Last week, as we studied the previous chapter, we learned of the sovereignty of God in salvation. Yet even though God is sovereign, and He gives mercy to whom He will give mercy, and He hardens the heart of them whom He desires, yet even so, God does not work independently of us and our desires. And so God instructs us to pray for the lost, to pray for their salvation. Paul uses himself as an example of prayer for the lost. And he uses his kinsmen, his nation, his people as examples of those whom he will pray for. His heart’s desire is for their salvation. The issue of salvation is not ONLY according to God’s sovereign will. But God’s will also incorporates man’s will. Not only the will of the man in need of salvation, but the will of the man who prays for someone’s salvation. Somehow, in a seemingly contradictory way God’s sovereignty in salvation incorporates man’s prayers and man’s decisions.

So as far as Paul is concerned, there is great value, in fact, a great necessity for him to pray for their salvation. He says in verse one concerning the Jews, vs1 “Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.”

And that illustrates that our family and neighbor’s salvation should be our priority as well. Our greatest desire should be to see our kinfolk saved. And from my experience that is a very common prayer request in our church prayer meetings. We pray very often for the salvation of certain loved ones of our congregation. And from time to time we get reports that God has indeed drawn such a one to Him that they might be saved.

But I have to say I get another sense at times from well meaning, sincere parents concerning their loved ones. And that is they seem to have a greater concern for the loved ones well being, their financial or societal or physical well being, than they do about their spiritual well being. And so I wonder how effective their prayers really are. Because even if the loved one ends up getting a good job, or gets married, or any number of other things we think are essential to happiness in this world, and yet remains unsaved, the fact is that they are very likely to soon encounter misery of another kind, and even if they should escape misery in this life, what is to become of them in the next? Do we have a greater regard for this life than we do for eternity? I’m afraid that our actions speak louder than our words.

So it is important that as Christians our priorities are right. It’s important that our desire is to see the salvation of our loved ones. And it is important that we pray diligently for them, because in some mysterious way, God uses the prayers of the saints to change people’s hearts and minds and bring them to salvation. And God commands us to pray for others salvation.

Paul said to Timothy in 1 Timothy 2:1, “I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone — for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” God would not command us to pray for other’s salvation unless there was some effect that our prayers can have.

So not only should we desire their salvation and pray for them, but 1 Tim.2 says that God also desires all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. So we can be sure then we are praying according to the will of God, because He desires all men to be saved. As 2Peter 3:9 says, “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” So incorporated into the sovereignty and election of God in salvation is the desire of God that ALL men might be saved.

Now going back to our text, Paul speaks of the need for all men to be saved. “Saved” may be a term that may be foreign to some of you here this morning. That word may even make some of you uncomfortable. But I would suggest if that’s so it is because you are unfamiliar with the Bible.

When you study the Scriptures you find that the need to be saved is absolutely unavoidable. Christians have to talk about men and women being saved because the fact is that men and women are lost. There is no escaping the fact that the Bible clearly teaches that the human race into which we are born is already a lost race. Romans 3:23 Paul says that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” This is why the good news of John 3:16 is that “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life,” (John 3:16).

You know, the lifeguards talk about how many “saves” they might make while working on the stand. If someone is able to swim, then they are not in need of saving. If a person is swept out in a rip current, and they are drowning, then they are in need of saving. The problem a lot of people have with that word “saved” is that they do not recognize they are lost, without hope, and in need of rescue. They somehow think that they can make it on their own.

We can never deal realistically with life until we face up to this fundamental fact: People are not waiting until they die to be lost – they are already lost. It is the grace of God that reaches down and calls us out of that lostness and gives us an opportunity to come to Christ and be saved. Therefore saved is a perfectly legitimate word to use. It makes us uncomfortable only when we refuse to face the fact that men and women are lost. They are born into a fallen race in which it is appointed unto man one to die and after that, the judgment, and they are facing eternal separation from God.

Now in chapter 10, Paul is addressing the issue of why God saves some and yet not others. And to that point, he has shown that the Israelites, who had all the benefits and privileges of God’s providence towards them, had yet not obtained salvation. And in Paul’s answer to this question he couples principle of the sovereignty of God with the responsibility of man to respond.

