Saturday, November 8, 2008

Abraham Believed God

Romans 4:1-5

Paul said “If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God.” (Romans 4:2) Abraham lived a Godly life. If God spoke it, Abraham did it without question! God told him to pack up and move and off he went. (Genesis 12:1-4) God told him to sacrifice his son and off he went. (Genesis 22:2-3) When Kedorlaomer and the kings that were allied with him attacked Sodom they took Lot captive. Abraham retrieved him. Even though the king of Sodom offered everything recovered to Abraham, he gave a tenth to the priest Melchizedek, then the rest he gave to the King of Sodom. (Genesis 14)

That isn’t what justified Abraham in God’s eyes though! “Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” (Genesis 15:6)

We can brag about the amount of time we spend in prayer or studying the bible. We can boast of what we give to the church, or how much we do. We can seek offices and good standing. We can build ourselves up with man all we want. This is just show. (Matthew 6:1-18) It does not make us righteous.

If we work for something, we feel something is owed us. (Romans 4:4)We feel we have earned it. Then we start to build ourselves up, because we deserve what we have gotten. Salvation is through faith. (Romans 3:24) We can’t earn it and we definitely don’t deserve it. It is freely given and all we have to do is believe.

“Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” (Romans 4:3)

When we believe Jesus Christ came down from heaven as a man, and we believe that He suffered humiliation, beatings and death, just so our sins could be forgiven. Then we have gained righteousness. Then we can be at peace with God (Romans 5:1)

MSW

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