God's Sovereignty

imagine there are five people who are planning to hold up a bank.

All of these five people are friends of mine.

I find out about it, and so I just beg with them not to do with it.

I plead with them, don't go ahead with this.

I try to block them from doing it,

and they push me out of the way and go on their course.

On the way to the bank, I managed to catch up with the group,

and just before they're moving in to rob the bank,

I tackled one of my friends to the ground,

and I wrestled with them on the ground,

and I managed to convince them in the process of doing that,

this is not the right course of action.

Come back with me.

And they stop, and they come back with me.

The other four continue on.

They rob the bank.

A guard and a bank employee are killed in the process.

All four are soon caught.

They're convicted.

They're sentenced, never to be released.

The one I tackled goes free.

Two questions.

Whose fault is it that the four are in prison for the rest of their life?

Secondly,

can the one that I tackled go about the rest of their life saying,

I am free because I'm such a great, moral, upstanding citizen?

The only reason they're free is because I restrained them.

I tackled them.

Such is the triumph of God's grace towards us sinners through Jesus Christ,

as it's been unfolded before us in the book of Romans.

The triumph of God's grace, as we've seen in Romans 1 to 8, radically changes everything for us.

Being made right, just, justified by Jesus Christ means that we now enjoy peace with God,

access to God, and even joy in the midst of hardships and difficulties and trials in life.

And as we saw last week, as Aidan brought the end of Romans 8 to us,

it ends with this great climax of confidence that nothing can possibly separate us from God's loving Jesus Christ.

God himself guarantees, sovereignly guarantees,

our final perseverance because our salvation is not based on our moral goodness.

It's not based on our will.

It's not based on the strength of our character at all.

God has called us, opened our minds to this truth.

He's tackled us, and now he carries us to final glory.

And so, imagine we're in Rome, and we receive this letter from the Apostle Paul,

there's a church in Rome, Jews and Gentiles are in here.

And as this is being read out to the church in Rome,

the Jewish group are going,

hang on a bit, Paul.

Wait a minute.

You've just ended chapter 8 here with this great climax of God's sovereign purposes not failing.

You say God will, those who saves, he will bring them all the way home to himself.

What about our people?

What about the Jews?

God called them out of Egypt.

But most of our people to this day have in fact rejected their God.

So maybe God's calling and purpose can in fact be rejected.

If God promised to Israel that they would be his people,

and yet the majority of them don't in fact believe in Christ,

does that mean that God's promise, his power, his mercy can in fact fail?

That is, will what you've just said, Paul, in Romans 8, stand?

Will it stand?

Will the blood-bought promises that we Gentiles and Jews are staking our lives on here, Paul,

will they stand?

Will God stand by his commitments, filled with the blood of his son?

Will he work all things together for our good?

Will the predestined be called, be justified, those who are justified in fact be glorified?

Will he give us all things in him?

Will nothing separate us from the love of Christ, in love of God, in Christ Jesus our Lord?

Is there truly now no condemnation?

And will there be no condemnation tomorrow?

Because look at God's historic people in Israel.

Romans 9, which Gary's just read to us, is, and you can see why he mentions,

there's so many references to the Old Testament,

because that's what we're dealing with, is God's historic people now.

Romans 9 is an explanation for why the word of God has not failed.

Even though God's chosen people, his historic people, Israel,

are now not turning to Jesus and being saved.

The sovereignty of God's grace is brought in as the final ground of God's faithfulness,

despite Israel's failure, and therefore as the deepest foundation of the precious promises of God

in Romans chapter 8.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

This is the deepest foundation, God's sovereign purposes.

So I've got three points today.

Israel's failure, did God fail, and God's sovereignty and our failure.

So first of all, Israel's failure.

Now, Paul is here dealing with a subject not only of intellectual importance,

but of great emotional importance to him as well.

Can I just add this point?

I think this is a very significant point.

This is one of the most overlooked thing about Romans chapter 9.

Romans 9 · chapter mention

Romans chapter 9 to 11 have been debated for centuries.

Romans 9 · chapter mention

And they are very difficult chapters.

But the most striking thing about Romans chapter 9 is verses 2 and 3.

Romans 9 · chapter mention

That is staggering.

It is staggering.

What he has just written there.

Absolutely staggering.

He has just spent eight chapters outlining the joy, the hope, the confidence of everything that he has

and you can have in Jesus Christ.

He knows the horror of rejecting Jesus.

And he is saying that he would give it all up.

All the benefits of Romans 1 to 8.

All the benefits of knowing Jesus Christ if that somehow it meant that his own fellow Jews would be saved in mass.

