Romans 9:6-24 (Salvation Belongs to the Lord, Pastor Jeff Kliewer)

Jonah, Nineveh, and the Theme That Salvation Belongs to the Lord

Gracious Heavenly Father, thank you so much that we could sing these praises to you, Lord. It's only by grace that we come here. It's only by grace that we have heard the good news of Jesus Christ. And it's only by grace that our hearts were open to believe it.

So Lord, we pray for more of your grace that we would more fully appreciate what you have done for us in giving your one and only Son and in calling us to salvation. In Jesus' name, amen. Between the years 790 and 750 thereabouts, BCE, BC I should say, before Christ, there was a king in Israel whose name was Jeroboam II.

Jeroboam was a wicked king, and yet during his time, Israel began to prosper and to have victory over the enemies. The enemies, the Israelites actually pushed back their enemy to the north, which was Lebanon.

Anybody see in the news yesterday that the Israelites made it farther into Lebanon against Hezbollah than they had yet in this war? Well, it's just striking to me that the same war that's being fought, and we see it on the news today, goes all the way back to 750 BC.

See, it's not just years or decades or even centuries, but millennia long this war has been going on. I would say this is an indication that it's not just an accident of history, but that these wars have been decreed, that God has a plan that ultimately culminates in the return of Christ in Jerusalem.

So Israel was prospering. They were conquering Lebanon, and their territory was expanding, just like as is happening today. In 750 BC, the prophets, however, revealed to us what the people were like. They were prospering, you might think, well, that means they were doing well.

But no, that is not the case at all, because two of the prophets, Amos and Hosea, tell us how God viewed Israel at that time. Just to give you an idea, Hosea was commanded by God to go marry a prostitute, okay, got it?

In order to demonstrate how God views Israel right now. She is like an adulterous wife. She's committing so much adultery and so rebellious against God that Hosea is to picture that by marrying Gomer.

And then when they had a child, you want to know what they named this child? Loruhamah. Good choice for a name, right? No, it means no mercy. Loruhamah, no mercy. This daughter pictures God's disposition toward his own people, Israel.

No mercy. He will not have mercy on Israel. Likewise, Amos prophesied against Israel and called them out for their sin. Finally, it got to the point where all he said was hard all the time to where the priest, he was a false priest, because he should have been in Jerusalem if he was a real priest.

Instead, he was operating out of the makeshift Northern Temple there at Bethel. He called Amos in and he said, all you do is say hard things about Israel. Why don't you go down South and preach to them in Judah and leave us alone?

You don't have a word from the Lord. And so Amos said to that false priest, I was no prophet and I am no son of a prophet. I was a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore figs, but God called me away from the herd to go prophesy his word.

So thus says the word of the Lord, your wife will become a prostitute and your sons will be cut down by the sword and you yourself will go die in a foreign land and Israel will be sent into exile. The word of the Lord.

So all this to say, both Amos and Hosea revealed to us that during that reign of Jeroboam II, Israel was not under mercy. They were under judgment. The hearts of the people were wicked. But there was a third prophet and you know him well.

His name is Jonah, also prophesying during the reign of Jeroboam II. He had prophesied that they would expand territorially, but he never, there's no indication that he ever preached repentance in Israel.

Instead, God said, here's what I want to do with you, Jonah. Go to Assyria. To the capital city of Nineveh, the fish people. Amos had talked about how these people will come and use a hook, a fish hook to draw the Israelites into exile.

And that physically happened more than a hundred years later, where they put fish hooks in the cheeks, the ears into the bellies of the Israelites and pulled them off into exile. This was a gruesome and ruthless people, the city of Nineveh.

Jonah was sent to them. And so here's what Jonah did. Got on a boat and sailed in the exact opposite direction. He headed for Tarshish, the farthest known city in the opposite direction of Nineveh. But God caused a huge storm to come and he revealed to the sailors by casting lots that it was Jonah who was running from God.

So Jonah was thrown overboard and he began to sink down in the ocean, helpless. The ship sailing away, him in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. You'd think that that's about as bad as it can get until a giant fish swallowed him.

Now that is no deliverance at this point. You can't control where the fish swims. You're not only underwater, you're in a fish. You can't just like pull levers in there to make him go this way or that and spit you out on the shore.

He was done for. He had no hope. He was helpless. But inside that great fish, a revelation came to Jonah. And he says the thesis statement of the book of Jonah, which comes from chapter two, verse nine, after being humbled in this way, he declares five words that summarize my sermon today and form the title of it.

