A Case Study of the Gospel (1) How Abraham was NOT made right with God (Rom 4.1-16)

The book of Romans is all about how unrighteous human beings can be made righteous in the sight of a holy God. In chapters 1 to 3, Paul has shown that no one is righteous by nature — "There is no one righteous, not even one" (Romans 3:10). Then came the great turning point: "But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known" (3:21). The bad news is that no one is righteous. The good news is that God has provided righteousness, available to anyone who believes.

Now Paul anticipates an objection. He imagines a Jewish reader saying, "What is all this new-fangled teaching about righteousness by faith apart from the law?" Chapter 4 is his response: "This is not new teaching. It is very, very old. Let me give you a case study — and I will take as my example the most famous Jew there has ever been: Abraham." A case study always puts flesh on the bones of an abstract principle, and this one helps us here in Galway see all the more clearly what it means to be justified by faith.

1. We Don't Get Right with God by Our Works (verses 1–8)

If Abraham had been made righteous by his works — by the things that he did — then he had something to boast about (verse 2). And as good works go, Abraham had some pretty impressive specimens. This is a man who left his homeland, his family, his friends — everything familiar — and travelled hundreds upon hundreds of kilometres to the ends of the earth just because God told him to. When his herds competed with his nephew Lot's for water and grazing, Abraham said to his much younger nephew, "You take the pick of the land." Outstanding humility and generosity. God calls Abraham his friend — he does not describe anybody else like that in the entire Old Testament. When God told him to sacrifice his son Isaac, Abraham was prepared to obey immediately. If anyone could be justified by good works, Abraham could. The Jewish rabbis certainly thought so. The Book of Jubilees says, "Abraham was perfect in all his dealings with the Lord and gained favour by his righteousness throughout his life."

And yet Paul says: "If Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about — but not before God" (verse 2). In the sight of God, all our good works shrivel up and disappear.

I remember seeing a video of Bradley Wiggins passing another cyclist in a race. The man he passed was doing 40 kilometres per hour on the flat — that is pretty fast. Bradley Wiggins came up behind him and whooshed past at 54 kilometres per hour. I like to go out on the bike at lunchtime a few times a week. My route takes me up the Clybourne Road and out into the countryside, then down into Barna on a lovely long downhill. Near the bottom there is a speed camera. My goal is to try to get above 50 — just breaking the speed limit, which is not a good thing to do. If I pedal really, really fast with a bit of a tailwind, coming down this steep hill in top gear, I can just about get over 50. And here is Bradley Wiggins on the flat, racing past someone at 54. It makes the man doing 40 look as if he is hardly moving. That is what happens to our good works. Compared to other people they might look okay, but as soon as we put them in God's sight, we have nothing at all to boast about.

Isaiah 64:6 puts it bluntly: "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags." Our English translations are a little more delicate than the original Hebrew, which literally says our righteous acts are like a menstrual cloth. That is what our good works are like in the sight of God. Not only will they not save us — they will condemn us.

So how was Abraham justified? Verse 3: "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." This word credited is crucial — it appears five times in verses 3 to 8. It is a financial word, from the world of banks and accounts. There are two ways money can be credited to your account: as wages or as a gift. When your boss transfers your wages at the end of the month, you do not send an effusive thank-you note — "Thank you so much for your generosity!" You have earned that money. It is yours by right.

But righteousness is not like that. You cannot earn it by working hard at good things. You could never pay for it, because it is infinitely more than you can possibly afford. The Mona Lisa is insured for a billion dollars, but you cannot buy it for a billion dollars — the French government is never going to sell it. Even if you spent every second of your life working and saved every cent, you could not offer enough. The only way you or I could ever own the Mona Lisa is if the French government decided to give it as a gift. That is not likely to happen — but that is the only way it will ever happen. And that is exactly how righteousness works. It is given as a free gift, received by faith. That is how Abraham was made right before God.

As if Abraham were not compelling enough, Paul cites another Old Testament case study in verses 6–8: King David, who had committed adultery and murder. David knew his sin ought to be counted against him, yet in Psalm 32 he writes that it is not. He is treated as righteous on some other basis than his works. As Paul explained at the end of chapter 3, this is only possible because of Jesus Christ: our guilt was credited to Jesus at the cross, even though he did not commit our sins, and his righteousness is credited to us, even though we did not do his good works.

