!2 He refers to a hypothetical if then argument in 4.2: For if Abraham was justified by works,

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1 Paul s Biblical Defense of Justification by Faith without Works (4.1-12) WestminsterReformedChurch.org Pastor Ostella February 26, 2017 What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? 2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3 For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." 4 Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. 5 And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, 6 just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works: 7 "Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; 8 blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. 9 Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. 10 How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. 11 He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well, 12 and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. Introduction As he has done before, Paul uses rhetorical questions in , our text for today. To orient ourselves to the content of these questions, we need to recall what he has been saying about the means, purpose, and implications of God s justifying righteousness, just covered in The means is the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, the purpose is to demonstrate the righteousness of God, and the implications are twofold: to exclude boasting and to uphold the law. Even though the law does not justify (3.28, by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight), the strong contrast with justification by faith does not mean that we overthrow the law. No, the law is not abolished but fulfilled in Christ. Now (in ), Paul strengthens the lawfaith contrast and develops a biblical defense of justification by faith without works. He does so in three ways: from the life of Abraham, the words of David, and the history of circumcision. I. From the life of Abraham We are introduced to Abraham in Genesis 12; he lived more that four-hundred years before the giving of the Mosaic Law (Gal ). From the book of Joshua, we know that Abraham was called out of idolatry (Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, 'Long ago, your fathers Terah Abraham Nahor served other gods (Jos 24.2). In Genesis 15.6, mention is made of the justification of this fallen sinner and former idolater, which Paul discusses by asking a question, defeating an argument, and applying an illustration. A. Consider his question In Romans 4.1, we read: What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? The phrase according to the flesh is used in 1.3 to describe our Lord who was born of David. It would be redundant to state that He was born in such a way that He has a flesh and blood body. This brings us to a distinct use of the term flesh for the earthly order of life in the fallen world. For Jesus, this means that He became subject to the conditions of man in the fall, yet without sin. He willingly became subject to the consequences of sin. For us, according to the flesh refers to the sphere of life in which our sinful natures operate (Rom 7.5), where conditions such as slavery under sin exist (Rom 3.9). This brings us to the sense of the opening question: what was true in the case of Abraham in his experience as a fallen man and subject to the conditions and the consequences of the fall? His experience according to the flesh, different from our Lord, was that of a sinner under sin s bondage in a state of alienation from God, an idolater, and in need of being put right with God. B. Now consider how Paul defeats an argument

2 !2 He refers to a hypothetical if then argument in 4.2: For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about. To reach the conclusion that the patriarch had ground for boasting, a premise is required, namely that Abraham was justified by works. It would then go like this, if he was justified by works, he would be able to boast. The unstated premise is he was justified by works. So the conclusion follows (for sake of argument): Abraham had ground for boasting. Then Abraham could have boasted that his right standing with God was something he achieved by some act of obedience, by something he did, by some good deed. He could affirm that he contributed to his justification; that he gave something in order to help achieve righteousness; that he helped bring about a right relationship with God. Before responding to the argument, Paul flatly denies the conclusion with the abrupt but not before God (4.2b). Even if some kind of boasting were to take place, it would hold no water before God! But the apostle does not leave the matter there with direct denial. He goes on to defeat the premise that Abraham was justified by works; he does this by appeal to Scripture (3a): what does the Scripture say? He quotes from the book of Genesis in 4.3b: Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. He refers to Genesis 15.6: And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness. No comment is made in Genesis 15 about works; nothing to that effect is in the flow of thought. Paul s appeal to Genesis is to accent the place of faith in the reckoning of righteousness, which is a declaration that one is righteous before God, a declaration made by God. And faith is clearly accented in contrast to works just cited in verse 2. C. Consider how Paul uses an illustration Faith is accented again in 4-5 where Paul applies an illustration from wage-earning (v. 4): Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due but to the one who does not work. In the marketplace governed by a principle of works, the wage an employee receives is not considered a gift but his due, which means that it is his right; it is owed to him; the employer is under obligation to pay him accordingly. At this point, Paul applies the illustration to the worksfaith contrast. For justification before God, the governing principle is faith, which is counted as righteousness (4.5b). The benefit (or blessing per David s words coming up next in v. 6) goes to the one who does not work. Receiving righteousness (being justified) by believing in Him who justifies the ungodly, means that the benefit of justification is a gift and not something earned. Justification belongs to a person who does not work, who in fact does no good deed for it. His righteous standing is a gift and not a payment back to him like a wage. II. The words of David Note how the David example confirms what has been said regarding Abraham (just as David also, v. 6). As Paul sees it, David s witness is against justification by works: just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works. He presents justification in terms of forgiveness for lawless deeds and in terms of the covering of sins (Rom 4.7): Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered). Regarding the element of reckoning (counting and declaring), Paul cites how David casts it in the negative (Rom 4.8): blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. Interestingly, if we look closely at Psalm 32, we discover that faith is present as repentance in David s acknowledgment and confession of sin without deceit (32.1-5: Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 2 Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. 3 For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. 4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah 5 I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, "I will confess my transgressions to the LORD," and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah. This Psalm, proves precisely what Paul claims: the blessing of justification is apart from works (Rom 4.6) because David speaks about the blessed man as a sinner against whom the Lord does not count iniquity (i.e. to whom the Lord counts righteousness). No one can do a good work; works and justification have a great gulf between

