All Glory to God Forever
Lesson 20 Notes: Romans 11:33-36
“For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever! Amen.” (Romans 11:36)
How do we make sense of life’s greatest mysteries? Some mysteries puzzle and challenge us. Others, like a surprising medical diagnosis or a missing family member, create great concern. Tragic circumstances and painful loss often bring the question, “Where is God, and why would He allow this?” As we read in Romans 9–11, Paul knew the reality of great, inexplicable sorrow. Paul grieved deeply over Israel’s rejection of Jesus as he unpacked God’s plan to bring Gentiles to salvation and restore Israel to Himself. How can God accomplish this? Only through His infinite wisdom and power, which is unlike our own in every way.
Over three chapters, Paul traced God’s ways and His goal in history, proving God’s righteousness in His glorious plan. Thinking about God’s mercy, grace, and wisdom filled Paul with awe. As he considered God’s great mercies to Israel and the world, Paul found himself lost in wonder, love, and praise. God’s greatness and sovereignty seemed to overwhelm Paul as he closed this section of Romans with a doxology. Paul’s powerful hymn praised God for His beautiful character and wonderful ways. We, too, can ask God to fill our hearts with worship as we marvel at who He is. God’s absolute superiority calls for unending praise.
God’s Infinite Character – Romans 11:33
Paul’s doxology begins with an exclamation of “Oh”—almost as if Paul needed to gasp for air before describing the beauty and depth of God’s character. Pause and think about the infinite truth Paul pondered. God’s magnificent nature and character exceed the capacity of human minds and language. Such words as “holy,” “true,” “faithful,” and “merciful” can scarcely capture all that God is and does. His wisdom, power, glory, and limitless love are greater than anything we might imagine. As Paul sought to praise God for all He is, he could not help but bask in the infinite riches and glory of God.
People often seek to understand God by comparing Him to someone or something else, beginning with the phrase, “God is like ...” God’s Word describes Him in hundreds of helpful ways, including as the rock, light, shepherd, gate, branch, and cornerstone. Like Paul, as we ponder who God is, His Holy Spirit helps us better understand Him. And yet, no comparison can fully capture His inexpressible nature. God is indescribable in the sense that no human description can encompass who He is. For this reason, God prohibits crafting or using any object to worship in place of Himself.1
Earlier in Romans, Paul warned of humanity’s tendency to worship created things in place of the Creator.2 God, the Creator, can never be represented by any created thing. Jesus told the woman at the well, “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”3 Only Jesus can show what the Father is like.4
God the Father has revealed Himself to us personally and perfectly through His Son, Jesus Christ. The author of Hebrews wrote, “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being.”5 Compared to eternity, Jesus’s earthly ministry was brief. Yet all of Scripture testifies of Jesus.6 God the Father chose to reveal Himself through His Word, both incarnate (Jesus) and written.7 The Bible tells us everything we need to know about God.
The depth of God’s riches includes His wisdom and knowledge, which again helps us understand Paul’s intake of breath and exhale with the word “Oh” as he began his doxology. The word “doxology” in Greek means “a glorious saying”—doxa is “glory”; logos is “saying.” God’s wisdom includes far more than knowledge. Wisdom is practical. Wisdom is also good; without goodness, a person is cunning but not wise. A wise person recognizes and loves everything true, noble, pure, lovely, and admirable.8 Wisdom applies true knowledge in the holiest way to achieve the highest purpose and best result.
People can access knowledge more easily today than in any other time in history. Has this accessibility made people wiser? We need only search social media to see that people remain resoundingly foolish even with access to a great amount of information. Romans reveals God’s wisdom to us in His justification,9 His sanctification,10 His salvation,11 and His Church.12
How do we begin to describe God’s knowledge? God is omniscient; He is all-knowing. While human knowledge is imperfect and partial, God knows all things perfectly and completely.
God has no need to discover anything, for, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before [His] eyes.”21 All life flows from God’s infinite knowledge and love. He knows everything about you personally—the DNA in your chromosomes,22 the hairs on your head,23 every tear you have shed,24 and the number of days you will live.25 God is never surprised. Even in eternity God’s great knowledge will never be exhausted.
God’s judgments flow from His infinite knowledge and perfect wisdom. The Greek word for judgment that is used here, krima, is defined as God’s judicial or divine decision. We usually interpret God’s judgment as His dealings with the wicked.26 In his doxology, Paul used the word “judgments” to refer to God’s divine and eternal decisions.27 Some of God’s unsearchable judgments have been revealed but remain inaccessible to human minds.
Like His judgments, God’s untraceable paths exceed human comprehension. However, through the guidance of the Holy Spirit and His Word, His ways begin to become clearer to us. God does not work exactly the same way in all people He calls to faith in Christ. Some travel a straight and narrow road directly to Jesus’s work on the cross. Others crisscross hills, valleys, and rocky roads before yielding to Christ. God’s sovereign work among human hearts, minds, and lives cannot be traced or tracked by mere human understanding.
