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God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men (Romans 9:18) | Jonathan Edwards · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to Reformed Thinking. This is the deep dive where we
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take stimulating theological material, stack up the sources,
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and extract the insights you need to be well informed.
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Today we are taking a deep dive into an absolute piece of
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theology, the right of God and the salvation of mankind.
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If you are preparing for study, thinking through the doctrines
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of grace, or just curious about what the term God's sovereignty
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truly demands of us, this material is targeted
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specifically for you. Our sources today come from
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Jonathan Edwards, the Great American theologian and
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preacher. We're using excerpts from his
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sermon on Romans 9.18, titled God's Sovereignty in the
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Salvation of Men. This source material forces us
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to look clearly at how divine choice operates, specifically in
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the twin issues of mercy and judicial hardening.
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The core text is Romans 9.18. Therefore hath he mercy on whom
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he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
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We're going to unpack the statement defining sovereignty,
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analyzing the stunning implications of that sovereignty
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on God's other attributes, and looking at the scriptural
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evidence Edwards uses to show this reality in action.
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It is a critical subject for many people.
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The idea of God's absolute right over salvation is where
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theological comfort ends and philosophical resistance begins.
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To understand Edwards, we must first understand the context
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Paul established. So let's ground ourselves back
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in Romans 9. Paul is wrestling with the
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rejection of the Jews, the physical covenant people, and
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the surprising inclusion of the Gentiles.
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How does Paul use our core text verse 18 to address this
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apparent discrepancy? Well, Paul asserts that God's
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promises operate not based on physical dissent but purely on
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divine choice, and he demonstrates this by reaching
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back into history to show that God has always exercised this
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distinguishing prerogative. Right, even within the covenant
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family itself. Exactly.
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Think about it. Abraham had two sons, Ishmael
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and Isaac. The promise went to Isaac, the
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line of promise. And Isaac has two sons, Jacob
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and Esau, and Paul quotes Malachi.
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Jacob I loved, but Esau I hate it.
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And critically, Paul notes, this choice was made before the
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children had done anything good or evil.
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That's the key he establishes right at the start.
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That election is not based on anticipated works, but on the
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calling of God. So this sets the stage for God
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dealing differently with people. Which brings us to the two sides
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of Romans 9.18, mercy and hardening.
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We see the mercy side immediately before our text with
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God's declaration to Moses. I will have mercy on whom I will
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have mercy. And we see the judicial side
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with the reference to Pharaoh. You know whom God raised up,
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that I might show my power in thee.
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The text is a comprehensive statement about God's absolute
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liberty. He can choose to soften a heart,
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which is mercy, or leave a heart to its own trajectory, which is
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hardening. And that second part?
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Hardening. That's the one that often causes
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the most distress, isn't it? Without a doubt.
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If God hardens, doesn't that make him responsible for the
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evil? And Edwards?
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He addresses his head on taking great pains to clarify the
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nature of this divine action. Yes, this clarification is
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vital. Edwards is crystal clear.
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Hardening is not understood as God performing any positive act
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or efficient power to actively inject malice or sin into a
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person. So God isn't making someone
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sinful. Not at all.
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To suppose that God forces sin into a heart would indeed make
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God the immediate author of sin, which is, you know, completely
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inconsistent with His essential holiness and character.
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God is not the source of human evil.
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OK, so if God is not actively creating sin, how does he harden
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someone's heart as the scriptures say he did with
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Pharaoh? Edwards outlines 2 distinct
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ways, and both of them are judicial, meaning they relate to
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judgment or allowing consequences rather than acts of
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creation. OK, what's the first one?
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The first way is by withholding the powerful influences of His
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spirit. So it's an act of omission.
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Exactly. The human heart is naturally
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hard. It is like clay left out to dry.
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If you don't continually apply moisture, the spirit's
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influence, it will remain hard or just grow harder under the
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sun of Providence. God hardens a person when He
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leaves them to the existing hardness of their sinful nature.
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He simply ceases to strive with them.
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That speaks to the constant, ongoing need for God's grace,
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doesn't it? If you are not actively being
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softened by the Spirit, you are by default getting harder.
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Precisely. And the second way is through
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the ordering of Providence. What does he mean by that?
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God sets up circumstances in the world which, through the natural
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corruption and malice already present in the individual's
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heart, become an occasion for their hardening.
