Romans chapter 9 this morning,
we'll be looking at verse 22 through verse 24. The title of the message this morning
is God's election and his effectual call. God's election and effectual
call. The scripture says, what if God
willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured
with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction,
and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the
vessels of mercy which he had aforeprepared unto glory, even
us, which he hath called not of the Jews only, but also of
the Gentiles. Now, by way of introduction,
I want you to remember that the apostle here is answering three
distinct objections. Three distinct objections. Paul
was praying for Israel, his people, according to the flesh, that
they might be saved, and the people would object. They say,
well, Paul, if that's so, if God promised to save Israel according
to the Scriptures, And you who are praying for the salvation
of Israel, who have rejected the Messiah, is the word of God
of none effect? Paul said no. Why? Because Israel
is one spiritual, not carnal. This is the answer of God. Israel
is not one physical, but one spiritual. And then he begins
to tell us about this Israel, that they are according to the
purpose of God's election. that Israel is chosen not by
a physical descent, but rather by the election of grace. And he describes this by Scripture. He says, as it is written, Jacob
have I loved, but Esau have I hated. Jacob not having done any good
or Esau not having done any evil, God loved Jacob and hated Esau. Now then the objection comes.
Is there unrighteousness with God? Is God unjust to love one
and hate another not based on anything they have done? He said, no, God's not unrighteous
about this. He's already told you. He said,
mercy is mine. I will have mercy on whom I will
have mercy, I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
So then, it is not of him that willeth, or him that runneth,
but God that showeth mercy." And then he says about Pharaoh,
he uses Pharaoh as an example, he says, Pharaoh, I raised him
up just to show my power to my people. I raised him up for that
purpose. So then the Lord will have mercy
on whom He will, and whom He will, He hardeneth. Then the
objection comes. If God is sovereign, how then
can man be responsible? Look at that. There's the objection
in verse 18. Oh, verse 19, there it is. Thou wilt say unto me,
why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
You're saying God chose one, despised another. How then can
the one hated be judged of God? And what does Paul say? But nay,
O man, who are you that reply against God? Shall the thing
form, saying to him that form it, why hast thou made me thus?
Hath not the potter power of the clay of the same lump to
make one vessel of honor and another to dishonor? And now
we come to our text. Paul is answering that last question. How can God be sovereign and
man still be responsible? Here it is. Who are you? Who
are you to bring God under your judgment bar? You are the clay. God is the
potter. God is the potter. You are the
clay. Shall the clay say unto him that formed it, Why have
you made me thus? And so then the subject of this
is, again, the election of God. The salvation is according to
the election of God. That God, from the beginning,
purposed to save some. God chose some, gave them to
Christ in mercy, and left the rest of humanity to their fallen, sinful state.
The ones God chose to redeem in Christ are here called Vessels
of Mercy. And those left to themselves
are called Vessels of Wrath. Vessels of Wrath. Now these Vessels
of Wrath are said to be fitted unto destruction. Now all men
are molded and shaped of God. All men are molded and shaped
of God. Now, most people don't have any problem with God saying,
you know, God made us the way we are. That's how God made you.
How many times have you heard that? That's just how God made
you. Well, of course it's how God made you. That's exactly
how God made you. We have no problem saying, God
made my features, God made my hands, God made my legs, God
gave me, God put me in this place, God gave me this. Usually, men
say, well, if something's good, they say, well, we know God gave
it. They say something evil, they gotta kinda confess it,
that it's of God, but it is. It is. But yet they kick in this
matter of salvation. When I say God makes a man saved
or he forms a man to be destroyed, they get mad. But friends, that's
exactly what the scripture says. And it doesn't matter how men
kick against it. I will not try to justify God
to you. God is God and you're not. Now
you kick and spit at him all you want to. That is God. Therefore some men are vessels
of mercy and grace, while others are vessels of wrath, whom God
will exact strict justice. Now these vessels of wrath that
are fitted for destruction, I want you to understand, they will
be destroyed because of their sin. The wrath of God will fall on
the vessels of wrath because of their sin. Now they are fitted
for destruction, but what they are filled with is sin. They're
filled with sin. And so God will punish them based
on their sin. Now these vessels of wrath have
one purpose. One purpose. that God should
show his power and hatred for sin. That's what God's going
to do with them. He is going to manifest his power
and his hatred, his holiness against all sin. It will show the absolute power
and holiness of God and their eternal destruction. This is
the reason God is long-suffering with him and does not take vengeance
on them at birth. It's because he would show his
power. You remember why he raised Pharaoh up. Consider that that
whole man's life was to display God's power. That was it. Was there any hope of Pharaoh
ever being saved? Did God ever intend to save Pharaoh? Never. Never. I'll tell you this, he had the
Word of God. He heard the Word of God. He witnessed the power
of God. But he was only fit for destruction.