God’s Immeasurable Greatness – Romans 11:34-35
Paul’s contemplation of God moved him to ask three rhetorical questions about God’s greatness. No human can begin to know all that God knows. His knowledge infinitely exceeds ours. He owes us nothing. All things great and small belong to Him.28 God spoke the universe into being and is infinitely superior to us in every way.
When we glimpse God’s grandeur, we realize how small and lowly we are before Him. The unsearchable depth of God’s wisdom prompted Paul to ask two questions: “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” The highest human intellect cannot compare to God’s divine wisdom. His wisdom hung the moon, stars, and galaxies and holds them in place.29
Apart from God, mere human knowledge is foolishness and folly.30 Even so, God imparts knowledge and wisdom to people so we do not remain ignorant. God invites us to trust Him, live obediently, develop our minds, and seek true wisdom from Him.31
When people sincerely seek wisdom from God, they realize that there is no true wisdom without God. We read in Proverbs, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.”32 Because God knows, we can know. Because God is wise, we can acquire wisdom. But even the godliest person will never fully grasp God’s person, character, or ways. God said, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.”33 Our plans may fail, but God’s never do. His wisdom and knowledge direct His actions. Therefore, His purpose always prevails.34 True wisdom consists of learning to trust and follow God. Proverbs tells us: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”35 God gives His people the wisdom they need exactly when they need it and just as He has promised.36 When life is uncertain, we can rest in the truth that our wise God keeps his commitments.
Paul’s last question is, “Who has ever given to God, that God should repay them?” The answer is clear: no one. God made this point to Job, asking, “Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.”37 God’s people serve their self-sufficient, sovereign God with willing but empty hands. When we give to God, we merely give back what He has first given us. Our families, churches, jobs, circumstances, abilities, capability to love, and even our very lives come from God.38 The worship and praise we bring to God flows from and through Him. God deserves but does not need our love and worship; perfect fellowship and love have always existed within the Trinity.39 God is completely sufficient in Himself—everywhere and always. Romans has shown that we come to our great God with empty hands in three major areas:
God’s Supreme Glory – Romans 11:36
Paul’s doxology shifts to praise God for His limitless nature. Incomparable glory belongs to God. All things are from Him, come through Him, and exist for His glory alone. Paul’s chorus of praise to the triune God could be an early Christian worship song. God’s glory abounds in creation and in His plan for salvation.
Paul placed no limits on God’s glory. The term “all things” expresses the truth that God’s glory knows no bounds. All creation, whether visible or invisible, physical or spiritual, brings God glory. Every minuscule atom or molecule in the universe comes from God. All things came into existence at God’s command. His creative power sustains His creation, which exists for His glory. Paul further amplified God’s glory with the words “from,” “through,” and “for.” These words examine the depth and breadth of God’s glory.
All Things from God – Before time began and even space came into being, God majestically and gloriously existed in His triune nature—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Before He spoke the heavens and earth into being, God lived in unapproachable light.52 Before He formed the earth, God’s throne stood firm in heaven. All that exists, whether visible or invisible, came from God Himself. His ideas, His plans, and His Word brought all things into being. No one but God could create as He did. He is the source of everything good. No one is like our God.
All Things Through God – God not only planned all things but accomplished His plan through His initiative and power. In other words, God is the creator but also the sustainer of the universe. God needed no help; no one could possibly help Him. God did not form the world from existing matter. God created everything out of nothing with His commands and His hands.53 By His existence and through His work, everything in all creation came to be and points straight to Him—God, the uncaused First Cause—who created and sustains His creation.
All Things for God’s Glory – Why did God create the heavens, the earth, and every living thing? Some people think the universe exists only for them. Others view the universe as purposeless and impersonal. Still others call out to the universe for help instead of praying to God. But all creation, every element of the entire universe, is for God personally.54 Before any of us existed, God planned the universe for His entirely wise and noble purposes. God’s highest purpose was not His creatures’ needs because nothing existed before He created. God’s motive for creation was and is wholly in Himself. Creation exists for God and His glory.
The gospel of salvation by grace is the great theme of Romans. God’s way of salvation, like His work of creation, comes from and through God and for His glory.
Salvation Is from God – Only a faithful God could accomplish a plan of salvation that upholds His perfect holiness and justifies sinners. God’s plan of salvation reveals His unending grace. Only God’s plan excludes human merit and good works as a way to gain righteousness. God’s plan thoroughly transforms the saved. Ultimately, God’s grace empowers people to demonstrate true righteousness as their lives reflect great love for God and lasting service to Him.55 God orchestrated the precise time in history for Jesus’s birth in Bethlehem, the moment John the Baptist identified Him, His years of teaching and healing, and His betrayal, arrest, trials, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension into heaven.56 God also directs the timing and circumstances surrounding each believer’s salvation.
