Romans 9:21

Rom_9:21-23

Hath not the potter power over the clay?

The potter and the clay

I. The material of which humanity is composed. Represented by clay.

1. Mean.

2. Powerless.

3. Plastic.

II. The sovereign right of God to mould it to His will. A vessel to--

1. Honour.

2. Dishonour.

III. The consistency of this doctrine with human free agency.

1. God determines our physical and temporal conditions.

2. Not our eternal doom. (J. Lyth, D.D.)

The potter and his clay

Hath he not power? Yes, he has, is the answer the apostle expects, and he is right, and God the Almighty Potter has unchallengeable power over His clay. Let it be noticed--

I. That paul does not refer to physical force, i.e., that God, in virtue of His almightiness, is able out of the same lump to make one vessel to honour and another to dishonour. The word is not, δύναμας ability to do, but ἐξουσία--authority, prerogative right. God is not under any obligation to confer equal honour or dishonour upon all. He will be doing no wrong, although He make a difference.

II. We are not to look upon Gods prerogative as unconditional.

1. True, the prerogative of the literal potter is absolute. He may do with his clay what he pleases, although it may be ridiculous, and ultimately ruinous to him. He may add inappropriate ingredients and spoil his clay: stupidly attempt to make fine vessels out of coarse clay; he may misshape his vessels, mar them, or when the whole batch is fashioned take an iron rod and dash them into shivers. If the clay, wheel, time, rod, be his own, he may set as absurdly as he pleases.

2. But then this absolute right will not shield him from the criticism of his fellows. They may not say No, this wont be permitted; you are ill-using your clay. But they will be at perfect liberty to say what Jonathan Edwards said of the devil, that he is one of the greatest fools and blockheads in the world.

3. Again, men are not like clay in all respects, e.g., they are possessed of rights. Man has a right to be treated with justice; to be furnished with ability to do his duty, if he is to be held responsible for not doing it to have the gate of heaven opened to him if he is to be blamed for not entering in. Man must have some power of formative self-control unto honour, if he is to be blamed for being fashioned into a vessel unto dishonour.

4. All this being the case, Gods power over the human clay is not utterly unconditional. His right to do with it as He pleases is, by His own benevolent arrangement, modified by rights which He has conferred on His creatures. He has not reserved the right to do wrong. It cannot be the case, then, that God has reserved the right to deal tyrannically with His poor human creatures. If they are held responsible to Him for the shape their character assumes, then something is due to them as the basis of their accountability.

III. The statement cannot be quoted in favour of unconditional reprobation. There are, indeed, beings who deserve universal reprobation, and, therefore, Divine; and there is future reprobation; but is it right to so magnify the Divine sovereignty as to exclude from the circle of Divinity, justice, righteousness, goodness, wisdom, mercy, and love? Such inversion of theology would be akin in monstrosity to the wild political aphorism that monarchs reign by Divine right and can do no wrong.

IV. What, then, was the apostles aim in propounding his query? Why should he be solicitous to show that God has a right to turn some of the race into a condition of dishonour, and others into a state of glory? The reason is that in chaps, 9-11, he is discussing the relation of his countrymen to the gospel. Alas! the great mass were unbelieving. What then? Would they, notwithstanding, be all turned on the Divine wheel into vessels of honour? The Jews contended that they would. It was the Gentiles only who were to be fashioned into vessels unto dishonour. No, says the apostle, you are wrong, my countrymen. It is with intensest sorrow that I say it. It is the penitent and believing only who shall be saved. And the Almighty Potter, who has us all on His wheel, has right, out of the same lump of Jews and Gentiles, to turn one man, even though he be a Gentile, provided he be penitent and believing, into a vessel of glory, and vice versa. The apostle had evidently the representation of Jer_28:1-17, in his eye. If a vessel becomes marred in the hands of the potter, then, instead of proceeding with it, he crushes the clay together and fashions it into another kind of vessel. God desired to fashion the Jews into a glorious vessel, when, lo! it became marred in His hand, and He had to make it into another--unto dishonour. The vessel was marred, not because of any imperfection in the Potters manipulation, for He is not liable to mistakes. Some bad and coarse ingredient had been by some enemy flung in, so that only a coarser vessel than what was desired could be made of it. Application: God is not willing that any should perish, i.e., He does not wish to have any vessels fashioned unto dishonour. He would have all to be beautiful and honourably serviceable, i.e., all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. Jesus, speaking to the impenitent, says, I would, but ye would not, and just because men will not they spoil the clay that is in the Almighty Potters hand. (J. Morison, D.D.)

The potter and the clay

I. The question proposed.

1. A seemingly needless one.

2. Proposed as an argument for conviction.

II. The answer implied. That God is--

1. The Creator of all things.

2. The arbitrator of the destiny of everything.

3. That He has, as such, a right to create and plan out as He thinks fit.

Application:

1. Do not question Gods authority.

2. Submit to all His decrees with humility. (J. H. Tasson.)

The potter and the clay

Against the hard absolutism of the parable of the potter and the clay the righteous instincts of the heart have often protested. Responsibility without freedom strikes us as despotic and unjust. If we are whirled about on the potters wheel of an inflexible fate, it seems intolerable that we should be denounced for taking the shape it has given us. And what maddens us the more is that not being free, we should yet be called into account and held responsible. No effort of ours, it seems, can alter our destiny; yet the stain of demerit clings to us if we fail to shape it. It is like charging the rivers with guilt for their inability to run up a hill when Gods decree of gravitation forbids it. All this we find, or think we find, in the image of the potter and the clay. And no doubt, read in its connection with the rest of the passage, it seems a vindication of the right of God to do what He likes--of His right to be arbitrary, to make selections on principles of favouritism. An image or argument, however, that lands us in such a conclusion--that issues in a disproof of the righteousness of God, carries in it its own condemnation. As the impersonation of eternal justice, He must choose and do what is fair--what commends itself to our pure moral instincts. He must reverence the laws He has stamped on our nature. He must live out from the perceptions of the right He has given us to live by. The image of the potter and the clay, of the vessels made to honour and the vessels made to dishonour, are emblematic of certain inequalities that prevail among men. You have these two inequalities; first, as to our sphere in life; secondly, as to our moral constitution. Now, let us look at this question a little more closely. First, one mans lot is favourable to the cultivation of the Christian temper, while anothers is not. That, I suppose, is inevitable. As there are some races who seem to exist only to be the serfs of the world, delvers in the field, toilers in the mine, so there are individuals elected by Divine decree, fashioned of dull and lethargic temper, to whom all life in the higher human interests has been denied. They cannot rise to the far empyrean, fanned by the wing of the albatross and the eagle; but must be content to skim with heavy flight near the earths surface. Well, if the Potter has made them so, let them so accept the destiny and the doom assigned. Let them do that in the strong conviction that the great Judge will take into account the conditions of life in which He placed them, and ask only if their achievements were equal to their opportunities. To them, little having been committed, from them little shall be required. Your sphere, your work in life, then, is the element given you in which to work out whatever greatness of character is possible within it. It defines your opportunities. These may be few, narrow, unpoetic. But there they are: and faithfulness within them will secure for you the same cordial greeting given by God to him who, having ten times your chances, gives back to the great Householder no more in proportion than you. Secondly, there are diversities of nature among men. You have one man with a sweet nature in him, perfectly and rightly disposed towards goodness and God. You have another, with whom life is a ceaseless struggle, who cannot put the victors foot on his frailties, and who at the end will die, having redeemed little of the wilderness within from its waste and wildness to the peaceful fruitfulness of the garden of God. It strikes you as unfair to ask these men to live in equal nearness to God. It is like asking the vessel made of common earth to have the glitter and beauty of Etruscan ware. Now, what are we to say to those hapless souls to whom fate has denied the moral materials of which the saintly character is formed--whom the Potter has made of common clay? That they will be condemned for not being the richest porcelain? for not attaining the moral beauty which the rigorous necessity of destiny and providence forbid? Surely not? A fine nature is a communicated blessing. It is not the acquisition of ones own will--not the fruit of ones own endeavour. No merit is ascribed to a man who is what he is because of something given him, not acquired by him. If much has been given in a mans moral endowments, much will be required of him; but to whom little has been given, of him little shall be asked. The ideal man of angel temper is different from the ideal man of a dull and sluggish soul. Both may be perfect after their kind. The injustice will not come in till God expects from both vessels the same finish and beauty. The clay vessel may be perfect as a bit of delf; it has its own perfection: the vessel made to be a bit of alabaster or Etruscan ware cannot have more. In conclusion, then, our lot and our nature--whatever these are, tractable or intractable--are given us as the element and the materials out of which we are to evolve a certain ideal character. The lot and the nature are our fate--for them we are not responsible. The character is the product of our own freewill--for it we shall answer. (James Forfar.)

