The power of God in all of His mercy

“For God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all.

O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

‘For who has known the mind of the Lord?
    Or who has been his counselor?’

‘Or who has given a gift to him,
    to receive a gift in return?’

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.”  Romans 11:33-36 (NRSV)

In the eleventh chapter of Romans, Paul writes about the disobedience of the Jews and the Gentiles.  The history of the Jewish nation includes many periods of time where the people were disobedient and did not put God first in their lives, yet God still used the Jewish society to bring the Christ into the world.  Paul writes that the disobedience of Jews and Gentiles still requires the same grace from God.

 

This passage of scripture is very important for all Christians today.  In a world that seeks knowledge and truth, we are caught up in the depths of our own knowledge and understanding.  Astrophysics is a branch of science that studies the physical laws of outer space. The theories of how the universe works have been developed over centuries of study and thought, and we are still learning and will continue to learn.  Yet God created all of our physical laws by commanding them into existence. In this same way, we can seek to understand why God allows the human race to behave as it does, but we will never fully comprehend it.  God has the power to speak light into existence, and He is somehow able to allow sin in the world and extend grace to all.