Post by eternal on Jan 28, 2006 11:58:38 GMT -5
Perhaps no other text in the scripture is more cited, or misunderstood by Calvinists than Romans 9. The whole chapter really, but I will only address this passage that is most often quoted.
16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 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." 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?" 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? 21 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? 22 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? 23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, 24 even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.
Where this text comes in at, is a looking at the unconventional operations of God. First Jacob was discussed, as he being the YOUNGER of the two, and yet still being the one that God chose to work through for this particular purpose. It is not to suggest that God did not have a relationship with Esau or that Esau was never used. To the contrary, in their narrative we see a tremendous change in the heart of Esau, just as we saw a tremendous change of heart in Jacob. The importance though in the Romans passage is that God bucked conventional thinking, and the birthright and favor for THIS purpose went to the younger of the siblings. Isaac too fits in this category. He is the child of the promise, even though he is the younger of the siblings. Cultural and religious mores would suggest that Ishmael and Esau should have been the ones to have carried forward such an important role. However, God chose to work through different means.
We see the same thing in Dt. 7:7f where God’s rescuing of Israel from Egypt was not because they were great in number, for they were “the fewest of all peoples.” Conventional wisdom would suggest that God’s favor is evident in great numbers and power, and so forth. But God does not operate through these means. That is human wisdom ascribed to God. Rather in Dt. 7, God says that His favor was granted because of His commitment, and that He is faithful, and His blessing will continue through “a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments.”
This of course brings us right up to my first quoted portion, where we find Pharaoh being raised up, to the shagrins perhaps of those pious Jews who would think that God’s participation in the works of heathens and the unclean is unbefitting. However, we know that all positions of authority are given by God, and it is the man/woman who holds said position that has the burden of responsibility and indeed priveledge to remain faithful to those commandments, or to rely on their own “wisdom” and falter from the true path of God. Pharaoh was such a person, even though he is so vilified throughout Judeo-Christian history. God is not absent even from this person’s life, and is working to build him up in love, even though Pharaoh rejected Him. Again, unconventional to their way of thinking.
While many of the Jews (this letter is written to a church in crisis as the Jewish leadership had been expelled by the governing authorities, and had only recently been allowed back into the city. Now, this strange mixture is a heavy influence, as the previously novice Greeks had risen in leadership and lay duty and even power and influence. So with the advent of the return of so many Jews back into the church there was widespread conflict on a social and theological tip) thought themselves to be the prize of God’s eye, and the natural leadership of the church as they were the chosen people, and their customs were to be embraced wholisticaly, Paul writes that God’s work is not limited to a select group of people, and indeed is abundant for/in all. As Jesus’ parable suggests in Luke 18:9f the mindset of many people at that time was that God had a select group of people who were “predestined” along the lines of the Calvinist doctrine, and would praise God for the way He made them, and that they were not like the sinners, etc. Again, the notion of a select group of people that God operates through, and is interested in and loves, yet Jesus’ parable is one against that person who prayed that way, and demonstrated the openness of His love.
God’s mercy is not for a select group of people. Rather, just as the bible articulates time and time again, the rain falls on the just and the unjust. God’s mercy is not limited to only a select group. Nor is His hardening. Both are tools for the same goal: repentance to the glory of God. We all experience it, and the hardening is not exclusively set for those we deem as not in the family of God, but rather it is a tactic used to help all people. Further, it is a cooperation between people and God, and perhaps even a response. To be involved with God on any level, as ALL people are, is to take into account the status of our heart, and then the consistency of God will bear itself in different ways according to the state of the heart. Like ice cream and clay. Put both on the street, and the same sun will harden one, and melt the other. But also truthful, is that God will remove His grace from time to time in order to bring about a calamity that will lead to the repentance of a person. This too is important in the life of creation existing amongst the Creator (Rom. 1:24, 26). Likewise His grace is also distributed in such a fashion that when we are in the hardest of states, a ray of sunshine of God’s love can grab us…for the hardened criminal or the most saintly of people who have stumbled even in the slightest of ways. It is to God’s discretion how He appropriates His own presence in the live of the receiver, to His glory and their benefiet.
We can not dictate that, no matter how much we try to with all of our theological formulations and doctrines. So then Paul perceives a likely objection. "Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?" If God acts in such a way; sustaining some in grace, and gives others over to themselves, why is it their fault? Where does moral responsibility lie then? In the individual or with God? If He sustains or gives over at discretion ("from person to person," depending on their need) what is my responsibility? Do I have no responsibility? Shall I be immoral, and count on God to sustain me in grace or correct me through giving me over? Paul screams NO! We have responsibility. We are to be transformed into the glory and character of God. This is the beauty of the intimate relationship with God, and any conjuring up of an ability to live foul and depend on the work of God to “get me out” demonstrates an abased understanding of the Divine Being and relationship with that Being.