To make one vessel unto honour and another unto dishonour.--

Honour and dishonour; or, the work of the sinner and the work of God

Note--

I. That all men are made of one common nature. We, as the old prophet has it, are the clay, and Thou our Potter, and we are all the work of Thy hand. Notwithstanding the vast variety in colour, conformation, habit, etc., there is such a correspondence, both in the physical and spiritual structure of all the races as to corroborate the declaration that God hath made of one blood all nations of men. Let us not be satisfied in admitting the truth of this doctrine, but--

1. Reverence the rights of all. Nothing can justify us in offering the slightest indignity to that right which belongs to man as man.

2. Sympathise with the woes of all. If we love not our brother whom we have seen, how can we love God whom we have not seen?

3. Diffuse that gospel which is the great want of all. Man, the world over, is a brother; out from the deeps of his heart there rises a cry for the help the gospel offers.

II. That of men made of the same nature, part is being fitted for destruction, and part for glory. The word destruction does not refer to existence, but to happiness. It is here put it antithesis to glory, i.e., all that is blissful in being. Now, it is here implied that there are certain men being framed for the destruction of all happiness, and others for all that is glorious. There are three things which show the truth of this.

1. The inevitable tendency of the two great principles that rule mankind--selfishness and love, or sin and holiness The one tends to the decrease of happiness, and the other to its increase; the one fits for destruction, and the other prepares for glory. A man under the influence of selfishness is one whoso nature is undergoing a rapid process of deterioration. There is a blight in his atmosphere that shall leave his spiritual territory barren. There is a disease in his system that shall, bring on death.

2. The actual experience of mankind. Take two men as types.

(1) One shall be Saul. He had, undoubtedly, a good mental, as well as a goodly corporeal constitution, and on him the Spirit of the Lord once moved. But the man was selfish; and this selfishness continued to fit him for destruction, until, in the cave of Endor, he exclaims, God is departed from me.

(2) The other shall be David. He was but a shepherd bey, having nothing peculiarly great either in bodily or mental make, but his soul developed itself under the reign of Divine love, which led him to serve his generation. And you see this youth, in almost every step of his life, getting into new power and rising into new glory. Now, all this is abundantly confirmed by Scripture, which represents all men as pursuing two paths, the one to destruction, and the other to glory--some sowing to the flesh, and reaping corruption, and some to the Spirit, and reaping everlasting life.

III. That whilst God could have. fitted men for destruction, His work is to prepare them for glory. We are not ignorant of the objection that God is represented as blinding mens eyes, making their hearts fat, and their ears heavy, and as hardening the heart of Pharaoh. True. But when such works are referred to God they must be referred to Him in an occasional, not in a causal--an incidental, not an intentional-a permissive, not a predestinating sense. Otherwise, indeed, moral evil is a Divine institution. Observe--

1. That the apostle does not affirm that God has ever fitted any being for destruction; and there are reasons to believe that He has never done so.

(1) There is analogy. Ask the astronomer or the microscopist if they have found one living thing formed for dishonour, or made for torture?

(2) There is the human constitution. Whether you look at it--

(a) Physically, with its varied members and organs, so exquisitely formed and put together, walking erectly, fronting the world with eyes on heaven, and lord of all that lives beneath the stars, or--

(b) Psychologically, with an intellect to reduce the universe to truth, and bear it along triumphantly in its path of thought, and a soul to mingle in the worship of seraphs, and delight in God,--can you affirm that man was made for dishonour?

(3) There is the conscience. Does the conscience ever testify to the ruined sinner that he was made for destruction? No. Were this the case there could be no remorse--no moral hell. As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.

2. The apostle does affirm that God prepares men for glory; and there are abundant reasons to believe the fact.

(1) There is the spiritual influence of nature. This influence you may call beauty in the flowery fields, sublimity in the surging main, glory in the terrible crystal, or divinity in all; but whatever you call it, there is nothing in it to fit for destruction, but everything to prepare for glory. I often wonder how men can sin abroad, in the bright fields of holy nature.

(2) There is the special system of mediation, including the communications of God to humanity during the first four thousand years, the mission of Christ, the ministry of the gospel, and the agency of the Spirit. In view of all this, who can maintain, for a moment, the notion that God fits men for destruction?

IV. That the history of all men, whatever their destiny, illustrates the character of God. In relation to the destroyed, there is the manifestation of long-suffering, power, wrath; and in relation to the saved, there is the manifestation of the riches of His glory. Conclusion: Learn--

1. That the most solemn attribute of thy nature is the power to misappropriate the blessings of God. Yonder are two plants side by side, rooted in the same soil, visited by the same showers, and shone on by the same sun; the one transmutes all into what will poison life, and the other into that which will sustain it. So the very elements that are preparing the men by thy side for glory--by the perverse use of thy moral freedom--may be fitting thee for destruction.

2. That the most momentous work in the world is the formation of character. It is either a soul-saving or a soul-destroying process. What wouldst thou think of a man who stood casting portions of his property into the bosom of the rolling river? But if thou art forming an ungodly character, thou art doing worse folly than this, thou art wasting thy spiritual self. That vessel which the architect, either from recklessness or ignorance, is constructing on a principle which necessarily unfits her to stand the swelling surges and the hostile gale, you would say, is fitted for destruction, so, in very truth, is thy character if built on the principle of selfishness. (D. Thomas, D.D.)

Vessels of honour and dishonour

Who can say of himself, or of his fellow, whether his is a life of honour or of dishonour? I have seen side by side, amid the heirlooms of a great historic English house, a goblet of massive gold, rich with costly gems, and beside it a common earthern vessel, with broken handle and with battered edge. Which of these is a vessel made unto honour, and which to dishonour? The one has stood amid the blaze of light and the flash of jewels, filled with rare wine, at the banquet table of a king, where mistresses laughed, and where libertines blasphemed; and the other has borne water to the parched lips of dying soldiers, amid the smoke and dust of battle. Which, now, is the vessel made to honour, and which to dishonour? (T. T. Shore, M.A.)

What if God, willing to show His wrath … endured … vessels of wrath … and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy.

Vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy

The sentence is elliptical. Supposing God to have done so, and for certain ends--what then? The apostle does not fill up the sentence himself, but leaves it to be filled up by his readers agreeably to the principles he had been laying down. Would there be unrighteousness with God?

I. The parties spoken of.

1. The vessels of wrath, i.e., the vessels to dishonour of verse 21.

(1) The wrath of God is invariably pointed against sin (chap. 1:18; Eph_2:1-3). It is judicial, not personal; righteousness demanding the punishment of iniquity--angry with the wicked, and insisting on the execution of the law. Sovereign wrath is a contradiction. Sovereign mercy is not. It expresses the unalienable right of the Supreme Ruler to show favour freely to the undeserving. The very word mercy implies desert of evil in its objects. But from the idea of the right of God to inflict suffering on the undeserving, we shrink with horror, for it would ascribe to God the right to do wrong. All punitive infliction presupposes desert. The bestowment of good does not. The latter, then, belongs to sovereignty; the former, to equity.

(2) The sins of men are freely committed. They are done with the choice of their wills. Otherwise there could be no such thing as sin. If a man were used as a mere machine, he could not be a sinner. Every sinner is sensible that neither, on the one hand, is he constrained to evil, nor, on the other, restrained from good. To say that man cannot will what is good is to employ terms most inconsiderate and misleading. What hinders him from willing? Only the absence of right dispositions. But the indisposition is just the want of will; and, there being no other inability in man than this, to say he cannot will resolves itself ultimately into the will not to will; inasmuch as he is kept from willing good by nothing but his aversion to good.