I had to stop there in my preparation.

Because I can't say that.

I can't say that.

Here is a love for people that is incomprehensibly staggering in the Apostle Paul.

We also see it in the Old Testament in Exodus with Moses.

It is a great reminder as we jump into Romans 9 to 11

that Paul, while incredibly logical, was never cold.

Never cold in his emotions.

He feels the unceasing anguish of knowing that his people that he loves have rejected their Savior.

And instead of seeking to ignore it,

instead of seeking to alter his theology to deal with that,

he lived with it.

He lived with it.

And so if the next three chapters pose an intellectual or a moral challenge for you,

it is important to remember that Paul is not writing from some kind of ivory theological tower

out of a college somewhere.

This is not a lecture.

This is Paul with a heart that longed to see his own people saved.

It is, however, a salvation that was just as open to them as it was to the Apostle Paul.

His own people have had the exact same opportunity that he has to receive Christ,

but they have rejected this salvation.

And in verses 4 and 5, there are eight privileges that have effectively been rejected.

And each one of these privileges pointed Israel forward, forward, forward to Jesus as their Messiah.

The adoption of sons, which refers to Exodus 4 verse 22,

Exodus 4:22

where Israel is called God's son.

Jesus taught that through him we can now approach God as father.

The divine glory refers to God's visible glory cloud dwelling amongst his people.

John chapter 1 verse 14 tells us,

John 1:14

And it says in John 1 verse 14,

John 1:14

We have seen his glory.

Same as Moses and Israel in Exodus.

The covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship, the promises, the patriarchs,

all pointing forward to the Messiah.

And lastly, Paul says,

From them is traced the human ancestry of Christ.

That is, it is obvious, but often overlooked, that Jesus was himself a Jew.

By God choosing to enter his creation as a Jew,

he not only was giving the Jewish nation an incredible honour,

but was in fact making it easier for them to relate to the Son of God than anyone else in the world.

And so with all these privileges and opportunities,

why is it that God's historic people have not recognised their often promised and long-awaited Messiah?

That brings me to verse 6 and my next point,

Did God in fact fail his people?

And this is the bulk of Paul's argument in Romans 9.

In 6 to 13, Paul firstly makes the point that God's promises have not failed.

That is, God's word to his people, his promise to his people has not failed.

And to clarify that point, he says in verse 6,

Not all who are descendant from Israel are Israel.

What he means there is that not everyone who is racially God's historic people are truly God's historic people.

In other words, it is so essential as we come into this argument here,

that we define Israel properly to see that God's promises have in fact not failed.

Some who are racially descendant from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are not God's true people.

And others who are not racially descendant from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are in fact God's true people.

And Paul, to build on this, gives two Old Testament examples.

He's calling his people here to look at God's promises just a little bit more closely.

He says,

Ishmael was Abraham's physical descendant.

But he was not Abraham's spiritual descendant.

Only Isaac was a child of the promise and inheritor of the blessings from God.

And the same principle is there in verse 10 with Isaac's twin sons.

They had the same father, both physically descendant, ultimately from Abraham.

But only one is the spiritual descendant and inheritor of the promise.

What Paul's doing here in this section is tackling the really thorny question of why anyone loves God.

And why anyone does not love God.

It's an answer that is hard to avoid and even harder to accept.

In verse 11, he tells us that God's choice to bless Jacob and not Esau was made prior to their birth.

Secondly, this choice was not based on foreknowledge of how the child would turn out in life.

It was made before either child had done anything good or bad.

Verse 11 reinforces the point of God's sovereign choice by adding in order that God's purpose in election might stand.

Verse 12 further reinforces this point by telling us that blessing from God does not come by works,

but by him who calls.

And for good measure, in verse 13, Paul adds a paraphrase of Malachi chapter 1 verses 2 and 3,

Malachi 1:2

Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.

Now, we've got to be careful here not to read into the word hate,

some sort of an emotional thing that we might add to it.

Paul's teaching here is very similar to what Jesus says in Luke 14

about his disciples hating their families,

about the cost of discipleship, if you like.

He's not saying that you must have a strong emotion against your family

as much as he's saying that there is a preference and allegiance to Jesus over everything else.

That's his point.

It's an allegiance question.

God chose to put Jacob over Esau.

But not because Jacob was morally superior to Esau.

Just read the Old Testament and you will see that clearly,

that Jacob is in no way morally superior to Esau.

It was by God's gracious choice.

Paul's defense of God's promises in the Old Testament is pretty straightforward.

Those promises were never automatically given to the physical descendant of Abraham.

