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He seems to be saying that God picks and chooses who will be save or lost, who will get mercy and who will get anger. That is the usual take on this passage.
We all come to new information with preconceived filters in place, paradigms about what is true and what makes up reality. Since all of us are born in sin we will have at least a certain amount of Satan's lies in place in our filters from the get-go. So it should be no surprise that the majority of people upon reading this passage would assume that God is arbitrary and selective. This is likely one of the writings of Paul that Peter was talking about when he said there were some things he had written that were difficult to understand.
God created everyone with the power to choose and the freedom to change. He fiercely defends that freedom all throughout the War which is precisely why the War has gone on so long the way it has. But it will be seen in the end that His choice to preserve freedom over forcing us to believe truth was the most effective one to restore the universe to unity and joy and peace,
In this context we have the freedom to misunderstand God when reading this passage because of our false preconceptions about Him inherent in our sinful nature and perpetrated by most religion. But we also have the freedom to challenge our own assumptions when we begin to see that our conclusions conflict with other more clear fundamental truths revealed to us about what God is like. What we will take away from this passage will reflect what previous picture of God that we have chosen to endorse. We can either reinforce the lies about God by using this passage to declare that it underscores His arbitrary, punitive tendencies or we can choose to bring in a more updated filter and examine this passage in the clearer light from other places throughout the Bible.
It is usually the case that the most troubling verses we run into in the Bible often are a cover for some of the most exciting and thrilling gems of beauty for the ones willing to dig and ask and wrestle and listen to the Spirit of God. Given that history I believe the same may be true of this passage as well.
So there are basically two paradigms or filters that we might bring with us to use in unpacking this passage. The first I mentioned above, assuming a God who arbitrarily decides who to use to display his wrath (read human-like anger) and who to selectively show mercy to for contrast. But to use this filter to interpret these verses is to reveal an underlying belief about God that is in harmony with the lies perpetrated by Satan since before the earth was created. Not a very safe position to work from I would say.
The other option is to question our own paradigm before jumping to conclusions about this passage and correcting our lies about God based on the most reliable testimony about Him, namely the life and words of Jesus who claimed to be the perfect expression of God. If we make the revelation of Jesus Christ the basis for interpreting this section of writing we will be enabled to see things not obvious to the unenlightened mind using the wrong magnifying glass. This is a place where we need the Holy fire of God's light to allow us to see things correctly. If we bring the light of strange fire to our study, i.e. our human emotions and false assumptions about God, we will never be able to discover truth in this passage but will only end up reinforcing Satan's misrepresentations about our loving Creator.
These are the things that have come to my mind this morning after reading this section and feeling confused and baffled. I asked God out loud to explain what is going on here to me. I told Him that He has some explaining to do and told Him what my initial reactions were upon reading this passage. It stirs up all sorts of triggers and doubts and even anger that God might override people's freedom just to justify Himself and His favorite people. That is not the truth about God that I have been learning lately but is very much a part of the false teachings about Him that have kept my heart at a great distance from Him for most of my life.
If God is arbitrary and selective and only extends mercy to just the ones He feels like while using others as playthings for His “wrath”, then I could never feel safe around a God like that and I can certainly never love Him. But that is emphatically not true, and I reject this filter as being sourced from the depths of hell as it comes from the father of all lies. I am going to seek the Spirit's guidance to listen for a more accurate paradigm through which to read this passage and wait to see what exciting things will be revealed to my heart. I want to use the light of the truth about God to shine into this chapter and I want to look through the magnifying glass of the life of Jesus to read these words until they reveal perfect harmony and I see the glowing gems of real truth that I know are buried below the surface of this chapter. I must be careful to see how this fits into the context of the surrounding passages so that I better understand the real points that Paul is trying to get across. I am looking forward to growing and deepening my understanding and appreciation of the beauty of God and His perfect consistency in love.