(3) These are truths sufficiently plain, and they serve to show the meaning of the expression fitted to destruction.

(a) More is meant than mere destination or appointment. Fitted includes particularly the idea of congruity between the character and the destruction. The question, then, comes to be--how are they thus fitted and by whom? In finding an answer to this question, observe the marked difference between the expressions on both sides of the alternative. God fits the vessels of mercy, but the vessels of wrath are only fitted for destruction i.e., self-fitted, fitted by their impenitent and obdurate sinfulness. The blessed God cannot be regarded as directly fitting men for destruction by any influence from Him (Jam_1:13-16; Eze_15:6-8).

(b) And, as God cannot make men wicked, neither should He be considered as appointing men to sin--unless it be in the simple sense of leaving them, in punitive abandonment, to the hardening influence of its wilful perpetration (Jud_1:4).

2. The vessels of mercy.

(1) The very idea of mercy excludes all desert on their part, and all obligation on the part of God. Vessels of mercy implies that whatever there may be of good in them, that good is something which they do not deserve, and which God is, in no respect, bound to bestow.

(2) This being the case, their previous preparation to glory is an act of pure sovereignty. Making them meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light (Eph_2:1-10).

II. The conduct of God towards them.

1. It is the same to both. The expression Enduring them with much long-suffering is used, it is true, only in reference to the former; but it is necessary, to complete the sense, that it be, as it were, carried forward, and considered as if repeated, in regard to the latter.

2. The long-suffering of God is one of the most wonderful facts in the history of our apostate race. It was manifested in His dealings with the antediluvian world, and in the whole course of His procedure toward the Jewish people. It has been manifested all along, and continues to be, in the experience of the race at large, and in the life of every individual. Who is there, of all the children of men, that is not the subject of it?

3. The idea implies the existence of a tendency in a contrary direction. The holiness of God is infinitely opposed to all sin, and while His holiness abhors it, His justice calls for its punishment. In proportion, then, to the strength of these principles of the Divine character, is the difficulty of forbearance with the workers of iniquity.

4. By this long-suffering, the great majority of men, alas! are only encouraged in evil (Ecc_8:11). They thus criminally, because wilfully, abuse the Divine goodness; and thus fit themselves for destruction (Rom_2:4-5). But others dealt with in the same long-suffering, alter very protracted and obstinate resistance of the means of grace, relent, believe, and are saved. Toward both there has been shown much long-suffering. To many a believer--especially to such as have been converted later in life than others--might I make an appeal for the truth of this.

III. The design or object of this conduct here supposed by the apostle. Suppose God does as the potter does: what if this were the case? It is evident that the question is intended to involve another question: Would there be any ground of complaint? Who, with any just cause, could say a single word against the procedure? Remember that men are not here spoken of as creatures, but as sinners--guilty subjects of Gods moral government, breakers of His law-all alike obnoxious to the visitation of His punitive justice. The general principle, then, is this--that God, the Supreme Ruler, so orders His rectoral procedure towards sinful men, as that He may most effectually secure the glory of His own character and government. Let us look at both sides of the alternative.

1. In Gods longsuffering towards those who ultimately perish, what is His course? He lengthens out their period of trial. He applies every mode of treatment, in itself, as a moral means, fitted to bring them to repentance. In doing this, He provides for a satisfactory display of righteousness in their final condemnation; so that none can say that they perished unwarned, untried, uninvited. In the forbearance of God, they have found opportunity for repentance, and they have guiltily misimproved it; converting it into an opportunity of further and further showing the evil principles and dispositions by which they are actuated, and which are the grounds of their sentence of death in the judgment. As an exemplification of our meaning, take the case of the flood (cf. 1Pe_3:19-20; 2Pe_3:9)

. And as it was with the antediluvian sinners, so was it with the Jews. Gods judgments on them were not only deserved, but by His whole procedure toward them shown to be deserved ere they were inflicted. Their mouths were stopped. And thus it will be at last. God the Judge has determined that He will not only be just in His sentences of condemnation, but show Himself just. Who will venture to find fault with this?

2. Of the other side of the alternative the import is sufficiently obvious. The riches of His glory evidently signifies here His glorious riches--and that means, as evidently, the riches of His mercy. The glorious riches of Gods mercy are made known by salvation in general having been provided; by the means of its provision; and by every individual instance of salvation bestowed. But the riches of His mercy are more signally displayed in some cases of salvation than in others. In particular eases, by His forbearance and long-suffering, He prepares wonderful exemplifications of the exuberant abundance and untrammelled freeness of this grace. Let this apostle himself tell us of his own ease, as an instance in point (1Ti_1:12-16).

Conclusion:

1. There is a tendency at present to dwell too exclusively on the Divine love, and to make too little of the other attributes of the Divine character. Because the atonement is universal, and the gift of Christ is the highest expression of love, therefore Divine love must be love without distinctions. As if, because the atonement has been made for all, in order to there being a consistent ground on which all might be invited to pardon, therefore there can be and must be no distinctions in the saving application of the atonement. God says, A new heart also will I give you, etc. Does He do this alike to all?

2. While it is right for us to look at both sides of the alternative, it is especially delightful for us to contemplate Him preparing for glory the vessels of mercy. His time of preparing them is very various. He can fit them in a moment: while sometimes the preparation extends through many a year. He spares them sometimes as instruments for His use in preparing other vessels of mercy for the same glory with themselves. And then, when He takes them to the inheritance of the glory for which He has prepared them, and which He has prepared for them--how delightful our emotions in looking after them. Be has taken these vessels where He may put them to uses more glorifying to Him, and more honourable to themselves, than any use He could make of them in their imperfect state below! (R. Wardlaw, D.D.)

Vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy

I. Vessels of wrath.

1. Whom does this phrase describe? Not persons pre-ordained to wrath, but deserving of wrath.

2. How are they fitted for destrucion? Not by Divine operation, but by their own wilful impertinence.

3. How does God use them? For the display of His justice and power.

4. How is the righteousness of the Divine procedure vindicated?

(1) By His patient forbearance.

(2) By the opportunity afforded for repentance.

(3) By the offers of His grace.

II. Vessels of mercy.

1. Their determination.

(1) Not by unconditional election.

(2) But by the reception of mercy and belief of the truth.

2. Their preparation--

(1) In life.

(2) By grace.

(3) Through the sanctification of the Spirit.

3. Their use. To display the riches of Gods glory--His wisdom, love and power in their salvation.

4. Their destiny--glory.

(1) In the perfection of their nature and happiness.

(2) In the presence of God.

(3) For ever.

5. The foundation of all their happiness. The sovereign grace of God in Christ. (J. Lyth, D.D.)

Vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy

A certain minister, having changed his views on certain points of Divine Truth, was waited upon by an old acquaintance, who wished to reclaim him to his former creed. Finding he could not succeed in his object, he became warm, and told his friend that God had given him up to strong delusion, and that he was a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction. I think, brother, was the response, you have mistaken the sense of the passage you last referred to. Vessels are denominated according to their contents. A chemist, in conducting a stranger through his laboratory would say, This is a vessel of turpentine, that of vitriol, etc., always giving to the vessel the name of the article it contains. Now when I see a man full of the holy and lovely spirit of Christ, devoted to His service and imitating His example, I say that man is a vessel of mercy, whom God hath aforetime prepared unto glory; but when I see a man full of everything but the spirit of the Bible--opposed to Gods moral government, seeking his own things rather than the things of Christ, and filled with malice, wrath, and all uncharitableness, I am compelled to consider him a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction., (Biblical Museum.)

The vessels of wrath

The doctrine of reprobation is a malicious libel on mercy. It is an attempt of Satan to graft his own character upon the Lord; and to make Him whose name is Love like him whose nature is hatred. Consider--

I. The characters here described.

1. Wrath means far more than anger--and it becomes a stronger word as the capacity for wrath increases. The kings wrath is as the roaring of a lion.

(1) Now measuring upwards in this way, what must Gods wrath be, whose every attribute is illimitable? and the very infinitude of His mercy proves what must be the extent of His wrath.

(2) And are there any creatures exposed to this? Yes, it must be so where sin is. It is far more anomalous to suppose moral guilt existing and God not angry, than it is to imagine rebels and a king unmoved, or children fiends in human shape and the father indifferent. The wrath of God must come, in the very nature of things, upon the children of disobedience. He that committeth sin must be a vessel of wrath by nature, and if that nature be not changed, a double portion of wrath abideth on him.

