Romans 4

Abraham, Like All Men, Was Justified by Faith

In this section, Paul specifically addressed Jews who may have misunderstood why God chose Israel and gave them the sign of circumcision and the Mosaic law.  God did not choose Israel to highlight their ability to obey; He chose them to demonstrate His willingness to forgive.  Dependence on mercy rather than merit was not a new concept introduced by Christians.  “By faith through grace” has always been the only way for men to come to God. 

In building on the thought begun in Romans 3:31, Paul asks the question, “Does the idea of justification through faith, apart from the works of the law, make what God did in the Old Testament irrelevant?” In answering that question, Paul looks at Abraham, who was the most esteemed man among the Jewish people of his day          - David Guzik

Was justification by faith a uniquely Christian revelation contrasted with Jewish doctrine? No. In this chapter the apostle showed that God has always justified people by faith alone.      - Thomas Constable

Abraham Believed God

The Father of Faith

Vs. 3 - For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him for righteousness.

To illustrate what he has just been teaching, Paul refers to the example of Abraham. Abraham was justified because of his faith, not because of any good deeds that he did.            - Don Fleming

Trust in God’s promise is what constitutes faith and results in justification. The promises of God vary. These promises constitute the content of faith. The object of faith does not vary, however. It is always the person of God. For us, God’s promise is that Jesus Christ died as our substitute and satisfied all of God’s demands against sinners (Romans 3:24-25).

Note that God credited Abraham’s faith to him as righteousness. Faith itself is not righteousness. Faith is not meritorious in itself. It is only the vehicle by which God’s righteousness reaches us.           - Thomas Constable

All Men

Vs. 5 - But to the one who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited for righteousness.

What does this mean, “does not work?” It can’t mean that Christians don’t do good works because a Christian’s life is supposed to be filled with good works. It means that you cease working as a way to earn your place before God. When it comes to establishing your rightness with God, you believe on him who declares the ungodly to be righteous.             - JD Greear

By this we understand that there are not two ways of salvation – saved by works through law-keeping in the Old Testament and saved by grace through faith in the New Testament. Everyone who has ever been saved – Old or New Testament – is saved by grace through faith, through their relationship of a trusting love with God.             - David Guzik

David Also

Vs. 6 - Likewise, David also speaks of the blessing of the person to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:

Whereas Abraham lived before the Mosaic Law, David lived under it. As Israel’s greatest king, one would assume that David would have been a strong advocate of the Mosaic Law. He was, but he did not view it as the key to justification.

The passage Paul quoted from David’s writings (Psalms 32:1-2) does not state directly that David himself received justification by faith, though he did. It stresses that those to whom God "reckons" righteousness (i.e., the justified) are "blessed." 

Psalms 32 is one of David’s penitential psalms that he wrote after he had sinned greatly. Paul not only proved that David believed in imputed rather than earned righteousness with this quotation, but he also showed that when a believer sins, his sin does not cancel his justification.         - Thomas Constable

One of the reasons why Paul quotes these verses is the presence in them of the key word ’reckon.’ The practice of associating verses from the OT on the basis of verbal parallels was a common Jewish exegetical technique.            - Douglas J. Moo

Paul says, just like David--our sins, which also deserved death, are going to be covered by Jesus’s blood, and we will never be charged with them because he was charged in our place.           - JD Greear

Before Circumcision 

Vs. 10 - In what way, then, was it credited—while he was circumcised, or uncircumcised? It was not while he was circumcised, but uncircumcised.

The apostle pointed out that when God declared Abraham righteous the patriarch was uncircumcised. He was a virtual Gentile. Fourteen years later Abraham underwent circumcision (Genesis 17:24-26). His circumcision was a sign (label) of what he already possessed. This point would have encouraged Paul’s Jewish readers, who made so much of circumcision, to keep it in its proper place as secondary to faith.            - Thomas Constable

Circumcision was not the gateway to his (Abraham’s) right relationship with God; it was only the sign and the seal that he had already entered into it. His being accounted righteous had nothing to do with circumcision and everything to do with his act of faith.  Paul has laid down the great principle that the way to God is not through membership of any nation, not through any ordinance which makes a mark upon a man's body; but by the faith which takes God at his word and makes everything dependent, not on man's achievement, but solely upon God's grace.               - William Barclay

Apart from Law

Vs. 13 - For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would inherit the world was not through the law, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.

God’s promises to Abraham were given long before Moses and the law.  Paul reiterated his point that men come to God by believing His promises and not by earning His favor.  

The Father of Us All

Vs. 16 - This is why the promise is by faith, so that it may be according to grace, to guarantee it to all the descendants—not only to the one who is of the law but also to the one who is of Abraham’s faith. He is the father of us all.

The fulfillment of the promise in Genesis 17:4-5 is found not only in Abraham’s descendants through Isaac, but especially in his role as being the father of us all who believe – and those believers come from every nation under heaven.             - David Guzik

A Promised Son

Vs. 18 - He believed, hoping against hope, so that he became the father of many nations according to what had been spoken: So will your descendants be.

Abraham and Sarah had received a promise from God that seemed ludicrous. But despite their doubts, they moved in obedience to a foreign land, trusting that God would eventually give them a son through whom all the nations of the world would be blessed.  

Faith's object is the promise of God. Faith is believing that God will do what God said he’d do, and adjusting your life around that. Again, faith is not just believing in God, it is trusting in a specific promise he has made. In Abraham’s case, it was the promise to send a son that would bring blessing and salvation to the world.                          - JD Greear

Fully Convinced?

Vs. 20-21 - He did not waver in unbelief at God’s promise but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, because he was fully convinced that what God had promised, he was also able to do.

When Paul says that Abraham did not “doubt . . . because of unbelief,” he means not that Abraham never had momentary hesitations, but that he avoided a deep-seated and permanent attitude of distrust and inconsistency in relationship to God and his promises.            - Douglas J. Moo

Also For Us

Vs. 23-24 - Now it was credited to him was not written for Abraham alone, but also for us. It will be credited to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

The principle underlying God’s dealings with humankind, Jews and Gentiles alike, is that he gives his promises by grace, and people receive them by faith. God accepted Abraham as righteous because Abraham trusted him to do what he had promised. In like manner, God will accept as righteous those who trust for their salvation in what Christ has done for them through his death and resurrection.           - Don Fleming

Summary

In chapter 4, Paul presented several irrefutable reasons why justification is by faith:    (Witmer)

  • Since justification is a gift, it cannot be earned by works (Romans 4:1-8).

  • Since Abraham was justified before he was circumcised, circumcision has no relationship to justification (Romans 4:9-12).

  • Since Abraham was justified centuries before the Law, justification is not based on the Law (Romans 4:13-17).

  • Abraham was justified because of his faith in God, not because of his works (Romans 4:18-25).

Here, again, we have the root cleavage between Jewish legalism and Christian faith. The basic thought of the Jews was that a man must earn God's favor. The basic thought of Christianity is that all a man can do is to take God at his word and stake everything on the faith that his promises are true. Paul's argument was--and he was unanswerably right--that Abraham entered into a right relationship with God, not because he did all kinds of legal works, but because he cast himself, just as he was, on God's promise.

It is the supreme discovery of the Christian life that we do not need to torture ourselves with a losing battle to earn God's love but rather need to accept in perfect trust the love which God offers to us.         - William Barclay