy.” God never said to hate your enemy. It is a contorted twist of Deuteronomy 23:3 through 6 talking about idolaters and they are to not have any part in the land. They are to be kept out. And so, the Pharisees took that beyond the true interpretation, and they just took that to mean we are supposed to hate anyone that is not like us. And so, they have put a firewall around themselves; everyone on the inside we love, everyone on the outside we hate. And that is where the apostate Judaism had diminished to. So, verse 44, Jesus corrects that, “But I say to you,” and let me say it again, this is not a new interpretation; this is just the correct interpretation, “love your enemies.” And that is an imperative command. We are commanded to love our enemies; not just our neighbor, but our enemies. Those who do not love us, we are to love, and those who are unlovely we are to love. Even lost people can love people who are like them. The acid test for us is to love people who are against us. And then He adds, “And pray for those who persecute you.” And that is an expression of love, and many times we pray selfishly just so that they will stop the persecution. No, this prayer is for their good that they would come to a saving knowledge of the Lord. Now, verse 45, this is the key verse. “So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.” And the meaning of that is so you can be like your Father who is in heaven. And what is God like in heaven? God loves His enemies. God has a love even for His enemies. And what he will go on to describe here is a general love that God has for His enemies that is a non-saving love that gives temporal blessings. “For,” and now is the explanation, “He,” God the Father, “causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good.” That verb “causes,” God actively, intentionally, premeditatively causes His sun…I love the way it is referred to as that is God’s sun. “That is My sun, and I am going to cause it to shine even on those who are My enemies as well as on those who are not My enemies, who are My sons.” So, there is no discrimination here between those who are evil and those who are good as it relates to God’s general love. And then, he goes a step further just to tighten the screw and reinforce this. “And sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” That is how good God is. He just opens the heavens and He pours out the rain on unbelievers, on those of totally different political affiliations, of those who even hate human life and human dignity. God is so good that He continues to pour out His goodness even on those who are enemies of the gospel and who are enemies of His cause. In fact, God often gives even greater expressions of general love to unbelievers than He even does to believers. And Psalm 73 is all about when Asaph goes into the temple and he sees the rich people coming into the temple, and they are just fat because they have so much food to eat, and they are just dressed to the nines, and they have so much money to give when they give their tithe. And Asaph was at a point where maybe it is better to be an unbeliever than to be a believer because God is pouring out more expressions of His general love upon unbelievers than He is upon believers. I mean, this is the antithesis of the health-wealth prosperity gospel. Selah, think about that, pause and meditate. And so, God delights in showering His goodness even on His enemies. So, this is His general love and it comes under the category of what we call common grace. And common grace is different from saving grace. Common grace is just God’s general love that is extended to unbelievers and it comes in many different forms. God is so good He allows even unbelievers to enjoy life here upon the earth to different degrees. He allows the unbeliever to be married even like the believer can be married to have the pleasure of an intimate relationship with your wife, to have children, to have grandchildren. That is not restricted to believers. That is how God’s cup is just overflowing in general love even to unbelievers. He allows unbelievers to have a job and to draw a salary and to be able to buy a house, and in many cases a good house, a very nice house, to enjoy nature, to go on trips, to go on vacations. The unbeliever can enjoy art and architecture and sports and music and concerts. All of this is a direct outpouring of God’s general love upon mankind. He allows unbelievers to receive medical care, to be able to go to hospitals, to have doctors and nurses. He even allows unbelievers to hear the truth and to hear the truth of the gospel that to some extent with some unbelievers brings a sense of blessing just to be intellectually even stimulated. He allows them to go to school and to university and to have their mind expanded and taught in so many ways. So, all of these are expressions of God’s general love that He has for all mankind. And the psalmist says God is good to all, some more so than to others, but God has lavished His general love upon this earth. In fact, God is even good to the animals. If you are still in Matthew, look at Matthew 6 and verse 26. This is how loving God is. In Matthew 6 verse 26 he says, “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow or reap or gather into barns, and your heavenly Father feeds them.” So, it is not just even reserved to people. And if we had time to go back to Job 38 to 41 and just read how God has created the animal kingdom and how God has put the instincts within them and God feeds them and God provides for them, even the animal kingdom. And you know, God will say to Job, “Job, I can’t remember where you were when we created all of this. I can’t quite remember.” And God is very sarcastic with Job and this is a just an echo of that. And then He says, “Are you not worth much more than they?” And as God says this, there are unbelievers. This is an evangelistic sermon. That is why in chapter 7 at the end of the sermon He says, “Enter by the narrow gate,” and “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven.” So, Jesus is speaking these words even to unbelievers. In Romans 2, I think it is verse 4, says, “Even the goodness of God should lead you to repentance as God has just lavished these temporal blessings upon you. Can you not see how good God has been to you?” And then in verse 28 of Matthew 6, He says, “Observe how the lilies of the field grow; and they do not toil nor do they spin. If God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you?” These are clear objective, demonstrative expressions of the love of God, the general love of God pouring out temporal blessings. Let me give you one more passage. I just want to nail this down. Acts 14 and verse 17, Paul as he is preaching in, I think it is Lystra on his first missionary journey. He is in Galatia. And in Acts 14 and verse 17. Again, this is just an expression of God’s general love. “He,” meaning God, “did not leave Himself without witness in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven, fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.” This is an evangelistic sermon. I mean, he’s saying this to unbelievers beginning at the widest point before he will narrow it down to the exclusivity of salvation in Christ alone. But he has just thrown open the gates to draw in the listener, “How good God has been to you! And He has satisfied you, and He has given you gladness and food and all the rest.” So that is the first aspect of God’s love and we need to understand this, God’s general non-saving love that gives temporal blessings, which leads now to the second aspect as we wade deeper into the pool. And that is God’s special saving love that is reserved exclusively for His elect. He loves His elect in a way that He does not love the non-elect. He has a love for the non-elect, but it is not a saving love. It is not a special love. And so, we have to make this distinction, and it is just like when I used to go into the nursery at church when I first had our twin boys. And I went back and I remember there was such a baby boom, and we had to go buy baby beds and there weren’t enough baby beds. We bought more and we ran out of room. We had to build a special arm of the church just to house the nursery. And so, I would go after the worship service down to the nursery to pick up James and Andrew, and there were all of these babies. Well, there is a sense in which I loved all of them, but there were two that my heart was set upon. There was two that I would pick up and take home with me. There were two that I said, “You’re mine.” There were two that I am so committed to you I will take care of all of your needs whatever that is. And in much the same way, God has a general love for the world, but only a special saving love for His elect. And I want to give you some verses for this and it is just out of this immediate context. So, come back to Romans 9 and specifically I want you to see Romans 8:29, what we looked at a couple weeks ago but just to remind you of what you already know. In Romans 8 and verse 29, we read, “For those whom He foreknew.” So, just stop right there. We talked about how the word “foreknew” does not mean foresight. It means those whom God previously chose to love. That is what the word “foreknowledge” means. And to know someone is to love someone in the biblical sense. Genesis 4 verse 1, “Adam knew his wife and she conceived and gave birth to a son.” So, to foreknow is to forelove. That is God’s loving heart set upon those whom He chooses to save. So, just to remind you even in Romans 8:29 that the word “foreknowledge” means to be previously loved by God before the foundation of the world. There’s no other meaning for that. Now in Romans 9, as we continue, we will be looking at it in future weeks, probably in two weeks, in verse 15, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” That is God’s special love. That is God’s saving love, just the abundance of mercy upon those who are ruined by the devastation of sin, God choosing to have mercy upon them and selecting them to be His own out of the fallen human race and to send His Son to redeem them and to send the Spirit to regenerate them. That is God’s special saving mercy, God’s tender compassion that goes far deeper than just His general love to clothe the birds and to give food to the body. Now, also in verse 18, “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.” So, there is a very clear distinction just like in verse 13, “Jacob I loved, and Esau I hated.” There are some that God has mercy upon and there are some that God hardens. And the mercy in verse 18 is obviously not a general love, because He has a general love even for those whom He hardens. He has mercy, in verse 18, upon those for whom He has a special saving love who are identified in verse 23 as “vessels of mercy.” “Vessels of mercy prepared beforehand for glory.” That is election, but His election is not a stoic election. It is not like God is in heaven just making chess moves in eternity past and just sheer logic and analytical analysis and God is like an air traffic controller in heaven. No, no, no, no. God set His heart of blazing love that all of the oceans of the earth could not extinguish, that flaming, blazing love and affection and mercy and compassion that God has for His elect. You and I have no comprehension how much God loves us. You and I have no comprehension for how long God has loved us. And so, this special love is set upon His elect in a way that is distinguished from those whom He hardens. He doesn’t love with a saving love those whom He hardens. Now, let me just give you a couple of more cross-references just so we can drive this nail down into the board. Ephesians 1 verses 4 and 5, a text with which you are most familiar, but let us hear it again. Ephesians 1 verse 4. I will give you a second to find it. I love seeing the Bibles here on this table where there is so much yellow marked up in your Bible. That is great. Spurgeon used to say, “Whenever you see someone with the Bible that’s falling apart, you know their life is not.” So, I love seeing your Bibles marked up. I just like seeing Bibles, period. When guys are like following me on this thing, I have no idea what you are watching, but it is not better than this, I will tell you that. So, Ephesians 1 verse 4, “Just as He,” God the Father, “chose us,” His elect, “in Him,” Christ, “before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him.” Please note, we are chosen not just for heaven; we are chosen for holiness before we get to heaven. Now, please note, “In love, He,” God the Father, “predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will.” You know, sometimes when people first see this, they go, “That’s the harshest truth I’ve ever seen.” No, it is the total opposite. This is the most loving truth you have ever seen. God did not have to choose any of us. I mean, the whole human race could have just plummeted into the bowels of hell and God would have been perfectly holy and just. That God would choose even one of us out of this room to be saved would be an inexpressible expression of love. That was a double entendre there, “an inexpressible expression of love,” indescribable expression of love. But for God to choose a vast multitude that no one can count in heaven, how high and deep and wide and broad must the love of God be to lavish such love on so many of His elect! This isn’t harsh. This is the most loving, gracious, kind truth you could ever hear. And if verses 4 and 5 say anything, it is “in love” and “according to the kind intention of His will.” How do you get harsh out of that? Let me just give you a couple more in Colossians 3 and verse 12 as long as we are just here in the neighborhood. And this is a Bible study. This is different than just a Sunday morning sermon where we can trace out some of this and not lose you. In Colossians 3 verse 12, “So then, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved.” Do you see how those who are chosen are those who are deeply loved? We are the beloved of God. And then in 2 Thessalonians 2 and verse 13, it is just one other quick text to see, and Paul writes, “But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord because God has chosen you.” You see, He chose us in great love. Now, the expression of this great love caused Him to do several things. It caused Him, number one, to design the gospel. God the Father is the Author and the Architect of the gospel itself, the plan of salvation. That is an expression of God’s love. And then to give us the elect to the Son in eternity past to be His chosen bride and to be His love gift. That is an expression of love of the Father that He gave us to the Son long before He even ever created the world. That was the love of the Father that did that. And then third, the Father gave the terms of condition to the Son that are necessary to redeem this chosen bride, that the Father spelled out that, “You would have to be willing to come into this world and to be born of a virgin under the law and to live a sinless perfect life and go to a cross and die on