Dive into Romans chapter 4 as we explore how Paul uses the life of Abraham to illustrate the essence of salvation. Understand the role of circumcision not as a ritualistic law but as a divine affirmation that faith transcends all rituals and commandments. This episode challenges preconceived notions of righteousness, emphasizing the expansive grace of God available to all believers, regardless of their adherence to rituals.
So we’re in the middle of chapter 4 of Romans, and Paul is showing through the life of Abraham how God saves people, how God takes the initiative, how he comes to us when we don’t know about him or when we’re not even looking for him, and how he brings the good news of Jesus Christ. Now, we talked about last time a particular section that’s a bit complicated at first, so I’m going to try to make it as simple as I can. Paul now introduces the issue of circumcision. And you might say, now, why was Abraham circumcised? Or you might ask, why was he circumcised? What was the point of that? And Paul gives us an incredibly surprising answer. I bet you if I were a betting man, you would not guess this in a hundred tries. Now listen, let’s first of all say this. God promised Abraham this child. When he was 75, he made that promise, and the promise was fulfilled 25 years later. And Abraham went through all kinds of turmoils of belief and faith and doubt in order to finally arrive at the place where he was convinced that God would do this by a miracle, as indeed God did. And that child did not come about by natural means and was a type of Christ to come. Because Paul told us, rather quoted from the book of Genesis, that God said to Abraham, In you all families of the earth shall be blessed, because I will give you a child, and in that child shall all the families of the earth be blessed. So then Abraham was circumcised. Now, what was God on about regarding that? Well, many people say that the true people of God, Israel, have to be circumcised, and if you’re not circumcised, you’re out. You are out of the faith. And they use circumcision as an illustration of or as a type of all the commandments and all the laws and all the rituals that Abraham, that Israel, rather, later on, was to exercise, and that anyone who did not do that would not be saved. Thus, there are many, many millions of Christians throughout the world, I presume, who think that salvation comes only through obedience and only through the conformity to the Ten Commandments.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, here we go. Here’s the reason. Listen. Romans 4, verse 11.
SPEAKER 02 :
Abraham received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had, while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father, listen to this, of all those who believe though they are uncircumcised, and that righteousness might be imputed to them also. Did you get what that said? Did you grasp it? Abraham was circumcised as a sign of the righteousness he had before he was circumcised. so that everybody who believes and is not circumcised can know that they are part of the kingdom of God as well. In other words, circumcision was a sign that circumcision wasn’t necessary. Let me say that again. Circumcision was a sign that circumcision was not necessary. Circumcision, which became a sort of ritualistic law, was completely distorted. Circumcision was not a ritualistic law. Circumcision was a sign of the faith that Abraham had before he was circumcised, so that he could assure the whole world that even though you’re not Jewish and are not circumcised and do not perform certain rituals, as you believe in Jesus, you too are saved and have his righteousness. What Paul is doing here is building a case for what he will explore in depth in Romans chapter 5. that the whole world is saved by the grace of God through the faith that he gives them and not by separating a certain elite that we must all join in order to be saved. Let me read these verses. I’ll read both verses 11 and 12 to you now. Verse 11, And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of faith which he had while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father of “…of all those who believe, though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also, and the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also walk in the steps of the faith which our father Abraham had while still uncircumcised.” It’s a mouthful, I know, but you need to go to Romans 4, verses 11 and 12, and think through not simply every clause but every phrase, and not simply every phrase but every word. You say, Colin, what the heck? What does it have to do with me? Well, it has a lot to do with you. Let’s suppose you are struggling with drugs or alcohol or food issues or gambling or work addiction or all kinds of escapes from the pain of your life. And you know these escapes are killing you and you are trying to be an obedient Christian. Yet every time you take the bottle to your lips, every time you take that drug, you feel overwhelmed with guilt and shame, and