2. Mark the term which expresses the reception of this anger--vessels; not leaves, which hold the storm-drop for an instant and then allow it to trickle off, but vessels retaining it. You may say, Such a load as Gods wrath must crush me; and in one sense it will; but in another it will not; you will have powers of endurance as great as the saints power of enjoyment. Hard and impenitent hearts are treasuring up wrath against the day of the wrath. Wrath shall come upon them, as Paul says, to the uttermost.

3. And moreover the sinner is a vessel fitted for destruction. What by? Sin. He who wills not the death of the sinner is not likely to fit him for dying. We prepare ourselves for destruction; Oh, Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself.

II. Gods conduct towards them. He endures them with much long-suffering. How much let your unnumbered sins declare. Why! any forbearance in your case were much long-suffering. All the day long has God been stretching forth His hand to a disobedient and gainsaying people. He gives you mercies, and you take them as your right: He gives you privileges, and you abuse them; He gives you a Saviour, and you crucify Him afresh; He offers you His Spirit, and you do despite to that Spirit of grace. Now is not a moments forbearance, in such a case, long-suffering?

III. The reasons for such conduct.

1. To show His wrath. Yet how could He show His wrath by long-suffering towards sinners? It appears that such a course would hide and not show it. Now the word translated show, means to point out as with the finger; and in this way God throws into the strongest relief His wrath.

(1) He develops His own character of love; He opens out His plans of mercy for years. Well! some may say, This tolerance of guilt speaks an indifference to it. You are wrong; the Lords long-suffering is but a blue sky on which you see in fearful and distinct outline the massive storm-cloud as it rolls over the sinners head and then bursts; it is but the sweet and natural beamings of the Lords countenance which gives His frown a doubly appalling blackness; it does not lessen His anger; it does not qualify His abhorrence of sin; it does not subtract from, but it adds to, the final display of His just indignation.

(2) And in another sense it shows it, for it clearly explains its real character. It is not the wrath of man, or he had struck at once. But the Lord is slow to anger; He wills not the death of the sinner; and when at last His wrath is seen, it is that of a Judge who punishes, not con amore but ex officio. The Lord delights in mercy, not in punishment. Wrath must come at last, but it comes with a slow foot. Mercy flies; anger creeps. Patience lingers and lingers at the threshold, keeping punishment knocking at the door. Gods endurance is indeed the interpreter of His wrath; it shows that His final destruction of the vessels of wrath is not that of an enemy gloating over the fall and death of his foe, but it is that of a father slowly, solemnly, and necessarily banishing a base and incorrigible son for ever from His presence.

2. To make known His power. But how can power be made known by a refusal to exert that power? Forbearance is often a more splendid achievement than all the labours of Hercules put together. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city. The Lords endurance is one of the most signal displays of His omnipotence. When I gaze upon the scene around Calvary, I look upon a more stupendous proof of power than when I behold the hundred and eighty-five thousand corpses of Assyrian warriors, all smitten by the angel of the Lord in one night. And when I look around upon this congregation, and necessarily think of many among you as vessels of wrath endured, enemies of God treated with much long-suffering, I see in each one of you a monument of the Lords power as notable as in the case of that weeping, wailing, and lost soul. But, lastly, Gods long-suffering makes known His power, by giving greater prominence at last to His power of punishing. It is like the stillness before a storm: you may hear a whisper; the rustle of a leaf is noticed; and when the first roll of thunder comes pealing throughout the hushed air, making the ground shake and the rocks resound, its fearful voice is the better articulated owing to the previous stillness; the thunder, like Gods power, is made known by the calm which preceded. And what is the conclusion of the whole matter? First of all, by the light of Gods Word, and by the aid of prayer, inquire whether you are vessels of wrath or vessels of mercy? Are you united to Christ by a living faith, or alienated from God by wicked works? And if the result of this inquiry be a conviction that you are still a vessel of wrath, oh! tremble over the fact. That vessel becomes more capacious every day; every mercy and long-suffering despised is an enlargement. What will it hold at last if you go on and on increasing its size, and making it fitter and fitter to hold more of that wrath which shall fill but never burst it. Step and pray for grace to arrest this self-fitting for destruction. Pray that the Lords Spirit may transform you from a vessel of wrath into a vessel of mercy. Pray that His much long-suffering may melt your hard heart, and make you long to have His love instead of His wrath shed abroad in your soul. Pray that the blood of Christ may, as it were, rinse out the polluted vessel, wash away all the wrath, and fill to the brim with mercy--fill it now; and for ever and ever fill it, as throughout eternity that vessel grows larger. (D. F. Jarman, B.A.)

Vessels of mercy

I. The vessels.

1. They are made of the same lump as the vessels of wrath. Thou who hast hope of heaven look back to the miry clay whence thou wast drawn! There was nothing in thee by nature better than that which is found in any other man. Had He left thee to thyself, thou hadst been as base and vile as others. If there be a difference in thee, the difference is of grace and not of nature.

2. They are as much as any other portion of the clay, entirely in the potters hand. Had the potter willed to leave that mass of clay alone, we should have been vessels of wrath most surely. Hells thistles grow self-sown, but Gods wheat needs a husbandman. Vessels of mercy fit themselves for destruction, but grace alone can prepare a soul for glory. If the Lord had permitted the whole human race to perish He would have been infinitely just. If He had chosen to spare a few, that would have been an act of surprising mercy. Inasmuch, however, as He hath taken so much of the clayey mass, as to make vessels of mercy innumerable as the stars of heaven, unto His name be all the glory.

3. Gods chosen ones: are--

(1) Vessels. A vessel is not a fountain, not a creator of the water, but a container. So the redeemed are not fountains by nature, out of whom there springeth up anything that is good. At one time they are full of themselves, but grace empties them, and then as empty vessels they are set in the way of Gods goodness, God fills them to the brim with His loving-kindness, and so are they proved to be the vessels of His mercy. Remember all that God asks of thee in order to thy salvation is, not to do anything, but to holdout thine empty hand and take all thou wantest. The elect of God are vessels only. They may afterwards give out to others, but they can only give out what God has put in them. They may run over with gratitude, but it is only because God has filled them with grace; they may stream forth with holiness, but it is only because the Lord keeps the supply overflowing.

(2) Vessels of mercy. In order that they may be such it is necessary that they should be sinful and miserable. Pity may be given to the miserable, but mercy must be bestowed upon the sinful. For a judge to talk of mercy to the innocent would be to insult them; and for the philanthropist to offer pity to the happy would be but to mock them. The redeemed are not vessels of merit but vessels of mercy.

II. The potter at his work. When a potter is about to make a vessel he does not take up the clay and put it on the wheel and then leave it to chance. No--

1. He has his plan. So it is with our Divine Potter. He takes the poor sinner; He puts him on the wheel, and as that wheel revolves the potter looks and sees in that clay a future something which does not appear to the vessel. It does not yet appear what we shall be; but the Potter knows, He will present us without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing.

2. He makes the outlines in the clay. You may have seen the man at work. Perhaps at the very first moment you may form a rough guess of what the whole thing is to be, though the elaboration you cannot yet discover. Certain it is, that the moment a man begins to be separated for heaven by the grace of God in his soul, you may see the outlines of what he is to be. There is--

(1) Faith in Christ.

(2) Love to Christ.

(3) A hope that maketh not ashamed, and a joy which makes glad his countenance.

It is but the bare outline, for the glory which excelleth is not there. The vase is only in its embryo, but yet sufficiently developed to give a prophecy of its finished form.

3. The gradual completion of the article. There will not always be in you the bare outline, but as time goes on there will be some of the beautiful lines and filling-up. The Christian will be getting more and more like his Master. And if we can see here on earth vessels getting ready for perfection, and if those vessels have so much beauty in them, what must they be when at last they shall be finished. If this world be fair, how much fairer shall the new world be.

III. The potters mark upon his vessels. In all manufactories there is always some trade-mark which is not to be imitated, and without which no vessel is the genuine production of the professed maker. You may know to-day whether you are a vessel of mercy by the Masters mark upon you.

