All right, if you'll return in
your Bibles to Romans 9. I was drawn to this particular
text of Scripture And I know I've preached from it at least
twice, and referred to it countless times. But I was drawn to it
this week by a video I saw on YouTube, and it was a young woman,
I would say she's still in her 20s. And the title of the video
was, Five Scriptures That Made Me Lose My Faith. And I thought,
well, that's kind of interesting to look at. So I clicked on it. And the first scripture that
she went to was this one. Now, she was raised in a, I get
the impression, she said she was evangelical. That's how she
was raised. Well, that would loosely describe
the religion I was raised in, though I realize that The term
evangelical, its definition changes, just like all the terms that
men make up. That's why I don't like using
them. But evidently, I would say that
she came from a church that taught what we would call freewillism. And she read this, and she got
mad. In particular, she got mad at
verse 18. Therefore, God has mercy on whom
he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. And she took those words to mean
exactly what they say. Now, I've watched this YouTube
in the morning in my screened-in porch drinking coffee, which
is, when the weather's suitable, that's what I do. And I end up
seeing things like this, and I was all ready to give her an
answer, which I've done a lot in my time. Don't know that I've
ever changed anybody's mind with the answers I give, but sometimes
I feel compelled to give one. And the answer that I was considering
giving her was going to begin with, I'll give you credit for
reading that scripture and believing it to mean exactly what it says. Because I am certain, as I can
be without, you know, first-hand knowledge, the church that she
went to quite likely never preached on this text of scripture. Or
if they did, they found somehow to read that statement and still make it look like God's
done all he can, now it's up to you. They could read the quotation
from the book of Exodus, We find it there in verse 14, where God
says, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will
have compassion on whom I have compassion. In another video
I watched on YouTube, the guy tried to explain it this way.
Yes, he chooses those whom he's going to have mercy, and he has
mercy on people who believe him. And that's how he thought God
was sovereign. He decided the terms under which people will
somehow qualify for his mercy and grace. But that's not what God meant
when he was talking to Moses. It's not what he meant as he
spoke through Paul in verse 18. It's not what he meant when he
spoke to Pharaoh through the mouth of Moses and what is written
down for us in the scriptures, that God put Pharaoh in the world
and raised him up to the throne of Egypt for this express purpose,
that God could demonstrate his power over everyone by smacking
Pharaoh down. He was set up so that God could knock him down
and prove that he is God. She didn't like that. And you
know what? I understand why she didn't like
it. She's a human being, and we've
been wanting to, we humans, we've wanted the rights and privileges
of God ever since Satan came into the garden and deceived
Eve saying the reason God won't let you eat of that fruit or
that tree is that He knows when you do, you will be like Him. And he's jealous of his position
as God. He doesn't want to share it with you. And that's what the real temptation
to Eve was. It wasn't the fruit itself. It was what would come by eating
the fruit, being like God. And so man comes into the world,
and there's a famous poem called Invictus. And the last lines
of it are, I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of
my soul. I wish that I could see the guy
that wrote that and say, well, if you're the master of your
fate and the captain of your soul, I know where you're going. suppose it's not funny but it's
still man is just so full of that pride he insists that he
be the one to decide things and God is there with a tremendous
amount of power that I can tap into it if I want
to I can let him save me because he's trying to he's straining
at the leash, you know, that my will has on Him. But if there's something going
on in my life I don't like, I can pray to Him and release His power
in my behalf. And if I want to go to heaven,
all I've got to do is when I think it's the appropriate time, let
God save me. God hands off. Now that's what's
in the heart of everyone that comes into this world, even if
they never express it in those words. And so I'm not surprised
that this young woman got upset at these words. And the reason
she got upset is she believed that they meant what they said. Man wants to be the master of
his destiny. If he's on a ship, he insists
on being the captain. The problem is this brings him
in direct conflict with God. Because God's of the opinion
he should be the master and he should be the captain of everything. And here's why he thinks he should
be the captain of everything. He made everything. I've made a few things in my
life. I like to work with wood for the most part. I'm not saying
I'm great at it, just I've worked with it. And you know, when I
make something, and I wasn't under contract for
someone else, I make something for myself, I have the opinion
I can make it however I want to, whatever size I want to,
I can make it pretty or make it ugly. I can make it to serve
some good purpose, some glorious purpose. Or I can make it as
some common piece of work that nobody's going to take note of.
In fact, if I want to, when I'm done making it, I can go right
out to our burn pile, throw it on there, and set it on fire.
