Romans: The Story of God Bible Commentary

images/img-37-1.jpg LISTEN to the Story

¹What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? ²If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about — but not before God. ³What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

⁴Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. ⁵However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness. ⁶David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the one to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:

⁷“Blessed are those
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.

⁸Blessed is the one
whose sin the Lord will never count against them.”

⁹Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. ¹⁰Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! ¹¹And he received circumcision as a sign, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. So then, he is the father of all who believe but have not been circumcised, in order that righteousness might be credited to them. ¹²And he is then also the father of the circumcised who not only are circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.

¹³It was not through the 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. ¹⁴For if those who depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, ¹⁵because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.

¹⁶Therefore, 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 have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. ¹⁷As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.” He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed — the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.

¹⁸Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” ¹⁹Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead — since he was about a hundred years old — and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. ²⁰Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, ²¹ being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. ²²This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” ²³The words “it was credited to him” were written not for him alone, ²⁴but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness — for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. ²⁵He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.

Listening to the texts in the story: Genesis 15:5 – 6; 17:1 – 16; Psalm 32; Isaiah 53:11 – 12; Sirach 44:19 – 21; 1 Maccabees 2:51 – 52.

Paul continues his line of thought begun in Romans 3:21 by showing that the story of Abraham found in Genesis 15 upholds his argument that justification is by faith and not by works of the law (see table below). Importantly, Abraham, the “friend of God,” was a revered figure in Jewish tradition.¹ Paul latches his gospel onto the Abraham story in Romans 4, demonstrating the prophetic nature of Abraham’s faith underscoring the scriptural roots of his teaching about justification by faith.²

At the hub of Paul’s argument is Genesis 15:6, which says, “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.” In contrast to Jewish readings of Genesis, Paul is out to prove that Abraham is not a proto-proselyte, the first convert to Judaism; but the proto-typical Christian, who has faith in God’s life-giving power. What Paul has in mind is no mere raiding of the favorite proof text of traditionalist critics and twisting it for his own ends. Rather, Paul is concerned with the true meaning of the Torah for the revelation of God’s righteousness in the gospel, a gospel that is for Jews and Gentiles. Abraham’s faith, as described in Genesis 15:5 – 6 and when properly understood, requires a recalibration of contemporary views about God’s promises, covenant, law, and salvation. That is because Abraham’s faith proves that justification is by faith and not by works of the law, nor is it restricted to people of the law. In this way, Paul is able to drive a wedge between Israel’s election and Israel’s law, and instead redraws election around faith in Christ, with Abraham the case in point.⁴

As such, the Abraham story is invoked sociologically to dissolve the category of “God-fearer” as a second class of insiders within Jewish and Christian assemblies. The Abraham story is also recast theologically to shut down any notion of salvation as a reward. Paul’s exposition of Abraham’s faith illustrates the dual role of faith as the badge for membership in God’s people and the instrument of salvation. As Schreiner writes: “Paul is interested in the inclusion of Gentiles and the basis of their inclusion.”⁵ Thus, Romans 4 stresses that all believers are Abraham’s children by faith since faith is what God requires of his people.⁶

In terms of the structure of Romans 4, Paul contends: (1) Abraham was justified by faith, meaning that salvation is by grace and not merited by works (vv. 1 – 5). (2) David reiterates the same point that God credits righteousness and forgives sins wholly apart from works (vv. 6 – 8). (3) Therefore, Abraham is the father of all who believe, circumcised or uncircumcised, because of the priority of the promise over the law (vv. 9 – 16). (4) Abraham’s faith was steadfast and centered on God’s life-giving power (vv. 17 – 22). (5) The story of Abraham is paradigmatic for Christians, who exercise a similar faith in God’s life-giving power by believing in the God who raised Jesus Christ from the dead (vv. 22 – 25).

Paul begins with a hermeneutical technique called “midrash,” where he brings together Genesis 15:6 and Psalm 32:2 in order to highlight God’s gracious action in granting righteousness to believers (vv. 1 – 8).⁷ Midrash is a broad term but basically means an “interpretive exposition.” The aim of midrash is to show the relevance of one text to another in the course of constructing an exegetical argument. There were several ways to do that, and one such way was the gezerah shewah or “equivalent regulation,” where the interpreter undertakes an exposition of two or more texts that share a common word.⁸ In the immediate context, Paul links Genesis 15:6 and Psalm 32:2 by their common word “credit” or “reckon” (logizomai).

The point of vv. 1 – 2 is to declare that Abraham was no exception to the statement in 3:27 – 29 about the exclusion of boasting and the inclusion of Gentiles. Paul begins with a rhetorical question, as he has done often, “What then shall we say?” but thereafter we encounter some translation issues that require comment. The basic question is what does the infinitive verb heurēskenai (“to discover, find”) modify? Does it go with the following noun “Abraham,” or else does it go with the subject of the preceding verb “we have found”?⁹

The traditional reading is that Abraham discovered that he was justified by faith, not by works (e.g., NIV, NRSV, ESV) — an observation that comports with the thrust of vv. 2 – 8 concerning the contrast between faith and works and corresponds to the definite emphasis on grace in v. 4.¹⁰

However, an alternative reading is proposed by Richard Hays, who contends that “we” is the subject of the verb “find” and Abraham is the object: Have we found Abraham to be our forefather on the basis of human descent?¹¹ This rendering has a number of strengths: (1) Throughout Romans the refrain, “What shall we say?” (Ti oun eroumen;) is normally a complete sentence and is always followed by a second rhetorical question (see Rom 3:5; 6:1; 7:7; 8:31; 9:14, 30). It is correct to see two questions being asked here rather than just one: “What shall we say? Have we found Abraham to be our forefather on the basis of genealogy?”

(2) The context of 3:27 – 31 and 4:9 – 22 deal with the question as to whether descent from Abraham and the status of “righteous” are limited to those who are circumcised. The primary point of vv. 9 – 22 is that Abraham is the father of all believers, whether circumcised or uncircumcised. In which case, the presenting issue is the scope of salvation with Abraham, comprising the case study for answering the question.

(3) The phrase “according to the flesh” (kata sarka) is inserted to address the issue of whether belonging to Abraham’s family is a matter of genealogy or a matter of faith. The presence of “according to the flesh” is strange on the traditional view since Paul would be claiming that Gentiles have Abraham as their ancestor according to the flesh, namely, by genealogy, when clearly they do not relate to Abraham by natural descent. Yet it makes much better sense if the issue is whether Abraham is our father according to the flesh (i.e., on the basis of circumcision) or whether Abraham is our father according to faith (i.e., on the basis of believing God’s promises). What is more, later in Romans 9:7 – 8, Paul will state that it is not children of the “flesh” who are Abraham’s seed, but the children of the “promise,” i.e., believers. Viewing Romans 4 and 9 together, Paul is claiming that election is marked out by faith in the promises, not by obedience to works of the law. The stress falls on how believers are in the Abrahamic covenant, by flesh or by faith, and Paul says emphatically by faith.

