Sunday 03 • 04 • 18

Romans 9:1-5

I am speaking the truth in Christ. I am not lying. My conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh. They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ who is God over all. Blessed forever. Amen.

Romans 9:6-13

But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but through Isaac shall your offspring be named. 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 offspring. For this is what the promise said, "About this time next year, I will return and Sarah shall have a son." And not only so, but also when Rebecca had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad, in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of him who calls. She was told, "The older will serve the younger." As it is written, "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated."

The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Would you pray with me? Father, we pray that the word of my mouth and the meditation of all our hearts would be pleasing and acceptable in your sight. Lord, you are our rock and our fortress and our redeemer. Amen.

A Story About Bad Honeymoons

So I love bad honeymoon stories. I know that's sick and twisted. Here's my favorite one. This is from a woman named Claire. She writes, "As our guests strolled through the receiving line at our wedding, they asked us where our honeymoon would be. And we told them we were headed to the Riviera Maya. However, the guest asked, isn't that where Hurricane Ivan is headed right now?"

That night, they received a voicemail that their flight was canceled because of Hurricane Ivan. The options were to delay the trip for a few days and cross their fingers, hoping that the resort would still be there, or reroute to the Dominican Republic. So the next morning, they boarded a plane and headed to the Dominican Republic.

"A short bus ride through third world conditions and we arrived at our resort, which was quite beautiful. Guests received little tropical drinks when they arrived and a short briefing about how a storm might be blowing through. It sounded like no big deal and we again threw caution to the wind. We awoke a few hours later and I said to my new groom, 'Honey, I think I heard a coconut fall outside' and he shouted, 'Claire, it was a whole dang tree.' Panic set in. This was no Dorothy in Kansas moment. This was a full blown hurricane. Lights flickering, rain coming under the door of our room, intermittent, the scariest views out of the window as trees and chairs and other large objects blew past."

"Well, the next morning, things were semi calm. So we went outside to survey the damage. Now you know you're not from a hurricane region when you don't know about the eye of a storm. So as the second half of the storm kicked up, we were walking on the beach. And now I have a scar on my thigh from being pierced by a flying palm branch. We made a mad dash back to our room where long games of crazy eights occupied our time for hours on end. The beach was destroyed. Our evacuation included a safari bus ride and then a coach bus to the airport. It was Hurricane Ivan. To this day, we still joke that our marriage was hurricane tested."

Now, why do I love that? Well, one, I have a sixth sense of humor. But also because what is it about a honeymoon? I mean, a honeymoon is when you expect it's going to be the best. People look at a honeymoon and they're like, that's supposed to be the very best. And why I like those stories is they're the opposite. They're the worst. And these kinds of stories always bring about the "why me" questions. Like, why are these circumstances? Why my wedding? Why this event? Why is this going down for us right now?

Why Me?

And today, as we pick up God's word, I want to pick up that question, and I want to flip it on its head though. I want to ask the "why me" question with regard to you being a Christian. Now we assume every Sunday that there are always people among us here who are not Christians, who said, "You know, maybe I used to be sort of into that." There are people who are investigating Christian faith. We are a community where we welcome that and expect that.

But the vast majority of you are Christians. And I want you to think with me today, if you're a Christian, why are you a Christian and not someone else? Not some of those people that you knew growing up?

Why did you choose Jesus? This is exactly what is happening right now as we pick up the book of Romans. Romans 8 is probably the most famous chapter in the book because it ends on this crescendo of confidence. God calls, he brings people to himself, and he will keep people to the end. And everybody said, woo hoo. You know, people love Romans 8. And yet, as we pick up Romans 9, Paul starts with this question. It's like he hears someone in the back of the room saying, well, what about the Jews though? I mean, the Jews. Remember them? God's chosen people. They had the covenants. They had the temple. Before that, they had the tabernacle. They had the laws. They have all these things that have been given to them and yet when Jesus shows up, they reject him. Very few of them follow him. In the book of Acts, the Jews reject Jesus as Messiah. What about the Jews? And this is not just a Bible question. This is a where we live question because there are people in your life that where you grew up in the same home, and you're a Christian and your siblings are not. People who were in maybe your fellowship group in college, good friends where you're like, I am still with Jesus, but that person's not and it raises all kinds of questions like, we all did the same things. We all memorized verses and went to Bible study and we all listened to Audio Adrenaline and Newsboys together. We did all the right things, but how come I'm a Christian and somebody else is not? That's the question I want to get at today. And that's exactly what you've just summarized if you're thinking that—verses one through six. Did God's word fail somehow? What happened?