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So the divine action is in the arrangement of the external
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situation. Right, but the immediate cause
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of the resulting evil is the individual's corrupted heart
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abusing that circumstance. Let's make this distinction
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clear using the scriptural examples Edwards provide,
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because they seem to imply direct action from God.
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I'm thinking of Isaiah 6.10. God tells the prophet to go make
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the people's hearts fat and their ears heavy.
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That sounds like a direct command to produce spiritual
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deadness. It sounds that way, but we have
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to read it in light of the larger context of God's
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holiness. Isaiah's preaching the Word of
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God is inherently good. It is meant to call people to
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repentance, of course. However, when the people abuse
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that light, when they violently reject the message, the very
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means of grace become an instrument of judgement.
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That's a fascinating way to frame it.
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It's like a person exposed to the sun.
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If they are well, the sun warms them.
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If they are sick with fever, the sun only makes them worse.
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God sent the light knowing their obstinance would turn the light
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into a judicial sentence. That's what Paul called being a
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saver of death unto death. The means of salvation, when
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rejected, become the occasion for further condemnation.
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It is the same principle when Scripture discusses God allowing
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sin in others. Consider Two Chronicles 18.22
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where God is said to put a lying spirit in the mouth of false
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prophets, right? This doesn't mean God created
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the lie or compelled the Spirit to lie.
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It means he suffered or permitted a lying spirit to
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enter them, allowing their existing wickedness to proceed,
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often toward a specific sovereign goal.
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In the example of Shimei, cursing David in Second Samuel
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16.10 is quite powerful, especially since cursing a ruler
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is a direct violation of God's law.
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How can God be said to have Bid? Shimay cursed David.
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Well, the word bid there cannot possibly mean a proper command
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to sin because that would contradict His revealed law.
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Instead, it indicates that God suffered the corruption that was
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already working in Shimayeth heart to surface at that precise
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moment. And furthermore, God ordered the
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occasion, David's distress and flight as a demonstration of
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divine displeasure against David, perhaps for the affair
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with Bathsheba. So God controlled the external
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circumstance. And allowed the internal
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wickedness to play out, fulfilling his own purpose
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without himself becoming the author of Shimei's sin.
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The guilt remains entirely with Shimei, but the control of the
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event remains entirely with God. So judicial hardening is a sober
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action of divine justice, either through omission, withdrawing
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grace, or arrangement allowing existing corruption to manifest.
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And it reinforces the argument that God deals differently with
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people based solely on his own determination.
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And that brings us to the formal definition of the right that
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underpins this entire discussion.
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The source material is unequivocal.
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God exercises His sovereignty in the eternal salvation of men.
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It is an active exercise of right.
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Edwards defines God's sovereignty as His absolute,
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independent right of disposing of all creatures according to
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his own pleasure. And that phrase, according to
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his own pleasure, is the theological core of the
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definition. It's meant to strip away any
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human limitations we might mistakenly impose on God's rule.
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Edwards uses this definition in opposition to three specific
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ideas that limit human rights, but which simply do not apply to
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the Creator. OK, let's take the first one.
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The term his own pleasure is used in opposition to
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constraint. Right.
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When humans act, even if we perform the action ourselves, we
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might do it under duress, out of fear, or reluctantly.
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A subject may do a King's bidding out of fear of
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punishment. They act voluntarily, but they
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are constrained. They aren't acting from their
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own pleasure. Exactly.
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God is never constrained. His action is entirely a
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function of the internal inclination of His own will.
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When He acts, He is at perfect liberty and ease.
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He never has to do something he finds irksome or fearful.
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And the second opposition, it's against being under the will of
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another. This one's a bit harder to
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grasp, I think, because we might think of a faithful servant who
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truly loves his master and cheerfully obeys him.
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He is happy to fulfill the command.
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Isn't that acting according to his pleasure?
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Not in the absolute sense that God uses the term.
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Even if the servant willingly and cheerfully obeys, his will
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is still directed by a superior. His actions flow from the
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requirements of the master's will, even if he delights in
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executing them. He doesn't act from his own
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absolute pleasure. Correct.
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God, conversely, never has a superior.
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His will is self-directed and independent of any creature.
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No created thing can ever dictate or even influence the
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ultimate direction of God's choices.
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That makes the independence so clear.
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If everything in the universe is a creature of God, then by
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definition nothing can direct the will of the Creator.
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And the third opposition is against any for obligation.