3 !3 them. Therefore, Scripture in Genesis 15 and Psalm 32 confirms the truth of justification by faith apart from works. III. The history of circumcision By implication, David calls justification a blessing (blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, 32.2). This notion of blessing leads Paul to enquire about the scope of justification and it opens the door to more biblical support for the strong contrast of faith versus works (4.9-12): 9 Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. 10 How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. And notably in parallel with without law, he was justified without being circumcised (4.11b). Let s consider Paul s answer that shifts from timing to purpose. 1. Timing The question of scope regarding the Jews only (the circumcised) or for the Gentiles also (the uncircumcised) morphs into the question of timing: when was righteousness counted to Abraham? The apostle presses his answer emphatically in 4.10: Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. The strong not but makes the point unmistakably clear: his justification was declared not after his circumcision but before his circumcision. Then he presses home the answer by repeating the point in 4.11a: He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. He adds some explanatory information about the sign of circumcision itself at the same time that he makes the striking point that Abraham was justified in a state of being uncircumcised. We sense immediately where he is going. How can anyone think that justification (right standing with God) cannot possibly apply to uncircumcised Gentiles when the forefather of the Jews, Abraham, was justified as an uncircumcised man? Furthermore, circumcision is not only a sign, says Paul, it is also a confirming seal. What did it confirm? It confirmed the fact that Abraham was justified (i.e. he had righteousness counted to him) in his uncircumcised state. And importantly, he had this righteousness of justification by faith. Circumcision was given to him to confirm and reassure him of the righteousness he had by faith long before he received the sign. 2. Purpose The application to the uncircumcised already implicit is made explicit by an explanation of the purpose of this timing (11b-12): The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well, 12 and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. God designed the timing of circumcision in relation to His justification of Abraham for the specific purpose of making him the father of all who believe without being circumcised and the father of the circumcised who believe as Abraham did apart from circumcision, who walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. Circumcision is a promise to Abraham that he will have many offspring (multitudes, Gen 17.4), an offspring (Isaac, Gen 17.19), and that he will have the offspring, the greater than Isaac, through whom all families of the earth will be blessed (Gen 12.3; 3.15). Paul adds the explanation that circumcision (by its timing) is also sign and seal of justification by faith that constitutes a core blessing to all nations. Hence, Abraham is the father of the uncircumcised and the circumcised by faith because he is the father of the Jews through Isaac and of multitudes of all nations through his greater Son, the Lord Jesus Christ (3.24: because we are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus). Bottom line: the timing and purpose of Abraham s circumcision shows from Scripture that justification is by faith apart from works. Application: this is an important place in Romans to discuss the nature of faith in its relationship to works and justification.

4 !4 A. Definition of justification by works Work is a deed, a doing, something you do (ch 2, good work, doing good vs evil deeds). Obviously is it not trying to be justified by evil actions but by good deeds (by deeds that one thinks are good), which in context here are deeds of the law. A person justified by works has grounds for boasting because of some deed by some contributing action that he puts forth. An important good work for Paul s readers that antedates the Mosaic Law is circumcision (Gen 17). Justification by works of the law means that something we do in obedience to a command serves as cause, reason or basis for our right standing and it gives some ground for boasting. 1 According to Romans 10.13, by works involves seeking to establish one s own righteousness in ignorance of God s righteousness; they do not submit to God s way of justification by faith: For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. A sort of capstone text on the meaning of justification by works is Romans 4 in the illustration of the wage-earner who receives his due. Applied to justification, God owes this blessing to the one who works; God is under obligation to him. The blessing then is not a gift but a compensation. God pays the person for some good work. This is a merit system in which a fallen human being merits God s favor in direct contrast to grace as unmerited favor. B. Explanation of justification by faith 1. A core difficulty When I attended church as a teenager, I heard the preacher say, you can do nothing for salvation, it is a free gift received by believing in Christ. Repeatedly, when I heard this, I would say to myself, but believing is doing something. This brings up a core difficulty in the doctrine of justification in that faith itself is an act of obedience. According to Paul, unbelievers do not obey the gospel (Rom 10.16) and final judgment will fall on those who do not obey the gospel (2 Thess 2.8). Surely, believing is obeying. It is Paul who tells us that faith works by love (Gal 5.6) and it is Paul who speaks of the obedience of faith in Romans (of faith's obedience 1.5; 16.26). Therefore, it is with good cause that we wonder how Paul can state the antithesis so definitively. We might put it this way, how can Paul put faith in an antithetic relation to works According to Rom , doers of repentant good works have righteous standing now and will be justified in the 1 future day of judgment. This now and not yet nature of justification teaches that it has two aspects. To be clear, this is not two justifications, one by grace and the other by works; it is wrong to think of the one as justification by faith without works and of the other as justification by faith and works. We need clarity here. The justification that those effectually called to the obedience of faith have now will be heralded, pronounced, and declared by God on the Day of Judgment when they are raised up in glory and openly acknowledged and acquitted (WSC, 38). This is encouraging. The reality of the judgment according to our works is a promise. We will be rewarded for all that we do, for all our works that flow from the obedience of repentant faith that is efficaciously granted in both its inception and its continuance. Knowing the sure outcome of our deeds encourages us in the duties we have to our Master. The standard by which the deeds will be judged is God s holiness applied in the context of gracious redemption. This fact motivates obedience. But nothing here states that justification is by our works. In the final judgment, faith, even in its nature as obedience is the instrument of our justification apart from obedient works of the law.