So today, we're going to look at this in three parts. First is the unspeakable doctrine. The second is the undesirable alternative. And third is the unbelievable hope. Unspeakable doctrine, undesirable alternative, unbelievable hope.

The Unspeakable Doctrine

What is the unspeakable doctrine? It's right here in verse 11. It says here, God's purpose in election. Now if that word is not familiar to you in church or in the Bible, you might know it by other words or I'm just introducing something new. It's also called predestination. It's part of a system of theology that's often called Calvinism, named after the sixteenth century French reformer, John Calvin. And if this is not familiar to you, it has to do with the basis of your salvation if you're a Christian. Why are you a Christian? And somebody else is not. And it comes down to this. Election means that God calls and saves based on nothing that is in us. No merit, no knowledge, no goodness, no intelligence, nothing in us that induces him to save us. It's entirely by his divine choice from first to last. That's how we answer that question: why me? Why not someone else?

Now, I'm calling this the unspeakable doctrine because I know how reprehensible this is to a lot of people. And it's hard intellectually. It's hard emotionally. It's hard when we consider people that we dearly love, and we say, why not them? Why not them? And Paul knows this. This is why, as we go from the first part of Romans 9 to the second part, the second part is filled with questions and objections. But here's my thesis. I'm going to ask you to bear with me in this. Of course, this creates all kinds of problems. You are not the first person on the planet who's ever been like, wow, this is really hard. I don't know if I can stomach this. Lots of people have been there. But here's my thesis: it creates all kinds of other problems if you don't listen to God's word in this area.

Now my point here is not to make all of you into Calvinist. My point is to preach God's word to you this morning. And I'm going to ask you, if you have intellectual problems from the very beginning with everything I'm about to say, to hang in for three weeks. I'm going to ask you really to give God's word a fair shake. And listen, this isn't my idea. This is Romans 9. And I'm going to ask you to give it a good hearing.

So let's make sure we're all on the same page. We all understand what Paul is really saying. Remember, this is Paul's main question: Why is it that some of Abraham's descendants, the chosen people, why some of them love God and are true Israel but others are not? Why is it that some people who grew up in church are still in church and some people are not? How do we resolve this?

So, look at what Paul says here. We're going to look at this passage. Look at verse 6:

It's not as though the word of God has failed us. — Romans 9:6

Paul starts off saying, the problem is not in here. The problem is in here. It's not in the book. It's in my chest. It's in us.

There is a predisposition in every person to turn away and reject God. That is human nature.

Second thing, verse seven: he says, "Not all who are descended from Israel are Israel." Christian faith, belief in God is not handed down generationally. There's no genetics involved. Every person has to come to Jesus on their own. Just because your daddy's a pastor doesn't mean you're a Christian. Just because your mom, your grandma taught Sunday school doesn't mean you're a Christian.

Third, verse 11: Salvation is not because of works, some merit in the individual, but rather, it says here, what does it say? Because of what? I've been doing this for seven years with you. Now you're gonna start talking back to me. Because of what? Because of his call. Right? It's not based on church attendance, Bible memorization, or audio adrenaline. It's because of his call. God sovereignly works in salvation. God opens blind eyes.

The Blindfold Illustration

My favorite illustration of this: Let's pretend that all of us together are on a journey. We're walking. Now, all of us are wearing blindfolds, and part of our human condition is we don't know that we're blind. So we're walking in a single file line. You have your hand on the shoulder of someone in front of you. Someone behind you has their hand on your shoulder. We're all walking along with blindfolds on. It's an easy pathway. As we're walking along, we're just chatting, talking, actually having a good time, cutting up, joking.

Somebody up in the front of the line is like, "Hey, it's getting warmer." And you hear somebody a couple people in front of you goes, "Warmer? I love the beach. This is gonna be great. We're all going to the beach."

So we're walking along this pathway. What we don't know is the reason we're getting warmer is we're all walking along this pathway to a giant chasm with a raging forest fire on the bottom. That's why it's getting warmer, folks. But as we're walking on this, we're happily walking to our own destruction.

Now, what does God's intervention look like in the life of that person? What is it? Take off the blindfold. This is what God's call and regeneration is in the life of a person. Happily walking to our own destruction. Hey, it's the beach, and suddenly your eyes are open. You're like, "That's not the beach. That is a blazing cavern of my death."

And so what is the only sane thing to do in that moment? Turn around and go the other way. Life is that way. Death is that way—where we're all just happily going that way.

Old Testament Examples

Now this is what Paul is saying to us. To demonstrate this, look at Paul's examples in the Old Testament, verses seven through 13. So first, he starts with Abraham. Abraham is the patriarch of the faith, and he talks about Abraham's two sons. God comes to Abraham in his very, very old age with his very, very old and dried up wife and says, "You're gonna have kids."

