Here we are now at Romans 4. Let’s do a quick recap, so we can always keep in mind the flow of Paul’s argument. Paul has argued:
- All Gentiles are sinful and deserve God’s wrath (Chapter 1)
- All Jews are sinful and deserve God’s wrath (Chapter 2)
- Having Torah doesn’t give Jews any special advantage (Chapter 3:1-8)
- The Torah itself was never meant to make someone righteous, but rather its purpose is to point out sin and condemn sinners (Chapter 3:9-20)
- Righteousness comes by the grace of God, completely apart from Torah, through faith in Christ (Chapter 3:21-31)
Now here in Chapter 4, Paul goes back to “the Father of the Jews” himself, Abraham, to drive his argument home that one is made righteous through faith, and not through the works of Torah.
Father Abraham…and Paul’s Very UnJewish Perspective of God
What is at the center of Paul’s argument here is Genesis 15:6: “But Abraham put his faith in God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.” So it is quite clear, what was it that made Abraham righteous? Was it the works of Torah or was it faith in God? Clearly, it was his faith in God, not his doing the works of Torah. In fact, it couldn’t have been through Torah—after all Abraham lived over 400 years before the Torah was even given through Moses.
Paul, though, at first emphasizes something else in 4:3-8. If one works (i.e. does works of Torah) then his wages are earned; they’re not a gift. On the contrary, it’s the one who doesn’t work (i.e. doesn’t do works of Torah), but rather puts his faith in the one who justifies (i.e. makes righteous) the ungodly—that is the person whose faith is counted as righteousness.
Now, we might just read right over this and not think twice, but we need to realize the revolutionary thing Paul has just said. He has given a thoroughly un-Jewish perspective of God. Jews traditionally believed that God would justify them (i.e. make them righteous) because they did the works of Torah, and were therefore “godly.” Essentially, they believed that if they practiced Torah, that God was obligated to make them righteous—He owed it to them! God would “righteousize” the godly because they practiced Torah!
Godly People Really Aren’t All That Godly
But Paul is intent on showing that both Jews and Gentiles are completely ungodly. And so, if the Jewish outlook was true, if God only made the godly righteous, then no one would be made righteous, because no one is truly godly. So Paul says it in the most shocking way he can: the ungodly person’s faith is counted to him as righteousness, and the “godly” person’s work counts for nothing in regards to righteousness…because “godly” people aren’t really godly!
We see this throughout the Bible. Just look at the elder son in the parable of the Prodigal Son—he always obeyed his father and did all the right things, but his problem was that he felt his father owed him because of it. He didn’t get the concept of grace, and was thus in danger of missing out on a celebration of grace. He was the truly rebellious one. In the same way, we can look at the story of Jonah, who exiled himself from Nineveh, where God’s forgiveness and grace were being experienced. And the irony of the story is that it is abundantly clear that Jonah the Israelite is the most rebellious, disobedient person in the whole story.
Back to Abraham…Righteous Before the Ole “Snip Snip”!
With that, let’s get back to Abraham (4:9-12). Here, Paul makes a simple and obvious point—Abraham’s faith was counted to him as righteousness before he was circumcised. Circumcision, therefore, is simply an outward sign of a previous inward decision to put one’s faith in God. Circumcision in and of itself means nothing, and therefore the Torah regulations in and of themselves mean nothing, without a decision to put one’s faith in God. And in that respect, both Jews and Gentiles are on the same ground: Abraham, therefore, is the father of the circumcised Jews who have put their faith in God, and he’s also the father of the uncircumcised Gentiles who have put their faith in God.
Paul then elaborates in 4:13-25 by alluding to YHWH’s promise to Abraham that he would have a son (Isaac), and that it would be through his offspring that YHWH would eventually bring salvation to the world. Did YHWH make that promise to Abraham because he kept the Torah? Obviously not. YHWH made that promise to Abraham because Abraham put his faith in God. The Torah, therefore, brings God’s wrath—for it declares all the world guilty.
But Paul isn’t quite done, for he elaborates even further on Abraham, by pointing out that Abraham’s faith in God was rooted in the conviction that God could bring life from the dead. This can be seen in two instances in Abraham’s life:
- God brought new life (i.e. Isaac) out from Abraham and Sarah’s “dead” bodies—meaning they were old and incapable of having kids, and God did it anyway;
- When God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham showed his faith that God would raise Isaac up, even if Abraham sacrificed him.
This is why, as Paul says, Abraham’s faith was counted to him as righteousness—it was a faith in the God would could bring life from the dead. How this applies to Christians should be obvious. That same God is the one who raised Jesus from the dead. Paul’s point is simple: the faith that is counted as righteousness is the faith in the God who raises the dead—that is the faith of Abraham, and that is the faith that is available to both Jews and Gentiles, regardless of the Torah.