If this is the issue, Paul is then asking, “Given our previous discussion about faith and works, grace and boasting, what should we conclude about Abraham? Is Abraham our forefather on the basis of human descent? Of course not! If that were the case, then Israel’s boasting would be valid and God would be the God of the Jews only.” Paul brings up “how” believers are justified in vv. 2 – 8 precisely because how Abraham was justified will impact both the scope of justification and the means by which Abraham becomes the father of all believers. Given the Torah’s association with Jewish identity, obviously the matter of the who and the how of justification are interlocking issues. For Paul, Abrahamic sonship and justification are a matter of grace, promise, and faith, not derived from physical descent, circumcision, or works.

Accordingly Paul constructs a hypothetical proposal in vv. 2 – 3 about Abraham being justified by works. Whereas some thought that Abraham was a paragon of virtue, who was duly justified by his works, who could boast in his God-given privilege and steadfastness under trial, Paul asserts to the contrary that Abraham couldn’t have made any such boast, especially not before God. The reason is clear: Abraham had no such works to boast in. Scripture says, rather than works warranting reward, that something different took place. Genesis 15:6 records that “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.” The promise to Abraham did not come to Abraham on the basis of what he went on to do, but on the basis of his steadfast faith. Abraham’s righteousness was not a matter of reward but of grace, for it came through faith, not by works.

To further establish this point, Paul reverts to a commercial metaphor in vv. 4 – 5 to categorically rule out any possibility of merit on Abraham’s behalf that warranted a declaration of righteousness. Paul is adamant that Abraham’s righteousness cannot be understood in contractual or commercial terms. Abraham’s righteousness was not meted out as a payment owed but an entirely unmerited gift that was freely bestowed. By employing this imagery, Paul is refuting contemporary views that said God credited righteousness to Abraham as a reward for his character and conduct. For example, some argued that Abraham was already righteous when God called him, some speculated that Abraham must have kept the Mosaic law, and others projected Abraham’s subsequent act of obedience in Genesis 22 into his justification in Genesis 15. Against all that, as Dunn comments, “Paul here attacks head-on the normal or at least widely accepted way of thinking about Abraham among his fellow Jews.”¹²

In contrast to these Jewish interpretations of Abraham, Paul declares that Abraham’s faith was credited as righteousness without Torah obedience; while he was uncircumcised and numbered among the “ungodly,” it was given by sheer grace. This is as clear of a rejection of a work-for-reward view of salvation as one can find in the New Testament.¹³ God does not justify the one working for the reward of righteousness, but God justifies the ungodly who believe in his promises.¹⁴ Salvation is not located in human effort, but in a divine reckoning.

That God “credits” or “reckons” faith as righteousness can only mean that salvation emerges from God’s act of declaring, acquitting, and creating. God does not weigh us and calculate if we are worthy; rather, he reckons us and makes us worthy to be with him. God creates a redemptive reality by declaring it to be so. This divine reckoning, based on the Greek word logizomai, means that we do not face an assessment as to our fittingness for a heavenly eternity on judgment day; instead, we are reckoned as righteous in the here and now. This little word logizomai carries big significance for in it we find our identity as God’s people (Rom 2:26) and our acceptance before God’s throne (4:4 – 6, 8 – 12, 24). Fleming Routledge tells the story of how a departing Episcopal priest from a congregation was given a going-away present comprised of a golden cross and chain with the word logizomai engraved on the back of it.¹⁵ Salvation resides in God’s great logizomai; we are reckoned as being in a covenant relationship with him by faith in Jesus Christ.

The same point is then illustrated in vv. 6 – 8 by way of a citation of Psalm 32:2, where God credits righteousness apart from works. David says the “same thing,” which means there is a theological agreement between Genesis 15:6 and Psalm 32:2 about the gracious nature of salvation. The one considered “blessed” is he “whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered” and “whose sin the Lord will never count against them.” Significantly, David stands as one already within the covenant, already circumcised, an anointed king over Israel, who does not assert his covenantal righteousness but pleads instead for forgiveness in the face of his transgression. The appeal to the stories of Abraham and David prove that justification by faith is consistent across Israel’s covenantal history.

Importantly this categorical denial of merit theology in vv. 4 – 8 is placed in service of a wider redemptive-historical arc that Paul draws across this chapter. For if “works” do not justify (vv. 2 – 8), then presumably neither does the work of circumcision (vv. 9 – 22), which paves the way for the uncircumcised to be justified by faith (vv. 23 – 25). As such, Paul insists that Abraham stood in the position of a Gentile, the quintessential example of a sinner, when he was justified. Abraham was a covenant partner with God wholly apart from the covenant symbol of circumcision. Let us note that in the Torah Abraham was a Gentile when God called him (Gen 12); Abraham’s belief in God’s promises (Gen 15) took place before he was circumcised (Gen 17) and before his faith was tested (Gen 22). If Abraham was justified by faith — without Torah, without circumcision, without proven obedience, by sheer grace — then the same can be true of others. Abraham is, then, truly the father of all who believe, circumcised or uncircumcised. In effect, Paul opposes a view common among Jewish authors that Abraham was the first circumcised proselyte to Judaism; instead, Paul sees Abraham typologically as the first Gentile Christian.¹⁶

In vv. 9 – 16 Paul returns to the argument that righteousness by faith applies equally to Jew and Gentile. Paul immediately unpacks the significance of Psalm 32:2 and Genesis 15:6 by asking: “Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before!” (vv. 9 – 10). The question behind Paul’s question is something along the lines of: If circumcision is the sign of the covenant (see Gen 17:9 – 14), is it not true that circumcision is indispensable for receiving covenantal grace?¹⁷ Paul’s answer is a resounding “no.”

To begin with, Paul’s question whether the blessedness spoken about in Psalm 32:2 pertains to both the circumcised and the uncircumcised demands an affirmative answer in light of Genesis 15:6. The blessedness, consisting of the forgiveness of sins and the noncounting of sins, comes to the uncircumcised as the example of Abraham demonstrates. The emphasis is on the “before,” for it was when Abraham was not yet circumcised that he was credited righteousness. If that is the case, no one can say that circumcision is the sine qua non for a right standing before God because Abraham was definitely not yet circumcised.

