Romans 4 - Overview

Ok, so with everything going on this past week, we are gonna take a step back and just slow down a bit. What I want to do in the time we have tonight is read Romans 4, and just kind of give a 10,000 foot overview of what is happening here, and we will dive in deep next week.

Romans 4 ESV

1 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. 13 For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. 14 For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15 For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression. 16 That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17 as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. 18 In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. 20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. 22 That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” 23 But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, 24 but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, 25 who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

OK, so there is a lot to unpack there, and we are going to drill into these verses in detail in the coming weeks. But I want to give you the overview.

First of all, we have to remember the audience. Paul was writing to the church at Rome. The Christians in Rome were a diverse group. You had believers who had come from a Jewish heritage and a Jewish understanding of the law, the ceremonial rituals, and the rigorous expectations of following God’s commands.

These Jews felt very strongly about their lineage. About the faith that had been passed down from generation to generation. In their view, Christianity was the correct reading of Old Testament prophecy, and they felt like it was their birth right.

They were not wrong in that, but maybe a bit too restrictive. Because one of the things Paul has to fight against is this ever growing circle of Judaizers who felt like Gentiles had to convert to Judaism in order to be Christians.

This is why Rome allowed for the spread of Christianity. They considered it a sect of Judaism, and because of the standards at the time, Judaism was considered “grandfathered in.” So we see in Acts that the Roman governors did not want to do anything about the Christians because they felt that it was simply a dispute between different sects of the same religion.

This was God’s grace in allowing for Christianity to spread until the Romans realized their own error, chose to crack down on it, and began persecuting the church in earnest. But by that time, it was too late. Christianity had spread like wildfire, and the persecution only fanned the flames.

So, you had the Jews who were basically having a crisis of faith: Are we Jews or Christians?

And they were sometimes doggedly holding to that Jewish heritage.

OK, so that is the Jewish side of the Roman church. Then you have the Gentiles.

Now the Gentile Christians in Rome were very pagan. You really kinda have to get your head wrapped around the 1st century Roman world.

How many of you remember Roman Mythology from school?

All the gods, all the stories. Many of our planets get their names from Roman deities. The Apollo space program comes from a Roman deity.

Now, in Rome, the deities were more literature than religious devotion. Devotion was to the emperor by the time of Paul.

But what came before the Roman empire?

The Greek empire. And again, anyone remember their Greek mythology?

The Greek traditions were more religious in their devotion, which held over into Roman occupied territories.

So, you have two major empires with pantheistic tendencies, empire-wide and local customs, practices, festivals, etc. And out of that system comes a group of people who are longing for something more. Something real. And they hear the message of Christ. They hear that they should put away all other gods because there is only one true God. And they seek to live like Christ.

And they don’t know that you are not supposed to eat certain things, or that you are supposed to wear your hair a certain way, or .... you get it. They haven’t had the advantage of the Law. They have only realized that what they were worshiping before was not the true God. And so they seek to worship God as best they can. They are seeking to like like Paul tells them they should, and they don’t understand why they have to get circumcised. Or why they can’t have a piece of cheese on their delicious bacon burger. It doesn’t make sense to them because they don’t know any better.

These are the two factions that make up the church in Rome. And Paul is having to bring them together, to show them that they have more in common than they think, and to show them that God doesn’t prefer one group over the other.

And look, y’all, we sometimes forget that today. We think that God loves us more because we’re baptist. But, there are going to be Catholics in heaven. And Methodists, and presbyterians, and pentecostals. We’re not better than anyone, because we are all unrighteous.

And Paul tells the church there in Rome that it isn’t about circumcision, or heritage, or anything else. It is about faith in God through Christ Jesus.

Our sins are covered not because of who we were born to, or what thing we did. Our sins are forgiven because of Who loved us and gave Himself for us.

Romans 5:8 ESV

8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

God sent Christ to be the propitiation for our sin. Christ paid our sin debt. Not because we do enough good things. Not because we have followed certain rules. Not because we have tried really hard to be the best we could be.

No.

Christ died for us to pay the debt we couldn’t pay. It was a debt He didn’t owe. But He paid it on our behalf, and that satisfied the righteous wrath of God.

When we really dive in next week we are going to look specifically at how Paul takes us on a journey through Abraham’s life and how his faith is what made him righteous. We are going to see that it is not about our family name or our bank account or our church membership. It is about our relationship with the Father. If it is not through the Son, we have no hope.