Now, to our ears, God’s sovereignty and man’s choice is an apparent contradiction. But as we have discussed in the previous messages on chapter 9, we have come to the conclusion that things that as Jesus told the disciples concerning salvation, that things which are impossible with men is possible with God. He is the author and finisher of our salvation, and yet we have a responsibility to believe, to repent, to follow Him.

The reason that the Israelites failed to obtain salvation was because they refused to recognize the truth in regards to their condition. They had a great deal of religious activity and they thought as a result they were doing ok. But they failed to see that they were in fact lost and in need of a Savior. So the first thing we see in regards to man’s responsibility is to believe the truth of God’s word.

Paul says in vs 2, “For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.” Paul makes a very important point here. Having enthusiasm for religion, or having a zeal for the things of God, does not in and of itself accomplish salvation unless it is based on the truth. To use the analogy of drowning again, you can have a person drowning who is making a great deal of motion, he may be splashing water all around and kicking and waving his arms, but it’s not doing him any good. He is nonetheless drowning. Activity, or zeal, or enthusiasm alone cannot save you.

Jesus said, “God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. That’s why sound doctrine is so important. That’s why it’s so important that you go to a Bible believing, Bible teaching church where the truth of God’s word is paramount.

Paul speaks later on in this chapter about the necessity for the preaching of the word, without which they cannot know the truth, and as such cannot be saved. He says in vs 17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” So the knowledge that leads to salvation is found in the word of God, and it’s important that we subscribe to the truth, so that we might be saved.

Now the main truth that Paul says was lacking in his kinsmen, the Jews, was that they thought they could obtain righteousness from their own efforts. Vs3, “For not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.” They thought they could make it on their own. They thought their righteousness would be sufficient.

However, the scriptures teach that God is holy, and God alone is righteous. The law revealed the righteous standard that God required. And everything in the OT pointed to the need for man to appropriate God’s righteousness on their behalf. This was particularly taught through the sacrificial system that the Law laid out. The sacrifices taught the principle of the innocent dying for the guilty. The blood from the lamb which was applied to the doorposts taught that another had to die for your sins, so that you might not die.

But the Jews missed all that the scriptures taught concerning the righteousness that God required and only God could supply. Instead, they tried to lower the standard of righteousness required by the law, in order to satisfy their own shortcomings.

Paul says though in vs 4 that Christ is the end of the law , so that there is righteousness for everyone who puts his trust in Him. What Paul is saying is that Christ was the end goal of the law. The law simply showed us that we are sinners. It was given to magnify our sin so that we would understand how far from God’s standard of righteousness we were. All the law pointed to Christ as the satisfaction of the law. He alone could keep the law perfectly. He was God in the flesh, and He was perfectly righteous without blemish. And only by His righteousness applied to our account, could we be saved. Our best attempts at righteousness would always fall short of fulfilling the standard of God’s righteousness. But Christ’s righteousness was great enough to cover our sins through believing in Him as our Savior and Lord.

I love 2Cor. 5:21 which states that principle this way; “God made Jesus, who knew no sin, to become sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.” By faith in Christ, and what He has done, God transfers our sins to Christ, and His righteousness to us. And only by God’s righteousness given by God’s grace, can we be saved.

No man can be justified on the basis of his keeping of the law, in hope that he can earn his righteousness on his own. Vs 5, “For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness.”

Moses said that in Lev. 18:5, but the problem was that no man could keep the law perfectly. All the law did was to condemn because no man could keep the law. The only man that could fulfill all the law was Jesus Christ. And accordingly, those who place their trust in Christ receive His righteousness and the life that is promised. What was impossible with men is made possible with God by faith in Jesus Christ.

So then there is a righteousness which comes through faith, not by keeping the law. Vs6, “But the righteousness based on faith speaks as follows: “DO NOT SAY IN YOUR HEART, ‘WHO WILL ASCEND INTO HEAVEN?’ (that is, to bring Christ down), or ‘WHO WILL DESCEND INTO THE ABYSS?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).”

