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The River ChurchSermons

Righteousness

Righteousness Illustrated, Pt. 2

Caleb Combs · Sunday, 15 June 2025 · Romans 4:13-25 · 44:49 · 6,467 words

Romans S8 · 4:13-25 Holly

There is no public page for this message yet — the transcript below is the whole of it.

Romans 4:17‑25 is examined as a call to trust God not only for salvation but in every area of daily life. The passage shows Abraham’s example of faith that glorifies God, brings righteousness, and serves as an example for all generations. Listeners are invited to acknowledge God in all circumstances, especially when situations seem impossible, and to live out that trust in practical steps. The sermon challenges fathers and all believers to be living examples of faith for the next generation.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

faith 107 trust 55 waver 11 footsteps 9 glorify 17 abraham 21 example 16 spite 6 god 120 abraham's 8 dead 21 source 7

Topics

Faith 34 Hope 6 Salvation 3 Abraham 3 Conscience 2 Righteousness 2 Sin 1 Death & Resurrection 1 The Holy Spirit 1

Scripture referenced 32

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Romans 4 1:30 Romans 5 2:08 Romans 4 2:16 Romans 4:17-25 2:16 Romans 4 2:32 Proverbs 3:5-6 3:19 Romans 4 3:51 Romans 4 4:45 Romans 4:17-25 4:45 Hebrews 11 9:35 Hebrews 11:1 9:35 Romans 4:17 12:11 Genesis 12 12:24 Genesis 15 12:24 Genesis 12 12:39 Romans 4:17-20 15:18 Romans 4:17 15:29 Romans 4:20 15:29 Romans 4:18-20 19:17 Romans 4:18 19:34 Genesis 15 19:54 Genesis 15:19 20:07 Romans 4:18 22:03 Romans 4:20 23:20 Psalms 56 26:51 2 Corinthians 5 26:58 Romans 4:20 30:57 Romans 4:21 32:38 Hebrews 11 34:39 Romans 4 35:53 Romans 4:23 36:19 Romans 4:18 42:06

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Pre-service announcement — 9 lines, 0:39. Excluded from every count and search on this site, kept here so nothing is hidden.

Hey, everyone. My name is Lorena, and thanks for checking out this message today.

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Thanks again for joining us, and we hope you are blessed by today's message.

Good morning. Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there.

It is great to gather with you on this Dad's Day.

Hopefully, you're enjoying your root beer float.

I'm sorry if you're lactose intolerant. I apologize.

But it's great to gather with you, whether you're a guest, new here.

My name is Caleb. I'm the pastor here.

It's always good.

It's great to gather with you. This is what we're doing.

We gather to lift up the name of Jesus.

We sing about him. We worship him in song and in sermon.

And so for the next few minutes, we're going to open the word of God to see what he has for us.

We've been in a series looking at the book of Romans.

And many of you have mentioned how much you've enjoyed it, which is so great.

We are in Romans chapter 4, and so we are in week 8 of 32.

And so keep staying with us.

And so we will be walking.

We're going to be talking through the book through really most of 2025.

And so a lot of great resources out there that we'll be kind of talking through and adding.

And so I talk about those each different weeks of our app that you can follow along with.

Daily devotions as well as a study guide and all the different sermons that are posted online.

So always encourage you to follow along, read along.

You can read ahead if you're an overachiever.

If you're one that's like, hey, you know what?

I'd like to know what's coming up.

Well, guess what?

We'll be in Romans 5.

And so if you want to get a jumpstart on what's going on, you can be ahead of the game, if you will.

And so we are going to be in Romans chapter 4, looking at verses 17 through 25 this morning.

So if you have a Bible, a device, something to follow along, read along, I would always encourage you to follow along that way.

Last week, we looked at the beginning half of Romans chapter 4, looking at some specific ideas and concepts.

And there was one spot where I landed last Sunday, encouraging each and every one of us to follow in the footsteps of faith.

Follow in the footsteps of faith of Abraham.

He's known historically or biblically as the father of faith or father of our faith.

And that encouraging word that the Apostle Paul gives not only to the Christians in Rome, but to each and every one of us, even to this day.

Follow in the footsteps.

Follow in the footsteps of faith or follow his example of trusting in the Lord.

One of my life verses, Proverbs 3, 5 and 6, trust in the Lord with all your heart.

Lean not on your own understanding and all your ways.

Acknowledge him and he will make your path straight or he will direct your paths.

I love that verse because it is so important to me because I am hardheaded and I like to trust in my own abilities,

trust in my own knowledge, trust in my own.

