#19. Romans 4:17-25 – Faith’s proven Prominence, By Grace (Justification Series, Part VIII)

 Part III: Our Justification, Confirmed

...according as it is written that, A father of many nations have I appointed you – facing which, he believes it of the God Who is vivifying the dead and calling what is not as if it were –

Paul’s quote is from Genesis 17:5 – still, again, before God circumcises him. There’s no stipulation around the verse, that “Abraham must do this” to get or earn this reward, because, well, the reality is that he is the father of many nations. Faith exists in many separate religions today, notably Islam and Christianity, stemming from Abraham. It’s just that many in both Islam and Christianity aren’t of the faith of Christ, specifically, to put them in ‘body of Christ’ territory, as most reject Paul’s gospel.

He is a believer in the sense that Abraham believes when God speaks. The term used to define God in Gen. 17:1 is “El-Who-Suffices,” or, “El-Shaddai.” This God-given faith bestows belief. He believes God to be capable of all. He goes as far as waiting until Abraham is eighty-nine years old! Incredible. Then he sets to work on making Sarah’s reproductive ability work again – life from dead things. Through this, Abraham finally receives a visual on God’s promises.

What’s the difference between vivification and resurrection? When Jesus is resurrected, the body awakens and the person walks again (Greek: anastasis, “UP-STANDING.”) Vivification is the return of the spirit (Greek: zoopoieo, “LIVE-DO.”) In this sense, vivification isn’t a new creation of the same person (Isaac being born from Sarah’s previously-dead ovaries is a new person, not a return of a spirit.) Resurrection, on the other hand, would be a new creation, as Christ is resurrected three days later as a new Being. I’ll have more to say on this at a later point, but let it be realized that Christ’s body is resurrected, as a new Creation (so much so that Mary couldn’t recognize Him,) and His spirit is vivified.

Abraham’s faith was rewarded through this. He not only gives birth to Isaac through Sarah (confirming Israel,) but has another six children after Sarah’s death (Gen. 25:1-2.)

– who, being beyond expectation, believes in expectation, for him to become the father of many nations, according to that which has been declared, “Thus shall be your seed.”

This is Abraham’s expectation in God. It was beyond impossible that Sarah gives birth. Many atheists don’t believe in God today because of moments like this laid out in Scripture. Yet, interestingly enough, I’m sure these same people would still remain ignorant to God, even if reproductive organs worked all the way to 100 years old!

He believed anyway, knowing God would fulfill His promise on His time. Sure enough, through all these different children, he becomes the father of many nations, in faith. In Genesis 17, Abraham has the promise repeated to him, in more elaborate fashion, and his expectation in faith is revived. Hence the phrase “Thus shall be your seed.” It’s become this big thing today that “in fAitH, all is pOsSible!” This is only true when the faith actually reflects the written text, or God’s word (John 1:1.) Abraham’s faith wasn’t foolish, or some random idea that he conjured in his mind, but a reflection of believing when God speaks. The “faith” you have certainly matters. If you’re in the body of Christ, your faith isn’t merely of Abraham, but spiritually in Christ (3:22.)

And, not being infirm in faith, he considers his body, already deadened (being inherently somewhere about a hundred years) and the deadening of the matrix of Sarah…

This is a really cool verse, in my opinion, because it just shows the layers and levels of detail in Paul’s writings. George Rogers starts by saying the “not” at the beginning here should be omitted, due to some manuscripts removing it? I… can’t say I know which manuscripts he speaks of, and he doesn’t elaborate. Nonetheless, all 3 Greek manuscripts we’re studying says includes the term “NO.”

So, not being infirm (sick, or weak) in faith, he does consider his body, and finds it deadened. It’s an interesting thought because it shows that our logic is not sufficient to properly match God’s power. Our logic has gaps in the reasoning because we are limited to our perspective. Yet the best logic, through faith, is shown here, that Abraham considers the body – he recognizes that it’s deadened, that he is somewhere around 100 years old! He recognizes Sarah, as well, and the “deadening of” her “matrix,” which is code for a “dead reproductive system.” Abraham still hadn’t given birth to Isaac by this time. And Sarah? Pssh, forget it. No human way is this possible. This contextualizes Paul’s statement, that Abraham is “being beyond expectation.”

…yet the promise of God was not doubted in unbelief, but he was invigorated by faith, giving glory to God being fully assured also, that, what He has promised, He is able to do also.