you feel that you can never have faith in Jesus Christ until you’ve got rid of that drink or that drug or that whatever it is. Now, that is… the reverse of the truth. Because if you apply this verse to your condition, what it means is this. You can be a person who has received the righteousness of faith before ever you have overcome your addictions. You see, your addiction here would be parallel with circumcision. That is, overcoming your addiction would be parallel with circumcision. And so you say, well, I can’t be a believer, I can’t be a member of the Church of God, I can’t be a member of the faith of Christian believers all over the world because I’ve still got an addiction problem. But this verse tells you that you can know that you are counted as righteous by faith in Jesus Christ even before you have got rid of your problem. Or even paralleled, you see, by this circumcision by the keeping of the law. And so this gives us enormous hope. Paul is beginning to show more and more of the massive expansiveness of the sacrifice of Christ on behalf of humanity. You see, Jesus, God became man in the person of Jesus Christ. He became a human being for us, and he took all of humanity and upon himself at the cross. He was judged on our behalf. His judgment is a substitute for our own. That’s the expansiveness of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And Paul is building the case for it in the life of Abraham. Abraham was not a godly man when God met him. Abraham was not a believer in the eternal God and Jehovah and the creator-redeemer of the world when God met him. Abraham was a worshipper of idols. His father was a pagan and had idols. And so it is amazing that we find God plucks him out and gives him all the grace and the mercy that will come not only upon him, but through him to all the world. Because remember what it says in verse 13, for the promise that he would be the heir of the world was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. So God is going to bring this righteousness of faith to all of us. Well, he’s bringing it to you right now. You say, he can’t possibly do that. I’m still an alcoholic. I still get drunk. Yes, he can. You remember I told you, I think you’ve heard this story before, that I was giving a seminar one day at a certain church, and I was teaching this, what I’m teaching you now, and somebody came up to me later and said, I know that what you are telling us is true. Do you know why? Because he said, months ago when you were at this church, You were preaching on the righteousness of faith alone without works of the law, and I came to believe in Jesus that very day. I was on the back row, and I was drunk. And he said, I had faith in Jesus, and that faith gradually brought me freedom and liberty from alcohol. Now that is what I’m telling you. Do not put a block, a roadblock, a mountain between you and God. Jesus said, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, be removed and cast into the depths of the sea. Now, what we do with our problems is we make them mountains in between us and God, and we say, I can’t be a Christian until I’ve got rid of this mountain, because it’s separating me from God. No, it isn’t. By Jesus Christ’s sacrifice, it is not, because Christ has removed the judgment from you, which is the mountain between you and God. And you say, yeah, but the alcohol still is operating. It’s still bothering me. It’s still tempting me and overcoming me and overwhelming me. I know. But I’ve said to you a time and again that the addiction is not the drug of choice. It is the state of mind. when you have a state of mind in which you believe you are guilty and sort of dragged down by this heavy weight of guilt, when you have this heavy weight of shame about you and this weight of fear, those states of mind will lead you to your drug of choice. The drug of choice does not lead you to those states of mind. The states of mind leads you to the drugs of choice. You say, how is that so? Because guilt and shame and fear are so damn painful, for goodness sake. They are so overwhelmingly saddening and heavy. that you want to escape them, and the escape becomes the drug of choice. So your drug of choice is the escape from your state of mind, and that state of mind is your life, your mind without the Savior, your mind without faith in Him who tells you, my son, my daughter, you are freed from shame and guilt. I receive you and I will help you with your addiction. I haven’t said what I’m going to say for years because I spent so much time writing my book, but I do do counseling, faith training counseling. I’m not a licensed therapist. I do not have training in formal counseling, but I do faith training counseling. And if you would like phone counseling at $60 per hour, you may email me and we’ll set up the arrangement. Contact me at faithquest at fastmail.net. That is faithquest, all one word, at fastmail.net. I’m sure I can help you. And if you would like the help, I’m here for you. Thank you. We’ll see you next time. Cheerio and God bless.
