03-27-11 Good God Sovereign God

Before we get into Romans chapter 9

I need to prepare us for what we’re going to find there.

This 9^th chapter talks about what, from a theological point of view,

we would call the sovereignty of God.

As we move into this chapter

there are some things I want to be sure

we never loose sight of.

For one thing,

I want us to keep in mind

that God did not place this chapter into the first book in the Bible,

He placed it into the 45^th book in the Bible.

And even within the book of Romans,

this is not the 1^st chapter,

it is the 9^th.

I point this out

simply because I want us to remember

that everything we will see in this chapter

is given to us within the context

of all that has come before.

For eight chapters prior to this one we will now study

Paul has been revealing to us

a God unlike anything any of us

would have ever anticipated on our own.

It is a God who,

from before the first day of His creation,

anticipated the consequences

of our free will.

And, knowing that we would use that free will

to sever our union with Him,

corrupting ourselves in an immorality

that would forever keep us isolated from Him,

from the very beginning

He proclaimed His love for us

by structuring into the center of human society

a redemptive plan for us

that would involve His own death

in our place

for our sins.

And, the very last words Paul wrote

prior to what he says to us in this 9^th chapter

were these:

ROM 8:38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

ROM 8:39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Only after bringing us to the point

where we could at last hear and accept this truth,

only then does Paul talk to us about the absolute sovereignty of our God,

about His absolute right

to do whatever He chooses

with whatever He has created.

And even when I say those words now

there are some of you

who feel uncomfortable.

I wish I had some really effective way

of communicating the abnormality

of the condition of the human race

when we enter this world.

Here we are,

created beings,

place into a created physical world,

but with each of us being controlled

by an inner spirt in utter rebellion against our Creator.

We actually believe

we have both the absolute right

and the ability

to live out our lives independent from the God who created us.

We take all that He has given us,

both in our own personal gifts,

talents,

and unique abilities and personalities,

and in the entire physical world He has created for us,

and we claim it as our own,

even taking credit for possessing it,

and then charge through our lives

with neither hearts of thankfulness

nor of submission

to the God who gave it all to us.

And yet,

in the midst of all of our arrogance,

our God patiently, persistently works to coax each of us into the light of truth,

to the understanding that we were not just created,

but that we were created FOR HIM,

to live in a love union with Him forever.

And, as this Creator God of ours

begins to draw each of us to Himself,

He carefully reveals Himself to us

in the ways that make it the easiest

for us to return to Him.

And the center of that revelation of Himself

is, of course, Jesus Christ.

He is the doorway God has selected

for our entrance into Him.

He is everything our spirits hunger for.

He is the one ultimately safe Person,

whose every movement,

every word,

every action proclaimed that,

JOH 3:17 ... God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

Do you know what Christ is to the human race?

Picture a dog,

unwanted by his master,

beaten,

and kicked,

and half starved during his first year of life,

then finally shoved into the car,

driven miles away from its home,

and then dumped out and abandoned.

Now picture that little dog

wandering for days throughout the neighborhood,

and the woods,

chased and bitten by bigger dogs,

teased and pelted with rocks by children,

half starved, and sick.

And then one evening

this miserable creature crawls into your backyard.

You see him through the window,

and step outside.

As soon as he sees you

his first instinct is to run in terror,

assuming you, too, will lash out

and hurt,

and whip,

and kick.

Then you go back inside,

and find a really tasty doggie snack

and bring it back out with you.

You set it on the ground

as close to the dog as you can get,

and then pull back and talk quietly,

calmly to the terrified animal.

When he finally crawls up to the food

and begins to sniff and then chew at the edges of what you’ve given him,

you then slowly begin to close the gap between you and him,

until at last he will allow you to touch his head,

and he risks receiving just a tiny bit of the healing and love you offer him.

That’s us and Jesus Christ.

That is our God reaching out to us

at the level, and in the way we are most likely to hear,

and to begin to trust.

