Vader: No, I am your father!

 Luke: No! No! That’s not true. That’s impossible!

Iconic dialogue from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, it is often quoted as “Luke, I am your father!” because the plot’s twist was so meme-able, not to mention memorable.  Even so, it fails to capture the suspense we encountered when the sequel film was released (1980),  as we endured three long years–griping about its ending and waiting for Return of the Jedi (1983) to find out whether it was a Darth Vader trick or true fatherhood, fictionally speaking.

Today’s passage Romans 4:16-25 is kind of like that…it’s all about Abraham’s fatherhood and the role of fatherhood in Abraham’s faith being credited as righteousness.

In a surprising plot twist, Paul argues that Abraham was not only the father of the chosen people, the father of the promised seed (Isaac), but also the father of all those who would receive the promise in the same way Abraham did: by faith! 

For the Jewish people today, Abraham is their father—the great patriarch of the Jewish people—but also their father in terms of faith, if they believe God like Abraham did.

Romans 4:16 Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham.

For any Jewish people who felt that salvation was their inheritance alone—their right because of their Jewish heritage—Paul pulls together his closing argument on the case for grace.

Grace isn’t earned. 

Grace resides not in heritage, club, or church membership. 

Grace cannot be bought or extorted. 

Grace is a gift.

It is unmerited favor.  It comes by faith in the promise God made to Abraham and his offspring to send a Deliverer–the Seed promised all the way back in Genesis–a Redeemer, a Messiah!

Grace invites all to hear the Gospel, to respond by faith in God and in His Promised Messiah.  Whether Jewish or Gentile believers, Abraham is our father.

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Give it up for Lent: Trust in heritage and Unbelief

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For futher study, read also Galatians 3:14-28. 

1. How is Paul saying the same thing in today’s passage as in Galatians?
2. Going back to the concept of rights and privileges,  how does family heritage create the perception of exclusivity and keep us from seeing the need to share this grace with others?
3. If you’re Jewish, how do you feel about Gentiles claiming Abraham as their father, too?  If you’re a Gentile, how will you respond to the privilege of sharing the Messiah with others?
4. Read John 8:25-47.  Jesus takes this idea of fatherhood and faith to a shocking step farther.  How would you describe the listener reactions to the truth as Jesus presents it?

     Humans sin.     Do animals?

(I’ll wait while you react.)

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Yes, you’re right: theologians do think about strange things.

How many angels dance on the head of a pin?

If a tree falls in the woods and there’s no one there to hear it, does it make any sound?

What happened to people who died before Jesus came?

Romans 4:1-15 sheds light on two of the four questions although not directly.  This passage reads like one big riddle which explains why many people blip right over it and miss out on seeing Paul’s brilliance.

Let’s face it: Paul was a really smart guy and he’s Building a Case for Grace.  If we jump over this section, we lose something valuable.  So go ahead and read Romans 4:1-15.  I’ll wait.

There ought to be two verses that pop out at you:

• verse 3 “What does the Scripture say?   ‘Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.’” (People who died before Jesus came either believed God or they didn’t.  Faith was credited as righteousness and unbelief wasn’t).
• verse 15: “[B]ecause law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.” (Animals can’t really sin because there was no law they broke in the Garden of Eden, unlike Adam and Eve who transgressed God’s law/command.)  Animals–indeed all created things–were made subject to the same broken world we’ve received as punishment (see Romans 8:19-21).  So while animals may do awful things to each other because of a broken world, they don’t have the Image of God or the law, and therefore don’t sin.

I argued earlier that the Mosaic Law served as a Sacred Space Maintainer (Lent 9-2013).  So whether the person was the patriarch Abraham or Abraham Lincoln, Paul is Building a Case for Grace–for grace that fills this Sacred Space.  No special rights are owed to any of us, no matter how famous we are or what contributions we’ve made to religion or culture.

This righteousness, Paul says (translated into words I can understand), cannot be earned like a wage, received through a bribe, come as a perk of paying membership dues, or fall into the vending slot after you put enough coins in.  All those things depend on us.