Salvation then is obtaining righteousness but not by works, which we cannot do, but by faith in Christ, which He has done for us. What Paul is saying here that Moses taught salvation by grace through faith just as much as Paul did. The statement by Moses reminds us of when Moses commanded the children of Israel before they entered into the Promised Land. He set forth blessings and curses depending on their obedience and disobedience.

Moses said in Deut. 30:11, “For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach. “It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’ “Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross the sea for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’”

The point Moses is making is that the law has been given to Israel in the context of grace, and the Promised Land, which is analogous to salvation, was God’s gift to them. It was not the product of their labor or their righteousness. The difficult tasks of salvation are not ours to accomplish, but they have been accomplished for us by Christ. It was He who came to earth from heaven. It was He who died, and rose again and ascended to Heaven. The work of salvation was accomplished by Him and is obtained by faith in Him.

So to show the accessibility of salvation to us Paul continues to quote Moses in vs 8, “But what does it say? ‘THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART’–that is, the word of faith which we are preaching.” Again, the quote is from Moses speech in Deut. 30 vs 13. By means of the word of God, the promises of God, we are drawn near to God in our hearts. And that word must be appropriated by faith, the word must be responded to in faith.

And so if the word which is in your heart is believed and the word that is in your heart is confessed then you will be saved. Vs 9,10; “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus [as] Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.”

What Paul means is that we have to come to the place where we believe what the word of God says concerning Jesus Christ and we must confess it before men. Jesus said in Matt 10:32 “Therefore everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven.” And part of that confession is we must recognize that Jesus has the right to lordship in our lives. Up to this point we have been lord of our lives. Up to this point we have run our own affairs. We have decided we have the right to make our own decisions according to what we think is right or best. But there must come a time, as God’s Spirit works in us, and the truth of God’s word works in us, that we realize Jesus is Lord and we surrender our life to Him.

To confess Jesus as Lord is to recognize that He is God in the flesh, that He was righteous and holy, without stain or blemish. That He came to earth to offer Himself as our substitute, that He might pay the penalty for our sin, and that He has risen from the dead and ascended to Heaven where He ever lives to make intercession for us. And one day, He is coming again to earth to receive His people that we might live with Him in a new heaven and new earth. That’s what it means to believe that God has raised Him from the dead. It encompasses all that Jesus is, and what He accomplished for us through His death, and what He has promised in regards to eternal life.

And that aspect of eternal life is emphasized in Paul’s quotation in vs 11 which is taken from Isaiah 28. “For the Scripture says, ‘WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.’” Another translation of that phrase is “whoever believes in Him will never be ashamed.” Never is forever. Never speaks of the day that will come to all men eventually. Hebrews 9:27 says, “it is appointed for men to die once and after this [comes] judgment.” Everyone will stand before the judgment throne of God one day. And if you stand there on the basis your own righteousness then you will find that you have fallen short of God’s standard and you will face the penalty for your sin. But for those who trust in Christ for their righteousness, the scripture promises us that we will never be disappointed. In that day, when God asks you on what basis have you come, you can simply point to Jesus, and say, “I am here with Him.” On the strength of what He has done, on the basis of His righteousness, on the basis that He has paid for my pardon, I can stand before God and not be disappointed.

Many years ago, maybe it’s been almost 35 years now, I used to work as a manager for some of the Ritz Carlton hotel restaurants. And our more formal restaurants had a dress code. One of the first hotels I worked at with them was in Naples, Florida. I helped to open that hotel. And Naples can get really warm and so the people living down there dressed accordingly. But the rules of the Dining Room stipulated that men had to wear a jacket and tie for dinner. But when the guests came to the door it was quite obvious that many of them were unprepared for that requirement. And there would inevitably be a awkward situation where we would have to explain our rules and potentially turn the guests away, who had been expecting a nice dinner with their friends.