A spiritual faith was necessary to inherit the promise.

In other words, what he's saying here is that God's promise to his people,

his word to his people has not failed at all in any way.

It's been misunderstood.

It's been misunderstood by his people.

He also asserts that this necessary spiritual faith is ultimately a function of God's choice.

Those who freely come to God are those who are freely chosen by God.

As I said, this teaching is not hard to understand, but it isn't easy to accept.

One initial response that many people have is an emotional response,

and it is that God's electing choice seems arbitrary, random.

And especially when you look at the Old Testament, you look at Jacob and you go, why him?

But Paul does not say here that God has no reasons to choose who he chooses.

All we are told is that the reason for his choosing has nothing to do with the individual.

That's all we're told.

Has nothing to do with the individual.

God has every reason to choose who he chooses.

We're just not told why it is.

But we do know it has nothing to do with the individual.

There is no superiority of one individual over another.

Nevertheless, this raises a second question of whether God had failed Israel.

Have a look at verse 14.

What then shall we say to this then?

Is God unjust?

Paul says, no, not at all.

In other words, if God's the one who does the choosing,

then why doesn't he choose everyone, all of Israel?

In verses 15 and 18, Paul again turns the Old Testament to form his answer.

In Exodus 33, Moses asked God to show him his glory

and not to depart Israel despite Israel rejecting God consistently.

God's response to Moses is in verses 18 to 19.

And he says,

I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you

and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence.

I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy

and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

God's words to Moses here are not the words of some arbitrary bully.

You see, mercy and compassion by their very definition

can never, ever be an obligation.

To say it is unfair for God to have mercy on some and not others

is in itself a self-contradictory statement.

The moment we declare mercy to be unfair

is the moment mercy becomes an obligation.

And therefore, it's no longer mercy.

And none of us wants that.

If you look at the rest of Romans,

no one wants mercy to be an obligation.

Mercy is always undeserved and totally free.

God is free to give it to all.

He's totally free to give it to some.

And he's totally free to give it to no one.

He's free.

For instance,

imagine a rich person deciding to choose

20 homeless children.

and gifting them with a home to live in

and, you know,

cupboards full of food,

clothes on their backs,

full education,

a job in their companies.

That rich person could do the same thing

for many more than 20 children,

but they choose 20 children.

That's it.

Does anyone have the right to say

that that rich person is being unfair

by not helping

all the homeless children?

In the end,

that person has no obligation

to help any of them.

their action to those 20 is sheer mercy.

And there is,

can be no suggestion

of it being unfair

to all the rest.

See,

the early chapters of Romans tell us

that no human being

can have any claim

at all

on God's mercy.

And if they did have a claim on it,

it can no longer be called mercy.

And since Romans 6 tells us

the wages of sin is death,

then the real shock,

the real shock of Romans 9

is that God would extend

his mercy

to anyone.

Anyone.

Not

everyone.

Paul then expands

on this point

of whether God

is unfair

by turning

to the example

now of Pharaoh

in verses

17 and 18.

and this builds

on the

early chapters

of Romans.

He comes to this

same issue

of God's fairness

but now from the opposite direction.

This is the Egyptian leader

who enslaved

God's people

who

anyone set up

against him

as

you see

in those early chapters

of Exodus.

He kills them.

and he did that

because he decided

that he would do it.

And in verse 17

Paul is quoting

from Exodus

9

16.

I have raised you up

for this very purpose

that I might

show you

my power

and that

my name

might be proclaimed

in all the earth.

God has compassion

and he wants

to have compassion

and hardens

those whom

he wants

to harden.

Again

these are hard

verses

but they make

a lot of sense.

If you go back

and you read

Exodus 4

to 14

you will notice

two things

that's happening

at the same time

in those chapters.

God hardens

Pharaoh's heart

to fulfill

his plans

and Pharaoh

at the same time

hardens

his own heart.

Pharaoh

sets himself

up against

God

and against

God's people.

In other words

Pharaoh

is not

an upstanding

moral man

that God

comes along

and hardens

his heart

so that he

becomes

cold and evil.

That's not

what's happening

in Exodus

4 to 14.

Somehow

both

God hardening

and Pharaoh

hardening

are both

true

at exactly

the same time.

God's

hardening

of Pharaoh's

heart

is God

giving

Pharaoh

over

to what

Pharaoh

has already

chosen

to do.

And we see

that in

Romans chapter

Romans 1 · chapter mention

1.

Pharaoh

decides

to resist

God

and God

reinforces

that position

for Pharaoh.

God

gives

Pharaoh

what he

has already

chosen.