As God then works in the lives of all creation, not just the select few who think they are the “saved ones,” we must understand that there is an ominous element of God’s sovereignty we have to recognize to get the most out of life. God is not “off duty,” but neither is He the marionetter pulling all the strings, as we are mere puppets in this façade of life. Paul utilizes the metaphor of “clay” to articulate this point. Some within the Calvinist circles love to point to this metaphor as a definition, instead of a metaphor. But their attempts are clearly forced and unfaithful to the text at hand. Paul is not trying to claim that people are as to clay in the sense that we have no “livelihood,” or “will” or “participation” in the process. The bible speaks to our partnering with God, and being “coministers.” This is impossible if we are mere “clay.” The commands to obey and our refusal to do as such is further evidence that this is not the parallel that Paul is trying to convey. If I mold the clay, the clay will not bounce towards another direction. If I want to make a circle, the clay will not go and become a dog. Our relationship with God is such that we can be said to be in a “covenant,” which is one of the primary biblical means of understanding the relationship between God and person(s).
The metaphor then serves to establish the truth that God is involved in His creation, working with us for His good purpose. And as God works, we can not fault God for the outcome, just as a piece of clay does not. Within the context of the movement of the passage we find that God is working with even the people the so called “people of God” of the time deemed “unworkablewith” LOL. God’s involvement is not based on some select group of special people as the Pharisee thought in the Lukan parable mentioned earlier. Rather His involvement is an intricate part of His existence with what He has created. His partnership is an intragral aspect of being, and none of us can fault Him for that presence, for it is even His own presence which establishes us in the first place, and indeed is what keeps us alive.
As God operates amongst His creation, we have no legitimate beef with the way God chooses to “intervene” (if you want to call it as such, which appears to be the way the objectors seemed to articulate the process) in our lives to bring about the glorious purposes of His kingdom and will. We can be the hardened at times, and we can be the one given mercy at times. Nowhere, it should be mentioned, is there any indication that these two processes’ of God (mercy, hardening) are of such to indicate “eternal resting place.” What Paul is describing here is not in relationship to an “eternal salvation” but rather God’s establishing of His will here on earth. This is a primary truth that most Calvinists ignore in their pursuit to use this passage as one that confirms their doctrines.
Now, back to the reply to the objectors qualm…certain factions within the Roman church felt that it was their calling by birthright to be in positions of leadership and decision making. They felt that it was by nature that the Gentiles should submit to the cultural “salvific tales” of Judaism, such as circumcision, various festival compliances, and so forth. However, God was revealing the “mystery,” as Paul routinely calls it, that Gentiles too were a part of the Kingdom, and there was no official requirement for observance to the customs of the Jews, nor was there any ritual that they need take part of. God was the God of the Gentiles as much as He was of the Jews, and the Gentile did not need “become” Jew to participate in the family and kingdom of God. God’s choosing to work through them was consistent with His activity throughout the history of His people, as already established, there was no basis for objection then on any grounds of priveledge, and there is no human claim to distinguishment in how God will choose to bring about His will in respects to culture or birthright, “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?”
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? 23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,
What I have never understood is how Calvinists appeal to this passage as one of distinction between groups of people. This makes no sense, and is foreign to the context of the scripture. Paul clearly is discussing one person, or a group of people here, and the process to which said person(s) comes to repentance. The vessel is shown patience for God’s glory. In fact the vessel is prepared for destruction. And this patience is for the purpose of transformation, that His riches of glory may be known as these vessels ready for destruction are shown mercy, and are transformed therein to this state of being. Many suggest that Paul is talking about himself here, as Saul was the vessel of destruction, and Paul was/is the vessel of mercy. The truism then is also meaningful for his readers who are having difficulty with their new setting and context, and too is meaningful to us today, as we have lived lives as vessels of God, with destruction immenent, yet the patience of God, for the sole purpose of His glory through the transformation of His people, brings us to the state of repentance and share in the sweet mercies of God.
To be noted, is that both states of being are described as “vessels,” consistent with how Paul has been working his argument, and the exegesis afforded here in this post.
24 even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.
This is the clincher, and is expressive of what has been articulated thus far. There is not a select group of partiality, but rather a common bond among all of God’s image, all of God’s creation, that God has called equally from all people. The argument made in Romans 9 is not one of a Calvinistic predestination at all. Rather it is a revealing of the “mystery of the gospel of Christ,” that both Gentiles and Jews are equally precious and important to the God of grace, and stand in equality in all respects to the master of our being.
peace.
