Now that Paul has suggested righteousness comes from faith, apart from observing the miqsat ma’asay haTorah, he needs to be able to make this case from the Torah and show this is the case in the Scriptures, not just a new idea. In the same fashion as Galatians, Paul turns to the the “father of faith” and where the story began, with the story of Abraham.
What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”
Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness.
Paul says Abraham knew this inherent truth to be true in his own walk of righteousness. Paul states that if Abraham earned his justification from his works, he would be able to boast. It is here where Paul begins using a metaphor based on labor and wage. When a person works, they get a paycheck. If Abraham was justified because of his works, then he earned the justification and he would be able to boast in his successful campaign to work for justification. Paul then says if a person simply trusts in the promises of God, that trust (faith) is “credited” to them as righteousness. The term credited can also be rendered as “reckoned” and refers to a settling of books.
Paul is working off of the same verse in Genesis 15 he used with the Galatians. Genesis told us Abraham had faith and it was reckoned to his account as righteousness. He believed he was accepted by God and was a member of God’s family by promise — that faith in the promise was just as effectual as if he had walked righteously.
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 circumcision as a sign, a seal of the righteousness that 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 then also the father of the circumcised who not only are circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.
Paul keeps pushing his point to make it relevant to those Gentiles who find themselves in the church of Rome. This belief, this faith cannot be reserved only for the circumcised, for Abraham experienced all of this before he was circumcised. This justification and the crediting of righteousness has to be available independently of circumcision. In this way, Abraham becomes the father of faith for the uncircumcised.
Paul’s point is that this faith is accessible and available to all — circumcised and uncircumcised.
It’s the same God. It’s the same promise. It’s the same faith.
They receive the same justification.
If Paul started his letter by saying all of humanity struggled with the same problem, he goes on to say all of humanity enjoys the same redemption.
Paul reiterates his point:
It was not through the 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 depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.
Abraham partnered with God before he was circumcised, before there was a Law, before there was a single command to follow. This means people cannot rely on the fact that they are obedient to God’s Law for their partnership and acceptance. As Paul stated in the first three chapters, nobody lives up to the standard, whether it’s God’s standard or their own. We all know we fall short and live under a cloud of wrath. Paul suggests we should trust the story instead.
Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. As it is written: “I have made you a 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 into being things that were not.
That is one of my favorite lines in Romans 4. …the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.
We are invited to trust the story of a God who gives life where death reigns and calls things out of what isn’t there. As we learned in Galatians, we are not righteous, but if we trust in the love and grace of God, He says we are righteous — even when we are not.
…calls into being things that were not.
Abraham understood this. Even though it goes against that which we believe to be most true about ourselves, even though it seems incredibly counterintuitive, Abraham believed that when God said it, it must be true.
Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said 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 a hundred 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. This 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, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.
And we too are invited into this same promise and hope. We are invited to believe God feels the same way about all of us. If we believe in this same truth and story, we find we have incredible peace and the joy of a cleansed conscience that is freed from that dark cloud of a curse we carry around.
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
It’s because of God’s love and acceptance — unmerited, unearned, undeserved, but true of God nonetheless — we can celebrate in our redemption. Not only this, but the same truth continues to overflow into other areas as well. We have a new perspective in the midst of suffering; if we are loved and valued, my suffering doesn’t raise the same set of doubts it did about God’s anger and doubts about my acceptance before Him.
In fact, our sufferings have the tendency to become teaching tools. They teach us about perseverance. Our perseverance is used by God to shape character in our lives. Our character is then used by God to bring us hope.
Ultimately, the hope is that God really is who He says He is, and that we really are who God says we are: loved, valued, accepted, redeemed.
And this hope does not disappoint, because somewhere in our bones, at our deepest level, through the work of the Holy Spirit, we know God’s love to be true.
As Jonathan Martin puts it in Prototype:
I believe there was a time in your life, sometime before you succumbed to the constant busyness, noise, and distraction of our world, when you knew something of the loving presence of God. There was a time (perhaps associated with a place) when you knew—or at least suspected—that you were infinitely loved. In other words, I believe you have heard from God, and that you probably know a lot more about hearing from God than you might realize.
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