Faith Credited as Righteousness Apart from Works

Abraham placed his trust in God, and that trust was counted as righteousness. The text does not specify exactly what he believed about God, though the apostle seems to treat it as a general conviction. If belief were truly universal, then it would necessarily include every particular; but if Abraham only believed God concerning the specific promises made to him, it does not follow that his belief was all-encompassing, for there are degrees and measures in how one trusts God. Thus, while Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness, no such reckoning is recorded when Israel witnessed the mighty acts of the Lord against Egypt, feared the Lord, and believed in Him and in Moses His servant. I suspect those from the nations who have not been careful in reading Scripture will now be presented with the explicit statement from Genesis—not as Paul placed it at the outset—but only as a bare acknowledgment that Abraham believed in God. Such a precise writer would not have framed Abraham’s belief and its reward as righteousness unless he meant to emphasize the gift nature of that credit. It is therefore likely that in the Epistle to the Romans, the apostle intends to show that it was faith—specifically Abraham’s faith—that was credited to him for righteousness. Now we turn to Abraham himself. To the one who labors, the wage is not regarded as a gift but as a debt owed; but to the one who does not work, yet trusts in the One who justifies the ungodly, that faith is counted as righteousness. Nothing that God gives to human nature as due is actually given as an obligation; rather, all is bestowed as grace. Even the good deeds performed are not done out of a sense of owed beneficence, but flow from God’s will to extend grace to whomever He chooses to bless. We must grasp this simply and universally: it applies clearly to those who work for wages and receive them not as grace but as what is due. This too can be said of those like Cain, who till the soil and do evil works—for I regard such actions as owed, as wages to be paid to sinners. Hence the apostle declares that the wages of sin are death, but no longer are the wages of God seen as owed things like eternal life; instead, eternal life is given as His grace. For He says that the grace of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. We must not suppose that in the gospel, the principle by which you measure will be measured back to you refers to excellent works; for we stand by grace, and this is not from us, but the gift of God, so that no one may boast. Regarding the measure of our sins, the punishments must be understood as given to us.

Furthermore, just as David speaks of the blessedness of the one to whom God credits righteousness apart from works—blessed are those whose lawlessness is forgiven, whose sins are covered, blessed is the one against whom the Lord will not count sin—this blessedness, then, is it tied to circumcision or to uncircumcision? We say that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness—but how? Was it while he was circumcised, or while he was uncircumcised? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision; and he received the sign of circumcision as a seal, a seal of the righteousness that comes by faith in the uncircumcised state, so that he might be the father of all who believe without circumcision, and that righteousness might be credited to them as well. And he is father not only of the circumcised, but also of those who walk in the steps of the faith that our father Abraham had while still uncircumcised. He receives, after being justified by faith, the sign of circumcision as it were a seal.