But what we ended up doing was we purchased a number of navy sport jackets and some ties and had them available in the coat check room for those who did not have one. So we provided at our expense the proper dress so they could enter the restaurant. Now that’s a poor illustration of something like the righteousness of God. It’s something we don’t have of ourselves. It’s something that is provided by the management. And that coat of righteousness which enabled the man to enter and eat, provided by the management gives you access to the glory of God. And so the righteousness of God that was through the Lord Jesus Christ and the blood shed on the cross of Calvary is sufficient to cover our sins by being dressed in His righteousness.

I love the hymn we sing, “The Solid Rock” which has the line in it, “dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne.”

So salvation is not just some privilege or right given to me because of my heritage or nationality or whatever. The same blessing is available for all who will call upon the name of the Lord. Paul started off by talking about the difference between the Jews and the Gentiles in regards to salvation, but now he says there is no distinction between Jew or Greek. In other words, it doesn’t matter where you are from, what your nationality is, what your race is, what your skin color is, what your gender is, the same Lord is Lord over all. And there is only one way to be saved, and that by only one Lord.

Vs12, 13, “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same [Lord] is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him; for “WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.”

Acts 4:12 says “Salvation is found in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” There is only one way to salvation, and that is by faith in Jesus Christ. And as Paul emphasizes here, saving faith is comprised of believing all that the scriptures teach us concerning Christ, believing in who He is, and what He has done, and what He has promised to do concerning us who believe. And confessing “Jesus is Lord.” Acknowledging that your submission to Him as the Lord, the Ruler, the Sovereign over your life.

Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. I would ask you a simple question today. Have you called upon the name of the Lord? Have you confessed with your mouth Jesus as Lord? Have you believed in your heart all that the scriptures say concerning Him? If not, then what is stopping you from doing so now? Let us bow our heads right now, and call upon the name of the Lord that we might be saved. Jesus has accomplished all the work, He alone has the righteousness that we need, and He has promised to give us life if we trust in Him. Salvation is available as a free gift of God to everyone, to anyone, who will call upon the Lord.

Today we are talking` about the sovereignty of God.  That is the title of my message, and it has been the  underlying subject of Paul’s message in the last couple of chapters of Romans.  We have not highlighted God’s sovereignty so much up to this point because there were other sub-elements of God’s character that Paul was emphasizing in those passages.  But nevertheless, the underlying principle of much of what we have studied over the past couple of chapters is the the sovereignty of God.

Now what do we mean by that term, sovereignty? Sovereignty refers to the authority to govern.  And in the case of God, it means His supreme authority over all, His right to determine, to predetermine, to govern, to rule over every thing that He has made.  After all, He made everything, He set in motion the courses of the stars, the sun and the planets.  Everything that was made, He made. He is the Sovereign God of the universe and He reigns over all things.

Now it’s one thing to say that, but it’s another thing to believe when you really examine what that means.  Back in chapter 8 vs 17 and 18 we learned that God is sovereign over our suffering.  Suffering, however it may come, even when it comes by evil intent, is superintended  under the sovereignty of God to bring about our sanctification. 

And in chapter 8:28 we saw that declared even more clearly; God uses all things (even evil things, even hurtful things) for good, to those who love God, who are called according to His purposes.  That is the sovereignty of God in action.

Then in the last part of that chapter, starting in vs 35, Paul makes a lengthy statement that establishes that God is sovereign over our circumstances.  Whether tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword.  He concludes by saying, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  

God is sovereign over all our circumstances, in all of life even unto death.  And now in this chapter, Paul is going to establish that God is sovereign over our salvation.  He has already alluded to that fact back in vs 30 by saying,  “and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.”

That verse is sometimes referred to as the chain of salvation.  But what should be apparent is that it clearly establishes that God is the author and finisher of our salvation.  He is the author of our salvation.  He planned it, He predestined us for it, He called us to it, He justified us by faith, and He will glorify, or finish our salvation by His second coming.

Now imbedded in that verse  is a doctrine that is particularly troubling to us.  It is the doctrine which is called election.  Election is comprised of foreknowledge, predestination, and calling. And it’s troubling to us because we can’t understand it.  Our finite minds cannot comprehend the infinite.  God is outside of time and space as we understand it, and we cannot comprehend that which we cannot handle, or touch, or measure, or calculate.  We want to put God in a test tube and conduct a bunch of experiments on Him so we can figure Him out.  