16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 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." 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?" 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? 21 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? 22 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? 23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, 24 even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.
Where this text comes in at, is a looking at the unconventional operations of God. First Jacob was discussed, as he being the YOUNGER of the two, and yet still being the one that God chose to work through for this particular purpose. It is not to suggest that God did not have a relationship with Esau or that Esau was never used. To the contrary, in their narrative we see a tremendous change in the heart of Esau, just as we saw a tremendous change of heart in Jacob. The importance though in the Romans passage is that God bucked conventional thinking, and the birthright and favor for THIS purpose went to the younger of the siblings. Isaac too fits in this category. He is the child of the promise, even though he is the younger of the siblings. Cultural and religious mores would suggest that Ishmael and Esau should have been the ones to have carried forward such an important role. However, God chose to work through different means.
We see the same thing in Dt. 7:7f where God’s rescuing of Israel from Egypt was not because they were great in number, for they were “the fewest of all peoples.” Conventional wisdom would suggest that God’s favor is evident in great numbers and power, and so forth. But God does not operate through these means. That is human wisdom ascribed to God. Rather in Dt. 7, God says that His favor was granted because of His commitment, and that He is faithful, and His blessing will continue through “a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments.”
This of course brings us right up to my first quoted portion, where we find Pharaoh being raised up, to the shagrins perhaps of those pious Jews who would think that God’s participation in the works of heathens and the unclean is unbefitting. However, we know that all positions of authority are given by God, and it is the man/woman who holds said position that has the burden of responsibility and indeed priveledge to remain faithful to those commandments, or to rely on their own “wisdom” and falter from the true path of God. Pharaoh was such a person, even though he is so vilified throughout Judeo-Christian history. God is not absent even from this person’s life, and is working to build him up in love, even though Pharaoh rejected Him. Again, unconventional to their way of thinking.
While many of the Jews (this letter is written to a church in crisis as the Jewish leadership had been expelled by the governing authorities, and had only recently been allowed back into the city. Now, this strange mixture is a heavy influence, as the previously novice Greeks had risen in leadership and lay duty and even power and influence. So with the advent of the return of so many Jews back into the church there was widespread conflict on a social and theological tip) thought themselves to be the prize of God’s eye, and the natural leadership of the church as they were the chosen people, and their customs were to be embraced wholisticaly, Paul writes that God’s work is not limited to a select group of people, and indeed is abundant for/in all. As Jesus’ parable suggests in Luke 18:9f the mindset of many people at that time was that God had a select group of people who were “predestined” along the lines of the Calvinist doctrine, and would praise God for the way He made them, and that they were not like the sinners, etc. Again, the notion of a select group of people that God operates through, and is interested in and loves, yet Jesus’ parable is one against that person who prayed that way, and demonstrated the openness of His love.
God’s mercy is not for a select group of people. Rather, just as the bible articulates time and time again, the rain falls on the just and the unjust. God’s mercy is not limited to only a select group. Nor is His hardening. Both are tools for the same goal: repentance to the glory of God. We all experience it, and the hardening is not exclusively set for those we deem as not in the family of God, but rather it is a tactic used to help all people. Further, it is a cooperation between people and God, and perhaps even a response. To be involved with God on any level, as ALL people are, is to take into account the status of our heart, and then the consistency of God will bear itself in different ways according to the state of the heart. Like ice cream and clay. Put both on the street, and the same sun will harden one, and melt the other. But also truthful, is that God will remove His grace from time to time in order to bring about a calamity that will lead to the repentance of a person. This too is important in the life of creation existing amongst the Creator (Rom. 1:24, 26). Likewise His grace is also distributed in such a fashion that when we are in the hardest of states, a ray of sunshine of God’s love can grab us…for the hardened criminal or the most saintly of people who have stumbled even in the slightest of ways. It is to God’s discretion how He appropriates His own presence in the live of the receiver, to His glory and their benefiet.
We can not dictate that, no matter how much we try to with all of our theological formulations and doctrines. So then Paul perceives a likely objection. "Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?" If God acts in such a way; sustaining some in grace, and gives others over to themselves, why is it their fault? Where does moral responsibility lie then? In the individual or with God? If He sustains or gives over at discretion ("from person to person," depending on their need) what is my responsibility? Do I have no responsibility? Shall I be immoral, and count on God to sustain me in grace or correct me through giving me over? Paul screams NO! We have responsibility. We are to be transformed into the glory and character of God. This is the beauty of the intimate relationship with God, and any conjuring up of an ability to live foul and depend on the work of God to “get me out” demonstrates an abased understanding of the Divine Being and relationship with that Being.