Salvation belongs to the Lord. Salvation belongs to the Lord. God saves by his own free mercy. And Jonah brought nothing to the table. He was willing in the opposite direction of God, willfully opposed to God's call.

He was running. Remember those words, willing and running, they'll come up again today, in the opposite direction. But God mercy Jonah and he was spit up on the shore. He survived this ordeal and now he goes to do what God said very begrudgingly.

And here's the point of the rest of the story. Jonah hated that God would show mercy on the Ninevites because they're more wicked than the Israelites, ruthless. He hated them. But we are told in Jonah chapter three, verse five, that when he walked in there, you would think that some prophet from Israel walking into the great city, the most famous and powerful city in the world would be chewed up and spit out.

He would be fish hooked and speared and strung up on the wall like the other bodies that used to hang on the walls of Nineveh. But no, according to Jonah chapter three, verse five, when he said that God is going to overthrow this city, every person in the city from the greatest to the least, including the king, repented of their sin.

They believed God. And that one generation was saved. Now interestingly, the book of Nahum reveals that about a hundred and some years later, the whole city would be overthrown. So the later generations weren't saved, just that one generation.

And we're told at the end of the book that it was 120 ,000 people. And the point there in the end, the last verse of Jonah is that God shows mercy to whom he shows mercy. Jonah objected to that in Jonah four, verse two, I knew you were like this God, you are merciful and compassionate and you would turn the hearts of these people.

I knew you were going to do this, but now let's pause for a moment. This happened in the 700s BC, right? Did God mercy Israel? No. Remember the prophet who told the prophet to stop saying that, told Amos to stop saying that?

Not only did God not mercy Israel and not mercy Judah, Amos addresses both of them. He also says God will not revoke the punishment from Lebanon or from Gaza or from Tyre. Or from the Edomites or the Moabites or the Ammonites.

All of them together were going to fall. Now those other nations fell under a serious boot and so did Israel ultimately. Judah got neck deep and then was delivered and finally destroyed by Babylon. But the point being, God did not revoke the punishment.

He came with harsh, wrathful judgment on all those people. And yet here's this one pocket of people up to the Northeast, the Assyrians, where 120 ,000 of them were mercied. So do you think it depended on the heart of that Assyrian soldier living in Nineveh?

Or do you think there's a power more forceful than their own will? More powerful than Jonah's own willfulness? More powerful than what's in the heart of man? I'll tell you this, it is no coincidence that all 120 ,000 of them repented.

That is the power of God's mercy and grace. And I'm going to tell you, salvation belongs to the Lord. There is nothing in all of creation, even in man, the willfulness of Jonah or the willfulness of an Assyrian, there is nothing that can resist God's mercy and grace.

When he desires to save, he's able to do that. He saved an entire nation. It wasn't a coin flip, hoping that this person might repent and that person maybe doesn't. All 120 ,000, that's statistically significant if you do the math.

It shows that the power to convert a heart, God's mercying power, the internal call to repentance comes from God and salvation belongs to the Lord. Now, we turn to Romans chapter 9. One of the most difficult passages in the New Testament.

One of the most debated passages in the New Testament. And there might be some in this room that identify themselves as Calvinists and some as Arminians, some Wesleyans, some Calvary Chapel people who follow Chuck Smith in his views of this, some traditional Baptists.

And I would say, reminding you of what Paul said, in this room, we don't follow Paul or Apollos or Cephas or Calvin or Arminius or Wesley. We follow Christ. We are one body, one people who together follow Christ.

We are not part of a clique or a group. And if there's something that I preach today that you might disagree with, guess what? That's okay. You're allowed to disagree with me. But here's all I ask of you, that just as you follow Christ, you follow the train of thought.

Amen? Paul's train of thought. And if I do well in following what Paul is saying in context, then follow that because it's what Paul is saying. But if there's something that's not in keeping with the text, find that, follow the text.

Because there's one authority in this pulpit and it's not me, it is this word. And so our job now, as we exegete from Romans 9, is simply to follow the train of thought. Not any system, but just what God is saying.

Romans 9 and the Question of Israel

So what's the context? It has been entirely soteriology in the book of Romans. All eight chapters, as we've studied them, have been about salvation. These ideas of being justified from sin, being sanctified, set apart, belonging to God as a child.

Look at chapter 8, verses 29 and 30. We've already introduced the idea that God has an election. We'll just read what he says in Romans 8, 29 and 30. For those whom he foreknew, that's a verb. It's not a learning on God's part, but he actively foreknows a people.