For, you see,

the very first thing God wants each of us to discover about Him

is that He loves us - He really, truly, personally, eternally loves us.

It’s not a generic love for humanity.

It’s in no way dependent upon

or tied to our performance.

It is not a love rooted in what we do,

it is a love rooted in who we are at the core of our being.

It is the real thing -

utterly personal,

based upon His absolute and perfect knowledge of each of us.

And, in God’s design,

the beginning of our restoration to our God

is our discovery, through Christ,

that He loves us.

But that is only the beginning.

And if we grow in our union with Him

as He intends for us to grow,

we will begin to discover

not just that He loves us,

but WHO IT IS that loves us.

In other words,

He will begin revealing to us

just a little bit of who He is -

the all-powerful creator God of all that exists,

who answers to no one,

who, by the very nature of who He is,

can do whatever He chooses

with whatever He has created.

He will seek to bring us to the point

where we will say with Paul,

1TI 1:17 Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

Let me try to put this pilgrimage of ours

into a single sentence.

God begins by seeking to reveal to each of us that He is utterly GOOD,

and then, once we have begun to see Him as GOOD,

He will then begin revealing to us that He is utterly GOD.

That right there

is the best description of the life of Jesus Christ on this earth I could ever give you.

Romans chapters 1-8 reveal to us that this Supreme Beings who is calling us to Himself

is utterly GOOD.

Romans chapter 9 then reveals to us

that He is also utterly GOD.

And now, after all of this preparation for Romans chapter 9,

rather than taking us into that chapter today,

I’m going to take us into a Psalm

that may help us understand better

how this whole thing plays out in our daily lives.

This is an unsettling time in our nation’s history.

It is an unsettling time in the history of our world.

Never before have we seen such uncertainty and chaos

in the financial foundations upon which our world society is based.

And never before have we sensed the potential

for even greater turmoil in the months and years ahead.

And then added to what we’ve churned our way through during the past few years,

we now face tremendous escalating turmoil in the Middle East,

not to mention the horrific devastation we’ve just witnessed in Japan

and its implications both for the lives of those involved

and for the global economy.

I cannot help but think that what’s going on in our nation and our world right now

provides the perfect backdrop for our discovery of the truth about the sovereignty of our God.

You see, most of the time

we do not discover the greatness of our God

until we are driven to that discovery out of necessity.

We delight in the growing awareness of His love for us,

but we are far more comfortable

with that discovery taking place

within a safe, controlled environment,

with us doing most of the controlling.

But the truth is,

we will not discover the greatness of our God

until we find ourselves in a situation

where all our own resources have failed us.

In the 42^nd Psalm

David gives us a glimpse

into the process we will go through

when God is pushing us into the discovery of His greatness.

The Psalm begins with a passage most of us know well

because we have turned it into a song we sing frequently.

PSA 42:1 As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God.

Now, doesn’t that sound wonderful?

David’s spirit longing for his God.

And he goes on in this same theme:

PSA 42:2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God;

But then, suddenly there is a change in David’s words.

He says,

When shall I come and appear before God?

He cries out, “GOD! Where are You?

When will I find You?

Where have You gone?”

And suddenly we begin to realize

why David is panting after his God -

this is not a deer

who is peacefully standing beside the quiet brook,

lapping up water in the shade of the trees.

This is a deer baked by the sun,

desperately in need of a drink.

The deer is panting after the brook

because he has gone days

with nothing but heat and drought,

and thirst,

and now his very life depends

upon his finding that water.

And David now pants after God

because all of his own resources have failed him,

and he has been driven into a desperate search for his God.

PSA 42:3 My tears have been my food day and night, While they say to me all day long, "Where is your God?"

PSA 42:4 These things I remember and I pour out my soul within me.

His soul is in agony,

and all of his so-called friends are laughing at him now.

“Where is your God now?”

Then he remembers the way it was

before he desperately needed his God.