God's

plans

work

through

our choices

not

despite

our choices.

This is

crucial.

that is

we ought

not

take

God's

sovereignty

as

something

like

fatalism.

The

biblical

version

here

the Greek

notion

of fate

the Islamic

notion

of kismet

are quite

radically

different

than the

Christian

teaching

of God's

sovereignty.

in the

tragic

Greek

myth

of

Oedipus

he was

fated

to kill

his mother

and

sorry

kill his

father

and marry

his mother.

And

he

and his

parents

did

absolutely

everything

that they

possibly

could

to avoid

that fate.

And yet

despite

their working

against

it

it

happened.

And

it's

basically

exactly

the

same

as

the

Islamic

kismet.

It's

fate.

It's

destiny.

It doesn't

matter

what I

do.

It's

the

will

of

Allah.

It

doesn't

matter

what I

do.

That's

not

the

Christian

teaching

of

God's

sovereignty.

For

the

Christian

God

never

forces

us

to

do

anything

other

than

what

we

already

want

to

do.

God

works

his

purposes

and

plans

perfectly

through

our

actions.

And

that's

a

mystery.

I

can't

tell you

how he

does

that.

It's

a

mystery.

And

yet

it

is

both

a

beautiful

and

comforting

mystery.

It's

comforting

because

either

we

are

determined

in

our

world

by

natural

forces

such

as

fatalism

and

kismet

or

they

happen

randomly.

All

the

actions

and

events

in

our

world

are

just

random

events

and

we

are at

the

mercy

of the

elements.

It's

either

fated

or in

a

secular

world

it's

just

random.

Or

of course

there's

the

biblical

doctrine

of

certainty.

we

make

choices

under

the

sovereign

hand

of

a

merciful

God.

God

chooses

those

he

hardens

but

all

he

hardens

want

to

be

hardened.

Paul

then makes

a third

case

for why

God

is not

unfair

to have

mercy

on

some

and not

others.

This

is a

section

really

from

19

to

29

really

makes

one

point

and that

is

God

is

just

supremely

right

and

for

us

little

autonomous

kings

we

really

struggle

with

this

little

bit.

The

first

thing

he

says

in

verses

20

to

21

is

that

God

makes

us

and

has

the

right

of

ownership

as

the

creator

of

us

all.

We

are

so

far

below

God

that

we

neither

have

the

right

nor

the

wisdom

to

question

our

creator.

And

so

we

must

be

really

careful

beware

of

standing

in

judgment

of

God.

Beware

of

standing

in

judgment

of

God

and

beware

of

forgetting

that

he

is

in

fact

judge

over

us.

In

verse

21

it

says

he

is

the

divine

potter

we

are

the

clay.

The

second

thing

he

says

is

that

we

are

the

authors

of

our

own

damnation.

Notice

verse

22

God

bore

with

great

patience

the

objects

of

his

wrath

prepared

for

destruction.

Now

that's

verse

22

but

compare

verse

22

what it

says

there

with

verse

23

where

we

are

told

that

the

objects

of

God's

mercy

are

prepared

in

advance

for

glory

by

God.

That

is

what

is

explicit

in

verse

23

is

that

it

is

God

who

does

the

preparing

and

yet

in

verse

22

we

are

not

told

who

does

the

preparing

and

the

implication

is

that

the

vessels

of

wrath

are

prepared

for

destruction

by

themselves.

That

is

what

we

saw

in

chapter

one

of

Romans

where

God

hands

people

over

to

the

life

and

the

death

that

they

have

chosen

for

themselves.

And

then

the

last

point

he

makes

in

this

section

is

that

God

saves

some

and not

others

because

in

his

divine

wisdom

it

displays

his

glory

more

than

any

other

way.

If

God

had

mercy

on

all

or

if

God

condemned

all

then

we

would

not

see

God

as

majestic

and

glorious.

