It doesn't happen often, but there are times when Carole and I fail to communicate well with each other. Our failure frustrates us, because even after we have sorted the problem out, it seems at times impossible to pinpoint how the misunderstanding began. We often say, "It would be nice to have a video of that conversation to see just where it went off the rails."

I do know that in marriage, in personal guidance and in group meetings, we need to be diligent to notice when something enters the conversation that can undermine the immediate purpose of the people involved. I find that it is hard work to stay on purpose and not allow extraneous ideas to subvert the conversation.

This danger to good communication has affected our ability to read Romans nine with a clear head. As Paul set out to write this chapter, he faced a heart-rending reality. Among his flesh and blood kin, the Jews, rejection of Jesus had gathered momentum all across the Roman Empire. Their rejection was so enormous and unexpected that it required an explanation from someone.

The apostle offered his explanation in Romans 9-11. Making sense of that rejection was his purpose in those chapters. It is hard work to stay focused on that purpose, because his explanation has unintentionally allowed another idea to enter the conversation and subvert it. That other idea is the modern doctrine of election/

I think I would be accurate to state that doctrine in these words. Election and predestination mean that God made a decision before the universe began to divide all human beings who would ever live on earth into two groups: the saved and the damned. He did this without respect of persons and without regard to anyone's moral achievements. (See Lorraine Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 83).

That way of nderstanding the doctrine gets people worked up. So much so that it is easy for them to read Romans nine and pay little or no attention to the apostle's original purpose. That creates a problem for people like me who want to talk about chapter nine.

If I focus only on the apostle's purpose, I will have people in the audience who think I am missing the main purpose of Romans nine, which they understand to be the doctrine of election and predestination. On the other hand, if I deal with the modern disputes about election and predestination, I may not do justice to the original purpose of this chapter, which has huge implications in our world for Christians and Jews.

So, I have no choice. I have to address both issues. In order to do that successfully, I have to do it peacefully. So, let me put my cards on the table. I do not believe or teach the doctrine of election and predestination as I read it to you a moment ago, but I respect you, if you do. I hope you will respect me when I offer an alternative understanding of Paul's language in this chapter. In offering this alternative I will also be bringing us back to the apostle's original purpose.

Guiding Principles
Two guiding principles help me in offering this alternative. First, we will never understand election and predestiniation, if we do not understand God's purpose in election. The apostle stated this purpose near the end of these three chapters in Romans 11:32. For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. God means His every act of election to lead to mercy for his human creation. Angus Dei, qui tollit peccata mundi, miserere nos. Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us. In so praying, the Church appeals to the center of the Father's electing purpose.

Second, election and predestination are not decisions about who is saved and who is damned. They are decisions about who will carry forward God's purpose of expanding the circle of mercy among the human family. The language of Romans nine does not focus on eternal destiny; it is about a mission in this present world. I will come back more than once to these two principles.

In verses 6-13 the apostle retold briefly two family stories from his Jewish past. When God made sure Abraham and Sarah had a son, Isaac, God was electing Isaac and not Ishmael, his half-brother. When God told Rebekah that Esau would serve Jacob, He was electing Jacob and not his twin brother, Esau.

Did the apostle say anything in those verses about Ishmael's or Esau's being saved or damned? He did not. From what we know about the story of Isaac and his brother, Ishmael, and about the story of Jacob and Esau, do we have any reason to think that Ishmael and Esau were damned? I have read the stories about those men in Genesis many times, and God blesses them both richly. It doesn't sound like damnation.

There is nothing in these verses about God's making a decision before the universe began to divide all human beings who would ever live on earth into two groups: the saved and the damned. There is a great deal in these verses about God's electing those who would carry forward in history His purpose of expanding the circle of mercy among the human family.

Widespread Jewish rejection of Jesus may have broken Paul's heart, but it did not mean that God's purpose had failed. As Paul will say later in this chapter, God has elected Gentiles along with Christian Jews, as surely as He had chosen Isaac and Jacob to carry forward His purpose of expanding the circle of mercy among the human family.

So far, so good, but tougher questions lie ahead in verses 14-26. So, let's tackle them and see how they help us address the contemporary debate about election and also the apostle's original purpose of understanding the meaning of Israel's widespread rejection of Jesus as the Messiah.

The Mercy and Justice of God
The apostle with great integrity raises the first crucial question in verse fourteen. What then shall we say? Is God unjust? It's the first question that comes up with modern people, but our motives are different from those of Paul's day.

When people today complain about election, they think God was unfair to determine before the world who would be saved and who would be damned. The script was written before human beings had any say in the matter, and that seems unjust.

My alternative interpretation rejects that understanding of election, and if people accept my understanding, they will drop the modern question about God's justice. However, the original question about God's justice still stands.

Is God unjust to choose one person over another for any reason? Was He unjust to choose Isaac and not Ishmael, or Jacob and not Esau to carry forward His purpose in the world? That's the question Paul proceeds to answer in verse 15-18.