Salvation Is Through God – That is, Jesus’s saving work on the cross made salvation possible. Salvation also comes through the Holy Spirit’s work of regeneration. The Holy Spirit works in human hearts to lead God’s children to repentance, faith, and sanctification. Nothing we do accomplishes or sustains our salvation. In fact, apart from God’s work, people are unable to slow their rush toward judgment. Salvation is entirely God’s work.
Salvation Is for God’s Glory – All believers, saved by God’s mercy and grace, will praise Him forever. We belong to God and live for His glory. Every aspect of salvation comes from God, through His work, and for His glory. God’s vast, infinite nature and character call us, like Paul, to worship Him. Our present and eternal privilege is to glorify God in all we say and do. God’s absolute superiority calls for unending praise.
God’s Supreme Nature
Paul’s explanation of God’s plan for salvation caused him to burst into a song of praise. God alone is worthy of all glory, honor, and praise. There is one God, who exists in three persons. The first person of the Trinity is God the Father, who created and sustains all things. He reigns supreme over all people. God loves those He created, despite their sin against Him. God the Father so loves the world that He made a way for all who will believe to know Him through His Son, Jesus.1
God is eternal, infinite, and different from us in every way. He seeks His children as a good Father who cares for them.2 He exists in perfect, inseparable communion with Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit. While Jesus was on earth, He prayed to the Father to send the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, to comfort His people. To know God the Father is also to know the Son and the Holy Spirit, who mysteriously yet certainly exist together as the one true God. Through Jesus, all who believe will one day see the Father and abide with Him forever in heaven.
Not believing in God the Father means rejecting God as He revealed Himself in the Bible. God is living and life-giving. Depending on ourselves or worshipping anything else leaves us empty and unfulfilled. Almighty God created the universe: all that we can see and everything human senses can neither see, hear, nor comprehend. To ignore God as our creator and sustainer is to reject Him and all He is. We forfeit knowing and loving our heavenly Father and replace Him with an insufficient substitute. The love of a human, such as the love of a good father, cannot compare to the love of God the Father.
When we believe in God the Father, like Paul, we stand in awe of Him. Placing our faith in our faithful, sovereign God brings great hope. In times of grief, we can turn to Him for comfort and strength. In times of uncertainty, we can depend on Him for guidance and trust His sovereign control over every situation. In times of great joy, we can celebrate Him for who He is—our God who graciously bestows every blessing. We praise His marvelous plan of salvation and rest in His grace, mercy, and love. God is worthy of all our praise.
Take to Heart
Throughout Romans 9–11, Paul explained the decrees of God that govern human history. Beneath these challenging truths, Paul continuously upheld God’s mercy, goodness, grace, faithfulness, and desire to bless His people, Israel, and the entire world with salvation. No wonder Paul burst forth in stunning praise for God. Paul’s high view of God exalted the depths and riches of God’s wisdom and knowledge. God, whose wisdom and knowledge are richly and incomprehensibly deep, carries out His sovereign judgment and perfect will with boundless love.
Only God could design salvation’s path for both Jews and Gentiles, and the mystery of election, without compromising His holy and just character. Amazingly, God had a plan to bring estranged people together and make them family; salvation not only saves us individually to bring us to God but brings formerly separated people together. God’s infinite mind surpasses our finite minds to depths we will never reach on this earth but will celebrate for eternity. We cannot fully know God’s mind. He needs no human counsel. We cannot outgive our generously gracious God, but our hearts can join Paul in praising Him. All things that exist come from, through, and for Him. He is the One worthy of all glory forever and ever! Amen.
People today settle for knowledge gleaned from computers and smartphones. Artificial intelligence offers quick access to sometimes questionable data. God’s knowledge is far greater than anything people can create; His wisdom is beyond compare. What do you need to know? In what situation do you need wisdom? God stands ready to help; He is only a prayer away. With His Word at your fingertips and His Spirit to instruct you, seek God as you navigate life’s challenges. When did you last seek God and His wisdom for everyday life decisions? God loves His people dearly. He knows the number of hairs on your head. He cares about the intimate details of your life and has the power to help you. Will you turn to God for wisdom and seek His guidance in every decision you face? How will you seek knowledge and wisdom in His Word?
