“Show Me Your Glory” by Steve Lawson
In Romans 9:15 Paul quotes part of God’s verbal response to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” I have never noticed anyone objecting to what Moses records in Exodus 33:19. However, when Paul uses the same inspired words of God, many people cringe. Just a few verses earlier Paul brought up the glorious doctrine of election. Paul anticipates the reader will think it unfair that God loved some and not all. Paul goes on to spend the rest of Romans 9 explaining election.
To many people it seems audacious of God to decide by Himself who gets eternal life. Yet we must confess it to be part of God’s character to do so. Steve Lawson writes, “This graciousness toward undeserving, sinful creatures is the apex of His glory. He will sovereignly choose to set His saving favor on whomever He will. In other words, God will deal with Moses in mercy, unlike the exercise of His wrath toward Pharaoh and the Egyptians.”
Steve goes on to explain that “God is autonomous. He will do whatever He please. He alone possesses the right of self-government and has complete freedom in his actions. “God is self-ruling and self-determining. He is independent of the will of His creatures, both sovereign and free in His actions.”
Again, as in all Biblical interpretation, we must look at the context. Moses has appealed to God after Israel has greatly sinned by making the golden calf. They deserved judgment and wrath, but look what God, “who is rich in mercy” per Eph. 2:4, does. Paul wrote in Titus 3:5, “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy.” This act by the self-ruling God leads Peter in 1 Peter 1:3 to declare, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope.” We must understand that God “sets His heart on sinners whom He has chosen to save. He sees us in our state of utter ruin. For reasons known only to God, He chooses to have mercy on those who have no claim to it.”
Will you join all God's people in praising Him for His great mercy? Pastor Gillikin