Faith had nothing on unbelief. The promise of God, by definition, is set. It’s righteous. No changing it. God follows through on His promises. This may sound obvious, but consider how few people are truly given the ability to perceive this statement. As we know, God is true, while every man is a liar (Rom. 3:4, and don’t tell me you don’t lie, you liar.) After considering everything in the previous verse, that Abraham was definitely old and Sarah had trouble throwing it back, Abraham still didn’t doubt (that God would fulfill His promise, of course, not… not anything with Sarah. Sorry, Sarah.)

To quote George Rogers:

“Faith so strengthened needs no support of reason or probability. It attains its most God-glorifying maturity when it spurns all support but the unconditional promise of God. Abraham doubted not because of unbelief. There was no division of his heart between faith and unbelief; he was not two men, one affirming and one denying the truthfulness of God.”

There’s a notable contrast here between faith and doubt. The two don’t reconcile. The reality is simple: one believes God, and the other does not. To be “infirm” in faith is first exemplified, ironically, through the opposite. To not be like Abraham here, to disbelieve God on something, is to have a sickness in your faith. Any time Abraham or Sarah were incredulous at any situation, God would tell them more about the promise. The resolution to doubt, then, is more of God’s Word.

Initially, I believed that his “faith” was invigorated here, but look again: Abraham is “invigorated by faith.” So, something tells me this “invigorated” is in relation to his fun times in bed (he’s still got it, at 99!) This being invigorated – by faith, particularly – leads to giving glory to God. Glory to Him. He earns it, being Supreme and the only One to fully fulfill His promises. You cannot say the same for any other deity on the planet. For other ‘elohim,’ it’s a conditional fulfillment – a give and take. Yet God doesn’t do this. He simply promises, that He may simply be glorified.

Wherefore, also, it is reckoned to him to righteousness.

The “wherefore” is the effect of the previous statement. It’s a beautiful ripple effect. I just realized this now – in verse 9, Paul makes a claim, that “Faith is reckoned to Abraham to righteousness.” Here I’m realizing that every verse since then has been a proof. This astounds me because I thought verse 1 of this chapter was the start of a line of reasoning. It’s not. It’s the natural line of questioning from the Jewish community (the educated, religious Jew, that is.) In repeating this, I realize now that Paul had started the line of reasoning in verse 9, and the “wherefore” reveals that everything he’d started since then was a proof. Faith reckons to righteousness because, simply, it believes God against all odds.

Now it was not written because of him only, that it is reckoned to him, but because of us also, to whom it is about to be reckoned, who are believing on Him Who rouses Jesus our Lord from among the dead…

This is interesting, because it’s like a wrap-up to the chapter. Obviously, chapter/verse context is an addition and shouldn’t be relied on, as many chapters have varying degrees of success at catching the point of the passage, but I think chapter 4 works well in this regard.

This story isn’t for Abraham only. This is why it matters for you and me today. If it were unimportant, God wouldn’t have it on page 8 of His evangel. Moreover, He wouldn’t even be quoting the Old Testament in His evangel if it weren’t at all important to a student of Christ.

Gosh, after writing that, and knowing I have not read the entirety of the Old Testament, both concerns and excites me. I’d love to do a (more relaxed) series in which I run through the Old Testament and share anything I find, but I may be getting ahead of myself. This series is long enough as it is, you know?

This isn’t the only time that Paul makes it clear that all of Scripture (not just His evangel) are for our benefit (Rom. 15:4, 1 Cor. 10:6-11, 2 Tim. 3:14-17.) Of course, we would do wise not to mix the evangels, or, mix parts of Scripture together when the directive, purpose and audience are completely different, but nonetheless, the more we study the Old Testament through His evangel, the more the older passages may be recontextualized properly for us. Recently I’ve been speaking with a man that learned, of all places, of the grace of God in the way He handles King Abimalech in Genesis 20:1-6! Yeah! Interesting how something we wouldn’t instantly think of as our ‘top 5 examples of grace’ turns out to be one of the key factors in bringing someone into a better understanding of the evangel!

Another key statement in the next part, that’s going to really contextualize the next few chapters for us: “It wasn’t written to [Abraham] only, that [righteousness] is [only] reckoned to him, but because of us also, to whom it is about to be reckoned.” Another big WTF moment! Thus far, we’ve read that Christ justifies us, that is, that we ‘have not sinned in the eyes of God.’ In a previous section, I mentioned that this means we are ‘righteous’ to God, but all I had at that point was the logical pattern: God’s righteousness >> in Christ’s faith >> given to us >> justifies >> righteous through Him >> right back to God. Now here Paul points it out explicitly for us. 

