Exploration

A young man was the heir to a great estate. As the eldest son, all the wealth that his parents had accumulated- all the business ventures, the real estate, the possessions and all the stocks, bonds and bank acocounts - it would all be his when his parents died and he would become one of the richest people in all the world. His wealth would not be due toanything he had done to earn it except that he had been born to this couple.

This couple had another child as well. This child had been adopted; not the offspring of their own union. And yet this child was loved equally, lived in the same house, had all the same benefits and priveleges as the son who was heir. The older son was bitter and angry over his parrents affection for this younger adopted child and treated his sibling with utter contempt and cruelty. This displeased the parents but what could they do. Llong before they had opened their hearts and home to this adopted child, the inheritance has been promised to the older son. And they were poeple of honor who believed in keeping their promises.

The son who was heir however, was ungrateful, selfish spoiled and inconsiderate. He had a drug addiction, gambling debts and other expensive, sefl-gratifying habits. He couldn't wait to leave home and get ou from his parents authooirty and influence and so when he was of age, he asked for just enough money to get out from under some of his problems and go out on his own. Then they would be free from him and they could give the remaining share of the inheritance to whomever they pleased - even the adopted child.

So off he went. Forsaking all the world that could have been his, he struck out on his own and eventually found out that life outside was harsh and cruel. He expended all his money, fell ill and generally lived a miserable life; too proud and resentful to go home and ask forgiveness and restoration.

In the meantime, the adopted child, the new heir, not by virtue of l\ineage but of parental choice, enjoyed all the comforts and influence of wealth.

Were the parents wrong? Were they unfair? Should not they have gone ahead and distributed their wealth evenly between the two children?

Those questions arising from this parable are some of the same ones which arise as we begin to discuss God's soverign choice of those whom will receive etrenal llife and those who won't. They are the precise questions that puzzled and perplexed beliver's in Paul's day. Therefore, Paul addresses the real life situation which was the backdrop for the parable I just told you.

Exposition

In the midst of his exposition of the awesome marvel of God's redemptive plan, Paul inserts a parenthetical thought for three chapters regarding the role and fate of Israel. For you see the Jews are the son in the parable I just told you. Israel, by virtue of God's promise to Abraham, Gods choice of Isaac over Ishmael and subsequently God's choice of Jacob over Esau , had become the chosen people of God, inheritors of Gods promises and glory, recipients of the laws and blood relations to Jesus Christ.

But Israel rejected that glorious inheritance and in spite of God's choice turned away from and rejected Jesus. The bad news was that the Jew by birth was no longer automatically considered the heir apparent to God's saving purposes.

The good news was that God's great salvation then was available to Jew and Greek - not as a matter of birth but by adoption through faith. One argument that Paul makes is that the true Israel is comprised of those who become God's peopl by faith not by birth.

As we look more closely ath this passage, we can see that it is divided into three main ideas.

1. (Vss 1-5) The first main idea is that of Paul's deep sorrow. Though he was a Roman citizen and a scholar trained in Greek thought, he was by birth a Jew, a kinsmen of those to whom the promises had been given and those who at the same time had rejected the gift of God's son.

   I have great sorrow and heaviness in my heart.

   Stewart Briscoe likens this to the ambivalence of feeling that a parent might have over the birth of a child which occurs in the shadow of a death of a parent or some other loved one. Paul was excited and happy for the Gentile beleivers to whom he was writing. But he was weighed down with indescribable sorrow that those to whom he was related had chosen to reject God's plan

   Notice verse 3. So great is his sorrow that he says, I wish I could be cut off from Christ if I thought it would help bring his kinsfolk back to God.

2. The second main idea is that God's purposes didn't change (vss 6- 15) Paul goes on to say that It is not as though God's word has been nullified by this rejection. Quite to the contrary. God's word is fulfilled for he says that they are not of Israel who are of Israel. That sounds at first like double speak. However, he is saying something very profound and true here. Even in the Old testament salvation was not simpply by virtue of birth but by belief. In the nation of Israel, there were undoubtedly those who did not trust God's promises and had no faith in Gods ability to save. They pursued a righteousness based on the following of the law and depended on their own works, rather than the promises of God. Paul says that they were of Israel, that is they were born descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and thus were heirs to the promise but by their rejection of Gods provisions, they had set themselves outside the family of faith and were no longer really of Israel

   The same is true today in the Christian church. A person can belong to a church as an active member, teach Sunday School, serve in any number of different ways and thus be a recipient of god's grace and promises to the people of God. And yet, these same people, deep inside may not truly believe. They might have never trusted God for their salvation, repented of sin and sought the forgiveness through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Thus they are of the church but not really of the true church universal whose cahracter is defined by belief not organizational membership.

