Please turn in your Bibles this evening to Romans chapter 4 as we continue our study through the Word of God. As we have seen in our study of Romans Paul has shown that all are sinners separated from God, no one is good, no one is perfect, no not even one, and thus, all deserve God’s judgment!
Man, left alone is doomed but God doesn’t leave him there. God steps in and justifies man, declares him righteous by faith in Jesus Christ. And as we concluded last week Paul said, “Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law. Or is He the God of the Jews only? Is He not also the God of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also, since there is one God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith. Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.” Romans 3:28-31.
In other words, we are not saved by keeping the Law, by doing good works, we are only saved by believing and receiving Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and that free gift is for both Jew and Gentile, it is there for the world to receive. That doesn’t negate the Law, for the Law is good but man is not, he can’t keep the Law. Thus, the Law shows man that he is a sinner separated from God and it points him to the Savior, to Jesus Christ, thus establishing the Law as Paul said.
Now as we move into Romans chapter 4 Paul is going to give us two examples of Jewish men who were justified by faith and not by works. Paul is going to be looking at Abraham, the Father of the Jews, and David, the King of the Jewish people. These were the two heavy hitters of the Jewish faith, highly respected by the Jews, and thus, the way they were saved will show the Jews and Gentiles how they and how we are to be saved. With that said, let’s begin reading in Romans chapter 4, starting in verse 1 and see what the Lord has for us this evening.
VERSES 1-2
Paul is going to show us that Abraham was justified by faith and not by works; he is going to examine this highly esteemed prophet of God. The thing is, if Abraham was justified by works he could then boast about how hard he worked, what a good person he was and that is why he was allowed into heaven! He can try to boast like that before man but God won’t accept it. Why is that? Because salvation is only found in Jesus and thus God won’t accept anything else. In fact, Paul tells us in Galatians 6:14a, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ . . .” There is no room for us to glory in our flesh, only in the finished work of Jesus on the cross of Calvary, and His resurrection from the dead that assures us of life in Him!
VERSE 3
The Jewish rabbis believed that “Abraham was perfect in all his deeds with the Lord.” And “We find that Abraham our father had performed the whole Law before it was given.” Now that is interesting to me for the Scriptures tell us that when God called Abraham from the Ur of the Chaldeans into the land of Canaan, he partly obeyed God for he stayed in Haran for 15 years until his father Terah died.
During a time of famine in Canaan, Abraham went down to Egypt with his wife, lied to Pharaoh, telling him that Sarah was his sister not his wife because he was afraid that Pharaoh might kill him to take his wife. Instead, he just gave her to him! Thus, he lied before Pharaoh. Also, he committed adultery with Hagar, Sarah’s maid to help God out, to get a son since the womb of Sarah was barren. Obviously he wasn’t perfect, he did not keep the Law before it was given to Moses, he fell far short of keeping the Law, not trusting in the promises of God, but he did always return to the Lord.
Now if Abraham was not justified by works, then how was he justified? Paul tells us by faith in God, he believed and that was accounted to him for righteousness. That word “accounted” is LOGIZOMAI (log-id’-zom’-ahee) in the Greek and it is a legal term speaking of crediting something into someone’s account. Here we see God credit into the account of Abraham righteousness that is based upon faith and not works. In other words, Abraham was declared righteous by God before the Law was established; it was still some 430 years down the road!
How could that be that Abraham was saved by faith and not by works? First of all, here in Romans chapter 4 verse 3 Paul quotes out of Genesis 15:6, so the Scriptures testify that it is of faith and not of works, it is not a New Testament idea. But what did Abraham believe in? The promises of God he believed in and even more specifically, the coming of the Messiah, the coming of Jesus. How do I know that? Again, let’s look at the Word of God. In Genesis 22:18 the Lord said to Abraham, “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.” Now we may miss the point but Paul doesn’t, for in Galatians 3:16-18 he tells us, “Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ. And this I say, that the law, which was four hundred and thirty years later, cannot annul the covenant that was confirmed before by God in Christ, that it should make the promise of no effect. For if the inheritance is of the law, it is no longer of promise; but God gave it to Abraham by promise.” Do you see that, Abraham believed in the coming Messiah and that was accounted to him for righteousness. It is as Jesus said in John 8:56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” God has never provided any means of justification except by grace through faith in Him!
VERSES 4-5
Think of it like this, for Paul’s point is basically, if I work for you, put in my 8 hours of work, you are legally obligated to pay me my wages, you owe me for the work I did. Some cults believe this works relationship, a works salvation by going door-to-door or on their mission work. If that were true, then God would owe you salvation, He would be a debtor to you, but that is not that case, God is a debtor to no man!
Paul is not encouraging laziness, all he is saying is you can’t work your way into heaven. The only way to enter in is by faith in Jesus. Abraham and those who believe with him were looking ahead to the coming Messiah; we look back and see that the Messiah has come! We see the finished work; they looked forward to the finished work!
