Alright, our text is Romans 4.
Romans 4 verses 13 through 16. Romans 4 verses 13 through 16.
Now last week we saw that Abraham was justified by faith apart
from any works. And he believed, he had faith
while he was yet uncircumcised. So this week in our text, it
deals with the promise, the promise that was given to Abraham. And
we're going to look at whether this promise is obtained by the
law or whether it's obtained by the righteousness of faith. Now, if it's of the law, then
it pertains only to the Jews. The promise only pertains to
the Jews and all those who, with the Jews, come to the inheritance,
which is spoken of in the promise, all those who labor under the
law and work for their righteousness. It's like the Jews there. And
then that would mean that the promise given to Abraham is meaningless. It's meaningless. But, if it
is of faith, then the promise to Abraham stands, and it goes
out to all the seed of Abraham who, like him, come by faith. Now the law was given them to
make the need for salvation by grace more evidently clear. And God helping me, I plan to
show you that today as we wrap up the study this morning. Our
title is, The Promise, by Faith or Law? Rather, by Law or Faith? The Promise, by Law or Faith? Alright, so our text opens here
in Romans 4 verse 13. It opens with the promise. For
the promise that he should be the heir of the world was not
to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness
of faith. So this promise that Paul is
speaking of here, this promise that God gave to Abraham declares
to Abraham and his seed that those who are of faith, like
Abraham, these were to inherit the world. Now the world, it
refers to both this world here and that world which is to come. So what we mean by this world
here, it means that God, our God, has given to us everything
necessary that we need. What we need in this world, he's
providing it for us, he's provided it through his son Jesus Christ,
and he's provided everything for us that we need for that
life to come. to inherit the promises in the
life to come. Paul wrote, all things are yours. All things are yours. And in
Christ he hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings. So that like Abraham, we look
for a city whose foundations, which hath foundations, whose
builder and maker is God. We are given that same faith,
that same spirit of faith like Abraham who trusted God and believed
God, we have that same spirit whereby we trust and believe
God. And then this world to come,
we see our inheritance is Christ, the promise of eternal life in
Him. He's promised that for His people.
So the key here, the key to this promise, therefore, as Paul just
showed us, it's not based on the law, keeping the law for
righteousness. And it has nothing to do with
what we do under the law of Moses or any works for us. It's by
the promise of faith. It's by faith being exercised
in his people. Now turn and hold, turn to and
hold your place there in Galatians 3. We're going to come back to
Galatians 3 several times because it's actually a complementary
chapter to what we're looking at here in Romans 4. So Galatians
3, and I put a marker, and let's begin with verse 21. We'll look
at 21 and 22 here. Paul asks, is the law then against
the promises of God? This is the same promise he's
talking about here in Romans 4. Is the law then against the
promises of God? God forbid. For if there had
been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness
should have been by the law. but the scripture hath concluded
all under sin, both Jew and Gentile, all are under sin, that the promise
by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. Us who have faith, us who believe
and trust God, trust his word. All right, so we understand that
the blessing of God is this, that even though we are sinners,
unable to work a perfect righteousness by ourselves, by our works under
the law, we believe, we believe that God has provided righteousness
in His Son, Jesus Christ, and in Him, we are perfected. We
stand perfect and whole before God. All right, now, the promise
and the fulfillment of the promise, therefore, right, the promise
given and the fulfillment of this promise given to you that
believe, it rests upon Jesus Christ alone. not upon any works
that you do. It rests upon Jesus Christ alone
so that he himself is the foundations of that city whose builder and
maker is God. He's that foundation. He's the
one upon whom we stand perfect and righteous and whole before
God so that he's our righteousness. I like this last verse in Romans
4, 25. It's a good verse. It says, who
was speaking of Christ who was delivered for our offenses and
raised again for our justification. That's a good verse for us to
meditate upon. Learn that verse. Teach it to
your children, your four-year-old, five-year-old, six-year-old.