1. That mark is--calling. Has Divine grace called you out of darkness into marvellous light? for if so, it is not a matter of question as to whether you are ordained to eternal life.

2. That is a mark which no man can put upon you. The earnest minister may cry aloud and spare not, but it is in vain calling to deaf ears. The Lord alone can so speak, that the deaf, nay, the dead, must hear. Hast thou ever, then, felt a calling which is not of man, neither by man? Has the voice of mercy so said, Come to Jesus, that thy heart has said Thy face, Lord, will I seek? Has He said to thee, Mary, and hast thou said. Raboni? Has He cried to thee, Zaccheus make haste and come down, and hast thou come down and received Him in thine house. Hast thou had that call, for if so, thou hast the mark of the Potter upon thee.

3. As this is a mark which no man can put upon you, so it is one which no man can take away from you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Vessels of mercy

I. Why believers are compared to vessels. The figure suggests the idea of--

1. Capacity. Capable of being filled. Their value is in their emptiness (2Ki_4:3-6). Sense of need.

2. Reception. The first thing needed, when emptied, is to receive. Mercy (Rom_9:23; 1Ti_1:16). Pardon (Act_26:18). The engrafted word (Jam_1:21). Christ (Col_2:6). Power (Act_1:8).

3. Possession. To hold what is put into them. The Word of God (Col_3:16; Joh_15:7). Not leaky (Heb_2:1).

II. The honour conferred on these vessels.

1. They bear Gods Name (Act_9:15). Character (Deu_28:10). Service (Deu_10:8).

2. They contain Gods treasure {2Co_4:7). The vessel--frail and worthless. The treasure--all powerful and priceless.

3. They are used in Gods service (2Ti_2:21). Their meetness consists in being set apart--cleansed--filled. (E. H. Hopkins.)

Vessels of mercy

They are such in their--

I. Formation.

II. Position.

III. Condition. Mercy--

1. Pervades their thoughts.

2. Is uttered in their words.

3. Is expressed in their actions.

4. Beams in their looks.

5. Glows in their prayers.

IV. Progression.

V. Preservation.

VI. Glorification. Application:

1. If thou be a vessel of mercy, let love and gratitude prompt thee to commend that mercy to others which thou hast received.

2. If a vessel of wrath, let nothing divert you from earnestly seeking mercy at the Cross of Christ. (Evangelical Preacher.)

The mystery of God in human history

I. His design. To display His--

1. Glory.

2. Power.

3. Mercy.

4. Wrath.

II. His procedure.

1. He endures patiently with sinners.

2. Allows them to work out their own ruin.

3. Confers the riches of His grace on them that believe.

4. Prepares them for glory.

III. His righteousness.

1. He calls all men to repentance.

2. Offers them His mercy in Christ.

3. Both Jews and Gentiles. (J. Lyth, D.D.)

Even us whom He hath called.--

The called

I. Who are called.

1. Not the righteous.

2. But sinners--both of the Jews and the Gentiles.

II. How are they called.

1. By the gospel.

2. By the ministration of the Word.

3. By the Spirit of God.

III. Unto what are they called? To the enjoyment of--

1. Pardon.

2. Holiness.

3. Heaven, (J. Lyth, D.D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Or [This word presents a dilemma, thus: Either the clay (thing formed) has no right to question, or the potter has no right to dictate. In the Greek the form of the question indicates the affirmative answer: "The potter has a right to dictate"] hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another [part of the lump a vessel] unto dishonor? [God is the potter, the human race is the clay, and the vessels are nations. Being under obligations to none, for all, having fallen into sin, had thereby forfeited his regard and care as Creator, God, for the good of all, made election that the Jewish nation should be a vessel of honor ( Act_13:17 ) to hold the truth ( 2Co_4:7 ; Rom_3:1-2 ), the covenants and the progenital line through which came the Messiah. Later he chose the Egyptians as a vessel of dishonor, to be punished for their abuse of the covenant people, and the murder of their little ones. In Paul's day he was choosing Gentiles (Europeans) as vessels of honor to hold the knowledge of the gospel. This choosing and forming is to the prejudice of no man's salvation, for all are invited in matters pertaining to eternal life, and each temporal election is for the eternal benefit of all. Potter's clay and potter's vessels are used to indicate national weakness ( Dan_2:41-44 ; Lam_4:2 ; Isa_41:25 ; Psa_2:9 ; Rev_2:26-27 ) and national dependence ( Isa_64:8-12 ) and national punishment ( Jer_19:1 ; Jer_10:13 ; Isa_30:14 ). It is a national figure ( Ecc_3:10-12 ), yet it recognizes national free will ( Jer_18:1-12 ). In the single instance where it is used individually, it is employed by Paul in a passage very similar to this, yet clearly recognizing the power of human vessels to change destinies by the exercise of free will ( 2Ti_2:20-21 ). But no individual vessel is one of honor till cleansed by blood ( Heb_9:21-22 ; Act_9:15 ; Act_22:14-16 ), and who will say that a vessel cleansed in Christ's blood is one of dishonor? And we are cleansed or not according to our own free choice.]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Rom 9:21. Ἤ) particle of interrogation [an?].—ἐξουσίαν, power) construed with, over the clay. The potter does not make the clay but digs it out; God makes man, therefore He has greater power [over man], than the potter [over the clay]. But absolute power and liberty do not imply, that the will and decree are absolute. If God had left the whole human race under the power of sin and death, He would not have done unjustly, but He did not exercise that right. [Man is struck with the vivid exhibition of Divine power, so that he ever after unlearns all the outrageous (unreasonable) suspicions of his thoughts, against the justice [righteousness] of God, Mat 20:15; Exo 20:20; Job 42:2; Job 42:6.—V. g.].—φυράματος) lump, which has been prepared from clay and softened by steeping, and has its parts now more homogeneous.—εἰς ἀτιμίαν, to dishonour) Paul speaks circumspectly, he does not yet say, to wrath: vessel must be construed with these words [To make one, a vessel unto honour, etc.]

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_9:21. Ἠ] The sense, without an interrogation, is: Unless perhaps the potter should not have power over his clay (τοῦ πηλοῦ), to make (ποιῆσαι, the infinitive of more precise definition), etc. Comp. Wis_15:7.

ἐκ τοῦ αὐτοῦ φυράμ.] The φύραμα (comp. on Rom_11:16; 1Co_5:6) is the lump of the πηλός, mixed with water and kneaded, out of which the potter makes the different vessels. In the application of the simile, the same lump denotes human nature in and by itself, as it is alike in all with its opposite moral capabilities and dispositions, but not yet conceived of in its definite individual moral stamp. Out of this, like the potter out of the clay-dough which is susceptible of various moulding, Godwho does not merely allow to come into being the different moral quality of individuals, in order then to fulfil on them the ἐλεεῖν or σκληρύνειν which He will (Hofmann), but effectively produces itmakes partly such as are destined to stand in honour (namely, as partakers of the Messianic glory), partly such as are to stand in dishonour (namely, through the eternal ἀπώλεια). Comp. Rom_9:22-23. See also 2Ti_2:20-21. The former is the effect of His ἐλεεῖν, as in the case of Moses; the latter that of His σκληρύνειν, as in the case of Pharaoh. Much too general and rationalizing, in opposition to the text, is van Hengels view, that the figure refers generally to the inexplicabiles divini rerum humanarum regiminis rationes; and Beyschlags view amounts to the same thing: out of the material of the human race (?) which is at His disposal as it continues to come into existence, to stamp individuals with this or that historical destination (?).

εἰς τιμήν] This is the destination of the vessel; it is either to be honoured, so that it has τιμήν (as e.g. a sacred vase), or is to experience the opposite, so that ἀτιμία cleaves to it (as e.g. an utensil destined to foul use).

