Romans 11:33-36 (NIV)
Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay him?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen.
This brief doxology (a Greek word meaning “word of glory”) was inspired by the insights that God had given to Paul in the previous three chapters about His plan to save the Jewish people, while at the same time opening the gates of salvation to the gentiles. It was not an either-or situation, but a both-and plan that was designed to kick out the walls of God’s temple to make room for the whole world, “whoever believes in Him” (John 3:16).
Paul’s clear view of how God was working awoke in his heart spontaneous praise and brought to mind verses he had memorized from Isaiah 40:13 and Job 41:11, which Tertius, his scribe (Romans 16:22) captured as they spilled from his lips. His total focus was on God, who He is and what He has done.
- He praises God for the riches of His wisdom and knowledge. Only God could make a plan to reach the whole world with the gospel and to bring multiplied billions into His kingdom.
- He understands that all that he can grasp of God’s judgments and His ways of doing things is just the outer edge of the reality. But what he is able to see fills him with awe as well as praise.
- Like the prophets before Him, Paul realizes that as much as he has accomplished for the gospel, as large a footprint that he had left in history, as many converts and disciples that he had brought into the kingdom, he was still only a single player in the mission that God had developed and was working through him and all his coworkers. God owed him nothing for what he had accomplished, but Paul owed God everything.
- Finally, with a brief glimpse of what God was doing, Paul praises Him for all of it, including what He would continue to do to reach the lost (including the non-believing Jews) in the future, and whom He would bring forward to continue the work when Paul’s time in the trenches was done.
Paul really understood. He understood God’s goodness, he understood God’s greatness, and he understood God’s love for His people that moved Him to never, ever give up on them.
Father, I can almost see Paul in his rapture, praising You with all his heart, hands lifted high in worship, and eyes focused on Your throne. Lord, when we get close enough to You to see the edges of Your plan, to hear Your heartbeat of love for all humanity, it always moves us to unbridled praise of You in all Your glory. Thank You for showing all this to Paul, and for letting us enter into his worship of You. Amen.