Perspectives trust in my own historical perspective rather than trusting in the word of the Lord.

And so Romans chapter four, Paul not only challenges us to live in that faith or follow in those footsteps, but gives us some practical steps.

Gives us what really that should look like.

And I finished last week's message going, Hey, great.

Let him follow after the footsteps of faith.

What does that?

Actually truly mean?

I'm hoping some of you are like, okay, what does that actually look like?

What does that actually practically mean in my life?

Cause I believe that's what a good teacher does challenges illustrates, but then gives practical steps for what does that actually look like in my daily life?

What does that look like in my marriage?

What does that look like when I'm raising kids?

What does that look like in every interaction that I have at the workplace or with my neighbors or all the different facets that I live out in?

My life, how does that practically look Romans chapter four, verse 17 through 25 says, as it is written again, echoing the apostle Paul saying, what does the word of God say?

That is so imperative that we live out in our lives as it is written.

I have made you the father of many nations in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence.

The thing.

Things that do not exist and hope he believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations as he had been told.

So shall your offspring be.

He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.

No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God.

But he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.

That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.

But the words that was counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours.

It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus, our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespass.

And raised for our justification.

Let's pray and we'll jump into that passage this morning.

God, we love you.

We praise you.

We honor you.

We glorify you.

God, you're good.

God, thank you for this morning.

Thank you for all the dads that are here or joining us online.

God, bless them, encourage them.

God, just challenge them to be the dads, the leaders that you've called them to be.

God, for those that are in this room or joining us that maybe this year is the first Father's Day that they have.

Their dad is no longer here.

God, encourage them.

God, maybe Father's Day is difficult for others in this room.

Bless them, encourage them, comfort them.

God, speak to your word this morning.

God, use me.

That's my ask of you.

God, ask for wisdom, guidance, and clarity in your scriptures.

God, we praise you and love you.

In Jesus' wonderful name, amen.

There's a lot in this passage and my goal this morning is to really kind of unpack the practical aspects of

what faith and how faith permeate, live out in our lives.

It is so important that we understand this.

We are saved by faith.

You're like, man, you have said this every week for the last four or five weeks.

I know because it is important that we realize that we are saved by faith, not by works,

not by anything we can earn or qualify for or be born into.

We are saved by faith.

But it's not simply salvation that comes by faith that the apostle Paul,

challenging us to live in.

He's challenging us to live in practical daily faith, trusting in the Lord,

not simply for our salvation, but for daily living,

for daily living in every area of our life.

And for many of us to practically think about that and go,

okay, you know, I trusted in God for salvation.

But when it comes to my daily life, it's easier if I just take control.

I think if we were to take an anonymous poll in the room,

many of us, if we would truly admit or truly look at our perspective

of what our trust is in God, it comes to a point of like,

hey, you know what?

That's trusting too far.

But the apostle Paul is not simply saying, hey, trust in the Lord

or have faith in him simply for your salvation, which he is saying that.

But even more, he's saying, give your life every single decision,

every single action, every single obstacle,

everything that you come across in life, trust or have faith in Jesus for that.

So what is faith?

Faith is a complete trust or confidence in someone or something.

Hebrews chapter 11, verse one says, now faith is the assurance.

One of your translations may say the confidence of things hoped for,

conviction of things not seen.

I love this explanation.

Trusting in something or someone is when you can't explicitly prove it or you can't see it.

I love the classic example of faith that every single one of us is using faith in this moment.

You sat down in your chair.

I didn't see anyone with a drill checking the screws.

All right.

I saw none of you doing that.

And you may want.

I'm going to do that in some of those chairs.

All right.

But the reality is you had faith that the chair would hold you.

Some of it was some preconceived knowledge or experience that you've had.

I've sat in this seat every week.

Most of you sit in the same seats each week.

And when you switch, it always messes me up because I'm like, hey,

you have not been here for three weeks and you just switched.

All right.

I'm taking attendance in my head.

Not really are.

Okay.

But the reality is, is most of us sit in those same seats and we trust that that seat will hold us.

Because we've had the very experience in trusting it.

The great thing that the Apostle Paul is challenging us in faith is to trust in the Lord.

Have faith in him.

And the great thing is we do have experience.

You're like, what does that mean?

Well, we have the 66 books of the Bible where we can see the very faith actions of people who trusted in the Lord.

And then we sing songs of God.

We want to see the same God that we trusted do incredible things back in.

The time of Abraham do it in 2025 in our lives.