again

at

its

heart

this

is

a

mystery

and

this

mystery

may

seem

strange

to

us

but

that's

the

point

of

this

section

we're

not

God

we

don't

have

all

the

clues

all

the

facts

we

cannot

know

everything

or

decide

what

is

best

for

the

whole

course

of

human

history

my

goodness

we

can't

even

decide

what's

best

for

dinner

sometimes

but

these

words

ultimately

are

words

of

comfort

clarity

and

comfort

and

so

the

final

point

not

just

Israel's

failure

but

our

failure

and

God's

sovereignty

God's

sovereign

election

is

marvelously

practical

and

it's

profoundly

comforting

for the

Christian

right

now

it's

simply

I think

builds

on the

hope

of

Romans

8

that

was

outlined

for us

last

week

by

Aiden

it

means

that we

have

an

incredible

incentive

to use

our wisdom

and our

will

and our

efforts

to the

best

effect

we're not

robots

to use

to use

to use

it to

the best

effect

knowing

that God

and knowing

that we

will suffer

consequences

from foolishness

and wickedness

at the

same time

there's an

absolute

promise

that we

cannot

ultimately

mess up

our

lives

even

our

failures

and our

troubles

will be

used

for

God's

glory

and

our

benefit

I gotta

tell you

as someone

who regularly

fails

that is

profoundly

comforting

profoundly

comforting

the promise

of God

to his

children

in Romans

8 28

is that he

works

for the

good of

those who

love him

it is a

guarantee

to those

who are

adopted

into God's

family

through faith

in Jesus

Christ as

saviour

and if you

are not

in his

family

if you

are not

in his

family

if you

have not

come

and embrace

Jesus

Christ as

your

Lord and

saviour

then know

this

even the

good things

in your

life

will

ultimately

not turn

out for

your

good

they will

most likely

harden you

to make

you proud

or to

make you

comfortable

or to

make you

blind

to your

need

and your

dependence

upon

Jesus

Christ

as your

saviour

the other

marvellous

thing about

God's

sovereign

election

is that

his

electing

love

is

ultimate

love

if God

loves us

before he

found

something

good

in us

sorry

if God

loved us

because he

found something

good in

us

we would

always be

worried about

losing his

love because

he finds

something bad

in us

there's

something more

that I'm

going to bet

deals off

guys didn't

realise you

were that

bad

it would

always be

a concern

and in

that case

his love

would never

be a

total

miracle

but God's

love does

not love us

because we

are useful

to him

he doesn't

love us

because we

are better

than someone

else

God in

Jesus Christ

simply

says

I love

you

simply

because

I

am

love

that's

it

and that

kind of

love is

perfect

love

perfect

love

that kind

of love

is the

fountain

of

endless

praise

and

gratitude

and

thanksgiving

and that

kind of

love

ultimately

means

that you

grow

more

and more

and more

in humility

the one

major

characteristic

of the

Christian

humility

because

God

has got

nothing

to do

with

me

you

see

the

God

of the

Bible

is so

majestic

he is

so

free

he is

so

absolutely

sovereign

that

any

analysis

that we

want to

do

of his

purposes

and plan

must

ultimately

end

in

worship

worship

it

must

end

in

worship

it

must

merge

into

worship

the

God

of

Romans

9

will

not

simply

be

analysed

he

must

be

adored

he's

not

simply

to be

pondered

and read

about

he is

to be

proclaimed

his

sovereignty

is not

simply

to be

scrutinised

it is

to be

heralded

this

Romans

9

is not

details

for

controversy

it is

the

gospel

for

sinners

who

know

that

their

only

hope

in

this

world

is

the

sovereign

triumph

of

God's

grace

over

the

rebellious

will

of

human

beings

God

in

his

mercy

in

Jesus

Christ

has

tackled

us

to

the

ground

shown

us

his

glory

a

better

way

how

dare

we

look

down

on

anyone

else

Romans

9

comes

after

Romans

8

8

for this

is

not

failed

because

it is

grounded

in

God's

sovereign

electing

mercy

God's

pure

love

and

therefore

the

promises

to

the

true

Israel

and

the

promises

of

Romans

8

stand

that's

the

good

news

of

Romans

9

the

promises

purchased

by the

blood

of

Jesus

Christ

will

be

mercifully

fulfilled

by the

sovereign

power

of a

merciful

loving

God

gracious

God

you

are

worthy

of our

worship

of our

honour

of our

allegiance

of our

love

Father

please

forgive us

that we

live

day by

day

and

we

make

much

of

our

self

instead

of

making

much

of

you

please

forgive

us

where we

look

down

on

other

people

where we

are

angry

with

others

where we

self

righteously

elevate

ourselves

over

others

give us

more of

your

gospel

of grace

we pray

thank you

Jesus

for your

sovereign

grace

you have

loved

me

the

unlovable

Holy

Spirit

help us

because

our hearts

and our

minds

are so

small

we

cannot

grasp

or

appreciate

the

majesty

your

majesty

without

you

capturing

our

hearts

and our

minds

and so

as we

read

your

word

as we

study

your

word

oh

put us

we pray

in our

proper

place

at the

foot of

the

cross

our

hands

over

our

mouths

and our

hearts

just

cry

thank you

thank you

thank you

grow us

we pray

in humility

as we

adore

Christ

together

amen