Observe the purposely-chosen arrangement of the words: the juxtaposition οί οὐκ ἔχει (or lacks), the juxtaposition of ὁ κεραμεὺς τοῦ πηλοῦ (although τοῦ πηλ. belongs to ἐξους.; comp. Buttmann, neut. Gr. p. 332), and the prefixing of εἰς τιμήν.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom 9:21 . ἢ οὐκ ἔχει ἐξουσίαν ὁ κεραμεὺς τοῦ πηλοῦ κ . τ . λ . The ἢ puts this as the alternative. Either you must recognise this absoluteness of God in silence, or you must make the pre-posterous assertion that the potter has not power over the clay, etc. The power of the potter over the clay is of course undoubted: he takes the same lump, and makes one vessel for noble and another for ignoble uses; it is not the quality of the clay, but the will of the potter, that decides to what use each part of the lump is to be put. True, the objector might say, but irrelevant. For man is not clay, and the relation of God to man is not that of the potter to dead matter. To say that it is, is just to concede the objector’s point the moral significance is taken out of life, and God has no room any longer to pronounce moral judgments, or to speak of man in terms of praise or blame.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rom_9:21

Hath not the potter power over the clay, out of the same lump to make one vessel, etc., etc. The word ἐξουσία rendered power, means also authority and right. In this case it means, the lawful power or right; He not only can do it, but he has a perfect right to do it; see the use of the Greek word in Mat_21:23; 1Co_8:9, and frequently elsewhere. This verse is merely an illustration of the idea contained in the last clause of the preceding. The Creator has a perfect right to dispose of his creatures as he sees fit. From the very idea of a creature, it can have no claim on the Creator; whether it exists at all, or how, or where, from the nature of the case, must depend on him, and be at his sovereign disposal. The illustration of this truth which follows, is peculiarly appropriate. When the potter takes a piece of clay into his hands, and approaches the wheel, how entirely does it rest with himself to determine the form that clay shall take, and the use to which it shall be destined? Can any thing be more unreasonable, than that the clay, supposing it endued with intelligence, should complain that the form given it was not so comely, or the use to which it was destined not so honorable, as those which fell to the lot of a different portion of the same mass? Are not these points on which the potter has a most perfect right to decide for himself, and regarding which the thing formed can have no right to complain or question? And so it is with God; the mass of fallen men are in his hands, and it is his right to dispose of them at pleasure; to make all vessels unto honor, or all unto dishonor, or some to one and some to the other. These are points on which, from the nature of the relation, we have no right to question or complain. The illustration here employed occurs elsewhere in Scripture, as in Isa_64:8, But now, O Lord, thou art our Father; we are the clay, and thou art our Potter; and we all are the work of thy hands. See also Isa_29:16, and Jer_18:3-6, Then I went down to the potters house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel which he made of clay was marred in the hands of the potter; so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter I saith the Lord. Behold, as clay is in the potters hand, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel. In the sovereignty here asserted, it is God as moral governor, and not God as creator, who is brought to view. It is not the right of God to create sinful beings in order to punish them, but his right to deal with sinful beings according to his good pleasure, that is here, and elsewhere asserted. He pardons or punishes as he sees fit.

Charles Hodge — Commentary on Romans (1835), First Corinthians (1857), and Ephesians (1856) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Alluding to the creation of Adam, he compareth mankind not yet made (but in the Creator’s mind) to a lump of clay: whereof afterward God made and doth daily make, according as he purposed from everlasting both such as should be elect, and such as should be reprobate, as also this word, making, declareth.

Whereas in the objection propounded, mention was only made of vessels to dishonor: yet he speaketh of the other also in this answer, for that he proveth the Creator to be just in either of them, as the rule of contraries doth require.

To honest uses.

Seeing then, that in the name of dishonor, the ignomy of everlasting death is signified, they speak with Paul, which say, that some are made of God to most just destruction: and they [that] are offended with this kind of speech bewray their own folly.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Hath not the potter power over the clay; of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another to dishonour?--"The objection is founded on ignorance or misapprehension of the relation between God and His sinful creatures; supposing that He is under obligation to extend His grace to all, whereas He is under obligation to none. All are sinners, and have forfeited every claim to His mercy; it is therefore perfectly competent to God to spare one and not another, to make one vessel to honor and another to dishonor. But it is to be borne in mind that Paul does not here speak of God's right over His creatures as creatures, but as sinful creatures: as he himself clearly intimates in the next verses. It is the cavil of a sinful creature against his Creator that he is answering, and be does so by showing that God is under no obligation to give His grace to any, but is as sovereign as in fashioning the clay" [HODGE]. But, Second: "There is nothing unjust in such sovereignty."

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 21. Hath not the potter power over the clay] The apostle continues his answer to the Jew. Hath not God shown, by the parable of the potter, Jer 18:1, c., that he may justly dispose of nations, and of the Jews in particular, according as he in his infinite wisdom may judge most right and fitting even as the potter has a right, out of the same lump of clay, to make one vessel to a more honourable and another to a less honourable use, as his own judgment and skill may direct; for no potter will take pains to make a vessel merely that he may show that he has power to dash it to pieces? For the word came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words. Then I went down to the potter's house, and, behold, he wrought a work upon the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hands of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. It was not fit for the more honourable place in the mansion, and therefore he made it for a less honourable place, but as necessary for the master's use there, as it could have been in a more honourable situation. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation-to build and to plant it; is it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them. The reference to this parable shows most positively that the apostle is speaking of men, not individually, but nationally; and it is strange that men should have given his words any other application with this scripture before their eyes.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

21. Has not the worker of the clay? etc. The reason why what is formed ought not to contend with its former, is, that the former does nothing but what he has a right to do. By the word power, he means not that the maker has strength to do according to his will, but that this privilege rightly and justly belongs to him. For he intends not to claim for God any arbitrary power but what ought to be justly ascribed to him.

And further, bear this in mind, — that as the potter takes away nothing from the clay, whatever form he may give it; so God takes away nothing from man, in whatever condition he may create him. Only this is to be remembered, that God is deprived of a portion of his honor, except such an authority over men be conceded to him as to constitute him the arbitrator of life and death.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(21) Hath not the potter . . .?—In strict logic, this verse would supply a confirmation, rather than a refutation, of the original objection. If man is merely as clay in the hands of the potter, it would not be un-reasonable to say, “Why doth He yet find fault?” No one would think of blaming a piece of earthenware because it was well or badly made. The argument of the Apostle is not directed to this. He has left the point with which he started in Rom_9:19, and is engaged in proving the position taken up in Rom_9:20. Whatever they may be, God’s dealings are not to be canvassed by men. Still, we cannot overlook the fact that there is apparently a flaw in the logic, though, perhaps, only such a flaw as is inseparable from our necessarily imperfect conceptions of this mysterious subject. The two lines of thought—that which proves the divine sovereignty and that which proves human freedom—run parallel to each other, and are apt to collude when drawn together. (See Notes on Rom_8:29-30; Rom_9:11; Rom_9:18, above.)

For the imagery of the clay and the potter, compare Isa_64:8; Jer_18:3-10.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21. the potter—the clay] This is the simile likewise in Isaiah just quoted, and in Isa_64:8. (Cp. Jer_18:1-10.) It gets its force from the perfect pliability of the material. Certainly the illustration does not relieve the stern utterances it illustrates; nor is it meant to do so.—It must be remembered that the “clay” moulded by the Eternal here is not Humanity merely, but Humanity as sinful, and, as such, void of the least claim to furnish “vessels unto honour.” (See ante, long note on Rom_9:11.) This, however, is not the main thought here, but rather the immeasurable difference of position between the Creator and the Creature.

lump] Lit. kneaded mass. Same word as Rom_11:16; 1Co_5:6-7; Gal_5:9.

one vessel unto honour, &c.] Cp., for similar language, 2Ti_2:20-21. The connexion there is akin to this, but such as brings out (what is not in view here) the moral results of sovereign grace. The special imagery of the potter and clay is absent there.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

