For if Abraham has been justified on the principle of works, he has whereof to boast but not before God;
Paul now tests his argument on the one man no Jewish reader could ignore. If anyone ever earned a standing before God, it was Abraham — so what did Abraham find?
Abraham is the strongest test case available. Israel took its pride in him, and God gave him the promises of blessing first.
Romans 4 then takes up two test cases to confirm the conclusion of Romans 3:28. The first of these is Abraham. This matters most of all to Jews. He is the father of Israel, and they made him their chief boast. God gave him all the promises of blessing first — to the nation Israel above all, but also to the Gentiles.
Someone might give up on the law and fall back on his descent from Abraham instead. Even that line of privilege, it turns out, is entered on the principle of faith.
A Jew might admit that he had failed under the law, and then claim the privilege he enjoyed as a child of Abraham. Suppose we look at Abraham in that natural way — as the man whose privileges came down to his children as an inheritance. Suppose we take our place under him in that line to enjoy them. What principle does this put us on? The same principle of faith.
The verse starts with an if, and its last words cancel what comes before. Everything hangs on where the boasting happens.
Had he been justified by works he would have had something to glory in, but not before God. Note those two words, for they show plainly what this passage is about: what counts before God, not what counts before men.
Works can win a man a name in the world. They cannot survive God's inspection.
Abraham, then, in one sense, has something to glory in: not before God, but before the world. In God's presence he is dust and ashes. In that light his human glory turns out to be corruption, and he admits it. But before the world he is God's witness — a justified heir of grace, on the way to glory.
Paul does not just assert this. He points back to Genesis, where Abraham's acceptance rests on his faith and not on his character.
If justified by works, certainly the credit would be his; but this is never found before God. And Scripture agrees. It says nothing about his goodness before his call or his acceptance. It speaks plainly of one thing he did: he believed God's word, and that faith was counted to him as righteousness (Gen. 15:6). No Jew who bowed to the divine authority of the books of Moses could dispute this.
The great man of faith gets no special category. He came in the same way as a nobody.
Abraham was a great man, and God was pleased to link His name with him. Yet whatever blessing was his, he was justified on the same principle as any other poor sinner. Scripture is definite enough on that point. He had no more to glory in than anyone else. He was as empty of works of righteousness as the rest of mankind.
This is not one method among several. It cuts against the way the world's religions work.
The religions of the world move on the principle of works, but justification before God is not on the principle of works. This is the whole argument of this chapter. At the start it says Abraham might have had something to boast of if he had been justified on the principle of works. But he was justified on the principle of faith. So all Abraham's boast was in God and His abounding goodness.
Readers often set this verse against the letter of James. The two are not rival verdicts. They are different courtrooms.
In James the whole point is what is valid before man, as James 2:18 shows. A man has the right to ask us to show our faith by our works, and so to justify ourselves and our faith before him. In Romans the whole point is what is valid before God. The very words "before God" occur in Romans 4:2. Our faith is quite plain to His all-seeing eye. He does not have to wait for the works that grow out of faith to be sure that the faith is really there.
- Boast — Works can earn a man credit. The verse grants that much, then names the one audience where it counts for nothing: God.
- Before God — In that light Abraham is dust and ashes, and his human glory shows up as corruption.
- Before Men — To the world he still stands as God's witness, a justified heir. James asks for that display. Paul asks what God sees.
- Proof — Genesis records no goodness in Abraham before his call. It records his faith in God's word, and no reader of Moses could dispute it.
- Level — However great he was, Abraham came in on the same principle as any other poor sinner. So his whole boast lands on God.
for what does the scripture say? And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.
What settles a dispute about how a person is made right with God? Paul goes back to Abraham, and to one sentence written about him in Genesis.
Abraham was as great as a man could be. Paul's answer still puts him level with everyone else.
Is faith, then, a new principle for being right with God? Was any child of Adam ever justified by works? Could human nature ever have boasted in God's presence? The apostle goes back to Abraham. How was he justified? If it had been by works, he could well have boasted. But that cannot be, for no one will boast in His presence. What then does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." However great a man Abraham was, however much God chose to link His name with his, and whatever blessing he had, he was justified on the same principle as any other poor sinner.
What did Abraham believe? A promise his own age made impossible.
Abraham believed the Lord's word, though he was then an old man, and his wife an old woman. In the eyes of man this promise was impossible; but Abraham believed God, and God counted, or reckoned, this faith to him as righteousness. So the record goes in Genesis 15:5 and 6. Nothing could be more clear and more simple. It was by simple faith in a simple statement. Abraham did not look at the impossibility of the promise. He looked at the almighty power of the One who made it. … Remember that this happened 430 years before the law was given. Abraham had never heard of the law when God reckoned him righteous. It was all by grace. It was all by faith.
