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Romans 9 - Unnecessary Comparisons

This is to illustrate just a few of the scriptures that presuppose the ability of men to freely make moral decisions, or to “choose God” – or not - indeed, God’s EXPLICIT REQUIREMENT that man do so, and that God’s mercy and hardening is His RESPONSE to man’s decisions and actions. As far as I’m concerned, the following is not necessary. Paul’s reference to Jeremiah 18 and Exodus 33 is enough to tell us when and why God hardens and shows mercy and is enough to refute the Reformed notion that Romans 9 is teaching that the “when” is eternity past and the “why” is God’s sovereign, immutable choice and that the “who” is every individual who has ever existed or who will ever exist. None of which can be found in the text itself nor can it be found in the contexts of the OT passages Paul quotes from!

 

Whenever we find other passages that explicitly state WHY God has compassion and shows mercy, whether to individuals or nations, it is ALWAYS conditional. Here are a few – out of many, many, many:

 

1) Nehemiah 1:5 – “I beseech you, O Lord God of heaven, the great and awesome God, who preserves the covenant and lovingkindness (mercy) for those who love Him and keep His commandments…”

 

For whom does He preserve mercy? For them that love Him and keep His commandments. Why will He have mercy on them? Because they love Him and keep His commandments.

 

A typical Calvinist response would be, “Ok, I agree that He shows mercy on those who love Him and keep His commandments but this scripture does not EXPLICITLY say that is WHY He shows mercy. Nor does it say WHY those who love Him do so. You are reading that into it.” I would say. “You’re right, I am INFERRING that. So would EVERYONE who is not a Calvinist.” ANYBODY reading this scripture without Calvinist spectacles would make the same inferences. We do it all the time in our everyday language. But to more substantively counter the presumed argument – here are some scriptures that are more explicit.

 

2) Isaiah 55:6,7 - Notice the conditional language of verses 6 and 7. In verse 7, what is the reason that the scripture gives for the Lord having mercy - on what basis does the Lord give mercy? The answer is, “Seek the Lord…call upon Him…let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, let him return to the Lord, [so] THAT He may have mercy…” God’s mercy is not predestined but is conditional on a man DOING certain things. Man doing certain things is the EXPLICIT REASON this SCRIPTURE gives for the Lord having mercy. If the wicked does NOT forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, the Lord will not have mercy.

 

3) Consider Nineveh. Yes, God “elected” Jonah. Jonah had no choice in the matter. He tried to run. No way. This “election” was an immutable decree. Nothing that Jonah could do or say would change what God had planned to use him for. Jonah’s will concerning his mission to Nineveh was NOT free. Perhaps we could say that Jonah’s will WAS free, it’s just that God can be VERY persuasive! We are not told WHEN Jonah was “chosen”. (Eternity past? It doesn’t say that.) I would also like to point out that Jonah’s “election” did not concern his personal salvation but had to do with God’s dealing with Nineveh. God also decreed, “Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” In chapter 3, verse 10 it says of the Ninevites, “When God saw their DEEDS, that they turned from their wicked way, THEN God RELENTED concerning the calamity which HE HAD DECLARED HE WOULD BRING UPON THEM.” (Emphases mine.) This passage EXPLICITLY states that something that man did CAUSED God to change His mind and to NOT do something He had declared He would do. God elected Jonah to one specific task so that the Ninevites would have a choice. BECAUSE of the choice the Ninevites made, God changed His mind and showed mercy. His decree, “Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown” was NOT immutable.

 

4) Matthew 5:7 – “Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy.” Which comes first here – the individual’s giving of mercy or the receiving of mercy?

 

5) James 2:13 – “For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.” You must show mercy in order to receive mercy. Which comes first?

 

6) 2 Thess 2:10-12 – On what basis does God send a deluding influence so that those in question will believe what is false? Sovereign decree? No! Verse10 – because they did not receive the love of the truth. Verse 12 – they took pleasure in wickedness.

 

Whenever a scripture tells us WHOM He will have mercy on and WHY, it is on those that love and obey Him; and when scripture explains WHOM and WHY He hardens, it is clearly seen that they are those who disobey His voice. THOSE ARE THE REASONS THE SCRIPTURES GIVE US. God’s mercy and hardening are not sovereign and immutable, but conditional – ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURES!

 

7) Read all of Ezekiel 18. Verse 4, “The soul who sins will die.” Verse 21, “But if the wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed and observes all my statutes and practices justice and righteousness, he shall surely live, he shall not die.” Verse 24, “But when a righteous man turns away from his righteousness, commits iniquity and does according to all the abominations that a wicked man does, will he live? All his righteous deeds …will not be remembered for his treachery which he has committed and his sin which he has committed; for them he will die.” WHEN will the wicked man live and not die? When he turns from his sins. WHEN does the righteous man die and not live? When he turns from his righteousness and commits iniquity. Is the wicked man predestined to righteousness? No, the scripture says, “IF the wicked man turns…”

 

8) Jeremiah 31:30 – “But everyone will die for his own iniquity; each man who eats the sour grapes, his teeth will be set on edge.” Does God predestine each man to eat sour grapes? No indication of that can be found in the context. It’s the man who eats, and who suffers the just consequences of his action.

 

9) Isaiah 1:16-20 – “Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your deeds from my sight. Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, reprove the ruthless, defend the orphan, plead for the widow. Come now let US reason TOGETHER’, says the Lord, ‘Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool. If you consent and obey, you will eat the best of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword.’ Truly the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

 

It is explicit in these verses that the “reasoning” of God constitutes conditional relating to man. God responds to man on the BASIS of man’s response to God’s reasoning. Why would Calvinists quote, “Let us reason together” to support a God of reason, and then ignore WHAT that reasonable God is saying here? How can one reconcile “reasoning together” with EVERYTHING being immutably predestined? There can be no “reasoning together” if everything is immutably predestined.