What if God, willing to show his wrath,.... The apostle proceeds to clear God from any charge of cruelty and unmercifulness, by observing his conduct in time, both towards those he passes by, and towards those he chooses; for in this and the following verse, nothing is said relating to any act of God before time, everything of that kind being considered already. In this verse, the apostle considers the conduct of God towards the vessels of dishonour; and let it be observed, that these are called

vessels of wrath fitted for destruction; they are said to be vessels, and so no longer considered in the clay, in the mass and heap of creatureship, but as creatures formed and made, and brought into being; and so to be used as instruments in God's hands, to subserve his ends and purposes, and therefore called "vessels"; and not only so, but "vessels of wrath", fallen sinful creatures, and so deserving of the wrath of God, and objects of his vindictive justice, in whom he may righteously display his wrath and vengeance: hence they may be so called, being as vessels filled with his wrath; as such who are the instruments and executioners of his wrath are called, in Isa 13:5, , "vessels of his wrath"; and in Jer 50:25; where the Septuagint use the same phrase as here: and they are moreover said to be "fitted for destruction", as Haman is said to be by the Jews (o); whom they affirm to be the same with Memucan, and ask why is his name called Memucan? and answer, , "because he was fitted for punishment": so these are said to be "fitted for destruction", that is, eternal damnation; not by God, for this does not respect God's act of ordination to punishment; but by Satan, the god of this world, that blinds them, who works effectually in them, and leads them captive at his will; and by themselves, by their own wickedness, hardness of heart, and impenitence, do they treasure up to themselves wrath, against the day of wrath, so that their destruction is of themselves: a phrase somewhat like this is used in Psa 31:12, where the Psalmist, under some dismal apprehensions of himself, says, that he was like , "a perishing vessel", or "a vessel of perdition"; the Septuagint render it, , "a lost vessel". Now what is the method of the divine conduct towards such persons? he

endures them with much longsuffering; as he did the old world, before he destroyed it; and as he did Pharaoh, before he cut him off: God not only supports such persons in their beings, amidst all their impieties and iniquities, but follows and fills them with his providential goodness, insomuch that many of them have more than heart can wish; nay, to many he affords the outward means of grace, which they slight and despise; externally calls them, but they refuse, loving darkness rather than light, and therefore are inexcusable: now if after all this patience, indulgence, and forbearance, when he could in justice have sent them to hell long ago, he is "willing to show his wrath"; his displicency at sin and sinners, his vindictive justice, his righteous vengeance:

and to make his power known; what it is he can do, by the utter destruction and damnation of such persons; what man in his senses can ever find fault with such a procedure, or charge it with tyranny, cruelty, and unmercifulness?

(o) T. Bab. Megilia, fol. 12. 2.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?

Ver. 21. Of the same lump] The apostle alludeth to man’s creation, and therehence ascendeth to God’s eternal decree of predestination.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hath not the potter ... - This same sovereign right of God the apostle proceeds to urge from another illustration, and another passage from the Old Testament; Isa 64:8, “But now, O Lord, thou art our Father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.” This passage is preceded in Isaiah by one declaring “the depravity of man;” Isa 64:6, “We are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.” As they were polluted with sin, as they had transgressed the Law of God, and had no claim and no merit, God might bestow his favors as he pleased, and mould them as the potter did the clay. He would do no injury to those who were left, and “who had no claim to his mercy,” if he bestowed favors on others, any more than the potter would do injustice to one part of the mass, if he put it to an ignoble use, and moulded another part into a vessel of honor.

This is still the condition of sinful people. God does no injustice to a man if he leaves him to take his own course to ruin, and makes another, equally undeserving, the recipient of his mercy. He violated none of my rights by not conferring on me the talents of Newton or of Bacon; or by not placing me in circumstances like those of Peter and Paul. Where all are undeserving, the utmost that can be demanded is that he should not treat them with injustice. And this is secured even in the case of the lost. No man will suffer more than he deserves; nor will any man go to perdition feeling that he has “a claim” to better treatment than he receives. The same sentiment is found in Jer 18:6, “O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, etc.”

The passage in Isaiah proves that God has the right of a sovereign over guilty individuals; that in Jeremiah, that he has the same right over nations; thus meeting the whole case as it was in the mind of the apostle. These passages, however, assert only the right of God to do it, without affirming anything about the manner in which it is done. In fact, God bestows his favors in a mode very different from that in which a potter moulds his clay. God does not create holiness by a mere act of power, but he produces it in a manner consistent with the moral agency of people; and bestows his favors not to compel people, but to incline them to be willing to receive them; Psa 110:3, “Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power.” It should be further remarked, that the argument of the apostle here does not refer to “the original creation” of people, as if God had then made them one for honor and another for dishonor. He refers to man as fallen and lost. His argument is this: “Man is in ruins: he is fallen; he has no claim on God; all deserve to die; on this mass, where none have any claim, he may bestow life on whom he pleases, without injury to others; he may exercise the right of a sovereign to pardon whom he pleases; or of a potter to mould any part of the useless mass to purposes of utility and beauty.”

Potter - One whose occupation it is to make earthen vessels.

Power - This word denotes here not merely “physical power,” but authority, right; see Mat 7:29, translated “authority;” Mat 21:23; 2Th 3:9; Mar 2:10; Luk 5:24, “The Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, etc.”

Lump - Mass. It denotes anything that is reduced to a fine consistency, and mixed, and made soft by water; either clay, as in this place, or the mass produced of grain pounded and mixed with water; Rom 11:16, “If the first-fruit be holy, the lump is also holy;” 1Co 5:6, “Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?”

One vessel - A cup, or other utensil, made of clay.

Unto honour - Fitted to an honorable use, or designed for a more useful and refined purpose.

Unto dishonour - To a meaner service, or more common use. This is a common mode of expression among the Hebrews. The lump here denotes the mass of people, sinners, having no claim on God. The potter illustrates God’s right over that mass, to dispose of it as seems good in his sight. The doctrine of the passage is, that people have no right to complain if God bestows his blessings where and when he chooses.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Annon potestatem habet figulus, &c.? St. John Chrysostom (p. 142.) expressly takes notice, that we must not by this comparison pretend that man has not free-will, &c. Greek: entautha ou to autexousion anairon. &c.

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George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

He argueth from the less to the greater, that if a potter hath power over his clay, to form it as he pleaseth, then God hath much more power over his creatures, to form them or order them as he listeth. God’s authority over his creature, is greater than that of a potter over his clay. The potter made not his clay; but both clay and potter are made by God. Here is something implied, that as there is no difference in the matter or lump out of which the potter frameth diversity of vessels, so there is no difference in mankind; all men are alike by nature, and in the same corrupt state; both those who are elected, and those who are rejected, that are made vessels of mercy, or vessels of wrath. And here is this expressed, that as the potter maketh vessels of honour or dishonour, of nobler or viler use, out of the same lump, as he listeth, and is not bound to give a reason of his so doing to his pots; so God may choose some, and reject others, and give no account thereof unto his creatures. The potter takes nothing from the clay, of what form soever he makes it; and the Creator doth no wrong to the creature, however he doth dispose of it.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

21. Clay—May be an image of perfect passivity. It may also, as possessed of alternative possibilities and pliabilities, be, as here, an emblem of free-agency. And the apostle’s question is, Has not God a right to create a free-agent, or to establish a system of equitable free-agency? Has not God the right to do right?

Power—The Greek word implies just authority.

Same lump—Inasmuch as the same free-agent has an alternative capacity for either course and for either result.

Unto honour—In view of his faith and obedience.

Dishonour—In view of his unbelief and sin.

Our reader will find the perfect demonstration of our exposition of this verse if he will turn to Jer_18:1-10, and carefully study there the original of Paul’s figure.

Jeremiah, by divine command, goes “down to the potter’s house” to see the potter’s “work on the wheels.” “And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to make it.” It is inferable from Rom_9:6-10 that the first intended vessel was a vessel of honour, perhaps a drinking cup or ornamental vase; but the other vessel, consequent upon the mar, was a “vessel of dishonour,” for the wash-room or bedchamber. And now comes the clear exposition of its symbolism of free-agency and divine impartiality.

“Behold, as the clay in the hands of the potter, so are ye in my hand, O house of Israel! At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it: if that nation against whom I have pronounced turn from their evil I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them… If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then will I repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them.” Thus the clay was the house of Israel; according as were their temper and conduct would they be moulded into a vessel of honour or of dishonour. So that the very clay is a living free-agent, the Potter is a wise impartial divine Reason, and the being made a vessel of honour or dishonour is conditioned upon the voluntary temper and doing of the agent. Salvation and damnation depended upon a momentous pivotal IF; the two alternatives of that IF were “turn from evil” and salvation, or “do evil” and destruction. And this, the immutable law of God’s free government, enacted before the foundations of the earth were laid, is that eternal purpose of God according to election which is so unrevealed and so mysterious to Barnes, Stuart, Hodge, and the great mass of predestinarians, but perfectly transparent upon the whole surface of God’s word. And this passage is absolutely conclusive against Paul’s predestinarian Jew. The insolent predestinarian Jew flouts the idea that the house of Israel should be subject to the law of—not predestined lineal salvation, but—a fearfully precarious free-agency, and Paul shows him from Jeremiah’s potter and clay that it had always been so!