In his mind, before time, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. In order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. So we're talking about the gathering of a people for God's own possession.

We're talking about salvation. Who will be with God as his brothers and sisters? Those Adelphoi, those brothers, refers not just to males, but females as well, but those who belong in the family of God, children of God.

Then it says in verse 30, those whom he predestined, he also called. Those whom he called, he also justified. And those whom he justified, he also glorified. In chapter 8, verses 33 and 34, we have a picture of the law court.

Who can accuse you of sin and send you to hell because of your sin? No one can charge you that way because you have an advocate, Christ Jesus the righteous, who intercedes for you with his own blood. And so nothing can separate you from the love of God.

You belong to Christ because he bled for you, he died for you. He's seated at the right hand of the father, interceding for you, appealing to his own righteous blood given on your behalf. This is about salvation.

And as we go into chapter 9, I want you to erase in your mind the big number 9. And every little number that follows. Because those were added in the 1500s. They're helpful as we discuss these verses so we know what we're talking about, where we can follow which verse we're on.

But remember, these were not in the original writing of the Bible. And I say that because you have to follow the train of thought from chapter 8 right into chapter 9, and not assume that we've totally changed the subject.

The golden chain of redemption, those whom he foreknew, he also predestined, he also called, that word called will appear again in verses 911 and 924. It's the same calling that he was talking about in chapter 8 as we see here this morning, and in case you missed last week, verses 1 to 5 are about Israel.

But the problem is, not all of Israel are talking about Israel. They are believing in Christ. And we know we're talking about salvation here, because Paul says, I am in such anguish, I myself, I wish I myself could be cursed and cut off from Christ.

To be a curse means to go to hell. His heart is breaking because not all of the Jews, in fact, the vast majority of those, do not believe in Christ. Okay, so it's very well established that the issue is, not all of Israel is believing in Jesus, they're on their way to hell.

But as a nation, as an ethnicity, they do have some things that are unchangeable, right? The adoption, we're told in verses 4 and 5, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, the promises, the patriarchy, and the fact that Jesus was a Jew, he came from the Jewish people.

All Israelites have that, ethnically, as a nation. But now we go into the next section, and notice the transition word, follow the train of thought, but, verse 6, here's the problem. It is not as though the word of God has failed.

The Israelites, they have the promises, they have the Messiah born to their ethnicity, and the patriarchs, and all these things, they have that as a nation. But most of them are going to hell, they're not believing.

It's not because the word of God has failed, so what went wrong? The first thing Paul will say to address that question is that salvation, who will be the children of God, listen, does not come from genealogy.

They thought that's what God had promised. When they were born Israelites, they were children of God, they're saved, they belong to God, they assume that about themselves. Paul will refute that, verses 6 through 9.

But it is not as though the word of God has failed, for not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel. Not all are children of Abraham, because they are his offspring, but through Isaac shall your offspring be named.

This means it is not the children of the flesh, the guy who has the right genetics, who are the children of God. The issue here is who really belongs to God for all eternity. But the children of the promise are counted as offspring, verse 9, for this is what the promise said, about this time next year I will return, and Sarah will have a son.

Okay, Paul is simply saying, salvation is not by genealogy at all, but by promise. Now, if God had promised that all Jews would go to heaven, God would be forced to do that, right? By two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we have this sure hope.

It's impossible for God to lie. If God promised that all Israelites would go to heaven, he would be forced to keep that. What Paul is saying, that's not the promise. He said through Isaac will your offspring be named.

Here's the idea, Abraham didn't just have one son, Isaac. So they're here thinking, we're the children of Abraham. Well, so were the sons of Keturah. In Genesis chapter 25, Abraham takes a concubine and has six sons by Keturah.

And even before Isaac was born, Ishmael was a physical descendant from the seed of Abraham. The point is, through Isaac will this promise be given. So it can't just be genetic from Abraham, but through Sarah, according to verse 9.

So first, the first point that Paul makes, it's simple. It's not a genealogical salvation. Just because you come through Israel, that can't be. Just you're a descendant of Abraham. No, God never promised that.

Here's the second thing. God purposed to save by calling the elect, not by judging works. So just like Abraham had a son through Sarah in particular, so Rebekah had two sons in the womb at the same time, and God chose one and not the other.

Let's look, verses 10 to 13. And not only so, so we're gonna take this farther, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad, in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of him who calls.

There's that word in the golden chain of redemption. She was told, the older will serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated. Jesus said, unless you hate your father and mother and brother, and even your own life, you're not worthy to be my disciple.