behalf of Your bride.” It was the Father that set the terms for the Son, but that was much love demonstrated towards us that the Father spelled out for the Son what He would have to do in order to secure our salvation. And then the love of the Father was also shown in the commissioning of the Son from heaven. What a departure that was! I mean, I have read of the last breakfast David Livingstone had with his father and mother before he left Glasgow to go to the heart of Africa and to never see them again and the passage of Scripture that they prayed over at that breakfast table knowing they would never see their son again. I mean, what a tender scene that is. Ten thousand times ten thousand times ten thousand more is that scene in heaven where the Father bids the Son farewell to depart His bosom and to enter into this world of woe and darkness in order to be our Redeemer. What love was in the Father to be willing to give up His Son! I mean, I remember when I took my two twins to college out in Los Angeles and I am pastoring in Mobile, Alabama. I mean my wife and I just went back to the hotel and just wept, just wept, couldn’t stop crying over at giving them to this school to no longer be at our side. Think of the love of the Father to give up His Son and to give up His Son for rebels and enemies. What love must there be in the Father to do this! And then on top of that, to send the Holy Spirit into this world to conceive in the womb of Mary the humanity and the body of Christ, and then to anoint Him in the River Jordan to empower Him for the rest of His life. And to keep Him secure on the cross, the Spirit of God empowering Christ in His humanity to remain steadfast upon that cross, “as He learned obedience through the things He suffered,” Hebrews 5:8. What great love the Father has! And then to send the Holy Spirit into the world to find you and to find me and to search out this world until He found each of His elect and then to convict us and to call us and to regenerate us, birth us into the kingdom, what love the Father has for us! And when He says, “Jacob I loved,” there is a world of truth behind that. This goes far beyond “He loved me, He loved me not,” and just pealing petals off of a flower. The heart of God, not just the mind and the will of God, but even the heart and the affections of God is so involved in all of this. As I said, we have no comprehension how much God the Father loves us. And then, throughout our Christian life, every step of the way, He has gone before us, He has guided us, He has led us, He has provided us, He has supported us, He has defended us. You know, it is beyond comprehension. So, that is the affection God has, deep galaxies of affection for us that whatever we feel for our own children is like one drop in all of the oceans of the world. It is but nothing compared to His infinite love. Now, I want to make one last theological point with you and then we will stop for questions. And the point that I want to make here is that though the elect were loved by the Father in eternity past, before they were converted, they were nevertheless under the wrath of God. So, I want you to turn to Ephesians 2 and this will be our last passage. Ephesians 2, and I want you to see this in light of everything that we have just discussed. Yes, God loved us from eternity past, but as we came into this world and before we experientially received the love of the Father in the new birth, we were under the wrath of God, even we the elect. So, in Ephesians 2 verse 1, I just want to draw this to your attention so that we can get as much of the full counsel of God on the table as we can. Beginning at verse 1 Ephesians 2, “And you.” Just stop right there. Who is the “you?” The “you” goes back to chapter 1. It has to go back to chapter 1 because it is first verse of chapter 2. It goes back to verses 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 13, 14, 15, 16; the whole of chapter 1. The “you” is those who were chosen by God before the foundation of the world, who in love were predestined according to the kind intention of His will. That is who the “you” is. “And you were in the past dead in your trespasses and sins.” Though we were loved by the Father in eternity past, we were born without any spiritual life when we came into this world. And then verse 2, “in which you,” again referring to those who are the elect. “In which you formerly,” these are your BC days, Before Christ. “Formally walked according to the course of this world.” There was no saving grace in you. You were just like dead fish floating downstream just like everybody else in the world. You were going the same way on the same path with the same priorities. And then it gets worse, not better. He says in the middle of verse 2, “According to the prince of the power of the air.” Well, you know who that is.  That is the evil one. That is Satan. That is the devil. And you were going according to the prince of the power of the air. You were held captive by a personal devil. You were in chains of darkness. That is why you didn’t have freedom of will. The devil had a hold of you and he wouldn’t let you go. And then he adds, “Of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.” You were disobedient to the Father just like the whole rest of the global population. Yes, you were chosen before the foundation of the world. But before you were regenerated and born again, even if your parents brought you to church, even if you were baptized, even if you went through a confirmation class, even if you were in Awana, even if you memorized all the verses, until you were converted you were dead in your sins. D-E-A-D. And you were held by the prince of the power of the air and you were a son of disobedience. You were not a son of obedience to God; you were a son of disobedience. You went your own way, you did your own thing when you wanted to do it, how you wanted to do it. And then verse 3, “And among them.” The “them” refers to this whole world unconverted. “We too.” The “we” refers to the elect of God, okay? “We too all.” In other words, we were thrown in with the world, all of us together, before we were converted. We weren’t any better. We may have been worse. “We too formerly,” BC days, “lived in the lusts of our flesh.” Listen, we were swimming in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh. And this is a global statement for all of the elect, every single one in that church in Ephesus as Paul is writing this letter and it is to be a circulated letter to go to Colossae and then from there to the rest of the Roman Empire, every one of the elect. It says, “Indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind.” You weren’t Mr. Goody Two Shoes. You were indulging the desires of your flesh. Now, here is what I want you to see. All this is for this. “And were by nature.” That is talking about your sinful nature, your sinful flesh, not just what you did on the outside; it is what you were on the inside. “Were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” So, what does that mean, children of wrath? It is a Hebraism for children deserving wrath. I mean, there was no covering over you. You were deserving wrath. You were under wrath. The Reformation Study Bible, alright that is as Reformed as you’re going to get in theology, okay? The Reformation Study Bible footnote says, “exposed to the just anger of God.” Though you were loved with a special saving love from all eternity past, before the reality of this saving grace was applied to your life, you were exposed to the just anger of God just like everybody else. And the ESV Study Bible, which is theologically very sound, says in its footnote, “You were subject to God’s condemnation.” That is what that means, “children of wrath.” You weren’t in neutral zone. You weren’t in no man’s land. There is no such theological category. You were in darkness, and you were under divine wrath. So, as we preach the gospel, as we share Christ with our children, with our family members, with our next-door neighbor, we don’t know who the elect are. Spurgeon said, “God hasn’t put a big “E” on their forehead to make this easy for us.” I mean, we just have to go tell the gospel to everybody, but even the elect. So, as we witness Christ to everyone, if you are outside of Christ whether you are elect or not elect, you are under the wrath of God and you are children of wrath even as the rest. So, let us maintain this theological distinction. And hyper-Calvinism, of which we are not, says that the elect were never under this wrath, that they were in fact justified in eternity past and that they were in essence saved in eternity past. That is rubbish. No, this text clearly says that even the elect within time were dead in trespasses and sin, walking according to the course of this world, were walking according to the prince of the power of the air, were indulging the desires of the flesh and the lusts of the flesh, and were by nature children deserving wrath until that day God called you by name to Himself. In great love, God set His heart upon us in eternity past, we who are the elect of God, and then within time called us to Himself out of wrath and out of the great danger of condemnation. That is what makes the miracle of the new birth so extraordinary. Now, I am going to end with this. How do you know if you are elect? It is very simple. Believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. And if you will believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and commit your life to Him, you are numbered among the elect. And that took place in eternity past. And the illustration has been given that as you approach this door, over the door it says, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” That is all you need to know. You are “whosoever.” That is broad enough for the entire human race. You can drive a semi-truck through that door and you see, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” You go, “That’s what I want to do. That’s me,” and you take that step of faith and you come through that door and you enter into the kingdom of heaven. You leave the evil world system and you enter into the kingdom of light. And you turn around and you look at that door, and on the other side of the door as you look back at it, it says, “Chosen in Christ before the foundation of world.” Well, that was on that backside of the door all along. You just couldn’t see it. You just didn’t know it. You can only see this side of the door. Only God knows what is on the other side of the door. That is a closed book on the other side of the door. All you need to know is the free offer of the gospel that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And if you have truly believed in Christ, it will make a difference in your life. It will change your life. There is no way you can commit your life to Christ and stay committed to the world. You commit your life to Christ, He becomes the Lord of your life and He now is the one who is directing and leading everything. So, as I close this, here’s the question: Have you called upon the name of the Lord for salvation? No one else can do that for you. Your wife can’t do it for you. Your children can’t do it for you. Even God can’t do that for you. You yourself must believe in Jesus Christ. And so, may God give you the grace to do that. And for those watching by livestream, wherever you are geographically, wherever you are spiritually, if you have never called on the name of Christ do so this very moment. The Bible says, “Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, today is the day of salvation.” You may never have an opportunity like this again to hear the gospel presented to you, and so I plead with you to commit your life to Christ this very moment. And Jesus says, “He who comes unto Me, I will in no wise cast out.”

Has the Word of God Failed? – Romans 9:6-13

OnePassion Ministries February 7, 2019

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Alright, Romans chapter 9, beginning in verse 6. The title of this is “Has the Word of God Failed?” And I think it’ll be very obvious why the title is what it is. I want to first begin by reading, starting in verse 6: “But it is not as though the Word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel, nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but ‘Through Isaac your descendants will be named.’ That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. For this is the word of promise: ‘At this time I will come, and Sarah will have a son.’ And not only this, but there was Rebecca also when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac, for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad – so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls. It was said to her, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ Just as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'” Now, these are blockbuster verses, to say the least. In these verses, there is an issue that Paul is addressing, and in order to understand these verses we need to understand what is on Paul’s mind to address, and it is very simply the issue that he anticipates is on the mind of the readers, the believers in Rome, and it is what he anticipates is on your mind and on my mind. And so, Paul is like a good attorney who will bring an issue up before the other attorney can bring it up. So, Paul wants to get this out on the table and in essence unplug a question that would hinder the readers from fully buying in to everything that he is saying. And here is the issue: God has promised to bless the nation Israel. God promised Abraham to make him the father of a great nation, but look around. Israel is now hardened in unbelief. Israel is now apostate. And that was true not only in the first century; that is true today. And so, any thinking person would ask the question, so what happened to the Word of God? What happened to the promises of God because God promised to make Israel a great nation and to pour out spiritual blessing upon the nation Israel, right? And we just looked in Romans chapter 8 that those whom He foreknew He predestined, He justified, He called, He glorified. There is an irrevocable, unalterable, eternal purpose of God in sovereign election. And the nation Israel, that’s the chosen people of God and the election of God it’s irrevocable. So, what happened? Why are the chosen people, it doesn’t appear to be they’re chosen? So, that’s the issue on the table. And if you’re thinking, and I know you’re thinking, then this has to be addressed. Now, as we wade into Romans 9, we are wading into some deep waters, okay? And so, we are going to have to take our time as we go through this because any one verse could raise fifty questions, and so we want to address this. So, by way of introduction, let me just give you a big picture here just for a moment. There are three questions that Paul will address and raise and answer, and these serve as the markers through this chapter. The first deals with verse 6, which I just raised, “Has the Word of God failed?” That’s in verse 6. And