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We must remember the fact that when the kingdom is delivered up, it is delivered up
by the SON to the FATHER, but the goal is not that the FATHER may be all in all, but
that GOD may be. The same Scriptures that reveal that the Father is God, reveal that the
Word was God, and if the monstrous translation "A God" be offered at John 1: 1, it must
equally be used in verses 6 and 18, and we shall then read "there was a man . . . . . sent
from A God" and "No man hath seen A God at any time", which translations of truth are
enough to throw grave suspicion on any who perpetrate this evidence of ignorance. It
should be remembered that while there is no definite article "the" in these three passages,
neither is there the indefinite `a' that is added by the translator on his own responsibility.
The Son is definitely called "God" in Heb. 1: 8, and was acknowledged as such by
Thomas with acceptance and without rebuke, while the doxology of Rom. 9: 5, after
all the attacks of the enemy, remains impregnable as a testimony to the deity of Christ,
the Son. With reference to this passage Wardlaw writes, in his book The Socinian
Controversy:
"This seems abundantly plain, so plain and so decisive, that if there were not another
text in the Bible directly affirming this great truth, I know not how I should satisfy myself
in rejecting its explicit testimony. It has accordingly been put upon the rack, to make it
speak by dint of torture a different language. It might, perhaps, be enough to say,
respecting this passage, that according to the order of the original words, the received
translation is the most direct and natural rendering. This, so far as I know, no one has
ventured to deny. All that has been affirmed is that it is capable of bearing a different
sense. And this has accordingly been attempted in no fewer than five different ways:
Of whom, by natural descent Christ came. God, Who is over all, be blessed for ever.
Whose are the fathers, and of whom the Christ came, Who is above them all (viz. the
fathers). God be blessed for ever.
Of Whom Christ came, Who is over all things. God be blessed for ever.
Of Whom Christ came, Who is as God, over all, blessed for ever.
Of whom the Christ came (and) whose, or of whom, is the supreme God, blessed
for ever."
In the earlier part of this same epistle to the Romans, we find a passage which is in
some respects parallel with Rom. 9: 5:
"Who worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, Who is blessed for
ever. Amen" (Rom. 1: 25).
It is the consistent testimony of the N.T. that all things were created "by Him and for
Him"--i.e. Christ (Col. 1: 16), and the ascriptions of praise in Rom. 9: 5 and in 11: 36
are both offered to the same God. In Rom. 9: 5 He is over `all things' (panton) without
reservation, evil as well as good. In Rom. 11: 36 out of Him, and through Him, and
unto Him are "the all things" (ta panta), certain specific `all things', which do not include
that which is evil. This important distinction we must discuss when we reach Rom. 11: 36
in the course of our exposition.
We joyfully acknowledge that which Israel in their blindness failed to see, that the
Messiah Who came from themselves so far as the flesh was concerned, and Who,
according to the Spirit, was declared to be the Son of God with power (Rom. 1: 3, 4), was
at the same time, "Over all, God blessed for ever". To this the Apostle adds his solemn