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What does that mean? If a person is under a binding
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obligations, say a contract or a debt, they might act freely to
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fulfill that obligation, but they are no longer at full
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liberty. They are bound by a prior
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commitment. But the one who acts from his
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own absolute pleasure is at full liberty.
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Exactly. God, before He makes any
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declarations or promises to creatures, is under no prior
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obligation to any creature whatsoever.
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So the essence of God's sovereignty is that before He
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speaks, before he covenants, He is not bound, constrained, or
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directed by anything outside of His own perfect nature.
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Precisely. And this leads us to the
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description of the right itself. It is absolute, unlimited and
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independent. Human rights are always limited.
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Always by law, by morality, by the rights of others, and always
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by God. God's right is not received from
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any source. He is the ultimate self
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existence source of all authority.
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To deny this absolute right is, well, it's to deny God's
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Godness. OK, let's unpack the
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implications of that absolute right for salvation.
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If God is truly independent, Edwards says, he can bestow
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salvation or refuse it without prejudicing the glory of any of
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his attributes. This is a critical point of
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theology. The immediate implication is
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stunning. God can save the greatest Sinner
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or cast the least Sinner into hell while maintaining the full
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honor of every single one of His perfections.
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Before we dive in, we should note the crucial caveat you
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mentioned earlier, Edwards says. This unlimited right exists
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unless God has already bound himself by a declaration.
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Yes, once the sovereign speaks, his own truth and faithfulness
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bind him. He has sovereignly declared he
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will save all who truly believe in Christ.
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That is a promise, and he cannot break it.
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And the other side of that. Conversely, he has declared he
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will not forgive those who commit the sin against the Holy
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Ghost. These limitations are
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self-imposed sovereign acts, but outside of those specific
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declarations, the right is absolute.
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Let's focus on the positive side first.
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How can God bestow salvation on the most scandalous, longtime
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obstinate sinners, say a murderer or a blasphemer,
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without sullying the glory of his attributes?
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The sufficiency of Christ's atonement must resolve this
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tension. It is the only resolution.
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The whole argument hinges on the fact that Christ's satisfaction
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is infinitely sufficient. So we need to analyze how Christ
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upholds those attributes. Let's start with holiness.
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God is infinitely holy and abhors sin.
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How does he look upon a saved murderer without minimizing the
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evil of murder? The question is, where does
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God's hatred of sin show up? Most clearly, Edwards argues it
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is not in the eternal punishment of the finite Sinner.
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Rather, God's abhorrence of sin is infinitely manifested in the
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sufferings of Christ, the eternal Son of God.
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The cross involved the withdrawal of the Father's
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countenance and the bearing of the curse by a being of infinite
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dignity. That single act is a greater,
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more devastating manifestation of God's abhorrence of sin than
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sending the entire race of sinners to hell forever.
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So when God saves a great Sinner, His Holiness is actually
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magnified. Yes, because the cost paid was
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so utterly vast. That reframes the entire purpose
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of the cross. It's not just a ransom.
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It is the ultimate declaration of God's moral purity.
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Precisely. Now consider the honor of God's
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majesty. When a creature sins, they cast
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contempt upon the infinite majesty of the Creator.
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This is an offense of infinite weight.
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So if God just waved it away and saved the offender without
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adequate satisfaction, His infinite majesty would suffer
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disparagement. It would, but Christ resolved
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the insult. By virtue of who he is.
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He did the sufferings of Christ, who is a person of infinite
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honor and dignity, being God Himself, fully repair the injury
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done to the majesty of heaven. He mediated and suffered in the
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offender's stead. The dignity of the person
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satisfying the debt must match the infinite dignity of the one
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offended, and the fact that God's own Son steps in makes the
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satisfaction infinitely acceptable.
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Meaning God's majesty is fully honored even when the offender
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is the most contemptuous Sinner. Fully next justice.
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Justice demands punishment. How can God save a Sinner and
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still be just? This is the central legal
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mechanism. Yes, it is.
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Christ suffered enough for the punishment of the sins of the
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greatest Sinner. When the Sinner believes in
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Christ, they are legally considered in Christ.
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This allows God to act not just as a sovereign dispensing mercy,
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but as a proper judge. That's where Romans 3.2526 comes
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in. The key Scripture God
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establishes Christ as a propitiation to show forth His
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righteousness. He can acquit the Sinner,
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provided that Sinner is in Christ while acting according to
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a rule of strict justice, because justice was already
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strictly satisfied in the person of the surety.