Now is a good time to say a few things about circumcision since it features so prominently in Romans 4. Circumcision of male infants was a sign of Abraham’s covenant (Gen 17:11; Acts 7.8; Jub. 12.26 – 28; m. Ned. 3.11) and commanded for Israelites (Lev 12:3). Circumcision was also regarded as the rite of entry for Gentiles into the covenant (Jdt 14.10; Esth 8:17; Acts 15:1; m. Šab. 19.3). Circumcision was thought to have a host of benefits like saving one’s life (see Exod 4:24 – 26), avoiding destruction (Jub. 15.26), deliverance from wrath (Jub. 15.33), warding away evil spirits (CD 16.4 – 6), purifying the soul (Philo, Somn 2.25), bringing perfection (m. Ned 3.11), serving as a symbol for eliminating sinful desires (Philo, Migration 82; Spec. Laws 1.9 – 10), and even having improved hygiene and virility (Philo, Spec. Laws 1.2 – 8).

The Christianized Odes of Solomon say, spiritually at least, “circumcision became salvation for me” (Odes Sol. 1.3). Circumcision was not just a ceremonial part of the Torah because, as Mark Seifrid suggests, circumcision was understood in ethical terms, denoting faith and piety.¹⁸ Circumcision was emblematic to Jews for covenant fidelity, while circumcising Gentiles was indicative of the triumph of Judaism over paganism (see 1 Sam 18:25 – 27; Gal 6:13). The ritual of circumcision denoted a whole theological galaxy of meanings related to covenant and conquest, promise and proselytes, blessings and warnings, heritage and hope, purity and prosperity, faithfulness and favor. In contrast to those who thought that circumcision was an eternal sign of an eternal covenant (Jub. 15.11, 23), Paul believed that what God did in Messiah Jesus, namely, “the circumcision of the Messiah” (Col 2:11), had rendered physical circumcision inoperable and insignificant in the new age (1 Cor 7:19; Gal 5:6; 6:15; Col 3:11).

The obvious comeback to Paul is to ask: What does circumcision actually mean? Here in vv. 11 – 12 we come to the heart of the argument. Paul addresses the matter of circumcision with a straightforward chronological reading of Genesis 15 – 17 where 15:6 (faith in the promise) precedes 17:11 (circumcision as sign). Paul declares that circumcision was the sign of the promise that Abraham received by faith, not the means for attaining the promise. The result proves that Gentiles are justified in the same way as Abraham — by faith — and those who emulate the Abrahamic faith belong in the Abrahamic covenant.¹⁹

Paul knows full well that Abraham “received circumcision” as a “sign of the covenant.” However, circumcision was not the instrument for righteousness. Rather, circumcision was a “seal of the righteousness that he had by faith” even while in his uncircumcised state (v. 11). Abraham’s circumcision was a ratification that God accepted him by faith, and acceptance was not restricted only to the circumcised.²⁰ Paul is stating that the chronology of Genesis 15 – 17 not only shows that Abraham was righteous by faith and that circumcision was a subsequent sign of this righteousness, but more importantly, Paul is showing that the covenant promises are determined by faith, not by law, and are not restricted to the circumcised. The promise operates through the “righteousness that he [Abraham] had by faith.” The Greek phrase dikaiosynēs tēs pisteōs (lit., the “righteousness of faith”) probably means righteousness acquired by means of faith (see NIV, NRSV, ESV, CEB, NET). Such a phrase stands in contrast to a “righteousness from the law,” which righteousness acquired by circumcision would imply (see T. Dan 6.10; 2 Bar. 67.6).

Paul continues by adding that Abraham is the “father” of “all who believe but have not been circumcised,” and Abraham is the “father” also of “the circumcised” who “follow in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised” (v. 12). There is no denial of Abraham’s fatherhood of the Jewish people, but Paul stresses that Abraham’s precircumcised state remains paradigmatic for Jews and Gentiles. Everyone, Jew and Gentile, is a son of Abraham if they believe like Abraham. Everyone, Jew and Gentile, is credited with righteousness if they follow in the steps of Abraham’s faith.

Paul makes his point even clearer in vv. 13 – 16; if you get the chronology wrong, you’ll get the theology wrong too. Whereas many Jewish writings subordinated promise beneath law, Paul moves to invert it and place promise over law.²¹ Paul asserts that the covenantal promises made by God to “Abraham and his offspring” did not originate “through the law”; therefore, they are not dependent on the law for their continuing validity. On the contrary, Abraham and his seed enjoy “the righteousness that comes by faith” (v. 13). If only those who “depend on the law” are Abraham’s “heirs,” two things follow. First, “faith means nothing and the promise is worthless,” and Gen 15:6 would be reduced to some kind of aberration in a saving plan otherwise focused on adhering to the Jewish way of life (v. 14). Second, since “the law brings wrath,” relying on the law will mean rendering oneself susceptible to the curses of the law for transgressing its stipulations. Living under the law means living with the possible penalties for violating the law. However, the Abrahamic epoch did not have the law and therefore was without the threat of punishment for transgressing the law’s demands. It was more fitting, then, for the promise to be given during the time of Abraham since “where there is no law there is no transgression” (v. 15).

Paul concludes this block of his argument by saying: “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 have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all” (v. 16). I submit that Romans 4:16 is the John 3:16 of Paul’s theology. It is such a good summary of Paul’s reading of the Old Testament, God’s fatherhood, his emphasis on grace, and the universal nature of salvation in Christ, and it marries together the individual and corporate horizons of redemptive history.

Beyond that, a few things here are noteworthy. First, the fact that the promise comes by faith means that it is based on grace, it is guaranteed, and it applies to everyone at all times. If the promise came by law, it would mean the opposite: it would be based on works, remain constantly in doubt, and be limited in scope to only a few. Rooting God’s promise in Abraham rather than in Moses means that we have salvation by grace, a sense of assurance, and a universal offer of salvation.

Second, Paul bookends v. 11 with v. 16 by again emphasizing that Abraham is the father of all who believe — whether Jews or Gentiles, under the law or outside of the law. Imagine for a moment how Christians in Rome would receive this message. The church meeting in the house of Rufus — the leader of our fictitious house church in Rome — which was comprised mostly of Gentiles, would be encouraged to be reminded that by faith in Christ, Abraham had become their father. They are not second-tier members of a religious association; they are legitimate heirs of the full promises of Abraham.

Third, salvation is described in a diverse array of images. Paul uses a number of terms for God’s salvific gift: justification, forgiveness, blessing, and being made heirs. Many of the images seem to overlap with one another. The crediting of righteousness means the noncrediting of sin, and the justification of the ungodly means the forgiveness of sins.²² There is also an abundance of familial and covenantal imagery employed. While Abraham is a model individual, the Abrahamic promise is for a worldwide family. While justification is about crediting righteousness, it is no less about covenantal relatedness. So, if we ask what salvation means in Romans 4, we would have to say that we are invited to believe with Abraham in order to belong to Abraham’s forgiven family.