But we cannot.  Isaiah 55:8 says, His ways are not our ways.  And our thoughts are not like His thoughts.  God says in vs9,  “For [as] the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.”

So we cannot know God unless He declares Himself to us.  God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.  We cannot examine Him as Spirit, but He has manifested Himself in the flesh as Jesus Christ and disclosed Himself to us in His word.  Otherwise we are left to our futile imagination.  But thankfully, God has revealed Himself to us as much as we can understand, and as much as we need to know.  It remains for us to believe His word.

So the primary invisible attributes of God which we should recognize is that He is sovereign, and we also are told in scripture that He is holy, He is just, He is merciful, He is love.  Yet sometimes it seems like those characteristics contradict each other.  But if we are to know Him, and believe in Him, then we must believe that all those attributes reside in Him in perfect harmony with one another.  One does not cancel out another.  For instance, God’s love does not cancel out His justice or His holiness.  And vice a versa.  We cannot always understand how it works, but then again we can’t understand atomic energy either, but that does not make it untrue. And similarly we can not understand the eternality of God.  And so we must believe in Him by faith.

Now as I have pointed out, Paul has emphasized God’s sovereignty over all things, even our salvation.  And as a component of God’s sovereignty we then read that Paul declares God’s mercy. God says to Moses in vs 15, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” And from that statement Paul concludes in vs16 “So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.”

God is a God of mercy. And He has the sovereign right to declare mercy upon whomever He wills.  No one earns mercy.  No one deserves mercy.  Mercy by definition is that you are guilty and undeserving of any favor.  Yet the Judge of All has the sovereign right to show you mercy. 

And corresponding to that, we would not need mercy unless we were condemned.  Jesus said in John 3:18-19, coming just after the famous verse about God so loved the world. He said,   “He who believes in Him is not judged [the KJV says condemned instead of judged. They mean roughly the same, but perhaps it’s helpful from our perspective to read condemned] ; he who does not believe has been condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. “This is the condemnation, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.”

So we understand from that statement that man is already condemned.  All men are condemned.  We were born in trespasses and sin.  There is none righteous, no not one.  Now God didn’t make man condemned.  God made man good, He put man in a perfect environment, He walked with man and talked with man each day.  And yet man choose to do evil. And as a result man became evil in his nature, so that we are all born in sin.  All men are  naturally born sinners. Furthermore, we naturally love darkness rather than light. Thus being condemned already, we need mercy.  We don’t deserve it, but we need it.  And God has the sovereign right to bestow mercy on whom He decides to bestow mercy.

Vs16, “So then it [salvation] does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.”  If we are to be saved, it will be because God shows us mercy, not because we have deserved salvation, nor because of our merits.

Now on the other side of the coin of mercy is condemnation.  And in regards to the world under condemnation, Paul uses the illustration of Pharaoh.  Egypt is a picture of the world under condemnation.  They had enslaved the Israelites for 400 years.  And Pharaoh as their leader is unwilling to let the people of Israel go. Moses, speaking as the spokesman of God, tells him repeatedly to let his people go free.  But Pharaoh continually hardens his heart and disregards the word of God.

So Paul says in vs17 “For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.’  So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.”  

Once again we come to a terminology which causes us concern.  How do we reconcile the mercy of God with what the scripture calls the hardening of God?  What we have to understand is that God is not acting independently of us.  If you read the account of Pharaoh during the exodus of Israel, you will see that half the time it says God hardened his heart, and the other half of the time it says Pharaoh hardened his heart.  Which is it? 

Well, the answer is not either or, but both.  Jesus said in John 6:44  “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him.”  But on the other hand, Jesus said in Matt. 11:28 “Come unto Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” So which is it?  God calls, God convicts, God illuminates, God moves you and draws you, but you have to come.  You have total responsibility to come.  The invitation is to all.  Rom 10:13  “WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.”  So it is necessary for God to move man, but it is also necessary for man to move to God.  James said “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.”

