Romans 4:1-25; Faith Alone

Jason Sterling March 1, 2026 Faith Presbyterian Church Birmingham, AL Bulletin

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Transcript

Setting The Stage In Romans 4

SPEAKER_00 0:23

If you have a copy of the Bible, turn with me Romans chapter 4. So turn Romans 4. You'll see it printed in your bulletin. It'll also be on the screen behind me. Exciting times in the life of our church. If you uh can tell, we're about a month away from being in our new sanctuary. Beautiful sanctuary. So grateful, so excited about how the Lord's going to use that space and be a means for gospel ministry in our city. But we've been looking at Romans and doing this study, and we've been coming back and saying, our confidence does not rest in beautiful buildings and things built by hands. Our confidence rests in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And nowhere is that gospel more clearly and comprehensively and powerfully unpacked than in Paul's letter to the Romans. And so we've been studying Romans as a church. And this morning, Paul is going to show us that the gospel's nothing new, that it's actually God's plan from the very beginning. Let me read Romans chapter four together, and then we will pray. Follow along with me. This is God's word. What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was credited, credited or counted, that's the NIV, sorry. It was counted to him as righteousness. Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due. And to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works. Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. Is this blessing then only for the circumcised or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well, and to make him the father of the circumcised, who are not merely circumcised, but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be heirs, faith is null, and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression. That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring, not only to the adherents of the law, but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. As it is written, I have made you the father of many nations, in the presence of the God in whom we he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, so shall your offspring be. He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness. But in the words, it was counted to him, were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who is delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. Let me pray and ask God to help us with this passage. Father, uh, there is a lot packed into this chapter in Romans 4. Make it clear. Help me to be clear. Speak, oh Lord, speak through this passage. You have brought us here this morning. It's not an accident. We are listening. In Jesus' name. Amen. You've got pull. You ever heard that phrase? He's got pull. He can get us tickets to the big game. Or maybe you've heard it phrased pulling rank. And it's when someone has the influence and the connections and the ability to make things happen because they know people. And because they've been around a long time. Maybe it's a younger colleague who shows up in your company and has all these great ideas, and you say, Settle down. I've been here before. I've been here at this company since before you were born. We got this. Or maybe you're at a restaurant with a group of people, and you walk in, and they say it'll be about 45 minutes to an hour wait. Someone in your party says, wait just a second. I know the owner. I'll be right back. That's pulling rank. And that's exactly what some in Paul's audience were doing. They were pulling rank with God. They were uh basing it on Abraham and on circumcision and the law. They were God, they were children of Abraham. We've been circumcised, we have the law. Surely that counts for something. Do you know who we are? Surely we're better than these Gentile outsiders and have a better standing. And Romans 4 is the Apostle Paul's defense. And he says, You want to talk about Abraham? Let's talk about Abraham. And it's a master stroke. It's brilliant because the Apostle Paul chooses two men in Israel's history that no Jew could argue with. Abraham, the father of the nation, founding father of Israel, and David, the great King David, who was the best king that Israel had ever had. If Paul could prove that they were justified by faith alone, that even these two greats, Abraham and David, if they could not pull rank, the case would be closed. And so that's exactly what Paul does in this chapter. He closes the case and he proves from Abraham's story that he and David couldn't pull rank with God either. Three things this morning. Righteousness is first credited. That's number one, credited, not earned. This passage shows us, secondly, that righteousness is given, not inherited. And lastly, that righteousness is received by faith. Credited, not earned, given, not inherited, received by faith. Before we dig in, let me pause. You could tell from reading the passage, you are probably like, what is happening? This passage is going to require some