Paul is Building a Case for Grace, unmerited favor.  Righteousness–right relationship with God–is a gift.  It’s a gift of grace by our God who loved us enough to bless our faith.  While we cannot depend on ourselves, we must depend on the One who sent His only Son to pay for sins–our sins!  (He didn’t commit any of His own).  We receive His righteousness and that’s grace!

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Give it up for Lent: Thinking it all depends on you

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For further study:  Re-read today’s passage and identify the concepts of wages, bribes, perks of membership and a vending machine idea. 

Questions:

1. Circumcision isn’t most people’s favorite topic.  Read here to find out why it was important to the Jewish people (see also Leviticus 12:3).  How did this sign set the Jews apart from others in the Ancient Near East?
2. How might a sign demonstrating their role as the chosen people become an exclusive club membership ritual?  It is easy to take what is a sign of something and turn it into the saving event.  Church attendance, spiritual disciplines like prayer, baptism, Bible study–how might we fall prey to the same error of substituting what we can do for what God did?
3. Why does Paul go through such description of Abraham and circumcision?  We’ll explore this a bit more down the road, but think about why Abraham’s not being circumcised and living well before the Mosaic Law was ever given makes a difference in the case Paul is building for grace.

When my children were little I enjoyed reading to them the Berenstain Bears book, Inside Outside Upside Down.  In the story Brother Bear gets inside a box that gets brought outside, turned upside down and put on a truck to go to town.  It was perfect for teaching spatial concepts.

The Jewish people of Paul’s day were about to get a lesson of their own about this.  Remember Paul asking rhetorically what benefit there was to being Jewish?   They had an insider role by being entrusted with the very words of God (Romans 3:1-2).

Being the chosen people made them proud (in both the good and bad senses of the word).  So Paul points out that even though they are inside, they are also outside.  They are inside the covenant of God’s chosen people, but outside with the same sins as everyone else.

Romans 3:27 Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. 28 For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. 29 Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, 30 since there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. 31 Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.  (NIV)

If faith is what God’s looking for, then it doesn’t matter if you’re inside or outside the covenant because we’re all outside as sinners.  Paul was Jewish but he argues that this heritage alone isn’t reason for boasting although if anyone could reasonably boast, it would be Paul (Philippians 3:3-9).

Rather what matters is faith.  Faith brings the outsider inside.  It seems upside down that God would choose to put sinners in right standing with Himself.  Why would God bother?  It is His grace that motivates such an upside down thing.  Yet through Jesus Christ, Jewish people can be Inside Outside Upside Down and saved in the same way as God saves the Gentiles: by faith.

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Give it up for Lent: Boasting, Insider Attitudes

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For further study:

1. What was the point of having a chosen people if they were outsiders, too?  (Isaiah 42:5-7 Luke 4:14-21)
2. Ephesians 2:8-9 reads, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith– and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God– not by works, so that no one can boast.”  Why was it necessary that God turned salvation upside down?
3. What can we boast about?  Read 1 Corinthians 1:26-31

All analogies fall apart when pressed. 

With that caveat out of the way, I’d like to offer an analogy for today’s passage: Space Maintainers. 

 They’re necessary to avoid space invaders (not this kind).

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Baby teeth lost prematurely may require a child’s receiving a metal space maintainer to save the space.

We have baby teeth for a variety of reasons, among which is that they normally save space for a permanent tooth which will erupt into its position as the baby tooth is lost at the right time.

When baby teeth fall out prematurely, spacers perform that function.  However, they were never designed to be permanent. They are removed when the new tooth erupts or the adjacent teeth become loose.

There is a Sacred Space called righteousness.  When God created Adam and Eve and placed them in the Garden of Eden, they were created to be righteous, in right relationship to God.

But when Adam and Eve rebelled against God, it’s like their baby tooth of righteousness fell out.  God watched as everything began to shift out of place, so He gave us a space maintainer: the Law and the Prophets.

The Law was not the space.

The Law testified to the Sacred Space of right relationship.

The Prophets were not the space.

The Prophets testified to the Sacred Space of right relationship.