so, from 6 to 13, he will answer this question, “Has the Word of God failed?” “Has the promise of God failed?” Second question is in verse 14, “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there?” The second question is, “Is God unjust?” Because when you look at the doctrine of election, when you initially look at it you might come to the conclusion, that’s not fair for God to choose some and to pass over others. So, Paul knows that that’s on the forefront of the readers’ minds and on your mind and my mind. So, in verses 14 through 18, he will address that question, is God unfair, is God unjust to choose some but not others? Then in verse 19 is the third question, and in verse 19 we read, “You will say to me then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?'” And that question is, how can God still hold us responsible? If God chooses, how does He still hold me responsible? Or to put it another way, why does God still blame us? So, with each of these questions, these are questions that Paul anticipates is raised in the mind of the reader and in the mind of anyone who is confronted with these truths. And these are questions that I have raised. It is not unspiritual to necessarily raise these questions, though we will see with the third question Paul will slam the door shut and he will say, “You have gone way too far with God. It’s none of your business to cross-examine God. Keep those questions to yourself. God is God; you’re not.” So, with that last question, it will be very direct. You will want to be here for that study. So, we are working away. This is like climbing a mountain. This is like climbing Mount Everest, alright? And it’s just going to go higher and higher and higher. So, here we begin the ascent up. And I’ve got three headings to give you now as we look at verses 6 through 13, and I’m not certain we are going to get through all of this, alright? So, the first heading is the affirmation of Scripture, the affirmation of Scripture, and that is in 6a. So, Paul begins, “But it is not as though the Word of God has failed.” Though he doesn’t state it in a question, in his mind he knows people are asking this question, “Has the Word of God failed? You promised You were going to bless Israel, and Israel is hardened in unbelief, and the church is now becoming a Gentile church.” So, this is what Paul will address. It is not as though the Word of God…and when he says “the Word of God,” he is referring to the promises that God gave to Israel. The word “failed,” it’s not as though the Word of God has failed, literally means “to fall,” like to fall over, to fall and no longer stand. So, it’s not as though the Word of God is no longer standing, is it? And so, Paul, as we go through this chapter, I just want you to see this, he is so brilliant the way he addresses this. He will use the Old Testament in the rest of this chapter to show, “No, the Word of God has not failed.” And he won’t just say it, he’ll show it. And so, what I want you to see, on my little piece of paper here I just went through all the verses and I’ll just say this rather quickly, but you can jot down some of these if you care. There are fifteen Old Testament citations that beginning in verse 7 going to verse 33, and Paul will use the Old Testament Scripture to show that the Old Testament Scripture has not failed. So, do you understand his pedagogy, the way he’s teaching this? So, let me just show you this and you can just let your eye go down the page. In verse 7, he quotes Genesis 21, verse 12. In verse 9, he quotes Genesis 18:10, and then it echoes in verse 14. So, maybe it’s sixteen citations. In verse 12 is Genesis 25:23. In verse 13, it’s Malachi 1:2 and 3. And if you use the New American Standard, like I do, these are in all capital letters. So, you know it’s an Old Testament quotation with the New American Standard because they’re put in all capital letters to help the reader understand what’s going on. In verse 15, he quotes Exodus 33 verse 19. In verse 17, it’s Exodus 9 verse 16. In verse 25, it’s Hosea 2 verse 23. In verse 26, it’s Hosea 1 verse 10. And I’m reading all this just so you will even feel the impact of what Paul’s doing. In verse 27, it’s Isaiah 10:22 and it’s also Genesis 22:17 and it’s Hosea 1 verse 10. In verse 28, it’s Isaiah 10 verse 23, and in verse 29 it’s Isaiah 1 verse 9, and in verse 33 it’s Isaiah 28 verse 16 and Isaiah 8 verse 14. Now, that was a mouthful to go through all that, and I hope I didn’t lose you. It sounds almost like I’m reading a phonebook, you know, going through all this, but there’s a point to be made that the Old Testament Scripture has not failed. And as Paul will make his argument, he will actually use the Old Testament Scripture to show that the Old Testament Scripture has not failed, that it was this way all along. So, he affirms the Old Testament Scripture. That’s number one. And we all know that. It’s impossible for God to lie. “The Word of God is living and active. It’s sharper than any two-edged sword.” “Heaven and earth will pass away before the Word of God will pass away.” Isaiah 40, verse 8: “The grass withers, the flower fades away; but the Word of our God abides forever,” et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. All of God’s promises are “Yea,” and “Amen,” 2 Corinthians 1. So, Paul begins by affirming that everything that was said in the Old Testament, even specifically about the future salvation of Israel, everything is going according to God’s eternal purpose and plan. There has been no deviation from the Word of God. The Word of God has not fallen over and collapsed. It’s standing stronger than it’s ever stood before. So, that’s the first thing to see. Now, the second half of verse 6 is the second heading, and it’s the clarification of Scripture because Paul now will clarify what he just stated at the beginning of verse 6. Now, this clarification is a very important clarification because it’s the key that will unlock the door that will let us into the following verses. It’s the key that will unlock the door. So, he says in the second half of verse 6, “For they.” Who’s the “they?” The “they” is ethnic Israel. The “they” is physical Israel. The “they” is someone who is born a Jew, a child of Abraham, okay? “For they.” Yeah, Dan, that would be you, alright? There you are right there. “For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel.” Now what does that mean, because it almost sounds like kind of double-talk, or…what does that mean? What this means is the first mention of Israel is “spiritual Israel.” It is, “believing Israel.” The second mention of Israel is the same as the “they.” It’s “physical Israel.” So, here’s the principle, here’s the point that within the larger circumference of ethnic Israel there is a smaller concentric circle that is the remnant, the believing remnant. And while God has chosen the entire nation to be His instrument, within physical Israel there is a smaller Israel that is the true Israel, that is the spiritual Israel. Let me put it another way. The larger circle are those who are born a Jew. The smaller inside circle are those who are born and born again a Jew. So, that’s the point that Paul is making for clarification. And the promises in the Old Testament Scripture were not made to the physical Israel as it relates to salvation. God never promised to save every Jew. The promise was for the remnant, and it was the remnant that He chose for salvation. Those are the ones whom He will call out of the nation into a saving relationship with Himself. Now, this is an important principle for us to understand because it’s easily applied to today. Well, first of all, not every Jew is a believing Jew. Dan here is a believing Jew, but the nation Israel is apostate right now. There are a relative handful. So, it’s grace upon grace, Dan. But the principle also applies to the church in this sense. Now, please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not a replacement theology guy. The church has not replaced Israel. Israel is still Israel. However, everybody who goes to church isn’t a believer. There are a lot of people who have a name on a church roll, but their name is not on the Lamb’s book of life or in the Lamb’s book of life. Not all the church is the church, just like not all Israel is Israel, and it’s possible to be in a church building and not be a believer just like it’s possible to go into McDonald’s and you’re not a hamburger, okay? It’s possible to sit in a garage and that doesn’t make you a car. And you can just come to this Bible study, and that doesn’t mean that you’re a Christian or a believer. Now, we are thrilled you are here, but what this means is every one of us must be absolutely certain that we are born again, that we have a personal saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. So, that’s the clarification that Paul is making. You won’t think that the promises of God have failed if you only understand that not all Israel is Israel, and God said it was that way from the very beginning. So, in essence, Paul is saying, “You need to go back and re-read your Old Testament,” because even in the Old Testament God said there would be a saving remnant within the nation. So, that leads us now to the third heading, which is the illustrations from Scripture, and that is in verses 7 through 13. Paul, master teacher that he is, the clarification wasn’t necessarily enough, he now wants to set before us two examples so that I can show you what I am saying. And the two examples he will set forth, Abraham and his sons, that’s in verses 6 through 8. And then, he will set forth Isaac and his sons. That’s verses 9 through 13. So, these are premier examples. These are not obscure examples that we don’t even know who this is. He begins with the father of the entire nation of Israel, Abraham, and then he goes to one of the sons of Abraham, Isaac. And by doing this, Paul is showing it was this way from the very beginning. Not all of Abraham’s sons believed, and not all of Isaac’s sons believed. So, when this stream first began to flow, there was a separation in the stream even as it began to flow. There began to be two tributaries flowing from the fountain. So, let’s begin with the first, and it’s Abraham and his sons starting in verse 7, “Nor are they all children.” Who are the “they?” The “they” is the same as the “they” in verse 6. The “they” refer to “sons of Abraham.” And when we say “sons of Abraham,” we mean physical sons of Abraham. That doesn’t necessarily mean spiritual sons, just physical sons of Abraham. So, he says “nor are they all children.” And when he says “children,” and you’ve got to keep your eye on the bouncing ball here, “children” here refers to “sons of God,” “spiritual sons of God.” So, he’s reinforcing the clarification that he just made at the end of verse 6, “nor are they all children.” All the children are not children. There are physical children, and within physical children there are spiritual children. So, he’s reaffirming that, and now he will, as we’ll go in verse 7, you’ll see where he is headed with this. “Because,” and when he says “because,” let me put it in the vernacular. We would say, “just simply because.” They are not all children just simply because they are Abraham’s descendants. In other words, no one is born a believer.  You have to be born again to be a believer. Back when I pastored, we used to have people write their testimony when they wanted to come join the church. And every once a while, I would get one of those testimonies where someone would say, “Oh, I’ve always been a believer. I have always been a Christian.” And we just like flashing red lights. “Timeout,” you know, “Come to the side,” lovingly, graciously, pastorally, but evangelistically, explain to them no one has always been a believer. No one was born into this world a believer. You have to be born again after you have been born in order to be a believer. So, that’s the point Paul is making in verse 7. “Nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants.” So, this is like John 1, verse 13, “who were born not of flesh, nor of the will of man, nor of,” there is another “nor,” I’m going blank, “but of God.” No one, just because your father is a believer doesn’t mean you’re a believer. That’s the point. God has many children, but He has no grandchildren, okay? Everyone has to be personally born again. So, let’s continue the verse now. “Nor are they all children because they are descendants, because they are Abraham’s descendants, but,” and the “but” indicates “rather,” “through Isaac your descendants will be named.” Now we go, “Now, wait a minute. Abraham had two sons. There was Ishmael through Hagar and there was Isaac through Sarah,” but what Paul is clarifying here is that it was Isaac, that son, is who God chose to save, not Ishmael. God passed over Ishmael and God chose to save Isaac. That’s abundantly clear. God was good to Ishmael. God gave him temporal blessings. He just did not choose him for eternal blessings, and so it was through Isaac. And he is quoting now Genesis 21 verse 12. So, even within Abraham’s sons, don’t miss this point, even within Abraham’s sons, Abraham being the father of the nation, not all of his physical descendants were believers, even with Abraham. Now, continue to follow this, “through Abraham your descendants,” and if you have the ESV, I think it says, “seed.” It’s a Greek word sperma, which comes into the English language as “sperm.” The idea is procreation. “Through Isaac your descendants,” your offspring, I guess maybe that’s what the ESV has, “offspring,” he’s talking about spiritual offspring, “will be named.” Now, I was digging around last night on this word “named,” and I thought, “So what does that mean?” Your translation may say “appointed.” So, I looked it up, and literally it is the word “called,” like the effectual call of God. And just like we saw in Romans 8:28 and 29, let me just remind you of that, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” That was verse 28. Then verse 30, “And these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called,” the very same Greek word. And just so you will note this, at the end of verse 11 it says, “so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls.” There it is again. Then in verse 24, “even us, whom He also called.” Verse 25: “I will call those who were not My people My people,” and in verse 26, “There they shall be called sons of the living God.” So, there is this sovereign effectual, irresistible call of God that goes to those whom God has chosen, and in this case, it was not Ishmael, but it was Isaac. And we’ll see in a minute, within Isaac’s family it wasn’t Esau, it was Jacob. So, not all Israel is Israel is the point. So, in verse 8, Paul being the good teacher that he is, he in essence says, “Let me explain myself more carefully.” So, verse 8 begins, “That is,” and good teachers are always using that phrase “that is,” “in other words,” “this is to say,” “let me restate that,” “simply put.” So that’s what Paul is doing here. He is just using repetition yet with