God’s unsearchable judgments and imperceivable ways both inspire and confuse our finite human minds. He sees and knows all things past, present, and future. His perfect plan of salvation, completed through Christ, continues to unfold daily as people turn to Christ in faith. God’s ultimate concern is for sinners to turn to His Son for salvation. God’s generosity in salvation proves His overwhelming desire to bless people, individually and collectively. God gave His only Son as our sin-sacrifice. Jesus gave His life in place of ours, so we might live with Him for all eternity. We cannot outgive God. We owe Him everything and will never repay our debt to Him. In grace, He gives us faith, and by faith we are saved. Will you come to God with a humble heart and yield yourself to Him? God, who is beyond you in every way, calls you to trust Him.
God’s untraceable paths lead us to Him. We sometimes question God’s ways or wish for something different when walking a difficult path. Paul asked, “Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” The infinite God, whose wisdom we cannot fathom, cannot be placed in a box that we create. He is beyond all we can comprehend. God’s Word contains truths that make us aware of His thinking and help us know Him better. However, His mind is deeper and higher and vastly beyond all that we can imagine. God’s question to Job sums this up: “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?”57 With our limited, time-locked perspective, not one of us can offer God advice. With humility and gratitude, we can fully trust our faithful God. How will you trust Him today, wherever His path leads?
How should we respond to Paul’s words of praise? As we comprehend God’s incomprehensible nature, we revere His holiness with wonder and worship. God is worthy of praise. The depth of God’s infinite character stirs our hearts, minds, and souls to magnify and praise Him. Paul’s doxology connects heaven with earth as we ponder and celebrate God’s glory. With a fresh gasp of awe we can say, “Oh!” along with Paul. For from God, through God, and for God are all things in heaven and on earth. Through His wisdom, God pulls broken creation, including estranged people, back together into His family. To God be all the glory forever and ever. Amen!
1. No other gods: Exodus 20:3-6
2. Worship creation: Romans 1:25
3. Spirit and truth: John 4:24
4. Son of God: John 1:18
5. The Son: Hebrews 1:3
6. Scripture’s testimony of Jesus: Luke 24:27; John 5:39
7. The Word: John 1:1-5
8. Perfect wisdom: Philippians 4:8
9. Justification: Romans 1–4
10. Sanctification: Romans 5–8
11. Salvation: Romans 9–11
12. The Church: Romans 12–16
13. Past and present: Isaiah 46:9-10
14. Knowledge of future: Psalm 139:4, 16
15. Eyes on mortals: Job 34:21
16. Words and deeds: 2 Chronicles 16:9; Luke 8:17
17. Evil and righteous: Proverbs 15:3
18. Done and undone: James 4:17
19. Motives and opportunities: 1 Samuel 16:7; Matthew 11:21
20. Needs and desires: Matthew 6:8
21. Laid bare: Hebrews 4:13
22. God’s intentional design: Psalm 139:13-15
23. Hairs on head: Luke 12:7
24. Tears shed: Psalm 56:8
25. Numbered days: Psalm 139:16
26. God’s judgments: Acts 17:31; Hebrews 9:27; Revelation 16:5-7; 19:2; 20:12
27. Eternal decisions: Psalm 33:10-11; Romans 8:28; Ephesians 1:11-12
28. God’s ownership: Job 41:11
29. Creator: Genesis 1:16; Psalms 8:3-4; 136:5-9; Colossians 1:16-17
30. Foolish knowledge: 1 Corinthians 1:20
31. True wisdom: Psalm 90:12; Proverbs 3:13-14; 4:4-7
32. Fear of the Lord: Proverbs 9:10
33. God’s ways: Isaiah 55:8
34. Prevailing purpose: Proverbs 19:21; Acts 2:22-24
35. Trust God: Proverbs 3:5-6
36. Ask for wisdom: James 1:5
37. Under heaven: Job 41:11
38. Received from God: John 1:16; James 1:17
39. The Trinity: John 1:1-3
40. Dead in sin: Romans 1:18–3:20; Ephesians 2:1-3
41. Jesus saves: Romans 3:21–4:25
42. Gift of faith: Ephesians 2:8-9
43. Boasting excluded: Romans 3:27-30; 4:2; 5:2, 11
44. Final judgment: Romans 2:8-9, 12, 16; 14:10; 2 Corinthians 5:10; Revelation 20:4-6, 11-15
45. Spirit sanctifies: 1 Corinthians 6:11
46. Good works: John 15:1-5, 15; Ephesians 2:10; James 2:14-26
47. Effective work: Philippians 2:12-13
48. In Christ: Romans 5:12-21
49. New nature: Romans 6:1-14; 8:1-17
50. God is for us: Romans 8:31-39
51. God’s glory: Isaiah 43:7; John 17:22-24; 1 Corinthians 10:31
52. Unapproachable light: 1 Timothy 6:15-16
53. Commands and hands: Genesis 1; Psalm 19
54. For God: Colossians 1:16
55. True righteousness: Romans 9:30-32
56. Salvation’s timing: Galatians 4:4
57. God the creator: Job 38:4
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