Paul concludes Chapter eight with an amazing statement. ‘Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus’. But even as he has been speaking about the way God is all powerful and glorious and in control, there surfaces a nagging doubt in our minds. If God is all that God claims to be, why is our world still careering along in the wrong direction?
Sensing such a question Paul seeks to instruct us by considering the history of his own people, the Jews. How was it that if they were chosen to be light for the world they had been defeated? If the Gospel was so clear why did they continue to reject it? Had God’s Word actually failed? Is all this ‘victory in Jesus’ talk just empty bragging and boasting?
When speaking of his own people, Paul struggles. He hates the fact of their failure. He aches for them. Yet at the same time He rejoices in their inheritance. We saw this tension in our last chapter. All of us are stuck between the ‘world as it is’ and ‘the world as it shall be’.
Romans 9:1 I am speaking the truth in Christ -- I am not lying; my conscience confirms it by the Holy Spirit -- 2 I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my own people,1 my kindred according to the flesh. 4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; 5 to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah,1 who is over all, God blessed forever.2 Amen.
We hear his anguish. This was his faith family. This was his nation. He loved them both. To see them hurting cut him to the core. I’ve heard parents who have children going through some terrible ordeal, say things like “I’d rather it was me than them. If I could take their place so they could be whole again, I’d do so at the drop of a hat”. Such is the kind of bond Paul feels towards his Jewish people.
He points out why. It was to that ramshackle, often mistaken and wayward group God had delivered the message of salvation. Their whole history was salvation history. They were chosen by God… adopted into God’s family; they had been given the laws, (including the 10 commandments); the whole history of how to worship God, everything from offerings, to temples, to priests, to scripture reading, to Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs (all the things we take for granted as we worship) had come through his people.
The great promises, like “I am the Lord your God and You are my people” had been promises they had received. The great people of faith, Abraham, Jacob, Isaac, Moses, the founding fathers, were his forefathers. And on top of all that, from the lineage of his King David had come his Messiah, as a Jewish figure called to minister first to the Jewish people, but ultimately as a light to the entire world. He says a hearty ‘Amen!’ to all that God had done through his people!
But now the Messiah had come and His own hadn’t recognized Him. They had persecuted Him. Jesus ends up being putting on trial and those amongst the Jews who were against Him rejoice when He is put to death. They had received God’s Word, but what had gone wrong? Was it the Word that was at fault? Had God’s Word failed?
Paul explains it this way. The Word hadn’t failed. What had gone wrong were his people’s thoughts about their relationship with God. They thought it was a matter of breeding and heritage… what Paul describes as ‘a matter of the flesh”. But it was never about who your parents were. It was about living into the promises of God by people putting their faith in God.
6 It is not as though the word of God had failed. For not all Israelites truly belong to Israel, 7 and not all of Abraham's children are his true descendants; but "It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you." 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as descendants. 9 For this is what the promise said, "About this time I will return and Sarah shall have a son."
America is seen by many as a Christian country. But just because you are born in America that doesn’t mean you are a Christian. It means you are an American with the freedom to practice the Christian… or any other….or indeed no... religion. Your religion is not determined by the country where you are born. The major religion of the country in which you are born may indeed have a tremendous influence on what faith you feel led to follow, but in the case of Christianity, it also takes personal commitment.
Likewise, just because a person is born into a Christian family, that doesn’t mean they are a Christian. It does mean they are part of a household of faith, but when they are older, though they will still be physically part of the family, spiritually they may be somewhere else.
Coming to Church doesn’t make us a Christian. I firmly believe that it is part of our every Christians calling to be a part of a worshiping community, but it is not the physical act of showing up on Sunday that brings the promises of God to life in our hearts.
The sacraments of the church; baptism and communion don’t make us Christian. They are outward signs of faith that confirm inward Christian experience. They are validated by our faith in God, not by the external actions in and of themselves.
What makes a person a child of God is the trust that they place in God. It is a matter of faith in the promises of God. It’s not about who our parents are or where we are born. It wasn’t like that for the Israelites and it’s not like that for us. Eugene Petersen in the Message Bible transliterates v8-9 “Israelite identity was never racially determined by sexual transmission, but it was God-determined by promise. Remember that promise, "When I come back next year at this time, Sarah will have a son"?”