Why? It's mine. I made it. And God made everything in this
universe. All of it, every particle of
it. Space and time itself answers
to him. And he answers to no one. Nebuchadnezzar didn't like the
idea that God was in charge. He thought he himself was in
charge, and he patted himself on the back and boasted of all
his conquests. And God said, that's enough. And gave him a dream, I believe, and Daniel
told him what's going to happen. And for seven years, glorious
Nebuchadnezzar ate food like cattle. For seven years, the glorious
king of the Babylonian Empire went insane. I don't know how he kept his
throne. I imagine it's just like they
do nowadays even in our government. There's so many people around
the leaders, they can make it look like everything's okay when
it's not. But after seven years, and this
is Nebuchadnezzar's own testimony, after seven years, he said, my
reason was restored to me. I like that. He didn't say, I
got back my reason. He said, my reason was restored
to me. Somebody took it away, somebody
gave it back. I didn't consent to him taking
it away, and I didn't ask him to give it back. He said, my reason was restored
to me. And what did his reason compel
him to do? He said, and I extolled the Most
High God. Before he went nuts, he was extolling
himself. When he got his reason back,
he said, I extolled the Most High God. And then he said this
verse. who does as he wills in the armies
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and no one can
stop him or even has the right to ask him, just what do you
think you're doing? Now, that's the modern version.
I think King James says, no one can stay his hand or say unto
him, what doest thou? But that's what he meant. No
one can stop him from performing his will, and no one even has
a right to call him into account for what he does on anything. Now you see, and by the way,
the title of this message is The Glory and Wonder of God's
Free Grace. But the reason we begin at this
point of God's absolute sovereignty, His just and righteous privilege,
if you will, to do whatever He wants with anything or anyone
He wants, that is a foundation to understanding who God is.
And to the degree you don't understand that about God, you don't understand
God. And things are going to be a
mystery to you. To understand anything about
the gospel of God, the first thing we must have some kind
of understanding about is God Himself and one of the foundational
aspects of God. He can do whatever He wants to
do. And it's right because he does
it. He doesn't do a thing because
it's right. It's right because he did it. Now, this young woman, and I'm
sure she doesn't understand this, this young woman was putting herself in the place
of God or even higher, what she didn't like about this is God
was doing something without a person's permission. And she thinks, well, I've got
enough decency about me that I don't do things to people without
their permission. God ought to be the same way.
She brought God into judgment And she brought God into judgment
because she's upset that God brings people into judgment. What is she doing? And I say
she, every one of us does it until God changes us and that
self-deifying principle still works in our flesh. She doesn't realize, and most
people don't realize, when you get mad at God, when you don't
like the way He does things, you have become God in your own
eyes. That's why I've made the statement
that with most atheists that I've heard speak, and speak out
against God, I realized their name atheist is one letter off.
They are not atheists, they are atheists. They have set themselves
up as God, for they bring God into judgment. The church I was raised in, I
don't ever remember hearing the word sovereign the whole time
I was there. Not that I was paying close attention.
I'll have to give them that little qualification. They might have
said it and I didn't hear it, but I do know this. They didn't
believe it. They didn't believe God was sovereign. Many will
say that He's sovereign, and yet when it comes to the point
of a man's eternal destiny, there, hands off, can't touch the free
will of man. Nobody seems to be interested
in the concept of the free will of God. I mean, if anybody's free, it's
him. Now understand, we normally think
of the word free as meaning without cost. But it actually has broader meaning
than that, especially within the context of the scripture
and the gospel and all that. It means without cause. without cause. The word that
is translated free in the scriptures, at least on some occasions, it
was used at that place where it is written concerning those
who hated the Lord Jesus Christ, they hated him without a cause,
they hated him freely. They had no good reason to hate
the Lord Jesus, he did nothing to them. There was nothing about
him that was worthy of hate. They hated him freely. God is an absolutely free agent. Whatever he does, he does it
for this reason and this reason alone. It's what he wants to
do. It says, he works all things
according to the counsel of the free will of man. You won't find
that anywhere in the Bible. He does. He works all things
according to the counsel of the goodness or badness of a person. You won't find that one either.
