Lesson 42c
Romans 9:6-16 · Mike Doyle · Nov 10, 2019
Romans (2018-21), No. 89
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926191652867

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Well, we're doing a couple of things today. We're finishing up 42. And we've gotten down to the very last question. And we'll continue to work on, even in Lesson 43, a lot to do with election and your will and God's will and how all of that fits together. But the last question in 42 was, Does the gospel have the power to turn men's hearts? And if you say yes it does or no it doesn't, you have to explain. Does it? Come on you chickens, somebody's got to answer. Does it? I think it depends on whether the Holy Spirit is involved in it. It's okay.

If you just hear the words and not have the work of the Holy Spirit and you don't get You don't get it. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense to you, or it's not important to you, or whatever. Yeah, you're untouched. Do you think that at the time of, if you don't respond to the gospel message, that at the time of the great white throne, God's going to tell people, the Lord Jesus is going to tell people, hey look, I told you about it. And does a person have the right to say, yeah, but your spirit wasn't involved, so I didn't go for it. So it's your fault. But they don't know about the spirit really. But they do know and are responsible for responding. Are they not?

I'm going to say, I forget the reference, but that no one comes to the fox to get Yeah, I think that's right. But I also think that from a God sovereignty standpoint, nobody's going to have an excuse. And I also believe that even if they did have a legitimate excuse, they won't take advantage of it. They didn't want it now. They won't want it then.

You know, it's all about me anyway, you know, kind of thing. The point is, though, is that I think the Lord Jesus, well, the Godhead comes at man in a very forgiving way. The cross of Christ is presented as a satisfaction from God's perspective about your sins. specifically and if you just like when the Lord Jesus was on the cross what did he say when he talked to the father about those crucifying him what did he say about them? So there's a tone there that isn't condemnatory it's all forgiveness and it's all sacrifice and And they were brutally, the crucifixion of Christ was not a pistol shot in the forehead, it took a while. He was brutally beaten and you couldn't recognize him and that kind of thing. So, I would say the gospel does have the power in and of itself to turn men's hearts. And I would say it might be the only thing.

Because when I talk about turning your heart, what am I talking about? What's turning your heart due? What does it lead you to? Change of mind. Change of mind about what? About Christ. About Christ? How about the idea of a change of mind about repentance? About the idea that, yeah, I am a sinner and, you know, something's got to be done to deal with these sins. I have to change my mind about the fact that when I walked in the door this morning, Carolyn said, we have a mutual friend whose, this girl's dad was a good friend of mine, and they're Catholic.

And she sees her at work all the time. They had a conversation this week about this very thing, repentance and God being satisfied. This woman said to Carolyn, I just don't think I'm ever going to be good enough. And Carolyn said to her, well, none of us ever are going to be.

The deal is that God took care of all of this. That's the difference. You're never going to be good enough. You have to accept God's remedy. Is that really what the Gospel does? And she said to Carolyn, you always talk that way, but I don't really understand.

And trust me, Catholics are way more religious than you guys are. They show up on time, but they might leave early. So, repentance and remission of sins, the Lord Jesus said should be priests in my name. And he is the one who took the penalty upon himself to deal with sins.

Do you view the gospel as an aggressive thing? A take-it-or-leave-it or else sort of a thing? Or do you view it as a very gracious thing? You don't view it at all. It's a subjective question. Do you view it as gracious or do you view it as, well, here are the facts, Buster, and you have to draw a conclusion. from the facts that this is what you ought to do, or is it a wooing and a drawing?

I think it's a wooing and a drawing. The conviction of sin isn't to make you suicidal. The conviction of sin is to reach out for the Savior, and that's what the power of the gospel is. To reach out for the Savior. You see that? I think a lot of times the gospel is presented academically more aggressively or whatever, rather than just graciously.

Well, and Mike is going back to that Romans 1.16, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. Yeah, the words themselves, and that's another point I wanted to make about that, is that when I was first a Christian, And I had just met Donna, and I didn't know what the Christians do. I had no idea.

Well, they probably go to church, right? So I went to church with her folks in Aurora for a while. And one of the classes they had there was how to present the gospel, right? So I get in the class, and the first thing they say is, well, write down and come up with your own story of salvation.