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hath not the potter power over the clay - And much more hath not God power over his creatures, to appoint one vessel, namely, the believer, to honour, and another, the unbeliever, to dishonour? If we survey the right which God has over us, in a more general way, with regard to his intelligent creatures, God may be considered in two different views, as Creator, Proprietor, and Lord of all; or, as their moral Governor, and Judge. God, as sovereign Lord and Proprietor of all, dispenses his gifts or favours to his creatures with perfect wisdom, but by no rules or methods of proceeding that we are acquainted with. The time when we shall exist, the country where we shall live, our parents, our constitution of body and turn of mind; these, and numberless other circumstances, are doubtless ordered with perfect wisdom, but by rules that lie quite out of our sight. But God's methods of dealing with us, as our Governor and Judge, are dearly revealed and perfectly known; namely, that he will finally reward every man according to his works: "He that believeth shalt be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned." Therefore, though "He hath mercy on whom he willeth, and whom he willeth he hardeneth," that is, suffers to be hardened in consequence of their obstinate wickedness; yet his is not the will of an arbitrary, capricious, or tyrannical being. He wills nothing but what is infinitely wise and good; and therefore his will is a most proper rule of judgment. He will show mercy, as he hath assured us, to none but true believers, nor harden any but such as obstinately refuse his mercy. Jer. xviii, 6, 7

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

21. “Hath not the potter power over the clay, to make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor?” The removal of the clay from the bank to the pottery is regeneration. The purification of the lay from all trash, pebbles and foreign materials, by desiccation, commination and sifting, is sanctification. The diversified work in the formation of the vessel is character building; while the final ornamentation, putting on the beautiful gloss, is glorification. Timee, “honor,” here means financial remuneration; while “dishonor” means no financial value. Since the potter, like all other mechanics, simply prosecutes his employment for the money that is in it, he invaritably sets out to make an honorable vessel. Why does he fail?

Because, after he has done his best, the clay mars in his hand so that the vessel is spoiled and utterly worthless, consequently he casts it away into the ditch, as it is a well-known fact that these marred vessels can not be worked over. They are actually fit for nothing. If you put them on the turnpike pike, they will dissolve and become mud. Hence the potter always throws them away as utterly worthless. Now let us make the application. When God sets out to make a man, He invariably proposes to make a good one. Why does He not succeed, since He is Omnipotent? It is not a mere question of power. The human will is involved. If your will falls in line and reciprocates God’s will, He is certain to make you a vessel to honor, just as the potter always does his best to make a good, sound vessel that will be current in the market, but, despite all he can do, the vessel mars in his hands and turns out a failure. Even so, while God is doing His best to make a good man, your will antagonizes His will till the vessel is spoiled. Then He can only leave you for Satan’s heap of rubbish, tumbled down into hell. If God were to ignore your free will, He would dehumanize you. He does not want a machine. If he did, He would make it. He wants a man. Hence He can not make you good without the co-operation of your will, lest He unman you. While the potter is doing his best to make an honorable vessel, the clay mars in his hands till the vessel is spoiled. Just so, while God has laid heaven, earth and hell under contribution to make a good man of you, this does not settle the question, because your will is free. If you sink away into the will of God, He is certain to make you a vessel unto honor. If you contravene His will, you will become a vessel unto dishonor, fit only for the ditch of damnation.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21. Hath not right over the clay? So God, as far as right is involved, has the right to make of his creatures what he will. It is not said that we are as clay in the potter's hands, but that God has the right over us that the potter has over his clay. One lump the potter can use for a splendid vase; another for a vessel for base uses.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

21. εἰς τιμὴν for honourable use, εἰς ἀτιμίαν for dishonourable use; of. 2 Tim. l.c[187]

[187] l.c. locus citatus

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21. ἤ οὐκ ἔχει ἐξουσίαν: ‘if you do not accept this you will be compelled to confess that the potter has not complete control over his clay—an absurd idea.’ The unusual position of τοῦ πηλοῦ, which should of course be taken with ἐξουσίαν, is intended to emphasize the contrast between κεραμεύς and πηλός, as suggesting the true relations of man and God.

φυράματος: ‘the lump of clay.’ Cf. Rom 11:16; 1Co 5:6, 1Co 5:7; Gal 5:9. The exact point to which this metaphor is to be pressed may be doubtful, and it must always be balanced by language used elsewhere in St. Paul’s Epistles; but it is impossible to argue that there is no idea of creation implied: the potter is represented not merely as adapting for this or that purpose a vessel already made, but as making out of a mass of shapeless material one to which he gives a character and form adapted for different uses, some honourable, some dishonourable.

ὃ μὲν εἰς τιμὴν σκεῦος, κ.τ.λ.: cf. Wisd. 15:7 (see below): 2Ti 2:20 ἐν μεγάλῃ δὲ οἰκίᾳ οὐκ ἔστι μόνον σκεύη χρυσᾶ καὶ ἀργυρᾶ, ἀλλὰ καὶ ξύλινα καὶ ὀστράκινα, καὶ ἃ μὲν εἰς τιμήν, ἃ δὲ εἰς ἀτιμίαν. But there the side of human responsibility is emphasized, ἐὰν οὖν τις ἐκκαθάρῃ ἑαυτὸν ἀπὸ τούτων, ἔσται σκεῦος εἰς τιμήν, κ.τ.λ.

The point of the argument is clear. Is there any injustice if God has first hardened Pharaoh’s heart and then condemned him, if Israel is rejected and then blamed for being rejected? The answer is twofold. In vv. 19-21 God’s conduct is shown to be right under all circumstances. In vv. 22 sq. it is explained or perhaps rather hinted that He has a beneficent purpose in view. In vv. 19-21 St. Paul shows that for God to be unjust is impossible. As He has made man, man is absolutely in His power. Just as we do not consider the potter blameable if he makes a vessel for a dishonourable purpose, so we must not consider God unjust if He chooses to make a man like Pharaoh for a dishonourable part in history. Postquam demonstratum est, Deum ita egisse, demonstratum etiam est omnibus, qui Mosi credunt, eum convenienter suae iustitiae egisse. Wetstein.

As in 3:5 St. Paul brings the argument back to the absolute fact of God’s justice, so here he ends with the absolute fact of God’s power and right. God had not (as the Apostle will show) acted arbitrarily, but if He had done so what was man that he should complain?

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Power [εξουσιαν] . Or right. See on Mr 2:10; Joh 1:12.

Lump [φυραματος] . From furaw to mix so as to make into dough.

Hence any substance mixed with water and kneaded. Philo uses it of the human frame as compounded. By the lump is here meant human nature with its moral possibilities, "but not yet conceived of in its definite, individual, moral stamp" (Meyer). 52 The figure of man as clay molded by God carries us back to the earliest traditions of the creation of man (Gen 2:7). According to primitive ideas man is regarded as issuing from the earth. The traditions of Libya made the first human being spring from the plains heated by the sun. The Egyptians declared that the Nile mud, exposed to the heat of the sun, brought forth germs which sprang up as the bodies of men. A subsequent divine operation endowed these bodies with soul and intellect, and the divine fashioner appears upon some monuments molding clay, wherewith to form man, upon a potter 's wheel. The Peruvians called the first man "animated earth;" and the Mandans of North America related that the Great Spirit molded two figures of clay, which he dried and animated with the breath of his mouth, one receiving the name of First Man, the other that of Companion. The Babylonian account, translated by Berosus, represents man as made of clay after the manner of a statue. See Francois Lenormant, "Beginnings of History."

To make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor [ποιησαι ο μεν εις τιμην σκευος, ο δε εις ατιμιαν] . Rev., more correctly, to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another part, etc. For vessel, see on 1Pe 3:7; compare Mt 12:29; Act 9:15. The vessel here is the one which has just come from the potter 's hand. Those in ver. 22 have been in household use.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.