Abraham and the Doctrine of Imputation

I invite you to take out your Bibles and turn to the 11th chapter of Hebrews. We've been examining the book of Hebrews and we're in the 11th chapter. And over the last few weeks we have been looking at the person and the call of Abraham.

We've seen that Abraham certainly was among the most important, if not the most important, of individuals whose life is outlined in the Old Testament. This morning we're going to look into his life just a little bit further.

We're going to go deeper into our examination. We're going to see how an important event in Abraham's life provides for us the foundation of one of the most important doctrines of the Christian faith.

And that is the doctrine which we call the doctrine of imputation. So that's going to be the focus of the morning. That's why the title of the sermon is Abraham and Imputation. Let's begin by reading our passage in Hebrews as our introduction, standing together as we read.

It says,.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise as in a foreign land living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.

For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. Father, as we examine the text of Scripture this morning, I pray that you would first and foremost keep me from error.

Help me, O God, to seek your truth as I preach and to preach your truth. And Lord God, open the hearts of the people to understand it. We pray that your spirit would bless us as we study together. Help us, O God, to always want to know what your word says on any given subject and apply that truth to our lives.

In Jesus name we pray. Amen. If you were here Wednesday night, you'll know that we discussed one of the most important truths which is taught in the New Testament. Actually, it is taught throughout the entire Bible.

It is a truth that was heralded by the reformers, and it usually is known to us by the Latin phrase sola fide, which means justification by faith alone. Justification is how one is made righteous before God, how one is declared to be righteous before God.

And sola fide, according to the great theologian Martin Luther, was the article upon which the church either stands or falls. And this is consistent with the New Testament as the theme that runs through the entirety of the New Testament is the theme that justification is not based upon our works, but rather upon the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.

This is most clearly, of course, enunciated for us by that great apostle who wrote the majority of the books of the New Testament, not by virtue of link that would go to Luke, but the who wrote both Luke and Acts and together they would make up the majority of the writing of the New Testament.

But the one who wrote the majority of the books of the New Testament would be the apostle Paul. And when we look at Paul's writings, Paul is consistent with the teaching that though works are an effect of our salvation, that is something that we are to do if we are saved.

Works are not the cause of our salvation. The cause of our salvation is the work of Jesus Christ. It is not our own inherent goodness, our own inherent righteousness or our own ability to do works in keeping with our righteousness.

And when Paul wanted to make this point known, when Paul wanted to prove his point from the Old Testament, which, of course, at that time was the scriptures, it was the only Bible. It was the one that they had when he wanted to make the point that justification is truly by faith alone and that there is no other way to be made righteous, to be declared righteous before a holy God.

He used one man from the Old Testament as his primary source example for that teaching. And of course, that one man was Abraham. So today, instead of going back to Genesis, which we have been doing, we've been starting in Hebrews and going back to Genesis.

Today, instead of going back to Genesis to look at the life of Abraham, we're going to begin by looking in one of Paul's books, the book of Romans. We're going to go to Romans chapter four. So if you want to open your Bibles, turn rather from the book of Hebrews over to the book of Romans chapter four.

Now, Romans is Paul's masterpiece. Romans is, of course, well, we could say it's the Holy Spirit's masterpiece. But it's, of course, penned by the apostle Paul. It's written by the apostle Paul. It comes as the spirit guided him to write these words.

And it is the closest thing to a theological textbook that we have in the Bible. It's the closest thing to giving us a systematic theological outline that the entire Bible affords to us. It begins in chapter one and two by describing the sinfulness of both the Gentiles and the Jews and culminates in the beginning of chapter three, where it establishes for us that there is none righteous.

No, not one. There is none who understands. There is none who seeks after God. All have turned aside. All have gone to his own way. The venom of ashes under their lips and the way of peace they do not know.

It goes on and on and tells about the sinfulness of mankind. And then toward the end of chapter three, he begins to talk about how a sinful person can be reconciled to a holy God. How can someone who is born in sin, grown in sin and is a sinner by nature and by choice possibly be connected and reconciled to a holy God?

And he tells us how. He says that it is not by our own righteousness, but it is by the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And faith is how we come to recognize that work. And how that work then becomes real in our lives.

And this is why he turns to the person of Abraham as his example. So we begin in chapter four, verse one, as he's telling us about Abraham. He's actually using Abraham as sort of an argument here. He's using Abraham as an argument for his position because he begins with a question.

Romans 4 .1, he asked this question. He said, what shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather, according to the flesh? Let's kind of analyze the question real quick. He begins with the fact that Abraham was a man.

He says, what can we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather? What can we say he earned by his flesh, according to the flesh? What did he earn by his works?

