Counted as Righteous

Romans 4: 13-25

 

 

          I used to play golf. I got where I could break eighty about half the time. If you’re a golfer, you know that’s not too bad. I never played the par 3’s that well, but even so, I almost made a hole in one dozens of times. Every time I came close, you know what my score was for that almost hole in one? Two.  

          It’s the same for outfielders who nearly catch that homerun ball. And for running backs who get stopped on the one inch line. And shots on goal that hit the post and bounce the other way. They all come soooo close. But when everything is tallied up, they are all the same. They don’t count. Cooking is the same way. Cook too little or too long or too hot or too cold and you don’t have a meal; you have a disaster. Close? Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

          What about righteousness? How does righteousness work? Does close count in righteousness? In Matthew 25, Jesus talks about the final judgment. He is on his throne and all the nations are gathered. He is separating those who are deemed righteous from those who are not. He congratulates one group and condemns the other. Both seem to be unaware of what they have done or not done. They are received or condemned based upon their treatment of others, based upon their compassion—or their blindness--for their fellow man. Their fate for all eternity lies in the answer to one simple question. When you helped, did you do it unselfishly without regard to any benefit you might derive? Did you do it to the least, to the invisible? I know, that’s two questions, but you get my drift.

       With righteousness, Jesus seems to be saying, you’ve got to give like me to be like me. It doesn’t matter that you have a shelf loaded with good deeds. Why did you do them? Jesus says to those with the wrong motives: “as you did it not to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me. And these (you) will go away into eternal punishment.” With righteousness, close doesn’t count. Or maybe, it depends on what is it you are counting. Albert Einstein, one of the great mathematicians of all time, put it this way: “Everything that can be counted does not necessarily count; everything that counts cannot necessarily be counted.”

          So how do you get counted righteous? In addition to the passage in Matthew, Paul gives us a thesis about righteousness in the book of Romans. Romans may well be the most theological book of the New Testament. It is lofty and complex, yet also down to earth and colloquial. It is a treatise of righteousness written to a church that Paul did not plant and had not yet been to visit. In the passage we examine today, Paul takes us on a tour of God’s saving righteousness, particularly as seen through the faith of Abraham. Abraham’s faith was “counted to him as righteousness.”

          My wife tells me that she has never been all that partial to the word righteousness. She says it just sounds too “high-falutin.” She says it doesn’t seem to fit.  She says it’s just “too ---something,” whatever that means. I think I know what she means. I grew up hearing that this guy or that woman was too “self-righteous.” It was not a compliment. I don’t really remember hearing it in any other context. Righteous seemed like something selfish or uppity.

          Well, if you agree with Cindy or me about that, then it’s high time to change your mind. Righteousness is a cool word. It describes something I want to be. You want to be righteous too. Here’s why.

          When you read Paul in the original language in which the New Testament was written, the word righteous comes from the same root as the word justification. They are interchangeable. To be righteous is to be justified. To be justified is to be righteous. We all want to be justified. That’s like saying we’re okay. And we are. We are part of God’s family when we believe in the gospel. At that point we are justified by God’s grace. Think of it this way. Justified means “just as if I had not sinned.” I like that! That’s what God gives me. And that makes me righteous. Remember, it means the same as justified. It means right with God. I’ll take that, too.

          So I think that the word righteous got a bad rap. Righteous is who I want to be. I want to be right with God. But how do I get righteous? Well, I can’t buy it. I can’t barter for it. I can’t earn it. So how can I get righteous? Well, consider Abraham.

          God promised Abraham that he would become the father of many nations. God made a covenant with Abraham to do that. We have talked about that. But Abraham was an old man, a hundred years old in fact, and his wife Sarah was ninety years old herself.   Paul is impressed with Abraham’s faith level. Paul says that Abraham’s faith did not weaken even when he considered his own body. The next line in Romans 4 just might be Paul’s attempt at humor, for he says that due to his advanced age, Abraham’s body “was as good as dead.” Now we have a number of members here who also are rather senior in age, but I know personally that they are very much alive. But then, none of them are contemplating childbirth and raising a child, either. At any rate, what Paul means is that Abraham had to have faith and plenty of it, because all the earthly signs to which he was accustomed were screaming “no way.”

          But Abraham did have faith. Abraham claimed God’s promise. Abraham walked with God. Sarah laughed, even named their son Isaac, which means laughter, but she also must have had faith, for indeed she and Abraham did conceive the first born son of the nation of Israel.  Paul uses terms like this to describe Abraham’s faith: “in hope he believed…did not weaken in faith…no distrust in God…fully convinced.” What was it in which Abraham was fully convinced? That “God was able to do what he had promised!”

          That’s how we get righteous. That’s how we get right with God. We believe. Paul tells us that Abraham’s belief “was counted to him as righteousness.” Do you see what Paul is saying? Abraham didn’t build up a big bag of good deeds, though he did many good things. Abraham didn’t accumulate great wealth to buy a seat at God’s table, though he did become a wealthy man. Abraham did not live a pure life, as is evidenced by his lie to King Abimelech about Sarah (Gen. 20) and his impatience with God that resulted in the birth of his son Ishmael not by Sarah but by her maidservant Hagar.  But Abraham did come to have complete faith in God, and when he did, he was blessed. He was counted as righteous.

          Paul says that the words “it was counted to him” were not written just for Abraham. They were also written for us. Paul says this: “It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised up for our justification.” Paul is showing us a double meaning here. Delivered up and Raised up. One saves us. We are delivered from our sins. The other finds us. We are raised up into righteousness. The gospel is incomplete without both events.

          The lesson of Abraham is simple. Close doesn’t count. Life is not about the quantity of your deeds or the depth of your reasoning. Life is about the quality of your heart. That’s what counts. That’s what makes you righteous. Do you believe that God sent his Son, let him die for us, raised him from the dead, and did it all for us? If you do, you are counted as righteous, just like Abraham and all the saints who have followed him.

          I’m thinking about all those goats back in Matthew 25 who did the right things for the wrong reason. They did it for themselves instead of unselfishly. They did it for personal gain and not for the Kingdom. At first blush, they seemed so much like the sheep whom Jesus loved and brought into fellowship with him. But a deeper reading shows that their acts only looked like faith. They weren’t ever that close to begin with.

          We have to believe to count. We have to have faith to count. When we do, the acts and deeds that we carry out will be acts of love that are God centered and not selfish. I have heard it said that if you don’t smell like sheep, then you ain’t no shepherd. Shepherds are what we all need to be. Then we count. We all have a witness to bring to the Lord’s Table. May we each find and participate in that witness. And then when that day comes for us to stand before our Savior, we too will be counted as righteous.