And so for each of us to live out that faith is so, so imperative and important.

I read this this week.

It's good.

The biblical definition of faith does not simply just apply to salvation.

It equally is applicable to the rest of the Christian life.

And so I want you to think about this this morning as we look at this passage.

Yes, we're saved by faith.

Yes, I trust in the Lord.

I trust in the Lord to save me.

But I just not simply that's not the finish line.

What is a faith filled life or the footsteps of faith?

What does that practically look like in my life?

So in this passage, verse 17, Paul references Abraham becoming the father of many nations.

He's referencing a promise given in Genesis chapter 12, Genesis chapter 15 and multiple other times in the book of Genesis where God.

Speaks directly to Abraham and says, Hey, go, go to this land.

I will make a great nation in Genesis chapter 12.

Now, the Lord said to Abraham, go from your country, your kindred and your father's house to the land.

I will show you and I will make you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great.

And so that you will be a blessing and I will bless those who bless you.

And within him who dishonors you, I will curse in you.

All the families of the earth shall be.

This promise is very, very important that we understand what is being communicated.

Abraham and Sarah are promised a great nation.

The promise that they will have many, many children that will follow after them.

The only problem is when this promise is given, they have zero.

Okay, they have zero and they are upward in age.

Someone about 85 years old.

Okay.

And so I.

I was reading the commentary this week.

The Guinness Book of World Records records the oldest woman to deliver at like something like 59 years old.

Okay.

And so I think that's, that's about the age.

And so the, the writer of the commentary was saying, well, they're missing out on Sarah who gave birth somewhere in her nineties.

All right.

Right.

I'm like, I'm thinking through that.

Another fun fact.

I know this is a sidetrack, but it's fun.

It recorded in Guinness, the Guinness Book of the World Record.

The woman who gave birth to the most kids.

In history, she gave birth to 69 children.

All right.

69 kids.

I think she had, uh, if I remember correctly, three twin, three sets of twins, three sets of triplets, a, a, a set of quads as well, or two sets of quads.

And so, um, you've got a few kids, not that many.

All right.

All right.

I'm thinking about that.

That's crazy.

But it is imperative that we understand that God is promising them something that they

don't have.

And we'll begin to see even more, some obstacles arise towards their faith.

See, faith is easy when it seems like what has been told is, is going to be accomplished.

We can all agree with that, right?

I sat in my seat, it's held me up.

But when something seems impossible or something seems even improbable, faith becomes to go,

Hey, you know what?

This doesn't make sense.

And so we'll begin to.

Talk through exactly what those obstacles look like.

But before we get there, we'll look in verses 17 through 20, because it's important that

we see not just the simple obstacle or the calling of faith, but the source of faith

in verse 17, verse 20 says, as it's written, I've made you the father of many nations in

the presence of God in whom he believed God was the source of Abraham's faith.

God was that.

That source.

It wasn't, it wasn't in, uh, an idol in that time.

It wasn't in his finances or his abilities.

It was simply in trusting in the Lord.

It was God.

I trust wholeheartedly in you.

It was not a source of something in this world.

It is so important that we understand.

Yeah, I trust and I have faith in something, but it was nothing of this world.

It was of the Lord.

That source is so important.

I read this week that God was the object of Abraham's faith.

It was no object that man can create.

It was the confidence that he had in the God of the universe.

But then he continues to explain why he said the one who gives life to the dead.

And some of you are sitting there going, okay, well, he raised Jesus from the dead.

That's what he's referencing.

That's not what he's referencing here in this passage.

See, he is referencing.

Abraham's understanding of he viewed his future as dead.

He viewed as, hey, you know what?

I'm a hundred years old.

I'm nearly dead.

I have no future.

Yeah, God, you promised this.

I don't know how you're going to accomplish this, but I still have faith in you.

And so in his faith, in his trust, he said, God, God, you're the one who gives life to the dead.

What's great about that is not simply just stopped with Abraham.

It continued with Lazarus.

And then ultimately with Jesus.

He's the one who gives life to the dead.

And so if you're sitting here and you've received Jesus Christ as your savior, guess what?

You're a child of God.

And he brought you from death to life.

And we have a God that brings the dead to life.

Even today, knowing that we were dead in our trespasses, as Roman says, the body, we were brought to life through the blood of Jesus Christ.

That's the good news and the faith that we can have in Jesus Christ.

He's the one who gives life to the dead.

And then he continues.

He calls into existence.

Things that do not exist.

He's calling out God as the creator.