5 !5 when faith itself is an act of obedience to a law and thus is a law-work itself? 2 Granted, the apostle never calls faith a work of the law (whether written in the heart on in Scripture) but we do hear him talk about the duty to believe (Acts 16.31) and repent (Acts 17.30). How can justification be by faith not works when faith is obedience to a duty, command, or law of God? 3 2. A simple solution The obedience of faith must be put into the right perspective. Obedience of any kind does not and cannot justify, even obedience of faith (as WCF, justification is not by anything done by the justified, not by the act of believing, or any other act of Christian obedience (XI, 1b). For a simple solution, we must recognize that justification is not technically by faith. a. Technically it is not justification by faith but by God It is God who justifies. Note the references to God s action (through): 3.30 (who [God] will justify), 4.5 (him who [God] justifies), 4.6 (God counts righteous), 4.8 (God will not count his sin). b. Technically it is not justification by faith but by blood: we have now been justified by his blood (Rom. 5:9 ESV). The righteousness of God flows to us through the faithfulness of Christ by His sacrificial death as propitiation that satisfied God s wrath against us (Rom 3.25). c. Technically it is not justification by faith but through faith 2 It is important here to ask, how does faith fit into this picture since it is a human action, a deed, even a good deed? Surely, Paul does not limit deeds or works to the kind that involve trying to earn a wage or seeking to justify oneself. Is he not excluding all human action, all deeds, doings, even good ones? Is he not saying that there is no single human deed, doing, action, even a good one (if one could be found) that has anything to do with the person s justification. Righteous standing is a gift to one who does not work, does no deed. There is no human deed that contributes to justification. If one existed, then a person could boast; if one existed, it would be doing a work that earned righteousness as his due and justification would not be a gift. Moreover, God would be a debtor under obligation to a human being to give him his due. Of course, this is ruled out by what Paul has been teaching about man s inability to do anything good as a slave in sin and the law s inability to justify since its proper function is to give the knowledge of sin, silence excuse-making, and pronounce liability to punishment. From the perspective of the law, no law work, no deed in obedience to God can justify. From the perspective of the standing of the ungodly under sin in its bondage, no one can do a single good deed, not even the good deed of the obedience of faith, for justification. In turn, if someone suggests some good deed that contributes to his justification such as circumcision, works of the Ten Commandments, even the good action of faith in Christ, then he would have grounds for boasting, his justification would be by works, and he would be seeking to establish his own righteousness by not submitting to God s righteousness that is through Jesus Christ, through His endurance of the wrath of God in the place of sinners by blood redemption. The faithfulness of Jesus is then set aside. His propitiating sacrifice is reconceived to a moral example that does not involve being punished by God so that the ungodly would not be eternally punished. In turn, Gethsemane for the Lord Jesus did not include a willingness to drink the cup of God s eternal wrath; instead, His submission to the Father is reduced to an example of human freedom to accept God s will or reject it. Then, in the large picture of God s plan to save fallen sinners, because of His gift to humans of freedom to accept or reject Him, God willingly accepts the suffering He experiences when His plan does not succeed. Of course, this worldview has built into it the denial of man s utter helplessness in the fall as a slave in sin. By contrast, Paul presents a picture of human depravity, bondage in sin, and therefore the inability of fallen humans to do any good deed whatever. They are fully responsible for their sins which they willingly and knowingly commit and are categorically without excuse. The law written in their hearts and on the pages of Scripture serves to mute their excuses, announce their liability to eternal punishment by giving them clear knowledge of their sins. Therefore, no deed of the law, no human action, no good deed not even the good deed of faith, justifies. Justification is through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ (Rom 3.22a), through His blood (Rom 5.9) through His redemptive work of propitiation by blood, and through faith in His blood (Rom 3.25a). Therefore, the obedience of faith is the means through which God justifies. He gives faith to the ungodly of all nations by His efficacious call. Ultimately, then we return to the place of submission to God in worship and proclaim His worthiness of worship because we are justified by grace. As the WCF puts it, the justified are those whom God effectually calls, and to whom He imputes the obedience and satisfaction of Christ by faith, which