And then memorize it. and then go over and make sure you have it in place so that the next opportunity you get, you're ready to go." I thought, that's not very gracious. I mean, we do that selling houses. Or appliances, come on. It wasn't long before I blew out of that place.

The point is that the gospel message is power in and of itself. If you just said the words of the gospel to a non-believer, those words themselves have more power than any anecdotal evidence you could give them. Don't you think? It's the words that have the power. That's the same way with everything that has to do with a Christian life. It's the word of God that has the power.

It's not your ability to persuade. Moving on to 43. Everybody have a 43? So we're kind of staying in the same vein because that's what Apostle Paul stays in. And what chapter 9 is pretty much about is the idea of election, as we've seen in the past. When you get this, we're going to go through 17-21 basically. And if you look at 15-18, question number one, the focus is on two men. Who are they? Who are the two men?

Moses. Moses is one. Who's the other one? Pharaoh. Our boy Pharaoh. So it's interesting. Moses is the leader of God's people. and he's honored of God and therefore he glorified God in his life. The other guy, Pharaoh, is an oppressor of God's people. It's customary to emphasize the fact that he said, who is Jehovah that I should hearken unto his voice to let Israel go? I know not Jehovah, moreover I will not let Israel go. So he was dishonoring to God, but God glorified himself in spite of him.

Okay, so the two guys we're talking about are Moses and Pharaoh. And so question two says, did Pharaoh glorify God? Yes. Okay, you got to answer. God is glorified with His grace, and He's also glorified in His wrath. So He poured out wrath on Pharaoh. He is glorified in that. Pharaoh glorified Him.

So if you look at Psalm 76.10, which I know you all have memorized, it says, For the wrath of man shall praise you, with the remnant of wrath you will gird yourself."

How does that work? Can you explain how God's wrath towards man, or wrath of man, brings out God's glory? How does it do that? Tell me how it does it. Have you ever thought through that process? He reciprocates in kind. He shows His glory through His wrath. He shows His power through His wrath. Wrath gives God an opportunity to demonstrate His glory. Do you see that? And without wrath there wouldn't be as many opportunities. But now wrath comes and God sees them as an opportunity to manifest His glory.

And I think a lot of times we don't understand that, and I keep referring back to this study in Genesis we're doing on Wednesday, but I see that over and over and over again, that the wrath of man, God demonstrates His glory and He shows that His whole purpose is to bless man. That's His whole purpose in everything He does. He's never vengeful, or I'll show you. None of that. It's always to bless. So the point is, is that both of these men, although in different ways, glorified God, didn't they? By their behavior.

And the reason is, is because God is sovereign. And sovereignty, I think, is a fairly tough concept for us Americans who live under a constitution to understand what sovereignty is. What is sovereignty? When you say God is sovereign, what does that mean?

Absolute power. Absolute power? Ultimate authority. Ultimate authority? That's it? Above all. He's above all? How does it implement itself in reality? Bless you. Again. After 40 years, I know that's coming. How does that implement itself in everyday operation, this thing called sovereignty? I think sovereignty is control of all things at all times. Okay. So he exercises his will regardless of what's happening. Right. It's his will. Okay. So then how can he be sovereign? Well, I'm jumping ahead of myself if I do that.

So, do you know what the greatest demonstration of God's glory ever was? Or is? The cross of Christ is. Yeah, it's the greatest demonstration. And it's also the greatest demonstration of His sovereignty. Why would I say that? It seems like He was losing. couldn't he control? Well, he had planned on Christ being crucified from the beginning, before creation. So he demonstrates his sovereignty because it happened. He made it happen. Yeah, he made it happen. And, how do I say this?

Have you ever asked yourself, in eternity past, which is an oxymoron, what does that mean? The Father and the Son enter into this agreement called the Eternal Covenant, right? And the agreement was that if you become a man and die for the sins of the world, I will raise you up for the sins. Have you ever asked yourself the question, Why is death the big deal? I mean, why couldn't he come to the earth and have to spend 400 years here under slavery or something, or pay a big fine, or whatever, to recompense or satisfy God about sin? Why does it take death? Why in that eternal covenant, the Father said, if you will become a man and die, I'll raise you up. Why does it have to be that agenda?