But neither the Law nor the Prophets were the Sacred Space.  When Jesus came, He came to us as Emmanuel, “God with us.”  He indwelled that Sacred Space perfectly because He is holy.  The Law and the Prophets were not replaced because they never were that space at all.  The Law and the Prophets circumscribed holiness.  They kept that space sacred.  They maintained that space from encroachment by sin and showed us that we are on the outside as sinners.  All we could do was look into the cordoned truth and become conscious that our own sin was keeping us out.

In the past, believing God was credited to faithful people as righteousness in anticipation of the day that Sacred Space would be filled.  They drew near to that Sacred Space by faith waiting for the cordon to be removed.

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.”   Romans 3:21-22

The Sacred Space has been filled by Christ Jesus.  The saints from the days before Christ and believers today find our right relationship with God by the grace shown in the death of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

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Give it up for Lent: Relying on Spacers of Legalism or Religion

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For further study, read all of Romans 3:19-26: 

1. Why is it often easier to trust in what we can see and do (like the law and good deeds) than in Jesus whom we cannot see?
2. Read Galatians 3:15-25.  In what ways are we “locked up” and like prisoners of sin?  Is there anything prisoners can do to free themselves and no longer be declared guilty? 
3. Hebrews 7: 18-19 reads, “The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless (for the law made nothing perfect), and a better hope is introduced, by which we draw near to God.”  In what ways is Jesus a far better hope for humanity?

Just in case I start to think that I’m better than the average bear, Scripture pushes its way through my crowd of self-serving thoughts—gathered around me like adoring fans—and God’s Word reminds me that I have no real cause for self-indulgent self-esteem.

There is no one righteous, not even one.” (Romans 3:10)

Hmmm.  Could we make an exception in my case?  Nope.

Like many other people—particularly women I know—I suffer from low self-esteem and frankly, passages like today’s don’t do anything to relieve this affliction.  In fact, it says, throw another log on the fire!

The conversation would appear to go like this:

Barbara:  God, have you no pity upon my low view of myself?

God:  Not really.  There is no one righteous. Not even one. Get over yourself already.  It’s not about you.

Self-esteem.  Hmmm.  A sober self-assessment says we’re all in the same boat.  We’re sinners.  Some of us may do better window dressing of the sinner, but the naked truth remains we’re all prone to rebellion and are living like we shouldn’t.  Add us all together and we still don’t compensate for one another.

So, I ask myself, “Is it really low self-esteem or simply an accurate assessment?”

And if it’s an accurate assessment, shouldn’t I be even more thankful that God doesn’t hold me to a humanly impossible standard as my only recourse?

That is part of why the Gospel is such good news.

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Give it up for Lent:  Preoccupation with Self-Esteem

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For further study:  Read all of Romans 3:9-18

Notice how our passage speaks specifically of sins of knowledge, devotion, actions, speech, ways, and worship.

1. Among the thoughts, words, and actions, how do these apply to you?
2. What changes might you need to make to find the way of peace?
3. In Job 28:12-30, there is a discourse on wisdom.  In verse 28 it says “And he said to man, ‘The fear of the Lord– that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.'”  What is our passage saying when we read, “There is no fear of God before their eyes”?

How can you tell the difference between rights and privileges?  Which did the Jewish people of Jesus’ day have: rights, privileges, or both?

First for the Jew, then for the Gentile was a repeated theme in the passage from yesterday,  First for the Jew was a right by the Covenant promises.  God covenanted with Israel, saying “The Redeemer will come to Zion, to those in Jacob who repent of their sins,” (Isaiah 59:20) and God’s covenants stand forever.  But then yesterday’s conclusion was that a Jew is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly.  The promised Redeemer was to those in Jacob who repent of their sins.  If one can be a Jew inwardly and access the covenant promises by repentance,

What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision?  Much in every way! First of all, they have been entrusted with the very words of God. (Romans 3:1-2)

The Jewish people were the chosen ancestry for our Messiah Jesus Christ–Scripture is clear on that.  The traditions, the Law, and the Covenant promises belonged first to the Jewish people–their promised right to guard.  But it was also an inheritance privilege to be shared widely to those who repent, as a reflection of the grace of God in giving the Law.  The right to have the Messiah come through the Jewish people could never be taken away.  Sharing the Messiah with others was a privilege and privileges can be withdrawn.

