Dr. Sproul discusses three prepositions in this verse—"of Him," "through Him" and "to Him"—and what they teach us about the nature of God. In this lesson, we discover that God is the means and end of all things starting in Genesis 1 and everything results in God's glory. Finally, we discover that God sets the standard and is the source of all righteousness and good.

We are rushing along through our study of Romans, and today we are going to be ambitious with the text and select a rather lengthy passage. I am going to be reading from Romans 11:36. I ask the congregation to stand for the reading of the Word of God:

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

This is a Word about God, from God, that we may be instructed in our understanding of His being and of His glory. Please be seated. Let us pray.

Father, we have heard the words of the Apostle’s doxology in our previous gathering, and now we listen to the conclusion of the doctrinal portion of this, his magnum opus. We pray, Father, that You would give us a glimpse into the fullness of Your excellency that is communicated by these words. For we ask it in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Paul’s Conclusion

This is the end of Paul’s treatment of the doctrines of grace, beginning in chapter 1 with the announcement of the gospel of God and justification by faith alone. We saw how the Apostle turned our attention to the human race’s universal exposure to the wrath of God for suppressing God’s revelation of Himself. We saw how this led to manifold other sins in the radical corruption of the human race, which included the sins of both the Jew and the Greek.

In chapter 3, Paul brought the whole of mankind before the tribunal of God, saying, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). What followed was an exposition of the doctrine of justification by faith alone, followed by a treatment of sanctification—our growth in Christ after we are justified. This was followed by a magnificent statement of the providence of God over all things, knowing that all things work together for good for those who love the Lord.

In chapter 8, we get the golden chain, which is Paul’s introduction to the doctrine of election that he expounded in great detail in chapter 9. Chapter 10 talked about the great missionary enterprise of the church, such that we should be sending people to all the world so the gospel may be preached to all peoples. In chapter 11, we have seen Paul’s profound treatment of the place of ethnic Israel in the future of God’s redemption. All of that was brought to a close in the doxology that we examined last time. Verse 33 reads: “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!”

So today, we come to the last verse of chapter 11, which is the last verse of Paul’s unfolding of the gospel of God. He concludes this section of the epistle with these words: “For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.”

There, in this single verse, is the sum and substance of the whole biblical revelation of the being and character of God. Paul sets it forth with three prepositions, which are loaded with significance. He says of God, “For of Him, through Him and to Him are all things.” I would like to spend time looking at those three prepositions and what they teach us about the nature of God.

In summary, by using these prepositions, the Apostle is saying that God is the source and owner of everything that is. Second, He is the ultimate cause of everything that comes to pass by means of the exercise of His sovereign will. God is not only the means by which all things exist, but He is the end, or purpose, of all things. All things begin with God, are governed by God, and are used by God for the purpose of glorifying Him.

All Things Are of God

First, let us look at the preposition that all things are “of Him.” The Greek word here is a simple preposition that can be translated by the English words of or from. There is a distinction that may be made between these two renditions. Both renditions call attention to a profound truth about God.

Everything is “of God” in the sense that it is ultimately His. It is His possession. In the very first chapter of Romans, when Paul introduced himself as the author of this epistle, he talked about his credentials as an Apostle, having been set apart by the grace of God to and for the gospel of God. When we started this study of Romans, I pointed out that the words “the gospel of God,” did not mean the good news about God. It was a possessive genitive, meaning that it was God’s gospel.

What we have been studying throughout Romans is God’s message. He is its source. He is its author. But now, Paul is expounding on that. God is not simply the owner of the gospel. He is not simply the owner of this world, but He owns everything in it. The cattle on a thousand hills are His, and the rest of the cattle as well. We could add the sheep and the donkeys, the camels, automobiles, homes, and the whole of creation. This is our Father’s world.

But beyond this basic point of God’s ownership of all things, we also see that, as the owner, He is the source of everything. What does that mean? The first affirmation about God in Genesis 1 is that He is the source of the universe: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). This preposition calls attention to God as the source of creation and everything in it.

Before I expand on that, I would like to look at a couple of very important cross-references to this same theme, one of which you may be familiar with. In the first chapter of John’s gospel,  John begins the prologue with these words: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:1–4). Then John 1:10 reads, “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.” Here, John introduces the Logos, the second person of the Trinity, as the creative agent of the universe.

The cosmic work of Jesus is expanded upon by the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Colossians. Colossians is rich in its affirmations of the dignity and glory of Christ. In Colossians 1:15–17, we read: “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.”