Was he saying that you're to have this visceral, emotional distaste for your own family? When you go to your Thanksgiving feast in a couple of weeks, are you to tell your uncle that you hate him? But I love Jesus.

No, the idea here of hatred is a distinction. It's not an emotional feeling here. It is referring to a choice. To love one and hate the other means that he chose Jacob and did not choose Esau. He passed over Esau in order to choose, but don't miss the point.

You always have to follow Paul's argument, right? There's a hena clause in verse 11. What's a hena clause? The word hena means in order that it gives the purpose of what God is doing in this choice. What does it say in verse 11?

In order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of him who calls. God has purposed to save a people for his own possession, not by what they've done, not by their works.

Anybody who disagrees with that is not a Christian. If you think you're working and earning salvation from God, you're still in the flesh, pridefully justifying yourself. But the person who recognizes, I can't earn this from God, I need a savior, and you call on Jesus and you beat your chest and you repent and you believe, you're saved.

God has purposed that he is going to save this way, that he will send the effectual call. And it's foolish, like this Israelite prophet walking around in Assyria, preaching the fall of Nineveh. How could that possibly work?

How will the people repent? And yet to show God's electing power, his mercying of a people, when Jonah preached that, they all fell down and worshiped the living God. And when you go out into this neighborhood and you tell people that there is a Messiah who bled and died on a Roman cross, and on the third day he rose from the dead, they will look at you like you're foolish.

And their willfulness will turn against the message you preach. Unless God, by the renewal of the Holy Spirit, the mercy that he extends into the heart of a man, changes that heart of stone to a heart of flesh.

It was God's purpose to save by calling. It's not just the outward call, because I'm gonna preach the gospel to anybody and everybody that will listen to me. But here this calling is sure, it's part of the golden chain of redemption.

Here the call will change their heart. Only God can do that. I can preach till I'm blue in the face. And I can't make you believe what I'm saying. Only God can mercy a heart. That's what happened to the Assyrians, and that's what he's saying here.

It's in order to show, in order that God's purpose of election would continue. Not because of him who works, but because of him who calls. Now, let's move on. Hopefully, somebody here is troubled by what I'm saying.

Hopefully, there's an objection coming up in your mind to say, wait a minute, that doesn't seem fair. Is there injustice with God? If this is how God saves, not based on what I do, my works, but based on his own electing grace and his effectual call, then isn't that unjust for God to deal with the world that way?

Anybody have that problem? That's the natural human problem. So Paul, preaching a diatribe, will answer it. And guys, by the way, if you have that thought and you think, well, that's difficult here, Pastor Jeff, that's good.

It shows you're following the train of thought, because Paul will introduce the problem here in verse 14. What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? You see, there's the question. Is this unjust?

Is this unfair? And he will answer, by no means, and here's why. For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. It's actually in the verbal form.

I will mercy whom I mercy. I will compassion whom I compassion. Now, the idea of mercy is that it cannot be demanded. The question of justice is one of being owed something. If you're a murderer, you deserve the penalty of death.

If you're a good person, you deserve to be rewarded. If you work hard in the field, you deserve your wages. But the wages of sin is death. And here's the idea. No one deserves anything but God's wrath.

That's the point. And so the only answer that we have here is that salvation is by mercy. See that? He says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy. Would God be just to send everybody in this room to hell?

Yes, he would. He hasn't done that. He has mercied whom he chose to mercy. And then he interprets his own quote, verse 16. So follow the train of thought. So then, this is his conclusion. It, what? What is it?

Those who would be saved, salvation depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy. Doesn't that just blow your mind? He literally says it's not based on human will, what's inside a man in his willing or exertion.

The words in the Greek ring a little better. It's not phalontos tracontos, meaning it's not what you will from within or what you do on the outside. The word tracontos actually means running. Your exertion, what you're doing for God.

It's not what you're doing outwardly. And it's not even what's going on in your heart, in your will. Isn't that amazing? It doesn't depend on that, he says. But what does it depend on? On God. It's going to come from him, from within himself.

From within his will, his counsel, his plan. He will extend mercy. Depends on God who has mercy. That is a mind-blowing thought. And it's a beautiful thought. I trust God to save me more than I trust my own will and activity.

If it depended on me, I could very well lose it. I would rather God save my children than I convince them to believe. Or even they make up their minds and come from within to the place where they believe.