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God remains just, and he justifies those who have faith
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in Jesus. The two seemingly contradictory
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roles are reconciled. Exactly.
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That brings us to truth. God passed his word that sins
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should be punished with death. In the day that thou eatest
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thereof, thou shalt surely die. God cannot lie.
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If he forgives, does he break his word?
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Not at all. God's truth and the threatening
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of death is maintained because Christ, as our surety, sustained
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the guilt and bore the punishment.
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So the initial threat was comprehensive enough to include
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the surety relationship. That's right.
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When Christ died, the Word was fulfilled, the law was
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magnified, and the threat was honored.
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So, in summary of the positive implication, God can save anyone
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anytime, no matter how wicked, because the satisfaction
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perfection offered by Christ is so vast, it actually honors and
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magnifies all four of God's crucial attributes more than
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eternal condemnation ever could. That is the big idea.
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Now we must turn to the second implication, which is often
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harder for people to accept. God may refuse salvation to any
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natural person. God can deny salvation to any
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unconverted person and cast them to hell without the least
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disparagement to His perfections.
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How does this hold true for His righteousness or justice?
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Because every natural person deserves hell.
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They are sinners who have violated an infinite law.
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They have done nothing to atone for sin or to remove their
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liability to punishment. So since condemnation is what
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they justly deserve, it is no injustice for a proper judge to
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inflict it. Correct.
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A judge who inflicts deserved punishment is righteous.
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And what about goodness or mercy?
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The unconverted often think, if God is merciful, surely he
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cannot stand to see anyone suffer.
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They rely on God's goodness as a default guarantee.
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And Edward stresses that this relies on a fundamental
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misunderstanding of mercy. Mercy is not a blind instinct
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that contradicts justice. Rather, God's mercy is
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illustrated by his justice. Mercy is sovereign.
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It's a free gift, not a right. God has not obligated Himself by
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word or promise to any natural person.
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Therefore, unconverted men lie open to the full curse of the
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law. So God is perfectly free to deny
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them salvation without harming the honor of his mercy, because
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mercy chooses its own object. It is a sovereign attribute that
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exists at his absolute pleasure, and no natural person can claim
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it as a right. The theoretical side is clear.
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God has the absolute right. Now let's look at the evidence
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Edwards piles up to show that God actually exercises this
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sovereign right in distinguishing between men,
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proving that human dependence is absolute.
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This is where the doctor becomes vivid.
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Let's start with the largest scale one God's calling nations
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and peoples. Salvation is bestowed in
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connection with means of grace, the revealed Word, the
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ordinances, the church, and God shows His sovereignty by giving
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these means to some and withholding them from others.
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The Old Testament example is so stark.
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It really is. God shows one small,
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inconsiderable people, Jacob's descendants, to be the
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repository of His truth. He gave them His law and
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statutes. Meanwhile he loved vast
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technologically advanced nations.
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The Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Greeks, the mighty Romans,
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fame for their philosophical wisdom under hevenish darkness.
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For ages they perish, generation after generation, without the
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light of the Gospel. And the Scripture explicitly
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takes away any cause for boasting.
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Deuteronomy 7.7 states Israel was the fewest of all people and
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they were stiff necked. Exactly.
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It wasn't their goodness, their military might, or their
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intelligence. God loved them because He loved
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them, which is a statement that the motive resides entirely
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within His sovereign will. He chose one small stiff necked
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tribe and let powerful civilizations languish in
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ignorance. That is sovereignty on a
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national scale. And the reverse application of
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that sovereignty happens dramatically in the New
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Testament. God rejects the physical
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children of Abraham, the Jews, and calls the idolatrous
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Gentiles. This is perhaps the greatest
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shift in redemptive history. The Jews who had been God's
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peculiar people are broken off. A monument of divine action
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dispersed across the world, and the Gentiles who were far off
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are grafted in. Paul calls this the wisdom of
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God in a mystery. And if you are listening to this
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now, you are likely part of the called Gentiles.
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And that fact alone is truth of God's differentiating sovereign
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choice. Absolutely.
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Advantages bestowed on particular persons.
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All people are naturally undeserving, but God still
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distinguishes some by giving them greater means for
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salvation. I think many people tend to see
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the grace they receive as a natural continuation of their
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circumstances. I was raised in a good home, so
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I believe. But Edwards argues those
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circumstances are themselves sovereignly given.