For I used to go along with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God, With the voice of joy and thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival.

Do you know what I hear in those words?

I hear David’s discovery

that religious form is great

and it seems to be all you really need

until your world falls apart.

As long as your God doesn’t have to have answers,

as long as your soul is not in agony,

marching along with the throng

and singing the songs with joy is all that’s really needed.

But once the pain hits

the throng turns away from you,

and your God must become real or there is no hope.

Then David reaches his first point of hope.

Talking to himself, he says:

PSA 42:5 Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me?

And then comes what I believe

are the most difficult three words

any human being will ever utter.

Hope in God...

You see,

it is with those words that,

for the first time in our lives,

our God must be, not just GOOD,

but He must also be GOD.

When David tells his own soul

his own heart, mind, emotions

to hope in God,

he is saying

this God I have accepted,

this God I claim to serve

must be more real than the need I feel,

more real, and more powerful than those who have caused my distress.

In the context of the turmoil in our country today,

He must have more control over my life

and my future

and the futures of those I love

than do those political, and financial, and social, and economic forces that seek to destroy us.

He must be more worthy of my trust

and more able to be my security

than the Dow Jones average.

In other words,

He must really be there and really be God.

And then David goes on,

after his bold affirmation to hope in God,

by giving an affirmation of what that hope will produce.

...for I shall again praise Him For the help of His presence.

But then, just like Peter, walking on the water,

David’s eyes are once again diverted

from his God

to his circumstances.

And once again he cries out,

PSA 42:6 O my God, my soul is in despair within me;

And the truth is,

with most of us,

most of the time,

our default setting in life

is not focused on our God,

it is focused on the chaos around us.

When was the last time you watched a news program

and came away with renewed confidence in your God?

When was the last time

you opened your eyes in the morning

and found that the first thought to enter your mind

was confident trust in your God?

If you’re like me,

you must reclaim that confidence

one day at a time.

And that’s what we see David doing next.

Therefore I remember You from the land of the Jordan And the peaks of Hermon, from Mount Mizar.

He chooses to remember his God -

to remember His promises,

to remember His faithfulness in the past.

Then, once again, David finds himself

feeling overwhelmed.

He says,

PSA 42:7 Deep calls to deep at the sound of Your waterfalls; All Your breakers and Your waves have rolled over me.

But this time there is a difference.

This time he has come to realize

that the flood that pours over him

is a flood controlled by God Himself.

It is YOUR breakers,

and YOUR waves that roll over me.

And that realization

brings him back to hope.

PSA 42:8 The Lord will command His lovingkindness in the daytime; And His song will be with me in the night, A prayer to the God of my life.

Listen to me, child of God!

Do you really believe the Creator God of the universe

could call you His own,

and let you call Him Papa,

and yet not care enough about your life

to govern the events that touch you?

What is it you fear?

Do you really think it is chance

or luck

or blind fate

that determines what touches you?

David relapses one more time

into fear and anxiety

before his Psalm concludes.

But by now he is making more progress.

He says,

PSA 42:9 I will say to God my rock, "Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?"

PSA 42:10 As a shattering of my bones, my adversaries revile me, While they say to me all day long, "Where is your God?"

He’s back into doubt again,

which tells me David and I share a great deal in common,

but now at least His doubt begins with the truth: I will say to God my rock...

Having cycled through his despair three times,

he has, at least, reached the place where he knows

if he is ever to find solid footing in this life,

it will not be in the things around him,

it will be on the solid rock of his God.

And then, finally,

he closes with an affirmation of the truth one more time.

PSA 42:11 Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God.

Hope in God...

As we move into the 9^th chapter of Romans

the main thing I want to take into this chapter

is the understanding that when we see things most clearly,

we don’t really want a little God

who lets us call the shots.

We want and need a truly great God

who is absolutely sovereign in His dealings with us,

and who uses that sovereignty

to proclaim the depths of His love for us.

That will make more sense

when we get into the passage next week.