Again we are back to an underlying theme in the Book of Romans. Salvation was not something to be inherited or earned, but received as a gift from God. And to underline that thought Paul tells us “Think about Sarah!” Abraham’s wife in her old age gave birth, not out of any fleshly desire… indeed her flesh literally let her down. In her flesh she was defeated, barren and felt like she had failed. What changed everything was God’s covenant promise. That was what defined her experience as a ‘faith’, not a ‘flesh’ experience. She trusted in God to do in her by faith what humanly was highly improbable.
Paul continues to develop this argument;
10 Nor is that all; something similar happened to Rebecca when she had conceived children by one husband, our ancestor Isaac. 11 Even before they had been born or had done anything good or bad (so that God's purpose of election might continue, 12 not by works but by his call) she was told, "The elder shall serve the younger." 13 As it is written, "I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau." 14 What then are we to say? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."
Listen to that again, this time from the Message Bible;
To Rebecca, also, a promise was made that took priority over genetics. When she became pregnant by our one-of-a-kind ancestor, Isaac, and her babies were still innocent in the womb—incapable of good or bad—she received a special assurance from God. What God did in this case made it perfectly plain that his purpose is not a hit-or-miss thing dependent on what we do or don't do, but a sure thing determined by his decision, flowing steadily from his initiative. God told Rebecca, "The firstborn of your twins will take second place." Later that was turned into a stark epigram: "I loved Jacob; I hated Esau. Is that grounds for complaining that God is unfair? Not so fast, please. God told Moses, "I'm in charge of mercy. I'm in charge of compassion."
Paul has been talking about how, in the flesh, we cannot save ourselves, but only through faith is our relationship with God restored. The other side of that picture is that it is God who takes the initiative in bringing our lives into fellowship with Himself, not the other way round.
God’s mercy calls us back into relationship, with a love like that of the Father in the parable of the prodigal son. We are called to return to our first love. As we heard in the Message reading; “His purpose is not a hit-or-miss thing dependent on what we do or don't do, but a sure thing determined by his decision, flowing steadily from his initiative.” And God’s initiative is one that comes from a place of grace, mercy and love.
The example Paul gives is about the twin children born to Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Esau. We are never in all of scripture given a reason why Jacob took precedence over Esau, just told that such was the way it was going to turn out, because God had made it that way!
This is, of course, just the sort of argument that drives us crazy. It hits our pride a death blow. Makes ‘us’ out to be ‘not the most important thing’ in the scheme of things. But at the heart of Paul’s argument is the notion that God is in control. That nothing, even the things that seem arbitrary and haphazard, can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. That all things work for good in the lives of those who are called according to God’s purpose. He continues:
16 So it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who shows mercy. 17 For the scripture says to Pharaoh, "I have raised you up for the very purpose of showing my power in you, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth." 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he chooses, and he hardens the heart of whomever he chooses. 19 You will say to me then, "Why then does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?" 20 But who indeed are you, a human being, to argue with God? Will what is molded say to the one who molds it, "Why have you made me like this?" 21 Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one object for special use and another for ordinary use?
This idea, the idea that God has the right to be God and has no need to explain anything, or justify His actions to any human being is one that the Hebrew people struggled with. It is so significant that at the center of the Old Testament we find a few books that really suggest and throw overboard the notion that we have any chance of figuring it all out.
The Wisdom of Ecclesiastes shows the struggle of a man who feels that trying to get answers out of God was like chasing the wind. He is in despair. “Vanity, vanity all is vanity!” Song of Songs gives expression to the mysterious forces of love and longing that just seem so powerful. God hardly gets a mention. Proverbs gives wise advice, but even then concludes that life is tough to understand, most of us are prone to mess things up and a good woman is hard to find.
More than any other the Book of Job questions conventional wisdom. Things turn out bad for the good and God refuses to justify any action that has been taken on the grounds that we simply are not capable of fully understanding the depths of God’s ways and the mystery of God’s will.