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Completely. Think of the lottery of birth.
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Some are placed in pious religious families where they
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are instructed from childhood, prayed over continually, and
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protected from gross wickedness, while others Others are placed
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under a powerful effectual ministry where the word is sharp
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and clear. Still others receive exceptional
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early strivings and awakening influences of the Spirit and
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their youth. Why does one person get born
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into a home with daily family worship and another is born into
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a place where the gospel is illegal or unknown?
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These distinguishing circumstances are external to
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the person, yet they are bestowed entirely according to
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his absolute sovereign pleasure. It eliminates any notion that
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the successful person earned their good fortune in life or
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piety. 3 Choosing the low and mean over the wise and great.
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This point shows contempt for worldly status.
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Christ often bypasses the places of status and wealth.
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He does, Edwards notes. Christ passes by the mansions of
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Princess and nobles and enters the humble cottage.
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We see this in the Gospel narrative repeatedly.
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The rich man and Lazarus. The famous example, the rich man
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who fared sumptuously every day, whom God left to his fate, while
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poor Lazarus, begging at his gate, was received into
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Abraham's bosom. The world sees the rich man as
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blessed and the beggar as cursed, yet God often reverses
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the earthly estimation. And this is confirmed by Paul in
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First Corinthians 1.2628. Not many wise men after the
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flesh, not many mighty, and not many noble are called.
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God chooses the foolish things and the base things.
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It's a deliberate strategy to ensure no human can claim glory
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based on their earthly status, intellect or perceived
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self-sufficiency. It is a profound check on
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intellectual pride, especially for those who rely on learned
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reasoning. God often passes by the learned
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scholar, the man of great understanding, and grants
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salvation to others of weak understanding who simply grasp
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the plain truths of Scripture. The ability to understand the
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gospel is not correlated with a PhD.
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It requires the Spirit's illumination, and that
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illumination is distributed sovereignly. 4 Bestowing
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salvation with few advantages God sometimes blesses weak means
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when great means are not successful.
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Grace appears in the most unlikely and infertile soil.
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This demonstrates the utter insufficiency of means alone.
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The source material gives us these striking family contrast.
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You have a good Abijah growing up in the wicked House of
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Jeroboam. Where godly Josiah being the son
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of wicked Amon. Right.
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But then look at the other side. Wicked Amnon in Absalom, who
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were the sons of holy David, or vile Manasseh, the son of good
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Hezekiah? So if holiness were transferable
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through pedigree, these holy Fathers would have produced holy
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sons. But they didn't.
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The fact that the most spiritual heritage can fail and the most
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wicked heritage can spontaneously produce holiness
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shows that salvation is not a family tradition.
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It is a direct act of God's will.
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And the contrast in Light and knowledge is equally stark.
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The scribes and Pharisees had immense scriptural knowledge and
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unparalleled access to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, yet they
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were overwhelmingly rejected. While the poor, often ignorant
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publicans were saved, the greater part of those who saw
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and heard Christ daily, those who have the best possible means
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were left to their unbelief. But then you have the Woman of
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Samaria. Who only heard Christ
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transiently, yet she and many of her townspeople were converted.
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It proves that the most excellent means cannot save, and
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the weakest means can be made sufficient when accompanied by
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the sovereign call of God. Five, saving the heinously
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wicked over the moral and religious.
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This is often the most challenging distinction for the
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outwardly moral person to accept.
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God shows mercy to those openly vicious the publicans and the
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harlots before the strictly moral and outwardly religious,
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like the Pharisees. This is the stark reality Jesus
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laid out in Matthew 21.31. The moral person, the Pharisee,
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relies on his own internal righteousness, the sense that he
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is blameless concerning the righteousness of the law, as
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Paul described himself before his conversion.
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Their own goodness is often the stumbling block.
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It prevents them from recognizing their need for
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Christ's substitution. They rely on works rather than
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grace. Contrast that with the openly
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wicked. They have nothing to cling to.
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They know they are lost. This leaves them open to
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receiving a gift they know they haven't earned.
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Like the rich young man. Who claimed to have kept all the
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commandments from his youth whom Jesus loved was left to his own
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devices. And then the ultimate example,
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God shows sovereignty by calling the chief of sinners, profaners,
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blasphemers, murderers, even at the 11th hour.