   John Calvin said that the Invisible Church and the Visible church are not coexstensive. That is to say that the visible church or the organizational church inthis world is comprised of both true believers and non-believers. However the invisible church or the church universal is comprised of all believers of all times and includes no unbelievers. If you are a bleiver you are automatically a member of the church universal evenn if you are not a member of an earthly visible church. However you may be a member of an earthly visible church but not a member of the church universal and invisible.

   So it is with Israel. They who are of Israel the nation are not all of Israel, the chosen people of God who receive their adoption by virtue of their faith response to God's election.

3. The third main point that Paul makes has to do with God's sovereignty (vss 16-18). God is not unrighteous or unjust in choosing those whom he wills. God is God and by definition, God is a supreme and soveregn power who selects whom he wants and does what God wills.

   One of the distinctive points of Reformed Theology is that salation is of God from start to finish and nowhere does it depend on human effort. It depends on God's mercy (16)

   The true believer submits to God's sovereignty and by faith relinquishes his/her own will to the will of God.

   The true believer may not understand God's plans or purposes but nonetheless says, "It is your Choice O God." In a world that is dominated by secular thought and humanistic idealism, we have a hard time saying this. Somehow we think that it is up to us; that it is something we must do or initiate or it isn't valid.

   In the next verses Paul, like his Old Testament counterpart Jeremiah, says that our relationship to God is much like that of a clay in the hands of a potter. What right does that clay have to question the hands of the potter that shapes it into whatever the potter wants. So it is with a sovereign God. Whether we think it is fair by human standards or not, God is sovereign and can choose to do whatever God pleases and choose whomever God pleases.

Explanation

There are two important lessons that we should take from this difficult text this morning.

1. We must continually be thrown back to the confession that salvation is of God from start to finish - that we have done nothing to merit god's favor or salvation. God shows mercy on whom God wills and it does not depend on our desire or effort for if it did, no one, not one of us would make it.

   O to grace how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be, Let thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love, Here's my heart God. Take and seal it; seal it for thy courts above.

   Amazing Grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost byut now am found was blind but now I see

   Twas Greace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved How precious did that grace appear, the hour I first believed

   As you come to the table of communion to acknowledge and share in all the richness of grace God has given by his own soveriegn choice and mercy, cpme with truly thankful hearts. Don't despise the inheritance that is yours by Gods own choice. Don't neglect it. Don't take it for granted.

2. Carry a burden for those who have not received it.

   You come to this table as an invited guest of the soverign God who chose you. You did nothing to earn the invitation. IT is a free table and it is open to all who by faith have trusted in Christ. But there are many who are not at this table. Your next door neighbor, your co-worker, yuor brother or mother or aunt or step-brother. Do you long with a heavy heart for those people to hear and believe the Gospel and share int he blessings and inheritance of the people of God.

   Do you have the same heaviness of heart for the unbeliever as Paul had for the Jews.

   When I was in Colorado as a teen, I remember that there was wa campaign to stop growthand to keeep people from moving into the stae fromother areas. Now that I am here, stop growth.

   Many believers are the same way. Now that I have found salvation, let's keep the church small and intimate. Let's not go out of our way to bring others into an understanding and faith of Gods love and forgiveness through Jesus Christ.

   You say, well if they have been chosen and predestined, why should I worry about them. I want to get into that next weeks sermon when we focus on the subject of Evangelism. However, Let me just touch on it now by saying that the work of salvation beliongs to God. We can't save anybody and if you ever hear someone saying that they saved someones soul, run from them for they don't understand Gods salvation at all. However, one of God's methods for reaching those whom he has chosen is the proclamation and teaching of the Gospel and it is true that those cannot believe who have never heard.

   We bear a moral obigation to carry a heavy burdened heart for the lost in the world, to pray for them and to share with the Gospel with them at every opportunity

	Pastor Fred D. Davis:	2025 North Valley Drive
	Revdavis@aol.com	P.O. Box 2042
	Fred_Davis.parti@presby.org	Las Cruces, NM 88004-2042