I trust God more than me. Now, why would God choose some and not the other? What is he looking at or considering if it's not within them or what they do? We don't know. It's not for us to know. That's the mind of God, inscrutable and unsearchable.

But that's what we're being told. And now he takes it a step farther. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose I have raised you up. Pharaoh, I made you king of Egypt for this reason, that I might show my power in you.

By sending plagues to crush you. And that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. That Yahweh, the king of Israel, would be made famous through Pharaoh. Now follow this. So then he has mercy on whomever he wills and he hardens whomever he wills.

You thought the justice question was hard? Because we can understand that. If we're all guilty sinners and he has mercy on none, we all go to hell. God's still just. We got what we deserved. But he mercied some, he's free to do that.

Okay, that answers that question. But wait a minute. If he hardened Pharaoh's heart, then doesn't that make God the author of sin? Anybody struggle with that question? If you've thought about these questions for long, surely you have.

And once again, God in his grace gives an answer. Paul anticipates that objection and he voices it in verse 19. You will say to me then, this means you're tracking, why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?

I mean, if Pharaoh got hardened in his sin, in order that God would raise him up as king and then crush him like a bug, how's that fair to Pharaoh? It was God who made his heart hard. It says right there, God's even able to harden a heart.

How can that be fair and right? Answer. Who are you, oh man, to answer back to God? It almost sounds like a non-answer, but that phrase, oh man, actually answers in some way. It puts us in our place.

Remember who you are compared to the one you're questioning. But notice then, he will give an answer. Let's read. Will what is molded say to the molder, why have you made me like this? Has the potter no right over the clay to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?

What if God desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory.

Even us whom he has called, there's that word called again, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles. Picture a lump of clay. There's no distinction between this part that you grab and that part that you grab.

It's just a lump of clay. But is the clay innocent or guilty? It's already considered guilty. Here's why. Verse 22, he has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction. It's a bit of a difficult concept, but think of this.

God is looking at humanity in our fallenness as a big lump of clay. And what if God takes this lump and raises it up to display wrath in order that those who are lumped out and made into vessels of mercy would see that and only praise him all the more that we are vessels of mercy.

Now watch. In the cross of Jesus Christ, when you see him hanging on the cross, do you see love, love, love, and only love? Or do you also see wrath? Wrath. It's a lopsided cross. If all you see is love, just as the love of God was displayed in the cross because the innocent son of God stepped in and took our place.

He took our place. It's also a display of wrath because God poured wrath on the son and he was pinned to a cross and mocked. And the wrath of God from heaven poured out on him. What does that mean about God's view towards sin?

I only experience a little bit of wrath in this world because of sin. When I saw on Facebook the picture of a sonogram or whatever it is, EKG kind of thing, of a baby in the womb and the abortionist is ripping the pieces of the baby apart and the baby squirming and trying to avoid that murder.

I felt wrath. Indignation. How does this country do this? How does this doctor see that with his eyes? And how evil is this? I feel some wrath, but I don't hate sin like God hates sin. Do you see the problem?

If you were to rank the attributes of God, mercy, compassion, love, and you made a top 10 list for yourself, where would the wrath of God fall on that list? Would it even be on your list? And the problem is we coming from Adam's lot, this lump of clay, we don't understand the weight of sin because we don't know the weight of his glory, the one offended.

And so we have this myopic view. We can't see what's really happening. But here's the central player in the universe. It's not you and I. And we can't make an anthropocentric demand on God, meaning based on humans, or an ethnic demand, as verse 24 says.

I'm an Israelite. I have to be treated this way. No, the central character in the universe is God. We exist for his glory. And if God has desired to display his own glory by giving wrath, eternal wrath to some, and display his mercy and grace to those of us who believe in his son, and we believe because he mercied us, didn't come from us, if he displays the full range of his glory in that way, who are we, like a pot, to say that the potter did it wrong?

Maybe his view is the right view, and mine is the one that's trained by my limited identity, right? He's the potter. We're the clay. And Paul didn't just make this up. He actually learned it from Isaiah.

That comes from Isaiah 45, the pot and clay analogy. And all through the trial of false gods in Isaiah 40 to 48, God is distinguishing himself by having a decree for ordaining whatever comes to pass, chapter 46, being able to tell the end from the beginning because his counsel will stand.

Paul has learned from Isaiah, and so he teaches this view of God's mercy. So let me make an application then to this sermon. We are to declare with Jonah and with David, because by the way, Jonah was quoting David from Psalm chapter 3.