engagement on your part this morning. Paul is not just preaching, he's building a case, and his case matters. So track, I'll try to walk through this just like we always do. Track with his argument, try to stay engaged in the details. And if we do, uh it will show us something really amazing. It is massive what Paul is doing here, and it changes everything. So you ready to dig in? Let's jump in. Point number one: righteousness is credited, not earned. Look at verse 2. Notice Paul. Paul doesn't say Abraham was justified by works. He, a very important word, if it's hypothetical, if it worked that way, he would have grounds to boast before people. But notice he says, not before God. Why not before God? Because God sees everything. God is perfect. He sees the human heart. And Abraham would have no boast before God. Why not? Look at verse 3, a very important verse in this passage. Abraham believed, and it was counted. And if you have a New International Version, credited, credited to him as righteousness. Paul is quoting here Genesis 15, 6. And notice the word he uses, counted. Maybe your translation says credited. It's an accounting term, and that's significant. Paul is obsessed with this term. He uses it 11 times. You probably heard it just keep over and over. He uses it 11 times in this chapter. And it's not, he's not being subtle. It's very intentional. He's beating the drum. It is a bookkeeping entry, not a performance review. This is before Abraham. Think about this. Before he was circumcised, before he sacrificed Isaac on the altar with that great act of faith, before any of his great acts of obedience, God made a promise. Abraham believed it. God credited him as righteous before him. Look at verses four and five. He explains what counted means by using, Martin set this up well, by using a wage grace comparison. If you work for something, the employer owes you. It's not a gift, it's something that you're due. But what about righteousness? I love the way this is phrased. Paul said, righteousness goes to the one who does not work, but who believes, and the one who justifies the ungodly. Did you catch that? Please do not miss this. Justifies the ungodly, the wicked. God justifies you while you are still in your sins. You are declared righteous while still being a sinner. And that is really good news. Because if God only justified the godly, we're all in trouble. We are in trouble. None of us would qualify. But he doesn't. Our God justifies the ungodly, which means we've got hope this morning. There is hope for you and me. You don't have to clean yourself up first to come to Jesus. You don't have to get your act together. No, you come just as you are: a sinner, ungodly, and God credits you with Christ's righteousness. Follow the argument. He doesn't stop with Abraham. He then moves on to his second witness. Well, what about David? Look at verses 6 through 8. He quotes Psalm 32. Think about who David is, the greatest king in Israel's time. But also, he did a lot, but also, if you know David's story, he was an adulterer, a murderer, a conspirator. And even David, with all of those achievements in his sins, says, notice that blessed is the one whose sins are covered, whose sins do not count against him. Even David couldn't earn righteousness. It was credited to him. And so Paul's point is two witnesses, two different times in Israel's history. Abraham before the law, David under the law, same thing, same message. Righteousness is counted, credited, not earned. That's his point. Here's a picture. Let's keep with the bookkeeping analogy, since that's Paul's word that he's using here. Imagine you get up tomorrow morning, you check your banking account, and you see half a million dollars has been deposited into your account. Problem is you didn't do it. You didn't earn it. And you call the bank and you're like, you're confused, and you're thinking, what is happening here? Someone has put half a million dollars into my account, their wealth credited to your account number, and the bank says, Yes, it's legally yours. It's not a loan that you have to pay back. This is a permanent transfer that you didn't earn, that you didn't work for. Someone, you couldn't accumulate these resources, but someone transferred them into your account. And now when the bank looks at your balance, they do not see your previous poverty. They see wealth that has been credited to you. That's what happened to Abraham. That's what happens to David. That is the gospel. You are given the righteousness of Christ, his wealth, obedience, flawless record that is given as if it were your own. So that when God looks on your account, he doesn't see failure or poverty, he sees the righteousness of Christ. That's why it's the good news of the gospel. And here's why this matters so much. Without God declaring you righteous based on Christ, you have two options. And a lot of people do this. One option is you minimize your sin, you lower the bar, and you just say, Well, God's not really that holy, and my sin's really not that bad. The problem with that is that's not true, and that's not reality. Or