²⁵ Con­cern­ing the Gen­tiles, God says in the prophecy of Hosea, “Those who were not my people, I will now call my people. And I will love those whom I did not love before.” ²⁶ And, “Then, at the place where they were told, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘chil­dren of the liv­ing God.’”

²⁷ And con­cern­ing Israel, Isa­iah the prophet cried out, “Though the peo­ple of Israel are as numer­ous as the sand of the seashore, only a rem­nant will be saved. ²⁸ For the Lord will carry out his sen­tence upon the earth quickly and with finality.”

²⁹ And Isa­iah said the same thing in another place: “If the Lord of Heaven’s Armies had not spared a few of our children, we would have been wiped out like Sodom, destroyed like Gomorrah.”

God Hasn’t Changed

A lot of peo­ple make the mis­take in assum­ing that God had one plan under the Old Tes­ta­ment era and another plan in the New Tes­ta­ment. It’s like they think that God tried things one way, and when it was clear that peo­ple couldn’t do it accord­ing to that plan, he changed his mind and came at things from a dif­fer­ent approach.

But noth­ing could be fur­ther from the truth. God hasn’t changed at all. His plan never changed. As I pointed out in last night’s Bik­ers’ Church talk (for those who were not there, keep an eye out on our web­site, it should be up within a few days), God’s plan has been the same since the begin­ning of cre­ation. From the moment that Adam and Eve fell, God pro­claimed the day would come when the power of sin would be broken.

Paul is mak­ing that point clear in this pas­sage. He uses the prophe­cies of Hosea and Isa­iah to make his point. The idea that sal­va­tion is for every­one isn’t some­thing that was “made up” through the teach­ings of Jesus. Hun­dreds of years before the era of grace began, it was proph­e­sied. Gen­tiles would be part of God’s fam­ily. And not every­one in the nation of Israel would remain faithful.

What can we take from this? I take hope in the idea that God doesn’t just come up with things on a whim. He isn’t caught off guard by the behav­iour of some­one and sud­denly has to come up with a “plan B”. From the moment I was formed in my mother’s womb, God knew my days. He knew the choices I’d make. He pur­posed a plan for my life and invites me to live fully in all that he designed for me. I love that realization.

My prayer: Lord, I take delight in know­ing that noth­ing sur­prises you. Noth­ing catches you off guard. Your plan for me, your plan for my fam­ily, my friends, my church, is known from begin­ning to end with you. I may not know all that is to come, but you do. And when I trust you, I have the con­fi­dence in know­ing that every step I take is ordained by you. There’s a con­fi­dence that comes from that truth. So, today I trust you with my steps. Lead me along the path that you have called me to jour­ney. Amen.

Until tomor­row.

Share on Facebook

¹⁷ For the Scrip­tures say that God told Pharaoh, “I have appointed you for the very pur­pose of dis­play­ing my power in you and to spread my fame through­out the earth.” ¹⁸ So you see, God chooses to show mercy to some, and he chooses to harden the hearts of oth­ers so they refuse to listen.

¹⁹ Well then, you might say, “Why does God blame peo­ple for not respond­ing? Haven’t they sim­ply done what he makes them do?”

²⁰ No, don’t say that. Who are you, a mere human being, to argue with God? Should the thing that was cre­ated say to the one who cre­ated it, “Why have you made me like this?” ²¹ When a pot­ter makes jars out of clay, doesn’t he have a right to use the same lump of clay to make one jar for dec­o­ra­tion and another to throw garbage into? ²² In the same way, even though God has the right to show his anger and his power, he is very patient with those on whom his anger falls, who are des­tined for destruc­tion. ²³ He does this to make the riches of his glory shine even brighter on those to whom he shows mercy, who were pre­pared in advance for glory. ²⁴ And we are among those whom he selected, both from the Jews and from the Gentiles.

Think­ing Like God

At some point, most of us do it. Maybe all of us. At least once or twice, we’re guilty of it. We ques­tion the ways of God. When some­thing doesn’t quite make sense, I try to rea­son as if I were God. If I were God … I’d do it this way. Or, we look at God’s actions and we fil­ter them through our own way of thinking.

In today’s pas­sage, Paul talks about God hard­en­ing the heart of Pharaoh so that he could be used for a greater pur­pose. In case you’re won­der­ing what role Pharaoh plays in his­tory, you can read his story, which begins in Exo­dus 5. If you were at Bik­ers’ Church last night, you know that The Passover, which took place in Pharaoh’s Egypt, is part of the Christ­mas story — the story of Jesus. But the Bible is clear that God does indeed harden the heart of Pharaoh.

