"For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen"--Romans 11:36
This verse cuts the cords of self-sufficiency, and takes away any ground for self-consciousness, or sense of superiority. We have nothing that we have not received. How easy it is for us to carry our selfishness along with us, even in our Christian life.
We are converted and saved from our worldly selfishness, we see the folly and vanity of earthly things, and we turn from them to the higher things of God and the spiritual life, but often we carry selfishness along on a higher plane, seeking to gratify ourselves.
The Hebrew word for consecration means to "fill the hand." In Exodus 29:22-24, we have a striking picture of consecration. The high priest was to stand before the Lord, and the offerings were to be placed in his empty hands, and he waved them before the Lord.
He thus carried out the idea of consecration. He received the offering from the Lord, and then gave it back to the Lord. This was the thought of David in the prayer which he made relative to the offerings gathered for the temple—the bible says in 1st Chronicles 29:14, "All things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we but given Thee."
Our very salvation is of Him. Every holy desire we have ever had is of Him, and shall we not fulfill what He has implanted? The bible says in James 1:18 "Of His own will begat He us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of His creatures".
Again, all things are through Him as well as of Him. We come into the world coiled around ourselves as thoroughly as a watch spring around its center. When we are converted, we are saved from the grosser forms of selfishness, but still we carry the selfish spirit into our Christian life.
It is said that the honeysuckle grows, according to the law of its being, always in one direction. Its spirals twine one way, and there is no force that can coil them another way. So, it is difficult to decentralize the human heart.
Even our beautiful hymns and our very devotions are often mixed with a sort of spiritual and emotional selfishness. How different from the songs of heaven, where all the hallelujahs are unto Him that site upon the throne, and to the Lamb. All seems to be lost in the glory of God.
Again, all things are unto Him. If all things are of Him and through Him, it is only right that they should return to Him. He should be the supreme object of all our affections and service. Let us not seek for religious pleasure, for emotional feeling, and the gratification of our sensibilities, but let us seek Him, glorify Him, and live for Him. The yielded life is expressed in the words--dying unto self and living unto God.
The bible says in Romans 11:36 is the first doxology in the letter “For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.” It is followed by another at the end, which is like it, though more complete: the bible says in Romans 16:27, “To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen.” Significant that both doxologies speak of the glory of God, and that forever.
Here are two questions to help us understand them:
Who is to be glorified? The answer is: the sovereign God. For the most part, we start with man and man’s needs. But Paul always started with God, and he ended with him, too. In fact, the letter to the Romans is so clearly focused on God that it can be outlined accurately in these terms.
Why should God be glorified? The answer is that “from him and through him and to him are all things,” particularly the work of salvation. Why is man saved? It is not because of anything in men and women themselves but because of God’s grace. It is because God has elected us to it.
God has predestined his elect people to salvation from before the foundation of the world. How is man saved? The answer is by the redeeming work of the Lord Jesus, the very Son of God. We could not save ourselves, but God saved us through the vicarious, atoning death of Jesus Christ.
By what power are we brought to faith in Jesus? The answer is by the power of the Holy Spirit through what theologians call effectual calling. God’s call quickens us to new life. How can we become holy? Holiness is not something that originates in us, is achieved by us, or is sustained by us.
It is due to God’s joining us to Jesus so that we have become different persons than we were before he did it. We have died to sin and been made alive to righteousness.
Now there is no direction for us to go in the Christian life but forward. Where are we headed? Answer: to heaven, because Jesus is preparing a place in heaven for us. How can we be sure of arriving there? It is because God, who began the work of our salvation, will continue it until we do. God never begins a work that he does not eventually bring to a happy and complete conclusion.
“To him be the glory forever! Amen.”
The great Charles Hodge says of the verse we are studying: “Such is the appropriate conclusion of the doctrinal portion of this wonderful epistle, in which more fully and clearly than in any other portion of the Word of God, the plan of salvation is presented and defended. Here are the doctrines of grace, doctrines on which the pious in all ages and nations have rested their hopes of heaven, though they may have had comparatively obscure intimations of their nature.”
The leading principle of all is that God is the source of all good, that in fallen man there is neither merit nor ability, that salvation, consequently, is all of grace, as well satisfaction as pardon, as well election as eternal glory. For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things; to whom be glory forever. Amen.
So, let us give God the glory, remembering that God himself says in Isaiah 42:8, “I am the Lord; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols.”
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