Now some read this and come to the conclusion, “Great, I can do whatever I want! It doesn’t matter; it is all covered by the blood!” You know what, that is very true, you can do whatever you want. But let me also say this, if that is the desire of your heart, if you desire to do all kinds of evil, if the motivation of your heart is your flesh, then you need to do a heart check to see if you are saved! You see, your belief’s will be manifested in your works, they don’t save you, they just show that you are saved! James put it this way, “Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” James 2:17.
VERSES 6-8
Paul now takes a few verses to show King David, another heavy hitter of the Jewish faith, and how King David was justified by faith and not by works! In this Psalm that Paul is quoting from David committed at least 3 sins here; he broke at least 3 commandments. First he coveted Bathsheba. Then he committed adultery with her. And then he had her husband, one of his mighty men murdered. Now I have talked with a person who said that David never sinned, he was perfect but listen to what Psalm 32:5 says, “I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,’ And You forgave the iniquity of my sin.” The Scriptures are clear on that, David was a sinner, like all of mankind except for Jesus!
Now if David cried out for justice before God, according to the Law he would have been put to death. Thus, David cries out for God’s mercy and God extended mercy to David, not on the basis of David’s good works, but upon his faith, which was then accounted as righteousness to David! And in Psalm 31:1-2, which Paul quotes here, David says “Oh how happy is the person who has his lawless deeds forgiven.” “Oh how happy is the person whose sins are forgiven.” “Oh how happy is the person whom the Lord does not put his sins into an account!” That is something to be happy about, God’s mercy and grace that He extends to us by faith!
Of this, Lenski tells us: “No sinner, and try he ever so hard, can possibly carry his own sins away and come back cleansed of guilt. No amount of money, no science, no inventive skill, no armies of millions, nor any other earthly power can carry away from the sinner one little sin and its guilt. Once it is committed, every sin and its guilt cling to the sinner as close as does his own shadow, cling to all eternity unless God carries them away.” You see, we are blessed, we are happy not by what we have done, but what God has done and by faith God has imputed righteousness into our account!
VERSES 9-10
Paul is saying that Abraham was counted righteous by God because of his faith not because of Abraham being circumcised. How do I know that? Because the promise that was given in Genesis 15:6 took place some 14 years before God instructed Abraham that he was to be circumcised, which means Abraham was justified by faith and not by a ritual. In saying that, it tells us also that Gentiles can receive the blessings, as Paul quoted David, “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, And whose sins are covered; Blessed is the man to whom the LORD shall not impute sin.” Romans 4:7-8. You see, by faith and not by works or rituals, just as the Jews are saved so the Gentiles are also saved!
VERSES 11-12
Being Jewish and circumcised did not make you a child of Abraham, but believing in the Messiah did. Folks, I don’t care if you were baptized as an infant or even as an adult, or you did this ritual or that ritual, walked on hot coals to some shrine, even nailed yourself to a cross, that will not save you, Jesus alone saves by believing and receiving Him into your life. That means all who believe, all who are justified by faith, are spiritual descendants of Abraham and a Jew who does not believe is not a descendant of Abraham!
VERSES 13-15
As we have seen in Galatians 3:17, the Law was still some four hundred and thirty years down the road from Abraham, so Abraham couldn’t be justified by the Law. And if you could be justified by the Law, if that were possible, then there is no need for faith and then why even believe in the promises of God! The problem is that you can’t be justified by keeping the Law and verse 15 can literally be translated, “The Law keeps on producing wrath.” Why is that? Because the Law sets the standard, not just the outward observance, but the heart and thus, only Jesus could and did keep it, we can’t! It is as Paul has said in Romans 3:20, “Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.” Again in Galatians 2:16 Paul tells us, “knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.” So the Law continually shows us we are transgressors, we are sinners before God, it doesn’t make us holy, it just shows us we are not!
If that is true, which it is, then why does Paul say in the last half of Romans 4:15, “. . . For where there is no law there is no transgression.”? That makes it sound like we would be better off not to have the Law, then we would not be guilty before God. That is not what Paul is saying here. Think of it this way, you are driving at a reasonable speed and there are no signs posted on what the speed limit is, you are not going to get a speeding ticket, you had no sign to tell you that you have broken the law. The thing is, the word “transgression,” PARABASIS (par-ab’as’is) in the Greek, speaks of an overstepping, a violation of a specifically stated commandment. Thus, the role of the Law is to just make clear what God desires, what He demands. But God has also placed in each of our hearts what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is evil, and we can’t even keep that so we are already guilty, the Law just shows you how guilty you are before God!