Picture it this way:  When my kids were in high school, they cherished driving privileges.  Our children did not have ownership rights to the car, only permission to drive it.  As parents, the most effective punishment we could issue was withdrawal of driving privileges.  We did not take away their driver’s license —just our car keys. 

Similarly, the Jewish people are elder siblings of Gentiles.  When the Messiah came to the Jews first–by right of prophecy–their privilege was to share Him with Gentiles, showing us who God is because they had been rightful stewards of the Word of God.  When they failed to show us Messiah, God temporarily withdrew sharing privileges, giving the keys to Gentiles who had now come of age.

Both Jew and Gentile remain children of God, but sharing privileges aren’t rights based upon nationality.  They’re privileges based upon faithfulness.  Jesus’ first disciples were Jewish ones.  Today, Jesus’ disciples come from many different backgrounds, both Jewish and Gentile.

The question becomes what are we doing with privileges we’ve been given?

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Give It Up for Lent: Anti-Semitism and Treating Privileges as Ownership Rights

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For further study:  read our full passage (Romans  3:1-8) which are among the hardest verses to understand.

Questions:

1. Romans 3:3 states, “What if some did not have faith?  Will their lack of faith nullify God’s faithfulness?”  This is asking whether God has not been faithful since some of the chosen people—the Jews—did not believe Jesus is the Messiah.  Read Isaiah 59:20-21 , part of which is quoted above.  How might our understanding of rights versus privileges speak to this? 
2. Romans 3: 5 reads, “But if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say? That God is unjust in bringing his wrath on us?”  When God suspends privileges, it demonstrates His authority.  Does this ever justify our deliberately rebelling so that His authority will be showcased?  How would you react as a parent if your children said the only reason they were sassing back to you was so that you could demonstrate your parenting skills?
3. Jeremiah 23:5-6 states, “The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will raise up to David a righteous Branch, a King who will reign wisely and do what is just and right in the land.  In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. This is the name by which he will be called: The LORD Our Righteousness.”  Is God still reaching out to the Jewish people?   In what ways?  We will talk more about God’s plan for the Jewish people when we get to Romans 9-11.

I’ve been going down Memory Lane for a while now.  Do you remember the TV show To Tell the Truth?  There were three contestants (one contestant being the guest described who had to tell the truth), but the other two were imposters and could tell things that were not true in order to convince the celebrity panel they were the real guest contestant.   Peggy Cass, Orson Bean and Kitty Carlisle were frequent panel celebrities trying to discern who the real guest was and who the imposters were. It was not often easy because the imposters looked much like they could be the guest.  The suspense ended when the host Bud Collyer asked,

“Will the real [insert guest’s name] please stand up?”

Today’s passage is kind of like that.  There are two groups (Jew and Gentile) and two behaviors (obeying and not obeying the Law).  Paul’s point in this passage is that the Jewish people had been given a grand and glorious privilege in having been given the Law and the Covenant promises.  But externals aren’t enough.  One needs to be faithful through and through, day after day.

Romans 2:13 For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.

Paul isn’t telling us anything new.  Plenty of the chosen people died in the wilderness because they had all the external rituals and national pedigree, but absolutely no obedience.  Scrape away the externals of heritage and going through the motions, and all that was left was a core of rebellion, a lack of trust in God.

But God knows men’s hidden secrets and therefore, He knows who is authentic (obeying the Law) and who is an imposter.   Sometimes the least likely people are the ones with true faith.  Gentiles by birth might be among the obedient ones, counterintuitive as it may be, they might trust God more than some of those with every historical reason to do so.  In asking, “Will the real Jew please stand up?,” we might be surprised at the answer when we are pressed To Tell the Truth.

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Give it up for Lent: Relying Upon Externals and Inconsistent Living

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For further study, read Romans 2:9-29 .

