Paul called Abraham to the witness stand as an expert witness in his plea with the Galatians. This must have been a shock to the Judaizers and some of the Jewish believers, because Abraham was their guy! They prided themselves on being the sons of Abraham. Jesus had told the Jews that if they were really sons of Abraham, they would be doing the works that Abraham did. What were the works Abraham did? There was only one that Jesus was referring to. God told Abraham to look at the stars and try to count them, because that was how many descendants he and Sarah would have, both in their 90’s, and her barren. And the Bible says, “And he believed the Lord, and he (God) counted it to him as righteousness.” What was the “work” of Abraham? He believed God. What did God do? He credited, he accounted righteousness to Abraham. Something that did not belong to Abram was given to him because he believed. Paul said of this Genesis account, “Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.” It is incredible but true that God justifies the ungodly. He saves sinners and calls them righteous even while we as saved sinners still battle with sin. That is the Great Reversal that Paul explains in 2 Corinthians 5 in the simplest of terms: “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” Our sin was imputed (transferred) to Christ on the cross, and Christ’s righteousness was imputed (transferred) to us. This is our only hope for salvation.
Abraham is still on the witness stand with Paul, and he is asked again: “Are you saying sir, that you did nothing to please God? That all you did was…believe him?” “Yes.” And then Abraham, in my imagination, turned to the Jews and Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists and Sikhs and every combination of Jesus-Plus-Works people in the world and said, “That’s all I did. I believed God. I didn’t just believe in God. Even demons do that and tremble. I believed God. He told me Sarah and I would have a child, and we were both as good as dead in that department. He even told me that in me, all the nations would be blessed, and I could not fathom how that would be so. But I believed God. Period.” Paul replied with Habakkuk’s powerful word, “The righteous shall live by faith.” The righteous doesn’t just become righteous by faith. He lives by faith.
When Martin Luther first read Habakkuk 2:4, he was living in a monastery and he didn’t understand it at the time. Later he entered into deep depression and illness and believed he was under God’s wrath. He thought he was about to die and he remembered Habakkuk, and he started saying that simple truth over and over, “The righteous shall live by faith.” When he recovered from his illness, he went to Rome. And the pope at that time had promised an indulgence, a forgiveness for punishment of sins in purgatory for any pilgrim who came to Rome and mounted the tall staircase at a famous church. You were to pay your money, climb the staircase, and get either your punishment or someone else’s punishment in purgatory removed through this work. People were flocking to the staircase and climbing it on their knees, pausing to pray and kiss the stairs as they climbed. Luther’s son later wrote about that day: “As he (Luther) repeated his prayers on the Lateran staircase, the words of the Prophet Habakkuk came to his mind: “The righteous shall live by faith.” Thereupon he ceased his prayers, returned to Wittenburg, and took this as his chief foundation of all his doctrine.” Luther later wrote himself, “Before those words broke upon my mind, I hated God and was angry with him…but when, by the Spirit of God, I understood those words—the just shall live by faith!—then I felt born again like a new man; I entered through the open doors into the very Paradise of God.”
The righteous shall live by faith. Believe it.
Believe God.
J. Mark Fox 