The key word here comes from accounting. Older translations read "counted to him for righteousness", and that small word "for" can mislead.
Read that chapter carefully and you will notice the words counted, imputed and reckoned several times. All three have the same force. They translate the same word, and the word reckoned comes closest to its meaning. "Abraham believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness." That is, God reckoned Abraham righteous, or held him to be righteous, because of his faith. The little word "for" can mislead. It may suggest that faith is a substitute for righteousness, something that can be turned into righteousness. "Reckoned to him as righteousness" gives the sense more closely.
If God were measuring the worth of what a man does, faith itself would be the achievement.
Eleven passages in Scripture speak of imputing righteousness, or of imputing something for righteousness. In nine of them faith is imputed for righteousness. So here it is not the value of what was done that God imputes. Otherwise our faith would be the merit… Righteousness imputed to a man means the same thing as the man being accounted righteous.
Then where does faith itself come from?
A person may be fully and securely blessed, but only by grace, and so by faith. Faith gives the glory to God, and faith itself is His gift.
What about the day Abraham obeyed and offered Isaac? The dates in his own story settle it.
"For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." Now this comes in Abraham's history many years before he "offered up" Isaac. The first is in Genesis 15:6, the second in Genesis 22. How completely distinct, then, is justification before God from justification before men.
Abraham and the believer today trust the same God, but not at the same point in the story.
Abraham accepted that when he could do nothing God would do everything, and that is just what he proved. Notice, God is able. We are utterly unable — God is completely able. This is where faith rests. There is this difference between Abraham and ourselves. He believed what God would do. We believe what God has done, for "we believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification."
- Counted — counted, imputed and reckoned all translate one word. God held Abraham to be righteous. His faith was not swapped for righteousness.
- Counted, not earned — in nine passages faith is counted for righteousness. If God weighed the worth of the act, faith itself would be the merit.
- Counted to a sinner — Abraham's greatness gained him nothing here. He was justified on the same principle as any other poor sinner. That shuts out all boasting.
- Counted before the law — the promise was impossible in human eyes. Abraham looked away from it to the power of the One who made it, 430 years before the law came.
- Counted still — Genesis 15 comes years before Abraham offered Isaac, so justification before God stands apart from justification before men. What Abraham trusted God to do, we believe God has done.
Now to him that works the reward is not reckoned as of grace, but of debt
Paul has just said that Abraham "believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." Now he tests it against a rule from working life, where pay is a debt and not a favour: does God owe sinners anything, or does He give freely?
Two ways of receiving stand side by side here: earning and believing. One writer holds the everyday meaning of wages against the way God justified Abraham.
If a man works, the reward is not seen as a gift, but as the wages owed to him. But suppose that, instead of working, he believes on Him who justifies the ungodly. What a magnificent proof and conclusion, that his faith is counted for righteousness! This is free grace, the very opposite of a debt under law. And this was the principle of God's dealings with their great forefather, in the account Moses wrote by inspiration.
Suppose Abraham had earned his standing. Two things would then have had no place at all.
If Abraham had been justified by his works, his justification would have been owed to him for what he had done. Wages are owed to workmen in the same way. There would have been no question of grace on God's side or faith on Abraham's. But in justifying, God acts in pure grace; for let us not forget that the believer in himself is "ungodly." So the righteous standing in which God views the believer is the result of pure grace. That grace does not look for or recognise any merit in the person justified. This is a very blessed and steadying truth: it frees the believer from any troubling thought that his standing rests on anything he has done or can do.
Wages create a debt. So the question is whether God has ever put Himself under such a contract with men.
Now one who works for a reward does not at the end consider that it is given him by grace: he has earned it and would be most resentful if anyone suggested that it was a "gift of grace": his working has made his employer his debtor. Does God so employ men on this business basis? Men may suppose so, but their work is nothing to Him. He has given them no such contract. They are like men working, with no authoritative instruction, to build a railroad where no train will ever travel.
Some hope a small effort will do — a modest contribution alongside God's mercy. But the issue is not the size of the price. It is the principle of paying at all.
The apostle presses further the contrast between the principles he has been comparing. "Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due." And the greatness of the reward does not change the principle involved: if you buy heaven cheap, you still buy it.
Suppose someone could stand at heaven's door on the strength of his own record. He would arrive — but he would arrive knowing nothing of what God is.
It is through grace, and through grace alone, that we come to know God. Suppose I could come to the door of heaven and ask to be let in on the ground of my own righteousness. Imagine for a moment that this were possible. How would I stand there? For "to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due." I might know God as the One who lived there. But it would be a cold entrance. I could not know Him as a God of love. What grace is shown in paying a man his wages for his work?
