The God Outside Your Box
Rom. 11:33-36
PSCOC
2/18/07
Intro: God in a box.
We like boxes. When we move, we put everything neatly in box, and neatly label it. We use file boxes. We eat boxed lunches. We receive and ship packages in boxes. We wrap presents in boxes. We organize our shelves by putting items in boxes. The “Container Store” specializes in charging you lots of money for boxes of various sizes. We even have a toy and restaurant called “Jack in the Box.” Boxes give us a sense of control and organization. If I got it in a box, and I got it labeled just so, then I know exactly what I got. It is empowering. Take it out of my box and I begin to feel anxious. I begin to feel out of control. I begin to feel that I’m controlled by what should be in the box, instead of me controlling it. So, I quickly work to get it back into the right box.
It is not surprising then that our compulsion to have things under control, to have a sense of predictability, compels us to try to put God in a box. We like the idea of winding the little handle and out comes God just as we expect him. We create boxes in our mind of what God can and can’t do. We want to know that we can predict what he might do next. He conveniently fits into our lifestyle and so happens to approve the choices we make. The problem is that the god in our box bears little resemblance to the God living outside our box. We end up worshipping our own image of God, instead of recognizing that it he who made us in his image not vice versa. We rob ourselves of the wonderment of serving and worshipping a God that is beyond anything we could ever imagine. We never know what it is like to give up being god of our own lives and to let an uncontainable God have free reign in our hearts. What happen if we gave up the god of our box for the God outside our box? Dare we venture to find out?
Move 1: The plan of salvation revealed.
Where I grew up, ask anyone in the CofC the plan of salvation and they would proudly give you the five-step plan of salvation. Hear, believe, repent, confess, and be baptized. You know what the problem is? There is not a single mention of God in this plan of salvation. The Bible never expresses the plan of salvation as five steps to be executed by man. That’s more of us trying to fit God into a box. If we execute the steps just so, God will pop out of his box and grant us salvation. It is not that those five are not important, even essential, but they are not the plan of salvation. They are together our response to the overwhelming plan of salvation, which includes us only by the grace of God.
God’s plan of salvation isn’t really about steps. It isn’t easy to get your mind around. Rom. 9-11 are perhaps the most difficult chapters in the Bible to understand. The subject is God’s incredible plan to orchestrate a way to save both Jews and Gentiles through Jesus Christ. That part sounds simple enough, but Paul is wrestling with how the Jews could be God’s chosen people and yet find themselves so out of favor due to unbelief. How could they be rejected and the Gentiles be accepted? This troubles Paul’s mind so much that he even says that he would wish himself accursed if it would save his countrymen. But Paul is clear. The Jews are the chosen instrument of God to bring salvation to the Gentiles and that he is so sovereign that even he uses the rejection of the Jews as a way to save the Gentiles. Remember Paul when he spurned by the Jews said “from now on I turn to the Gentiles” (cf. Acts. 18:6). The Jews’ rejection of Christ led to the opportunity for the Gentiles. While at the same time, God planned to use the acceptance of the Gentiles to arouse the jealously of the Jews that they might come back.
Everyone is either a Jew or Gentile, and so the destiny of all men is at stake in this discussion. It is hear that Paul will quote difficult OT texts to underscore God’s election and sovereignty. Here he says things about God that doesn’t fit into our box. 9:13, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” 9:15, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” About Pharaoh in 9:17, “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”
He also says a lot of things we do understand. 10:12, “For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who call on the name of the Lord we be saved.” So, we know that we are not arbitrarily condemned or saved. Our response matters and no one is saved simply because they are a physical Jew. Yet, the overwhelming emphasis of the text is that God is sovereign and he has and will continue to bring about his great plan of salvation precisely in his way, by his election, even when we might not get what it is he is doing.
Read 11:25-32. As Paul is concluding his thoughts on God’s great scheme of salvation he hits us with a big one. “All Israel will be saved.” It is clear here that he is not just speaking of the church, for he continues to differentiate between Jews and Gentiles, but it is also clear from the verses that he does not mean that anyone will be saved simply because they are a physical Jew. So, what does Paul mean?
I wrote a research paper on this very passage. I studied it at every angle, have read practically every interpretation, and I want to tell you that none is fully convincing. I am not even sure that Paul knows exactly what he means. There are some things I feel pretty certain it doesn’t mean, and I can give you my best understanding at another time, but it isn’t my point today. I was determined that I could get to the bottom of that passage, but in the end I was simply overwhelmed by the incredible depth and complexity of all that God is accomplishing through his plan of salvation that I was just left awe struck. I opened my box and saw that God could never fit. I could never have all the answers. How arrogant to think otherwise. I was simply left with worship.