Teach it to them. They may not understand it now,
but it gives you a great opportunity to speak of the blessings that
we have in Christ, that he was delivered for our offenses and
raised again for our justification. It's a sweet meditation. All
right, so it's all of grace, all of grace. Our God is showing
us that he has saved us, put away our sins by grace. Now Paul further drills down
to this promise. Look at verse 14, Romans 4, 14.
For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void,
and the promise made of none effect. So he's saying again,
he's reaffirming this truth to us, that if the right to the
inheritance is only theirs who come to God by the works of the
law, by their works, then the promise that God made to Abraham,
which he received by faith, believing God, it's void. It's void. In other words, believe what
you want, Abraham, but it does nothing for you. you still must
labor and work under the law, which, by the way, isn't even
given to you for 430 years from now. So Abraham is outside of
the covenant of God, outside of the covenant of grace, right? If it's by law, then there's
no covenant of grace. It's a covenant of works, which
hasn't even been given to anybody for 430 years in the future,
from the time of this promise, right? So his faith would count
for nothing because it would therefore be resting upon our
works under the law, laboring to work a righteousness for ourselves. But thankfully, the truth is
that it comes by faith. And therefore, because it's by
faith, the promise goes out to those who are Jew or Gentile. It doesn't matter whether you're
circumcised or uncircumcised, it's apart from the law and our
works under the law or under any kind of law. It's not by
our works that makes us righteous. Now turn back to Galatians 3
and don't take your marker away from there. Galatians 3, this
time look at verses 26 through 29. Here Paul affirms this, he says,
for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been
baptized into Christ, you've put on Christ. There is neither
Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither
male nor female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye
be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the
promise." So that promise made to Abraham of his inheritance
of this world and the world to come. that God is providing everything
for us in His Son Jesus Christ, it's ours. For those who come
to God believing Him, just like Abraham, trusting and resting
in His righteousness which He's provided in Christ. Okay, so
back in our text, we're gonna look at verse 15, but I wanna
read 14 again because it builds into 15. So Romans 4.14, that
if they which are of a that if they which are of the law be
heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect. All right, if that's the case,
then Abraham's faith is void, it counts for nothing in this
at all, because that would mean our inheritance comes by works
of the law. Romans 4.15, here's why. Because
the law worketh wrath. For where no law is, there is
no transgression." Alright, so in other words, there's no room
for promises. Faith counts for nothing, because
the law says, it doesn't matter what you believe, the law says,
this is perfection. And what you're doing there,
it's sin. That's sin, and that there, that's sin, and this is
sin, and that's sin, that's sin, that's sin, that there's sin,
that's sin, that's sin, that's sin, that's all the law is showing,
that this is sin. When you do this, when you do
these things, it's sin. Because the law is showing you
the perfection and the righteousness and the holiness of God. So that
what we are trying to do in keeping that law perfectly, we're going
to find each and every time that we have come up short. We are
coming up short. Because understand this about
the law. The law doesn't give you any help. Right? When you look to the law and
you try to labor under the law to please God, there's no grace
imparted to you or I who are looking to the law. There's no
grace in it. God isn't saying, good job, you're really trying
this here, you're really trying your best at this thing, good
job. There's no grace like that. The law says, do this, like this,
and live. You do it like this and you shall
live. But if you don't do this, then you're going to come up
short and you're going to die. You're going to perish under
the law. So it gives no help. In other
words, we that are laboring under the law, it doesn't change our
flesh. It doesn't improve our flesh. All that the law does is it constrains
the flesh. How? By fear, by threats of punishment,
by wrath. That's how the law works. you
know, it doesn't change the passions and the lusts that are in the
flesh. The flesh still does, the flesh lusts for what the
flesh lusts for. But, through fear of the law,
through fear of the punishment, then we say, wait a minute, I
better not do that, because if I do that, this is what the law
says is going to happen to me. So, understand that the law was
given, and what the law does, and what it does very well, it
defines what sin is. Right? When we were just parts
of You know, as Gentile nations, parts of various tribes and nations
and peoples and tongues, what the law did, I mean, we didn't
have the law, right? So we only had an understanding
of what was right or wrong. based on our elders and what
they determined was right and wrong. But what the law did that
was given to the Jews, it very accurately showed the righteousness
of God. It said that is sin. It defined
what sin is for us very carefully, very specifically. And it defined
precisely how to punish that sin when it's committed. And
that's what the law does. It shows what sin is and it says,
and when that sin is committed, this is the punishment for it.
