The Application to Us
This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” The words “it was credited to him” were written not for him alone, but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. Romans 4:22-25
Paul is drawing his exposition of this Old Testament text “it was credited to him as righteousness” with what it says about Abraham’s faith, to an end. He makes explicit what has been implicit throughout, that it has direct application to Christians. As God ‘credited’ Abraham’s faith ‘for righteousness,’ so He does the same for us. And as Abraham believed in the ‘God who gives life to the dead’ (4:17), so do we. In Abraham’s case, God revealed this power in creating life in the dead womb of Sarah. For us this power of God is manifested in His raising Jesus from the dead. Paul often describes God as the One who raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 8:11; 10:9; 1 Corinthians 6:14,15; 2 Corinthians 4:14), but he rarely makes God the object of our faith. He does here to make our faith as similar to Abraham’s faith as possible.
Paul’s description of Jesus being raised from the dead falls into two parallel lines:
who was delivered over to death for our sins
and was raised to life for our justification
Paul might be quoting here a brief confessional formula circulating in the early church. The first line reflects the language about the suffering Servant in the Greek translation of Isaiah 53:12 ‘Because of their sins he was delivered over.’ Isaiah 53’s language was applied by Jesus to His own death (Mark 9:31; 10:33).
In this confession the word ‘for’ probably means ‘because of.’ Jesus was delivered to death ‘because of’ our sins, dying the death we deserved, and then was resurrected ‘because of’ our justification, (to guarantee our justification) which He had accomplished by His death.
The same God who credited faith to Abraham as righteousness ‘will credit righteousness’ for us also if we ‘believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead’’ (4:24). Abraham was not unique in his experience of being justified by faith. This is God’s way of salvation for everyone.
We have a complete Bible that includes both the creation of the Universe and the resurrection of Jesus, and that within its pages also includes many powerful, valid promises for us today. We can and must lay hold of them, ‘even against’ all human ‘hope,’ yet ‘in hope’ (4:18), in the confidence of God’s faithfulness and power. This is our privilege as genuine children of our great spiritual forefather, Abraham.