Credited as Righteousness

Romans 4:18-25 

The story is told of a wealthy old lady, who decides to go on a photo safari to Africa, taking her faithful old poodle named Cuddles, along for the company.  One day the poodle starts chasing butterflies and is soon lost.  Wandering about, Cuddles notices a leopard heading rapidly in her direction with the intention of having lunch.  The old poodle thinks to herself, “Uh, oh! I’m in deep trouble now!”  Noticing some bones on the ground close by, she immediately starts to chew on the bones with her back to the approaching cat.  Just as the leopard is about to leap, Cuddles exclaims loudly, “Boy, that was one delicious leopard!  I wonder if there are any more around here?”  Hearing this, the young leopard halts his attack in mid-strike, and with a look of terror he slinks away into the trees, thinking to himself:  “Whew!  That was close!  That old poodle nearly had me!”  Meanwhile, a monkey who’s been watching the whole scene from a nearby tree, figures he can put this knowledge to good use and trade it for protection from the leopard.  The monkey soon catches up with the leopard, spills the beans and strikes a deal for himself with the leopard.  The young leopard is furious at being made a fool of and says, “Here, monkey, hop on my back and see what’s going to happen to that conniving canine!”  Now, the old poodle sees the leopard coming with the monkey on his back and thinks, “What am I going to do now?”  But instead of running, Cuddles sits down with her back to her attackers, pretending she hasn't seen them yet, and just when they get close enough to hear, the old poodle says: “Where’s that monkey?  I sent him off an hour ago to bring me another leopard!”

                Strangely enough, that bears a striking resemblance to our own situation.  Like old Cuddles the poodle, there also is deadly predator after you and me, who is constantly tracking us down.  It’s the old wily enemy, Satan, who like a leopard wants to capture us and drag us back to his lair, where he can devour us alive.  Now, the chief trap he uses to catch us is pride – the pride of thinking we are self-sufficient, that we can not only take care of ourselves, but ultimately save ourselves.  And the bait he uses to lure us in is the same temptation he used against Adam and Eve – the temptation that we can be like God, and call the shots and make our own decisions.

Neal Anderson says that all sin boils down to us trying to meet our needs in a way different than God intended.  So, Satan entices us to rebel against God’s holy Law and do our own thing, whether it be an impure thought, a demeaning word or a selfish action.  And then once we give into temptation, the trap is sprung, and the Law itself comes crashing down on us, accusing us of our sin and guilt.  My friends, that’s how the deadly predator tracks us down and tries to capture us.  That’s why we need something to outwit the enemy.  But unlike Cuddles the poodle the answer does not lie in ourselves, because we are not smart enough or powerful enough to overcome Satan.  No, the answer lies in the grace of God alone.  His free and undeserved love to us in Jesus Christ is the only thing that can outsmart Satan and set us free.

            Such was the message that St. Paul shared with the Christians at Rome in our text for today.  You see, those believers were being outwitted by the enemy.  They had bought into the lie that it’s not sufficient to simply be saved by grace, you also must do something to please God, to make Him happy with you.  It’s what I like to call the ‘Jesus, But’ religion.  It’s the first and oldest heresy, the false idea that in order to be saved you need to believe in Jesus, BUT you also need to do something else.  In particular, they thought they had to observe the strict dietary laws and sacred rituals of the Old Testament.  After all, it was difficult for these Jewish Christians to give up their old Jewish ways.  They felt they still had to do something to prove themselves to God and thus earn His favor. 

            Sadly, too often you and I fall prey to that same lie.  People love to quote that old cliché, “God helps those who help themselves.”  Many people even think it’s a Biblical verse.  Well, not only is that quote never found in Scripture, the principle is not there either.  And yet, we mistakenly think we’ve got to do something to help God out.  For example, when we pray about something, but then, instead of leaving it in God’s more-than-capable hands, we take it back and worry about it and try to work it our on our own.  Or when we pat ourselves on the back for all the good things we’ve done at church, the donations we’ve made to the community, the way we’ve taken care of our family, or how we excel at working, looking down at others because they’re not as pious or godly or righteous as we are.  But perhaps worst of all is when we sin, but instead of simply confessing our sin and receiving God’s free forgiveness, we try to remedy it on our own by beating ourselves up with a guilt trip, or thinking we can somehow do something to make up for it. 

Yes dear friends, when we do that, then like the Jewish Christians in our text we’ve been outwitted by the enemy and given into the lie that we can save ourselves by our own righteousness.  The interesting thing is that the Jewish Christians in our text pointed to Abraham as their perfect example – the example that hard work and obedience is the way to salvation.  However, as Paul points out in our text they had it all backwards.  Abraham is not the example of works but of grace, not the example of obedience but of God’s free gift of faith which saves, because the story of Abraham is not about what Abraham could do but about what God did.  After all, Abraham and Sarah were unable on their own to do anything have a child.  And without that child there would be no Messiah, through whom the world would be blessed.  And even though they did try to do something, like having Abraham’s servant, Eliezer be the heir, or using Sarah’s servant, Hagar to have a child, they only messed things us, just like you and I do, when we try to work things out on our own.  In other words, they were powerless to do anything about the problem.  For as our text says, Abraham was too old to have a child and Sarah was too barren.  They were as good as dead.  And they were hopeless and helpless to do anything about it on their own.