The precise object and nature of Abraham’s faith is exposited in vv. 17 – 22. Paul begins by citing Genesis 17:5, where it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations” (v. 17a). The citation provides scriptural warrant to Paul’s claim in v. 16 that Abraham is the father of all believers because God explicitly promised Abraham that he would be a father of many nations. Yet the citation also serves to introduce the content of Abraham’s faith, focused as it was on God’s promise and power. That is why Paul states that Abraham “believed” in God, precisely, “the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not” (v. 17b). Abraham’s faith is exercised before God and is secured against the nature of God.

Two aspects of God’s nature are singled out for special attention. First, God’s power to bring the dead to life. That God brings down death and raises up life was a well-known notion in biblical testimony (see Deut 32:39; 1 Sam 2:6). It was God’s power to create a nation from the frailty of Abraham’s body and from the deadness of Sarah’s womb that was the object of Abraham’s hope. Indeed, Abraham’s faith in God to bring life foreshadows resurrection faith. Isaac, the promised child born to Abraham and Sarah, anticipates the resurrection of Jesus. Such a faith in God’s life-creating power is replicated by those who believe that God raised Jesus from the dead, which Paul will soon talk about in vv. 24 – 25. Thus, Christians don’t just emulate Abraham’s faith; they believe in the same promise, namely, that God brings life from the dead.²³

Second, God’s creates things by pure fiat or by a divine speech-act. God doesn’t just announce stuff; his words literally bring things into being. Abraham believed in him who “calls into being things that were not.” This could be saying no more than God’s intent is to summon a nation that does not yet exist.²⁴ I suspect, rather, that Paul is saying more than that, namely, that Abraham had faith in God’s power to create a new people, with a new status, in a new covenant, as part of a new creation. If so, justification is an event that happens ex nihilo, like the promise from which it comes. God’s reckoning alone makes us righteous, not by a gradual moral transformation but by the launch of a new creation.²⁵

More is said about Abraham’s faith in vv. 18 – 22. In brief, Abraham is a model for what he did and didn’t do in his faith. On the one hand, he didn’t weaken in his faith even though he and Sarah were old and almost dead; he didn’t waver into unbelief concerning the promise. On the other hand, Abraham believed that he would be the father of many nations even when it seemed hopeless; Abraham was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God; and Abraham was persuaded that God could do what he promised to do.

The most important thing to note here is that Abraham does what humanity was supposed to do but did not do. Whereas humanity exchanged God’s glory for idolatry (1:23), Abraham gave glory to God (4:20). Whereas the Jews lacked faith (3:3), Abraham was faithful (4:18 – 20).²⁶ This, Paul explains, is why “it [faith] was credited to him as righteousness” (v. 22). In this way, Paul uses Genesis 15:6 as an inclusio, beginning with it in v. 3 and ending with it v. 22 to underscore how the Abraham story is about how God creates and justifies a people for himself, according to grace, and by faith.²⁷

In vv. 23 – 25, Paul turns to the direct relevance of the Abraham story for the Roman audience. When Paul writes that “the words ‘it was credited to him’ were written not for him alone” (v. 22), he is engaging in some theological exegesis of Scripture whereby the meaning of Genesis 15:6 is relevant to, in some cases even about, his current audience. The Torah is not just a record of revelation; it reveals and prophesies that which God intends to do for his people.

Hence Paul’s statement that the words of Genesis 15:6 were written “for us, to whom God will credit righteousness — for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead” (v. 24). What was true of Abraham is also true for believers. Abraham was justified by faith and so are Christ-believers justified by faith. Faith here is specified as believing in the resurrection of Jesus (see Rom 10:9 – 10; 1 Cor 15:3 – 5; 2 Cor 5:15; 1 Thess 4:14). The future tense of the promise, God “will credit righteousness” (mellei logizesthai), is a present reality meted out in God’s declaration of justice for all believers in the here and now (3:22 – 24; 5:1, 9; 8:30, 33; 10:10), and yet it also awaits a future fulfillment to be enacted in the resurrection of the body (2:13; 3:30). The net point is that anyone, irrespective of ethnicity, who believes in God’s life-giving power, just like Abraham did, can rest assured in the promise of Genesis 15:6; from Easter until the end of the ages, God has put them in a right relationship with himself.

Paul caps off his midrashic exegesis of the Abrahamic narratives by citing what is probably a traditional formula: “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” These are poignant words that form a fitting end to our tour through the citadel of Romans 1 – 4. In this verse there are strong echoes of Isaiah 53:5, 11 – 12, where Jesus appears as the Suffering Servant who was handed over to death, bore the sins of many, was vindicated by seeing the light of life, and resultantly makes many righteous. Importantly, the main verbs are divine passives, so that Jesus was handed over by God (paredothē) and raised up by God (ēgerthē), which indicates we are dealing with a theocentric act of God in the cross and resurrection. Furthermore, the two prepositional phrases, though both beginning with the preposition dia, are inexact in their parallelism. The first phrase is retrospective in that Jesus was delivered over to death because of our transgressions (dia ta paraptōmata hēmōn), while the second phrase is prospective in that Jesus was raised up to life for the purpose of securing our justification (dia tēn dikaiōsin hēmōn).²⁸ Taken together, Jesus’ death has dealt with sins, while Jesus’ resurrection establishes the justification of believers.

The link between resurrection and justification has struck some commentators as odd. While Paul often ties justification to the cross and blood of Christ (see Rom 3:24 – 25; 5:9), he can also put salvation in relation to Jesus’ resurrection (see 1 Cor 15:17). We must remember that the resurrection constitutes Jesus’ own justification since the resurrection is God’s cosmic verdict that Jesus is the Messiah, Lord, and Son of God (see Acts 2:36; Rom 1:3 – 4; 1 Tim 3:16). So, on the cross Jesus undergoes our condemnation for sin (Rom 8:1), and in his resurrection he becomes the source of our justification (1 Cor 1:30). The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is an apocalyptic event within which the justification of believers takes place. Thus, by a Spirit-forming faith, we have union with Christ, and what is true of him becomes true of us. In other words, we are justified because our transgressions have been forgiven at the cross and because we are incorporated into the justification of Jesus the Messiah in his resurrection.²⁹

Romans 4 focuses on the theme of faith, precisely, Abraham’s faith as a prototype and exemplar for Christian faith. In thinking about how we might live out this faith story, I want to explore the nature of faith, faith in the biblical story, and the link between believing and belonging.