Ruling out wages does not leave the believer with nothing. A reward remains, though it is not one he worked for.
Verses 4 and 5 are aimed at the deep and natural link the mind makes between reward and work — between reward and debt. But Abraham did no work. "To him that works not" God reckons a reward. And what a reward! "I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward." To the believer God reveals Himself as the reward of His own work. He works the poor sinner's salvation, and places the crown of that work, in Christ Jesus, on the head of the saved!
The words quoted there are from Genesis 15:1 in an older translation; the ESV reads, "I am your shield; your reward shall be very great."
- Debt — Where a man works, his pay is a debt, not a gift. Paul takes that rule straight from daily life.
- No contract — God has never hired the human race on that basis; He is no man's employer and no man's debtor.
- No discount — A small price is still a price. Paying less does not move you from debt to grace.
- Grace — Abraham did not work for it. That left room for God's grace and for Abraham's faith. A wage would have crowded out both.
- Reward — The man who earns his pay stays a stranger. The believer receives God Himself as his reward.
but to him who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness.
Paul has just pictured a workman collecting his wages, and now he turns the picture over. God counts a person righteous for trusting instead of working — and He is the God who justifies people while they are still ungodly.
The argument turns on a contrast anyone can test in daily life. Work earns pay, and pay is owed, not given.
Did you ever weigh these words of the Spirit of God, dear self-righteous worker? "To the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due" (Rom. 4:4). If I work for you at £1 a week, it is only right and fair that you should pay me when the work is done; that is debt. But if I fail to do the work I should have done, and you then come and give me £5, that would be grace.
So the choice is personal, and it comes down to one question.
"Working" stands opposite "believing on Him who justifies the ungodly." Do I work for justification? Or do I receive it freely by God's grace through faith in His Son? It is one or the other. There is no mixture: the two are distinct. But God cannot count righteousness to my account because of my works. Why? Because they are not perfect in righteousness. They carry far too much unrighteousness in them. The value of the work of Christ is a different thing: it is perfect, faultless, unmixed. On that ground God can freely count righteousness to the account of the one who believes in Jesus.
Justifying is more than letting someone off.
And who are we to believe in? The God "who justifies the ungodly." Who but God could do that? A human judge could not. He might let the guilty one off, or be merciful to him; but no human judge has the power to justify a guilty criminal. To justify him, he would have to clear him of every charge against him. If the man was guilty, he could not do that. But, blessed be His name, God can, and in a way perfectly consistent with His own perfect righteousness.
What makes it consistent is not leniency but the cross.
In human law courts it is impossible in strict justice to justify the guilty. But the work of Christ on the cross has such power, and He took our place of judgment there so completely, that God is able to justify the UNGODLY.
Many spend years trying to become godly enough for God to accept them.
One writer told an old man that this was why he still had no assurance:
"You have never yet seen God's starting point. All these years you have been striving, more or less, to be godly, believing that God justifies the godly. You have never yet believed that God justifies the ungodly; that is the starting point. Godliness will come afterwards."
Faith is not a currency handed over the counter in exchange for a standing before God.
Abraham is the great example of what is meant (verse 3). He — and we — are held by God as righteous in view of faith. That is its simple meaning. Faith brings in all the justifying merits of the blood of Christ. These are the great basis of that righteousness. We may also safely say this: the first right thing in anyone's life, and the start of a right course, is when he turns to God as a sinner and believes in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Miss this, and faith itself becomes the new work people rest on.
Many never enter into peace with God and full assurance of salvation. The reason is that they are looking inside themselves for something that would make God bless them. They admit that their works give them no claim on Him. But they think their faith might give them that claim. So the quality or quantity of their faith fills their minds. What should fill them instead is the free grace of God, the power of the work of Christ, and the Word of God that cannot fail.
Shutting works out of justification does not shut them out of life.
This is God counting righteousness apart from works. Yet it is the only principle that produces good works as its fruit. Oh, do not let the pride of unbelief blind you to how lost you really are. May you turn to God just as you are, a poor lost sinner, and find in the grace of Christ all you need.
- Ungodly — that is what the verse calls the people God justifies. It is God's starting point, not yours.
- Debt — a worker's pay is his due, not a gift. Work for a standing before God, and you are asking for wages instead of grace.
- Grace — He gives instead, on the ground of Christ's work, so the verdict is righteous and not merely lenient.
- Faith — not a payment for righteousness. It is the empty hand that brings in the whole value of Christ's blood.
- Fruit — godliness comes afterward. Works are never the cause; they are always the result.