It's important that we, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis one, one, God as their creator.

It's imperative that we see that as it's not some big bang that happened or some amoeba that crawled up and evolved.

No, no, no.

God specifically made man out of the dust of the ground.

He created, he spoke into existence, all creation.

That's the beauty of God as the perfect creator that he designed.

The Bible says you were fearfully and wonderfully made.

Marvelous are his works.

God is the creator of all things.

Read one commentary.

Describe God as the creator or definer of all things, not the world.

And so just as Abraham says, hey, I saw my future as dead.

I saw a dead end in front of me.

God, you spoke in truth and changed it.

Paul continues in verses 18 through 20 and really is the meat of the message this morning.

It is, it just brings a hope encouragement to you and, and challenges.

I've been reading it all week going, this is, this is personally convicting to me.

Verse 18, he says in hope, he believed against hope.

Man, I could just preach those, those words every day of my life, probably to myself.

In hope, he believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations.

As he was told, so shall your offspring be.

Paul here is quoting Genesis 15.

Again, the interaction between God, God telling him that you look at the stars.

You see all those stars?

That's is, that's all the children.

That's the descendants you'll have.

He continues in verse 19.

He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead.

Since he was about a hundred years old.

Or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.

No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God.

We looked at the object or the source of Abraham's faith.

And for the next few minutes, I want to talk about the obstacles of faith.

So God has promised Abraham.

And then he also promises Sarah later on in Genesis that they will have a great nation.

They will deliver children.

The only problem is they had aged out, if you will.

My man was about a hundred years old.

He describes his and her parts as dead.

Just like last week.

I'm not teaching a biology class.

Okay.

I don't plan to this week.

You can read the passage and understand they had to, they had to overcome the age of being

able to have kids.

We can all agree on that.

All right.

She was barren.

All right.

She was unable to have children.

And so they saw this obstacle.

Yeah.

God said we'd have a great nation.

God said we'd have all these descendants.

God said we'd have all these kids.

God, the clock is ticking.

This doesn't make sense.

I just keep getting older.

That's how birthdays work, right?

I wish it was the inverse for many of us.

All right.

We don't have Benjamin Button in here.

All right.

You're not aging down.

No, no, no.

It's, it's, you are aging and that's what's happening to Abraham and Sarah.

And he describes himself as pretty much dead.

He's talking about his ability to have kids.

Yet, what I love about verse 18 is in hope, he believed against,

you're like, man, that's, that sounds like an oxymoron in hope.

He believed against hope.

No, you can reread that as in hope.

He believed against the facts that were in front of him in hope, in trust and belief in faith.

God said he would do something.

And I trusted him regardless of what my eyes saw, what my experience said,

what the facts look like in front of me, what the doctor said, what my spouse said,

what my kids said, what the church said, what the news said, what the world around me says.

You know what, God, I believe you in spite of what's happening around me.

And that's what faith is all about.

He believed in spite the situation or the facts around him.

Paul continues.

He said he did not weaken his faith.

And then verse 20 says, no one believed made him waver.

I've really struggled in this all week.

I threw a text out to our other location.

Pastors and go, how did, can we say, or how can, uh, God through the Holy spirit,

inspire Paul to write that he did not waver.

If you know a little bit about the story of Abraham, he did maybe didn't waver.

He, he went out and, uh, God's not going to deliver through Sarah.

So I'm going to go sleep with, uh, Ishmael's I'm going to raise and have Ishmael.

Right.

And so had, had, had a baby with Hagar.

And so you're like, okay, that's, I would view that as wavering.

So, so I actually was texting the location guys.

I'm struggling with this.

And one of them, uh, actually many of them, it was a great conversation.

And so pastor Chuck at grand blank sent me this.

I thought it was really good.

So the word waver means to separate or make distinct.

And so the idea is he didn't replace or reject the promise of God.

It was just, it was moved down the list.

If you will.

He moved Hagar option to the top as potentially the way that God was doing it.

But the Greek word means he.

Held the promise of God.

It did not reject it or annoy it, ignore it.

But another conversation, as I read, I begin to think about God was seeing his faith and

had grace and honored him.

It wasn't a perfect faith.

It wasn't a perfect faith.

Then we need to think about how that works out in our own lives and think about different

other Bible characters and think about Peter walking on water.

Peter began to look at all the different circumstances or the things happening in this life.

And he began to sink.

And what did God do in his lack of faith?

He didn't, he had tons of faith.

He was walking on water, but he got distracted by the circumstances.

He got distracted by the facts.