Because death separates from sin. Because death is a great separator. It is. Yeah, it's a great separator. So what happens? The thing about death is that it's... I'm going to talk about this at the Lord's Table. It's the ending of things. When everybody in this room, barring the rapture, we die. It's the end of your whole total existence here. It's over with. And then it's going to get repeated or picked up later on. It's over. Death is a great ender. It's the period. And so what God was doing through the eternal covenant was putting an end to things. He was stopping things. And the end was coming right then. And what was it going to be? It's the end of everything that dissatisfied Him. But that isn't all that he did, because the second half of that covenant was what?

I will raise you up. Oh, the raise up part is where we all are, hopefully. So there's an end. I think about this sometimes. This is the human brain trying to figure this out. He could have done it another way. He could have done it where death doesn't mean end. He could have done it a million different ways. Can you think of one? I don't know what would have satisfied him about the sin deal. A big eraser.

I think the thing is, and it comes from the circle, God is love. That is the principle. There's no greater demonstration of love than giving a son. That's right. And that's why I think the root of all this plan is God is love and demonstrating His love. How could He demonstrate it any more than giving a son?

Because the plan could have been death. I mean, I just come in on Friday. I erase all sins. Could he have done that though? Why not? He's sovereign. He's in control of all things. I mean, that's why I think this is, you know, a hard... Over here first. I think the reason he had to is he's also just. And all of his attributes had to be in play, not just... Yeah, righteous and holy. But it's just. I'm the judge. You're done. I've commuted your sentence. I mean, that's why I said that.

I think it still roots down to his principal element, and it's demonstrated all throughout time as his love for us. He always is trying to be gracious. He's always trying, and it's God is love. And I think that's where this whole plan, and you know, this is just, I find it before time and eternity pass, there's no rules. There's no game. There's no nothing as far as us. That's right. So death means and was put in place in this whole scenario of life. So that I mean, he could have done it a different way. There's never any death, there's never any, you know, but he created this whole plan.

And I think it comes to the culmination point of Christ where it demonstrates his love, above all else, that it's love that's demonstrated. But I have to agree with Alan that he can't demonstrate his love until this righteousness is satisfied. And he's got that issue to deal with because sin is an assault against his character.

But he created that in the plan. I mean, before there was any time, he knew that we would sin. But that was part of... No, my point is, he's got in some way to take care of the offense and he can't just do it by saying, oh, never mind. He's got to do something because of the holiness of his character to deal with, there's a consequence. and He's got to deal with that consequence.

Here's the other thing. The cross of Christ was not about me. It was about Him and the Father. That was it. And when God loves, well, where is it? The love is between those three to start with. And so He did it out of love for the Father and love for the Holy Spirit. That's really what the motivation was. Did He love His creation? Sure He did.

But our involvement in the eternal covenant is we were the cause that they had to have one. But go back to before there was anything. That's right. This whole thing was laid out that we were allowed to sin. We were allowed to sin because He gave us free will. Right. And so, I mean, I just go back to before there was any rules to the game. Yeah. Well, except that the very first rule, the very first rule was the soul that sins it will die. That was the first rule. For man.

He made it up that way, that's what I'm saying. Well, for the full culmination of him demonstrating his love to us in Christ. Again, I just go back to God is love, and that was the whole basis of his creating us, is to allow people to ultimately glorify him and love him in relationship. But he created us in his image and likeness, and so we were created as lovers, just like he is. Carol? Okay, I may be off subject by now.

The sacrifice on the cross only worked because he was 100% God and 100% man. And he was perfect. He was totally sinless and it had to be a perfect sacrifice. None of us, other people, could do it. No. No creature could do it. No coming close. Right. And the resurrection proves that His work on the cross worked. It did what it was supposed to do. The Father was satisfied. Everybody was satisfied. Right. Well, again, I'm getting into what I'm going to talk about at the Lord's table. It's important for us to really get a hold of the fact that God is satisfied. He's okay now. Because we walk around thinking, well, I'm satisfied. Well, big deal. Who cares if you're satisfied? Is God satisfied about me? And if He is, on what basis?