faith they have not of themselves, it is the gift of God (XI, 1a) because the only instrument of justification is faith and saving faith is a gift of grace, whereby the elect are enabled to believe to the saving of their souls (XI, 2) for it is the work of the Spirit of Christ in their hearts (XIV, 1). Moser claims that the answer is in the non-meritorious nature of faith as a human work. The works negated by Paul 3 refer to merit in contrast to faith in this respect. The human act of faith is a matter of cooperation with God that determines why one person is justified and another is not (God s reckoning depends on human receptive activity, Severity, 155). It is a receptive volitional action that is the opposite of merit works and therefore that is not merit qualified. According to Moser, God must do his part, but an autonomous human act of receiving by faith is necessary for justification.

6 !6 Romans 3.30 helps give perspective here. It clarifies the meaning of justification by faith with its emphasis on God who will justify by faith and through faith. Technically, it is not faith that justifies; faith has no declarative power; it has no saving power; faith has no redeeming or propitiating power. God propitiates, redeems, saves, declares righteous, and justifies. By faith means through faith as His instrument through which He counts, reckons, imputes righteousness to the ungodly. If we emphasize faith as an act of obedience, then it would be included with the obedient works of the law, commandments, and duties that do not justify. In this light, what can we say of faith? Faith as obedience does not contribute anything to justification, no more than any other act of obedience to the law contributes to justification. It does not make God a debtor to the one who obeys. d. Technically it is not justification by faith but through faith as the gift of God. Therefore, the simple solution, which is a profound solution, is that justification is not by works or any good deed even that of believing. Instead, it is by God through the faithfulness of Jesus, through His redeeming-propitiating blood, and through faith that is given to the ungodly by God s efficacious call. Faith functions apart from works because it is beyond human ability. We have to note how the duty to believe is in the same category of all duties that humans have to God. The duty to believe (to obey God in faith, to submit to God) is in the same category with all other duties for which man is fully responsible but totally unable to perform. In other words, all people in the fall are under sin (Rom 3.9) as slaves to sin and as such they suppress the truth in unrighteousness and nothing good, not even the good of trusting in God. They not only do nothing good ( with chapters 1-2), they are also unable to obey the law and they are unable to submit to it or to God (Rom 8.7). Thus, if Paul has the aspect of faith as a law-work, or obedience to a command of God in mind in his antithesis, then justification apart from works includes even the works of faith. Unmistakably, the commands to believe and repent do not allow us to infer from them to the conclusion that fallen sinners have the ability to believe or repent. 4 So, because of total depravity a contribution of obedience, even the obedience of faith, could justify no more than any other duty could be obeyed for justification. Justification can be by faith without law because the justified sinner is incapable of any act of obedience. The issue is not the nature of faith as a law-work versus law-works generally; the issue is the impossibility of faith. Its very existence as an act of obedience cannot have its origin or source in the justified sinner. Its nature as obedience is irrelevant to justification because when it comes into existence, it is not something that the sinner contributes to his justification. As God s gift it has a special instrumental function among the duties that man is incapable of performing but is enabled to do by God s recreating grace. Ultimately, then we return to the place of submission to God in worship and proclaim His worthiness of worship because we are justified by grace. As the WCF puts it, the justified are those whom God effectually calls, and to whom He imputes the obedience and satisfaction of Christ by faith, which faith they have not of themselves, it is the gift of God (XI, 1a) because the only instrument of justification is faith and saving faith is a gift of grace, whereby the elect are enabled to believe to the saving of their souls (XI, 2) for it is the work of the Spirit of Christ in their hearts (XIV, 1). May we fall down before the majesty of God for the faithfulness of Jesus Christ through whom we have redemptive freedom from slavery, and through whom we have deliverance from our liability to punishment because He bore our sins in His own body on the tree, and was raised from the dead for our justification; to the glory of the triune God, now and forever, amen. This inability regarding the natural man in his fallen condition is something that Moser rejects and seeks to defeat 4 by argument in Evidence. He reveals his thinking most plainly in interaction with Plantinga.