He works all things according to the counsel of his own will. Now, by the grace of God, I've never
stood in opposition to that concept. Admittedly, I never heard it
clearly stated until my first year of college, because they
certainly weren't saying it in my church. And the fellow I heard it from
first wasn't saying it as a point that we should believe. He was
saying that as a point that Calvinists believe. It was a systematic
theology class, and somebody asked, what is Calvinism? So
he described it. And when he described it, my
thought was, well, if God's God, that's the way things got to
be. Now, I'm not saying that to brag. I'm just saying I have
never felt the rebellion that that woman evidently felt about
God being sovereign and unaccountable to man. And it's only by His grace that that's
the way my life worked out, that I never felt any rebellion that
I'm aware of to that particular point of theology. But it is
natural. for humanity, and probably more
for us Americans than anybody else, because, I mean, we are
raised on the concept of individual freedom. And I'm glad we are. But that's with regard to other
people. That's with regard to those who
would like to rule us in inappropriate ways. and control aspects of
our lives that they have no right to control. And yes, for that
freedom, I don't want to get up here and
both say I'll fight and die. I don't know what I would do, but I'd
resist any encroachment on it, pretty seriously. I'll put it
that way. That may be an underwhelming way to express it, but yeah,
I'm serious. Just leave me alone. Let me do
my thing. That's fine among men. We're talking about God here.
And God's not just a big man. People call him the man upstairs.
I'm sorry. He's not just upstairs. In his essential person, he's
not even in the house. He made the house where we live. And he made us. And when he's done with the house,
he'll knock it down. And everybody in that house lives as He determines,
dies as He determines, and ends up where He determines. Now, God tells us that because if it weren't that way,
if He left our eternal destiny up to us in any respect, we boast of the whole thing. You ever seen people like that?
You know, they help you a tiny bit with something, and then
they go around and brag about it as though they did the whole
job. And, well, we may have the grace
to just let it go. It irritates us when people do
that. God has no obligation to be gracious
about that. He says, I will not share my
glory with anybody. Therefore, we can be assured
of this. He is going to be in absolute
control of everything so that he can take credit for everything. Now, I said this is about the
glory and wonder of God's free grace. You can't see the glory and wonder
of God's free grace until you come to terms with the reality
that God is under no obligation to show you any grace or mercy. and you can't put him under any
obligation to do it by anything that you do. Furthermore, if he's determined
to show you grace, you can't stop him. There'll be nothing you can do
that will resist his will successfully. One of the doctrines commonly
referred to as Calvinism is irresistible grace. Once again, you have a
man-made term that is not totally accurate. Grace is resistible,
just not successfully. Everybody to whom the grace of
God comes resists that grace. And just like when God wrestled
with Jacob, it's not as though Jacob was as strong as God, and
it took God all night to finally get the upper hand on him. God was toying with him, so to
speak. He was teaching him some things through that whole wrestling
match. And when it pleased God to bring that thing to an end,
he just reached up, grabbed Jacob by his thigh, and I suppose he
squeezed. And he said, let me go. Jacob said, let me go. God said to Jacob, let me go,
and Jacob said, I will not let you go till you bless me. Now
did he have God over a barrel? Could Jacob have kept God wrestled
to the ground? Of course not. That whole thing
was not make some kind of demonstration of Jacob's free will, that whole
business was to bring Jacob into a position where he was desperate
and would cry out, have mercy on me, bless me, for one thing
by letting go of my leg it's killing me, but I must have your blessing. So we see the glory and wonder
of God's free grace when first we realize that there's nothing we can do
to direct the grace and mercy of God to go where we want it
to go. We can't do it for ourselves.
We can't do it for our children. Our parents couldn't do it for
us because God is free. He cannot be forced to do anything,
and he can't be stopped from doing anything. Then, when you realize that this
thing is utterly out of your hands, moreover, when you that everything
you have done has worked against any natural understanding of
why God might be gracious toward a person, you are left helpless. Helpless, apart from Him. And that's the point He will
bring all of His people to. They are helpless. They realize
I'm helpless apart from your sovereign grace. I can't change anything about
who I am. I can't change who you are. I
can't do anything that will force your hand. I can't do anything
that'd stop your hand. My church can't do anything for
me in this matter. I am helpless." And then if we're ever brought
to that situation, to that understanding, then we see the glory and the
wonder that God is gracious to anybody. People read, Jacob have I loved,
Esau have I hated. Well God doesn't hate anybody.