Some have asked if the same was true of Judas. Did he have a choice? After all, the story needed a betrayer. One who would hand Jesus over to be cru­ci­fied. (Or did it?) Some won­der if Judas gets a fair shake, since his role ulti­mately led to the death and res­ur­rec­tion of Jesus.

When we try to answer these ques­tions fully, we find our­selves in the place of try­ing to think like God. And that’s a dif­fi­cult, if not dan­ger­ous, place to be.

Why? Because the Bible is also clear that God’s thoughts are not like ours. His ways are far beyond any­thing we could imag­ine (Isa­iah 55:8) In fact, if you were to read the entire 55th chap­ter of Isa­iah, you’d dis­cover that it is speak­ing about sal­va­tion, and the way God goes about touch­ing the hearts of peo­ple is not the way we might do it … if we were God, that is.

Here’s what I know: God so loved the world, that he gave his only son that who­ever believes might be saved. That means … who­ever. Any­one. We are all given the oppor­tu­nity to know God. Some will reject that oppor­tu­nity. Some will turn away from God. And if God then takes those who turn away and hard­ens their heart and uses them in some way, it really is beyond my com­pre­hen­sion to understand.

You see, I’m not God. I can’t think like he does. I can only trust him that he knows best.

My prayer: Lord, I trust you. For­give me for the times when I try to fig­ure every­thing out. That’s not my job. My job is to walk by faith. There are going to be things that I can’t answer. Ques­tions that will remain unre­solved. May I con­tinue to trust you even when I don’t have it all set­tled in my mind. As the Apos­tle Thomas prayed, “Lord, I believe! Help me with my unbe­lief.” Amen.

Until tomor­row.

Share on Facebook

¹⁰ This son was our ances­tor Isaac. When he mar­ried Rebekah, she gave birth to twins. ¹¹ But before they were born, before they had done any­thing good or bad, she received a mes­sage from God. (This mes­sage shows that God chooses peo­ple accord­ing to his own pur­poses; ¹² he calls peo­ple, but not accord­ing to their good or bad works.) She was told, “Your older son will serve your younger son.” ¹³ In the words of the Scrip­tures, “I loved Jacob, but I rejected Esau.”

¹⁴ Are we say­ing, then, that God was unfair? Of course not! ¹⁵ For God said to Moses, “I will show mercy to any­one I choose, and I will show com­pas­sion to any­one I choose.”

¹⁶ So it is God who decides to show mercy. We can nei­ther choose it nor work for it.

Is God Fair?

It is a pro­found ques­tion. When God uses some­one in a way that we wish we were used, it’s easy to think that God is being unfair. When we see some­one being blessed while we strug­gle, it’s easy to ques­tion God. In fact, it’s human nature to do so. Peo­ple have been doing it since the begin­ning of time.

And yet, is it the right ques­tion to ask? I don’t believe it is. You see, we base fair­ness on our own under­stand­ing of what it means to be fair. We use our cul­tural under­stand­ing of right and wrong to decide if life is fair or not. And as soon as we ask the ques­tion is God fair? we are plac­ing God into that box of lim­ited understanding.

Per­haps the ques­tion we should be ask­ing is can God be trusted? In other words, regard­less of how I see things play­ing out in my life or in the life of another, can I trust God. Is he trust­wor­thy? I believe he is.

You’ve likely heard this illus­tra­tion before, but we see life the same way we see the road ahead of us when we’re on our bikes. We open the throt­tle when the road is straight. When we can’t see beyond the curve, we lean in, feel the rush of excite­ment of not know­ing what’s ahead, and ride the curve. The fact is, we don’t know what might be wait­ing for us ahead. But God does. He sees the jour­ney from the van­tage point of an Eagle fly­ing above the road. He sees what awaits beyond the next curve. He knows what is com­ing up in our lives. At times, he calls to us to slow down, because the road is rough beyond the next curve. At times, he invites us to open it up even more, because the road is beau­ti­ful, and he loves see­ing us enjoy the thrill of the ride.

If we learn to trust him, the ride can be far more excit­ing than any­thing we could imag­ine. When we ask is God fair? we are focus­ing on the moment rather than the jour­ney. We are bas­ing the ques­tion of what we are expe­ri­enc­ing at that time. And in doing so, we are really ques­tion­ing if we can trust God with tomorrow.

My prayer: Lord, I want to expe­ri­ence the full­ness of the jour­ney that you have called me to live. Some­times I can be guilty of look­ing at some­one else’s jour­ney and com­par­ing myself to them. For­give me for doing that. You have called me to some­thing very unique. I choose to trust you with my jour­ney. So, lead me, I pray. Amen.

Until tomor­row.

Share on Facebook