He was only fit for destruction. You remember, that's exactly
what Jude says, of those men that crept in the church, those
ungodly men, he says, which were of old ordained to this condemnation. Ordained. That God might show
His power. But you see, God uses these ungodly
men for another purpose, and that is for the salvation of
His people. He uses them against their desired
purpose. They want to destroy the church.
They want to stamp out the name of God. And yet God uses their
wrath, or restrains their wrath, so that He should call and save
His vessels of mercy. We think of the Jews when they
crucified Christ, they did exactly what they wanted to do. And all
the while they were doing exactly what God ordained them to do. Crucify his son. Why? That the
vessels of mercy should obtain mercy. That we should be redeemed. Now these vessels of mercy, those
are the guns God elect, and listen how he puts it. They weren't
fitted, they were aforeprepared. aforeprepared unto glory. These vessels of
mercy were loved of God from eternity in Christ. These vessels of mercy have one
purpose as well, and that the riches of the glory of God's
grace should be made manifest in their salvation. Friends, everything God's doing
is for Himself. everything god's doing is for
himself in the vessels of wrath he is displaying his power and
his holiness in the vessels of mercy is displaying his grace
and mercy and love god's manifesting himself to its creatures god purpose that he would accomplish
The salvation of these vessels of mercy. He elected them from
eternity to be trophies of His grace. Now does this doctrine
of election in the scripture give all the glory to God? You know, if you want a litmus
test, if a man's preaching the gospel, does the glory belong
to God or man? According to the Word of God,
the glory belongs unto God, always to God, never to us. Not unto us, not unto us, but
unto thy name be glory. This matter of election, friend,
is not just some theory. It's not some abstract doctrine,
a part of systematic theology. This doctrine of election is
loved and embraced by the vessels of mercy. It's loved and embraced
only by the vessels of mercy. We that are vessels of mercy,
we love and adore this because we are only hell-deserving sinners. We only deserve what Esau obtained,
wrath. That's what Jacob deserved. That's
what we deserved. But God. But God, who is rich
in mercy, chose us to be vessels of mercy. aforeprepared us to
be objects of His love. And we love this truth of the
blessed, sovereign mercy and election. This humbles us. It
brings us to the earth and causes us to bow down and praise God
for His mercy, His rich mercy. Now Paul shows this salvation
from all eternity was purposed by God unto those that are chosen
of God. He now brings it and puts flesh
on this doctrine. He says, even us. He said, this
is not impersonal doctrine to us, is it? Election is not impersonal.
It's very personal to me. Very personal to me. Without
it, I would have no hope. Without it, I would have no hope.
That's what the scripture says. If he had not obtained a remnant,
that's what he tells us just down this in verse 29. He says, look, we'd been like
Sodom and Gomorrah. We'd all been that way, if it
had not been for the mercy of God. He puts flesh on this and
he says, look, this is not just abstract vessels of mercy. I'm
talking about us. This is us I'm talking about.
Vessels of mercy, aforeprepared unto glory. before prepared. Is election a doctrine to be
learned? Or has it been realized by you?
Is it real? How many people take the doctrine
of election and look at it as some intellectual argument? Some point of debate? Listen,
friend, you'll never find me debating election. I don't debate
it. It's so. If you don't believe it, I can't
do anything for you. I know it's so. Because I am
one of God's elect. I am one. Are you? Is this a reality to you? How
then could one know? Because I mean, this is talking
about all of us right here in this room. In this room, these
two people represent everyone in this room. None of you should
be... You are included here. You are
one of these. Which one are you? That's a vital
question. This is personal. This deals
with you, right now, personally. Are you a vessel of mercy, aforeprepared? Or are you a vessel of wrath,
fitted for destruction? How can one know? How can one know? The answer
is found in our text. Look at verse 24. How did Paul,
how could Paul say, even us? Even us! Listen. Here it is. Even us, whom he hath, what? Called. Oh, it becomes very personal
now. Now, have I been called? Have I been called? The calling
of God. God's purpose in the election
is that some of Adam's race be saved. If there were no election,
no man could be saved, no man would come to Christ. Listen
to what Jesus said, all that the Father giveth me. shall come to me. And that one that was given me
and comes to me, I won't cast him out. Why? I came down from
heaven not to do mine own will, but the will of Him that sent
me. And what's this will? The will of the Father is that
of all He has given me, I should lose nothing, but raise it up
again at the last day. Our Lord says this. I'm not going
to lose one of my elect. I'm not going to lose one of
them. And this should ring comfort in your ears if you are a believer.