Well then what does that mean? And you see the wonder of that
statement is not that God hated Esau. I perfectly understand
why God hated Esau. Esau hated God. What should blow us away is,
Jacob have I loved? You and I, we might have liked
Esau. He was a man's man. Nowadays, you know, I see these
people having series on Christian manhood, you know, and they're
even trying to, you know, explain it in terms of, you know, being
the man's man kind of thing. And I realize why they're doing
it, you know, because the culture's been trying to feminize men so
long. And they're trying to turn back the clock. Well, my friends, that isn't what God's trying
to do. He's not trying to make all of us men go around thumping
our chests like an ape, proving we're stronger than everybody
else. That's not what this business is about. But nonetheless, Esau
would have been the kind of person, a hunter, a man of the field,
strong, Isaac liked him. Despite what God had told Isaac,
that the older brother would be subservient to the younger
brother, Isaac went on with the intention of giving the blessing
to Esau. But Isaac's will wasn't important
in this matter. God's was. And for reasons, I was going
to say for reasons known only to God. No, God doesn't do things
for reasons. God is the reason. Why did God do that? He wanted
to. That's the only reason there is for God. According to the Lord Jesus,
our God in human flesh, he prayed this, I thank you, Father, Lord
of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from
the wise and prudent and revealed it unto babes. For even so, it
seemed good in your sight to do it. Why did God hide His truth
from the religious leaders of that day and reveal it to people
who were so insignificant nobody even thought about it? Why did
God do it that way? That's why He wanted to do it.
Seemed like a good idea to Him. And that was it. That's all there
is to God's actions, His will. And so here we are. We've done
everything that would turn God's grace away from us. And God is such a being that
you cannot force His hand in any way. And here we are helpless
and we begin to see that glory and wonder. Yes, He has mercy
on whom He wants to have mercy and He hardens whom He wants
to harden. And if I ever take the time to
write an answer to an objection to that concept, while we say
that whatever God does is right because God did it, here's one
thing you'll learn about God. Everything that God does is right
and just if you will look at things honestly. Yes, God hardened
Pharaoh's heart. But if you'll recall, he sent
Moses and he said, hear what Jehovah says, let my people go. You know what Pharaoh's response
was? Who is Jehovah that I should
listen to his word? And God began a series of 10
judgments on Egypt, any one of which should have humbled Pharaoh
and caused him to repent and submit in his heart and let God's
people go and Pharaoh himself go on worshiping. Any one of
them should have. But God told Moses, he said, Pharaoh's heart
is hard. And you read for the first four
or five of those judgments, God would bring the judgment, Pharaoh
would say, all right, that's enough, that's enough. You tell
God to stop, then I'll let y'all go. So God would stop, then he
would say, and Pharaoh hardened his heart. It wasn't till you
know, fifth or sixth, I can't remember the exact number, that
it says God hardened Pharaoh's heart. Up until then, Pharaoh
started out with a hard heart. He kept hardening it, and finally
God said, okay, you want to harden your heart against me? I will
show you how hard your heart can get. You know how hard it got? God
killed Pharaoh's firstborn. And the firstborn of all the
house of Israel, not only among humans, but among all their cattle
and all that, just killed them all. And so Pharaoh relented
and said, all right, get out of here. We don't want you anymore. And I can't recall, I don't even
know if the Bible says how long it took him to get to the Red
Sea. But you know what? Within a few days, evidently, Pharaoh
said, now wait a minute. Nah, I'm not gonna let that happen. Got his army together and went
chasing after him. You talk about a hard heart. If God did that
for a group of people, I'd think, okay, back off, leave him alone. But here's the glory. Here's
why we should give thanks to God. that His grace is controlled
by Him and not by us. Verse 25, as He says in Hosea,
I will call them My people who are not My people, and I will
call her My loved one who is not My loved one. It will happen
that in the very place where it was said to them, you are
not my people, they will be called sons of the living God. Now, if you don't know the story
behind those quotes, you won't understand the glory behind this
doctrine of God's free and sovereign grace. The story is from the
life of the prophet Hosea. And God came to Hosea and he
said, Hosea, I want you to marry a prostitute. What? Yeah, I want you, you go out
and you marry a woman who sells herself to other men. And that's what happened. And
the Bible says, that she gave birth to two. And they named one, not loved,
and the other, not mine. Why? They weren't Hosea's children, because later Be honest with
you, I can't remember if the legitimate child came first or
after. But there was one child where
it says, she bore Hosea a child. But with the other two, she's
had a child. Evidently, they didn't belong
to Hosea. So, that's not mine. That's not my child. Another one comes along, not
loved. I can't love the child born from another man. Neither
one of them got a place in my house. What was the hope of those children?