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Like the thief on the cross, he spent his entire life in
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wickedness, reviled Christ, and then in his very last hour
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received sovereign grace. There's no prior work, no moral
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preparation, no religious instruction to point to.
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Nothing. It is the purest possible
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demonstration of free, unmerited mercy.
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God waited until that final moment to prove that the merit
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rests entirely in His will, not in human timing or effort. 6IN
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saving some seekers but not others, even within the process
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of seeking and striving, God distinguishes.
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This is the sobering reality for those actively engaged in the
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process of faith. Some seekers are converted
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almost immediately. They come to conviction and
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assurance with ease while. Others seat for a very long
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time. And endure great struggles and
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yet fail to obtain salvation. What causes the difference in
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the seeking process itself? God helps some over great
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difficulties and temptations. He subdues Satan's influence in
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their lives, removes obstacles, and stabilizes their hearts.
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He leaves others who may have been equally sincere in their
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search, ruined by those same temptations, or plagued by a
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backsliding heart, or allowed to settle into a perpetual false
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confidence in their own religious efforts.
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The final hard truth here is that some people are converted
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and saved who never had as great, intense, or prolonged
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strivings as others who nonetheless perish.
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The factor that distinguishes them is not the quantity or
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quality of human effort, but the sovereign interposition of
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grace. The dependence is absolute at
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every stage. We have established that God can
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and does exercise this absolute right.
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Next question is why? Why does He operate in this
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differentiating manner in the most sensitive affair, eternal
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salvation? Edwards tells us this is not an
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arbitrary act of Caprice. It is necessary for God to
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fulfill His original design and creation to glorify Himself by
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making a true and complete manifestation of the essential
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glory of His nature. So if you imagine God's nature
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is an infinitely complex complete jewel.
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He intends for the universe to be a setting that displays every
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facet of that jewel. If anyone attribute is not
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manifested, say His justice or His truth or His sovereignty,
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then the manifestation of His glory is defective.
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The picture is incomplete. And we noted earlier that the
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attributes reflect glory on one another.
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It's not enough for God to show wisdom, it must be holy wisdom.
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It's not enough to show mercy, it must be just mercy.
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And, crucially, sovereignty reflects glory on all the
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others. It is part of the glory of God's
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mercy that it is sovereign mercy.
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It is freely chosen, not compelled.
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All attributes must be manifested for the declarative
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glory of God, His revealed name, to truly declare His nature.
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Why is sovereignty itself an attribute that demands
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manifestation? Because it is an eminent
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attribute. If the glory of an earthly
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Prince is his dominion, then the infinite glory of God is His
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absolute sovereignty. Herein appears God's infinite
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greatness and Highness above all creation.
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He's not merely a great being, he's the absolute monarch of
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existence. And that glory is intensified by
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the subject over which the sovereignty is exercised.
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Absolutely, sovereignty over rocks and stars is glorious, but
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sovereignty over men is more glorious still.
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As man is an excellent creature made in God's image, possessing
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reason and an eternal soul, God will exercise this dominion over
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the soul of man. And the extent of the dominion
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is the final point. If a ruler has dominion only
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over small, trivial matters, his honor is limited.
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God's sovereignty appears infinitely glorious because it
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extends to the most critical affair possible for a creature,
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the eternal state and condition of souls.
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To rule over who lives eternally and who perishes eternally.
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This is where the boundlessness of God's sovereignty is most
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vividly displayed and magnified. And because God's design is to
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manifest all His glory, He exercises His absolute right
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over men in this most vital matter of eternal salvation.
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He has mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom He will He
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hardens. This might sound like Dry Phil
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philosophical theology, but it has profound practical
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implications for how you live, how you pray, and how you view
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your spiritual state. Edwards provides several uses
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derived from this doctrine. One absolute dependence.
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We must learn from this reality how dependent we are on God for
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every element of salvation. That dependence starts not with
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our conversion, but with the very framework of creation.
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It was of God's sovereign pleasure that He bothered to
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contrive a way to save any of mankind at all, getting us
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Christ, rather than leaving us like the fallen angels who
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received no Mediator. Our dependence continues in the
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means. The Bible, the ordinances, the
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visible church, and it continues most acutely in the internal
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work of grace. When a soul is saved, it is
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because God said, let there be light in the soul of such an
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one, that word is one of infinite power and sovereign
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grace. We contribute nothing to the act
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of being saved 2. Humble Adoration Since God's
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sovereignty is such a crucial and evident attribute, we must
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adore His awful and absolute sovereignty.