And Abraham's like, "Oh, really? Okay."

So Abraham and Sarah scheme: "How are we gonna do this?" They come up with a plan. Abraham, you get my slave, my Egyptian slave Hagar pregnant, and we'll treat that as our kid. And that's what happens. That baby's name is Ishmael. And God shows up and says, "That's not the way I do stuff. I like working in the impossible."

And instead, there's a child of promise whose name is Isaac, which means laughter because it's a big joke that God can do this. And what happens here? God says, "Hey, this is the child of the promise. This is the child through whom all your generations will be blessed. This is the child who I promised. Not Ishmael, Isaac."

There's a distinction here. There's a distinguishing. You can read about this later on this afternoon in Genesis 16, 17, 21. But what is summarized here in verse seven is this:

Through Isaac shall your children be named.

That word "named" can mean another translation of that is "called." Through Isaac shall your children be called. God is showing right here: salvation is of Me alone. I'm doing this, and I'm choosing Isaac over Ishmael.

Now you can hear somebody in the back going, "Well, come on, Paul. You know, that's an Egyptian kid that was rejected. Maybe this is a racial distinction between Israelites and Egyptians. Maybe, Paul, could you come up with the scenario of two kids, same conception, same family, God chooses one over the other despite even character problems?"

Paul's like, "I got you. I got you."

Next generation down. So Abraham's grandkids. Isaac and Rebecca have two sons, Esau and Jacob. You can read about this in Genesis 25. Go down one generation, and look at what it says here.

There's a distinction made. Verse 11 tells us this, the difference between Esau and Jacob was only God's purpose in election. The word there for election means to choose, to call out of. The second difference is that this is made prior to birth. It says, before the twins were born. And third, it's on the basis of no good or bad merit. Right? Before it says here, before the twins were born, before they've done anything good or bad.

In fact, quite the opposite. If you've read the Bible or know anything about this, it's crazy how himself the God of Jacob. One of the most scandalous terms in the Bible because Jacob is not a guy you want to do business with. One of the worst characters in the Old Testament. One of the lowlifes of the lowlifes. He was always about trickery and deception. There are story after story of him practicing that. So God's choice here is obviously not about merit, not about, "Oh, he's the really good guy." When God says, "I'm the God of Jacob," we all go, "Ugh." Yet what's it say in verse 13?

Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.

Some of you are like, "Woah, woah, time out. Yellow flag on the play, 20 yards. Wait. I thought God was a God of love. What about John 3:16? What about God loving in all his ways? And what in the world does God hate? What are you doing in my Bible? Let's rip this one out."

This is a Hebraism, and you who've been around our church for the last month know this. Three weeks ago, we talked about Matthew 6. Jesus on the Sermon on the Mount says, "Money is a master. God is a master. You can't love both. You're either gonna love one and hate the other, or love one and despise the other." What is he saying? It's a Hebraism. Nobody's saying, "I hate my wallet." It's by comparison to how much we love and praise God as our greatest treasure. All our earthly things are to vanish from view. Right?

Then last Sunday, we preached through Luke 14 where Jesus says:

If you want to be my disciple, hate your mom and dad and your children and your wife or your husband and come and follow me.

Now we know one of the ten commandments is honor your parents. So Jesus can't be meaning, "Go hate your mom." But again, it's a Hebraism. It's an idiom. By comparison, you are to love God so much that all other loves, even the best ones in this life, are to be that much secondary.

So let's translate that to verse 13 and understand what God's saying. When God says, "Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated," this is not your kind of hate or my kind of hate. God's love, remember this, is not emotional or reactive. It's creative and gracious. God is not in love with Jacob at this moment. And God is not like, "I can't stand Esau. I am repelled by Esau." I mean, everything that you could be repulsed by in Esau, you could very much, and maybe more so, be repulsed by in Jacob. So that can't be what's going on here.

Rather, God's love is creative. It creates value in what He loves. It doesn't respond to it. God's love is gracious. It's effective in transforming us. It's not responding to some kind of wonderful character values we have within us. So when God says hate, he doesn't mean what you mean. His is, by comparison to how much he loves Jacob, there's an absence for Esau. And by comparison, that feels like hate. Neither of them deserve to be saved, and yet God sets his love on Jacob for no reason.

The stunning thing for Paul—like, Paul is losing his mind as he writes this—the stunning thing for him was not that God didn't love Esau. It's that God loved Jacob. The stunning thing for us should not be, "Hey, why didn't God choose those people?" But "Why me?" That's where Romans 9 is meant to take us. What a joke. Me? Why me?