I mean, whoever their father was, he had no interest in them,
and they probably didn't know who it was. All they knew, all those two
children could know about their relationship to Hosea was that
they didn't belong to him and they had no right to claim his
love and everything that comes with a father's love. Home, food,
protection, none of that. They had no claim to it. And
there was nothing they could do about it. There was nothing
they could do about it because their ancestry was wrong and
you can't change your ancestry. They were properly named. They
weren't Hosea's. And there was no reason for Hosea
to love them. In fact, there was compelling
reason for Hosea to reject them. What did Hosea do? He renamed them. He renamed not mine to mine. He renamed not loved to loved. Who renamed them? Not themselves. Hosea did. Why? Within the context of that story,
Hosea was the sovereign. And we, in the spiritual sense, occupy
the place of not mine and not loved. But our God, and I'm sure that
Hosea did this under the direction of God. I'm not thinking that
he would have done this of his own volition. He didn't want to marry the woman
in the first place. Much less would he be inclined to accept
children born to another man. But God, thank God he's not like
us. and he comes to us not mines
and not loved. By nature we are not his. By
nature we're children of wrath, not children of love. By nature
we are not his children at all, and we can't claim the rights
and privileges of children in God's household. And there's
not a thing we can do about it. Our ancestry's from Adam, we
are outcasts from paradise, and we have nothing by which to gain
re-entry. Unless, God says, ain't not mine,
giving you a new name. You are mine. Ain't not loved. gives us a big hug of his grace
and says, you're mine. And not all my pauses are for reflection. Some of them, it takes me a few
minutes after I say something to regain my composure. Imagine that. God looked at us scoundrels, us outcasts, us children of an adulterous woman and an
adulterous man. We aren't God's. We don't belong
to him. We're not loved. That is, we
can't make any claim on His love. That's why I don't go out and
tell people God loves you. I don't know. But even though I can't say God loves
you, God can. I can't say you're the elect
of God. God can. God can. And here's the wonder of it. In the very place where it was said to them, you
are not my people. In that very place, they'll be
called the sons of the living God. Where is it said, you are
not my people? I'll tell you where I hear it
said the most. Right in my own conscience. right up there where even I know
I'm too sinful for God. And if I'm not saying it, there
is one called the accuser of the brethren. Aha, look at you. You're not his. You don't belong
to God. Let's be real. Somebody who belonged
to God wouldn't act like that, wouldn't think like that, wouldn't
do that, wouldn't want that. in the very place it was said
to them, you are not mine. I will say, they are mine. Now if you want to, and apart
from grace, you want to, if you want to keep saying to yourself,
I'm of God, I'm a child of God. I'm loved by God. You go on saying
that to yourself. And if you're the one saying
it, God's not saying it. I understand by faith we can
make that statement. But if you've never come to the
point where your own testimony regarding you is not God's, not
love, or certainly not able to constrain the love of God. I
got no proof of it. But when that honestly, when
that voice is honestly in your mind, then God says, and by the
way, if that voice is ever truly in your mind where you accept
it, that's the truth of it, that's when God said it. is first he'll convince you,
you don't belong to God. God's got no reason to love you. Then will he say to you, the
nobody, the outcast, you are mine. I love you. Eric and I probably share favorite
scripture, not that that's our only favorite, but one of them.
Fear not, O Jacob, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name. You are mine. And say what you will. That is free and sovereign grace. It's not a doctrine that we boast
about because we believe it. We don't take credit for believing
it. We don't think we're better than free willers because we
believe it. No, it's not a doctrine to be
argued about. You know what the interesting
thing is? Romans 9 is the only place where there's ever an argument
made for God's sovereign grace. Otherwise, the rest of the Bible
just assumes God's sovereign over everything, doesn't ever
try to prove the point. And the free and sovereign grace
of God is not a barrier to anyone's salvation. It is the only door
of entry into the favor of God. Without it, nobody's saved. Because every one of us comes
into this world as not mine and not loved. And it's only as God
the Sovereign, by His own will, decides it. You're mine. You're loved. And I'm glad. I am glad he did
not put my finger on the switch of yes or no. He did not simply provide the
energy necessary, but I've got to turn it on. He looked at this world full
of nothing but rebels, and he looked at this one. He said,
that one's mine. I love him. And then he sent his son to die
for me. Because God's just and he can't show his love to me
without satisfying his justice. And then he sent his spirit to
tell me, through the preaching of the gospel, to tell me, God
loves you, you belong to him. And here I am, I'm just standing
here, having never done anything. to make me loved by God or make
me belong to Him. He did every last bit of it. And I'm not mad at Him for that. I'm glad He violated my will.
I'm glad He didn't knock at the door of my heart but knocked
it down. I'm glad he didn't say, let me be Lord. He threw me off
the throne that I didn't belong on and sat there himself. And then he said, I love you. I redeemed you. I've called you. You're mine. Lord, we thank for
his grace.