- So also Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”
It is an innate human desire to deserve things rather than receiving things for nothing.
We often say, "I deserve this and that." And we also say, "You deserve this and that."
And when it comes to the grace of God, we don't really understand it because pretty much nothing in this world is ever free.
We have a desire to work for things and earn them by our own effort. So, when we find that God bestows upon us His unconditional grace, and the only condition is to believe that it's unconditional, we find it hard to believe that.
Abraham believed what God said, and God declared Abraham was righteous, not because of anything good that he had done, but because he believed what God said to him.
Hmm.. So two things must happen. God must say something to us, and we must believe what he said to us. God has indeed declared to us his will and promises in the Bible, and it is our responsibility to believe what he said in the Bible.
So, we believe God's will and promises, and the important aspect of this belief is that if we truly believe it, we would surely act on it.
For example, Abraham believed that God would surely bless him and make the number of his offspring as the number of the stars at night. Therefore, Abraham could even obey God's command to sacrifice Isaac among other reasons.
Hebrews 11:19
- Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
Therefore, faith is believing God is for me, not against me, and God's commands and promises are trustworthy, even when we don't quite understand his methods and timing.
Many people tend to think that keeping the law makes us righteous. Surprise, surprise, not necessarily. Actually, that is absolutely not true in God's kingdom. Merely, keeping the law with our own effort is dead works. Even someone who doesn't believe in God can obey the law but that doesn't ultimately make them righteous.
Righteousness comes from faith in God's character, commands and promises. Believing that God is good, and His will is perfect. God delights in people who have faith in him, just as Jesus marveled at the Centurion's faith in Matthew 8:10
- When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those following him, "Truly I tell you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel.
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