people swing to the other end and they see God's holiness and they see their sin and they're completely devastated, crushed, and paralyzed. They cannot do anything, they're simply in misery. Both are tragic, both miss the gospel. Because the gospel says, yes, God is that holy. He is that righteous. Yes, think about Romans one through three. Yes, our sin is that serious, but God, but Christ, his righteousness has been counted to you. And so you can face the truth, you can look at the holiness of God, you can look at your sin without despair because you are trusting in Jesus. We don't need to pull rank, we don't need to build our case and earn it. We already have what we need. The righteousness of Jesus has uh been credited to our account. Secondly, righteousness is given, not inherited. Look at verses 9 through 10. Ask a simple question here. When did Abraham get this righteousness? Did he get it before or after he was circumcised? And here's the answer. Genesis 15 is when he believed in the promises of God and it was credited to him as righteousness. But he didn't get circumcised till a decade or more later in Genesis 17. You follow the argument here? Paul's point is Abraham had no credentials. He had no religious ritual, he was ungodly, and he was justified while he was still uncircumcised. And so then the question is so what's the point of circumcision? Well, verse 11 the sign and seal of righteousness that Abraham already had. Here's an illustration. Think of it like adoption. A child is legally part of a family at the moment that they're adopted. That's when their status changes. The adoption certificate that they get later in the mail or whatever doesn't make them a part of the family. It confirms that they already are. Same with Abraham. Justified first, circumcision came later, just like the certificate. Paul doesn't stop with circumcision. Again, follow his argument. He goes to the law, verse 13 through 15, and he does the exact same thing. He says, No, Abraham has nothing to do with the law. Because Abraham was justified 600 years before the law, before the Ten Commandments, before all the regulations in Leviticus. He just had a promise given by God and he believed it by faith. You see what Paul is proving is that Abraham was justified before circumcision and the law, which means that you do not need religious credentials in order to be saved. Verse 16 tells us why it has to be this way. Because it guaranteed that the gospel would be available to everyone, to Jew and Gentile, religious and irreligious, credentialed and uncredentialed. And so let's make some application. And in the application, I want to talk specifically and talk about those who struggle with assurance of salvation. Because maybe this morning you're not pulling rank. Maybe you don't really feel excluded, but you're very anxious about your spiritual life and about your relationship with God. Maybe you live what is often referred to as good day, bad day Christianity, where you're constantly playing the spiritual, He loves me, He loves me not game. You know that game? I do it all the time. Read my Bible, pray. He loves me. I snap at my kids, He loves me not. I'm generous, I serve, He loves me. I fall back into that same sin again, He loves me not. Always struggling with that question: Am I enough? Am I spiritual enough? Do I know enough? And friends, I have lived, I live most of my Christian life that way. That sounds fun, doesn't it? Does that sound like freedom at all? Joy? No. It's exhausting. Because there will always be someone that's more spiritual, someone more consistent, someone who knows the Bible better. And that is why this is so essential as we think about our walk with Christ and living out our faith, this chronology here. Abraham was justified before he had any credentials, before anything impressive. And that means that your assurance can't be based on your credentials either. God didn't say to Abraham, hey, get circumcised, take Isaac to the altar, and let me show you that you're really serious about this, and let me see your spiritual resume, then I will accept you. No, he says, I'm declaring you righteous right now. While you're ungodly before any of that, you see, we can stop living good day, bad day Christianity. I can stop living good day, bad day Christianity because Abraham was justified before his credentials. And it is you, your standing is based on Jesus Christ alone, and that never changes. And so if righteousness is credited, not earned, it is given, not inherited, then how do we receive this righteousness? Well, that's the last point that Paul gets to. Look at verses 18 through 21. Righteousness is received by faith. He basically, here in these verses, does a case study and shows us, it's really amazing a couple of verses, shows us what faith actually looks like. Look at verse 19. He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead because he was a hundred years old, or when he considered his wife Sarah in the barrenness of her wound. I want you to notice a few things right here that we can observe about faith. First, it considers