different words. “That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God.” So, it is not those who are born physically a Jew who inherit salvation. I mean, you can be a Jew and go straight to hell, just like you can be a Gentile and go straight to hell. It’s those who are the children of God. So, please make a stark contrast in verse 8 between the children of the flesh and the children of God. The children of God are those who are born again. The children of God are those who have been sovereignly elected and effectually called by God, and that again is the remnant, the smaller concentric circle within the larger nation among Israel. So, just remember what Paul is addressing is, “Hey, the Word of God has not failed. God said in His Word from the very beginning, even with Abraham’s family, they’re not all going to be children of God.” And we’ll see in a moment even within Isaac’s family, they’re not all going to be children of God. So, in the middle of verse 8, we get to the “but,” and so he goes, “but the children of the promise.” “Children of the promise” is the same as “children of God” because God promised to save them. The children of the promise are regarded as descendants. And your translation may say “are counted as offspring.” “Regarded,” for those of you who work in the financial world, this “regarded” is an accounting term, logizomai, you can hear “logarithms” and “logic” in that, and it’s a very definite counting and calculating. The children of the promise, they are the ones who are counted by God as descendants, meaning “spiritual descendants.” So, the point is very clear. The Word of God has not failed. God never purposed to save the entire nation of Israel. God only purposed to save a remnant within Israel, just like it is in the church, just like it is in America. People say, “Well, we once were a Christian nation.” We were never all saved. I mean, there were a bunch of people that were saved, Whitefield and Edwards and the Great Awakening, but there were scores of unconverted people. Not all people even in a so-called Christian nation are born again. So, that’s the point that Paul is making here. Now, verse 9 will explain the content of the promise and why this promise is invincible and cannot fail, because the promise of God is executed by His sovereign call. So, let’s look at verse 9. “For this is the word of promise.” And the word was actually spoken by God to Sarah and to Abraham, “For this is the word of promise.” And the promise deals with the promise to save, the promise to make this one an object of God’s grace. So, he now quotes Genesis 18 verse 10. And Paul is a real expositor. I mean, he is just spitting out verses right and left. He is pulling the whole Bible together to make this point. He is using Scripture to teach Scripture. He is using Scripture to interpret Scripture. He is using Scripture to illustrate Scripture. This is tremendous. So, he quotes the verse, “At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.” Now, this son refers not to Ishmael; it refers to Isaac. And the speaker of this is God, and it goes back to Genesis 18 and it’s what we call a “theophany,” could be a “Christophany,” which means an appearance of God or an appearance of Christ before He entered this world. I mean, Jesus came to this world in the form of the angel of the Lord before His virgin birth. There were some isolated periodic times when Christ the second Person of the Godhead appeared, and this is one of those. In Genesis 18, there were three angels that appeared. Two were created angelic beings, one was the Angel, capital A, of the Lord, and the word “angel” just means messenger. So, Christ appeared as “the Angel” of the Lord, the One sent with the message of the Father. So, don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying Jesus is an angel like some Mormon teaching. No, He is simply referenced as “the messenger of the Lord” with God’s message. And this is God’s message, “I will come.” And the idea there is God will come and divinely intervene in the life of Sarah who is so old, she has passed the age of being able to conceive and bear a son. “I will come and Sarah shall have a son,” and that “shall” is a “shall” of divine certainty. It is a “shall” of divine invincibility that God will cause it to happen, and it will be a miraculous conception and it will be a miraculous son. And in some ways, it’s a foreshadowing by type of the virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, that He too would be born of a miraculous birth. And in some way by type, it is a foreshadowing of your new birth that that was a miraculous birth that it would have been impossible for you to have been born again, except God came and intervened in your spiritually dead heart, just like Sarah’s womb was physically dead, God caused it to live and for there to be life in that womb. And so, that’s the point that Paul is making as he quotes Genesis 18, that those whom God has chosen to save, God can make it happen. God will sovereignly, powerfully, supernaturally come and intervene in that life. And just like Isaac was supernaturally physically born, God can also cause the one chosen to be spiritually born. That’s the point that God is making. So, let’s look now at verse 10. We go now to Isaac’s sons. The point has been made that not all Israel is Israel. Isaac had one son that was chosen to be saved, another son that was not chosen to be saved. I guess I need to make this application. Even within families today that go to church, not everyone is necessarily saved. And you can have the same physical father and you be saved, but one of your siblings is not saved. That’s the way it was with Abraham. And for those of you who are fathers, if one of your sons is not a believer, it doesn’t necessarily mean you have done a horrible job being a father because even with Abraham, one believed, the other did not believe. There are the eternal purposes of God that will be worked out according to God’s own purpose. Now, someone may say, and it’s usually wives and mothers, “Wow, then I don’t want to have any more children because I don’t know that they’ll be chosen.” You’re not wiser than God. You’re not more loving than God. God will do exactly what’s right with each of your children. You just witness to them, love them, bring the gospel to them, take them to church, bring them to where the gospel is, pray for their salvation, but you just have to leave the results to God. Mom, you can’t save your children. Dad, you can’t save your children. Only God can save your children. You do your part, but at the end of the day God must do His part. So, this leads us now to verse 10, and I’d love to just look at verses 10 through 12, and we’ll pick up verse 13 next Thursday if we can do it that way. So, he keeps the logic going, and he comes to the second illustration now in verse 10. Excuse me, earlier I said it was versus 6 through 9. Yeah, okay, it was 6 through 9. I may have said Isaac’s sons were 9 through 13. I meant 10 through 13. You may need to correct that. So, now we are in verse 10, “And not only this.” That’s a way of saying…we would put it this way if I was just verbally speaking, “Well, let me give you another example.” “And not only this, but there was Rebecca also.” So, we were just talking about Sarah, Abraham’s wife. Now, let’s talk about Rebecca who is Isaac’s wife, “when she had conceived twins.” Now, I can understand this. I have a wife who conceived twins, and those twins are Jacob and Esau, “by one man, our father Isaac.” So, we understand the concept here. Verse 11, “for though the twins were not yet born.” So, it’s prenatal, I mean, in reality it’s before the foundation of the world. “For though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad.” So, what he is about to say, it will have nothing to do whether Jacob or Esau do this or don’t do that, it has nothing to do with them. “So that God’s purpose.” Now, you remember God’s purpose. That was in Romans 8:28. He says, “We know God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God to those who are called according to His purpose.” That’s talking about God’s eternal purpose. That’s talking about God’s eternal decree. That’s talking about God’s sovereign will from all eternity past. That’s talking about Plan A, and there is no Plan B. That’s what God’s purpose is. “According to His choice.” His choice here is referring to sovereign election, unconditional election, that Ephesians 1 verse 4, those whom God the Father chose by Himself and for Himself to be the chosen bride for His Son. God’s purpose according to His choice would stand. And I think there’s an intentional contrast between verse 6, where he says, “It’s not as though the Word of God has failed,” and the word “failed” means “to fall.” He now contrasts with, “No, God’s choice stands.” God’s choice and God’s purpose can never fall over. “Not because of works,” so it’s not on the basis of anything that God supposedly would have foreseen in Jacob or Esau but, so in other words here’s the way it actually is, “but because of Him,” God the Father, “who calls.” And the call brings into effect the result of His choice and purpose. So, God makes His choice based upon His purpose, and the call brings it into reality within time. The purpose and the choice is in eternity past, the call is within time. And the call is so powerful that when God calls that one whom He has chosen, they will respond because the Spirit of God will draw them and convict them and give them repentance and faith and then regenerate them. They will then in turn call upon the name of the Lord because they have first been called. Now, look at verse 12. “It was said to her,” and Paul now quotes Genesis 25:23, “The older will serve the younger.” Timeout. God just reversed everything because it’s the younger who serves the older, and what God is establishing here a principle is that God most often chooses the most unlikely ones to be His. God delights to reverse the way you think it would be. And so, often God chooses the one that appears to be the furthest away from Him and passes over the one that we would have said, “Oh, that’s the next one to be saved. I’m sure of that.” God delights in doing the unexpected. God delights in passing over the one we think would be the first-round lottery pick and reaching the one that for us would be the one that was never drafted, the most unlikely one. And that’s what happens here in verse 12. God completely reverses the order. Now, I’m just going to touch on verse 13, and I need more time for next week to unpack verse 13, but let me just kind of wade out, and then we’ll have discussion among ourselves and then anyone who wants to email us. Verse 13, “Just as it is written,” and so Paul just keeps quoting Scripture. And so, there’s a double authority as Paul quotes Scripture. It would have been enough for Paul as an apostle to say it is this way, but for Paul as an apostle to now quote Scripture, this is like two nails into the board to fasten it. “Jacob, I loved but Esau I hated.” And so, even within Isaac’s household, within the nation of Israel at that point, and at this point the nation Israel is just Abraham and Sarah and Isaac. And, you know, Rebecca is now kind of grafted in and now these two twins. It’s a pretty small circle of a nation at this point. God chooses to love Jacob.  And when He says, “Jacob, I loved,” that means, “Jacob I have chosen to love and to save.” And we know that from Romans 8:29 when he says, “Those whom He foreknew,” which means those whom He previously loved or those whom He previously chose to love. Now, “but Esau I hated,” and what that means is not that He loved Esau less, but that He actually rejected and because of His holiness and because of Esau’s unholiness, He actually had animosity for Esau, and rightly so because Esau left in his sin was a flagrant violation of the holiness of God. Now, next week I want to develop this, and there are other positions on this, and I want to acknowledge those and talk this out with you. But at this point, what you simply need to see is that God chose Jacob, and He did not choose Esau. That, we can at least agree on that. And that even at the very beginning when there’s only a handful within the nation, they weren’t all children of God, Esau was never a child of God though he was a child of Abraham and a child of Isaac. So, the Word of God has not failed even in Paul’s day in the first century when Israel rose up and crucified the Lord Jesus Christ and rejected Him and refused their Messiah, and the gospel then went to the Gentiles and Gentiles began to flood into the church. It wasn’t as if everything God said in the Old Testament had been invalidated. No, God is a promise keeper. God kept His Word because God never promised to save all Israel to begin with. It didn’t happen in Abraham’s family. It didn’t happen in Isaac’s family. Now, just a couple of points of application and then we’ll open it up and Ken if you have got anybody coming in or texting us, emailing us. If you are in a family where all your children are believers, you are blessed, beyond blessed, beyond blessed, beyond blessed, beyond blessed, because it’s not an automatic thing. God has opened the windows of heaven and poured out His mercy and His grace upon your household. You should be so stunned at the goodness and mercy of God. That’s number one. Number two, this should not prevent you from having children. You should have children, and you should bring the gospel to them, but it’s the same for your children just like it is for the people who live across the street. You can’t guarantee anyone’s salvation. You are going to have to leave the matter with God who does what’s right. And in these next questions that Paul will raise, we will see God is not unjust and God is not unfair, because “fair” would be God would choose no one and God would leave everyone in their sin. It’s mercy that God even chose and loved Jacob. It’s mercy that God even saved Isaac. It’s mercy that God even saved you. But it is not unjust for God not to save everyone. So, we need to understand we don’t want fair; we want mercy. We don’t want justice; we want mercy. You don’t want what you deserve, let me put it that way. You want what you do not deserve because of the Lord Jesus Christ. So those are the two primary points of application that I want to make here. And just to reinforce the main one at the end, God’s Word will never fail. And if there seems to be a contradiction, it’s not in the Bible. It’s in our understanding. The limitation is with you and me. It’s not with God, I promise you. And it’s not in the Word of God. It’s just that we need more clarification. We need better understanding, but the Scripture never contradicts itself and the Scripture never fails. And there may be a few knots tied, a few places in the Bible that you can’t quite sort out. You may just have to live with it, but be assured there is no problem in the book. The problem is with our understanding, and it may take another world before we actually have a few of those knots untied.

