(33) Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!

(36) For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen

All we have studied in Romans since I began this blog can best be summed up by citing William Macdonald who explains the concluding doxology (praise to God) as looking back over the entire Epistle and the divine wonders that have been unfolded.  Paul has expounded the marvelous plan of salvation by which a just God can save ungodly sinners and still be just in doing so.  He has shown how Christ’s work brought more glory to God and more blessing to men than Adam lost through his sin.  He has explained how grace produces holy living in a way that law could never do.  He has traced the unbreakable chain of God’s purpose from foreknowledge to eventual glorification.  He has set forth the doctrine of sovereign election and the companion doctrine of human responsibility.  And he has traced the justice and harmony of God’s dispensational dealing with Israel and the nations.  Now nothing could be more appropriate than to burst forth in a hymn of praise and worship.

The Apostle Paul knew the mysteries of God as well as any man but Paul confesses to be at a loss  – the more we know, the more we understand that we do not know.  So Paul is overwhelmed and worships God as he contemplates the divine plan.  I love C.S. Lewis’s (surprised by joy) thoughts on this subject.   Amiable agnostics will talk cheerfully about ‘man’s search for God’.  To me as I then  was, they might as well have talked about the man’s search for a cat.  Our views of God are all skewed by our backgrounds, our biases.  God exists independently of our views of Him and it is impossible to know God’s mind except as God reveals it to us.

God is the creator of all things.  He means to be known and loved and has revealed himself through his creation and has spoken to us through the Bible.  All of redemption history, all of matter comes from God.  God is our source.  Jesus Christ, true God and true man, is our mediator and no one comes to God except through Him.  All creation is under the sovereignity of God and works back to Him.  AMEN