This is what they need to do. If you take someone's cow, you
might have to restore it fourfold. Give them four cows back. If
you knock out someone's eye, then you're going to lose your
eye. If you take off someone's thumb, you're going to lose your
thumb. And that's how the law is, right? And some things require
death. for doing those things. So that's
what the law shows. It defines sin and it assesses
a punishment for those sins. So, if you will come to God by
the law, right, and those that are also still trying to go back
under the law, right, for any part of righteousness, for any
part of their salvation, as anything adding to it, you know, for adding
to Christ, Paul says, then hear what it says. Hear its demands.
because it demands wrath against those that break the law of God.
So, under the law, therefore, if you want to come to God by
that law, then we would, by our weak, corrupt, sinful flesh,
have to produce righteousness perfectly. Under that law, we've
got to stop everything that we're doing perfectly. We have to stop
it perfectly. And all those things, as Paul
defined, for which sake the wrath of God cometh upon the children
of disobedience. We have to stop those things
perfectly. And, somehow, not only stop going forward, but
we have to figure out how we're going to pay off this debt of
righteousness that we've accumulated. All this big debt of righteousness
that we owe to God. And all these situations that
we've come into in life. And thought, thought, word, and
deed, where we didn't have perfect righteousness in it, we owe that
to God. We owe that debt of righteousness
to God. So all those years of rebellion
and disobedience, we have to somehow pay for that. And when
we do that, which is right, there's no super coin that is righteous
now and goes back and pays off some of the debt that we've owed.
There's nothing like that. And we send an atom in the garden.
We were in Adam, in Adam's loins, just like Levi paid tithes in
Abraham. Well, we sinned in Adam in the
same way, being in his seed, all right? So we're sinners and
we can't make that up. So what did our Lord say in Luke
17, Luke 17 10? He was defining or talking about
the servant who labors, you know, he's plowing the field and he's
feeding the cattle and he comes into his master, all right? And it says, So likewise ye,
we're like that servant out there plowing the field and doing what
our master has told us to do. And he said, ye, when ye shall
have done all those things which are commanded you, say we are
unprofitable servants, we have done that which was our duty
to do. In other words, we're bankrupt
sinners. We don't have what it takes to pay down the righteous
debt that we owe to God. We're sinners in need, desperate
need of His grace. Now the good news, the good news
is that God gave it to Abraham by promise. By promise. It's all by His grace. Alright, so that promise is founded
upon the grace of God which He has supplied abundantly and freely
in His darling son Jesus Christ. Alright, Romans 3. Romans 3,
25 and 26 says, whom God, speaking of Christ, whom God had set forth
to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare
his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through
the forbearance of God. We're not laboring under the
law to declare our righteousness, but by faith we declare God has
provided righteousness in his Son, Jesus Christ, and his righteousness
is my righteousness whereby I stand before the throne of God faultless
by faith. By faith. Lord, don't look at
me in my works. Look at me standing in his works,
covered in his blood. I believe you, Lord, that he
is the righteousness that you freely provided for the forgiveness
of sins for your people. To declare, I say at this time,
his righteousness. that he might be just and the
justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." So that God gets all
the glory and we're not trying to rob or steal from God in any
way. Now, I want to say a word on
this phrase that says, for where no law is, there is no transgression. And I was studying it yesterday
a lot, looking at this over and over again, because these men
kept saying, This is a proverbial expression. This is a proverbial
expression. I didn't really understand what
they meant by this is a proverbial expression. So I kept reading
it and praying and trying to understand what they were talking
about there. What the Lord showed me, what
I finally understood is that basically what they mean and
what Paul meant, I saw what Paul meant, is that he added this
to clarify what he meant, what he's clarifying the first half
there. So that when he's saying there that the law, he's emphasizing
the law works by wrath, that the law was given to make sin,
the appearance of sin known, to make it known to us. So the
law worketh wrath, Because where no law is, there's no transgression.