Burdened for the Lost – Romans 9:1-5

OnePassion Ministries January 31, 2019

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Alright, Romans chapter 9. Romans chapter 9, and we begin now this extraordinary chapter. So let me begin by reading the passage. If you’re taking notes, this is entitled, “Burdened for the Lost.” “Burdened for the Lost,” Romans chapter 9. We’re going to look at the first five verses today, we’re just going to put our toe in the pool of this extraordinary ocean of truth. Paul writes, “I am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.” So, with these verses we start a whole new section in the book of Romans. Romans 9, 10, and 11 stand as one unit and address a monumental question that Paul must answer. The question is this, if God is sovereign in salvation, if God chooses those whom He will save from before the foundation of the world, and if God irresistibly calls to faith in Jesus Christ every one of His chosen ones, as we just saw in Romans 8, then why are God’s chosen people, Israel, still in unbelief? That’s the question on the table. If God is really sovereign and has chosen people for salvation, then why are God’s chosen people not saved? That is the question, and Paul will take now three chapters to address this monumental question, and in these three chapters there is extraordinary truth for us to know and to have. So, why are God’s chosen people still lost? Why have God’s chosen people not chosen Christ? And so the question is, has the eternal will of God failed? Have the promises of God gone unfulfilled? And so, Romans 9 will present Paul’s magnum opus on the doctrine of sovereign election. Nowhere else in the entire Bible do we have a tour de force like what we have in Romans 9 in his presentation of the sovereign election of individuals for salvation from before the foundation of the world. And it will take us several weeks in February to plough our way through Romans 9, and I think it will be one of the most rewarding spiritual experiences that you will ever have in your Christian life. I don’t think that’s an overstatement. And what Paul will demonstrate to show is that within the chosen nation there is a remnant that are chosen for salvation, that not everyone in the chosen nation of Israel is chosen for salvation, and he will say and we’ll look at it next week, not all Israel is Israel. There is a larger circle of national Israel, but within the larger circle of national Israel, God always has a chosen people that is a smaller, concentric circle. It’s just like not everyone in the church is saved. There is a smaller circle within any church, within every church that actually really is regenerate and knows the Lord. So, not all Israel is Israel and not all the church is the church. And there is the sovereign election of God that is a smaller, tighter circle, and that is what Paul will set forth in this entire chapter of Romans chapter 9. And it will be breathtaking, it will be jaw-dropping as we will work our way through it. But first, this morning, the first five verses, and the importance of these first five verses to us – and this is still by way of introduction – is that we do not want to ever become callous or lukewarm toward unbelievers. We do not ever want to become cold Calvinists. We do not ever want to become one of the frozen chosen. We do not ever want to become callused about the state of unbelievers. And just because we believe in the doctrine of sovereign election, in no way whatsoever does that pour cold water on the flame in our heart. In fact, it pours gas on our heart, and it causes our heart to be ignited even more for those who need Christ. So, verses 1 through 5 in Romans 9 plays a very important part in how we view even the doctrine of sovereign election. It should never make us just merely academic or theological. It should never make us passive or apathetic. We want to put ourselves into the skin of the Apostle Paul in these opening verses, and his heartbeat must be on our heartbeat. And what we see here is Paul is deeply burdened for his fellow Jews who are without Christ, just like you and I need to be deeply burdened for our own family members who don’t know the Lord, for our own work associates who do not know the Lord. We can never see the world the same again. There needs to be deep sorrow within our hearts for those who are without Christ. I mean, when we go to the grocery store, when we go to a football game, when we go to the mall, there needs to be a recognition within our own heart, “Not all these people know the Lord, and I need to be concerned for them that they know Christ and as God gives me the opportunity for me to speak for the Lord Jesus Christ.” My wife yesterday was in a department store and shared with me giving a witness to a man as she was trying to find some shoes and talking to him at length as God just opens this door to walk right through it with a semi-truck, testifying to the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. God gives us these divine appointments, and we need to be spring-loaded and ready but we also need, within our own heart, to be moved for people who need Christ. So, let’s look at these verses. I’ve got a killer outline for us, alright! The first thing I want you to know is in verse 1, “Paul’s Affirmation.” Paul is about to say something that is so extreme and seems so over the top that he has to say what he says in verse 1 before we get to verses 2 and 3. So, verse 1 is Paul’s affirmation that he really is telling the truth, as he says this. So, he begins by saying, “I am telling the truth.” Now, let’s just stop right there. Paul, don’t you always tell us the truth? Hah! I mean, why would you say, “I’m telling the truth,” when you always tell the truth? Because what he’s about to tell us is so unbelievable that in a sense it takes this prelude to say, “No, I really am telling the truth.” And he is stressing and over stressing the veracity of what he is about to say. And then he adds, “in Christ.” Do you see that? And when he says “in Christ,” the essence of this is “I am calling on Christ Himself to bear witness that I am telling you the truth. I wouldn’t lie to you, but I sure wouldn’t lie in the presence of Jesus Christ to you,” and this is just like 2 Timothy 4 verse 1, where Paul says, you know, “I’m saying this to you in the presence of God and of Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and by His coming.” He brings Christ into this. This is almost like taking an oath, putting your hand on a Bible and saying, “I’m telling you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” If that were not enough, he then adds, “my conscience bearing me witness,” which is just another layer of emphasizing “What I’m saying to you is the genuine truth.” Your conscience is what distinguishes between what’s right and what’s wrong, and it’s like an inside smoke alarm that goes off when you don’t say something is true. As soon as it comes out of your mouth, your conscience reminds you, it awakens you and says, “You know that’s not true, you know you just exaggerated.” That’s your conscience, bearing witness to you on the inside. And Paul says, “My conscience is crystal clear and clean as I tell you this. I am not exaggerating.” And then, if that were not enough, he gives a fourth layer and adds “in the Holy Spirit.” And so, he now appeals to not only the second but to the third Person of the Trinity, the Spirit of truth. That’s how Jesus identified the Holy Spirit in John 14, the Spirit of truth. So, it’s even the Spirit of truth who testifies in my inner man that I’m telling you the truth in this. So, Paul bears down on the truth. And just a word of application, men, before I go any further, it is a mark of godliness to always tell the truth. We cannot shade the truth, tell a half-truth. Half the truth is no truth, half the truth is a lie. We have to be men who are truth tellers, and especially in your business practice your word needs to be your bond. It should just be a formality that you would have to sign a contract or have some notary stamp as this is authentic. You need to be known as a man of the truth and that your word is solid gold. Alright, so that’s “Paul’s Affirmation.” So this leads now, second, to “Paul’s Anguish,” and we start to get in to why he would belabor the point that I’m telling you the truth. So verse 2 is Paul’s anguish, and he says that, “I have great sorrow.” Now you know what this sorrow is about because I’ve already read the whole passage. It’s about those who are without Christ. Now please note, he doesn’t just have sorrow, he has great sorrow. And this word “great” in the original language is a word that you’ll recognize immediately. It’s the Greek word megas, which comes into the English language as “mega.” Paul says, “I have mega sorrow,” and when you look this up in a dictionary, this word means exceeding sorrow, immense sorrow, enormous sorrow, like heart wrenching, heart breaking sorrow. And the word “sorrow,” I looked it up. I just want us to have a feel for the intensity of this. It means “sorrow to the point of deep pain within your innermost being.” It’s a deep heaviness that will not go away. It’s used in John 16:21, Jesus uses the very same Greek word to describe a woman in labor and the excruciating pain that she suffers in delivery. It’s the word that was used in John 16:6 when Jesus told the disciples, “I’m about to leave” when He was in the upper room and gave the upper room discourse. And it brought heart wrenching sorrow that they’re about to leave… He’s about to leave them. So, Paul has this great sorrow and then he adds, “and unceasing grief,” which means it won’t go away. It’s not something that comes and goes, it’s is not something that every once in a while, I have this fleeting emotion. This…he wears this like a coat. I mean, this is constantly pressing upon his soul. When he says, “unceasing,” it means it’s continuous, constant. And the word “grief” here means it’s just all-consuming, it’s eating him up, it’s tearing him apart. And then he adds, “in my heart,” and he wants us to know this isn’t something that just lays on the surface of his life, it’s not something that’s just an external facade, but it’s something down deep in the very epicenter of his being. You know, I don’t know that I’ve ever felt this, just to be very honest, to this extent, and it’s something that only God can do. We can’t just kind of psych ourselves into this, this is an overflow of your own walk with the Lord and your deep convictions about heaven and hell, and salvation and damnation, and for the weightiness of this to rest upon you as you consider the Great White Throne Judgment and what awaits those, or even loved ones, who do not truly know the Lord. As you contemplate this with an eternal perspective, we begin to wade out into the depths of what Paul is experiencing here. And Paul is not a spiritual lightweight, I mean he had a gravitas about him. The word gravitas is Latin, it comes from “gravity.” There is a pushing down, a weightiness about this that you and I need to feel something of this. We are men of joy and men of happiness, but we are also men of deep sorrow for those who are without Christ. And let me just give you one verse from the life of Christ Himself, because this is very Christ-like. And it’s Matthew 9 and verse 36, it’s a very important verse. And Matt, remember when your dad did a word study on this verb I’m about to read, it was an eye-opener for me, I’ll never forget it, and he did it maybe twenty-five years ago. Matthew 9, in fact, your name for this book in the Bible, Matthew 9 verse 36, just to remind you the obvious. Matthew 9 verse 36, John MacArthur actually sent Matt here to get my notes, okay, so they’ll be going back on the plane. So all right, Matthew 9 verse 36, “Seeing the people,” which means the vast multitude of people without the Lord, “He felt compassion.” He felt compassion for them, “because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd.” Let me tell you what this, “felt compassion,” actually means and it’s such a long Greek word, it’s too convoluted to even try to repeat. But it means “out of the bowels,” to yearn out of the bowels. We normally say “out of the death of our heart,” but the Hebrew expression was even deeper, because my heart’s not only here metaphorically, or physiologically, my intestines are even deeper. And that’s what this verb “felt compassion,” it means “to have the bowels yearn.” We would put in the vernacular “to feel something in the pit of your stomach.” I mean, there are times you receive news that is just so alarming that you just can’t eat. It may be the death of a loved one, it may be the shocking news from a doctor, and you just lose all sense of appetite because there just like a bowling ball is down in your stomach, this weightiness. That’s what this word “felt compassion” means, and it means to feel something in the seat of your emotions. Well, the walls came tumbling down. That’s how Christ felt, that’s what Paul is feeling here, a deep sorrow and unceasing grief. So, here’s what I want to say to us. As we will be studying the doctrine of election in this chapter, Romans chapter 9, and we have already studied it in Romans chapter 8, “predestined,” may it never cause us to be desensitized to people who are without Christ. It’s the heart of Christ for us to love all people, and we don’t know who the elect are, and we don’t know who the non-elect are. We just go share the gospel with everyone but to share the gospel with everyone, we need to feel something for everyone. And when you study these doctrines of grace, you really have to think, you have to be a cognitive thinker to connect the dots, you have to be analytical. And sometimes it can pull us away from our emotions and detach us, and sometimes we see some hyper-emotional church service on television, and we go “No, I don’t want to be hyper emotional,” and so we swing the pendulum in this…way in this other direction and we just become like library nerds who have no feelings, whatsoever. No, we need to be moved to the point of tears for people without Christ. So, may we never be mechanical in our ministry and just go through the empty motions, may we never be so cognitive that we lose our affections and our affections for lost people. Alright, this leads to the third, and I guess I should just ask you the question or make this point of application before I move on to the third heading. Ask God to give you this kind heart, ask God by the Holy Spirit to plough up the hardened crust around your soul. It’s not going to happen with just mood music, it’s not going to happen with just some deathbed illustration. It’s going to have to be a deep, abiding work of God in the epicenter of your soul, so deep that only God can do it. Ask God to do that. I need for God to do this in my life. So, this now leads to third, “Paul’s Affection,” and we see now why he is so broken up on the inside. And so he begins verse 3, “For,” which I’ve told you introduces an explanation of what he has just said. So the word “For” tells us, “here is why I have unceasing sorrow, here is why I have great sorrow.” “For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ.” Now, as he says this, we know that this is hypothetical because he just told us, let me remind us in chapter 8 and verse 35, “Who will separate us from the love of Christ?” rhetorical question, the answer of which is “nothing and no one.” So, he has just belabored that, and in verse 38 and 39, he says he knows that nothing can separate him from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. So he knows, doctrinally and theologically, nothing will ever separate him from the love of Christ. But there is such a conflict going on inside of his soul as he considers those who are without Christ that he wishes, and he genuinely, genuinely is saying, “I would bear their tribulation if they could but know Christ.” The word “accursed,” I need to point out to you, is a Greek word that…as soon as I say it you’re going to recognize it, anathema, and the word anathema means “to be damned.” It means “to be doomed to destruction,” it means “to be plunged into the lake of fire and brimstone and to suffer the weeping and the gnashing of teeth, and to come under the fierceness of the unmitigated wrath of God in hell.” That’s what the word “accursed” means, and it means “to be cursed by God.” It means “to be the object of the vengeance and the fury of a holy, omnipotent God.” This is not a light thing and “to be accursed” is reserved for false prophets and false teachers who distort the gospel, Galatians 1:8 and 9. And Paul says, “I could wish that I were accursed, that that I could be damned in their place,” and then he adds, “separated from Christ.” Well, we know that he cannot be, but he is in essence saying, “It’s what I’m feeling in my soul. My head tells me I’m eternally secure in Christ, I know that. But my heart hadn’t caught up to my head, and my heart is being ripped apart on the inside.” And this is so real, that’s why he had to say in verse 1, four layers, “I’m telling the truth,” “in Christ,” “my conscience bearing witness,” “in the Holy Spirit.” “What I’m about to tell you is so heavy, I’ve just got to nail it down with these statements that I’m telling you the truth.” This is not hyperbole, this is not an exaggeration, this is the absolute truth of Paul’s testimony. And he gives more information now. Why? He says, “I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren,” When he says, “my