📜WEB · Romans 4:16
What does Romans 4:16 mean?
"For this cause it is of faith, that it may be according to grace, to the end that the promise may be sure to all the offspring, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all."
— Romans 4:16 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
For the promise to Abraham and to his offspring that he should be heir of the world wasn’t through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.
For if those who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void, and the promise is made of no effect.
For the law produces wrath, for where there is no law, neither is there disobedience.
For this cause it is of faith, that it may be according to grace, to the end that the promise may be sure to all the offspring, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.
As it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations.” This is in the presence of him whom he believed: God, who gives life to the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were.
Besides hope, Abraham in hope believed, to the end that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, “So will your offspring be.”
Without being weakened in faith, he didn’t consider his own body, already having been worn out, (he being about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb.
Explanation
Romans 4:16 sits in the middle of Paul's argument that righteousness before God comes through faith rather than through keeping the law. In plain language, the verse says that the inheritance God promised is received by faith, and it works this way specifically so that it can be a matter of grace — an unearned gift — rather than a wage owed for obedience. Because it operates on the basis of grace and faith rather than law-keeping, the promise is guaranteed to everyone who has faith, whether they are Jews who live under the law or Gentiles who do not. Both groups become children of Abraham, who Paul calls "the father of us all."
To understand the context, Paul is writing to the church in Rome, a congregation made up of both Jewish and Gentile believers who were wrestling with how these two groups related to each other and to God's covenant promises. Earlier in Romans 4, Paul had already established that Abraham was justified by faith before he was circumcised (Genesis 15:6, quoted in Romans 4:3), and even before circumcision was commanded (Genesis 17). This matters because circumcision was the sign of the law-covenant for the Jewish people. Since Abraham believed God and was counted righteous prior to receiving that sign, Paul argues that Abraham's fatherhood cannot be limited to those who are physically circumcised or who keep the Mosaic law. He is the spiritual father of all who share his kind of faith, Jew and Gentile alike.
Theologically, this verse crystallizes why Paul insists that salvation must come by faith rather than by law-
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