Listen, God says I prepare vessels for glory, but vessels are prepared for destruction. God, there, is the subject and the verb is active. Verse 23, vessels of mercy which He had prepared to glory. Now notice, verse 22 is a passive, v essels of wrath fitted to destruction. You realize the difference between active and passive? In active, the subject does the acting and in passive the subject receives the action. I should say in the Greek voice which is similar to English. Now in the Greek you have two serious distinctions here in the Greek tense and you must recognize them.
In verse 23, vessels of mercy which He had prepared to glory. Notice, there are vessels of wrath, at the end of verse 22, fitted to destruction. Now I don't want to get too deep and I just want to give you one or two thoughts. "What if God, willing to show His wrath, and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction And that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had before prepared unto glory,"
He's the potter and the vessel is simply clay.īut I want you to notice what happens in verse twenty-two. Verse 18, "He has mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardens." The argument comes, "Well it doesn't seem fair," and in verse 21 Paul says, "Hath not the potter power over the clay of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor?" The potter can make a vessel any way he wants. Paul is clearly saying that, there is no other message here. Paul is saying here that God is sovereign.
That's a very provocative question and of course you get ultimately into whole area of God's sovereignty, but let me show you something most interesting about Romans 9:21. Does that mean people like Judas were made by God for destruction? The Bible speaks of vessels of mercy and vessels of destruction, which God specifically made for His purpose (Romans 9:21-23). How do we understand Romans 9:22, "vessels of wrath prepared for destruction"?Ĭlick here to get an audio copy of this message.
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