“Creator and the Created”

Scripture: Romans 9:19-26

Last week, we considered the ways of God – that not only are they not our ways, but that they are so far above our understanding as to make them appear to be strange, at best. In Jesus’ parable of the Workers in the Harvest (Matthew 20:1-16), he addresses this very issue. The landowner hired three groups of workers for his vineyard. The morning group is promised a denarius for the day’s work, the noontime group is promised a “fair wage”, and the evening group is simply told to go and work. When the end of the day arrives, the master pays ALL of the workers the same amount, and of course, the group that worked all day started complaining that they should have been paid more.
The master replies that they had received what was agreed upon, and what difference did it make if he was generous to the others – it was his money to be generous with!

This parable is about compensation and reward, and is just one example of the Lord’s un-human ways! His are not ours, and ours can in no way even come close to his!

St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a 12th century French abbot, wrote:
What is the highest, most exalted act of intelligent life? It is to love. Love seeks no cause, no end, no reward beyond itself. I love because I love; I love that I may love.
--Cited in Henry Osborn Taylor, The Medieval Mind (London: MacMillan, 191* 1:429.

Maybe that’s the difference between us and the Lord – that he knows how to love, and we are still learning!

Read Romans 9:19-21

“Why does God still blame us?” Paul may be referring to the Exile, that time when Israel was set aside for 70 years, so they could reflect on the previous 500 years of sinful disobedience. It’s pretty good question, but one that is nonetheless pertinent to the lives of many folks today.
We’ve all heard it - Why is God doing this to me? Haven’t I suffered enough? Why is he so angry with me?
We question God all the time, and we even reject his answers when they don’t suit us! And Paul’s response to this is “Who are you to talk back to God?” Good question! Who are we to question the Lord, to doubt him, to intentionally go against his word? Who are we to expect to understand his ways, to have them make sense within our own context? Who are we to demand that the Lord work in ways that are compatible with our human ways?
Remember Isaiah 55:9? “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” The apostle reminds us that we have no right to appeal God’s decisions and actions, and we definitely have no right to talk back to him! We are to accept his ways, not to try to correct or improve them!

And Paul uses the concept of a potter’s work to illustrate his point. My cousin’s husband is a skilled potter and artist, and has a shop called "The House of the Potter”. I wish I could get Bill to come and explain his craft to us, but in his stead, I’ll take a crack at it. First, it is the potter’s decision as to what he makes out of each individual lump of clay. Bill has made innovative chess sets, fine dining pieces, every day mugs and cups, funny pieces (I have a pitcher he made that has a face, 2 arms and 2 left hands on it!), and even my communion chalice and paten were made by this skilled artisan. The clay had no say in the production, and quite honestly, neither did I! I simply use the pieces I received.
And when the piece is finally formed to meet the potter’s standard, each and every one must be submitted to thousands of degrees of heat in the kiln, to harden and set it in this perfect shape and purpose. There is no changing the creation that the potter has made, even if the clay could want to be different, or could think that it should be different! The potter’s will is paramount!

Read Romans 9:22-24

So whether in wrath and power or love and compassion, whether in peace and presence or exile and separation, God is always God in every way. Why is he like that? Only he knows, but Paul offers that it might be to reveal “the riches of his glory” to all who he would show mercy to. This sounds like a pretty good reason, but it still doesn’t take away our answer from last week – it is still “Just because!” We still don’t know why he would want to show his glory and mercy to some and leave others caught up in their condemnation, and why he offers Jesus Christ as the means to receive his glory and mercy.
The truth is that our being good is never enough, that attending worship and becoming members of the church is never enough, that loving others is never enough, that being a Jew is never enough, that even desiring his glory is still never enough. God prepares us to receive his all by offering humanity a relationship with "his all" in Jesus Christ. And when we claim that relationship, we receive his glory and mercy and grace and hope and promise of eternal life – all in one “fell swoop”!

Could it really be that easy? That in accepting Jesus Christ, and all that he is and stands for, it could complete God’s preparation of us for glory? Yes – it really is that simple. Creator and created can actually have a relationship with each other by our accepting the Lord Jesus as Savior and the purpose of life that he has placed in us. All are welcome, regardless of our life, regardless of our past, regardless of who the world tells us we are, and regardless of personal failures or, for that matter, our successes. The Potter will take the “clump” that we bring to him from this life, and will remake us in his perfect and incredibly wonderful way. Nothing in all creation is too ugly, or too sick, or too far gone for him to “make over” in his glory!

Read Romans 9:25-26

These two quotations from Hosea are found in Hosea 2:23 and 1:10. The book is an analogy of Israel’s impending exile. The Lord uses the comparison of an unfaithful wife and the marriage relationship that she tries to destroy, to the way that Israel has treated their covenant with Yahweh. Hosea’s wife, Gomer, will leave him for quite some time, but after years of searching, the faithful husband finds her in slavery, and buys her back to resume her life as his beloved. The past mistakes wouldn’t count against her; the abandonment of faithfulness wouldn’t matter; her life with other men would be forgiven; and a new life would begin without all the burdens and failures and betrayals that had plagued her in the past.
The first quotation that we just read is telling the people that their God is about to welcome others into his grace, and the second promises that Israel, once again and after the separation that is about to occur, will be invited back into the relationship that they had once denied.

And that promise is ours, too. The strangest and most unexpected people will be welcomed into God’s mercy; those who we have always found objectionable will know this new call and relationship; and the ones who denied the love of God in Christ Jesus can finally know it in fullness for themselves. And it will happen right in the middle of where we are – sinful, unwashed, condemned, and hopeless, and in Christ, all will be made new for us.

Are you ready to stop blaming God for all your failures? Do you want the struggles of this life to end? Then turn it all over to Christ Jesus and the great Potter, and let him remake you in a whole new image – one that will not only receive glory, but one that will radiate the glory of Almighty God to others.