Words like “faith” and “believe” get used a lot in our own culture. From the raunchy lyrics of George Michael’s song “Faith,” to the Monkees hit song “I’m a Believer,” the words “faith” and “believe” resonate with us at some level. That is probably because it is part of our nature to believe and trust. All life is a life of faith, whether it is faith in ourselves, our friends, family, plans, people, ideologies, institutions, or even in forces beyond this earthly realm. We always look to someone or something to be an anchor that we can cling to in a world of uncertainty. We all reach out in faith somewhere, whether you are religious or not, because it is in our nature to trust. Yet we must ask, What is faith? What is faith about? Romans 4 is an exposition of “faith,” but what is this “faith” to which Paul speaks?

A good place to learn about faith is the book of Hebrews, where faith is a prominent theme. Hebrews 11 provides a parade of heroes in the “Hall of Faith” as it describes men and women of ancient times who kept the faith, who believed the divine testimony, and who trusted in their God. These heroes were all commended by God for their faith even though “none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect” (Heb 11:39 – 40). At one point the author gives this definition of faith: “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (Heb 11:1). Faith is a firm conviction that what we hope for will one day happen. Faith is confidence about a future that to many observers looks futile. Martin Luther put it best: “Faith is a living, unshakeable confidence in God’s grace; it is so certain, that someone would die a thousand times for it. This kind of trust in and knowledge of God’s grace makes a person joyful, confident, and happy with regard to God and all creatures. This is what the Holy Spirit does by faith.”³⁰

Returning to Romans 4, Abraham is presented as the most exemplary figure of faith in the biblical story. Abraham responded to God’s call and left his house, homeland, parents, and even his ancestral gods to go to Canaan to worship the Lord and be the father of many nations. He faced hardship, division, testing, opposition, war, and even infertility. In fact, everything seemed to point in the opposite direction of what God had promised him. But Abraham did not give up; instead, he maintained his trust in God — so much so that the apostle Paul says about him:

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead — since he was about a hundred years old — and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. (Rom 4:18 – 21)

There are a few things we can say about Abraham’s faith. First, it had to overcome fear, for all circumstances pointed to the exact opposite of the divine promises coming true. Abraham and Sarah had no children, were positively geriatric in age and appearance, and probably saw little prospect of any human life coming from their bodies. After all how could this old geezer be the father of many nations? Herdsmen might have whispered snide remarks whenever they saw Abraham, mocking his faith, or jeering at his pretentious claims that one day he’d have descendants as numerous as the stars. Despite all that, Abraham didn’t give up on God. He didn’t falter or think that God had failed him, but he kept his hope in God because of his confidence in God.

I do not doubt that Abraham, and a good many people around him, were scared, scared that he might die without an heir. Abraham had dragged his wife and kinsmen halfway across the Middle East based on a promise without a deposit. Abraham and the tribe around him could have remained desperately worried about the future, their ability to survive, whether the tribe would hold together. But what made Abraham unique was that he put his faith where his fear was. He trusted in God’s promises and did not countenance the possibility that God would prove false. That is faith!

Second, Abraham’s faith was God-centered.³¹ His faith was not based on human possibility or logical probability. The faith of Abraham was oriented away from himself and directed firmly toward God. It was a faith in God’s person, God’s plan, God’s promise, and God’s power. The power of faith resides not in ourselves but in the power of the one in whom we put our trust. In contrast, faith is weak when it allows itself to be determined by or dependent on what lies within the realm of human power or human possibility or is limited to the horizon of human vision.³² George Müller famously said: “Faith does not operate in the realm of the possible. There is no glory for God in that which is humanly possible. Faith begins where man’s power ends.” Faith is strong when it begins with the presupposition of God’s faithfulness to us. Accordingly, our faith is strong when it properly comprehends and acknowledges the power and faithfulness of God.

In want of giving my own definition of faith, I would surmise that faith is our trusting response to God’s own faithfulness. As Karl Barth put it: “Faith is trust in the divine faithfulness.”³³ The notion that God is faithful is a bedrock of biblical teaching (see Deut 7:9; 1 Cor 1:9; Heb 3:6). We also see divine faithfulness in the faithfulness of Christ. In Revelation, John the Seer calls Jesus “the faithful witness” (Rev 1:5). Furthermore, Paul’s celebration of his salvation in Philippians 3 can be rendered as: “[Hoping] I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through the faithfulness of Christ — the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.” Redemption is tied to the fact that we have union with the one who was himself faithful and obedient for us.

In light of these biblical pictures about God’s faithfulness and Jesus’ faithfulness, I was deeply moved by the preface to a big theological book I once read, where the author noted the last communication he received from a dying friend. His friend expressed confidence in the “Faithfulness” to whom he had entrusted himself.³⁴ That is a wonderful picture of faith. In light of the biblical picture of divine faithfulness, I would say that faith is entrusting ourselves to the faithfulness of God as seen in the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Faith is our trusting response to God’s faithfulness.

To give an illustration about faith, I spent several years in the Australian Army and for part of that time I served as a paratrooper. I clearly remember my parachute training in the small town of Nowra in rural New South Wales. We did two weeks of intense training before our first jump. This prepration included learning the differences between static-line and free-fall parachuting, lectures on how to put on a parachute, what to do in case of emergencies, how to activate a reserve chute, and doing all sorts of exercises that simulated what it was like to be in a parachute harness. We practiced over and over how to safely hit the ground without breaking a leg or busting a shoulder. The training was thorough, time-tested, and effective. The last parachute fatality in the Australian military I think well over fifty years ago. So I had good reason to be confident that everything would be okay when I did my first jump.

Even so, there was one thing that was lingering at the back of my mind. The parachutes we were using, called T10s, were the cheapest parachutes that the Australian Army could buy. They were the 99¢ version of parachutes. They weren’t sports parachutes, where you land with a gentle pitter patter. They weren’t maneuverable and permitted minimal steering. The T10s were designed to get you from the plane to the ground as fast and as safely as possible in order to minimize the time you are in the air because that is when you are vulnerable to being shot. Also, every parachute jump has a casualty rate of 5 percent caused by strains and sprains on landing, and that was without anyone even shooting at you. I had heard shocking stories of soldiers breaking all sorts of bones when landing in trees, powerlines, and even busy roads. I knew of one guy who broke his hip when he landed on a washing machine in someone’s backyard. So I was naturally nervous about parachuting.

