Justified
By Faith
Romans 4
Today in our
ongoing study of the apostle Paul's New Testament letters from
beginning to end, we find ourselves moving on to Romans chapter 4. If
there are any new readers who don't have chapters 1 through 3, email
my business
mail box and I'll send them
back as Word, Adobe Reader or Rich Text attachments (please specify).
The entire chapter is about Abraham and his wife Sarah, so there is a
lot of Old Testament stuff in here. If anyone is having any problems
mustering up the kind of faith this passage calls for, I challenge
you to read this entire – but brief – passage of Scripture. So
here goes...
“What
shall we say then that Abraham, our forefather, discovered in this
matter? If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something
to boast about – but not before God. What does the Scripture say?
'Abraham believed God, and it was credited as righteousness' (Genesis
15:6, 22 NIV) Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him
as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the man who does not
work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited
to him as righteousness. David does the same thing when he speaks of
the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart
from works: 'Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will
never be counted against him.' Is this blessedness only for the
circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that
Abraham's faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what
circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or
before? It was not after, but before! And he received the sign of
circumcision, a seal of the righteousness he had by faith while he
was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe
but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be
credited to them. And he is also the father of the circumcised who
not only are circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the
faith that our father Abraham had been before he was circumcised.
(Romans 4, verses 1-12, NIV)
To
sum this up in a few sentences, Abraham and David are both men who
are called righteous – but in Spiritual terms rather than physical.
The only time that Abraham ever saw God, or a physical representation
thereof, was when the Lord God met him at Shechem (see Genesis
chapter 12, verses 6-7). David, to the best my my recollection, did
not see any visual manifestations of God. Instead, God spoke to him
through other prophets there in Jerusalem at that time. Righteousness
is defined in the next verse: “Now
when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as
an obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God
who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited to him as
righteousness. David does the same thing when he speaks of the
blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from
works: 'Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose
sins are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never be
counted against him.'.
This was a clear prophecy concerning the coming Messiah who will rule
the world from Jerusalem, none other than the man in the glory Jesus
Christ. In the remainder of this quotation the main thing Paul wrote
consisted of comparisons between Old Testament circumcision and New
Testament circumcision of one's heart and soul. The circumcision of
old was physical. But, since Jesus was the fulfillment of the Old
Law, as Paul taught, circumcision is no longer physical. It has
extended itself into that of the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ, having
left the physical realm only to cross over into the Spiritual
dimension that we call “heaven”. Taking up where we left off,
let's proceed with the second half of this study starting at verse
13.
“It
was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the
promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the
righteousness that comes by faith. For if those who live by law are
heirs, faith has no value and the promise is worthless, because law
brings wrath. And where there is no law, there is no transgression.
Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and
may be guaranteed to all of Abraham's offspring – not only to those
who are of the law but also to all those who are the faith of
Abraham. He is the father of us all. As it is written, 'I have made
you the father of many nations'. He is our father in the sight of
God, in whom he believed – the God who gives life to the dead and
calls things that are not as though they were. Against all hope,
Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations,
just as it had been sent to him, 'So shall your offspring be'.
Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was
as good as dead – since he was about 100 years old – and that
Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief
regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and
gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do
what he had promised. That is why 'it was credited to him as
righteousness'. The words 'it was credited to him' were written not
for him alone, but also for us, whom God will credit righteousness –
for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He
was delivered over to our death for our sins and was raised to life
for our justification. (Romans 4, verses 13-25, NIV)
“...
the
promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be
guaranteed to all of Abraham's offspring – not only to those who
are of the law but also to all those who are the faith of Abraham.”
Here is an example of how the Bible uses Abraham to illustrate faith,
which is given to us by the grace of God. We are all descended from
Abraham. So, we have all inherited his faith that he had in God. We
can do all things through God who gives us strength. The promise God
made to Abraham, “I
have made you the father of many nations”,
applies to everyone who sincerely believes in Spirit and in truth
that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Jews and all non-Jews get equal
treatment according to the apostle Paul, who was himself a Hebrew and
a scholar of the Law of Moses. Considering that Jews back in those
days would have nothing to do with Gentiles – much like today in
many cases – this statement coming from Paul is quite remarkable.
Whereas the Hebrew nation, which is modern-day Israel not counting
millions more from around the globe, considered themselves separate
and set aside, Paul makes it crystal-clear that God sees Jews and
non-Jews as being equals. Besides the supreme sacrifice of Christ on
the cross, having shed his blood freely for all our sins, this
unconditional equality amongst all peoples, nations and races
reflects the sum total of the very essence of the New Testament.
“He
is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed – the God
who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though
they were. Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became
the father of many nations... ”.
In the same way that God gave Abraham and Sarah new life by allowing
them to conceive a child when they were 100 years old, so he did with
Jesus by raising him from the dead on the morning of the third day
after he died (temporarily) on the cross. But since Jesus'
resurrection made him immortal, so we are all going to receive that
same immortality after we die, thanks to Jesus, our Kinsman Redeemer,
who rose first. Since Abraham was very much alive when he believed
God's promise to him, so are we when we give our lives to Jesus
Christ, whose death and resurrection takes our sins away. So Abraham
and ourselves, the Jewish and Gentile nations of the world, are joint
heirs of the Kingdom of God when Jesus comes back to take home his
bride, which is not only the “church”, but all those who believe.
“Without
weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good
as dead – since he was about 100 years old – and that Sarah's
womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding
the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory
to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had
promised. That is why 'it was credited to him as righteousness'.”
The Bible defines faith as being “the evidence of things hoped for,
and the belief in things which cannot be seen”. Abraham was in full
compliance with these prerequisites, knowing full well that God
“calls
things that are not as though they were”. If
God can do this through his spoken and written Word for Abraham, then
he can and will for all of us who believe as well. “The
words 'it was credited to him' were written not for him alone, but
also for us, whom God will credit righteousness – for us who
believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead.”
If we have sufficient faith in God who raised Jesus from the dead,
and having never met Christ in person, then we already have the same
righteousness in God's sight as Abraham had.
God allows us to have challenges in our lives in order
to build us up. He strengthens us by having us go through negative
experiences in order to extract a positive result. As the verse says,
“...we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance
character; and character hope”. This hope that is produced by our
character development is where our faith comes from. Our faith, in
turn, is what justifies us before God (that and our unwavering belief
in Jesus). The more developed our character becomes, the closer we
become with God through Christ Jesus, and so the greater our faith.
They are all proportional to one another. We are to keep focusing on
these facts while ignoring all the negative that can so easily keep
us off track. Despite what goes on around us we are to remain focused
on the positive. We have to keep the faith to get our just reward.
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