Romans Introduction Part 3 - Election

Election

Another doctrine we must touch upon in any study of Romans - one that has been neglected and even vilified in recent years - is that of God’s sovereignty in salvation. When we eventually come to Chapter 9 we will find the some of the clearest and most incontrovertible statements upon the sovereign right of God to save whom He pleases, and to pass over all others without in any way compromising His love, holiness and justice.

So it (election unto salvation) depends not upon man’s will or exertion, but upon God’s mercy. {Romans 9:16}

I have had people say to me about this specific passage that, “Yes, yes I know what it says…but I believe such and such…” as if their own personal feelings and opinions carried more authority than the words of God Almighty. It is hard teaching for the rebellious and wicked human heart to accept. It is repulsive to the natural man in all of us. But it is a prime example of those things in the Bible that we must accept because it is true (because God said it) regardless of how we feel. Let the Word of God change us, but let us never change the Word of God. Let God be true and every man a liar. {Romans 3:4}

As we examine this teaching we shall see how it is linked to all the other elements of salvation from the depravity of the human heart, where the helplessness of man is shown - to the need for the righteousness of God to be imputed, Whose character alone can stand the consuming fire of His holiness. We shall see how we are placed in the cleft of the Rock (which is Christ) by God – and how He covers us with His hand so that we may not die in His presence. We shall come to realize that it is God’s salvation from start to finish – His grace, His mercy, His righteousness, His will, His unbounded love, His plan and purpose, His beginning and end – and that the full and final accomplishment of it does not depend in any way upon His creatures – though He requires of them that they strive to enter in at the strait gate and to walk in the narrow way.

For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. {Hebrews 4:12}

"I know that thou canst do all things, and that no purpose of thine can be thwarted.” {Job 42:2}

I know that whatever God does endures for ever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it; God has made it so, in order that men should fear before him. {Ecclesiastes 3:14}

I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I gird you, though you do not know me, that men may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness, I make weal and create woe, I am the LORD, who do all these things. {Isaiah 45: 5-7}

And all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but He does according to His will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth; and no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, 'What hast Thou done?' {Daniel 4:35}

We shall see that, when God at last moves our hearts to come to Christ, all we can bring is our own rebellion, failure, hatred, lostness and abject need – and then receive freely what is freely given – a full and utterly unmerited salvation that finds its source deep within the counsels of God from eternity, and that is effected in the loving gift of God’s Son.