MenuThe Righteous Shall Live By Faith
For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith, for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” – Romans 1:16-17
Imagine that you’re living a lie. Every day you put on a mask of righteousness in front of other people, but deep down, you know it’s a lie. You know the depravity of your own sinful desires and passions. And maybe you do all you can to atone by being a “good person,” but you know you can never make up for it before a holy God – an angry God who punishes sin… who knows your guiltiness. You might wish you had never been born.
Now imagine that you’re told to teach about God’s righteousness. You feel the weight of even greater hypocrisy dumped upon you… This was Dr. Martin Luther’s problem when he was appointed to lecture on the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans to students at Wittenberg University. As Luther studied Romans, he spent a long time considering the passage above:
At first I clearly saw that the free grace of God is absolutely necessary to attain to light and eternal life, and I anxiously and busily worked to understand the word of Paul… ‘the righteousness of God is revealed in the Gospel.’
I questioned this passage for a long time and labored over it, for the expression ‘righteousness of God’ barred my way. This phrase was customarily explained to mean that the righteousness of God is a virtue by which He is Himself righteous and condemns sinners. In this way, all the teachers of the church except Augustine had interpreted the passage. They had said: the righteousness of God… is the wrath of God.
But as often as I read this passage, I wished that God had never revealed the Gospel, for who could love a God who was angry, who judged and condemned people?
This misunderstanding continued until, enlightened by the Holy Spirit, I finally examined more carefully the word of Habakkuk: ‘the righteous one shall live by his faith’ (Habakkuk 2:4).
From this passage I concluded that life must be derived from faith… Then the entire Holy Scripture became clear to me, and heaven itself was opened to me. Now we see this brilliant light very clearly, and we are privileged to enjoy it abundantly.”
As the Christian Church marks the 500th anniversary of the date when Dr. Martin Luther nailed 95 Theses on the castle church door in Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517, inviting debate on the abusive practice of indulgences, let us remember 4 key points:
- We are saved from sin, the devil, and eternal damnation by God’s GRACE ALONE.
- God’s grace comes to us through the life, suffering, death and resurrection of JESUS CHRIST ALONE. This is the “Gospel” or “Good News” of Jesus, the Messiah.
- We receive God’s saving gifts by FAITH ALONE – simply believing the Gospel.
- God’s truth about our Savior Jesus Christ is made known in the Bible: the Old Testament, which promises the coming Savior, and the New Testament, which tells of the Savior who has come. Therefore, we rely on HOLY SCRIPTURE ALONE – God’s written word, the Bible – as the only final authority for Christian faith and life.
The Lord sent Paul to preach the Gospel to the Greeks and (non-Jewish) barbarians, to both the supposed “wise” and the “foolish.” We might be tempted to keep the Gospel to ourselves and limit it to people like us, but Jesus did not limit His work to the descendants of Jacob. He redeemed the whole world – even barbarians and fools like us. So He sends us to reach out to all people. The world may consider the Gospel foolish, and may mock and ridicule Christians, but like Paul we are proud of what Christ has done for us. Christ’s suffering, death and resurrection give us absolute confidence that God loves us and has saved us. Our confidence is based on what God has done to save us, not what we try to do, even as the Holy Spirit works faith in us and bring salvation to us through the words of the Gospel. God’s promises invite us to trust in Him – that’s “faith.”
Pastor Nickel