He got distracted by his eyesight around him.

And that's what is described here in Abraham.

Yeah.

God, I know you can do this, but you need help.

See, I believe you're going to do that, but I'm going to help if you will.

And that's what is described in this passage.

See, he didn't weaken.

He didn't weaken his faith.

He didn't waver at it.

He trusted in God.

Yeah.

It wasn't a perfect faith.

That's where grace and mercy come into our lives.

See, this pastors will get up and go, Hey, you know what?

To have faith, you can have no fear.

To have faith, you, you can't waver or struggle.

The reality of it is every single person that I am speaking to or talking to here in this

morning is a human being.

Every one of us has history.

Everyone else has eyes.

Everyone has all these dynamics that we, that work through in their life.

And we look and go, we allow that to determine our faith.

The truth of the matter is it's not faith over fear.

It's faith in spite of fear.

It's faith in the midst of the most difficult seasons.

You're like, man, I had that tagline in my house.

I'm sorry.

All right.

Psalm 56, three is when I am afraid I will put my trust in you.

Second Corinthians chapter five, for we walk by faith, not by sight.

We come to them.

That understanding of, you know, we don't allow what we see to dictate our faith and

We allow our faith and trust in God to dictate what we see.

See, Abraham was fully persuaded or fully convinced that the power of God would match

I'm going to read that again because it is so powerful.

We begin to see and understand.

He was fully convinced that God's power would match his promise.

And so we begin to.

We live that out in our lives.

It doesn't mean that you won't go through difficulties or struggles, but knowing that

the God of the universe will never leave you nor forsake you.

The God of the universe has wants and desires a relationship with you.

That the God of the universe has specifically ordained and designed your footsteps in every

area of your life.

And as a follower of God and his calling, all things work together for your good.

And for us, as we look at this,

faith idea or this current situation that we're going through, we allow that to define

or dictate our faith rather than coming to that understanding of God.

I trust you.

I don't know what the end results are going to be.

God, I don't know what you're doing.

I know some of you sitting in this room right now are going through some of the most difficult,

darkest times ever in your life.

And you're hearing this pastor get up and say, oh, just have faith.

That's not what I'm saying.

That's not even close to what I'm saying.

I'm sympathetic and saying, hey.

Trust in the Lord.

I don't know what the end results are going to look like in your life, but I know who

does.

God does.

Putting your trust, putting your life, putting your family, putting your kids, putting your

grandkids, putting your health, putting your finances, putting this church, putting the

future of our country, putting the future of this world, all in the hands of the God

who knows what he's doing.

And then coming to that understanding, God, I trust you.

I don't know what you're doing, but I know you are good.

So that's what we look at when we read the Bible.

That's what the great news of the Bible is.

We can look and look at that.

We can look at that in a historical context and see what God has done.

He's proved himself faithful and faithful and faithful and faithful every single moment.

Regardless, you're saying, Caleb, I don't feel that in this moment.

Because what we allow is we allow those feelings or the circumstances around us to dictate

our faith rather than what Abraham did.

In hope, I'll read it exactly so I don't butcher it.

In hope, he believed against hope.

So then you've got to look and see what do you put your hope in?

What do you put your confidence?

In what do you put your faith in?

Because we look and go, Caleb, timing of God.

I've been waiting a long time.

I'm waiting 5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50 years for this.

Can I tell you this?

Keep trusting in God because he's good.

I don't say that as a disconnected pastor.

This is all, you know, don't worry about it.

No, no, no.

I know the difficulties, the storms, the obstacles.

See, Abraham looked and goes, God, this is impossible yet.

Jesus said, with God, all things are possible.

You don't allow your current situation to define the power, the identity of God.

We looked at the source of faith.

We looked at the obstacles of faith.

And now the end of the passage, verses 20b through 25,

we begin to see the objectives of his faith.

We see what he's accomplishing.

But he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God.

The original language in here describes the exercise,

the exercise of faith.

He grew strong in his faith.

Many of you love to go to the gym.

I probably should, but I don't, all right?

So you love to go to the gym.

You love to go to, you love to work out.

You love to discipline your body.

You do it on a daily basis.

So you grow in strength.

That's what the apostle Paul is calling the believers to grow in.

Grow in your faith.

Grow in it.

Grow stronger in it.

And so you become and go, hey, you know what?

I can only believe a little bit today.

Believe a little bit more.

Tomorrow and then the next day and build that muscle of faith.

Build that muscle of trust.

The great thing about it is you can't do it alone.

It's a, what?