If you have been called of God, this should ring comfort in your
ears. That you were given to the Son of God. Given to Him.
The Father says, I give them to you. And Jesus said, I take
them. And as He came down from heaven
robed in our nature and our flesh, He obeyed the law of God for
these vessels of mercy. He did it for them. He obtained
righteousness for them. He died for their sins. God, being just, imputed their
sins to Him. He took our sins in His own body
on the tree, and suffered the reproach and
wrath of God due our sins. The scripture says, Because for
thy sake I have borne reproach, shame hath covered my face. I
became a stranger unto my brethren, an alien to my mother's children.
The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up. And the reproaches
of them that reproach thee are fallen on me." You see that God chose these
vessels of mercy. He did not do so at the expense
of justice. These vessels of mercy were to
be saved according to justice. You see, God will satisfy justice
both on the elect and those who are not. God's love for the believer never
overrules God's justice, which was against our sin. You
see, if God chose to show mercy at the expense of his justice,
God himself would be unjust. That's not the way God is. God
is not unjust. God is righteous and must punish
sin. And how did you do that? By Christ.
Consider this as an illustration. Consider this an illustration.
If you were guilty of a traffic fine or a fine against the law,
you were fined, the law came and the gavel swung and says,
guilty, pay the fine. He had two men guilty, and both
were judged guilty before the law and had to pay a fine, but
yet neither one of them had sufficient to pay. Ah, but one was the son
of a judge, and the judge saw his son, having compassion on
him, paid his debt. Now was he unjust to pay only
the debt of his son? No. He swung the gavel. His son was guilty. But yet he
paid the fine for him. Was he unjust because he didn't
pay the fine of the other? No. No, justice was satisfied
in both of them, wasn't it? The other one went to jail. The
son was set free. You see this? God did not excuse
his justice or lay it aside. But yet he punished it in Christ,
our substitute. Christ agreed to pay our debt
and did it. And if the son shall set you
free, Listen, you shall be free, indeed. Indeed. Now, therefore,
is there no condemnation to those which are in Christ Jesus? If
God chose a people and Christ died for those people, then the
question still remains, who are they? Again, it is, what makes
the distinction is this, the calling of God. The calling of
God. Now, the calling of God is manifest
and the evidence of one's election, a vessel of mercy prepared unto
glory, to those he makes known, look at that in verse 23, that
he might make known the riches of his glory to the vessels of
mercy. How does he do this? In his calling. Now, I want you to understand
there are two types of calling. Two callings. First is a general
calling. There is a general calling. Look unto me, and be ye saved
all the ends of the earth for I am God and there is none else. There's a general call that goes
out right now. I just said it. I told you. Look
unto Christ and be ye saved all the ends of the earth. Throw
away all your excuses. You've got no excuses. Come to
Christ. Why? He commands it. He demands
it. You should believe on the Son
of God. You should cast off all your unrighteousness. You should
believe on Him. This Word of God goes out. As
the sower, you remember that parable, the sowers, they went
forth and sowed the seed. They sowed how? At a venture.
Today, I just told you that. I sowed at a venture. I don't
know. Perventure, God might say so. Now, The seed, as it goes out,
it falls on all different types of hearts. Hard hearts. Man by nature has a hard heart.
Man by nature, his heart is full of the stones of his sins hiding
underneath the earth. He covers it up with religion,
but underneath is hard, cold, and dead. He's so full of the
cares of this world. that it chokes the word, he gets
in religion, he hears the gospel, he receives it for a moment and
then it just goes away. Or it's choked out by the cares
and thoughts of this life. And so then for this seed to
actually take root, the ground has to be prepared. The ground
of the heart has to be prepared. Who does this? The Holy Spirit
does this. By many means He does this. By
afflictions and troubles and difficulties, He causes men's
hearts to be plowed up and He takes away all of their refuges. He takes away all their religion
and it doesn't... Isn't that what He did in Hosea?