Eventually the time came for our first jump. When we got into the plane, it didn’t take long until we were airborne and it was my stick’s turn to jump. This was the moment of truth and for some a moment for a change of underwear. I didn’t want to appear scared before my mates, but I kept having second thoughts as to why I was throwing myself out of a perfectly good airplane with a parachute purchased for its low-budget price. At “H hour” I saw the green light come on and I told myself that I just had to trust my training, my instructors, my equipment, and my own abilities.

As I quickly approached the bay door of the C-130, I could feel the adrenaline pulsating through my body as the jump master ever so nongently helped me step out through the door. As the cool air hit me, I instantly tumbled around for three or four seconds in a blur of blue and green until I finally stabilized and I felt myself drifting downward with my chute safely opened. I immediately began my safety drills, checking that my chords weren’t tangled and I wasn’t going to collide with any other paratroopers in midair. I soon landed on the ground with a heavy thud, but I rolled along the ground just as I had been taught to do. I layed on the ground for a moment, flat on my back, looking up into the blue sky, realizing that I had made it. My faith was not a blind faith, it was not an unreasoned faith, nor was it a futile faith. I believed that I would survive the jump, and thankfully I did. This faith, however, was not abstract or theoretical; it meant stepping out and laying my life on the line. I took a literal leap of faith, trusting in the integrity of my equipment and in the reliability of my training.

Now all analogies break down, and I’m sure comparing faith in God to faith in a military parachute has its limitations. Yet, in both cases there is a genuine leap into the unknown, casting oneself into the care of something else whom we do not fully see for certain. I went on to do over thirty jumps in my paratrooper career, and what it taught me was that faith means that we trust that there is someone trustworthy to keep us and preserve us in the face of danger. If we throw ourselves on God, he will always catch us.

The Bible is a book about faith. It is about God’s faithfulness toward creation, toward Israel, and toward the church. It is about the faith and fidelity of Old Testament saints from Aaron to Zechariah. It is about the faithfulness of Jesus Christ as the Son of God. It is about the belief and obedience of Christians who come to faith and are called to endure in their faith. The biblical story is a story of faith!

The reason why Paul brings up the story of Abraham is not because he wants to engage in some cheesy proof texting to prove that justification is by faith. No, far beyond that, Paul wants to show his Roman audience — perhaps Jewish Christians relegated to the fringes of a Roman synagogue community or Gentile Christians worshiping in a cramped apartment block — that they are part of the story of faith. This is their story, this is who they are! The Abraham story is for them and even, in some sense, about them. Abraham believed that God’s power would create life from nothing by giving him a child. Christians believe that God’s power has been supremely exercised in the resurrection of Jesus. Abraham was credited as righteous by faith without circumcision; so too are Jewish and Gentile Christians credited as righteous by faith without circumcision.

I’ve noticed a huge trend of young evangelicals leaving their churches either to join Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches or else to embrace liturgical patterns of worship that rehearse ancient practices. This “back to the past” trend is I think being driven by the fact that many young people have become disillusioned with the never-ending church fads, cult worship of the latest and the greatest, are sick of turning pastors into celebrities, and are tired from jumping on and off ecclesiastical bandwagons. You gotta keep up on the latest doctrines, watch out for the newest heretics, and attend the coolest new conferences. I remember one church leader opining to me about all the fads that his denomination has gone through over the past decade or so. “We wanted to be seeker-sensitive churches, then welcoming churches, then healthy churches, then emergent churches, and now missional churches. I’m tired of it. I just want to be the church!” Church leadership gurus keep changing the narrative as to what is the problem and what the solution should be.

The faith that Paul speaks about is different. It is not about a fad; it is about a foundational narrative. By professing faith in Israel’s Messiah, believers find themselves sharing in Israel’s story of God’s plan to put the world to rights through the Redeemer and a redeemed people. The example of Abraham shows that faith is the door through which we walk in order to enter a new symbolic universe pertaining to creation lost and found, humankind fallen in sin and raised in glory. The act of faith, then, is no mere personal decision that means the individual may now look forward to no more than a time of heavenly bliss in a postmortem state. Faith puts us in the story, it makes us actors in the theodrama, it recruits us into the company of the gospel so that we follow in Abraham’s steps, all the way to Golgotha, to the empty tomb, to Pentecost, and then on to the new heavens and new earth. Faith means that we part of the story of God and his promises!

I remember when I was in elementary school that we had a religious education teacher who would get us kids to sing a few Sunday school songs. Coming from a non-church-going family, I never went to Sunday school, so these were the only Sunday school songs that I ever learned as a child. But one song always stuck in my mind: “Father Abraham had many sons, many sons had father Abraham. I am one of them and so are you, so let’s all praise the Lord.” I’m sure most of you know it. I submit that this song captures the main theme of Romans 4. By faith, we are Abraham’s children, and we belong in Abraham’s family.

The central point of Romans 4 is about this: Who are the people of God? Paul’s answer is that it is those of faith, men and women who believe; irrespective of ethnicity and independent of the Torah, they are true children of Abraham. Paul’s concern is not just to legitimate a theology of justification — though he does clearly do that — but to legitimate the identity of Gentiles as members of the people of God because they have faith in Jesus who died for their sins and was raised for their justification.

This is an important point because it means that faith is not just about what I assent to; it is also about whom I belong to. Faith is about family, a Christ-shaped, Spirit-filled, and God-centered family. Faith tells me who my brothers and sisters are, and what it is that brings this family together. It would seem that faith has to do with participating in a new spiritual and social reality through acceptance of the gospel of God’s righteousness made present in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.³⁵ Believing means belonging to the body of Christ through reception of the gospel about Christ!

This is why I think the images of marriage (Rom 7:1 – 6) and adoption (Rom 8:14 – 17) are so important. Those images refer to believers being bonded to God by matrimony and by patrimony and then joining the church family as a result. In light of those images, faith is more than our assent to certain ideas. Faith is the mark or badge of belonging to God’s family and constitutes proof that we are his children. The joys of faith are similar to the joys of marriage and adoption. Faith means that I am not alone. I have a home and a family among those who know and name the same God that I do. Faith puts me into a relationship with God and God’s other children.

Sociologists regularly undertake studies as to whether believing in God requires belonging to any religious community. One interesting trend I’ve learned is that while rates of belief have remained fairly stable in recent years, the rates of belonging to a church or religious organization have steadily declined.³⁶ That might seem to contradict what I’m saying, so that believing does not really require belonging. But I would push back and ask: What kind of God do these people believe in and what kind of gospel have they received? If one has a consumerist view of religion or if one has a view of God as a kind of cosmic therapist whose sole purpose is to be there 24/7 to meet my on-call needs, understandably such a person might well choose to not involve himself or herself in a church, as it would be surplus to their religious requirements. However, if one views God as creating a worldwide family for himself, using the church as the platform for his mission into the world, then a churchless Christianity makes about as much sense as a Christless Christianity. That is because belonging to Christ’s community is part and parcel of believing in Christ.