VERSE 16
It is as Paul said in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” If you want to get technical about it, we are not saved by faith, we are saved by God’s grace and grace is appropriated into our lives through faith. And think about it, grace and faith go together just as Law and works go together. Grace and Law are the principles and then faith and works are the means we pursue these principles for our relationship with God, one leading to life and the other to death! It is as Spurgeon said: “Grace and faith are congruous, and will draw together in the same chariot, but grace and merit are contrary the one to the other and pull opposite ways, and therefore God has not chosen to yoke them together. He will not build with incongruous materials, or daub with untempered mortar. He will not make an image partly of gold and partly of clay, nor weave a linsey-woolsey garment: his work is all of a piece and all of grace.”
Paul also says that this salvation by grace through faith is “sure” and it is a Greek word meaning “firm, of force, steadfast, sure.” We can have assurance of our salvation because it is not based upon us being so good, living a certain way, but because He is so good and what He has promised He is able to bring to pass! John tells us, “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.” I John 5:13. And Jesus said “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.” John 5:24. Thus, all who believe, all those who have the faith of Abraham, will be saved! On the other hand, if we were saved by works, we would never know for sure if we were saved or not. It would always be a question, did we do enough good works to get in or how much do we need to do to get in? God has given us assurance of our salvation because it is based in Him and not in us and He is faithful to bring to pass what He has promised!
VERSES 17-18
God supernaturally made Abraham the father of the nation of Israel and He also supernaturally made Abraham the spiritual father of many nations. God made a promise to Abraham and also brought it to pass!
When God speaks of giving life to the dead, calling into existence that which does not exist, I believe it speaks not only of creating life in the first place, but also of our salvation, that God sees what we will become, He gives to us life and He is molding and shaping us into His image as John tells us, “Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.” I John 3:2. Thus, that which seems hopeless, when God is added to the picture, there is hope, there is confidence that God can do what He has promised.
Spurgeon puts this into practice as he says: “All true believers, like Abraham, obey. Obedience is faith in action. You are to walk in the steps of faith of father Abraham. His faith did not sit still, it took steps; and you must take these steps also by obeying God because you believe him. That faith which has no works with it is a dead faith, and will justify no one.”
VERSES 19-22
Here is the thing, Abraham was 99 years old and Sarah was past the age of child bearing when she became pregnant. Thus, to them, the promise of God of having a son was impossible by their own efforts, and it is at this point, and many times in our own lives, that God steps in and says “It’s show time!” You see, Abraham and Sarah could not take credit for their son Isaac; it was a gift of God! Not that all children are not a gift of God, they are, but God did intervene and give them this son when it was humanly impossible for them to have children! And Abraham was strengthened at God’s promise and I’m sure even more so when that promise came to pass! The question for us as we go through impossible situations is “How big is your God?”
It is through faith once again that God will impute righteousness into our account apart from the Law, apart from baptism, apart from this or that, just by believing and receiving Jesus Christ into your life, it is a gift, not of works!
VERSES 23-25
The story of Abraham was not just for him, but it is for us also, we can learn from it what faith is all about. Satan tells people, “You shall not surely die!” and God says, “You will die in your sins apart from Jesus!” Who do you think people believe, who do you think people listen to? Tragically, they listen to Satan’s words, even though they don’t believe it is of Satan and these ideas of a works relationship with God has infiltrated many churches and it is in every cult. They may say you need Jesus and then there is the “But . . .” the other things they add to the finished work. What do you need to do to be saved? Paul said this in Romans 10:9-13, “that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For ‘whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.’” That is how you are saved – by grace through faith!
You see, our offenses were the problem that needed to be dealt with and our justification is the result that God has raised us by Christ’s resurrection. C. H. Mackintosh put it this way:
Abraham was called to believe in a promise, whereas we are privileged to believe in an accomplished fact. He was called to look forward to something which was to be done; we look back on something that is done, even an accomplished redemption, attested by the fact of a risen and glorified Savior at the right hand of the majesty in the heavens.
- C. H. Mackintosh
Let me close tonight with this overview of chapter 4 and what Paul had to say regarding our justification which is through faith and by grace, not works. We are told:
In chapter 4, Paul presented several irrefutable reasons why justification is by faith: (1) Since justification is a gift, it cannot be earned by works (vv. 1-8). (2) Since Abraham was justified before he was circumcised, circumcision has no relationship to justification (vv. 9-12). (3) Since Abraham was justified centuries before the Law, justification is not based on the Law (vv. 13-17). (4) Abraham was justified because of his faith in God, not because of his works (vv. 18-25).
- Walvoord & Zuck, The Bible Knowledge Commentary, p. 455
It is as Jesus said in John 8:56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.” And I will leave you with this, are you glad, are you rejoicing in seeing the risen Lord, for Abraham was rejoicing in what was coming, and we should be rejoicing in what the Lord has done. Are you?