Full Persuasion: Saving Faith (Rom 4:9-22)

“And being fully persuaded that what He had promised, He was able also to perform” (vs21).

The Lord promised to save us, and the elect believe the promise.  We are God-taught that He is true, not a liar, and we trust Him with our souls.  We lean on Him, love Him, and worship Him for the salvation that He gave us, which is holiness and heaven, forgiveness and thereby power over sin.


The gospel is eternal life GIVEN to us; it isn’t earned - “And this is the testimony, that God has given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son“ (1 John 5:11).  Abraham was justified by faith before he did anything (Rom 4:9-12).  He believed God before circumcision and before receiving the promise.  He believed, and in spite of the impossibility in man (Abraham),  the promise came to pass - “And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah‘s womb: he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strengthened in faith, giving to glory God“ (Rom 4:19-20). 


Because God sees the end from the beginning, “gives life to the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were”,  Abraham believed God was faithful to do what He said.  By faith, Abraham obtained the promise, and that’s how we persevere and conquer sin, “Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall your offspring be” (Rom 4:18). We believe the Lord is gracious enough to pardon and empower us, to give us the Spirit by what Christ has done.  We believe the gospel of God keeping us from sin and forgiving sin, both.  We believe the rewards of obedience, and we receive them, both now in this present world one hundred fold, and in the world to come, life everlasting (Mark 10:30).  We are conquering by God doing the miraculous, which is what He promised all the time (Rom 4:16).


Abraham’s faith is our faith; it believes the gospel of a saving God, and this is the faith that God credits with righteousness; it is saving faith, and believing God shall save you, you are right with God.