Dear Friends,

  In the ninth chapter of Romans Paul surfaces and refutes the two major objections that prideful humans have raised against Biblical election from the first century till now.  It amazes me that those who object to the doctrine read this chapter, including a rather concise dissection of their objections, and still raise the same objections, despite the obvious fact that Paul refuted them in the body of inspired Scripture.  Do we want to agree with what Paul taught by the direction and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, or do we want to agree with his first century critics? 

In dealing with these errant objections to Paul’s doctrine people who have chosen already to reject the Bible doctrine of election tend to fall into one of two rather significant errors.

 
1.  First they repeat the errors that Paul surfaced and refuted.  “God is unfair.”  “God can’t elect a certain people and be righteous.”  “If God elects some to be saved and not all, how can He judge those not elected?  Paul dealt with these objections.  All we need to do to refute them is to read and carefully follow Paul’s teachings in this chapter. 

2.  The second error is a bit more insidious.  It claims to hold to Paul’s teaching, even to agree with his refutation of the objections raised.  However, this error uses Paul’s explanation in ways that Paul, nor the Holy Spirit, intended by making God the author of what is sometimes called “double election.”  This idea attributes the cause of punishment for the wicked to God, not to the sins of those “elected to damnation.”  It is my belief, based on Paul’s language in these verses, that Paul carefully avoided teaching double election.  He asserted God’s sovereignty, not His fatalistic causing of all things that occur.  God did not invade the peaceful, righteous life of an Egyptian Pharaoh and diabolically orchestrate Him to sin repeatedly against Israel .  Those who advocate extreme predestination, using this passage to assert that God wholly caused Pharaoh to reject Moses’ pleas for the release of Israel , typically claim that they do not believe that God causes sin, but they fail to explain how they can assert that God caused Pharaoh to commit these repeated atrocities, but “He didn’t cause sin.”  

Some who advocate a form of the second error stop distinctly short of “double election,” the idea that God equally and actively elected both the righteous and the wicked.  However, in their promotion of extreme predestination they often commit the logical fallacy of the “horns of the dilemma.”  I have heard advocates of this view offer these words, “If you don’t believe that God causes everything, then you are a deist.”  A deist effectively believes that God created the universe, set it in motion, and then vacated it, leaving the forces of nature and of humanity to act out their own nature and choices with no divine intervention whatever.  Do you see the horns of this dilemma?  According to the errant and illogical assertion, there are no other possible views besides these two.  Either you must believe that God causes everything or you must believe that He causes nothing.  I believe it is safe to assert that most Bible believing Christians reject both extreme views set forth in this dilemma, holding that God causes some things in human history, but not all things.  There is a vast distinction between the doctrine of free moral agency, the basis for salvation by works (that God allowed Adam and fallen humans after the fall in the Garden of Eden to retain their unfallen will, the capacity by which advocates of this error believe an unregenerate, fallen human may exercise his free will and save himself) and the Biblical doctrine of free will (the Bible’s teaching that God has given to all sentient—intelligent, thinking—beings a mind and intelligence with which they may make decisions within the limitations of their innate nature.  God instituted “free will offerings” in the framework of Old Testament sacrificial worship.  In the New Testament Paul affirmed the continuation of this principle relative to the manner in which he approached the preaching of the gospel, “For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation of the gospel is committed unto me.” ( 1 Corinthians 9:17 )  Here and in multiple other New Testament passages the inspired writers of the New Testament letters consistently refute and reject the notion that every act of faith and good works in the regenerate, elect person is divinely, irresistibly, and effectually predestinated by God.  Thus the Biblical truth regarding God’s dealings with humanity, particularly with His regenerate, chosen people, rejects both horns of this illogical fallacy and stands on solid Biblical ground precisely between the two horns.  I observe for your consideration that advocates of errant ideas must practice multiple logical fallacies to hide the substance, especially the illogical consequences, of their errant beliefs.  

