Romans: I Will Have Mercy on Whom I Will Have Mercy
Have you ever thought about why you were born where you were born, to whom you were born? When I was young, we had a missionary come to our church. He talked about the places that he served overseas and shared how poverty stricken the people were. He even shared examples of their poverty.
As I lay on my bed that night, I thought about those poor poverty-stricken children in faraway places that I could only imagine in my head. It occurred to me that those children had not had a part in any decision about where they were born or to whom they were born. It also occurred to me that I had no part in any decision about where I was born or to whom I was born.
There is truly little that we really have control over. We do not pick our skin color, our eye color, our hair color. We have no say in who our parents are or who our siblings are, or even if we have any siblings. We have no input into where we are born or what time we are born, or what century we are born in. As I lay on my bed that night, I could not figure out why God has blessed me in such a gracious way and why others had not been so blessed.
When God’s people in the Old Testament sinned against God, he was determined to wipe them out and start over with Moses. However, Moses, stood in the gap for the people of Israel and pleaded with God to give them another chance. God relented and made the statement, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy!”
God’s mercy continues today. His salvation is a complete and totally free gift. Anyone who has received Jesus as their Lord and Savior ultimately must acknowledge that they had absolutely nothing to do with God’s grace and mercy. The fact that they are saved has nothing to do with them and everything to do with God. Why? Because God has mercy on whom he chooses. This is Paul’s point in Romans chapter 9.
-Pastor Ken