As Paul says in verse 20 “Who are you, a human being, to argue with God?” In our day we speak a lot about ‘human rights’. And so we should. But in this passage the concern is not with human rights but with God’s Divine right.
Now the spin put on this passage is that God has the right to be merciful on whomsoever God chooses (rather than on God’s right to be against whomsoever God chooses). Remember that at the back of this argument is the fact that Gentiles were being received into the church as equitably as those from a Hebrew background.
Paul suggests that if God had ‘hardened folks hearts’ (like God did with Pharaoh), then it was for a higher purpose… namely in order to demonstrate God’s mercy. If God chooses to harden anybodies heart, that’s God’s right. God can do that without having to explain why. It could be, as in the case of Pharaoh, to demonstrate mercy!
21 Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one object for special use and another for ordinary use? 22 What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience the objects of wrath that are made for destruction; 23 and what if he has done so in order to make known the riches of his glory for the objects of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory -- 24 including us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?
Hear that from The Message
Clay doesn't talk back to the fingers that mold it, saying, "Why did you shape me like this?" Isn't it obvious that a potter has a perfect right to shape one lump of clay into a vase for holding flowers and another into a pot for cooking beans? If God needs one style of pottery especially designed to show his angry displeasure and another style carefully crafted to show his glorious goodness, isn't that all right? Either or both happens to Jews, but it also happens to the other people.
Again the case is stated that God can do whatever God does on the basis that God is God and we are not. Simply put, “There is a God” “And isn’t me”. Maybe we would hope that Paul would have unpacked this a little more, but he’s not really arguing for God’s rights, rather that God has the right to include Gentiles as much as Jews as God’s children. Aware that some folk reading this may want him to back up his argument from scripture Paul does so by quoting Hosea and Isaiah.
25 As indeed he says in Hosea, "Those who were not my people I will call 'my people,' and her who was not beloved I will call 'beloved.'" 26 "And in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' there they shall be called children of the living God." 27 And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, "Though the number of the children of Israel were like the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved; 28 for the Lord will execute his sentence on the earth quickly and decisively." 29 And as Isaiah predicted, "If the Lord of hosts had not left survivors1 to us, we would have fared like Sodom and been made like Gomorrah."
In each of the quotes it is the mercy of God that is the dominant theme. In the Hosea quote, people thought not to be loved are called children of the living God. In the first of the Isaiah quotes the stress is on God searching for faithfulness amongst a faithless majority. In the second Isaiah quote a scenario is imagined that depicts how things would have turned out if God hadn’t shown mercy.
Paul concludes that it is precisely because of God’s mercy that Gentiles were now included in the covenant of God’s people. God had seen their faith, just as God had always recognized the faith of the faithful ones amongst the Hebrew people.
The great irony was that all along the years Paul’s own people hadn’t got it when they came to the law. They thought that the law would prove their salvation. They presumed that if they kept the laws everything would be fine. The Gentiles never had the law to condemn them. But they had come to an understanding that faith and trust were the vital elements in relating to God.
Through putting their trust in Jesus Christ the Gentiles had found a rock upon which their faith could be built. But that same rock had proved to be a stumbling block to the Jews!
30 What then are we to say? Gentiles, who did not strive for righteousness, have attained it, that is, righteousness through faith; 31 but Israel, who did strive for the righteousness that is based on the law, did not succeed in fulfilling that law. 32 Why not? Because they did not strive for it on the basis of faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone, 33 as it is written, "See, I am laying in Zion a stone that will make people stumble, a rock that will make them fall, and whoever believes in him1 will not be put to shame."
‘The Stone laid in Zion’ is a reference to Jesus Christ. After 2000 years He remains a stumbling block to some but to others the rock upon which their faith is built. Faith itself is a rock-like virtue that strengthens our lives. So to have a faith like rock built upon the rock of Jesus Christ has a solid significance.
As we travel through the next couple of chapters we’ll see Paul continuing to wrestle with his own people’s failure but whilst doing so, he urges us to see that because of their failure our salvation is made possible. He will also suggest that whilst God was not done with the Hebrew people, neither was God through with us.
This is Good News!