But Pharaoh hardened his heart against God, and God hardened Pharaoh’s heart as well.  God was working in conjunction with Pharaoh’s will.  Pharaoh had a choice, but he hardened his heart and God worked in coordination with that.

The question then arises in vs 19, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?” The answer is man resists God’s will.  Pharaoh had more messages given to Him from God, more opportunities to see the power of God and to see God manifest Himself than almost any other man.  He had many opportunities to repent.  But Pharaoh hardened his heart.  So the word of God goes out to everyone, and God is patient towards everyone, but some resist God and some obey God, some remain condemned, and some are saved. 

What Paul is illustrating here is the insolence of man in questioning God’s purposes.  It’s as if man wants to blame his condition on God.  He is more or less saying, then God has made me this way.   Therefore, I am under no condemnation, because I don’t control my destiny. I don’t have a choice in the matter.  God has already decided.  He has made me this way.  Therefore, God is unjust, not me.Man’s question aimed at God was accusatory, as if to say that God really isn’t good.  God really isn’t fair.  He plays favorites. He is unjust. 

But Paul’s argument is that we don’t have a right to accuse God, first, because He is the Creator, and the Creator has sovereignty over anything He has made.  He says in vs 20 “On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it?  Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use?”

So God is the Creator, but furthermore, as I mentioned a moment ago, when God created man He made him good, in a world that was good.  God provided all that man needed to stay good. But man chose evil, not God. It was man’s choice that condemned him, not God.  God doesn’t make man choose evil. James 1:13 says, “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust.”  So man’s sinful desires originate in man, not in God.

But Paul’s answer is to ask another question.  A question that emphasizes the mercy of God even though it is directed towards those who are condemned.  He says in vs22 “What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And [He did so] to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,  [even] us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.”

Now this question at first glance may seem to emphasize that God made some people that He will hate and some people to whom He will be merciful towards.  But I think that is a misunderstanding.  And to perhaps help us understand better, let’s examine this word translated in the NASB as prepared.  As in He endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction.  The word in the Greek can be interpreted as mended, fitted, or destined.  The NLT says “endured with much patience vessels of wrath destined for destruction.”  

So if we understand it in that light, then we can see that God did not make them for destruction, but they have chosen that path.  And if they keep on going in that direction they are destined for destruction.  It’s like a highway sign that says “Road Out Ahead.”  If you disregard the sign and continue on, you will end up going off a cliff to your destruction.  

What Paul is asking then is; What if God, in order to demonstrate His character, showed great patience towards those people who are destined, or headed for destruction, in order to make known HIs glory upon vessels of mercy, those whom He has called?” So the way that God shows mercy is to first demonstrate His judgment.  If the sinner is not first convicted of his sin, and shown the penalty for his error, then how can God demonstrate His mercy?  Mercy only is given to those who are under judgment.  

But rather than focus on the negative side of the equation and try to impugn God’s motives and goodness, we should recognize the positive side, which is to see the purpose of God is to show mercy.  God’s goal is to show mercy and He waits patiently for the sinner to turn to Him, rather than mete out immediate justice as is His sovereign right.  As Peter says in 2Peter 3:9 “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”  The emphasis is not on condemnation, but on mercy as God is patiently waiting for men to come to repentance.  God isn’t sitting in heaven going “enemenminemo, I’ll pick this one, and let that one go,” but notice Peter says God wishes for ALL to come to repentance.

To that argument then Paul gives an illustration of God’s mercy.  He says in vs 25 “As He says also in Hosea, ‘I WILL CALL THOSE WHO WERE NOT MY PEOPLE, ‘MY PEOPLE,’ AND HER WHO WAS NOT BELOVED, ‘BELOVED.’ AND IT SHALL BE THAT IN THE PLACE WHERE IT WAS SAID TO THEM, ‘YOU ARE NOT MY PEOPLE,’ THERE THEY SHALL BE CALLED SONS OF THE LIVING GOD.””