brethren,” he’s talking about fellow Jews, “my kinsmen according to the flesh.” And when he says, “according to the flesh,” he’s talking about racial, national Jews, Israel. Kinsmen, “my fellow countrymen related by blood birth.” So here’s what Paul is saying, let’s just get the full impact of this, “I am willing to lose Christ if they would but gain Christ. I am willing to go to hell, if they could but go to heaven. I am willing to suffer damnation, if they could but savor salvation. I am willing to be plunged into the lake of fire, if they could but drink from the river of life.” That’s what Paul is saying. And I want to tell you the truth in Christ, I’m not at this point yet. And I need to be making strides to get to this point. And you with me need to be taking at least some baby steps in this direction to feel pity and compassion for those without Christ, or we will never get out on a limb and be the witness for Christ we need to be. We’re just going to hold our cards close to the vest, and we’re just going to play it safe and not fly the flag of Jesus Christ until we get to this point of feeling this. So let me just ask you, as Paul’s talking about his kinsmen according to the flesh, let me make this personal for you. You have kinsmen according to the flesh, you have blood relatives, you have a mother and a father, you have a brother and a sister, you have a son and a daughter, you have in-laws, you have an aunt and an uncle, you have cousins, and out of all those different buckets there are people who are without Christ. There’s not a man in this room who can say, “No, across the board every single one of us know the Lord.” And there will even be people in your family who go to church and who say they’re a believer, but there’s no fruit that really accompanies their confession. And you cannot be so naive as to just take their confession at face value. We’re not to be judgmental, but we are to be fruit inspectors. And if there is no fruit, then with love in our heart we need to be continually bringing the gospel to them in different ways as is appropriate, as God opens these doors, and as you give careful thought “How can I let out some rope? How can I scatter some seed to witness to them about Christ?” But Paul is burdened here for those who are the closest to him. And we need to be burdened for people we’ve never met, we need to be burdened for people in China and India and Tibet, but it needs to begin at home, and it needs to begin with those in your inner circle. And that’s where Paul is, and that’s where you and I need to be. And again, we need to be taking steps in this direction. We can’t be rescued off the Titanic and not feel something for those who got on board with us, and who are sharing a cabin with us and who are sitting at the same dining room table with us when there is an extra seat in the boat, the rescue boat, that they could hop in, if we have to go back in and swim to get them and pull them into the boat, we need to be persuasive and do this. We need to be burdened for the lost, and that is the heart of God and the heart of Christ and the heart of Paul. We need to have not only the mind of Christ and the mind of Paul, but we need to have the heart of Paul to go with the mind. It’s not either/or; it’s both/and. So this leads now, fourth, to “Paul’s Assessment” in verse 4 and the first part of verse 5. Paul now itemizes why Israel has such privileges with God. And it deals with why Israel has squandered such privileges that have been afforded to this nation, and he will now give eight privileges that have been afforded to the Jew. And there’s parallel application for those of us, you know, people who have grown up in church, these same privileges. But please note in verse 4 he says, “who are Israelites,” so he’s defining the end of verse 3, “kinsmen according to the flesh,” lest there be any mistake in anyone’s mind, they’re Israelites, “to whom belongs,” and now comes this laundry list, and I’m going to walk us through it, because Paul put it in the Bible and there’s eight of these. Number one, he says “the adoption as sons.” What that means is in the Old Testament, in Exodus 4:22 and in Hosea 11:1, God refers to the nation Israel as His firstborn son. Now that’s not referring to the new birth per se because not all Israel is Israel, but it’s referring to God’s care and provision for the nation Israel, like a firstborn son. Ford, you’re a firstborn son. I’m a firstborn son. Matt, you’re a firstborn son. Kent, are you…you’re a firstborn son. There is a certain special care for that firstborn. I mean, I had more pictures taken of me, you would think my younger brother was never born, and you would think there were like twenty-eight of me, but there is a certain care and affection that a firstborn son receives, and that’s the idea behind this. And so, it’s just referred to as the adoption as sons, that Israel was adopted out of all the nations in the earth. God showed far more care for Israel than He did for the Egyptians, you know, the Canaanites, the Assyrians, the Babylonians. They receive special attention. And then he adds, “and the glory,” that’s second. “And the glory” here refers to the outshining revelation of God, that God made Himself known to Israel. It’s not just that God was good to Israel; God made His glory shine to Israel. And this is really referring to even the making known of the gospel and the way to know God that was not made known to nations around the globe. God gave special saving revelation of Himself to the nation Israel and how to know Him. And then third, “the covenants.” That refers to the Abrahamic covenant, the Mosaic covenant, the Palestinian covenant, the Davidic covenant. I mean, God entered into a contractual relationship with the nation Israel and pledged Himself and promised and swore by His own name that He would keep His word to the nation Israel in ways that He did not so enter into binding relationship with other nations. And then fourth, the giving of the Law. Wow! God gave the Scripture to the nation Israel, the moral law in the Ten Commandments, the ceremonial law, the entire sacrificial system, the civil law of the nation Israel was to govern itself. What a privilege! And then fifth, “the temple service,” referring to just the entire sacrificial system, the priesthood, the sacrifices, all of that was a picture of Calvary. It was all a graphic illustration of Jesus our high priest who would give Himself as the perfect sacrifice for our sins upon Calvary’s cross. Every sacrifice that was brought in the ceremonial system was a dress rehearsal for Golgotha. Israel was so privileged. And then seventh…excuse me, “the promises,” sixth, “the promises,” I skipped over, the promises referred to the promises of the coming Messiah. From Moses to Malachi, all of the…oh, there’s over a hundred specific prophecies that were given in the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament and even more. And then seventh, “whose are the fathers,” and this refers to the birth of the nation from the loins of the fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And then the cherry on top, eight, “from whom is the Christ.” I mean, think about this. Jesus was born a Jew, He was born of a Jewish mother. He was born in the Messianic lineage. He was a son of David, a greater son of David. He was as Jewish as any Jew could be. I mean, what privileges were afforded to those who were born in the nation Israel. And all this did was escalate their accountability and responsibility to act upon the truth to God. “Unto whom much is given, the same shall be required,” that’s Luke 12 verse 48. “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required.” God’s expecting far more from a Jew than someone born on the other side of the globe who never heard the name of Christ. Both when they die without Christ will go to hell, but there will be a far greater and more severe or severer punishment in hell for those who have the greater privilege but who trample underfoot the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, let me make an application before I go on here, I wonder if the same could be true of you. I don’t know where everybody is, only the Lord knows where everybody is. Have you been given special spiritual privileges of hearing and knowing the truth of the Word of God as you have grown up? Did you have parents who took you to church? Did you have a mother who prayed for you? Did you have a father who told you the truth about salvation in Jesus Christ? Then why do you, like Israel, remain unbelieving if you are not yet committed to Jesus Christ? Greater privileges have been afforded to you than even Israel knew because you live in a day of the fulfillment of the promises, and the Messiah has already come, and He has already kept the law. So, before I move to the last heading, I just want to ask you this heart-searching question, men, have you been born again? Do you know the Lord in your heart? Do not be like Israel and even have the privilege of coming to a Bible study like this and have someone who’s preached for almost fifty years and who has studied the Word hard for over forty years, go verse by verse through the book of Romans, word by word and pull it out, and still not have Christ in your heart. Don’t let that happen to you. Be all in with Christ. And if you’ve never committed your life to Christ you can do so before I get to the fifth point. You can do so right now, just say, “Lord what a sinner I am. I confess my sin, have mercy upon me the sinner.” And believe in Christ who was born of a virgin, lived a sinless and perfect life, died a sin-bearing death upon the cross, was buried, raised on the third day, has ascended to the right hand of the Father. And whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. To call on the name of the Lord means you’ve come to that crisis point of commitment of your life to Christ. Well, let’s go now to the fifth and final point. And it’s “Paul’s Adoration.” At the end of verse 5, Paul breaks out in into a doxology, and Paul’s cup is so full of love for Christ that he cannot even mention the name “Christ” without bursting forth in a doxology. And it reminds me, and Kent, you can connect with this, it reminds me of W.A. Criswell down at First Baptist, Dallas. In his preaching he could not say the name “Christ” without crying, without his voice. And Matt, your dad, came to his funeral here. And W.A. Criswell preached the twenty-fifth anniversary of your dad’s…remember, he took the Bible and threw it out into the…that’s what liberals do. Took the Bible and he threw it out into the congregation about eight rows up into Grace Community Church. I remember the last times I heard W.A. Criswell preach, he would say “Christ” and that voice would just begin to crack, he just couldn’t hold the emotion back. That’s were Paul is. He cannot say “Christ” without bursting forth into this doxology and men, I need to get to that point. And I want to tell you I’m not always at that point, sometimes but not always. And we all need to get to that point, that Christ just moves our soul that just even the mention of His name stirs the waters. So, notice how he ends verse five, and this is really a great way to end because the juxtaposition of this, as I read this, Paul now turns on a dime and he goes from the depths of despair, “I wish I was accursed,” and “great sorrow,” to now to the heights of ecstasy. I mean, it’s like a round of golf. I mean, this is like from double bogey to hole in one. I mean, this is like he’s burdened and broken up and now by the end of verse 5, he’s like a rocket launch to the heights of heaven, and we need both. We don’t go around just moping all the time, we have this sorrow, but there is also this celebration within our soul on the greatness of Christ, right? It’s not mutually exclusive; it’s mutually inclusive. So, notice how verse 5 ends and I want God to imprint this on my heart, “who,” and that’s a personal pronoun that refers to Christ, who, not what, “who is over all.” Let’s just linger here for a moment, let’s just enjoy this. “Over” means “to have authority over, to have charge over.” It’s not just you’re seated up in the clouds, it means you have the reins of the universe in your hand, and everything is under you. You are over it all. If you had an organizational chart of the universe, this pyramid at the top is Jesus Christ, and everything and everyone is under Jesus Christ. This is a statement of sheer sovereign lordship is what this is. This is Matthew 28:18, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given unto Me,” all authority. There is no authority but that it’s in the hands of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now let’s just play with this for a moment. “Over all,” “who is over all.” He is over all demons, He is over all circumstances, He is over all His enemies. He is over all unconverted hearts. I mean, He can crack open that heart anytime He wants to. He is over all spiritually blind eyes. He is over all unregenerate souls. He is over all prayer requests. He is over all human wills. He is over all opposition. He is over all difficulties. He is over all trials. He is over all persecution. He is over all martyrdoms. He is over all. It’s all under His nail-pierced feet. And He exercises His right to rule over all. There’s no little side bar on this organizational chart of the universe. You know how sometimes there’s a little dotted line and some secretary’s way out over here on the side or some, you know, intern? No, no, no, there’s no side dotted lines on this organizational chart. Everyone is lined up, marching order under the King of kings and the Lord of lords, the potentate of the universe, Jesus Christ. Now note the next word, please note the next word, “God.” Who is Jesus? God. Here is an explicit declaration of deity. Not an implicit, meaning reasonably assume, no, this is blaringly obvious, it is explicitly stated. He is God. Let every cult member read this loud and clear. He is God, capital “G.” That’s not referring to the Father; that’s referring to the Son. You can see that in your own Bible. “Christ who is over all,” “God blessed” means to be praised, to be worshiped. And this too is another statement of His deity, because only God is to be worshiped, right? No angel, no man is to be worshiped, God and God alone. “You shall have no other gods before you,” that’s the first commandment, Exodus 20 like verse 3, but Jesus is to be worshiped. For how long is Jesus to be worshiped? “Forever,” and that is a Greek word that means “unto the ages,” unbroken ages without end, forever and ever and ever. So, what should be our response? Next word, “Amen,” for the Presbyterians, “Aamen,” amen, and if you’re like a back-row Baptist, “A-a-a-men.” Amen, and in the Greek, you know what it is? Amen. It just comes directly into the English language exactly as it is in the original language, and it just simply means “it is true,” “it is so,” “so be it,” “yes, a thousand times yes.” And Paul Amens his own sermon here. Kind of like the Baptist preacher, the sermon was so good he signed his own Bible. Paul is just like saying, “This is good stuff, this is great truth, amen to what I just said,” and amen from every one of our hearts as well. So, this is the doxology, this is the adoration, this is the praise that must be within our own heart and soul for God, and specifically for the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. So I’ve been applying this all the way through, and I can see Kent looking up some questions here, and I won’t have time to take some. Do we have any questions there? “It was real confusing, so I have a lot.” Okay, okay. So, what did you type in, Kent? Oh okay, all right. Let me just begin this closing application. What we should take from this is, as we walk out of here, we need to see people as either saved or lost, not as Republican or Democrat, not as Texan or foreigner, not as male or female, you’re either saved or you’re lost. Those are the only two categories in the world. And as we see and discern people to be lost, we need to see them as in the flames already, and we need to feel something for them, or we’ll never talk to them, and we’ll never reach out to them. We need to almost have smoke on our clothes that we’re so close to the flame that we feel, in the depth of our being, their lost condition. And though I can never lose my salvation, to know some little small smidgen of what Paul is saying here, I would trade places with you if that’s what it took to get you in Christ. And we need to do whatever is necessary to bring the gospel to people like this. All of us either do this, we either take the gospel to lost people or we bring lost people to the gospel, it’s one of the two. So, we either go to people who need the Lord and with a burden in our heart, or we bring them to where the gospel can be heard, one of the two. So all of us need to be thinking about that, to whom would the Lord have me reach out and risk maybe even a relationship and say, “I have a concern out of love for you,” and just share the gospel? Or to risk a relationship and say, “Hey, would you come to church with me? Would you come to Bible study?” And you know, not everyone that you would invite even to this Bible study is going to think, “Wow, this is the greatest thing I’ve ever heard.” I mean, there are going to be people you might invite be turned off by this, especially with these next verses that we’re going to be looking at. But let the chips fall where they may.

