Romans 9:15-24

¹⁵God told Moses, "I''m in charge of mercy. I''m in charge of compassion."l

¹⁶Compassion doesn''t originate in our bleeding hearts or moral sweat, but in God''s mercy.m

¹⁷The same point was made when God said to Pharaoh, "I picked you as a bit player in this drama of my salvation power."n

¹⁸All we''re saying is that God has the first word, initiating the action in which we play our part for good or ill.o

¹⁹Are you going to object, "So how can God blame us for anything since he''s in charge of everything? If the big decisions are already made, what say do we have in it?"p

²⁰Who 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''t talk back to the fingers that mold it, saying, "Why did you shape me like this?"q

²¹Isn''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?r

²²If God needs one style of pottery especially designed to show his angry displeasures

²³and another style carefully crafted to show his glorious goodness, isn''t that all right?

²⁴Either or both happens to Jews, but it also happens to the other people.