You know, another quick story. A woman said to me a couple of years ago, she was at my house for something. She was talking about her life. She said, you know, I've done some things that I can't forgive myself about. I said, what's the big problem there? God has forgiven you. What's your problem? And I could tell she blinked. She'd never entertained that thought that the one we offended is satisfied. He's satisfied.

You know, you do something to someone you really care about and you go and ask for forgiveness. What do you really want to know? Did they really forgive me? Are they really satisfied about what I'm trying to do here? Because if they're not, you're not at rest. You're going to keep trying, right? The big lie is you've got to keep trying. because God isn't completely satisfied about you.

Yeah, he is. Because of his son. You know, the thing where it says, without the shedding of blood, there's no remission of sin. And it could be like Courtney saying that that was the way God set it up, but it also could be that's really how it works in his world, God's world, is there has to be this shedding. That's a principle. Yeah, it is a principle. That's a foundational truth. You can't change it.

That's right. Donna? Well, I was thinking, too, along with Courtney, God is love, but He also desires to share His glory. And we don't know exactly how, but He is able to reveal part of His glory to us that the angels don't understand. That's true. Well, they don't understand love for one thing. Because of the way God set up... Well, the way he built us and the way he built angels were different. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, and it's interesting, you know, like we were talking last week about, you know, God loved Jacob and he hated Esau. Did he really hate Esau? Or did he love Esau less? No, he just didn't choose him. He wasn't on the line of Christ. That's exactly the point. The point is that Esau drew the long straw. No, what it came down to is that God in His sovereignty said, well, I'm going to go from this person to that person to that person to that person to that person to that person to Christ. And this is a line that I've set up in which that's the way it's going to go.

Now, it doesn't mean that he skips over you and goes to you. It doesn't mean that he cares about you any less. You're just not in the plan in terms of the lineage. So, I think Alan's right, though. I think that the attributes of God, His glory, He cannot demonstrate His love. until He is satisfied His righteousness. He's holy and righteous, totally unto Himself. And so what that means is that whatever He is unto Himself, He's got to take care of it, because we can't. The sinner, the one who causes the problem can't fix it. He's got to fix it. And it wasn't that it was a plan.

I don't think it was any other way to do it, because what did He really do? If the cross is the period, the ending point, He stopped the first creation. He stopped and got rid of the whole sinful thing, and started new, with the resurrection of Christ. Started new.

It's the only way he could do it. It's the only way that makes sense to me, because of what his character is. He doesn't modify his character so that he can manifest his love. No, his attributes are absolute, and he's got to deal with them. Has he told God to love the world? But in order to demonstrate that love, he's got to do this thing with the satisfaction. He has to. He's bound by who he is, by his own character.

Did you see that? One thing I was thinking about is the verse 2. He who became sin for us, that God would show forth his righteousness in us. That we might become the righteousness of God in Christ. Wow. That's a much greater thing. As you see God working through humanity, it's interesting to watch the sovereignty thing is always in play. He's moving to carry out. But at the same time, the sovereignty is of such a thing that inside of that, we have free will.

I was thinking that because we've created an image of God, We literally have, like no animal has this, but human beings create an image of God, have similarities to God because we're creating this image. Are you talking about the creation or the re-creation? I'm talking about... The reason I ask the question is that when Adam fell, how much likeness to his original creation did he retain?

Right. I guess I'm thinking non-believers and believers are all created in God's image. No. You don't think? Well... I mean, they have consciences, and that's because they're... But God's image, you can't say God's image has a sin nature. Well, no, no, no. I'm just saying there's these finite things that, because they're created in God's image, We have traits of God, whether we're...

Oh, I see what you're saying. Like you have a mind, emotion, and will. You have a spirit. Yeah. And you have a physical body. And so we have... God is sovereign, totally. We're sovereign in a tiny way because we have a choice. I can choose to believe or not. That's the only choice I have. Yeah. You know? Yeah, that really is the only choice I have.