The Tragedy of Unbelief – Romans 9:30-33

OnePassion Ministries May 9, 2019

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I want to begin with a word of prayer. We are just going to dive into the Word. Father, as we now look into Your Word, we approach it with reverence and awe. We desire to clothe ourselves with humility. We desire to be slow to speak and quick to hear. We desire for the seed of the Word to find fertile soil in our hearts. We desire that You would cause the Word to bear much fruit in our lives. We are all at different places in our walk with You. Draw from this one passage of Scripture, Lord, and meet each one of us exactly where we are. I pray that the practical relevance of even this text would be very clear as we try to teach sound doctrine. So, I thank You for these men. I thank you for those who are watching all around the world, even the ladies who are joining us by livestream. Bless this study now in Jesus’ name. Amen. Alright men, it is my last time to say Romans chapter 9. Yeah, I probably will say it again. I hate to come down from Mount Everest. The view from here is spectacular and this has been in many ways life changing as we have been in this chapter. We are at the end of Romans 9, verses 30 to 33. So, who knows, we may not be able to get all the way through these verses. Romans 9, I want to begin reading in verse 30. And if you are taking notes, I have changed the title of this to “The Tragedy of Unbelief,” The Tragedy of Unbelief, and I think that more captures the central theme of this passage. So, beginning in verse 30, Paul says, “What shall we say then? The Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, just as it is written, ‘Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, and he who believes in Him will not be disappointed.'” Your translation may say, “will not be ashamed.” When we look at a passage of Scripture, we always want to isolate, “What is the big idea?” What is the dominant theme? What is the central thrust? It is like the clothesline upon which we hang all of our thoughts. And so, to put our finger on the live nerve running through these four verses, it is about unbelief. It is about the unbelief of Israel, the tragedy of unbelief. And by way of introduction, I want us to just quickly consider what a horrible sin unbelief is. Unbelief is in reality cosmic treason against God. It is a boldface defiance of God. In fact, unbelief calls God a liar and repudiates His Word. It is an utter rejection of God. Unbelief slams the door shut that leads to heaven. Unbelief is so serious that there is no forgiveness for the sin of unbelief if one dies in unbelief. It is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Unbelief tramples underfoot the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and despises the blood of Christ as an unclean thing, as the blood of mere pigs. Unbelief insults the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has come into the world to convict men of sin and righteousness and judgment, John 16:8 through 11. And number one on that list is the sin of unbelief. The Holy Spirit has primarily and principally come into this world to convict men of the sin of unbelief because they believe not. Unbelief damns the soul. Unbelief refuses the grace of God. Unbelief is arrogance and pride on steroids at the highest level. Unbelief prizes other things more than God. Unbelief refuses Jesus Christ His rightful place to reign in the human heart. Unbelief refuses God’s diagnosis of your spiritual condition, and unbelief refuses the only remedy that can cure from sin. That is how serious unbelief is. And ultimately, unbelief is not an intellectual issue. It is a heart issue, and that is what Paul is addressing. He is addressing the unbelief of the nation Israel. It was from Israel that God called His prophets. It was to Israel that God gave His law. It was out of Israel that God gave birth to the Messiah, His Son the Lord Jesus Christ. It was to Israel that the gospel was first preached. It was in Israel that Jesus was crucified, buried, raised, and ascended to heaven. And Israel has utterly turned its back upon the Lord Jesus Christ and upon God with exceptions, and we have some exceptions even here today who are trophies of His grace. So, as we walk through this passage, it matters not if you are not a Jew. You may be a Gentile, and unbelief is still as inflammatory. It stiff-arms God and keeps God at arm’s length. So, as we walk through this, I want to begin in verse 30. I have got five headings which are like tent pegs to hang our thoughts as we walk very carefully through this passage. I want you to note first the summation. At the beginning of verse 30, Paul writes, “What shall we say then?” And what that question does is it brings the entire chapter of Romans 9 down to a bottom line. Paul is a bottom-line man. Get to the bottom line. And as Paul says, “What shall we say then?” Paul is getting to the bottom line, “Why has God chosen so many Gentiles and only such a small remnant of Jews?” This little expression, “What shall we say then?” it is the seventh time in the book of Romans. Paul has said that just as a footnote. And Paul is repeatedly saying, “What shall we say then?” If you want to do an impression of the Apostle Paul, just go around saying, “What shall we say then?” I will just give you the citations on this: chapter 3 verse 5, chapter 4 verse 1, chapter 6 verse 1, chapter 7 verse 7, chapter 8 verse 31, chapter 9 verse 14, and now for the seventh time in the book of Romans, Paul says this again. So, here is the conclusion, here is the summation of this chapter. So, that quickly now leads us to the reception, which would be the second half of verse 30, the reception. “That Gentiles,” and that would be non-Jews, the vast majority of the world, “who did not pursue righteousness.” Stop right there. “Pursue” is an athletic word. It means “to run after something swiftly in order to attain a prize or to reach a goal.” And it says, “The Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness,” meaning God’s righteousness, the righteousness that comes from God, the righteousness that brings a right standing before God, the righteousness that gives a right relationship with God, the righteousness that everyone desperately needs to be found in acceptance with a holy God. It says, “They did not pursue righteousness.” For the most part, they were pagans. For the most part, they were heathens. For the most part, they were atheists, they were agnostics. For the most part, they were caught up in the religions of Egypt and Babylon and Assyria, the false religions of the world. They were not looking for God’s righteousness. But here is the strange twist: they attained righteousness. The Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness attained righteousness. And the word “attained” is another athletic word that means “to lay hold of an esteemed prize.” It is like the prize at the end of the race. They attained what they were not even seeking, what they were not even looking for. Now, we can easily believe this and understand this, number one, because of total depravity. I mean, Paul has already said in Romans 3 and verse 11, “There is none who seeks after God, no not one.” So, we are not surprised to see that the Gentiles did not pursue God and did not pursue righteousness. The fact of the matter is because of the blindness, the spiritual blindness of the human eye and the spiritual deadness of the heart and the soul, of course they didn’t pursue righteousness. There is none who pursues righteousness. But second, this very clearly implies a divine intervention that there was an unexpected dramatic turnaround for a large number of Gentiles. What they were not even looking for, they found. And this speaks to how God must be the Initiator of salvation and how God must be the Pursuer and how God must be the Seeker because we were not pursuing God. It necessitated that God pursue us, that Jesus would leave the ninety-nine and come look for the one lost sheep. And that is what God has done with those Gentiles in the first century. Let me bring it up to date. This is what God did in your life that you attained that what you were not even looking for. Of course, you may have wanted religion. Of course, you may have wanted a morally respectable life, but you attained that which you were not even looking for. And then, he becomes more descriptive at the end of verse 30, and he says, “Even the righteousness which is by faith.” And what that means is the only way to receive this righteousness is to receive it by faith and by faith alone, that you come to God with an empty hand, that you come to God and humble yourself and lower yourself and repent of your sin, and you come to the place of submitting your life to the Lord Jesus Christ. You come to the end of yourself so that Christ may begin and you receive it by faith. And this has been the constant thread that has been woven through the book of Romans. We go back to the very theme verses, Romans 1:16 and 17. “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The righteous man shall live by faith.'” And that set in motion this theme. There are so many verses. I have got them all written down here, how many times the word “believe” and “faith” is mentioned in the book of Romans. I would use up all my time, but you can just walk through the second half of chapter 3 and all of chapter 4. With my ballpoint pen, I have drawn a circle around every time “believe” and “faith” is found in my Bible, and I have connected all those circles. And it is just like a roadmap through Romans, isolating that it is by faith and faith alone, sola fide, by faith alone. And so, this is where the Gentiles found themselves. They found themselves with that which they were never looking for. They found the righteousness of God in Christ. How much like God is this to save those whom you would think would be the least likely to be saved, whom you would perceive to be the furthest away from God, those who did not even know the Word of God, who had just pagan religious superstitions about God. Those are the ones who attained the righteousness of God. And it brings greater glory to God when He saves those who are the furthest away, when He has to reach all the way to the bottom of the barrel. So, that is the reception. That is the realization, and quite frankly, that is most of us here today. Third, I want you to note the rejection. That is in verse 31: “But,” verse 31 begins with the word “but,” and not all “buts” in the Bible are good. This actually takes a turn to the left, total shift of focus, total contrast to the Gentiles who attained what they were not even pursuing. “But Israel,” referring to God’s chosen nation, and let me just remind us Israel has been the dominant theme of this entire chapter beginning in verse 1. Okay, so verse 31, the rejection: “But Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness.” Now, what that means that they were running, pursuing. Again remember, athletic word, they were running full tilt, they were sprinting. It was no lack of effort. They were strenuously, energetically trying to attain a right standing before God. They had the covenants. They had the law. They had the prophets. They were so into this they added over seven hundred more commandments to the Word of God. I mean, the Bible wasn’t enough for them. They wanted more steps in the ladder to try to reach God. “Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness,” and what that means they were seeking the law for righteousness. They were trying to keep the law as a means by which they would attain to a right standing before God. And that is just the way the natural mind functions and works. All of the religions of the world, wherever they are found, every false religion, all teach that you have to do something, you have to be something, in order to find a right standing before God. And leading that parade was the nation Israel. There was no nation that pursued it more wholeheartedly than did the nation Israel. And at the tip of the spear were the Pharisees who even separated themselves from their own nation in order to get to the head of the line, in order to be wholeheartedly in pursuit of this self-righteousness. Notice what it says. It is the total opposite. “They did not arrive at the law,” meaning they did not arrive at what the law required and the reason is because that the law requires absolute perfection. The law says that if you break just one commandment, you have broken them all. I mean, how many links in a chain have to break before the entire chain is broken? Just one. And how many stones have to be thrown through a glass window before the entire window is shattered? Just one. The law says that you have to be as perfect as God is perfect because the law is a reflection of the perfect holiness of God. And Israel was under the false delusion that they could meet that standard or that God would somehow just grade them on the curve, that they were better than other people, better than other nations. But as they were in this state of self-deception, they failed to attain that which they were pursuing, the very righteousness of God. And so, here we see, here is a very relevant point for us even as we live now in a Gentile-dominated world. How possible it is to be religious but lost! How possible it is to be sincere up to your eyeballs, but to be sincerely wrong! Churches today are just like Israel in the first century. Churches today are filled to overflowing with unconverted, unregenerate church members who are just like Israel, who are pursuing a righteousness of their own. They are like what Jesus said of the Pharisees long ago, “They honor Me with their lips.” Their choir is phenomenal. The soloists they can strut out are amazing. “They honor Me with their lips but their heart is far from Me.” We see from this how, from Israel making relevance today, how easy it is to have full heads but an empty heart, to know all of the answers but they are the answers to the wrong questions, to know the pastor but not to know the Lord, to come to church but to have never come to Christ. This is the hardest person on planet earth to reach with the gospel. It would be easier to reach a Gentile who is not even looking for it than to try to reach a very religious person who is steeped in their religion but never sees the need to be born again. The gospel is always for the down and out. The gospel is always for the out and out blatant immoral person. They never perceive that they are the ones standing in the need of the gospel, and the reason why they are not converted is not because are too bad to be saved; it is because they are too good to be saved. It is their own morality and their own pursuing of righteousness that prevents them from ever attaining to righteousness until God removes the scales from their eyes, until God awakens them from their slumber, until God blows a trumpet in their ear, and they finally come to the realization that their own self-righteousness will not give them a right standing before God. You can be born in this but until you are born again you will not even see the kingdom of heaven. So, that is the rejection, and that rejection continues to this present hour in Israel, as well as outside of Israel with Gentiles. So, this leads now to number four, the explanation. Paul, again the master teacher, Paul doesn’t just make a statement, he backs up the statement. He doesn’t just tell us