“Well don’t you believe that God is in control?  You reject God’s sovereignty.” is often asserted by advocates of this extreme and errant view.  The question itself evades the primary point.  The real question of belief regarding this principle of God’s relationship with His created universe, especially humanity, and more especially with His chosen people out of humanity, is not whether God is sovereign or in control or not, but with how God exercises that sovereignty and control.  Notice Paul’s defense of his faith at Mars Hill, “And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation….” ( Acts 17:26 )  Paul did not assert that God finitely controlled or caused every act of human conduct.  He clearly asserted that God set limits or “bounds” on mankind.  He controls the “bounds,” but He does not cause or even orchestrate every act of human conduct within those divinely set “bounds.”  

Paul’s use of the “Pharaoh analogy” in this passage exemplifies man’s utter lack of merit and God’s wise—and righteous—administration of His affairs, but in no way did Paul use the Pharaoh example to assert that God caused Pharaoh to sin against Him and His people.  On the Day of Judgment Pharaoh, not God, shall stand before the Righteous Judge and be required to account for His sins!  

God’s work with His chosen people that frames the centerpiece of Paul’s objective in this chapter has to do with His election, His individual personal election, of a people to be redeemed from their sins and to be transformed by an act of miraculous grace from “vessels of wrath” into “vessels of mercy.”  Praise God that, according to His amazing design and purpose, when Justice called, Mercy on behalf of every chosen vessel of mercy!

God bless,

Joe Holder

Personal Election: Objections and Inspired Answers

 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy. For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?  (Romans 9:14-24) 

            Anyone who has ever engaged someone in a discussion of personal election as taught in Scripture will be familiar with the line of reasoning raised by objectors to the doctrine.  Indeed they should be; Paul documented the objection and responded to it in this passage.  Paul read Satan’s “playbook” and, directed by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, neutralized the objections in our study verses.  The fact that Paul’s detractors raised the exact objections that they raise does not ordinarily phase these folks.  It stands to reason that if I have a choice between agreeing with an inspired apostle’s writings in the New Testament or with his critics, I should agree with the inspired apostle!  I recently read an interesting observation that accurately captures the thought that I have at the moment.  “The Bible is what God has made; sermons [or interpretations and applications of Scripture] are what we make with what God has made.”  This Bible-centric idea leads us to one of two conclusions.  If we attempt to manipulate the Bible to say what we want it so say, we put the Bible at our mercy.  If we strive to learn what God says in Scripture and to submit to God’s inspired words and thoughts in Scripture, we put ourselves at the mercy of Scripture.  One idea is eisegesis, taking our preconceived ideas to Scripture and—in unprincipled fashion—manipulating Scripture to fit our ideas, a practice that makes our personal non-Biblical ideas our primary epistemology, our primary source of information and authority.  The other idea is exegesis, going to Scripture for our ideas and allowing Scripture to shape us and our beliefs into its mold.

            The Bible student who rejects Bible truth, be it personal and individual election or any other Bible truth, tortures the Bible and puts it at his/her personal mercy.  The clarity with which Paul identifies and refutes objections to the doctrine of election in these verses is amazing.  Here we live in the twenty first century, over two thousand years after Paul wrote these words under the influence of the Holy Spirit.  Yet people who sincerely claim to believe and follow the Bible boldly reject what Paul wrote and embrace the precise objections raised by Paul’s critics in the first century.  I have thought that this lesson as much as any in the whole Bible affirms the supernatural origin of the Bible.  God knew that His way of redeeming a chosen people out of fallen humanity would not be popular with prideful humans, so He surfaced their timeless objections and refuted them in His inspired Book.  Praise God for the Bible!
 

The Objections to Election

            What are the objections raised to God’s election of a people to be redeemed from their sins and to live with Him in righteous glory throughout eternity?  Let’s examine each objection and Paul’s refutation of it.

First Objection:  Election would make God unrighteous.  This idea means that God doesn’t give every human being a “chance” to gain salvation. 

