Who are you, who answers back to God?

Romans 9:1-24 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

I am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit, ² that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. ³ For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, ⁴ who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, ⁵ whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.

⁶ But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; ⁷ nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but: “through Isaac your descendants will be named.” ⁸ That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. ⁹ For this is the word of promise: “At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.” ¹⁰ And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; ¹¹ for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, ¹² it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger.” ¹³ Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

¹⁴ What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be! ¹⁵ For He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” ¹⁶ So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. ¹⁷ For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” ¹⁸ So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.

¹⁹ You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?” ²⁰ On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? ²¹ Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? ²² What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? ²³ And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, ²⁴ even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.

Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it?      There are many who question God. Many of those questions begin with words like: How could a loving God allow…?  If God really is God, then why…? Others don’t question God but rather they create a God that fits their personal preferences, saying things like: The God I serve wouldn’t…  My God is…     One of the things that makes it difficult for people, particularly in the U.S. and in other free cultures to understand God is that we have no idea what it means to live under a sovereign rule. The idea of freedom that is established in our political system causes people to believe they have the right to question nearly everything. Our culture and society has perverted the freedom we have and the rights we have been granted, by law to the point where people now believe they have the right to do whatever they want. There is no longer a community set of morals, each individual decides for themselves what is right and for the sake of not offending the community tolerates and accepts what each individual chooses.

God is sovereign. As the creator of all things, He establishes the order of all things. When you consider the intricacies of creation, from the vastness of the universe down to the subatomic elements that make up all living and nonliving matter, God’s attention to detail and order is evident.  There are those who rather than question God, simply deny His existence. They create theories and speculations to try to explain creation. No one would look at any physical object, a computer, an automobile, a pencil, or a glass and believe that it just came into being, that it exists simply through a random sequence of unrelated events, yet that’s the logic or the lack of logic by which they explain the creation of the universe and everything that lives and breathes. Rather than being subject to a sovereign creator, rather than having faith in an unseen God who orders everything, they trust in an undeniably impossible scenario for the existence of creation. No logical mind could truly believe the incredible odds against the random creation of everything we know, let alone that which is still unknown.  

Just as our government does grant certain freedoms and rights to all people, God also created man with a free will. We do have the right, the freedom to question God. We have the right and the freedom to choose whether we will abide by His ordained guidelines or do whatever we want. God though, is sovereign. What we don’t have is the authority to change the rules. We can indeed decide for ourselves how we will live, what we will believe. We can appease our own preferences and create a god in our own image, fashioning it as we see fit, changing our god as often as we change our mind. None of that changes who God really is or what He really says and has established as His eternal order. In Revelation 1:8 God says:     "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."     Isaiah 44:6 says:     "Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts: 'I am the first and I am the last, And there is no God besides Me.”     In Exodus 3:14, when God called Moses to go to the Israelites, He described Himself saying:    “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”    

When we, with our finite minds, try to fully understand, describe or represent an infinite, eternal, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent God we simply fall short. God says: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways, For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9) With God it’s not My way or the highway. He gives us freedom to choose, but God’s way is the high way.  In our culture, our society and sadly even in the church we attempt to understand God according to what we know, according to the realities of earth. God has established things on earth, authority, family, relationships as a reflection of what He has established in His eternal kingdom. The key is as Jesus taught us to pray: ”Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”    We are supposed to define earthly things according to God’s heavenly order, not to define the heavenly kingdom according to what is here on earth.

Creation itself is evidence of a creator. Romans 1:18-32 says:  For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,  because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.  For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.  For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools,  and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.

Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.  For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural,  and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper,  being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful;  and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

We do have the right, the freedom to question God and to do as we please. Our questions, our beliefs however do not change the immutable truth of God’s word and His established order. Our choice to question God, to choose our own way will lead to the consequence of that choice.

Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ; Holy Spirit; Thank You for how You have created me. Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Amen