The Re-Justification of God

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This is an interesting examination of Romans, chapter 9 through 11. The author's purpose is to examine the Calvinist treatment of Romans 9:10 - 24. Calvinists see affirmation of predestination, and double predestination, in these passages.These passages seem to depict God at his most nominalist and absolutist. Thus, we have God depicted as electing some - perhaps entire groups - to damnation with as much concern as a potter might elect any given piece of his work for destruction.

This approach has been seen as making God into a monster. According to this view, a loving God grants existence to some solely for the purpose of sending that lovingly created creation to the worst fate imaginable. Even worse, this fate has been predestined before time began and there is nothing that the purpose could have done to avoid this fate.

Author J.D. Myers' point is to examine that perspective. His thesis is that Calvinists are misreading Romans by assuming that Paul is talking about salvation. Meyers makes a compelling point that Paul is talking about “election to service,” rather than election to salvation.

Myers opens with the by now uncontroversial point that Paul was not talking about individuals in Romans as most modern Christians assume. (Actually, Myers makes a “both/and” point - Paul's discussion cannot be limited to either groups or individuals; it applies to both.) According to Myers, Paul's argument is that the Jews were called to serve God as the way of bringing God to the world, but that now God has chosen to include the Gentiles into that role. Paul argues that God obviously has the right to decide how he wants to redeem the world and no one has a right to argue about unfairness.

Myers points out that all the passages about the older brother serving the younger involve service, not salvation. He also points out that a non-election to service does not mean that a person so “non-elected” would be unsaved. This seems to resolve the quandary of the Jews in that Paul both affirms that the promises to the Jews are perpertual but that the gentiles seem to have been grafted on to Israel, and some Jews cut off, only to be regrafted on again at a later time. That treatment, to me, always seemed fairly inconsistent with respect to the Jews who had been cut off as long as being cut off meant loss of individual salvation. Myers writes:

“For example, Paul writes in Romans 11:17-21 that the elect branches were cut off so that non-elect branches could be grafted in, which in turn will lead to the elect-which-became-non-elect to be re-grafted back in and become re-elect. If Paul is referring to eternal life when he speaks of election, none of this makes any sense. How can a people or a nation whom God elected “to eternal life” before the foundation of the world go from being elect to non-elect and then re-elect? However, this makes perfect sense when we recognize that election is not to eternal life but to service. God wants to bless the world through His people, and if one group of people fails in this God-given task, then God will simply find someone else to do it while He continues to lead the first group to fulfill His overarching purposes—albeit in different ways than originally intended. If this second group also fails, they too will be moved into an alternative role in accomplishing God's will (Rom 11:17-21). If necessary, God could raise up a people for Himself from rocks (Matt 3:9). In this way, when Paul writes about branches being cut off so others can be grated in which will lead to the cut off branches being grafted back in again, he is not talking about people losing and regaining eternal life, but about losing and re-gaining places of privilege and purpose in God's plan for this world. God's plan of redemption started with Israel, shifted to the Gentiles, and eventually will reincorporate Israel so that “of Him and through Him and to Him are all things” (Rom 11:36).”

Salvation - individual and corporate - seems like a big deal. On the other hand, the function of reconciling the world to God, although a big deal, seems like responsibility more than a privilege. The responsibility is now on the Church; in the past it had been on Israel; in the future, it will be on both the Church and Israel.

Myers also deals with various of the classic biblical tropes that are taken to indicate predestination to individual salvation. Myers points out that those examples don't refer to individual salvation, but instead they speak of service, and all parties are selected to provide some kind of service, some exalted, some not. Myers writes concerning the issue of “dishonored pottery”:

Paul has just shown that God's work in this world can be accomplished by people like Esau and Pharaoh, or the nations of Edom and Egypt, that is, by those who are not God's “Chosen People.” Paul knows that this sort of debate is not the first time it has come up in Israelite history. A nearly identical discussion took place during the days of the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah. Isaiah prophesied that God would use the idolatrous King Cyrus to accomplish His will. When many Israelites were indignant that God might raise up a foreign ruler to carry out His will, Isaiah reminded them that God was like a potter who could make whatever He wanted from clay (Isa 54:9). A similar discussion took place during the days of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah 18, we read that God is like a potter who can make whatever He wants from a lump of clay. It is to these sorts of historical discussions that Paul refers in Romans 9:21-24.
Western theology has committed a terrible disservice to this imagery of a potter and clay by making it seem as if God is a deterministic puppet master up in heaven pulling the strings of people and nations down here on earth. This is exactly the opposite of what Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Paul meant by using this terminology. In Jeremiah 18, for example, while God is equated with the potter, God calls upon Israel to turn from her wicked ways and obey His voice so that they, as the pot which God is fashioning, will not be marred (cf. Jer 18:8-11). God calls upon Israel to come into conformity to the work of His hands. If they do not, they will become marred, and He will have to reform the clay again into another vessel (Jer 18:4). He does not destroy or discard the clay; He simply forms it into another pot which will be used for a different purpose. A similar understanding is seen in Isaiah 54 and Romans 9.”

This is a short, accessible book. If you are interested in the subject, it makes for an efficient and useful introduction.

PSB