He said, look, I'm going to take away her corn, her wine, her
gods, her mirth, I'm taking it all away. Why? That I might show
her love. That I might show her a door
of hope. If God's ever going to save you,
He's going to start plowing up the sins of your heart. He's
going to expose you for what you really are. He's going to
love you like that woman at the well. He first, before she could
understand who He was, had to understand her condition. He
exposed her for who she was. She was an adulterous woman living
with a man, and she was trying to hide it. You couldn't hide
from Him. plows up. This is the work of
the Holy Spirit in the call. Now this general call goes out. But I tell you this, it's only
effectual to the vessels of mercy. It's only powerful to the vessels
of mercy. Now listen, I have assurance
of this. God's Word does exactly what God's purposes do. This morning, as well as every
other time I've ever preached, or any other man of God has ever
preached, every time the Word of God is spoken, it goes out
and does exactly what God's... God says, My Word will not return
to me void, but shall accomplish the thing whether I do I send
it, either to harden the heart or break it, to damn or to save,
whatever God purposes. Therefore, we continue to call
men We continue to call men. Why? This is the means God has
chosen to save His vessels of mercy. Those who don't believe in God's
grace and mercy and election, they say, why do you preach?
If God's already determined, why stand up? Because God told
me to. I don't need another excuse. God said this is the means. That's why we do it. 2 Thessalonians 2 and verse 13,
We are bound always to give thanks to you, brethren, beloved of
the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation.
Here's the means. Through sanctification of the
Spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto he called you by our
gospel. Any question about that? How
this works? God chose to save. How? Through sanctification of
the Spirit, setting apart of the Holy Spirit, calling and
creating that new nature, holy nature inside of us. And that you should believe on
Christ. How should you believe? How should
the Spirit sanctify you? through our gospel. That's how. That's why we preach.
That's why we do this general call. Because I don't know who
the elect of God are, and neither do you. And so what do we do? We cast that adventure, but to
God it's no venture, is it? To God it's no venture, this
seed falls exactly where he plants it. You that believe, you testify
of this, you know this to be true. You once were lost and steeped
in your religion, trusting in your good deeds, your false God,
and God came and quickened you, and you cast all that away as
dung, that you may win Christ. This is what it is to be called.
This is an effectual call. Powerful call. powerful call. What does the word effectual
mean? One preacher said, it gets the job done. That's probably
the better definition for it. But it has to do with power and
will. It has to do with power and will. The effectual call of God is
by the power of God and the will of God. This effectual call involves
the grace and power of the sovereign God to call sinners to Himself. Now, the general call that is
not accompanied by the power of God and the will of God to
save is always rejected. Listen, this morning, if you
reject this gospel, if you do not believe on Christ right now,
you know why? Because God had no power coming
with this message to your heart. God had not willed for you to
have it. Now, I'll tell you this, you
are responsible for it. I don't care what you think.
I don't care if you can't reconcile that or not. You are. You're
responsible. If you die in your sins, it will
be all your fault. Oh, but if you ever hear it,
it will be God's. It will be God's glory, God's
praise, if you ever heard it and believed it. The effectual
call is like this. It is raising one from the dead. That's what this effectual call
is. It is like the call of Lazarus from the dead. When Christ came to that tomb
and he commanded Lazarus to come forth, whose power and will was
it that Lazarus should come forth? Lazarus? Did Lazarus have any
power or will? Dead. whose power and will was
Christ's. And if you ever come to Christ,
it will be his power and his will that bring you. Now what
could Lazarus do? Was Christ pleading with Lazarus?
Was he begging Lazarus to do his part? No. You laugh because it's silly.
Well listen, free will works religion is just silly. It's
ignorant. foolish. Their God is not God
and their Christ is not Christ. Our God saves by effectual calling. He calls a sinner from death
to life. Man is born dead in our sins
and cannot come. Therefore, the power of resurrection
belongs only to Christ, belongs only to God. Listen to these
words the Apostle says in Ephesians 1. The eyes of your understanding
being enlightened. that you may know what is the
hope of His calling, what is the riches of the glory of His
inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness
of His power." Now, how did you enlighten? How were you enlightened?