what, he tells us why. So, here is the explanation. So, verse 32 begins, “Why?” Question mark. So, Paul is leading us now into the introduction because he knows that the listener, the reader is thinking, “So, why is this?” He says, “because they,” referring to the unbelieving Jews in the previous verse, that is the antecedent to “they.” “They did not pursue it by faith.” Here is the deal. They were running. Yeah, they were running. They were running faster than anyone else on planet earth. They were just running in the wrong direction. And if you are running in the wrong direction faster than anyone else, you are going further away from where you ought to be. They were running the wrong race on the wrong track in the wrong direction. “They did not pursue it by faith.” I mean, that was too simple for them. That was an insult to their religious pride because we believe that we are better than other people. Just by faith? You mean, you could just live a sinful pagan life and in a moment of faith you would receive the righteousness that we have been pursuing our entire life? No. Israel tried to earn it. They tried to merit it. They tried to inherit it. They tried to buy it. They tried to attain it every way except by God’s chosen means to receive it by simple faith alone in Christ alone. They did not pursue it by faith. They had their stinking nose in the air looking down their long nose at others. They were holier than thou. They were too good in their own eyes to receive a handout, to receive just a free gift. “No, we make religion the old-fashioned way; we earn it. We will earn our way to heaven. That is an insult that we would just receive a gift, like this is giving something to a beggar.” He goes on in verse 32, “but as though it were by works.” They were trying to work their way to heaven. Can you imagine anything more insane than to try to work your way to heaven? If you are trying to work your way to heaven, you are grossly ignorant of two facts. Number one, you do not know how holy God is. You don’t have a clue. And number two, you do not know how sinful you are. I mean, you are moronic spiritually if you think that you can contribute to your own righteousness and make any installment deposit to get yourself to heaven. That is like a man in quicksand who is going down. The more he tries to save himself, the faster he goes down. The only way for you to get out of that quicksand is for a rope to be thrown to you and by faith to lay hold of that rope and for someone else to pull you out of that quicksand. And the more you just shove that rope away and by your own efforts to try to elevate yourself up and out of that pit, the faster you are going down to the pit. George Whitefield, the great evangelist, said, “Can a man save himself by works?” He said, “It would be easier to pull yourself up to heaven with a rope of sand than for you by your own righteousness to ascend to the holy throne of God.” And so, that is the explanation, and he now continues the explanation. He says, “They,” referring to the unbelieving Jews who were hardened in their self-righteousness, “They stumbled over the stumbling stone.” They tripped over it. They fell over it. There it was. It was right in front of them, but it was just laying on the ground. It was so seemingly small in their eyes. It wasn’t a boulder. It wasn’t a mountain. It was just a little stone that seemed to be so unimportant, so earthy, just laying there on the ground. It wasn’t on a pedestal. It wasn’t in the spotlight. It didn’t meet their expectations of what they were looking for in a triumphant Messiah who would break the yoke of Roman oppression and restore national sovereignty to the nation of Israel. They were looking for a political solution, not a spiritual solution. They wanted the economy restored. They wanted their own government to preside over them. They had no concept of what their real and true need was to be delivered from the yoke and the bondage of sin. So, “they stumbled over the stumbling stone.” They just rejected Christ. In fact, they crucified the stumbling stone. They were only too happy for it to be buried so they don’t have to even look at it or deal with it anymore. And this is drawn from Psalm 118 verse 22, this very idea, and it is quoted five times in the New Testament: Matthew 21:42, Mark 12:10 through 11, Luke 20:17, Acts 4 verse 11, 1 Peter 2 verse 7. I take the time to read those just to impress you with the fact that this is a major theme in the Bible that is in three of the four Gospels, that is at the very beginning of the preaching of the book of Acts, and finds its place in the epistles. “They stumbled over Christ” because…you ready for this? They thought the gospel was foolishness. They wanted, as I’ve already said, a mighty Messiah who would come riding into Jerusalem triumphantly and just take over. They did not want God to send them a carpenter from, of all places, Nazareth. “Can any good thing come from Nazareth?” “That is on the wrong side of the tracks. You are in the wrong ZIP code. You have the wrong pedigree. Your resume is lousy.” “One so unattractive,” that Isaiah said, “men would hide their face from Him.” One so weak! One who was followed by a bunch of nobodies, just a bunch of fishermen, and even worse, a tax collector. That is the scum of Israel, a tax collector. Followed by even harlots! One who was charged with blasphemy! One who was indicted as one who is an insurrectionist creating trouble in Israel, trying to overthrow the government! One who was crucified on a cross, a means of execution publicly so horrific to the natural mind that no Roman citizen could even be crucified! It was too loathsome. It was too barbaric. It was too uncivilized that He would be crucified between the two known terrorists of the day. Barabbas, public enemy number one! “You want us to believe in one who charged us with sin, who called us to repent, who tried to unmask our hypocrisy, who said that we are outside the kingdom and that we have to be born again to enter the kingdom?” One who said—listen to this—that tax collectors and harlots would enter the kingdom before we enter the kingdom. What kind of nonsense is this? And one who said that we will perish in our sins if we do not likewise perish. You are telling me that my standing before God and my eternal destiny is entirely one hundred percent dependent upon my relationship with a publicly executed nobody Jew. That is what you are telling me. That is absolute stupidity, absolute nonsense. And so therefore, 1 Corinthians 1:18, “For the preaching of the cross is to those who are perishing foolishness, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” Verse 21 of 1 Corinthians 1, “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For, indeed, Jews ask for signs.” They wanted miracles! Well, Jesus gave them miracles. “Well, no, we want more miracles.” Jesus said, “I’ll give you only one more sign. It will be the sign of Jonah the prophet. You destroy this temple and in three days, I will raise it up. That’s the sign you’re going to get.” “Jews ask for signs, Greeks search for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block,” there you have it, “and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” So, they stumbled over the stumbling stone. They wanted some diamond to be mounted on a pedestal. They couldn’t stoop to believe in a crucified carpenter from Galilee. This leads finally now to the quotation in verse 33. We love Paul. Not only does he tell us, but he explains why. And now he follows up with Bible. This is Bible on top of Bible, “Just as it is written,” and Paul brilliantly now quotes two passages from Isaiah, and he will take one of the Isaiah passages and cut it in half, take the other Isaiah passage and insert it in the middle and just weave his own argument together perfectly from Scripture. Those two passages are Isaiah 8 verse 14 and Isaiah 28 verse 16. So, “Just as it is written.” He starts with Isaiah 28 verse 16, “Behold.” Now, what that means is, “What I am about to tell you is astonishing. What I am about to tell you is bewildering, jaw-dropping, mind-boggling.” “Behold.” Let us just take this very carefully one word at a time. “I.” Who’s the “I”? God the Father. This is God the Father acting. “Lay.” The word “lay” means to set something in place. It means to put something into place and in this case as a foundation. God the Father would “lay,” please note, “in Zion.” That means in Jerusalem. Paul now shifts to the Isaiah 8:14 passage, “a stone of stumbling,” a stone that will cause the downfall of the nation Israel. A stone that just lays in the dirt, that is seemingly unimportant, that is so easy to overlook, that would be easy if you would pay attention to cast it aside. “A stone of stumbling,” meaning God the Father laid this stone that will cause your stumbling. “And,” he’s still in Romans 8:14, “a rock of offense.” Israel was looking for a rock star and God gave them a rock, “a rock of offense,” meaning this was an insult to their pride. This was an insult to their flesh. They were offended by this scheme of salvation that brings man to nothingness before God, that reduces man to a posture of being a beggar before God, to come to God and to declare spiritual bankruptcy, to have no spiritual capital by which they could bring to God to be a part of earning their own salvation. This was offensive. It was a “rock of offense.” And now, he goes back to Isaiah 28:16. “And he,” meaning the idea is almost “whosoever.” “He who believes in Him.” And just so you know this, “believe” and “faith” are from the very same Greek root word. They are more than synonyms. They are just translated different ways. “He who believes in Him.” Now, first of all, to believe means to commit your life to the object of your faith, and there is only one object of faith that will save. You can have faith in the wrong object and you will perish. There is only one object into which you may place your faith in order to have the righteousness that comes from God alone. And would you please note, it says, “in Him”? “Him” is a personal pronoun. Not “in it,” but “in Him.” This rock of offense, this stone of stumbling is a Him. It is the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, the virgin-born, sinless life, substitutionary death, bodily resurrection, present enthronement Christ. “He who believes in Him.” Please note, nothing is added to “believe,” nothing is added to “Him.” This is sola fide. This is faith alone in Christ alone. “He who believes in Him will not be disappointed.” This word “disappointed” is a very strong word. It means “to be ashamed.” It means to be disgraced, to be dishonored, to be put to shame. But the negative in front of it, “not,” you put your faith in Jesus Christ and you will never be ashamed. You will never be disgraced in the eyes of God because this is the One whom He has placed before us. I think we see here the tragedy of unbelief, that unbelief rejects the one whom God sent. Unbelief causes one to stumble over Christ and to perish eternally. Unbelief repudiates the free gift of God. Unbelief is arrogance and pride and says, “I have my own way of salvation. I have my own diagnosis of my own problem. I have my own solution to what I need.” Unbelief says, “I am wiser than God. I am stronger than God. I have a better plan than God.” Unbelief elevates self and it demotes God. That is what unbelief does. That is why I’m calling this, “The Tragedy of Unbelief.” So, as we bring this to a conclusion, I want to tell you three things. Number one, those whom we think will never be saved are often the very ones who are saved. Don’t write anyone off your list. If you and I had been alive in the first century, we would have said the last people on planet earth to be saved would have been the Gentiles. They are agnostics. They are atheists. They are pagans. They are in rank unbelief. They are in emperor worship. They are in with false idols. They are not even looking to be made right with God. Those are the very ones whom God saved. So, those whom we think will never be saved are often the very ones who are saved. That should give us encouragement and that should give us hope that as long as there is the grace of God there is hope. And the doctrine of election is our greatest hope that God can overcome the stubborn, uncircumcised heart and bring that one to faith in Christ. Second thing, those whom we assume are saved are often those who are not saved. Just because they are religious, just because they have a Bible, just because they know the Bible, just because they go to a worship service, that doesn’t mean they are saved. It may be an indication they are. It may be an indication just that they are religious but lost just like Israel in the first century. And I think we assume too much. I have been a pastor for thirty-four years. By the grace of God, I have seen scores and scores of people converted. I would say easily nineteen out of twenty out of those hundreds and hundreds were self-righteous church members who falsely assumed that they were born again or that they were converted or that they were in the kingdom of heaven, when in fact they were not. And it was not until they came under the heart-searching, sin-exposing, Christ-exalting preaching of the Word of God were they suddenly awakened to the fact that they have never yet believed in Christ. So, we are surrounded by people like this, and the church is our first mission field. Third, the last thing I will say is no one will ever be saved until God convicts them of their sin. It will not be until they come to the end of themselves and have exposed before their own eyes their own heart and their own need of grace will they ever be saved. And so, this is why we are so dependent upon the ministry of the Holy Spirit as we preach the gospel. We can give a perfect, airtight, Scripture-supported presentation of the gospel to a lost person, but it is not until the Holy Spirit convicts their heart and reveals to them their need for this message will they ever want it. And so, this shows us how dependent we are upon the Holy Spirit. And sometimes, it will be the lesson that we thought we taught the poorest, the witness that we felt, “I didn’t really button down everything that needed to be buttoned down,” may be the very arrow that God sends to the heart and brings them to their knees and brings them to Christ. And when we see that, it is a reminder to us that though we should present the gospel in the most accurate and winsome way, at the end of the day we are totally dependent upon the Holy Spirit to convict, to call, and to regenerate lost sinners. So, men, I don’t know where you are. I would assume that most of you here are true believers in Christ. I would pray that you are, but there is a very statistical probability that someone here this morning would be just like Israel of old, and are religious but unconverted. And if that is you, if God is tapping you on the shoulder, then may today be the day you come into the kingdom. And for those watching on livestream, I can only pray that God would cause my words which are simply the words of God in Romans 9 to really pierce and penetrate deeply into your heart and soul. And if you yet are an unbeliever, very religious, but you have not yet come to that intersection in life where you turn away from your sin and you turn to the Lord Jesus Christ, may you do so this very moment. Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, today is the day of salvation.