{"id":643,"date":"2007-08-26T21:09:18","date_gmt":"2007-08-27T01:09:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.drslewis.org\/camille\/?p=643"},"modified":"2007-08-26T21:09:18","modified_gmt":"2007-08-27T01:09:18","slug":"a-giant-stone-of-grace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.drslewis.org\/camille\/2007\/08\/26\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\/","title":{"rendered":"A Giant Stone of Grace"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A friend passed along an &#8220;ad&#8221; for <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/tominthebox.blogspot.com\/2007\/02\/guard-your-thoughts-against-calvinism.html\" title=\"Calvinix\">Calvinix<\/a>.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>From Phinney Pharmaceuticals comes an exciting new product to keep those Reformed thoughts out!<\/p>\n<p>CALVINIX is specially formulated to prevent your brain from absorbing Calvinist and Reformed materials no matter how you may encounter them! . . . CALVINIX creates an invisible barrier around your brain literally dissolving Calvinist theology as it is picked up by your senses, while at the same time enhancing your understanding of Arminianism.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I can now read Romans 9 without stress!&#8221; &#8211; Dr. Bob Jones III<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Finally, Spurgeon without guilt!&#8221; &#8211; Dr. Jack Schaap<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Amazing product! James White, you&#8217;ll never convince me now!&#8221; &#8211; Dave Hunt<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>And that little goofy joke alone made me remember that I had never gotten past Romans 8 in my study. Talking about our victory in Christ seemed enough. But now I&#8217;ve got a new hobby horse. <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=Romans%209;&amp;version=65;\" title=\"Romans 9\">Read this<\/a>\u00a0(italics are all mine):<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>What God did in this case made it perfectly plain that his purpose is not a hit-or-miss thing dependent on what we do or don&#8217;t do, but <em>a sure thing determined by his decision<\/em>, flowing steadily from his initiative. God told Rebecca, &#8220;The firstborn of your twins will take second place.&#8221; Later that was turned into a stark epigram: &#8220;I loved Jacob; I hated Esau.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Is that grounds for complaining that God is unfair? Not so fast, please. God told Moses, &#8220;I&#8217;m in charge of mercy. I&#8217;m in charge of compassion.&#8221;<em> Compassion doesn&#8217;t originate in our bleeding hearts or moral sweat, but in God&#8217;s mercy<\/em>. The same point was made when God said to Pharaoh, &#8220;I picked you as a bit player in this drama of my salvation power.&#8221; <em>All we&#8217;re saying is that God has the first word, initiating the action in which we play our part for good or ill<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Are you going to object, &#8220;So how can God blame us for anything since he&#8217;s in charge of everything? If the big decisions are already made, what say do we have in it?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Who in the world do you think you are to second-guess God? Do you for one moment suppose any of us knows enough to call God into question? Clay doesn&#8217;t talk back to the fingers that mold it, saying, &#8220;Why did you shape me like this?&#8221; Isn&#8217;t it obvious that a potter has a perfect right to shape one lump of clay into a vase for holding flowers and another into a pot for cooking beans? If God needs one style of pottery especially designed to show his angry displeasure and another style carefully crafted to show his glorious goodness, isn&#8217;t that all right? Either or both happens to Jews, but it also happens to the other people. Hosea put it well:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u00a0 I&#8217;ll call nobodies and make them somebodies;<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I&#8217;ll call the unloved and make them beloved.<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0 In the place where they yelled out, &#8220;You&#8217;re nobody!&#8221;<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 they&#8217;re calling you &#8220;God&#8217;s living children.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Isaiah maintained this same emphasis:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u00a0 If each grain of sand on the seashore were numbered<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 and the sum labeled &#8220;chosen of God,&#8221;<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0 They&#8217;d be numbers still, not names;<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 salvation comes by personal selection.<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0 <em>God doesn&#8217;t count us; he calls us by name.<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Arithmetic is not his focus.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Isaiah had looked ahead and spoken the truth:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u00a0 If our powerful God<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 had not provided us a legacy of living children,<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0 We would have ended up like ghost towns,<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 like Sodom and Gomorrah.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>How can we sum this up? <strong><em>All those people who didn&#8217;t seem interested in what God was doing actually embraced what God was doing as he straightened out their lives. And Israel, who seemed so interested in reading and talking about what God was doing, missed it. How could they miss it? Because instead of trusting God, they took over. They were absorbed in what they themselves were doing. They were so absorbed in their &#8220;God projects&#8221; that they didn&#8217;t notice God right in front of them, like a huge rock in the middle of the road<\/em>.<\/strong> And so they stumbled into him and went sprawling. Isaiah (again!) gives us the metaphor for pulling this together:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u00a0 Careful! I&#8217;ve put a huge stone on the road to Mount Zion,<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 a stone you can&#8217;t get around.<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0 But the stone is me! If you&#8217;re looking for me,<br \/>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 you&#8217;ll find me on the way, not in the way.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A friend passed along an &#8220;ad&#8221; for Calvinix. From Phinney Pharmaceuticals comes an exciting new<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grace"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>A Giant Stone of Grace - A Time To Laugh<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.drslewis.org\/camille\/2007\/08\/26\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Camille Lewis\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Camille Lewis\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/e93a8c9ec8fb8b926471114158437f82\"},\"headline\":\"A Giant Stone of Grace\",\"datePublished\":\"2007-08-27T01:09:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":747,\"commentCount\":2,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/e93a8c9ec8fb8b926471114158437f82\"},\"articleSection\":[\"Grace\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.drslewis.org\\\/camille\\\/2007\\\/08\\\/26\\\/a-giant-stone-of-grace\\\/\",\"name\":\"A Giant Stone of Grace - 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