These passages in John and Colossians, which amplify what the Apostle says briefly here in Romans 11, are staggering in their assertions about the function of Christ as the cosmic substance, Creator, and Author of all things, for whom all things were made, and in whom all things consist.

The Source of All Truth

Let me pursue that by looking at the ways in which God is the source of all things. The New Testament speaks of three dimensions of human experience of which God is the source. The first is that God, who is the source of all things, is the source of all truth.

We live in a time where theories of relativism have become widely accepted. In the latter days of Francis Schaeffer’s life, he used to speak about the death of “true truth,” not because he stuttered, but because the culture, chiefly through the influence of existential philosophy, pluralism, and relativism, had undermined objective truth. So, when Schaeffer spoke about true truth, he was referring to truth that was beyond the preferences or the tastes of individual subjects.

Kierkegaard used to teach that truth is subjectivity. In the twentieth century, this came to mean that truth, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. In other words, something can be true for you and, at the same time, not be true for me.

I have used this illustration elsewhere: I once had a discussion about the existence of God with a young lady on a college campus. She asked, “Do you believe in God?” I said, “Yes, I do.” She said, “Do you find it meaningful to believe in God?” I said, “Yes, I do.” “Do you pray to God?” “Yes.” “Do you sing hymns of praise to Him?” “Yes, I do.” She asked, “That’s meaningful to your existence?” “That’s right,” I said. She said: “Therefore, for you God exists. But I don’t believe in God. I don’t pray to God. I don’t sing praises to God. So, for me, there is no God.”

I said to this young lady: “We’re not talking about the same thing. I’m talking about the existence of a being who, if He does not exist, then all my faith in Him, all my prayers to Him, all my devotion and singing about Him—none of these things, individually or collectively, have the power to conjure Him up. Conversely, if this God does exist, your unbelief, your disinterest, and perhaps your hostility toward Him do not have the power to destroy Him. I’m talking about objective truth. I’m talking about the nature of reality.”

We can do a word study of the biblical concept of truth, alētheia. We read, for example, in the theological dictionary of the New Testament, a lengthy entry on alētheia, which defines the biblical concept of truth as “that which describes a real state of affairs.”

In the eighteenth century, philosophers were concerned with the science of epistemology, which is the science of how we know anything. They wrestled at great length with the question that Pontius Pilate asked Jesus. You might recall that during His trial, Pilate asked Jesus, “What is truth?”

I have said before that one of the disappointments of reading the printed Word is that we do not get to see facial expressions or hear the inflections of voices. Was Pilate being cynical? Was he scornfully asking, “What’s truth?” Or was he caught in a pensive moment of meditation when confronted by Jesus, scratching his head and saying, “Well, what is truth?” I do not know how Pilate said it, but this question, which philosophers through the ages have tried to answer, reached a heightened intensity in the eighteenth century.

At that point in history, John Locke was famous for introducing what was called the correspondence theory of truth. Let me define that for you. As the term indicates, the correspondence theory of truth simply says this: Truth is that which corresponds to reality. Locke was very close to the New Testament definition of truth as that which describes a real state of affairs. It is distinguished from fantasy, mirage, imagination, and so on.

No sooner had Locke laid the groundwork for the definition of truth than the next generation of philosophers began to talk about the way in which individual perception determines our understanding of truth. The question was raised: If truth is that which corresponds to reality, what if my perception of reality is different from yours? Now, we are back to my discussion with the young lady on the college campus.

What is the Christian response to the question of the philosophers? Truth is that which corresponds to reality as it is perceived by God. Beloved, only God has a comprehensive knowledge of all reality. God knows reality in its absolute fullness. There is no nuance, no microscopic subatomic particle of the universe that is unknown to the mind of God. What He knows, He knows perfectly and eternally. What He knows, He knows comprehensively and exhaustively. The One who knows all things without error is the source of all truth.

That is why the battle for the Bible is so vital. That is why Christianity is founded upon the conviction that this book does not give us the individual, subjective insights of mortals. It is the self-disclosure of truth that comes to us from the very fountainhead and source of all truth. God is the source and the standard of all truth. That is what makes truth so sacred.

When we are willing to disregard or neglect the truth, when we are willing to allow it to be slain in the streets in order to maintain relationships, we are striking a blow against the very nature and character of God. There is no possession we have that is more precious, valuable, or powerful than truth.