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We often adore God for His goodness and mercy, which is
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proper. But this doctrine demands that
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we also adore Him for His ultimate control and right to
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rule, even when His ways are past finding out.
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Exactly the infinite greatness of God appears in nothing more
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clearly than in His sovereignty. We see this adoration model
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throughout Scripture. Our God is in the heavens.
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He hath done whatsoever He pleased.
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This requires all possible lowliness and reverence in Our
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approach to Him. And the model Christ provides is
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so key here. It is even Jesus praised the
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Father for the specific exercise of this rite, particularly in
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hiding things from the wise and revealing them to the simple.
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Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.
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If Christ submits and adores the sovereign disposition, how much
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more should we? 3 Attributing salvation to
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sovereign grace alone. If you were in a state of
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salvation, you have no reason to exalt yourself based on any
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natural difference, strength, or righteousness of your own.
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God orders things in such a way that no flesh should glory in
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his presence. If you were saved, you have no
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cause for boasting except in God.
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It should drive thankfulness. Deep thankfulness.
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You should look at the wickedness of others, or look
29:07
back at the wickedness in your own past, and realize that it is
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sovereign grace alone that made you differ from those who
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perish. 4 Submission and Covenant condescension This
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doctrine creates an incredible contrast, the necessity of
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submission to the sovereign, followed by the beauty of his
29:25
voluntary condescension to bind himself to us.
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Submission is necessary because contending with God about His
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sovereignty over your soul is ruinous.
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If you refuse to submit to His right to choose, you are simply
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hardening your own heart against the very principle that could
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save you. Edwards calls it the stumbling
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block on which many thousands fall and perish.
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He does, but then comes the astonishing realization of His
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grace. The Sovereign, who is naturally
29:50
under no obligation to us, relinquishes his absolute
29:53
freedom toward believers. Once you believe, God binds
29:57
himself by his word and promise. He makes a covenant, effectively
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turning the free gift of salvation into a debt that must
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be paid according to his faithfulness for God.
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To deny salvation to a believer would be contrary to his justice
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and truth, because he bound himself by covenant.
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What unbelievable condescension. For the king of the universe to
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tie his hands with an oath, as Hebrews details, so that the
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believer can have strong consolation and hope that acts
30:22
as an anchor for the soul. He uses His truth to bind His
30:25
sovereignty for your assurance. 5 Guarding against extremes This
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doctrine offers a middle path for those seeking salvation,
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steering them away from both presumption and despair.
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First, avoid presumption. Do not take God's mercy for
30:40
granted and continue in sin. Do not think that because
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Christ's grace is sufficient, salvation is automatic, or that
30:46
you can choose the timing. Remember, He is sovereign.
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Salvation will not be in your power, but according to His
30:51
unconstrained pleasure. Follow His direction in the
30:53
revealed will. Today, if you will hear His
30:56
voice, harden not your heart. That direction is the means He
30:59
has chosen. And second, avoid
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discouragement. If you are looking at your life
31:05
and you feel like a great Sinner, a long time backslider,
31:07
or someone who has been deeply resistant to the Spirit, do not
31:11
despair. Unless you have committed the
31:13
unforgivable sin against the Holy Ghost, which is extremely
31:16
rare and specific, God can still bestow mercy upon you without
31:20
compromising His offended holiness, insulted majesty, or
31:24
hostile justice. The satisfaction of Christ is
31:26
sufficient for the chief of sinners.
31:28
It is God can, if He pleases, greatly glorify Himself in your
31:32
salvation, no matter how wicked your life has been.
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That is the nature of absolute sovereign grace.
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We have spent this time seeing how Edwards used Romans 9.18 to
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show that God's choices in giving mercy or withholding His
31:45
Spirit are guided not by human merit, but by His absolute,
31:48
independent prerogative, all while maintaining the full honor
31:51
of His attributes through the finished work of Christ.
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As you carry this knowledge forward, consider this.
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How does embracing the total reality of divine sovereignty
31:59
change your perspective on prayer for others?
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If salvation is entirely dependent on God's sovereign
32:04
will, how does that sharpen the earnestness and humility with
32:07
which you approach the throne for the souls you love, knowing
32:10
that the change they require is entirely in His hand and not
32:13
achievable by any human effort, yours or theirs?