The idea that salvation grows out of “chance” or opportunity that individual humans exploit lies at the heart of this objection.  How does Paul refute the idea?  First, in the strongest negative term he ever used, “God forbid,” Paul rejects the conclusion.  Paul’s rejection should be sufficient for the Bible student who is willing to submit to Scripture alone.  However, Paul advances his reasoning with a specific example.  He introduces us to Pharaoh and the epic events that resulted in God’s eventual deliverance of His people out of Egyptian slavery.  Tom Constable offers the following thoughts regarding these verses:

9:14 The apostle first flatly denied the charge that God is unjust. God cannot be unjust because He is God.

9:15 Then he proceeded to refute the charge. When the whole nation of Israel rebelled against God by worshipping the golden calf ( Exod. 33 ), God took the lives of only 3,000 of the rebels. He could have justly slain the whole nation. His mercy caused Him to do something that appeared to be unjust. Likewise in His dealings with Jacob and Esau God blessed Esau greatly as a descendant of Abraham as He did all of Abraham’s descendants. Nevertheless He chose to bestow special grace on Jacob.

“The grace of God has been spoken of in this Epistle often before; but not until these chapters is mercy named; and until mercy is understood, grace cannot be fully appreciated.”(302)

9:16 It is not man’s desire or effort that causes God to be merciful but His own sovereign choice. God is under no obligation to show mercy or to extend grace to anyone. If we insist on receiving just treatment from God, what we will get is condemnation (3:23).(1)

As Constable rightly observes, any understanding of God’s dealings with sinful humanity that fails to consider divine mercy will utterly fail to grasp the truth of Scripture and the logical—not to mention righteous—processes that appear there regarding God’s dealings with humanity, particularly His chosen people.  Notice especially Constable’s reference, “…until mercy is understood, grace cannot be fully appreciated.”

            The heart of Paul’s rejection of the “God cannot elect a special people and remain righteous” objection appears in the fundamental character of God and the fundamental sinfulness of humanity.  Paul defends God’s righteousness in election both by his appeal to divine sovereignty and by his reminder of man’s sinful and utterly undeserving condition apart from God’s mercy.

            Although this point is something of a side issue to the primary thrust of Paul’s line of reasoning, it is important for us to understand how he dealt with the Pharaoh example.  Occasionally people take the example beyond what Paul reasoned here and attempt to create the idea that God caused an otherwise benevolent Egyptian monarch to do one evil deed after another.  Neither here nor in the Exodus record is this the case.

            Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up…  How did God raise Pharaoh up?  Did God orchestrate or manipulate Pharaoh against his natural inclinations?  Did God put into Pharaoh’s heart evil ideas that he would not otherwise have imagined?  No!  Again I cite Constable and other authorities that he quotes.

Pharaoh deserved death for his opposition and insolence. However, God would not take his life in the remaining plagues so his continuing opposition and God’s victory over him would result in greater glory for God (cf. Josh. 9:9 ; Ps. 76:10 ).

Here is another example similar to the one in verse 15 of God not giving people what they deserve but extending mercy to them instead.

9:18 This statement summarizes Paul’s point. In chapter 1 the apostle had spoken about the way God gives people over to their own evil desires as a form of punishment for their sins. This is how God hardens people’s hearts. In Pharaoh’s case we see this working out clearly. God was not unjust because He allowed the hardening process to continue. His justice demanded punishment.

“Neither here nor anywhere else is God said to harden anyone who had not first hardened himself.”(303) (2) 

“God’s hardening does not, then, cause spiritual insensitivity to the things of God; it maintains people in the state of sin that already characterizes them.”(306)

Paul did not mention the fact that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, which Moses stated in Exodus. Paul’s point was simply that God can freely and justly extend mercy or not extend mercy to those who deserve His judgment.(3)

            If we consider the moral state of man and the righteousness and mercy of God, the difficulties of these verses and the human, prideful objection to election are largely resolved.  If God capriciously manipulated a righteous, deserving monarch for His private purposes, the objector’s idea stands, and God, not Pharaoh, should be charged with the responsibility for what happened.  However, if Pharaoh was already calloused against God and bent on keeping a slave labor force to accomplish his prideful notions for himself, Pharaoh, not God, rightly is seen as the responsible party.  This point is specifically and clearly presented three times, in Exodus chapters 9 and 10 .  Even Pharaoh himself recognized and admitted he alone was fully responsible and wholly guilty of sins of disobedience for refusing to free Israel ( Exodus 9:27 ; 10:16 ).  Paul devoted the majority of the first chapter of Romans to the fact that God only gives people up to the consequences of their own sinful desires after they wholly devote themselves to those desires.  Effectively the first chapter of Romans serves as an advance commentary on Pharaoh and his personal defiance of God and of God’s people.