So what he's saying there is that we're all sinners and we
deserve wrath under the law. So he's clarifying the purpose. He's making known to us the purpose
why the law was given. Because if God gave the inheritance
to Abraham by promise, which he did, well then why did God
give the law? Why did God give the law? If
it's by promise, then what was the purpose of God giving the
law to Israel? Did he give them the law so that
they could inherit the promise by their law keeping? By fulfilling
some righteousness and keeping the law? Because that's exactly
what the Jews believed and what Paul believed until the Lord
arrested him and saved him by grace. Then he ceased trying
to labor under the law for righteousness. So why did God give the law then? If it's by promise, what's the
purpose of the law? Well, the simple purpose is he
gave the law to make the offense of sin known. That's what Paul's
saying there, that the law worketh wrath because without, where
there's no law, there's no transgression. In other words, he gave that
law to make sin known, to make it apparent for what it is, how
evil and sinful sin is, just how wicked it is. In Romans 4.15,
because the law worketh wrath, because no law, because if there's
no law, then there's no knowledge of transgression, is what he's
saying, so he gave the law for where no law is, there is no
transgression, no knowledge of sin. If we didn't have the law,
with all its defining, peculiar ability in defining that law
and assessing what the punishment of that law is, we wouldn't understand
it very well. Alright, now go back to Galatians
3 once more. Galatians 3, now we're going
to go to verse 18. And you'll see, very peculiarly,
Paul is speaking of the exact same thing that he's talking
of here in Romans 4. Galatians 3, 18. For if the inheritance
be of the law, it is no more of promise but God gave it to
Abraham by promise. Wherefore then serveth the law?
Why did God give the law then? It was added because of transgressions. till the seed should come to
whom the promise was made. So in other words, the law was
given to the Jews to discover sin to them so that they knew,
I'm a sinner. They understood what sin is and
just how grievous their sin is to the Lord. Just how abundantly
sinful we are in all parts. We're sin all over. And so the
Lord was making that known to them. and so that they understood
the exceeding sinfulness of sin, so that they understood it's
by promise, just as God said to Abraham, it really is by the
promise of faith. We believe him, that's our righteousness,
trusting God, what he's provided. And the blessing, therefore,
which the Jews had over the Gentiles, right, because we hear that,
that they were blessed, they had the oracles of God, they
had the prophets, they had the law, And you're like, I don't
get it. I don't understand why that's a blessing. Well, the
blessing to them is that by having that law, they would see their
great need of the Messiah Savior when he came, because they would
see what sinners they are, because they had the magnification of
sin in the law given by Moses, which the other nations didn't
have. They just had a few things that they followed because that
was their tradition. And the elder said, don't do
that. but they were able to do a lot of things without any guilt
of conscience. But the Jews understood the broadness
and the breadth of the law that we're nothing but sin, we offend
God all over the place. Left and right, we're offending
Him. And they had not known that except God gave them the law. So it exploded to their view
what the law was. Now, they managed to somehow
not having faith, they managed to labor under that law thinking
that they were pleasing God and that they were, right? You think
of Paul. Paul said, man, I had this thing. I was a Pharisee
of the Pharisees and according to the law, I was blameless,
blameless. But then God showed him as he
walked in the light, as he showed him the light and revealed this
into him and he knew, wait a minute, I thought I was blameless, but
I really am offending God and I'm sinning against him and I'm
not believing the promise which he gave to Abraham. And that's
why he gave the law, so that when the Messiah came, that we'd
see our need. Lord, thank you. Now I know my
need, because I'm trying under the law, and I'm not doing it.
I'm not cutting it at all. So they'd see that, in thy seed,
or in thee, thy seed, all nations shall be blessed. That's Christ.
They would be looking for Christ. And this is what Paul was saying.