The challenge is direct: have you received this gift of righteousness through faith in Jesus Christ? You could give all your savings to the Simon Community today and spend the rest of your life volunteering with disabled children — and that would not get you one millimetre closer to heaven. Those are very good things, but they are not nearly good enough to make you right with God. Righteousness can only be received as a gift. This is what makes Christianity unique among all the religions of the world. Every other religion says you must earn your way to heaven. Christianity says there is nothing you can do — it is all about what God in Christ has done for you.

2. We Don't Get Right with God by Circumcision (verses 9–12)

Paul imagines a Jewish objector: "Okay, maybe Abraham did not earn righteousness by good works — but he was circumcised. He received this wonderful religious privilege, this sign and seal of the covenant." The Jews set great store by circumcision. Rabbi Levi, writing in the fourth century, said: "In the age to come, Abraham will sit at the gate of hell and will not permit a circumcised Israelite to go down there." In other words, if you have the sign, you are safe.

So many people think exactly like that today — not about circumcision, but about church sacraments and religious privileges. There are men and women in Galway today who think they are right with God because they have been baptised, because they take the Lord's Supper, because they pray, because they come to church.

Paul demolishes that thinking with one devastating question: when was Abraham justified? Was it after he was circumcised or before? The answer: before — in fact, fourteen years before. God justified Abraham by faith in Genesis 15, and then gave circumcision as a sign and seal in Genesis 17. He was not saved because he was circumcised.

If you are on a plane and it gets into trouble and you have to jump, there is no point jumping out clutching a sign of where to find the parachute. There is no good holding a picture of a parachute — that is not going to save you. You need the real thing. If you need a lifeboat, a picture of a lifeboat will not help. Circumcision was just a sign — a picture of the reality that Abraham experienced fourteen years earlier. Baptism is just a sign. The Lord's Supper is just a sign. The sacraments are full of meaning and tremendous blessing, and God commands his people to use them. But we must never think for a moment that they will save us. We are justified by faith in Jesus Christ.

3. We Don't Get Right with God by the Law (verses 13–16)

The Jews were tremendously proud of the law given through Moses on Mount Sinai. It was an immense privilege. But instead of sharing that knowledge with the nations, they came to see the law as a status symbol that made them better than the Gentiles. The irony is that if they had really read and understood it, the law would have humbled them. Instead, they were swollen with pride. "We perform all the prescribed sacrifices. We eat only kosher food. We don't buy or sell on the Sabbath. We have the law — we are safe."

How many people in churches today make exactly the same mistake? "I believe in God. I believe the Bible. I believe everything it says. I believe Jesus is the Son of God who died for sinners." As James says in his letter, the devil believes all of those things as well. The devil knows the Bible better than any of us. Knowing the truth, believing the truth intellectually, does not make you righteous.

Paul states it bluntly in 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." God did not come to Abraham with a law to obey. He gave him a promise to believe. Law and promise are two totally separate categories. You do not obey a promise — you receive it by faith.

It is like a parent saying to a child, "I promise I will buy you a bike for your birthday." The child believes the promise and lives excitedly in the light of it. But imagine three days later the parent says, "I will buy you a bike — if you carry out all these chores every day and get 85% in your school exams." That is not a promise anymore. That is a law. You have moved from receiving something graciously to something that must be earned. Either it is a promise or it is a law, but it cannot be both. God gave Abraham a promise to be received by faith — and Abraham believed it, and that is how he was made righteous.

Paul goes further in verses 14–16: if God made righteousness depend on keeping the law, no one would ever be made right with God, because the law only brings condemnation and wrath — we simply cannot keep it. "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 are of the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all" (verse 16). That includes you and me today.

The Challenge

It is a wonderful thing to have the Bible, to read it every day, to study it and know it inside out. But never think that knowing the Bible, possessing the law, or trying to keep the law will save you. The only way to be made right with God is by believing the promise — the promise of forgiveness that comes through Jesus Christ. Next week, in the second half of Romans 4, we will see more clearly how we are made right with God. But this passage clears the ground: not by works, not by religious privileges, not by the law. Only through faith in Jesus Christ.

Listen to the full sermon above or explore more from the Romans series.

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