Move 2: Here I am to worship! (read 11:33-36)
Paul was moved to worship after contemplating the weightiest matters of God. It is as if Paul himself is admitting that he has written about things beyond him. This doxology could not be more appropriately placed. But if we are ever going to arrive to the height of worship this text call us to, then we must be willing to step out of own boxes. It isn’t really God that was in our boxes. He would never submit to such a thing. If the majestic temple of Solomon couldn’t contain him, if the entire universe cannot encompass all of his glory, then how can we think that God is so small to fit into our boxes? But this is how we act, when act like we are in charge of our lives. When we think we have all the answers. It is amazing to me how we say with certainty what God will do or not do, when we are told plainly “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord” (Is. 55:8). Yes, we can affirm that God cannot lie, or that he is always faithful and holy, because God is who he always is. He is consistent with his nature, but often our notions of what God will or won’t do is really driven by a need to remain in control of our world. This we must give up, if we are truly to see him for who he is.
“Our God is so big, so strong, and so mighty; there’s nothing my God cannot do…for you.” Isn’t it amazing that kids don’t put God in a box? They have nothing to fear by conceiving of God as bigger than we could ever imagine. Josiah (my three year old son) doesn’t care if you are talking about the moon or a cement truck; God made it! He has no reason to think otherwise. “God can’t heal someone who is terminally ill.” Says who? But it is also just as wrong to say, “If you name it and claim it, God has to heal him.” Says who? God will be God. “God can never change my spouse.” The god in your box may not be able to, but the one outside your box can your spouse and you too! “God can never bring about change in the church.” And on and on we could go. God can and will do exactly as he intends to do. Our response is worship.
“Depth” probably goes with all three nouns. “Riches, wisdom, and knowledge.” How deep is the ocean? Not deeper than God’s riches. How vast is the Grand Canyon? Not vaster than the wisdom of God. How expansive is the Milky Way? Not as expansive as his knowledge. You want to get into God’s mind? Good luck, because his ways cannot be tracked. We think we can give God advice on how to run this world, our lives? Did God need Abraham to have a child with his handmaiden to fulfill his promise? Abraham forgot the depths of the riches, knowledge, and wisdom of God. When we do the same, we often feel that we need to help God out and give him advice.
Or maybe we come under the delusion that we have done so much for God that he owes us something. Yet we owe our very existence to God. Every gift we have is from the gracious bounty of the riches of God. He is the source of all things. He is the sustainer. And all exists for his purpose and pleasure. It is when we lift our eyes to this view of God that we can say, “Here I am to worship” and with Paul, “To him be the glory forever! Amen.”
Move 3: All we really have to do is worship.
There is no greater joy than to give up our god in a box and to worship the God who is beyond comprehension, yet who has graciously made himself known to us, most intimately through his Son. It will bring you to your knees, tears to your eyes, and chills down your spine. It will stir in you a feeling of great humility and gratitude to be in the presence of such a wonderful God. It will penetrate your heart so that you will recoil at the very idea of going back to your god in a box. You will know that a God who has already revealed his mercy in such a profound way can be trusted with all that we are, and then your whole life will become never ceasing worship to him. Like the song we sang today, “Let every breath, all that I am, never cease to worship You.”
That’s the kind of worship we are talking about. It is the only kind of worship that will do for a God so great. Anything less just shows that we worship the god in a box. I invite you to worship the God outside your box today. There is great joy and freedom in recognizing that God has it all under control. We don’t have to figure out everything. We just need to figure out who is God. We don’t have to run our own lives and fret about everyone else’s life. We don’t have to figure out everyone who’s going to heaven or hell. It’s God’s plan of salvation. Why don’t we let him “have mercy on whom he will have mercy.” Really all that we have to do is surrender our lives in worship to him. That’s the life of a disciple. It is the life that rejoices in allowing God to be God.
It is certainly not an accident that the very next words that come in Romans are; “Therefore, I urge you, brothers in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship.”
Invitation: Empty the box.
Let God take care of the details. If you have not given your life to the God who is beyond anything that we could ever imagine, I hope and pray you will today. It is God’s plan of salvation, but he has given each of us an opportunity to respond to that plan. Our decision determines whether we receive that salvation or not. To not decide is to reject. You can call on the name of the Lord today and join the people of God in never ceasing worship.