So I think that the image and likeness of God, like Courtney talked about, as a member of the Adamic race, you're not a lover. You're a hater. You're a sinner. You're all of those wonderful things it talks about in Galatians, you know? And you manifest those in your life, and also you're a deceiver, so you try to convince people, well, I'm really not as bad as I really am.

And the great thing about the cross of Christ, and as we know, identification, it ends everything we are in Adam. It ends it. And we're recreated in the resurrected Christ. Now we are lovers. We have his life. That's what makes us like him. I don't think non-believers are like him at all. I think they're more like our friend Bilzy, the devil. I really do. What we manifest out of who we are is either satanic, evil, sinful, or it's the resurrected life of Christ. And like the love circle, why do I love God?

He first loved me. But as a man, an atom, I don't know that. I mean, I hear it and I can articulate it, but I can't be a lover. I don't have the capacity. So we decided that Pharaoh did glorify God. Who's responsible for Pharaoh's hardness of heart? We talked about this a little bit last week. Oh, the father. Who is? The father. You think so? That means he's the author of sin? He orchestrated this whole Egyptian scenario. So he tricked Pharaoh. Well, sometimes it says that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, but sometimes it says God hardened his own heart. That's exactly what it says.

Exodus 8.15 says, But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and didn't listen to them, as the Lord had said.

Exodus 8.32 says, But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and he did not let the people go. He didn't talk to Moses. He didn't hear what Moses was saying.

That's right. And Exodus 9.34 says, But when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned again and hardened his heart, he and his servants.

You know what's cool? Well, not cool about that, but what's interesting about that is that God is giving him all of these physical demonstrations of his sovereignty. Almost like a warning. And so he knuckles under when it's raining. But when the storm clears and it gets sunny again, what does he do? I'm going right back to where I was.

Because it shows that he intrinsically isn't changed at all. It's like the bowls of wrath that are going to be released during the three and a half years of the tribulation. Those bowls of wrath aren't going to change anybody's mind. Nothing is going to change people's mind in terms of God's wrath.

Why? What leads man to repentance? Romans 1. What leads man to repentance? It's the goodness of God. It isn't the wrath. It's the goodness that leads him. It's interesting about our boy, Pharaoh. He hardened his heart quite a few times before The Word of God says, like in Exodus 4.21, the Lord said to Moses, when you go back to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in your power, but I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. Now notice, that's after Pharaoh had hardened his own heart. So, in two letters, how does that work? Can a human being today harden against God, harden against God, harden against God, and then God will say, okay, I'm putting you in the hard part over here. What do you think of William Newell's statement that Pharaoh's heart was left by God simply in its natural state, heavy with iniquity?

I'm going to ask. That's a great question. What do you think about that statement? Did everybody hear what she said? No, what did she say? That Newell, in essence, said that God didn't specifically harden Pharaoh's heart. He just left him alone in his natural state. Which meant what? He's hardened. You see that? The non-believer that you're talking about, made in God's image and likeness, if God doesn't act upon that person, He lets them alone. Is there ever going to be a change in that person? Nope.

Why? Because you have to go back to source. What's the source of who Pharaoh is? He came from Adam. He's a sinner. He's dominated by the sin nature. So God is acting on Pharaoh to try to get him to change his mind, but he tells Moses, no matter what I do, he isn't going to do it. And so when it comes right down to it, and when he says, well, I'm going to harden his heart, all he does is withdraw his mercy and his grace. You know, in Galatians, when it talks about falling from grace, how do you fall from grace from a Galatian standpoint? You try to live your Christian life under some sort of legal principle. You fall from grace. Does that touch your position at all? No, it doesn't. Not one iota. But your conscious awareness of God's grace goes away.

So Pharaoh is in this environment where he sees the power of God and he realizes, well, I'm kind of a puppet in this deal. And if you'll notice, all of the wrath that God let loose on Egypt, every one of them went after one of Egypt's gods. Every single one of them. Well, this is the frog god. Well, I'll show you about how effective frogs are. And locusts and all of that kind of stuff. It was all after their deity system, I guess you'd say. But once the pressure is off, what does Pharaoh do?