Given this nexus of believing and belonging, the challenge for pastors and leaders is to make sure that people in their churches know that faith is the only thing they need to belong and that faith is not a privatized affair but is a genuinely family event. God does not save us and then assign us a number until it is time to go to heaven one individual at a time. Rather, God saves us and puts us into his family for the purpose of sharing in the family business of worship and mission.

Lest anyone think I’m simply trying to give a plug for church membership, let me say that belonging is a vital part of believing since we need to belong to something if we are to be healthy people capable of flourishing. Any psychologist will tell you that belonging is one of the most basic human needs. We have an innate desire to form attachments and to gain acceptance from others. Our sense of identity, purpose, security, and worth is bound up with belonging. The church is the place where that identity, purpose, security, and sense of worth are formed. It is this sense of belonging that enables us to flourish as individuals and even as whole communities. Our belongingness is to be cultivated, celebrated, and even defended against those who would say that some of our family members do not really deserve to be there.

On the defensive side, Paul argued in Romans 4 that Christians belong to God’s people and have all the rights, privileges, and hopes that go along with that. However, such a claim was challenged. Some Jews might have said to Jewish Christians that their belief in a crucified Messiah and fraternizing with Gentiles disqualified them from membership (see Hebrews). Some Jewish Christians might have told Gentiles that they did not belong to the Messiah or to Abraham unless they are circumcised and followed certain elements of the Torah (see Galatians). Strangely enough, while I’m writing this section, there is an online debate going on about who is “Reformed.” The label “Reformed” is obviously a prestige tag that many do not want to share with others since such an expansive definition would lower the currency of the term. So there is a melee going on in cyberspace as to whether or not Calvinistic Baptists like John Piper and Mark Dever are really part of the Reformed fold. Many voices are in fact claiming, “I’m more Reformed than thou!”

In some ways, this is the same issue as Romans 4. Who is in and who is out? Who gets to put up the fences around the farm and who gets to decide who lives on it? Sadly, as Fleming Rutledge points out, that sort of rivalry about who is worthy and who isn’t has been wired into our DNA since Cain and Abel.³⁷ The Romans 4 story of Abraham, faith, and justification is about belonging. Yes, obviously it covers other things too, like the forgiveness of sins and justification; let’s not discount them. But Paul employs the example of Abraham to demonstrate how God embraces us in his grace in Jesus Christ and establishes us as full and equal members of God’s forgiven family. We bring nothing in our hands to make us worthy to be in that family, but we do not have to, for God has made us worthy by receiving his own Son in whom we apprehend holiness, righteousness, and redemption.

1. On Abraham in Judaism, see James E. Bowley, “Abraham,” in EDEJ (ed. J. J. Collins and D. C. Harlow; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 294 – 95 and the series of quotations conveniently listed in Jewett, Romans, 308 – 9.

2. Paul has already intimated that point by quoting a piece of traditional material about the gospel being “promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures” (Rom 1:3), by appealing to Habakkuk 2:4 to prove that “the righteous shall live by faith” (Rom 1:17), and by stating more broadly that “the Law and the Prophets testify” to the revelation of God’s righteousness through faith in Jesus Christ (3:21 – 22).

3. The verbal parallels indicate that Paul is dealing with the same issues throughout Romans 3:21 – 31 and 4:1 – 25, namely, the saving significance of faith (see Moo, Romans, 244 – 45; Tobin, Paul’s Rhetoric, 126).

6. The relevance of Abraham for Christian faith has already come up in Paul’s earlier letters. It appears that certain Jewish-Christian agitators infiltrated the churches in Galatia and urged the Gentile Christians there to be circumcised. Central to their argument was the example of Abraham. Abraham was circumcised (Gen 17:23 – 26; Acts 7:8), and if the Galatians wanted to be children of Abraham, they had to be circumcised too. Paul wrote to the Galatians urging them not to be circumcised and not to be fooled by such a specious argument. Paul responded in Galatians 3:6 – 18 by saying that: (1) Genesis 15:6 proves that faith and not circumcision is necessary for righteousnessand adoption into Abraham’s family. In fact, Genesis 15:6 is a prophecy of the gospel, indicating that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. (2) Those who rely on the law are under a curse, yet Christ died to save Israel from the curse of the law, so that the Abrahamic blessings would flow through to the Gentiles. (3) The Abrahamic promise came before the Mosaic law, and the law does not nullify or set aside the promises. Paul uses these arguments from Galatians 3 in a similar way in Romans 4, albeit with a few minor changes of emphasis.

7. Several commentators acknowledge that Paul’s interpretive techniques here belong to the genre of midrash, yet they are reluctant to call it so apparently because midrash is such a broad category (e.g., Moo, Romans, 255 n. 1; Schreiner, Romans, 209 – 10).

8. Richard N. Longenecker, Biblical Exegesis in the Apostolic Period (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975), 32 – 38.

9. Several manuscripts (e.g., K L P 33) notice this ambiguity and try to resolve it by placing the verb at the end of the clause to clarify that it was Abraham who did the finding.

11. Richard B. Hays, “ ‘Have We Found Abraham to Be our Forefather According to the Flesh?’: A Reconsideration of Rom 4:1,” NovT 27 (1985): 76 – 98; N. T. Wright, “Romans,” 10:489; idem, “Paul and the Patriarch: The Role of Abraham in Romans 4,” JSNT 34 (2013): 225 – 31; see earlier Theodore Zahn, Der Brief des Paul an die Römer (Leipzig: Deichert, 1910), 215; also Grieb, Romans, 46 – 47; Keck, Romans, 120. But see objections by Byrne, Romans, 148; Moo, Romans, 259 n. 13; Schreiner, Romans, 213; Jewett, Romans, 307 – 8.

13. Cf. Gathercole, Where Is the Boasting? 232, 242 – 46; Vickers, Jesus’ Blood and Righteousness, 98 – 100; Watson, Paul, Judaism, and the Gentiles, 260 – 69; Jewett, Romans, 310, 325. Others play down the meritorious nature of the works in Romans 4:4 – 5, such as Hays, “Reconsideration of Rom 4:1,” 93; Wright, “Romans,” 10:491 – 92; idem, Justification, 220 – 21; idem, “Paul and the Patriarch,” 209, 215 – 17, 232 – 36; Dunn, Romans, 1:200, 204 – 5, 228.

14. On the justification of the ungodly as the central theme in Pauline theology, see Otfried Hofius, “ ‘Rechtfertigung des Gottlosen’ als Thema biblischer Theologie,” JBTh 2 (1987): 79 – 105.