As God then works in the lives of all creation, not just the select few who think they are the “saved ones,” we must understand that there is an ominous element of God’s sovereignty we have to recognize to get the most out of life. God is not “off duty,” but neither is He the marionetter pulling all the strings, as we are mere puppets in this façade of life. Paul utilizes the metaphor of “clay” to articulate this point. Some within the Calvinist circles love to point to this metaphor as a definition, instead of a metaphor. But their attempts are clearly forced and unfaithful to the text at hand. Paul is not trying to claim that people are as to clay in the sense that we have no “livelihood,” or “will” or “participation” in the process. The bible speaks to our partnering with God, and being “coministers.” This is impossible if we are mere “clay.” The commands to obey and our refusal to do as such is further evidence that this is not the parallel that Paul is trying to convey. If I mold the clay, the clay will not bounce towards another direction. If I want to make a circle, the clay will not go and become a dog. Our relationship with God is such that we can be said to be in a “covenant,” which is one of the primary biblical means of understanding the relationship between God and person(s).
The metaphor then serves to establish the truth that God is involved in His creation, working with us for His good purpose. And as God works, we can not fault God for the outcome, just as a piece of clay does not. Within the context of the movement of the passage we find that God is working with even the people the so called “people of God” of the time deemed “unworkablewith” LOL. God’s involvement is not based on some select group of special people as the Pharisee thought in the Lukan parable mentioned earlier. Rather His involvement is an intricate part of His existence with what He has created. His partnership is an intragral aspect of being, and none of us can fault Him for that presence, for it is even His own presence which establishes us in the first place, and indeed is what keeps us alive.
As God operates amongst His creation, we have no legitimate beef with the way God chooses to “intervene” (if you want to call it as such, which appears to be the way the objectors seemed to articulate the process) in our lives to bring about the glorious purposes of His kingdom and will. We can be the hardened at times, and we can be the one given mercy at times. Nowhere, it should be mentioned, is there any indication that these two processes’ of God (mercy, hardening) are of such to indicate “eternal resting place.” What Paul is describing here is not in relationship to an “eternal salvation” but rather God’s establishing of His will here on earth. This is a primary truth that most Calvinists ignore in their pursuit to use this passage as one that confirms their doctrines.
Now, back to the reply to the objectors qualm…certain factions within the Roman church felt that it was their calling by birthright to be in positions of leadership and decision making. They felt that it was by nature that the Gentiles should submit to the cultural “salvific tales” of Judaism, such as circumcision, various festival compliances, and so forth. However, God was revealing the “mystery,” as Paul routinely calls it, that Gentiles too were a part of the Kingdom, and there was no official requirement for observance to the customs of the Jews, nor was there any ritual that they need take part of. God was the God of the Gentiles as much as He was of the Jews, and the Gentile did not need “become” Jew to participate in the family and kingdom of God. God’s choosing to work through them was consistent with His activity throughout the history of His people, as already established, there was no basis for objection then on any grounds of priveledge, and there is no human claim to distinguishment in how God will choose to bring about His will in respects to culture or birthright, “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?”
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? 23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,
What I have never understood is how Calvinists appeal to this passage as one of distinction between groups of people. This makes no sense, and is foreign to the context of the scripture. Paul clearly is discussing one person, or a group of people here, and the process to which said person(s) comes to repentance. The vessel is shown patience for God’s glory. In fact the vessel is prepared for destruction. And this patience is for the purpose of transformation, that His riches of glory may be known as these vessels ready for destruction are shown mercy, and are transformed therein to this state of being. Many suggest that Paul is talking about himself here, as Saul was the vessel of destruction, and Paul was/is the vessel of mercy. The truism then is also meaningful for his readers who are having difficulty with their new setting and context, and too is meaningful to us today, as we have lived lives as vessels of God, with destruction immenent, yet the patience of God, for the sole purpose of His glory through the transformation of His people, brings us to the state of repentance and share in the sweet mercies of God.
To be noted, is that both states of being are described as “vessels,” consistent with how Paul has been working his argument, and the exegesis afforded here in this post.
24 even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.
This is the clincher, and is expressive of what has been articulated thus far. There is not a select group of partiality, but rather a common bond among all of God’s image, all of God’s creation, that God has called equally from all people. The argument made in Romans 9 is not one of a Calvinistic predestination at all. Rather it is a revealing of the “mystery of the gospel of Christ,” that both Gentiles and Jews are equally precious and important to the God of grace, and stand in equality in all respects to the master of our being.
peace.