In the sixteenth century, a great debate took place between Martin Luther and the humanist philosopher Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam. Erasmus had written a diatribe vehemently attacking Luther. This was particularly directed at Luther’s understanding of the sovereignty of God and election. In his diatribe, “On matters of this kind, of ultimate theological truth, I prefer to suspend judgment. I prefer not to make assertions.”

Just as Luther, when confronted by Satan, threw an inkwell at him, he reached for the same inkwell to throw against Erasmus. when he responds to Erasmus. Luther said: “You prefer not to make assertions? You call yourself a Christian? Don’t you know that making assertions is at the very heart of the Christian faith? Spiritus sanctus non est skepticus. The Holy Spirit is not a skeptic. The things that He has revealed in His Word are more certain than life itself.” Luther knew the source of truth. How precious was that fountainhead and wellspring of all things true.

The Source of All Goodness

Not only is God the source of truth in the Bible, but He is the source and standard of goodness. The ultimate norm of goodness, the norm above all norms and without norm for ethics and for righteousness is the character of God Himself.

We frequently make distinctions between positive law and natural law, or even biblical law. The primary meaning of natural law in textbooks has to do with laws that can be extrapolated from a study of nature or science. But there is another way theology speaks of natural law, and that is as the law which proceeds, ultimately, from the nature of God.

How can we discern between that which is good and that which is evil? We look to the law of God to reveal to us the source of what is right and the source of what is evil. The law of God is not an arbitrary legislation that God decides to impose upon His creatures. Rather, the law of God flows from His own being.

In theology, we make a distinction between the internal and the external righteousness of God. The external righteousness of God refers to what God does in His management of the universe. It refers to God’s behavior. There is no shadow of turning in Him—His acts and His works are altogether righteous. The reason for the external righteousness of God is that it flows out of the internal being of God. God does what is right because He is the source of all righteousness. When God behaves in a righteous way, He is simply working out His own being, which is altogether righteous. He is the source of all that is good. He is the standard for all that is good.

The Source of All Beauty

I recently wrote a brochure for our congregation with respect to our hope for a future church building. There is a theme on the first page of that brochure that succinctly states the purpose of this campaign: “For beauty and for holiness.”

I did not invent that theme. That is the theme that God gave to the people of Israel when He commanded that they build a house for Him. That house would be built for His glory, and only for His glory. That house would be built for holiness. I think anything that we plan to do must be driven by those two concerns: God’s glory and His holiness.

In the Old Testament, we are told to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. If you want to get an education that may expand your thinking, go through the Old Testament and look up every passage that refers to beauty. You will see that the Bible teaches that God is not only the wellspring, the fountain, the source, and the standard of the true and the good, but also of the beautiful. Everything that is beautiful comes from Him, and everything that is beautiful in this world points back to Him.

When pagans compose magnificent music or art, they may have no affection for God in their hearts. Yet in spite of themselves, the fruit of their labor points to the author, the source, and the fountain of everything beautiful. There is nothing virtuous in the ugly. But Paul is explaining that of Him and from Him are all things.

All Things Through God

In our brief time, I have mentioned three things of which God is the source: the good, the true, and the beautiful. We could expand that list greatly if time permitted. Instead, I will go to the next preposition.

“For of Him and through Him are all things.” If we believe that one sentence, “through Him are all things,” that could end the Arminian and Calvinistic debate forever. This text speaks about the means by which God governs and orders His universe. That word “through” has to do with means or the instrument by which things come to pass.

Paul is simply reiterating what he taught in Romans 8. God, in His providence, exercises His sovereignty over, in, and through all things. All things that come to pass ultimately come to pass through the sovereign agency of God Himself. We need to understand that. We need to embrace it, and we need to love it. It is the great joy of the Christian to know that all things are in His hand and that all things are used by Him for His purposes, through His causal means, to bring to pass whatsoever He is pleased to bring to pass.

There are no accidents, in an ultimate sense, in a universe governed by God. As I like to say, if God exists, sovereignty is an essential attribute of His very deity. If there were one maverick molecule in the universe running loose outside the scope of God’s sovereign control, God would not be sovereign. If He were not sovereign, He would not be God. When Paul comes to the end of his meditation on what God has wrought through creation and the redemption He has brought to pass in and through Jesus Christ, after he sings the glorious doxology that we looked at last time, he sums it all up: “For of Him and through Him”—by His agency, by His means—“are some things?” No, “For of Him and through Him . . . are all things.”