How is it “about to be reckoned?” Ohhhh, oh, it’s because “we believe on Him Who rouses Jesus, our Lord, from among the dead.” Soooooo many things to get out of this, quickly. We believe God, but this is after all the setup we’ve had, about how it’s God’s righteousness and Christ’s faith manifested in you. So, it’s us believing, yes, but in effect of everything that’s come before. We aren’t even asked to believe that Abraham’s seed was quickened 40 years too late – such evidence for a fact like this can probably only be found in Scripture, now (I dunno, I’m 21, not a professional scientist.) But there is indeed evidence toward Jesus’ existence, as well as the disciples and Paul, and if that’s not enough for you, the fact that so much of Scripture lines up perfectly and is in complete harmony with itself over thousands of years is pretty telling of its reliability as fact, even if you cannot literally ‘see’ what’s happening.

Another thing to note is the definition of “Lord” here, which is Jesus. A “Lord,” 2,000 years ago, is a “Master.” This is not how God is defined. God is a “Subjector,” as Elohim, in Greek (or Hebrew, but plural,) is literally, “TOWARD-SUBJECTOR(S)”. Our Lord is in reference to Jesus, while God references the Supreme spirit that is subjecting all to Him (1 Tim. 2:4, 4:10.)

So understood, we realize that “Him Who” rouses Jesus is clearly God, separate from Jesus, here, rousing Him. How people get something like “The Trinity” out of this, that “God and Christ are the same,” baffles me to no end! Clearly, Christ is our Lord, through Whom we believe God. He is the example we can look at, the example of unconditional love to such a degree so as to justify our sorry asses, and this indeed reflects our understanding of the Subjector as a whole. We do have evidence of Him, with this understanding.

…Who was given up because of our offenses, and was roused because of our justifying.

More wrap-up for the end of this argument. Everything so far is tied up in a neat little bow, wouldn’t you say? Here we have a why, an answer, finally, as to why the horrible death of Jesus was on display for us – for our offenses, the very offenses laid out in Romans 1:18-3:20. Everything (and I do mean everything) in those passages are covered, for those who are believing.

Question for the astute reader: who gave Him up? Was it Satan? Many Christians suppose this, but this would imply that our Lord’s subjector was Satan! How is this, hmmmmmm?

Truth: He was given up by none other than God, a truth laid out clearly in Romans 8:32. Yup! And it was all to justify the sinner completely. Sin serves its ‘teacher’ service, and is quickly discarded. How satisfying that the proponent for death (being sin) is put in its place so succinctly here, and that God gave up a celestial (John 1:1, Col. 1:15-17,) not explicitly sacrificing one of us to get His point across on His supremacy, and more importantly, His love. It’s to justify us! Recall that Jesus’ death creates a propitiatory shelter. God is gaining our favor through this act of complete and utter love – justifying us despite the fact that we are completely charged with transgressions against Him. And, to quote George Rogers once more:

“Our sin killed Him; our justification permitted His resurrection. It was not a personal resurrection only, but something that concerned all men. As our offenses brought Him to crucifixion, so our justification releases Him from death. Had His body been left in the grip of death, we should never know the sufficiency of His sacrifice.”

There’s value in His resurrection, just as much as His death. His death is a result of sin – a death that results in the death, also, of our sin (2 Cor. 5:14,) which is all we really have been made out to be, per 1:20-3:20. Yet His resurrection revives us apart from sin, leaving only the resurrected spirit, that dwells in you and me today. Could any gift be so much sweeter than a release from the pressure and imminence of death? Sure, death still occurs for us, as it does for all – but it’s been contextualized. Its use is revealed as temporary, not permanent, which puts the strife, the struggle of not knowing what its use is, to rest.

Of course, there are still questions. When exactly is death absolved, if we are no longer subject to it? It would require us to be physically resurrected, to match our new, resurrected spirit, at some point, right? Also, what happens now? What does knowing this do for us? How can we understand this further in our daily lives? And the end goal still hasn’t been made clear to us. What’s God aiming for, here? And, of course, what of the unbeliever? What to make of them?

All this and more are answered with further study. More of God’s word provides the answers. God bless.

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The "justification" series will continue at a later date. Paul is about to shift topics, but, particularly in Galatians, the "justification" of the saints by faith will be picked up again.

- GerudoKing