What did he gain by what he did?

What was established in Abraham's works? And the answer that is implied, it's not given in the text, but the answer is implied in the text, is that nothing was gained by Abraham by his works. In fact, Paul says in verse two, if something could have been attributed to Abraham's personal goodness, if something could have been attributed to Abraham's works, then he would have rightly been able to boast.

Read verse two. He says, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. You see, the gospel takes away from us any ability that we might have for boasting.

It takes away any ability that we might have to stand before God and somehow say, we deserve to be in heaven, or we deserve to be here. The gospel steals our boasting. Because the truth of the matter is, we have nothing to boast about.

If the Holy Spirit had not changed our heart, if the Holy Spirit had not come and infiltrated our lives and given us new life and brought us to life and brought us into accord with the gospel and brought us into the confirmation of the Lord Jesus Christ, we would yet still be in our sins, dead as we were before.

We have nothing for which to boast.

And neither did Abraham. If anyone in the history of the people of faith would have had a reason to boast, it would have been Abraham. But Paul says, even he has no right to boast. Even the one who is called a friend of God has no right to boast.

Why does Abraham have no right to boast? Because Abraham was a sinner. Now, I know if you've been here for the last three weeks, if you were here last week and the week before, I sort of heartened on that idea.

Two weeks ago, I really focused on it. Last week, I mentioned it again. And here the third week, I'm mentioning it again. Why am I focusing so much on the sin of Abraham? Because I want you to understand that when we talk about Abraham, we are talking about a man who was radically saved.

We're not talking about a good man who was moved from goodness to betterness.

We're talking about a dead man who was moved from death to life.

Spiritually dead to spiritual life. A nature of sin to a nature of a desire for God and for his will. That's Abraham. And guess what? If you're a believer, that's you too. And that's how his life mirrors ours.

And we mirror his, rather, as he came before us. Abraham was a man of flesh and blood, just like us. He had a sinful nature, inherited from Adam, just like we do. His flesh was weak, just like ours. And we see examples of his weakness, even after his conversion.

Abraham had a propensity to lie. Now, I've heard people argue, and we're going to talk about this a little bit more next week, when we start talking about Sarah. I've heard people say, well, he didn't really lie when he said Sarah was his sister, because they were half brother, half sister.

But I don't know if you know this, but half truth is a whole lot. And that's what he did. He was trying to hide the fact that they were married.

Why?

Because he was afraid. She was so beautiful.

We're going to talk about her beauty next week.

But the Bible says she was so beautiful that he was afraid that these people would take his life to take his life. That was a lack of faith. He was so afraid for his life that he was willing to compromise the integrity of his bride because she had to say, well, I'm only his sister.

And as such, she almost, on two different occasions, almost was compromised physically. God kept her from that. But yet at the same time, it was all a result of Abraham's inability to maintain confidence in what God had called him to do.

He had a lack of faith in God's protection. But you know what?

We do, too.

Even believers find themselves at times when they are faced with severe difficulty or severe trial or severe pain or the potential for suffering. Oftentimes, we forget God's providential protection. Oftentimes, we forget God's hand upon us and what God has led us through up until now.

All we can see is the trial ahead. We cannot see the many mountains over which God has brought us in the past. And all we can see is that problem right in front of us. So we can't condemn Abraham as being worse than us, but we can't exalt him as being better than us.

He was a man saved by grace who had problems. This is why in Romans 4, we're still in Romans 4, this is why in Romans 4 Paul's making the point. He's saying Abraham couldn't boast. Abraham couldn't boast in his goodness.

Abraham couldn't boast in his righteousness. Abraham's righteousness was the same as ours. It was the filthy rags. This is why the scripture says, and he mentioned this, he talks about this in Romans 4, we're still in Romans 4, verse 3.

He asks the question, for what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. Now, if you want a note in your Bible or if you're writing notes and you want to write a note down, Paul is quoting from the book of Genesis.

He's quoting from Genesis chapter 15 and verse 6. Because in Genesis chapter 15 and verse 6, what we have is God makes a covenant with Abraham. God makes a promise to Abraham. And the Bible says in Genesis 15, 6, Abraham believed God's promise.

And as a result, it was counted to him as righteousness. And Paul is using that as an example here of justification by faith alone. He said Abraham was not justified by his works. Abraham was not justified by leaving Ur of the Chaldeans and going out into the land that he didn't know.

He was not justified by doing all of that. He was justified by faith alone. Now, I want to get a little deep with you. Can I go a little deep? Because I want to share, I want to talk about something that's going to get a little heavy.

And I know the AC ain't working real good, so it might get a little warm. And heavy and warm at the same time are going to be tough. But I want to share something with you that I think is so vitally important on this issue.