All Things to God

Finally, we come to the third preposition: “For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things.” The word “to” here points to the purpose or the end to which everything is moving. If I can end a sentence with a preposition, it is “where everything is going to.” I know some conservative grammarians will not allow us to end sentences with prepositions. You may recall the sage advice of Sir Winston Churchill. When he observed that grammatical law, he said, “That’s one rule up with which I will not put.”

Where is everything going? Where are all things headed? What is the goal of all the universe? What is the ultimate purpose of all of history? In a word, the answer is God. He is the Alpha; He is the Omega. He is the source, the beginning, the end. All things are moving, in history and in the universe, to fulfill the purpose of God.

There are many things we observe every day that we look at and say: “How in the world can that possibly fit with the purposes of God?” There is so much evil, so much corruption, and so many things that we say God cannot have anything to do with. But against all things wicked, corrupt, and fallen stands a mighty God who orders all things together to His glory.

One theologian said that this last verse of chapter 11 is Paul’s version of the non nobis Domine: “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy Name be all the glory.” Your destiny has been appointed by God from the foundation of the world for His glory. The destiny of nations, of history, of the planets—even the orbiting of the heavenly bodies—has been created, designed, and ordained by God to display His glory. That is why the psalmist looks at the stars and is overcome with awe. He says:

The heavens declare the glory of God;

And the firmament shows His handiwork.” (Ps. 19:1)

Paul says, “For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom”—now we have a pronoun that refers to God—“be glory.”

God’s Manifest Glory

Let me give a brief excursus. The word for glory in the Bible is a glorious word. The word for glory, kavod or kabod, literally means God’s weightiness, significance, and value, or God’s august being and character. The glory of God refers to His singular transcendent dignity that no creature can possess in a similar magnitude. God’s glory is sui generis. It is in a class by itself. No creaturely glory is worthy to be compared with it.

When God shows forth the internal, weighty significance of His being in the Old and New Testaments, He typically does so by the outward manifestation of the shekinah cloud. It is so brilliant in its refulgence and so excellent in its brilliance that human beings must shield their eyes, lest they go blind. That is the outward manifestation of the eternal inward dignity of God.

When we look at the description of the new heavens and the new earth in the final chapters of the book of Revelation, all I have to do is mention it and my wife immediately tears up. Revelation talks about the holy city that comes down out of heaven, which is strangely described as a place where the sun does not shine. There are no candles. There is no moon. There are no artificial sources of light. You might think that a place like that would be bathed in perpetual darkness. But the author of Revelation tells us that there is no need of the sun or any artificial light in heaven because the glory of God and the radiance of His Son bathe the holy city in light twenty-four hours a day. The glow from the face of God illumines every inch of the kingdom of heaven. That is the manifestation of His glory.

God’s Light Never Extinguished

When we are finished with a church service, the deacons stay behind and go about the sanctuary to extinguish all the candles. They turn the lights out because we do not need them anymore. This room will be plunged into darkness. Even the light that we are enjoying in this room today, dear friends, is but for an hour.

But the light of the glory of God is never extinguished. The Apostle says, “To whom be glory forever.” The glory of God is destined for eternity. It began in eternity, and it continues for eternity.

In the bulletins at our church, we include a cross on the front page with the five solas of the Reformation: sola scriptura, sola fide, sola gratia, solus Christus, and the final one, soli Deo gloria. The reason is that when Paul finishes expounding the doctrines of grace in Romans 1–11, he concludes his doxology with soli Deo gloria, “to God alone be glory.”

Do you realize what kind of being is God? Do you realize that the only appropriate response when we enter His presence, when we come into worship before Him, is reverence? It is a response of awe, humility, and submission.

One thing that frustrates me about the contemporary church is the cavalier casualness that professing Christians display in worship. Have they no idea of Him with whom they are dealing, such that the angels must cover their eyes when they sing of His glory? The people of God are to be people of reverence and worship. Our glory will come and go, but the glory of God endures forever. Let us pray.

O Lord, how inadequate are we to plumb the depths and riches of who You are, to plumb the depths of what is revealed in these apparently insignificant, simple, and common prepositions. We are staggered in our imaginations when we think that all things are of You, through You, and for You. In You we live. In You we move. In You we have our being. Without You, there is no life. Without You, there is only inertia. Without You, there is no possibility of existence. We thank You for who You are. Set our hearts aflame to love You, not only for what You do for us, but that we may love You and honor You and worship You for who You are, because You are worthy of our worship. Amen.

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability.