6. “By Faith” (Romans 4)

Throughout life in various relationships or with various groups we have a sense of what we need to be “in” with that group.  How it is that we can belong and be accepted.  As we’re growing up and in school, with some groups, if you want to be accepted and belong to that group  you need to be athletically gifted, you need to be fast, strong. With another group it’s none of that stuff, but it might be being really smart, or nerdy, and you need to be into fantasy novels.  You need to read them and be able to talk about the characters and plots. As one grows up there might be certain adult friend groups where if you want to belong you need money, because that group of friends is always traveling, going to nice restaurants and you just won’t be part of it if you don’t have the money or don’t want to spend it on those things.  

Our kids recently have been watching the movie “The Sandlot” which is probably one of my favorite movies from growing up. It’s a baseball movie about a new kid with the nickname “Smalls”. He doesn’t really fit; he’s kind of a nerd; he’s really smart, but can’t play baseball. And so, when it comes to the neighborhood kids, he’s out. “He’s a square, kid’s a square,” he’s a winnie, he can’t catch, he can’t throw, he’s hopeless. As we think about how we find belonging and acceptance in relationships, How is it that we can be accepted by God? How can we belong to God and be rightly related to God?  

If you’ve been with us in Romans so far you know that this is a central question for Paul and what he writes in this letter.  Because humanity is not right with God.  We have a problem when it comes to our relationship with God.  We all have turned from God, we’ve sinned, we’ve chosen to worship other things in this world, meaning we’ve chosen to spend our lives and center our lives around things other than God.  So how can we be made right again?

Last week in Romans 3 we considered this idea of the “Righteousness of God” that’s a central theme in this letter. If you remember, we talked about that God is committed to this world and His people. He is committed to setting this world right and dealing with all that has gone wrong, which means that God is committed to dealing with evil and sin.  But God is also committed to saving His people.  He is committed to redeeming and making his people right with him. And In Romans 3, Paul shows how God’s righteousness in judging evil and God’s righteousness in saving his people and making them right with him all comes through what God has done through Jesus.  That it is through Jesus and the cross that all this can come together.  At the cross God shows his righteousness by judging sin and evil.  At the cross God shows his righteousness by saving his people and making them right with him. And what we touched on very briefly last week, but is really the main theme of chapter 4 is how it is that we can receive that righteousness. How can God, the righteous Judge,  declare us to be in the right, to be righteous?  How can we benefit and be recipients of all that God has done in Jesus? How do we take hold of that? And Paul’s answer is “By Faith.” If you just scan through these verses in Romans 4, again and again you see either the noun “Faith” or the verb “believe” both which come from the same Greek root word.  You also repeatedly see the term “righteousness” – which really connects what we considered last week with this week – that is, how can you and I be made right with God? We see in Chapter 4 why righteousness must come “by Faith” as well as what faith is and what it looks like.  So let’s consider that this morning, 1) Why righteousness must come “by Faith” and then, 2) What is faith and what does it look like?  

Why Righteousness must come “by faith”

You may remember from last week that the Jewish people of Paul’s day were considering  the problem of human sin and evil. How it is that God would judge the world and people in the world for their sin, and yet save his people. What is the thing that puts someone on the side of righteousness so that they experience God’s salvation rather than judgment.  How can someone be righteous, rightly related to God, and therefore not judged but saved?  And their answer was, well, the law, God’s law given through Moses.  

But Paul has said No.  It’s not through the law. And to make his point, Paul goes back to the beginning of the Jewish people, to Abraham… 

The Story of Abraham.  Remember, this is where it all started.  Humanity turns from God in Genesis 3, and from this fall into sin, everything goes wrong: false worship and idolatry, all sorts of wickedness, foolishness, and violence (Genesis 4-11).  And out of this mess of idolatry, sin, and brokenness, God takes this one man, Abraham, and his family.  God sets his love on him; he calls him to himself; he says I will be your God; he makes promises. Why?  Because through Abraham and his family God is going to redeem humanity; he’s going to love the world and draw people out of all the confusion, evil, brokenness, and sadness back to himself to know God and belong to him.  

Remember who Abraham was and where he came from.  He wasn’t a nice law-keeping Jewish man worshiping God. He came from a family that worshiped other gods, like the rest of the world.  He was very much a part of the mass of humanity that was “ungodly”. But God called him to himself and promised to make him a great nation and bless him, and bless the world through him. And it was this promise that Abraham believed, and lived his life believing and trusting what God had said.  

In Genesis chapter 15 (which is the specific text Paul zeroes in on here, quoting it and referencing it multiple times in Romans 4) Abraham has just come back from a battle. He’s lived many years now, trusting God and what God has said, even though he and his wife Sarah still have no child, which makes all of God’s promises seem like they aren’t going to come true. After all, how do you have a great nation and land and bless the world through your family if you don’t have any children and descendants?  God calls Abraham and he takes him outside and says to him, “Look toward heaven, and count the stars, if you are able to count them……So shall your offspring be…” And Genesis 15:6 says, “Abraham believed the LORD, and [the LORD] counted it to him as righteousness.”

There it is. Paul is saying look, it’s always been by faith.  From the very beginning, how was Abraham counted as righteous?  By faith. It’s always been by faith and it must be by faith.  because being rightly related to God comes from God’s gift, God’s promise, and God’s grace. It is a gift. Paul already said this in 3:24, people are declared righteous by God’s grace as a gift.  And we see it in 4:4.  If you make righteousness something you can get through works, then it’s not a gift anymore. It’s wages.  You did your shift, you did the work, now it’s time to pay up. But how on earth does God owe you?  God, who always relates to his creatures freely.  Think about it, if God made you and has given you life and everything, how could you ever put him in your debt so that he owed you?  It’s a gift.  And if it’s a gift, then it can’t be by works.   

But It also must be by faith because of God’s promise. In verse 13, God gives his promise to Abraham and his descendants  not through the law, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.  Verse 14 says if the heirs of this promise, the inheritors of this promise are those who obey the law, then what happens to faith?   It is emptied, faith has no effect, it becomes nothing. And what about God’s promise?  It’s canceled…. invalidated. You see, Paul is saying the minute you make being accepted by God about something you work for, or achieve or maintain by your obedience, you make it no longer a gift, no longer about God’s promise AND No longer resting in grace. Romans 4:16,  That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring.

Remember Romans 1-3, the law reveals our sin. It reveals we are not righteous, it shows how much worse our problem is. You see it must be by faith, because that’s the only way it will be about grace. God giving you his favor, blessing you and forgiving you, making you right with him when you deserve none of that, in fact you deserve the opposite. And if you’re tracking with Paul and why it must be by faith, already you are getting an idea of what faith is. Throughout this chapter Paul contrasts two ways a person might seek to be made right with God. On one side of the contrast there is the way of works and wages, the way of law, the way of performance. On the other side is the way of faith, trust in God’s promise, resting in God’s grace.  

What is Faith and What Does it Look Like?

What then is faith?  Faith is not looking to yourself or your abilities or your accomplishments and performance, but looking to, depending on, trusting in God’s saving intervention.  Faith is an open hand receiving God’s gift of righteousness and salvation.  Faith receives God’s promise and trusts and looks, not to what you can do to fix the situation, control, make it happen, work for some kind of remedy, but faith rests and relies upon the God who is gracious, who has made promises, who offers the gift of righteousness in Jesus Christ. What is faith?  Faith is the way, the means, the instrument by which we receive God’s gracious gift.  

As I mentioned my kids have been really into the movie “The Sandlot” and there’s this scene toward the beginning where the new kid, “Smalls,” gets invited to come play baseball with the local kids by the best baseball player in the neighborhood, Benny. Now Smalls is already known as a reject,  a loser, a square as they call him, because the last time he was at the Sandlot, he tried to catch a fly ball, but instead of catching it, it knocked him to the ground which brought laughter from the other kids and deep humiliation to Smalls.  And then things only got worse when he tried to throw the ball and it barely went ten feet. The other kids burst into laughter and he ran away crying and full of shame. But Benny invites Smalls to come play again, and so Smalls goes – desperate to make friends; desperate to be accepted. In the second play of their practice, Benny hits one out to Smalls, and again he fails to catch it and has to, in humiliation, run the ball in to the pitcher because he can’t throw, confirming once again what all the kids already know: He’s not game, he’s a lost cause.   

But Benny has this soft spot for smalls and so he runs out to have this private conversation with Smalls.  Smalls is about to leave, he knows he can’t play, it’s hopeless, help is hopeless. Benny tells Smalls, “Just stick your glove out in the air. I’ll take care of it.” Benny runs back, calls for the same play, and Smalls closes his eyes and holds out his glove.  He can’t catch, he can’t play, he can’t achieve and win acceptance with these kids.  All he can do is trust, believing that Benny is sufficiently able to do the seemingly impossible:  hit a baseball with perfect accuracy right into Smalls’ glove. The scene goes slow motion as Benny hits the ball into the air, as all the other kids watch the ball, as the audience watches the ball in slow motion fall right into Smalls’ glove.  Smalls’ open glove catches the ball, and, because Benny his greatness could do this seemingly impossible thing,  Smalls is accepted; he’s in; he belongs.  

Think about what we’ve been studying in Romans. You and I are Smalls.  Before God and God’s law we are Smalls.  We have failed.  But our failure is a lot more serious than failing to be good at baseball. We have failed at what a human being is supposed to be.  We have failed and we will continue to struggle with sin.  We cannot work our way to God, we cannot put God in our debt, we are completely hopeless apart from God’s saving intervention. But remember last week, Romans 3 and what God has done. God put forth Jesus to turn away the wrath our sins rightly deserve; God makes us right in Jesus; God works redemption in Jesus;  He justifies us by grace as a gift.  God does it; God does it all! 

How do we get that?  How do we benefit and connect to that?  We receive it by faith.  Faith is the open hand, the open glove, receiving righteousness from God.  Faith receives and rests on God’s promise, God’s grace, God’s gift of redemption, the gift of righteousness that we could never hope to achieve ourselves. Have you received God’s gift?  Is this how you relate to God, with a posture of an open hand, receiving from him, dependent upon him?  This is what it means to be a Christian.  

All of us live in a world where our acceptance and being in the right is so tied to our skills and our abilities and our performance. You probably struggle to see how God could receive you and count you as righteous apart from you doing something.  After all, kids, in school you’re only in right relationship with your teacher if you’re doing the right things, right?  In our school you get awards if you’re spotted being good; some teachers use colors for each day to tell you how you’re doing. You want purple or at least green, but not yellow, and definitely not red. You get a little older and you’re only rightly related to the sports team and coach if you’re fast enough, strong enough, score enough. You only get accepted into the college or university of your choice if you can perform and show you’re worthy.  And then you start working and you’re only rightly related to your job and coworkers, you only excel by your ability to perform.  In almost every sphere of life your experience is “I am accepted by my performance.” But what does Romans 4 say? Let me paraphrase: Who is counted as righteous before God?  The one who doesn’t perform, knows they have failed, but looks to God, trusts God, and receives God’s gift and promise and grace through Jesus.  

How many times do we come into this space, a church, feeling like garbage because again this week we blew it, we didn’t live up, we feel like failures. Failures as parents, failures at life, failures spiritually, and does part of you ever wonder where am I at with God?  Where do I stand with God? Some of you come from certain church backgrounds where what was communicated to you is sure, God is gracious, but honestly there’s no coming back from certain sins, especially dirty ones, like sins of a sexual nature. Christianity is about learning the right morals, the Biblical principles, and living them. Or maybe your background is in a church tradition that teaches you need faith in Jesus, but Faith AND. You need Faith, AND these religious rituals. Faith AND these religious practices.  And you can never really know if you’re completely in the right with God. 

Not only can you know that God accepts you by faith in Jesus, but this faith, this posture toward God of receiving from him, and looking to him, and trusting his promises, this is meant to characterize the whole Christian life. Look at the end of the passage, verse 17, where we get a picture of what faith looks like. It wasn’t just one moment where Abraham believed God. His life was one of faith.  So God had given these promises to Abraham, to make him a great nation, to bless him, to give him and his descendants land, that through Abraham the whole world would be blessed, but Abraham and his wife, Sarah, didn’t have any kids. And it’s not like they hadn’t tried.  For decade after decade they knew the pain of infertility.  And yet, Abraham looked to God and trusted God.   

Abraham believed in the God, verse 17,  who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Verse 19, when Abraham looked at his own body, which was as good as dead and when Abraham considered the “deadness of Sarah’s womb” (literally what the text says), he looked to God and hoped in God’s promise. All he could see with his eyes, and all he could see from the evidence around him was death, but he trusted God’s promise.  He believed what God had said; he believed in a God of resurrection. He believed God and grew in faith as he continued to wait and trust and hope in this God who can bring life even out of death.  

This faith, this posture is not a blind faith, but a faith that looks God. What God has said, and from where we sit, what God has done in Jesus Christ.  This is a faith that doesn’t gloss over or look at the world with rose-colored glasses that just likes to think positively, no this is a faith that looks at death, that looks at sin, that looks at evil, that sees the evidence of these things in our very selves and yet has hope because of the promise and faithfulness of God in Jesus Christ. And this is the faith, that is the operating principle of the new humanity that goes all the way back to Abraham and continues this day for all who receive and rest upon this God who speaks, who makes promises, who is a God of resurrection who has shown his faithfulness in Jesus.  

This kind of faith is what Paul’s ministry is all about. At the beginning and end of Romans, he talks about the obedience of faith that he is seeking spread among all people.  In chapter 1 he says he wants to see these believers in Rome so that he might strengthen their faith.  It is by this faith, this receptive posture toward God that the power of the gospel breaks into a person’s life as they receive and rest upon Jesus.  It is by faith that a person starts the Christian life but also lives the Christian life. It is this faith from A to Z.  It is the opposite posture and operating principle of the old humanity, the old way to be human that turns from God, and trusts in self, worships and serves created things, looks to oneself and one’s own strengths and abilities to control and fix and make life work. This morning, will you look to God, will you look to what God has done in Jesus, and receive and rest upon Jesus and God’s promise fulfilled in Jesus?