Questions to think about:

1. What are some ways I might be relying upon a family member’s faith or my pedigree?
2. In the full passage of Romans 2:9-29, it talks about first for the Jew and then for the Gentile.  Why does God do that if He shows no favoritism?
3. In what ways do we give God a bad name when we live and act in ways contrary to what we know?  It has been said that our Christian life is the only Bible some people will ever read.   Take time today to confess ways you’ve been hypocritical as well as for the bad witness that has been.  Receive God’s forgiveness knowing, 1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Have you ever heard someone ask “Who are you to judge?”  Generally someone asking that question is hoping the mere asking will deflect judgment that they don’t want, often over behaviors they don’t want judged.

God won’t and can’t be dissuaded.

He is the one to judge and

He’ll judge by His own standard:  the truth.

If you look at today’s full passage, you’ll see it’s filled with you and it’s filled with judgment and wrath.

Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth.  So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment? (Romans 2:2-3 NIV)

So does this mean that God doesn’t ever want us to judge anything?  No, we are allowed to judge behaviors because the truth is revealed in His Word.

What we are not allowed to judge are the hearts of other people.  God will take care of that, giving to each of us what we have earned on earth by our actions and our hidden judgments of people’s hearts.

The reason we will not escape God’s judgment is that even though we might not do specific behaviors we see in others, we do plenty of other things that also do damage to the Image of God.  (So, while I am not engaging in the homosexual behaviors listed in the prior passage, what if I dislike political activists trying to change the culture to declare it A-OK when God says it’s not?  The damage done to the Image of God is the same regardless whether it is homosexual expression or disliking activists).  Both use the Image of God to do something God Himself would not do.

All of this is why God sent Jesus.  Ultimately Jesus will judge us for what we’ve done with His Image whether to do good or to selfishly pass judgment on God’s truth and follow evil.

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Give it up for Lent: Passing Judgment on God’s Truth

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For further study, read Romans 2:1-8, Matthew 7:1-5

Questions to think about:

1. While this passage of Scripture’s use of you was referring to Paul’s Jewish readers in Rome, how many ways can you find that you’ve been a hypocrite about sin or taken for granted God’s forgiveness and grace?
2. What secret thoughts reside in your heart about God’s truth and are there ways you might reject it?
3. Jesus says, Matthew 7:1 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”  How does this apply to today’s passage?

I must have lived under a rock in 1990.  Not until I started working on today’s devotional did I realize The Monty Hall Problem was ever such a national fixation.  The question was loosely based upon Monty Hall’s program “Let’s Make a Deal” and explored the odds of picking correctly among three doors of which only one was a winner. 

The problem was popularized in the Ask Marilyn column of Parade magazine in 1990 and generated more response mail than just about any other column.  The answer given by high-IQ-famed Marilyn vos Savant (i.e. switch doors if given a choice) appeared incorrect but was demonstrably true.  Even so, nearly 10,000 readers –PhD mathematicians and average readers alike—wrote to scold her for being wrong and vehemently asserted that one should never switch doors from one’s original choice.

Interesting isn’t it: things can be proven true, yet people will still exchange the truth readily for a lie?  Worse, in the “Let’s Make a Deal” of life, people still choose the bad deal (door number three) knowing that it’s already been revealed to be wrong!  This is the type of bad-to-worse exchange referred to in today’s passage.

The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them…so that men are without excuse. (Romans 1:18-19, 20b)

God reveals His wrath against sin.  It’s like He’s opened door number three and plainly shown us the truth: choosing sin will always be a losing proposition. Yet many people will refuse to turn from their choice to sin.

Each of us is without excuse and will eventually be stuck with the door we choose.  Will you stay with sin’s Bad-to-Worse Exchange or will you switch and choose the way of Christ that leads to life?

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Give it up for Lent: Making Excuses for Embracing Known Sin

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For further study, read Romans 1:18-32 to see the full extent of sin’s Bad-to-Worse Exchange.

Questions to think about:

1. What sin is at the root of our refusing to change our ways?  What does it mean to be without excuse?
2. To live a lie, we suppress what we know to be true.  Find the ways our passage (Romans 1:18-32) reflects that idea.
3. How does God decide what is a sin?  I have written an article on sin that you can read today.
4. When Scripture says that God “gave them over” it’s referring to God’s intentional releasing of people to the full natural consequences of their chosen actions.  Are there any natural consequences you’re presently facing that might be warning flags to return to God and seek His truth?