I wish I had the time this morning to tell the story of Hosea.  I would encourage you to read that little book.  What Paul is referencing here is just a short excerpt from that story which indicates that God has a right to chose those who were not His people to become His people.  Hosea had a wife who was an adulteress.  And she had three children which as the names of the children suggest that they were not his biological children.  But even so, God is stating His plan to be merciful to those who were unfaithful.  His plan to be merciful to those who are estranged from Him.  His purpose to restore those who had been rebellious towards Him.  God is merciful, and He shows mercy to those who do not deserve it, even those who have been unfaithful.  I think that this is a reference to the salvation that would come to the Gentiles, because of the statement Paul made in vs 24 which says, “whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.”  

But in the next quotation from Isaiah, Paul also speaks of the salvation that was rejected by unfaithful Israel.  Look at vs 27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, “THOUGH THE NUMBER OF THE SONS OF ISRAEL BE LIKE THE SAND OF THE SEA, IT IS THE REMNANT THAT WILL BE SAVED;  FOR THE LORD WILL EXECUTE HIS WORD ON THE EARTH, THOROUGHLY AND QUICKLY.”  And just as Isaiah foretold, “UNLESS THE LORD OF SABAOTH (Hosts)  HAD LEFT TO US A POSTERITY, WE WOULD HAVE BECOME LIKE SODOM, AND WOULD HAVE RESEMBLED GOMORRAH.”  

So again Paul is talking about the sovereign plan and purpose of God to bring about salvation to both Jews and Gentiles.  God has a plan to save a remnant of Israel and He will accomplish it, even though it may seem that the nation of Israel has totally rejected Jesus Christ. If it were not for God’s sovereignty and mercy, then they would have become like Sodom and Gomorrah. God totally destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and it remains a desolate wasteland until this day.  But look at Israel.  God has brought Israel back into it’s homeland after all these centuries, and He has a plan to bring them to salvation as well in His time.

In the final paragraph of his argument, Paul makes the case again for salvation by faith, not according to works, or heritage, or nationality, but by the mercy of God.  And he makes it clear that the Gentiles who were not by heritage the children of God were becoming children of God, and the Israelites who had been the children of God were stumbling over the means of their salvation.  Listen to what he says starting in vs30 “What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith;  but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at [that] law.  Why? Because [they did] not [pursue it] by faith, but as though [it were] by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,  just as it is written, “BEHOLD, I LAY IN ZION A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE, AND HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.”

Notice that Paul says the Jews stumbled at salvation because they did not seek it by faith.  We might expect Paul to answer the question of “Why?” again from God’s perspective, and simply throw the matter back on God’s sovereignty. Instead, he places the responsibility with Israel: Because they did not seek it by faith… they stumbled at that stumbling stone.  They were presented with the truth.  They had light enough to see the truth.  And yet they rejected Jesus because He didn’t fit their template.  He didn’t promise them the national restoration they were looking for.  They weren’t interested in spiritual salvation, they were interested in economic, in political, in national restoration to preeminence in the world. And they stumbled over Jesus Christ who came to save sinners.

So Paul shows that Israel is responsible for their present condition, just as all men are responsible for their sinfulness. Has he contradicted everything he has previously said, which emphasized God’s sovereign plan? Not at all, he simply presents the problem from the other side of the coin – the side of human responsibility, instead of the side of God’s sovereignty. 

The Jews were determined to work out their salvation on the basis of their own behavior, their own good works before God, their national heritage, and consequently they stumbled over the stone. They didn’t want to admit that they need a Savior, that they were not able to save themselves. As no man is. But for those who see that they need a Savior, they have already been drawn by the Spirit of God, and awakened by his grace, and made to see their need for a Savior. Therefore, they have a desire to be saved, and the confession of their need for a Savior causes them to accept Jesus. Consequently their salvation rests upon the stone which is Christ. 

Anyone who trusts in Christ  will never be put to shame. Jesus is God’s mercy and love poured out to those who will accept Him.  For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. The manifestation of God’s mercy is Jesus.  You cannot blame God for your judgment, you can only blame yourself.  But you can come to Christ for your deliverance from that judgment. He was condemned that we might be shown mercy.  The choice is up to you. Jesus said, He that comes to me I will never, never cast out,” (John 6:37).

Paul says in chapter 10, Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.  Call on Him today.