While still in the praying part of planning my preaching schedule and thinking very seriously about preaching through Romans, I was somewhat intimidated by the challenges. How to handle this? Explain that?
And then I realized (God spoke to me?) that my approach was wrong. Why be concerned with covering all the variations and interpretations? Really. Look at the long lists of scholars who don’t have it all figured out. They can’t agree. Why would I put myself under the pressure to make these things clear to everybody.
So I decided that I would study and preach the text to the best of my ability.
AND … I decided that I would not try to answer the “unanswerable” questions in this amazing letter. It was encouraging for me to note as I have progressed through the study that I have very good company with this thought.
Preach the text and don’t try to say more than what God says.
Part of my dilemma came from my background. Too often as evangelicals and fundamentalists we believe ourselves to be THE answer people. We can answer everything. Just give us a Bible and we will show you.
Now we are answer people in that we do have the answer in Christ and in God’s Holy Book. But we tend (in our pride and misunderstanding?) to come up with more answers than are presented in “the Book.”
What a blessing this study has been! I worship and praise God every week as he “blows my doors off” with the amazing truth of his word.
And now a note from Leon Morris on predestination. A wonderful, strengthening doctrine so clearly taught by the Apostle Paul.
- Paul goes on to predestination. [1] This is an important New Testament concept and one which some people find difficult because they are so sure that we have free wills. This is not the place to go into a discussion of the relative places of the two; it must suffice to notice that the meaning of the word is plain. We must not allow ourselves to be sidetracked by modern notions of what is or is not possible for God. Paul is saying that God is the author of our salvation, and that from beginning to end. We are not to think that God can take action only when we graciously give him permission. Paul is saying that God initiates the whole process. As Barrett puts it: “The history and personal make-up of the Church are not due to chance or to arbitrary human choices, but represent the working out of God’s plan.… Our own intentions, like our own virtues, are far too insecure to stand the tests of time and judgement.” He sees it as “the most comfortable of all Christian doctrines, if men will accept it in its biblical form, and not attempt to pry into it with questions which it does not set out to answer. It is … the final statement of the truth that justification, and, in the end, salvation also, are by grace alone, and through faith alone.”[2]
- [1] 138 προορίζω means “set the boundary (ὅρος) beforehand” and clearly points to what we mean by predestination.
- [2] Morris, L. (1988). The Epistle to the Romans (pp. 332–333). Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press.