Because when someone reads Romans 4, 3 and then they connect it to Genesis 15, 6, there are a lot of misunderstandings that they can come away with. And I found two very common misunderstandings that I want to challenge and I want to put out of your mind.

Because I don't want you to be confused. The first one is this. I call it the liberal misunderstanding. The liberal misunderstanding. Liberals look at Genesis 15, 6 and they say, yes, Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness because Abraham was righteous.

They just come out and say it. They believe people can be good. They believe people can be righteous. And Abraham was a righteous man, so to call him righteous is no big deal.

Right?

But we know better than that.

We know that righteousness is not inherent within us. But that is a common liberal misunderstanding. It's common to hear people talk about the goodness of an individual or their inherent goodness. That must be put out of our mind.

That's the common liberal misunderstanding. But there's one that I think is just as common and just as dangerous. And I call it the common conservative misunderstanding.

Most of you aren't liberal.

I don't think. So you probably didn't think much about the liberal one. But conservatives can also misunderstand things. And I think there's a big conservative misunderstanding in this passage. Some of the conservative Christian movement believe that because Abraham didn't have any righteousness of his own, they understand that.

That God decided to take his faith as a substitute for righteousness. In a sense, God wanted to call Abraham righteous, but he couldn't because Abraham was a sinner. So God took a second option. Well, he doesn't have any righteousness, but he does have faith.

So I'll take his faith instead of righteousness and I'll make him righteous based on his faith. And here's how it's usually expressed. People will say this. They'll say that. Let me make sure I want to say this correctly.

I don't want to confuse.

They'll say that someone is righteous because they believe righteous because they believe. And that is not correct. Abraham was not righteous in and of himself because of his goodness. Neither did his faith replace his need for true righteousness.

Abraham was given an external righteousness. Neither righteousness came from himself. You see, the common liberal understanding says he was righteous in and of himself. The common conservative understanding says he wasn't righteous, but he had faith.

And God said that faith is righteousness. Neither one is correct. He believed God and God declared him righteous with a righteousness that was not his own. I told you he was going to get a little deep.

His faith was not righteousness. His faith was the vehicle by which God counted him righteous with someone else's righteousness.

Am I leaving you behind? Am I running away with you?

Because I'm not trying to. But see, what I'm doing is I'm building the platform for what is called imputation. That word imputation is so vital to the Christian faith. And so few people really understand it.

Because what imputation means is that which is belonging to one person and is in their account comes out of their account and is charged to the account of someone else. It's taken out of one and charged to another.

It is imputed from one to another. And the Bible teaches this very clearly. That we don't have righteousness in and of ourselves. And faith itself is not righteousness. But faith is the vehicle by which God gives us righteousness from outside ourselves.

You need a Bible verse? Let's look at a Bible verse very quickly. Go with me very quickly to Philippians 3. Philippians 3, verse 9. Paul says here that he wants to, and it begins, to be found in him. Philippians 3, 9.

He wants to be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law. Now, just stop right there. He says, I want to be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own. Why doesn't Paul want to worry about a righteousness of his own?

Because he knows he's not going to have it. He knows that no matter what he does, no matter his attempts to attain the law, no matter how hard he struggles, he's never going to have a righteousness of his own.

He says, so I want to be found in him. Who is the him? Him is Christ. I want to be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of my own, which comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ.

And here's the key. The righteousness from God that depends on faith. Beloved, the only true righteousness that we have is the righteousness that God gives us, which is the righteousness of Christ. Let me paint a picture for you.

When Christ died on the cross, whose sin did he die for?

Believers.

That I live 2 ,000 years later than Jesus Christ. Yet Jesus Christ can rightfully be called the savior of my sins, having taken my sins upon himself. The only way that can be is through imputation. Is that Christ had, and again, using the ledger example, this is Paul's example.

When he uses the word counted in the ESV, if you look at Romans 4, 3, he says counted in the NSB. It's the word reckoned. It's the word, it means to be, to compute or to reckon, to count, to charge, to an account.

If you think of a ledger book, Christ had a ledger book. Christ ledger book on the side of sin was totally empty. Because from the time of his conception all the way to the time of his resurrection, there was never one sin.

He wasn't even born in sin. We are born in sin. He is born of the seed of the woman, but he is born not by the seed of man, but he is born of the seed of the Holy Spirit. So he is born not as a son of Adam, but a son of God, where we are all sons and daughters of Adam.

He is born as the son of God.

He doesn't have a sin nature, so he doesn't have that. And he grows without the sin nature and he has no sin. The Bible says he is tempted in every way as we are, but yet without sin his whole life. So if you looked at his life from conception to resurrection, on the side of the ledger which would have said sin, there would be a great big blank.