the obstacles. And I think that's really important. Notice Abraham didn't close his eyes and just pretend like everything was great. No, he looked at his body that was old and dead, and he looked at Sarah, who was barren, and he he didn't ignore that. He faced that honestly. And so I think that's important. Faith is not denial, it's not pretending like you don't have any problems or like everything's great or that problems don't exist. It's not the power of positive thinking, it's not wishful dreaming. Notice what he does here. He's facing the impossible situation, but he looks at God and he doesn't stop with his problems. He doesn't stop at the circumstances, he looks beyond those to the promise of God. Faith is facing the reality, and then trusting that God's word and promise is more real than what you see. Faith is facing the reality, and trusting that God's word and his promise is more real than what you can see with your eyes. And what's interesting is you see that his circumstances, Abraham's, didn't change for decades. Some of you this morning are in some really hard circumstances, and from where you sit, they seem impossible. What does it look like to walk through that with faith? It means don't over-spiritualize it. Be honest about the reality, but see through that and hang on with all you've got to the promises of God. That God is on his throne, that he is still good, that he is with you, even though you can't see right now how that is all working together. And hang on with all you've got, that you firmly have the gospel, that you have the righteousness of Christ, you have that stability, and it feels like everything around you feels unstable and fragile. You hold on to those things in the midst of acknowledging those, the hardness of whatever it is that you're facing. Look at verses 20 and 21. It's interesting. His faith actually grew stronger. Why? Because he focused on God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he promised. Not convinced of his own strength and worthiness, but of God's ability. And look at the result, verse 22. That's why his faith was counted to him as righteousness. And then Paul takes the turn to us. Look at verses 23 and 25. This wasn't just written for Abraham, it's written for us this morning. And here's the connection. Abraham believed God could bring life from his dead body, meaning he looked at his body and he was saying, God, you can give life here. I'm a hundred years old, my wife is barren, but you can do this. And we believe in God, don't we? Who brought life out of a dead body? Jesus Christ raised from the grave. Same faith. See it? Same impossible miracle. Same result. God declares us righteous. Jesus through his death paid for our sins. Look at verse 25. His resurrection proves that you're declared righteous. Cross dealt with your guilt. Resurrection declares your justification. Tim Keller says, faith, I love the way he phrases this, is a trust transfer. Removing hope in yourself, removing hope in other things, and placing your hope on Jesus Christ as your Savior. Here's an illustration. Think about a person who is drowning. When you're drowning, at some point, you have to stop thrashing around trying to save yourself. You have to quit and give up and trust. And you have to throw all of your weight on the lifeguard and let them pull you to safety. That's saving faith. It's not conjuring up some emotion or some strong feeling. It's not achieving perfect certainty. It is saying, I can't, he can, I'm going with him. I'm trusting Jesus. And so the question I'll leave you with this morning is have you done that? Have you made the trust transfer? Not, do you believe in God? Okay, even the demons believe in God. Not I grew up in the church. That's pedigree and credentials. Not I go to church every week. No, that's religious activity. Have you transferred your confidence off of yourself onto Christ? Or maybe this morning you sit here and you feel ungodly. You have done things in your life that you never thought you would do. Well, the invitation for you is will you trust the God who justifies and makes right the ungodly? As we move forward to this new season of ministry, let's be clear about what sustains us. What sustains us is not legacy and not buildings and not 50 years of the history of our church, all great things. Our confidence rests in the same thing, the same gospel that saved Abraham and David thousands of years ago. Credited righteousness received by faith alone in Christ alone. Will you come to Jesus and receive him by faith this morning? Let's pray. Father, thank you that salvation has always been by grace, that you have loved us enough to come get us. Thank you that you did not just save the godly, that you justify the ungodly. And I pray this morning you would forgive us for trusting our credentials instead of trusting you. And I pray, Holy Spirit, that you would help us to make the trust transfer. If there's someone here that needs to do that, would you give them faith? Give them eyes to see, work in their heart, Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name. Amen.