LIVING WATERS
For the proclamation of the Gospel and the edification of the Body of Christ
God's Amazing Justice
When we come to the subject of God's justice, how it is imputed to man, and to whom God attributes it, we are filled with amazement. To prove it, we must go to the first example, to the archetype of justice and the first beneficiary of it: Abraham. Contrary to what is sometimes said, Abraham was not a naturally just man. He was not what could be called a morally blameless person for God to reward him with his righteousness.
When God called him, Abraham was living in the midst of the idolatry of the Babylonians. Then, God's call was, in the first instance, almost totally disobeyed by Abraham. He did not leave his kindred or his father's house, nor did he come to the land that God was to show him. He 'dragged' his father Terah, took his nephew Lot, and halted at Haran, halfway.
Then, when he finally breaks away from his father, and travels on to Canaan, Lot still follows him. The first thing God says to him while in Canaan is: "To your descendants I will give this land" (Gen. 12:7). It does not say here that Abraham believed God, as he says later, in 15:6. Apparently, God's promise received a quiet show of indifference or unbelief on the part of the patriarch.
Shortly after, Abraham passes over in his call, because he goes to Egypt, a land that will bring him very bad memories. There he lies to Pharaoh, shamefully exposes his wife ("so that it may go well with me for your sake," he tells Sarai), and, when the whole mess is cleared up, he returns from Egypt laden with ill-gotten gifts.
After the embarrassment of Egypt, Abraham returns to the place of blessing. God backs him generously in the episode with Lot, and in regard to the battle against the four kings. Only after this, and after having received the blessing of Melchizedek, does Abraham receive the word of God's righteousness.
Nor was it on the noblest occasion, for the word of God did not come to him because of his "seed" (which, according to Paul's interpretation in Galatians, is Christ), but came because of the promise of his own offspring. He had no son, and he feared that the heir would be Eliezer. Then God speaks to him, and, for the first time, Abraham's spiritual ears were opened to the word of God, and he heard in faith, and that faith was counted to him for righteousness (Gen. 15:6). Thus we come to the key point in Abraham's life.
So, when we try to look for a righteous character in Abraham, we do not find it. And so it seems that it must also be with all who follow in his footsteps in faith: "What shall we say then that Abraham, our father according to the flesh, found? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has whereof to glory, but not toward God. For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness. But to him that worketh, his wages are not reckoned as grace, but as a debt: but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness" (Rom. 4:1-5).