            God’s objective, as specifically stated by Paul, was not to manipulate an otherwise righteous monarch, making God the cause of his callous and fickle actions against Moses and Israel .  God’s objection is clearly stated, “…that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.”  Nothing in these two objectives in any way, even remotely or indirectly, imply that God caused Pharaoh to do anything that was not already in Pharaoh’s heart to do.  God’s dealings with Pharoah gave him temporary pause but upon further reflection the arrogant monarch returned to his own willful design to retain Israel as a slave workforce.

            How does Pharaoh’s example respond to the objection to divine election with which Paul is dealing here?  Simply stated, God’s election is in no way responsible for man’s sin. 

God did not elect and cause the wicked to practice their depraved actions any more than He caused Pharaoh to practice his evil against Israel. 

Any interpretation of Pharaoh’s conduct that effectively makes God the causative manipulator of Pharaoh’s sins contradicts Paul’s primary objective in rejecting the notion that God becomes unrighteous if He chose a specific people to be redeemed from their sins.  Paul’s fundamental premise is that God is righteous in election, not unrighteous.  If Paul intended to affirm that God caused Pharaoh’s hardness and sins against Israel , he would have contradicted his stated purpose in using Pharaoh as an example in his refutation of the objection to election.  Ah, Scripture will explain itself if we allow it to do so and get our prideful static out of the way.

            So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.  Paul’s stated purpose in rejecting the critic’s objection is to affirm that election, the “it” of this sentence, does not originate with sinful, fallen man, nor of humans who seek to please God, though he in no way implies that running the Christian race or working to serve and honor God are wrong.  The point he makes here deals with the source of election.  Contrary to populist reasoning that rejects Biblical election, God didn’t choose the heirs of redemption based on His omniscience, His advance knowledge of who would be willing or who would run.  The origin, the ultimate motive for God’s election of a people to redeem from their sins, lies with God alone, and the motive in God is mercy, not justice. 

Second Objection:  How can God find fault with sinners if He chose some to redeem and didn’t give all an equal opportunity to save themselves?

Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?  What is the inherent flaw in this line of reasoning?  Paul surfaces it for us clearly in his response.  Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?  Fallen sinful man, according to Paul’s inspired reasoning is no more inherently deserving of anything from God than a piece of common clay in a potter’s shed!  Does the potter plan on spending much of his time each day reasoning with the various pieces of clay to discover which piece of clay will submit to his molding on the wheel and which piece of clay will resist?  The idea of Paul’s objector is as ludicrous as the analogy of the potter and the clay!

           Inherent in the objection raised is the idea that fallen sinful humans are deserving, that they hold a position with God that requires some form of special consideration.  Does a convicted criminal on death row have an inherent right to walk the streets and exercise the privileges of a law-abiding citizen?  No, his crime, duly tried and convicted, has stripped him of any legal right he may have formerly possessed.  The only thing he deserves in the eyes of a righteous law is the imposition of the legal penalty for his crime.

302 302 . Newell, p. 355.

1]Tom Constable, Tom Constable's Expository Notes on the Bible (Galaxie Software, 2003; 2003), Ro 9:14-16 .

303 303 . Leon Morris, The Epistle to the Romans, p. 361.

[1]Tom Constable, Tom Constable's Expository Notes on the Bible (Galaxie Software, 2003; 2003), Ro 9:17-18 .

306 306 . Ibid., p. 599.

 1]Tom Constable, Tom Constable's Expository Notes on the Bible (Galaxie Software, 2003; 2003), Ro 9:18.