But yet on the side of his ledger which said righteousness, it would be full. You understand? Because Christ is the only righteous man to have ever lived. And on the side of his ledger which said righteous, there would be nothing but his life story.

Because from conception to resurrection was righteousness. Now portray me. You can use yourself, but I'm going to use myself as the example. My ledger book looks the opposite of Christ's. On the side of sin, I was born in sin.

Fallen son of Adam. And in my ledger book is my life. And the Bible says until my conversion, everything I ever did was sin. You know that unbelievers can't do anything but sin? Because the Bible says that which is not of faith is sin.

And that which is not done in faith is sin. And when an unbeliever does anything, it is nothing but sin continually. So until I was converted, there was nothing but sin in my life. And yet even after my conversion, there are still sins in my life.

And there is no positive righteousness. There is nothing I bring to the table. So we see my ledger, Christ's ledger book, totally clean on the side of sin. Totally full on the side of righteousness. My ledger book, totally full on the side of sin.

Totally blank on the side of righteousness. And that's the two books looking at one another. But the Bible teaches very clearly what we would call substitutionary atonement. Or the doctrine of imputation.

That when Christ went to the cross, all of the sins that I owed a penalty for, every one of the sins that I owed a penalty for, were taken from my ledger book and applied to Christ.

When did it happen?

It happened on the cross.

It happened on the cross.

At that moment when Christ said, Tetelestai, it is finished. All of my sins were what were finished. My sins were paid for at that moment. But yet I still had a blank book.

I had no sins. But I also had no righteousness.

Neither because I still don't have goodness to bring to the table. And the Bible clearly teaches that it is not only the fact of being sinless, forgiven of sin, but it's righteousness which will enter the kingdom of heaven.

Where is my righteousness going to come from? This is what we call double imputation. Or the concept that not only did my sin get transferred to the ledger book of Christ, but the righteousness of Christ is transferred to me.

It is imputed to me. This is why the Bible says that we stand before God not having a righteousness of our own, but a righteousness which comes by faith. A righteousness where? From God. God gives us the righteousness of Christ.

Beloved, this is the doctrine of imputation. This is why Paul made this point. He said, Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. It was charged to his account that he then was righteous.

Not having a righteousness of his own, but a righteousness from God which comes through faith. The vehicle is faith. But the righteousness is not ours. The righteousness is that which was Christ's given to us by God.

It is not a difficult doctrine to understand. But I think often it is a difficult doctrine for us to really believe. Because I think so often we begin to try to worry about where our good works fit into our salvation.

And we begin to think, well, maybe I am not doing enough to be saved. Maybe I am not doing enough to be righteous. Maybe I am not doing enough Bible reading. Or maybe I am not doing enough praying. Or maybe I am not doing enough good works in the church.

Or maybe I am not doing enough good works at home. And we start thinking like that. Beloved, we are responsible to do good works. But never let yourself begin to think that your works are the reason for your salvation.

Your works are a result.

Not a cause.

Your work is the effect. The cause of your works is because the Holy Spirit has converted your soul and given you a desire to do those works. Yes, our works bear testimony to our faith. Yes, our works bear testimony to one another.

The good tree bears good fruit. And that is what we are supposed to do. But yet at the same time, when you stand before God, when the earth passes away, and you are before Jesus Christ in judgment, you will not be clothed in your own righteousness.

For if you try to be clothed in your own righteousness, you will certainly not enter into heaven. Do you remember the story that Jesus told? It was a parable.

It was a parable of a feast.

And all the ones who came in the feast were given garments to wear. And the one did not wear the garment.

And what happened to him?

He was cast out.

And a lot of people say, now why would he cast out? He can't afford the garment. He couldn't have afforded that garment. Why did the king cast him out? Read the parable again. And realize that the garment was provided by the king.

The man tried to come in with his own garment. And as such was cast out. You will not enter into heaven wrapped in a righteousness that is your own. You will only enter heaven wrapped in the righteousness of Christ.

Father, we thank you. We thank you for this opportunity to have dug a little deeper into the word, to understand better a doctrine which is so foundational to our faith. And Lord God, if there are those here who are in some way trusting in a righteousness of their own.

We pray for their repentance now. We pray that you would give them strength and clarity of mind to repent. That they would give up on trying to enter into heaven based on a righteousness of their own.

And that they would trust in the righteousness of Christ. The only righteousness by which we will be saved. We thank you for the salvation that you've provided us in Christ. And Lord God, we ask that you move in this place now.

And if there be one that needs a regenerative touch. Lord God, we ask your spirit to move if it's within your will. In Jesus name we pray.

Amen.