The Undesirable Alternative

Let's talk about the undesirable alternative because I know some of you are choking right now. Some of you are like, "Why do we have to do this? Why do we have to do this whole election thing? This feels really hard."

Election causes so many difficulties. And I always think it's funny when people think like they're the first person who ever thought of this causing difficulties. The Bible addresses this. Yes, if you take this doctrine out of Scripture and isolate it and dwell on it, you will end up rocking yourself in a corner. But holding this within Scripture and really listening to what it says, it shows us look, all the alternatives don't work.

So let's think of three of them today. We'll talk more next week. First is this, objection number one: What if we—what about foreknowledge?

You know, the favorite alternative to election is to squeeze election into this doctrine of foreknowledge, which is what God knew ahead of time anyway. God already knew, so he predestines those that he already knew will accept it. So God looks down the corridors of history and can see you're the type of person who is going to be predisposed to need him. Or he looks down the corridors of history and says, you know, that's the kind of person who will believe, and he predestines that person. Does that work? Let's test drive that one.

See, the position of that means know in advance. But the implications of that line of thought are actually pretty bad if you think about it. Because mere foreknowledge is actually a conditional election, a conditional love, where God says, well, that's the kind of person? Do we really want to say that? Let's think about this. A gospel of foreseen works? Let's try that one on.

See, people seem to think if you can reject the doctrine of election, you're in a safe place to stand. This is a great place to be in. This is good. You say, I'm not a Christian because God elects. I'm a Christian because I chose Jesus. I came to a really hard point in my life, a day when this became really clear, and I chose Him. But Paul says the reason that you're not a Christian is because you're not wiser than other people. You're not more intellectual or intelligent than other people. You're not better than other people. You're not more moral than other people. It's just based on him. It doesn't depend on you at all.

So Martin Lloyd Jones gives this analogy, and I think it's really helpful. He picks this passage out of Acts chapter 28 verse 24, where people come to Paul. Paul's teaching people—he's under house arrest. And it says there, well, some believed and some didn't. Some believe the words that Paul spoke, some did not. He says, okay, let's test this. So why did some believe and some didn't? Well, you could come up with a lot of things. You could say, well, maybe it's because some people saw it one way, some people saw it another way. Okay. Well, why did some people see it one way and other people saw it another way? Well, okay. Maybe it's because some were humbled and some were not. Well, why were some humbled and some not? Alright. Well, maybe it's because some people admitted their sin and some didn't. Well, why did some people admit their sin and some not?

See, Lloyd Jones does this thing where he keeps asking the same question, and he keeps going until the circle draws really, really tight. And you end up saying one of two things: either you're saved because you are a teeny tiny little bit better than other people, or it's all of God's electing mercy and grace. See, either you're saying like, I'm just a little bit more moral. I'm just a little bit smarter. I'm just a little bit more humble. I'm just a little bit more intelligent. I mean, you're either saying I'm just a little bit, or it's all Jesus. It's all God's grace. It's all God's grace and election. And do we really want to say that's true? Do we want to say a little bit? I think that anybody who really is rocked by the gospel would say, man, what a joke. I'm just like Jacob. Right? I'm just the same. I mean, why me?

So the real question is whether we want everybody believes in election one for sure or another. It's just whether we believe in it. It's all of Jesus, and it's all of grace, or it's based on some foreseen goodness in me that's a little teeny bit better than other people. Do we really want to say that?

Objection Number Two

This feels completely arbitrary. Man, I hear you. I mean, does God choose people in a sense by going eeny meeny miny moe? You know, is it like the sorting hat in Harry Potter? You're chosen to the damn school, and you're chosen to the elect school. Doesn't it sound ridiculous when it gets down to some of this stuff?

And look, Paul is not saying that God has no reasons. Paul's just saying none of them are you. None of them are in you. It's all of Him. That's entirely of Him. There are no superiority of Christians over unbelievers. And when we say things—and we say it all the time, catch yourself doing this. Wow. She seems like the type of person who could be a great Christian. What? No. You don't believe the gospel if you're saying that. Well, I'm really surprised, you know. I'm really surprised that such a nice guy—I thought he was a Christian. Really? Do you know any Christians? I mean, have you ever been to our church? This is not a nice group of people. You know, it is not God going through his report card. Let me go old school with me. Okay?

Flipping his Rolodex and picking out names, going through his card catalog and pulling cards, going through his computer and putting dots by names, naughty list, nice list. It's just God. It's just grace. So it's not a matter of God capriciously doing this.