How did you know the exceeding riches of the grace in Christ? How do you know the exceeding
greatness of His power to us who believe according to the
working of His mighty power? That's how I was enlightened.
That's how we were raised from the dead. You remember Ezekiel
standing before the valley of dry bones. Can these bones live? You're asking the wrong person,
Lord. You know. I don't know what you'll do. Only you can
make these bones live. And when he did, he prophesied,
and the scripture says there was a noise and a shaking, and
the bones came together to his bone. And when I beheld, lo,
the sinew and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered
them above. But there was no breath in them,
and he said unto me, Prophesy to the wind. Prophesy, son of
man, say to the wind. Thus said the Lord, Come, O ye
four winds. Oh breathe the breath upon these
slain that they may live so I prophesied as he commanded me and breath
came into them and they lived and there stood on their feet
an exceeding great army. I tell you when the God of heaven
calls you from the dead your bones will begin to shake. You begin to understand your
wickedness and God's holiness. flesh and sinew will come upon
you. And you'll realize this, you
have no breath. You come to the point where you
know you cannot believe on your own. And the Holy Spirit must come
and give you the breath of faith. And when he does, you believe. You know this, faith is the breath
of spiritual life. Faith is the breath of spiritual
life. It's the evidence of life. Faith
in Christ alone. It's also likened to a calling
from light into darkness. Man by nature is ignorant of
God, doesn't understand how can God be just and justify the ungodly. We go about in our darkness seeking
to please God by our works. But you are chosen generation,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, that you should
show forth the praise of Him who called you, listen, out of
darkness into His marvelous light. How is this? As God commanded
the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts to
give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. Where? In
the face of Jesus Christ. You see, we stop looking at ourselves
and we start looking to Christ. This is what it is to be called
out of darkness. into His marvelous light. And this calling is out of bondage
into liberty. We were under the bondage of
sin. Isn't that what Jesus said? He said, if you continue in my word, then
you are my disciples indeed, and then the truth shall set
you free. Truth. He is the truth. If the
Son shall set you free, you shall be free indeed. Free from what? If you're looking at me and say,
free from what? We're not in bondage to any man.
Listen, you are in bondage to sin. If you sin, you're a servant
of sin. So sin is what we're in bondage
to. You're under the guilt of sin,
the power of sin, and you are going to suffer the penalty of
sin. But, if the Son shall set you free, He'll set you free
from the guilt of sin. by paying your debt, blotting
out your transgressions. He'll set you free from the power
of sin by giving you a new nature. So as now you fight against sin,
you fight against the flesh, you long to be like Christ, to
be with Christ, to serve Christ, to love Christ, to love his people. This is what a new man does and
one day he'll free you from the very presence of sin. See, we're
set at liberty. We're at liberty if we're believing.
We're also at liberty from the law, free from the law. Oh, happy
condition. Jesus is bled and there is remission. Cursed by the law, bruised by
the fall, Christ hath redeemed us once for all we're set at liberty from the
law and lastly this I want us to look at these objects of the
calling listen look what look what he says here go back to
your text he says these objects that now have the riches of the
glory of the of Christ revealed to them they've been raised from
the dead set at liberty listen he says even us as though that was a miraculous
thing. Even us! How can this be? Even us, who
were dead in sin. Even us, who were vile and corrupt
in nature. Even us, who deserve hell. Now, listen. Don't miss this. Look at verse look at verse twenty one half
not the potter power of the clay look at it of the same were you by nature than the vessels of
wrath did he use any different clay to make the vessels of wrath
fitted for destruction or the vessels of war prepared under
glory using different clay No? Even us, by nature sinners, God
chose us. Christ redeemed us. How do I
know the Spirit himself called us? Even us. This is how we view ourselves,
isn't it? Vessels of mercy. aforeprepared
unto glory by the hand of God himself, no difference between
us and them. Who maketh thee to differ from
another? Or what hast thou that's not received? And if you've received
it, why do you act like you haven't? May God teach us the salvations
of the Lord. and help us to be gracious. Should
we not, of all people, be most gracious? Should we not, of all people,
be most kind, considering what great things God has done for
us? We should be, of all most people, loving and compassionate
toward others. May God help us to preach this
gospel with love and compassion, seeing we are only vessels of
mercy prepared of God. No glory to us. No glory to us. Glory to God. May God bless us.