Romans 9:14-18
Last week we talked about how Christians are the spiritual children of Abraham. We also saw that when God made his promise to Israel, He was speaking of those that are spiritual descended from Israel, not those that are of the flesh. This means that God’s promises and election are still true today and have not failed.
Paul begins this week’s section of Romans with a question. This is keeping with his diatribe style, which is one where he anticipates objections to his arguments and presents them as part of his argument so that he can address them directly. Paul is anticipating that his audience, after hearing the argument that God chose Jacob over Esau before they were even born is that God is unfair. Paul’s immediate answer to that is “μὴ γένοιτο,” which as we discussed in previous lessons is the strongest negative that Paul knows. Paul cannot bear the thought that someone might think God is being unfair in the way he operates.
Paul follows this with a quote from Exodus where God says to Moses “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy…” (Exodus 33:19) which is another way of saying, it is God call to make. This quote from God comes right after the incident with the Golden Calf. Once again the people were in rebellion against God, and God was coming to destroy them in punishment. Moses begged God to forgive them, and offered himself in exchange for their punishment. This pattern of rebellion and mercy repeats over and over through out the Old Testament account.
That background helps to understand what Paul is getting at here. Everyone one of us is guilty. This is not about justice, because if it were, none of us would get to heaven for we are all guilty before God. This is about mercy. Mercy is that condition where we do not get what we deserve because God in his goodness decided to take our punishment on himself in our place. Justice would be all of humanity going to Hell; mercy is some of us get saved.
In Romans 9:16 Paul is pointing out that it does not depend on our desires or our works. That is there is no work you can do that makes you worthy of forgiveness. There is nothing of you that is good enough to out weight the bad. Many people to day are trying to work their way in to heaven. I have heard many people say to me, “I just do the best I can and hope it is good enough to get me in,” and other similar expressions. The entire concept of karma comes out of this works based idea. Karma teaches that when you do good, good eventually comes back around to you. When you do bad, bad comes back around to you. Therefore, you should do as much good as you can so that you can have good come to you and hopefully you have done enough good to protect you from the bad karma.
This is in sharp contrast to Christianity. Christianity teaches that man is totally depraved, and there is no good in him. God in his mercy reaches down to man and lifts him out of that depravity. It is not about how good a man could be, but how merciful God is.
To help explain this Paul turns to the story of the exodus in the Old Testament. In that account Pharaoh had enslaved all of the Hebrews that were living in Egypt. Pharaoh was afraid of how numerous and strong the Hebrews were getting and as a result treated them with great cruelty, even to the point of killing off their baby sons. It is in this context that Moses stood before Pharaoh and demanded that he set the Hebrews free. The scriptures tell us that Pharaoh refuses. His refusal brings on the plagues and eventually the destruction of Pharaoh’s army.
In that account the scripture says that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, and refused to let the Hebrews go. It says this several times, but about halfway through the account it switches over to saying that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Pharaoh first showed how evil he was, and of his own freewill hardened his own heart against God. Only after that did God harden his heart against him. This was necessary for God’s plan. God raised up Pharaoh specifically for this purpose. God keeps Pharaoh’s heart hard so that his entire plan could work out. God used Pharaoh to show the world who He was.
There was nothing Pharaoh could do that would stop that plan from working out. God intended that all of the plagues would happen so that the people of that era, and for generations afterwards would be talking about what He did through out the world. Paul is making the point here that in he end it is up to God, not man.
Paul is not dealing with free will in this passage; he is specifically dealing with the sovereignty of God. The thrust of this section of scripture is that our place in His family is up to him, not us. We enter in to His promise with His people and inherit his mercy.
I have heard many people proclaim, “life is not fair,” and I have to wonder if they realize how good of a thing that is. People usually say that when something bad happens to them, or when they are denied some desirable outcome. I suppose someone might say that when something good has happened to them, but I have never heard it. I agree that life is not fair, and we should be grateful that is the case! If life was fair, we all go to Hell for our sins. God’s mercy is granted to us without any regard for how good or bad we have been in our own eyes. We have all violated the law, and if life was fair we should be punished for those violations. Instead God grants us mercy and even grace.
God’s mercy and grace is available to you, today, right now. Have you claimed it?
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