He just stays where he is. It's like a non-believer. If God doesn't woo somebody and the Spirit work on them, what do they do? They just stay where they are. Does it say that God purposely hardened that person? No. If He leaves you alone, you're... for lack of a better way to say it, you're screwed. You are. You drew the short stick. If He leaves you alone, And it's a really good thing that the Holy Spirit's job is to convict the world of sin, because if He didn't do it, nobody would come. Nobody. Kind of cool. So hardening. One of the observations is that there's a hardening of Pharaoh's heart in what one guy said is an absolute sense. You know, the cement set up and dried. and I'm not going back. You know where else you see this from a spiritual standpoint? You see it in Hebrews chapter 6.

You know that verse that is a controversial verse where it's impossible to lead a man to repentance once he has, forget how it goes, probably I'll look it up, I left my phone at home. That verse has nothing to do with salvation. But it does have to do with spiritual growth. If you're presented as a believer with what I would identify as the growth truths, and you reject them, you won't go back there.

You ever notice that? Once you start down a road and you get halfway down the road and you realize, this is the wrong path for me, this isn't right, and you turn around and go back, you're not going down there again. And that's what that verse means. It's the same thing that happens with Pharaoh. He's being led by the sovereignty of God, but he is thinking, this is not the way it ought to be, because I'm king. God isn't. Who am I? Who is God? Who is Jehovah? I'm Pharaoh.

Well, that's the way all self-sin natures think. I will put my throne above God. Where did we get that from? From our boy Lucifer. That was his attitude. That was the same thing he sold to Eve. It's the same thing all of our sin natures have. I will put my throne above God. I'm going to make the decision about me. It is, after all, about me. At the end, in verse 19, I'm going to read 19 through 21.

You will say then, why does he still find fault? For who resists his will? On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answered back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, why did you make me like this? Will it? Or does not the potter have the right over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? So in that very first verse 19 it says, you will say to man, why does he still find fault for who resists his will? And really, that should say, who has resisted his will? So what does that resisting mean?

That's the question for. What does the word resist, resisted, mean? Rejection. Rejection. It means you set oneself against. You withstand. You oppose. Resist, yeah. What's that? To oppose. Yeah, oppose is a good word. Stand out against. The Greek word is a-n-t-h-i-s-t-e-m-i. Anthistomy. Anthistomy means to stand, and anti means against. Okay. Now, not only that, It's in the perfect tense. Do you know what the perfect tense is? Some of you guys are geeky enough to know. It's something that's completed in the past that keeps on going into the future.

So I have resisted and I'm not changing. I'm going to continue to resist as we go. So it's a process of standing against God's will which has come to a finished end. and the resulting state. And that state is a permanent stand against God. And so when he says, why does he find fault with me for who resists his will? Who has ever come to the permanent standing that I am against God's will no matter what?

Read the paper tonight, you'll know. Watch the news. I thought God's will was for all men to be saved. God wills that no man should perish. But that would be fine if you didn't have a free will to choose. But whose will can overcome God's will? Nobody can. So then would you say all men will be saved? No. No way. Then why?

If it's God's will. God's will is that none should perish, but all come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. When the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ comes up, you have to decide. You have to decide. And you have the capacity and the freedom to decide against God. So that's the starting point of His will?

If you had it any other way, you'd be a robot. See, I don't think God wants anybody to live with Him who doesn't want to be there. I think you can resist God's will. Oh sure, I do it all the time. A lot of people do it for a long time, and you say, no, I'm not going to choose you. But there is a time when God keeps asking, there may be a time when you say yes. There may be.

He'll pursue you right to the last second. I've told you the story about my buddy, Jerry Benjamin in the Springs, who had come from a Jewish family, and his father accepted Christ an hour before he died. A Jewish rabbi. All he said to Jerry was, right before he died, was, Jerry, you and I believe in the same Savior.

That was it. That's after he told Jerry, for years, you can't mention that name Jesus in my house. I always thought, you know, when somebody resists God's will, They say no, and it's final, but it's not final. No, it's not. I mean, up until the time you check out of here, then it's final. That's the second bell, right? It's closed. Father, we thank You for Your grace. We thank You for Your sovereignty, but we also thank You for the fact that You have put us in a position where we can respond to Your love to us and for us. We thank You. We pray in Your Son's name. Amen.