16. On Abraham as a proselyte, see Philo, Cherubim 31; Names 76; Dreams 161; Abraham 70; Josephus, Ant. 1.155; Jub. 12.1 – 21; Apoc. Abr. 1 – 8.

18. Mark A. Seifrid, “Blind Alleys in the Controversy over the Paul of History,” TynBul 45 (1994): 79 (77 – 81).

19. The discussion of Romans 4 by Peter T. O’Brien (“Was Paul Converted?” in Justification and Variegated Nomism: Volume 2— The Paradoxes of Paul [ed. D. A. Carson, M. A. Seifrid, and P. T. O’Brien; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2004], 375 – 90) is particularly helpful here.

21. Cf. 2 Macc 2:17 – 18; Pss. Sol. 12:6; Sib. Or. 3.768 – 69; 2 Bar. 14.12 – 13. According to Byrne (Romans, 152): “Paul has to cut the nexus between promise and obedience [to the law].”

22. Traditionally Romans 4:1 – 8 has been used as a proof text to substantiate the doctrine of Jesus’ imputed righteousness. While the doctrine is theologically correct (see Bird, Saving Righteousness of God, 71 – 77; idem, Bird’s-Eye View of Paul, 96 – 98; idem, “Justification,”145 – 52), Paul never explicitly says that Jesus’ righteousness is imputed to believers. Let us observe that there is an imprecision in the language used about crediting/reckoning in Romans 4 since Paul can say that “faith is credited” (vv. 3, 5, 9 and implicitly in vv. 10, 22, 23) and also that “righteousness is credited” (vv. 6, 11, and implicitly in v. 24). Is there a double imputation of faith and righteousness? What does it mean that “faith” is imputed? I surmise that when Paul writes that “God credits righteousness apart from works” (v. 6), he is simply using the language of Genesis 15:6 to reiterate what he said in 3:28 that God “justifies apart from works,” rendering the phrases coterminus. The crediting of faith means a recognition of the sufficiency of faith to please God. So Paul is not talking about the mechanism by which justification occurs with the imputation of Jesus’ righteousness (see Rom 5:18 – 19 for something closer to that idea), but merely using biblical language to say that justification does occur by faith. See also Brian Vickers, Jesus’ Blood and Righteousness: Paul’s Theology of Imputation (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2006), esp. 191 – 232.

25. Seifrid, Christ, our Righteousness, 68; Stuhlmacher, Romans, 74; and esp. Käsemann, Romans, 122 – 23, for whom Romans 4:17 is the quintessence of Paulinism.

26. Cf. Edward Adams, “Abraham’s Faith and Gentile Disobedience: Textual Links between Romans 1 and 4,” JSNT 65 (1997): 47 – 66.

27. Or, we could say that the fall of Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 begins to be undone by the call of Abraham in Genesis 12 – 15.

28. Cf. discussion in Morna D. Hooker, “Raised for our Acquittal (Rom 4,25),” in Resurrection in the New Testament (ed. R. Bieringer, V. Koperski, and B. Lataire; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2002), 323 – 42; Bruce A. Lowe, “Oh διά! How Is Romans 4:25 to Be Understood?” JTS 57 (2006): 149 – 57; Kirk, Unlocking Romans, 74 – 81.

29. On resurrection and justification, see Bird, Saving Righteousness of God, 40 – 59; Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, 735; Howard Marshall, Aspects of Atonement: Cross and Resurrection in the Reconciling of Humanity (Colorado Springs, CO: Paternoster, 2007), 68 – 97; and Markus Barth and Verne H. Fletcher, Acquittal by Resurrection (New York: Holt, Rhinehart, & Winston, 1964).

34. Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), xv.

36. Kevin R. Ward, Losing Our Religion? Changing Patterns of Believing and Belonging in Secular Western Socieites (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2013).

Links between Rom 3:21 – 31 and 4:1 – 25³
Righteousness apart from law	3:21, 28	4:6
Righteousness through faith	3:22, 27	4:5, 11
Righteousness to all who believe	3:22, 29	4:11 – 12, 16
Righteousness by grace	3:23	4:4, 16
The law not nullified	3:31	4:14

Who “Discovers” or “Finds” in Romans 4:1?
Abraham discovered justification by faith	“What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter?” (NIV)
We have discovered that we are not related to Abraham by human descent but by faith	“So what are we going to say? Are we going to find that Abraham is our ancestor on the basis of genealogy?” (CEB)

Abraham in Jewish Tradition
*Abraham as Righteous*	*Abraham as Law-Observant*	*Abraham as Faithful in Testing*
For Abraham was perfect in all of his actions with the Lord and was pleasing through righteousness all of the days of his life (Jub. 23.10).	And all of the nations of the earth will bless themselves by your seed because your father [Abraham] obeyed me and observed by restrictions and my commandments and my laws and my ordinances and my covenant (Jub. 24.11).	This is the tenth trial which Abraham was tried, and he was found faithful, controlled of the spirit. Because he was found faith and he was recorded as a friend of the Lord in the heavenly tablets (Jub. 19.8 – 9).
Therefore you, O Lord, God of the righteous, have not appointed repentance for the righteous, for Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, who did not sin against you, but you have appointed repentance for me, who am a sinner (Pr. Man. 8).	That is the fountain of Abraham and his generation. . . . For at that time the unwritten law was in force among them and the works of the commandments were accomplished at that time (2 Bar. 57.1 – 2).	Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness? (1 Macc 2:52)
Abraham was the great father of a multitude of nations, and no one has been found like him in glory (Sir 44:19).	He [Abraham] kept the law of the Most High, and entered into a covenant with him (Sir 44:20).	He [God] certified the covenant in his flesh, and when he [Abraham] was tested he proved faithful (Sir 44:20).
Abraham has not sinned and has no mercy of sinners (T. Abr 10.17).	Abraham did live by it and was considered God’s friend, because he observed the commandments of God and he did not choose to follow the will of his own spirit (CD 3.2 – 3).	Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? . . . And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend (Jas 2:21 – 23).
Great is circumcision, for despite all the religious duties which Abraham our father fulfilled, he was not called perfect until he was circumcised (m. Ned 3.11).	And we find that Abraham our father had performed the whole Law before it was given, for it is written, “Because that Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws” [Gen 26:5] (m. Qidd. 4.14).	God marvelling at Abraham’s faith in him repaid him with faithfulness by confirming . . . the gifts which he had promised (Philo, Abr. 273).

Abraham, Justification, and Interpretation of the Book of Genesis
Jewish exposition:	Abraham works justification boast
Paul’s exposition:	Abraham faith justification obedience