Romans 9

I haven't posted here for ages. This blog became, as they say, a statistic. The relevant statistic is that the vast majority of blogs are abandoned in the first year. Not surprising I suppose.

Last night we read Romans 9 in Bible Study. It's such a straight-forward chapter in some respects, that I'm surprised people have so much trouble with it. Why can't we just read it and accept what it says?

Something that strikes me is that Paul anticipates the counter arguments - "You'll say to me 'how can God find fault, for who can resist his will?'". Hey, that's exactly what I was thinking!

We can't resist God's will, and God's will encompasses minute details about our lives, including our salvation. That's that.

Philip Jensen - I don't know if he coined the expression, I've now heard it outside of Sydney circles - says that salvation is "100% God, and 100% us". I used to like this, because we have to be careful in some ways.

But I think these days I disagree. Not only is 100+100=200, but I just don't think it's true. We have no cause for boasting. God, in order to glorify himself, according to his great mercy, sovereignly implants a repentant spirit in us, without which we would never seek him, and with which we necessarily will.

So my actions, from the day I was born to the day I will die, were predetermined by God before the foundation of the world. Any lesser view detracts from the omni-everything of God. I am clay, or a sheep, or whatever else is unable to do anything but that which it/he is enslaved to or was intended for.

How can we get anything else from Romans 9?

The Pianist I

This week my beautiful wife and daughter are in England, so I'm a bachelor for a week. Inevitably then, I'm

1. Living in squalor, 
2. Eating poorly, 
3. Sleeping in, and 
4. Watching a lot of films.

Last night I watched The Pianist. About 20 mins in I felt sick and almost turned it off, but I persevered. It was excellent. When the German soldier gave him bread, and he opened the wrapping and there was jam inside, I could almost taste that jam, it was so good. Much of the film was about hunger, and it worked really well. Much of the film was about escalating violence, and that worked really well too.

Anyway, it raised several problems for me, which I'll deal with over a few posts lest this one get too long. I'll deal with the toughest one (for me) first:

God did that.

It's a common thread in Bible study groups, especially when the group does Old Testament stuff. God told Israel to attack so-and-so, and to leave no one standing, not men, not women, not children, not livestock. Nothing. Saul keeps a few sheep alive and gets in big trouble.

If you made a film about this, I would probably watch it and feel about Israel the same that I felt about the Germans in this film. When they were captured at the end, inside the wired fence, I hated them. I was really glad they'd been captured. And I was meant to feel this way. The filmmakers had that very purpose in mind.

So I'd feel about Israel the way I felt about the Germans, and presumably I'd feel about God the way I felt about Hitler.

This is a problem. (Goes without saying doesn't it?)

Usually, at least in Bible studies I've been to, there are some rationalisations which are raised at this point. You know the point? Someone in your BS hadn't really thought about Israel's genocidal tendencies before, and they're struggling not to be appalled by the whole thing. So some people say:

The thing you've got to remember, is that we all deserve that. We all deserve to die. We all hate God, by nature, and reject him. The Canaanites hated God. Let's look at Romans 3...

And the answer seems good enough, and we all store it away for a while. It's like in those fantasy films where the evil power gets trapped in a stone, and the magic that kept it there would be good for a time, but every 1000 years or so someone needs to re-work the magic to keep it there? Hah... can anyone relate to that?

But when I watch things like The Pianist, it comes out again. God's wrath is intense. His choice of Israel as his special possession is arbitrary, and so the Canaanites get screwed. God made us like this, for his own glory, and it leads to some pretty incredible violence and hardship, and then eternal punishment. I really really struggle with this.

So last night I was talking to God about it, and got nowhere. But maybe in time I will.

One more issue this raises for me:

I was raised as a Christian, and so initially I trusted God was there because my parents said so, and because I talked to him and it seemed reasonable.

These days I think the thing that what keeps me a Christian is the historical testimony. Sometimes I feel like God is real, sometimes I feel like I'm being sanctified, but sometimes I feel like it could just all be a farce. But then I remember: There's good reason to believe that Jesus lived and died and rose from the dead. The evidence is good. So God is there, and I have to deal with his character as it comes. And in the Bible that is a difficult thing.

I wonder where this is all going to lead me... Time for an intervention? Is anyone out there a little worried?