But that’s when God stepped in and in His grace He gave them the miracle of a child, named Isaac through whom eventually the Savior would come.  You see, only God could create life in Sarah’s lifeless womb.  And in His grace He’s done the same for you and me.  For like Abraham and Sarah, we too were as good as dead – dead in our trespasses and sins, eternally dead in heart and soul.  But out of the death of our sin and guilt God created new life, the life of forgiveness and salvation by the remission of all our sins.  And He did it by giving us the real miracle baby, Jesus Christ our Savior, the Messiah through whom the world has been blessed.  As St. Paul said in our text:  “HE WAS DELIVERED OVER TO DEATH FOR OUR SINS AND WAS RAISED TO LIFE FOR OUR JUSTIFICATION.”  This appears to be an early Christian creedal formula based on Isaiah 53:12, where it says:  “he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors.  For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the trans-gressors.”

Indeed, Jesus bore our sins in His body to the cross.  All our deepest, darkest offenses, no matter what they are, whatever plagues and torments your soul – He’s taken them off our hands and carried them to Calvary where He disposed of them once and for all.  And then He rose again for our justification, so that we can be justified and declared righteous and innocent in His sight.  And all of that is ours as a free gift, through faith in His name. 

That’s what Paul meant, when he said:  “IT WAS CREDITED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS.”  He was talking about Abraham, who believed the promise.  And through that faith He was saved.  But even that faith was a gift from God, because our text says that:  “HE WAS STRENGTHENED IN HIS FAITH.”  And God’s the one who did that.  Through faith He credited to Abraham all the righteousness of Jesus Christ to cover up His sin.  But the miracle of the Gospel is that He has done the same for you and me.  Like Abraham, God has credited to us the righteousness of Jesus to make us holy and blameless in His sight.  We could think of it like the difference between a debit card and a credit card.  When you use a debit card, they subtract the amount of the purchase from what’s already in your account.  But, when you use a credit card, they simply charge you the amount, and bill you later.  Which is why many people mistakenly think it’s like free money.

Well, in Jesus’ case it truly is free.  Since God knew there was no way we could pay the price for our salvation, He took all the debits of our sin, and guilt and shame and charged them to Jesus, who paid for it all in full with His holy precious blood and His innocent suffering and death.  And then He took all of Jesus’ goodness, righteousness and holiness and added them to our account, so that we are now pure and forgiven of all our charges.  And all of that He pours out to us through faith, which itself is a free gift from Him through the Holy Spirit in the Word and the Sacraments.

In a way it’s like the boss of a big company, who needed to call one of his employees about an urgent problem with one of the main computers.  He dialed the man’s home phone number and a little boy answered.  The boss asked, “Is your Daddy home?" “Yes,” whispered the small voice.  “May I talk with him?” the boss asked.  To his surprise, the small voice whispered, “No.”  Wanting to talk with an adult, the boss asked, “Is your Mommy there?” “Yes,” came the answer. “May I talk with her?”  Again the small voice whispered, “No.”  Knowing it was unlikely that a young child would be left home alone, the boss decided he would just leave a message with the person who should be there watching over the child.  “Is there any one there besides you?” “Yes” whispered the child, “a policeman.”  Wondering what was going on, the boss asked, “May I speak with the policeman?” “No, he’s busy.” “Busy doing what?” asked the boss.  “Talking to Daddy and Mommy and the Fireman,” the child whispered.  Growing concerned the boss asked, “What’s going on there?”  In an awed whispering voice the child answered, “The search team just landed the helicopter.”  Now the boss was really worried and he said, “What are they searching for?”  With a giggle the little voice whispered:  “Me!”

  In a cute way that story reminds us that when we were hiding from God in our guilt and shame, lost in sin and death and despair, He didn’t give up on us.  Instead, He came and found us.  He not only sent Jesus to save us, He also sent the Holy Spirit in the Word and Sacraments to bring us to saving faith in Jesus, so that our faith can be credited as righteousness.  So, instead of trying to work to make ourselves pleasing to God, we can simply rejoice and thank God that He’s already made us pleasing in His sight.  And that’s why we live our lives to His glory – not to try to earn His favor, but simply to express our appreciation to Him for already granting us the favor of forgiveness and salvation as a free credit by the gift of His grace.  For to Him alone be all the glory and praise.  Amen.

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