 

10) Deut. 28:1,2 – “…if you diligently obey the Lord…All these blessings will come upon you…” Verse 15 – “…if you do not obey…these curses will come upon you…”

 

11) Deut 30:19 – “…I have set before you life and death…choose life, in order that you may live…”

 

ANYONE reading these passages, and many, many others that are similar, who is not already blinded by the Calvinist presuppositional misunderstanding, would take them at face value. There are dozens and dozens of scriptures like these. I have to believe and behave, based on all these scriptures I’ve given above, and many, many others, that I do indeed have a real choice and that it MATTERS what I choose. I am NOT totally depraved, I am NOT unable to choose God, I am able to respond to God, and the choices He sets before me. He said, “These choices I have set before you…” I am NOT free in the sense that I can dictate what the choices are. So if one defines “free will” as the ability to define the choices, I would agree that, according to that definition, man’s will is not free. I have to play the game according to God’s parameters, but to read the Calvinist perspective, i.e. total depravity/inability and immutable micro-managed predestination into these many scriptures is massive eisegesis.

 

We are free and able to choose any of the choices that God sets before us

and those choices affect and include our eternal destiny.

 

12) In speaking of unrighteous men, Paul, in Romans 1:18ff says that God has made Himself evident to them. Verse 20,21 – “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been CLEARLY seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”

 

Here we see that men became futile in their thinking AFTER knowing God. Their hearts are darkened as a result of not honoring God as God and giving thanks, even though they knew Him. The phrase “they knew God” is not qualified AT ALL. It does not say, “knew, but not savingly” or anything like it. In verse 28, it says that God gave them over to a depraved mind. How could that be if men are BORN depraved? It is clearly seen here that darkened hearts and depraved minds are states that men come to – not start from.

 

13) Romans 2:14ff – “For when Gentiles who have not the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness…”

 

Here heathen men INSTINCTIVLY do the Law and their conscience “bears witness”. We are told elsewhere that men, through sin, can “sear” their consciences. How can this be if men are totally depraved and instinctively choose what is evil – as Calvinists teach?

 

The RSV says – “When Gentiles who have not the law do BY NATURE what the law requires…they show that what the law requires is written on their hearts…”

 

How can this be if man, by nature, is totally depraved from birth – as Calvinists teach?

 

14) Jeremiah 4:14 – “Wash your heart from evil, O Jerusalem, that you may be saved. How long will your wicked thoughts lodge within you?” Verse 17,18 – “Like watchmen of a field they are against her round about, ‘BECAUSE she has rebelled against me,’ declares the Lord. “Your ways and your deeds have brought these things to you. This is your evil. How bitter! How it has touched your heart!”

 

Who does the washing here? Whose ways and deeds are responsible for what has happened? “BECAUSE she has rebelled…” Not God’s ways and deeds. Not God’s predetermination. Your deeds, your evil.

 

15) Psalm 95:8/Heb 3:8 – “Do not harden your hearts…” What is God doing here? He’s reasoning with us as He did in Isaiah 1:18-20. Consider the context of this statement in Hebrews 3:6-19. The WHOLE context is CONDITIONAL! Verse 6 – “Christ…whose house we are IF we hold fast our confidence…” Verse 13 - …LEST any one of you be hardened…” Hardened by what? By God? No, “…by the deceitfulness of sin…” Verse 14 – “For we have become partakers of Christ, IF we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end…” Verse 19 – “…we see that they were not able to enter BECAUSE of unbelief.”

 

16) Zechariah 7:12 – “They made their hearts like flint so that they could not hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets…” Who is it that is hardening hearts here? Not God.

 

These scriptures and many more state that man is the one who hardens his heart. Now I know there are just as many, if not more, scriptures that speak of God hardening hearts. Many of those scriptures ALSO say that God hardening the hearts, of enemies of Israel, for instance, so that they will come up against Israel and be destroyed, is a judgment – a response - BECAUSE of the sin of those nations – worshipping false gods and practicing evil.

 

19) “Do not say in your heart when the Lord your God has driven them out from this land, ‘Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land,’ but IT IS BECAUSE OF THE WICKEDNESS OF THESE NATIONS THAT THE LORD IS DISPOSSESSING THEM BEFORE YOU. It is not for your righteousness or for the uprightness of your heart that you are going to possess their land, but IT IS BECAUSE OF THE WICKEDNESS OF THESE NATIONS THAT THE LORD YOUR GOD IS DRIVING THEM OUT BEFORE YOU, in order to confirm the oath which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. (Deut 9:4,5 emphases mine)

 

20)“When you enter the land which the Lord your God gives to you, you shall not learn to imitate the detestable things of those nations…because of these detestable things the Lord will drive them out before you.” (Deut 18:9-12)

 

God holds Israel to the SAME CONDITIONAL STANDARD as the heathen nations before them.

 

21) “…if you ever forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I testify against you today that you will surely perish. Like the nations that the Lord makes to perish before you, so you shall perish; because you would not listen to the voice of the Lord your God. (Deut 8:19,20)

 

God’s hardening/wrath is spoken of as a judgment, a response to the practice of sin, of disobedience. I acknowledge that there are MANY scriptures that speak of God hardening and softening hearts that have no specific conditions attached. But using scriptures with no specific conditions attached to “prove” that God monergistically hardens hearts by immutable decree in eternity past is very shaky ground (special pleading) considering all the many scriptures that EXPLICITLY state that God’s hardening is BECAUSE of mans actions AND the many scriptures that speak of men hardening their own hearts.

 

NEXT: What Shall We Say Then?

 

 

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