Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?”
Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases (Psalm 115.2-3).
INTRODUCTION
It is often difficult for the post-modernist reader to accept the doctrine of God’s sovereignty in salvation, even though it is one of the principles most clearly articulated in Scripture. The pragmatism of William James and the self-sufficiency born in the wake of the nineteenth century’s industrialization was further entrenched into the social fabric of American modernization through the deterministic educational philosophy of John Dewey. The almost universal dominance of philosophical and scientific naturalism in western culture makes it hard for many to appreciate the apparent antinomy of some biblical doctrines. The greatest source of misunderstanding centers on those doctrines that chiefly address man’s free agency and God’s sovereignty in salvation. The history of salvation spelled out in the pages of Scripture are not primarily the stories of Israel and Judah and how they ultimately work out their salvation; rather, it is an account of how God rescues mankind from sin, the effects of the fall, and secures his redemption. From Paul’s point of view, all that ultimately matters is what God chooses to do. “What matters in the fate of Judaism is not what it is and produces; it is its calling to be what God causes it to be. As Jacob, yet to be born, did not gain God by means of his works, so the Jew does not now bring God down to his own level by fulfilling the law or by doing service for God” (Adolf Schlatter, Romans: The Righteousness of God, p. 205). Paul’s explication of God’s sovereignty in Romans 9 is troubling for many because, as he explains it, not only does God extend his mercy to those whom he has chosen, he also hardens the hearts of those whom he chooses (9.18). Moreover, Paul makes no attempt to reconcile man’s autonomy with God’s sovereignty. God is not to be judged by man; he can only be judged by his own person (9.19-24). “Paul does not provide a logically compelling resolution of the two strands of his teaching – God, by his own sovereign choice, elects human beings to salvation; human beings, by a responsible choice of their will, must believe in order to be saved. But criticism of the apostle on this score is unfair. It is unfair, first, because Paul can accomplish his purpose – showing God to be just – without such a resolution. And it is unfair, second, because no resolution of this perennial paradox seems possible this side of heaven” (Douglas Moo, Romans, p. 591).
THE MERCY AND COMPASSION OF GOD (9.14-16)
The question of God’s righteousness and judgment in 9.14 was previously raised in Romans 3.5, But if our unrighteousness serves to show the righteousness of God, what shall we say? That God is unrighteous to inflict wrath on us? (cp. 4.1; 6.1; 7.7; 8.31; 9.30). Now, Paul further emphasizes the sovereignty of God through justification by faith alone. When God chose Isaac over Ishmael was he unjust? When he announced to Rebecca before her twins were born that the older will serve the younger, was he unjust? Was it capriciousness on his part to say, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.?” Paul denies this most emphatically! Paul accentuates his point by drawing the reader’s attention back to God’s comment to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion” (Exodus 33.19). “His [God’s] mercy is his own decision and does not depend upon what the individual does. It would not be mercy if it were based upon the worth of the individual’s work. God gives mercy to whomever he wants to give it. This attests to the deity of God that knows of no dependence upon the individual; the individual is called to relinquish his resistance against God, as though he had to be afraid of his injustice. Righteousness does not come about because the individual claims his own right apart from God and thus limits God’s supreme power; on the other hand, it is just and in accordance with the truth that the individual yields unconditionally to the one who has mercy upon him. … Divine mercy, not the individual’s volition and work, determines what God does and what he causes the individual to be” (Schlatter, p. 206). Does a person then not have volition? Indeed, he should and does have it, but any righteousness to which he may aspire does not originate apart from God’s work in his life. Righteousness comes to the one who yields unconditionally to the one who has mercy on him.
It is a basic tenet of Christian theology that God is self-existent (aseity) and does not in any way depend upon mankind; neither is there any necessary symbiosis between God and his creation. God may through his self-disclosure in Scripture explain some of the things he does, though he is not accountable to anyone for anything. While the Bible assumes the existence of God and makes many declarative statements about him, any attempts to prove his existence through reason or empirical validation lies beyond the intent of Scripture and will inevitably do nothing to foster belief in God (though such pursuits may bolster an existing faith). The Bible declares that God alone has intrinsic worth, whereas man has value because he is created in the image of God and because he is the object of God’s affection. Predestination is not predicated on God’s omniscient foreknowledge of anyone’s saving faith in Christ (see my sermon notes from March 12, 2006). Quite to the contrary, persons cannot put their trust in Christ unless God first enables them to do so (John 6.44, 65).