And here's the next thing, and you're going to choke on this one. No one is excluded from the kingdom of God who wants to come in. See, if we're walking down the road, we're happy going to our destruction. We're happy with our blindfolds on. We're whistling and talking and joking on our way to hell. When God removes the blindfolds, it is what Christians do when we turn like, Jesus is life, and I want Him, and I never wanted Him before.

See, if you're drowning in the ocean and somebody throws you the Jesus life raft, if your heart is not, by the grace of God, turned toward him, you're like, that's death. That's not life. I'd rather have the shark. Thanks.

The kingdom of God, election and by grace, is that God doesn't exclude anybody who really wants in. In fact, God makes alive people who never wanted in. That's what God does for us in grace. Jesus is irresistible to those who've been made alive by God.

All whom the father gives come to Christ. — John 6:37

Final Objection

Final objection. And this one's really common. It seems like you're saying that God the Father takes some pleasure in condemning the wicked. And look, I just want to be really careful. Some of y'all are in recovery groups recovering from reformed theology. And I'm a reformed theologian. But this has been abused and taught in ways that are destructive and hurtful to lots of people. And I just want you to hear this, okay?

Verse 13 can make it sound like God somehow delights in the destruction of the wicked. Like, I just love to hate people. And remember, that is not what we're saying. The uniform testimony of Scripture is that God is good, and God is loving, and He is kind to all He has made.

His mercy on all He has made. — Psalm 145:9

God's hatred in this sense is not emotional vengefulness, but an absence of intervention. So Susan and I are big gardeners. In fact, we've gotten rid of all the grass in our front yard. Hallelujah. Love it, right? We love to garden. And that's what we've learned about living in a subtropical climate like Raleigh, North Carolina. We're really good at growing weeds in my house.

Now, what do you have to do to grow weeds in your yard? Nothing, right? They grow so well. I mean, they grow really, really well, and it's really hard to not grow weeds. You have to really work hard to not grow weeds. I spend a lot of time pulling up little tiny things, right? Because I don't want to grow them.

Look, in the same way, what does God have to do for a human heart that is bound towards self-destruction and sin and hatred of God? Nothing. All that requires for that person to continue on that pathway is His non-intervention.

And yet for God to save a sinner and conform us to Jesus Christ requires incredible intervention. The death of His son, electing grace, the provision of the Holy Spirit in your life that's going to bring you into perfection with Jesus. I mean, that's incredible intervention. That's an incredible amount of work.

See, look, election doesn't exclude anybody from God's kingdom who doesn't want in. God takes people like me who were walking happily down the road toward my own self-destruction, pulls off the blindfold and shows me life. Praise Jesus.

The Operative Word is Love

So here is the unbelievable hope. And I don't want you to miss this. Verse 13, the operative word there—although all of you heard the big word in that sentence was hate. The big word in that sentence is love. The big word in that sentence is love.

Here's why: even if you disagree with most of what I said this morning, I think that you want to agree with me. I think you want to agree and believe in election and predestination. Because without it, love isn't love. Without it, grace isn't grace.

Listen to what it says. Remember the free love of God:

Jacob have I loved. — Romans 9:13

Don't miss this. So Ed Clowney, who's a pastor and a theologian who used to teach at my seminary a long time ago, he used to use this illustration to describe this. He says, if your wife ever asks you this—this is great marriage advice or dating advice, okay?—if your wife ever asks you, "Honey, do you love me?" and you say, "Of course, I do," and she asks, "Why?" then you better not say this. Because you're prettier than other women, because you're smarter than other women, because you meet my needs, because you're very serviceable to me. You say any of those things, she's going to be upset and rightly so. Nobody wants that kind of love, right? Nobody wants a love that says "because" at the end of that sentence. That's not love. That's using someone.

What is the one and only right answer to why? Just because. Just because, right? You know, why do you love me? Just because.

I love you because I love you. Secret hint. That's a really great answer. See, this is what God the Father says to us. When we finally give in to electing grace, when we finally give up on self with regard to salvation, the doctrine of election takes grace to its radical conclusions: I love you because I love you.

If God saves me without my works, He must choose me without my works, apart from them too. If God says "I love you because you repent, because you obey, because you're trying," then He doesn't love you. If you don't believe the doctrine of election, then you don't know the love of God. You don't know that this is a love that is put on you just because—just put on you. He loves you for you.

John Newton said he had a woman in his church, an older woman, who used to say to him all the time: "Sir, the Lord must have loved me before I was born or else he would not have seen anything in me to love afterward." Amen.

So why me? And why you? Why? There's only one answer: Just because. Just because he loves us. The free, unmerited, electing love of God. This is the only way we can sing:

Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Little ones to him belong. We are weak, but he is strong. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.