Sunday, March 1, 2026
Second Sunday in Lent
Text: Romans 4:1-8, 13-17
Sermon Audio
As we gather… Religions such as Judaism, Islam, and Christianity all agree that Abraham was a great man. But the reasons Christians believe that Abraham was great is not primarily because of what he did, but because of what he believed. The Lord came to Abraham and made many promises with Abraham. Abraham believed these promises! It wasn’t anything he had done or because of his ability to jump through any hoops God set out for Him. Rather, it is Abraham’s faith that made Him right with God. As Christians, we may be tempted to point to our list of accomplishments that would make us worthy or good in the sight of God. However, even then, these things do not earn us God’s favor. We too become righteous through faith apart from anything we’ve done. The gift of salvation is truly free in Christ, what a great blessing!
Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Why was it so important for Paul to discuss who Abraham was before he was Father Abraham? Paul needed to cover all of his bases in this letter. He hasn’t met these Christians in Rome yet and he wanted to be sure to give them a well thought out letter about faith in Christ. There were certainly many Jews in Rome who needed to understand that the lineage of Abraham was far more encompassing than the covenant that was given to him of circumcision. Before Abraham was given the task to circumcise, to mark his future descendents at the people by whom God’s Promised Seed would come, he was first called to faith. God called Abraham out of unbelief and gave him faith to trust in His promise. Before the LORD gave him any law to do, He made Abraham His child of faith. Before God could make him the patriarch of His Seed He called him out of unbelief. “What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.” What did Abraham believe?
Our Old Testament reading gives us the account of the LORD calling him out of Haran. This is the land that he had settled in with his father and brother. We find out in the book of Joshua, that Abraham’s family served other gods. Abraham was a pagan when God came to him in Genesis 12. Haran was a commercial center in the cradle of agriculture after the flood. A moon god, which was aptly named Sin, was the pagan god of the region. This god was supposed to be one of fertility and growth. You can almost imagine Abram kicking back after a long day of harvest and looking out over the abundance of his crop and flock of sheep, looking up at the moon and thanking Sin. Yet this god of fertility had not opened the womb of his wife, Sarai. Abram was secure in the land with his brother and family in the land where his father was buried, but something was missing. The true God who gives life was about to call him to faith with a simple promise, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
That is all it took to abandon his idolatry. The 75 year old Abraham heard these words of the one true God and immediately grabbed his wife and nephew and did as the LORD commanded. He was childless, but he heard the call of God and believed that He was the only God that could truly deliver on His promise. He believed that God would give him a Promised Land and that all nations would be blessed through his offspring. He trusted that this was the only God that could give life to a dead womb. The promise of the Seed would get more detailed in the coming chapters, but Abraham believed that God would deliver. He never wanted to go back to his old gods. He certainly had his times of doubt over the next 25 years, but his faith remained in the God who can give life. This is the faith that was counted to him as righteousness. Abraham first had to have faith in the LORD before God would give him any task. “For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith.” The seal of faith first was on the heart of Abraham before he was given the covenant of circumcision.
Abraham could only go on to do what God asked of him because he had first been called into faith. You, dear Christian, remember that you have been called into the same faith. None of Abraham’s deeds were counted to him as righteousness, only his faith. Abraham did the works given him to do because he first was given the righteousness of faith, not so he could earn righteousness. The LORD has certainly given you tasks to do, and it is truly good that you hear the voice of God and do what he asks, but that has nothing to do with your righteousness before God. We must never begin to look at ourselves as ones who do the works of God for our own righteousness rather than those who cling to the righteousness of faith that is given through Abraham’s Promised Seed, Jesus Christ. Is this not what the Pharisees would do? In John 8 they would claim to be heirs of Abraham, yet Jesus points out to them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would do the works of Abraham.” This is to say that Abraham’s works flowed from the righteousness of faith whereas the Pharisees’ works were to show how righteous they were in their own eyes. They wanted to show they were the best Jews that ever lived.
We’re no better than those Pharisees who tithed mint and cumin but ignored the weightier matters of the law; justice, mercy, and faith if we fall into that trap. We don’t give tithes to show God how good we are, but because God has been good to us. We aren’t faithful to our spouses so we can hold our noses up at all of those sinners out there, but because God has given us as husband and wife to be an image of Christ’s sacrificial love for His church and the reflective love, honor, and respect of the church to God. Our acts of obedience to God stem solely from His gift of righteousness of faith and proclaim His mercy. “For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.”
How then are we made offspring of Abraham? St Paul concludes our Epistle Reading with, “That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.” God who gives life to the dead must unite us to the Promised Offspring of Abraham. He must call us out of our life of comfort in the pagan land of our earthly fathers, as He did for Abraham, and place us in the Promised Land of our heavenly Father. Jesus shows us this means in our Gospel today, “Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” To be born of faith is to be born from above by water and the Spirit. In Holy Baptism you were given this new birth. One of faith that unites you to Christ, Abraham’s Seed. Abraham had faith in a promise that was not fulfilled in his time. We have seen the fulfillment of this promise in Jesus Christ. We are united in the same faith and to His Seed in this beautiful birth from above. Here we are given the faith and placed into God’s family before we can even think of doing any deeds. The fulfillment of righteousness in the life of Christ earns the righteousness of faith for all who believe and are baptized.
If you remember from last week, we looked into the temptation for Christ. The temptation that He endured for us. The temptation that happened right after His baptism to fulfill all righteousness. Jesus then goes about His continued fulfillment of righteousness by doing the works that we can never do on our own. He defeated temptation so that in our baptism we can defeat temptation through Him. He lives a life of works to fulfill all of God’s demands so that through our baptism we can do works through Him. Christ is the fulfillment of our righteousness of faith. His fulfillment sees its completion on the cross. “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” Christ was lifted up so that we who believe in Him may have eternal life. He that knew no sin became sin for us. The Seed of Abraham sacrificed Himself and was buried so that He could rise and bring new life for all people who are children of Abraham’s faith. God brought life to Sarah’s womb so the Christ, the Seed of Abraham could bring life to the world through His death and resurrection.
You now feast at the table of the LORD with all of the people from every nation who have been made children of Abraham through faith in Christ. The faithful who have gone before us are in the bosom of Abraham as we await the final victory and resurrection of the body in the new heaven and the new earth. This is the promise of all who have the righteousness of faith that is bestowed on the faithful through Jesus Christ our Lord. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” Thanks be to God!
The peace of God which passes all understanding guard and keep you in the true faith unto life everlasting. Amen.