Reflecting on his study of Scripture and the experiences of his own life, Augustine came to believe that the individual left to himself is so lost in sin and rebellion against God that he will not seek God. His fallen will is so corrupted that he cannot seek salvation. In that sense humanity has no free will. So if there is to be salvation for man, it must come at God’s initiative. God’s grace seeks, restores, saves and preserves the sinner. But then why are some saved and not others? Augustine and others in his tradition argue that it cannot be for anything in men and women—for some residual goodness or moral superiority in those saved over those who are lost. The Augustinian doctrine of sin precludes that answer. So the reason that some sinners are saved and others are lost must be in God. It is according to God’s sovereign purpose, his eternal decree, that some sinners are rescued and others are left in their sin. The foundation of this divine decree is simply the good pleasure or will of God. (William R. Godfrey, New Dictionary of Theology, p. 528)
So Paul’s contention is this: that God is not unjust (cp. Genesis 18.25); rather, he is merciful and in his mercy has freely chosen to save some from the effects of their sin. A holy and just God would of necessity bring everyone to judgment, but a merciful God seeks a way to save those who are lost: We must all die; we are like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again. But God will not take away life, and he devises means so that the banished one will not remain an outcast (2 Samuel 14.14; Ezekiel 33.11). The question of God’s partiality is not to be determined by comparison to the relative goodness of the entire human race, but in light of God’s faithfulness to the covenant promises he has made with Israel and more importantly to his own character and goodness. Thus, his mercy is not contingent on an individual’s will or effort (9.16, lit. running) but solely his own good pleasure to chose one person as opposed to another. The Psalmist says, “I run in the path of your commands,” but he does so only because “you [God] have set my heart free” (Psalm 119.32); in this the psalmist completely agrees with Paul that it is not his effort that brings about obedience but God’s grace which has set him free. “The reception of God’s saving promises is not ascribed to human choice or activity. … Human works were excluded previously as the basis on which God elects and calls (vv. 11-12). Verse 16 restates and clarifies this theme by indicating that human choice and effort are not the basis on which God’s merciful promise is received. This verse excludes in the clearest possible terms the notion that free will is the fundamental factor in divine election. The salvation of any, even of the Jewish remnant, is due to the mercy of God” (Thomas Schreiner, Romans, p. 508).
PHARAOH’S HARD HEART (9.17-18)
Just as God is free to display his mercy, so too he is free to withhold it. Paul demonstrated the positive side of God’s mercy with the illustration of Jacob whom he loved. He cites God’s revelation to Moses as reason for his selective mercy. Paul has stated the negative side of God’s mercy and cites Pharaoh as an example of God’s purpose in withholding mercy. God’s plan to display his power in Pharaoh and to advance his name throughout all the earth is the sole purpose of Pharaoh’s existence (for more information on the decretive will of God and secondary causality, see my sermon notes from May 12, 2002). This is a troublesome text for many people because it is impossible to avoid the inference to double predestination. What makes it even more troublesome is the popular distortion of double-predestination held by many. In a nutshell, some people falsely characterize this doctrine to mean that God works monergistically towards the reprobate in the same manner he does towards the elect (that is, God actively works in an individual’s life either to secure his salvation or his reprobation; this is sometimes labeled hyper-Calvinism). If God were active in the life of Pharaoh to cause him to sin, then he would be the author of sin and this is clearly not the case. The classic view in reformed theology involves both election and reprobation but not symmetrically with respect to Divine activity. That is, God has from eternity past decreed that some will be elect and he positively intervenes in their lives to bring about their salvation. This is a monergistic work of grace. To the non-elect God withholds his monergistic work of grace. “From the ‘raising up’ of Pharaoh Paul concludes that God ‘hardens’ whom he wills. … A careful analysis of the Old Testament text also reveals that God’s hardening of Pharaoh precedes and undergirds Pharaoh’s self-hardening, and it is an imposition on the text to conclude that God’s hardening is a response to the hardening of human beings. One cannot elude the conclusion that Paul teaches double predestination here, and this is not contrary to his gospel, but it secures the theme that faith is wholly a gift of God” (Schreiner, p. 510).
No doctrine stimulates more negative reaction and consternation than this one. Some degree of such reaction is probably inevitable, for it flies in the face of our own common perceptions of both human freedom and God’s justice. And vv. 19-23 show that Paul was himself very familiar with this reaction. Yet, without pretending that it solves all our problems, we must recognize that God’s hardening is an act directed against human beings who are already in rebellion against God’s righteous rule. God’s hardening does not, then, cause spiritual insensitivity to the things of God; it maintains people in the state of sin that already characterizes them, this does not mean, as I have argued above, that God’s decision about whom to harden is based on a particular degree of sinfulness within certain human beings; he hardens “whomever he chooses.” But it is imperative that we maintain side-by-side the complementary truths that (1) God hardens whomever he chooses; (2) human beings, because of sin, are responsible for their ultimate condemnation. Thus, God’s bestowing of mercy and his hardening are not equivalent acts. God’s mercy is given to those who do not deserve it; his hardening affects those who have already by their sin deserved condemnation. (Moo, pp. 559-600)
Paul’s final word is simply this: that it is God’s free and unconstrained choice that determines who will be undeservingly saved and who be deservingly lost.
