By J.D. Walt
Prayer of Consecration
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body as a holy and living sacrifice to you.
Jesus, We belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Scripture
It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?
Romans 9:16–21 (NIV)
Consider This
There is a backstory here in this letter—and all the other ones too. It runs both in the background and in the foreground all the time. It’s the story of Paul, the superstar Pharisee formerly known as Saul.
I wonder as he wrote about the hard-hearted Pharaoh, if the ancient Egyptian despot served as a kind of mirror for him—of who he was becoming—under the very auspices of being chosen by God. Remember, Paul cruelly persecuted the early Christians and labored passionately to crush the church. To be clear, as he did these things, Paul was doing his dead-level best to do the will of God. He was “the story.” In retrospect, he must have remembered how his heart was as hard as a rock. Yet now the chief hater of the church had become its chief helper; the main detractor of Jesus of Nazareth had become his chief champion. This is so far beyond far-fetched that no one would even begin to make it up. It is impossible. And I think this is Paul’s point here. Nothing is too difficult for God because God is God.
The human-bound mind wants to explain God and the ways of God in some kind of system or logic; some kind of “God has a reason for everything” system or “everything that happens is God’s will otherwise God can’t be sovereign” system.
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?”
Paul is saying because God is God, all bets are off. Stop trying to figure this out. This is beyond your pay grade. He is giving them the first-century translation of, “Shut up.”
But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God?
As Paul writes, he wrestles with God. He wants his people, the Jews, to be in on the cover story. They are, after all, God’s chosen people. Yet Paul knows God is doing something much larger here than just the Jews, and he knows he, himself, is a sign and symbol of it—the chief sinner becoming the chief saint. That’s the cover story: It’s all about Jesus. Paul’s life is now an illuminated backstory.
Here’s the kicker: Paul thought he was the main story before he met Jesus. Now he knows his life is a backstory for the great cover story of Jesus. He never imagined it because it was beyond imagination. Now Paul is now running through the Rolodex of the whole Bible. With the Jews now seated as his jury, who can he call on here? Jeremiah! Yes, Jerry—what would he say?
“Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?
God will be God so we must let God be God. So here’s the gospel in it all: Though we can’t understand God, we can trust God. Why? Because God is just? Sure. There is more though. Because God is mercy. And is this just some sort of divine philosophy we are supposed to accept? Nope. God has spoken a final word that will save the whole world—it’s the Word that brings divine justice and divine mercy together into the eternal revelation of divine love:
Jesus.
So many of us are still waiting to trust God until we understand God; when all the while, the truth is we will not understand God until we trust him. This is the very meaning of faith. And this gospel of Jesus will come to us by faith or not at all. Remember, faith is not believing something you aren’t sure is true; as in you just have to “accept it on faith.” No, faith is trusting in the reality of someone you are coming to believe is The Truth. This is how your life becomes a backstory in the greatest cover story of all time.
Yes, Jesus.
Prayer
Abba Father, thank you for Jesus, your perfect image in human flesh. Thank you that if we have seen Jesus, we have seen you. Thank you for not standing outside of your creation but coming into it and not only the created reality but into us, your very image bearers. Jesus, we belong to you. Holy Spirit, would you impart to us the mind of Jesus that we might think thoughts after God; that we might not wait to understand before we trust—but that we might trust and then find we understand. You are the potter. We are the clay. We trust you God with our lives. Praying in Jesus’s name, amen.