In typical fashion Paul begins with a flat denial at the end of verse 14. Not at all! Then, in verse fifteen he brings us back to the first of the guiding principles I mentioned earlier. For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." We will never understand election, if we do not understand that God means His every act of election to expand the circle of mercy among the human family. It is not unjust for God to show mercy.

Neither is it unjust for God to show mercy by electing some people and rejecting others to carry forward that pupose. If His purpose depended only on frail human beings, how successful do we think it would be? That's the point of verse sixteen. It (God's purpose) does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. Human beings fail. God does not fail. Much more to the point, when people fail, God actually uses their failure to show His mercy on an even broader scale. Paul illustrates that idea in verse 17 and makes the point even sharper.

For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." Yes, but do you remember how that came about?

Pharaoh openly and repeatedly resisted God's purpose. In the language of Exodus, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron (Ex. 8:15). Exodus goes even further and says that God caused Pharaoh's resistence. In Exodus 4:21 God says, I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.

Paul's point is this. God chose Israel to carry out His purpose, and He caused Pharaoh to oppose His purpose, but God will use cooperation and opposition to show His mercy in all the earth. It is true, as verse 18 puts it that God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. But either decision is designed to bring His mercy to the whole human family.

And here I need to bring us back to the alternative understanding of election that I am proposing to you. Does the text in Romans 9:14-18 say anything about Pharaoh's eternal destiny in heaven or hell? It does not. The statements about election in this passage do not focus on Pharaoh's eternal destiny. They have everything to do with furthering God's purpose of expanding the circle of mercy among the human family. God's acts of showing mercy to one and hardening another let us know that either way His commitment to show mercy to man will never go away, and no human behavior will thwart that purpose. It will actually further that purpose.

Can you see the relevance of this to Paul's original purpose? Israel's widespread rejection of Jesus as the Messiah may have broken Paul's heart, but even that tragedy had served to expand the circle of God's mercy to more and more of humanity. It was precisely Jewish rejection of Jeus that originally brought Christianity to the Gentile world that covered the rest of the earth.

Of Human Will and Divine Pottery
Of course, there is a further question in verse 19. One of you will say to me: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" "How can God blame others for what he himself brought about?" (Dunn, Romans II, 564). Paul's answer is stunning.

Verses 20-21: But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?'" Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

Heaven, it would appear, does not have a Freedom of Information Act. It is enough for us to know that God's overarching purpose is to show us mercy. What lies behind His decision to harden anyone's heart is His secret, not our business. We can trust Him to do what is just. We can rejoice that His justice disperses His mercy.

For wise and just reasons of His own God blames those whom He has hardened. But that is not the amazing thing about God's dealing with humanity. The really amazing thing is that He is so merciful with us. That's the point of verse 22. What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of hiw wrath - prepared for destruction?

I have to stop here and ask one more pointed question. What destruction did Paul have in mind? In the case of Pharaoh his armies were destroyed when they pursued Israel into the Red Sea. Is there any necesary reason, is thee any clear hint in the text of Romans nine that Paul was thinking about hell? It is just not there. People who find it there are reading their own ideas back into Paul's words. Verses 23-26 make it quite clear that the text does not focus on Pharaoh's eternal destiny. It has everything to do with expanding the circle of God's mercy among the human family as a result of Pharaoh's cruelty and of Israel's widespread rejection of Jesus as Messiah.

What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory - even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

As he says in Hosea: "I will call them (the Gentiles) 'my people' who are not my people; and I will call her 'my loved one' who is not my loved one," and, "It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' they will be called 'sons of the living God.'"

The Pastoral Center of Gravity
The message of Romans nine proclaims with joy and hope that God's unshakable purpose is to expand the circle of mercy among the whole human family. Nothing human beings can do one way or the other can frustrate that purpose. The purpose will be achieved, because it depends on God. That is the Gospel.

God's method of offering mercy to the whole human family is to choose individuals and nations to carry forward His purpose. At other times for reasons known only to God He causes some individuals and nations to resist His purpose. Either way, whether people carry forward or resist His purpose, the result is greater mercy for more people until He can offer mercy on the whole human family.

Whatever the outcome of the Al Queda terror network or of stem cell research or of environmental degradation, our God will use them to have mercy on the whole human family. He never bypasses His generous gift of free will, but He outflanks our evil uses of that gift and causes what we do serve His merciful purpose. That is why Good Friday is the paradigm of God's triumph over all the dark forces of this world.

If God's unshakable purpose is to expand the circle of mercy among the whole human family, shouldn't we who are the children of God show the Family likeness? Let us be people of mercy. Of course, we have to use our heads. Of course, we have to seek for justice. But let our wisdom and our justice serve mercy.

I am always willing to discuss the Church's on-going debate about election and predestination. We can have that discussion in a way that brings honor to our Lord, if we reflect His mercy to each other and to our world.