I'll read it in Romans 7. Romans 7, 12 and 13. Regarding
the law, Paul would say this, that, wherefore the law is holy,
and the commandment holy, and just, and good, was then that
which is good made death unto me? God forbid, but sin that
it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is
good, that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. All right, so the Lord showed
him, the Lord revealed him, just as he's revealed to us. that
when we see and understand the holiness and the righteousness
of God that in our flesh, in ourselves, we don't rise up to
meet that. And we don't want to lower the
righteousness of God to try and make it so we can meet that line. We understand God is righteous
and perfect and holy and just. So the law served its purpose. It did serve its purpose for
which God gave it. so that now believers are not
under the law. And we understand we're not under
the law, right? This is what Paul said in Galatians
5.18. I'll read it. But if ye be led
of the Spirit, and believers are led of the Spirit, then ye
are not under the law. Right, we're not under the law.
And we'll look at more of that in the next hour. We'll see how
that we do walk before God and serve him and bring forth fruits.
not by the law, not by the flesh, but by the Spirit in us, right?
He produces that. So, we now, all believers that
are sons and daughters of Abraham, we're all saved by promise, just
like Abraham was saved, because Abraham believed God and it was
counted to him for righteousness, right? Because God gave him that
faith and God gives us that faith in grace so that we believe and
trust that He is our righteousness and we rest in him. All right,
now hold your place in Galatians, because we're going to come right
back. But I just want you to see verse 16 in Romans 4. Romans
4, 16. therefore it is a faith, that
it might be by grace. To the end, the promise might
be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the
law, not just to those Jews who have the law of Moses, but to
that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father
of us all. And when he says father of us
all, he means not just the Jews, who tried to come by the law
but saw that they didn't do it, but also those who come by faith
just like Father Abraham, just like Abraham did. So it's always
been by promise. Now, seeing that and understanding
why the law was given, now it helps you as you're going through
those scriptures and you're saying, I'm not really sure what he's
saying there. So you go back to Galatians 3 now and look at
verse 23. it begins to open that up, the
whole purpose of the law and what role the law plays in all
this and why God gave it. He clarifies it for us. So Galatians
3.23 says, but before faith came, we, we Jews, he's talking about
the Jews, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith
which should afterwards be revealed. He's speaking of those Jews that
were laboring under the law like him trying to work a righteousness
before God. They were shut up to it, laboring
under the law. Wherefore, verse 24, the law was our, the Jews'
schoolmaster. Now it says to bring us unto
Christ, but to bring us, it was added by the translators. It's
not in the original. In that word unto, can be translated
until, until Christ. So the law was our schoolmaster,
the Jews' schoolmaster, until Christ came. That we might be
justified by faith, or that we might the more readily embrace
the faith when it's time came. When it came, when Christ came,
we would readily embrace that faith, seeing that we lay under
the law, and we didn't produce any righteousness. God rejected
our righteousness. All right, so we now come by
faith, just like all the children of Abraham come by faith, that
same way. But after that faith is come,
we are no longer under the schoolmaster. So don't put your neck underneath
that law as a yoke. But as Christ said, all ye that
labor and are heavy laden, come unto me and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, for it's
light and easy. It's by faith, by His Spirit
working in us, by His work bearing fruits of grace and righteousness
in us, not by us laboring in the flesh under the law to try
and do it. The law wasn't given for that
purpose. It was given to show us what sinners we are. All right,
verse 26, for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ
Jesus. So I pray the Lord would bless
you. He blessed me in just seeing
that study and how it opened up both what was being said in
Romans 4 and in Galatians 3, how it really interpreted, they
interpreted each other. Pray the Lord will bless that.
Let's pray. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your grace and mercy, that you have abundantly provided
grace in your son, Jesus Christ. And Lord, we thank you that We're
not still laboring under the law to try and work righteousness.
But Lord, by the faith which you've revealed in us and revealed
to us, we look to your son, Jesus Christ. Help us, Lord, to rest
in him. Help us to walk by his spirit. For it's in his name we pray
and give thanks. Amen. Now, the next hour, I was
so blessed this week. It was such a blessed week. I
got a question last week. on a verse and I've been thinking
about that verse all week and every day. There's not a day
that went by that I didn't think about this verse and was studying
in it and it was such a blessing to me as the Lord opened it up
so I'm looking forward to sharing that with you guys next hour.