Salvation belongs to the Lord. I want you to memorize that saying, Jonah 2, 9, and understand it to me that salvation is entirely the work of God to mercy hardened dead sinners. It's all his work, entirely his work.

It's not our works, not our genealogy. It's not our willing. It's not our running. It's not our objections. It's nothing within us. They want us or try contest our running. It doesn't come from us. It comes from where?

God from within himself to God be the glory. And I want you to keep thinking about these things and reading these passages until it's not just a difficult thing for us to struggle with, but till we agree with Paul's answer to the very problems he poses.

And then something crazy happens. I love it. What seemed to trouble us becomes a delight. This becomes an incredible delight. There's something beautiful and that feels good about getting humbled. Job did not feel good about the trials that humbled him.

But when God spoke in chapters 37 and 38, and he says, where were you? When I formed the heavens and I told the sea how far they can go. Eventually, Job will clap his mouth and say, I repent in dust and ashes.

And when he comes out of that moment, he feels better because he's in the right place before God. God is God and he's going to do according to his counsel. Nebuchadnezzar, same thing. Daniel 4 verse 35.

Jonah, from the fish to eventually, think about this. Who wrote the book of Jonah? Jonah, he was the only one there to tell what happened in the fish. He later writes the book and he casts himself as the problematic character at the end of the book, sitting there sulking because his little vine died, but not having mercy and appreciating that God mercy to people who didn't deserve it.

He was humbled. Anybody here ever been to the Grand Canyon? I actually had a chance to run a marathon on the rim of the Grand Canyon. It was beautiful. But one of the great things about the Grand Canyon is when you're there and you see the size of it, it makes you feel small.

What's great about it is not that you feel big, it's that you feel small. That's what Romans 9 does for you. It's like a Grand Canyon. It makes you small so you can see the glory and splendor of the one who is big.

Who made it all and who did all of this to save us. There's probably somebody here today who's worried now. You're thinking, wait a minute, what if I'm not elect? What if I'm not chosen? Am I destined for an eternity in hell?

Here's the good news. The call goes out to all. Repent and believe. Here's all you have to do. Believe in Jesus Christ and by believing, you'll know that you're elect. That's all that matters from our perspective.

We're looking at deep mysteries today, guys. Deep mysteries where God reveals deep things for the children of God. But the gospel call goes out to any and if you're not sure that you're elect, repent, believe in Jesus, then you'll know.

And guys, maybe somebody here is more concerned that, you know, I don't believe this. I'm not convinced. I don't think Pastor Jeff followed the text right or maybe he missed something. I'm okay with that.

That's okay. If I believe this doctrine, then God will show you in time what he wants to show you. I'm going to love you just the same and we'll all love. That's why we're not going to be Calvinists or Arminians and this, that, and the other.

We're going to be one church that loves each other. And it's okay to differ. God will show us in time. Maybe when we get to heaven, we'll all see it no longer through a glass darkly, but face to face.

So we can love each other through any differences, right? So have that kind of view. And finally, worship and praise his glorious grace. When Ephesians talks about this subject, right? We're blessed in the heavenlies with every spiritual blessing, including that we are elected, predestined.

Ephesians 1, 4, and 5. It simply summarizes it this way. It says, to the praise of his glorious grace. You are to thank all of this grace in my life, where I was born, who my parents were, how I heard the gospel, how my heart opened.

It's all to the praise of his glorious grace. So how should we respond? When we go deeper in the things of God, it makes our hearts more full of praise. I'm going to say something challenging. I want everybody here to be on time Sunday morning.

Right at, if this is a 1045 crowd, right at 1045. And here's what we're going to do. Just thinking about this, we're going to cut the announcement section. Because I'll send that in the email on Thursdays, and we'll have it running when you get here on the screen.

So you'll still get the announcements. But when that service starts, I want our hearts full of praise, ready to sing. We've been doing four songs. Now we'll have time for five. By the way, what's your stamina for worship songs?

I'm probably somewhere around like 8 to 10 before I wear out spiritually. I'm like, OK, I'm ready to sit. Physically, my stamina as a runner, I should probably do 40 or 50. But my heart isn't that full yet that I would want to praise like that.

Now we don't have time to go beyond five, right? That's OK, because we have multiple services. But can you bring five songs to the Lord who rescued you out of hell when you brought nothing and just mercy to you and gave you Christ?

Can you come and give him five songs in the morning? And if you can't stand that long, I totally understand that. You can sing seated or standing. You don't have to stand the whole time. But I'm asking you to come praise his glorious grace.