A fruit of the spirit.

The Holy Spirit will give you the ability to truly trust on a daily basis.

And we can look at the example of Abraham.

Yeah, he didn't waver, but it wasn't a perfect faith.

He fell.

He messed up.

Yet God in his great grace, God in his great mercy,

And still made him the father of great nations.

The father of our faith, if you will.

Continues in verse 21, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.

Do we live that way?

Do we live fully convinced that God is able to do what he says?

I can say this unequivocally.

I don't.

I wish I did.

I'm not even speaking for anyone else in this place.

I can say this unequivocally.

There are times I do, but there are many times I like Caleb's control.

Caleb to figure it out because I can figure it out.

God just, I'll let you know when I need you.

I used the example a few weeks ago.

We use God as a spotter.

God, I'll let you know I'm lifting this weight.

I can handle it.

But when I can't handle it, I'll need you to spot it for me.

The truth of the matter is God's not looking to be our spotter.

He wants to lift the weight for us.

He wants to carry it.

He wants you to stand next to him and glorify him for carrying the weight.

He's saying, cast it on me.

I'll carry it for you.

23 says, but the words that was counted to him

were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also.

It'll be counted to us who believe in him,

who raised from the dead Jesus, our Lord,

who was delivered up for our trespasses

and raised for our justification.

Explain that two weeks ago.

Our view of becoming righteous.

God viewing us just as if we had never sinned.

And so three objectives,

and I'll get you out of here this morning.

We'll close with one more song.

The first objective of his faith to glorify God,

to glorify God.

He was, grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God.

When you trust in God, you glorify God.

Hebrews chapter 11.

And without faith, it is impossible to please God.

Or is without faith, it is impossible to really, truly glorify God.

God is glorified when we fully rely or trust in him.

In every situation, in every standard,

in everything we go through in this life.

God, I trust you.

When you take your head off your pillow, God,

I trust in what you're doing today.

I may not see it or understand it or like it, God,

but I trust you.

I have faith in you.

So one, God is glorified when we have faith.

Two, faith is the only thing that brings about righteousness.

As I said, just at the beginning,

faith is what saves us.

And faith is what we're called to live.

Faith is what saves us.

And how we're to live on a daily life,

to be righteous, to glorify God.

Because the truth of the matter is,

as I said,

we cannot become righteous on our own.

We can't become right.

We can't do anything.

I don't know.

We can't build that standard.

That's much of what Romans chapter four explains.

So, you know, you can,

you can't accomplish righteousness.

You're not 2%, 5%, 10%, 80%.

No, we're 0%.

God is 100%.

And because he is 100%,

he has made us righteous by the blood of Jesus Christ,

by the cross and the very resurrection.

In verse 23, the last objective,

the words that was counted to him

were not written for his sake alone.

Man, this is good.

Written just for Abraham's sake.

They were written for yours and mine.

They weren't accidental.

They go, hey, you know, this is an interaction with God.

No, this is an example.

And so Abraham's faith glorified God.

Abraham's faith brought him to righteousness.

And Abraham's faith set him as the example

for all generations as the very father of our faith.

See, everything that was,

everything that was written in the past

was written to teach us the ups and downs.

Abraham navigating the very trust and the faith

and the very reliance,

the hope that he found in Jesus.

Abraham was father of faith

because he was righteous by the blood of Jesus Christ.

He believed in God.

Paul references the gospel right here.

We counted to us, believe in him who raised from the dead,

Jesus, our Lord,

who was delivered up for our trespasses

and raised from the dead.

For our justification.

What's he saying there?

He's saying, hey, your sin, our sin,

my sin at a cost.

It was death that Jesus was sent

and took our trespasses, took our sins,

took our faults, took our failures,

nailed them to the cross and said,

you know what?

I'll take your punishment.

Raised again three days later,

he became sin so that you and I become righteous.

There it is.

In this example, he became the father,

the example of faith.

Not a perfect faith, by the way.

We're gonna think about this as perspective of Father's Day.

And I was having a conversation with a friend this week.

We were talking about dads being that example

and what that looks like in our lives

and really just feeling like many of us

have failed in examples and like,

man, I wish I would have, should have done it,

lived life there for many dads.

And some of you are sitting here as a dad going,

man, I got adult kids

and it's something I deal with every day.

But I spent some time looking up some facts.

This is a crazy when the father of in a home

is saved first, converted first.

The probability of the rest of the family coming to Christ

is 93%, 93%, crazy.

Another about church attendance.

If a father attends church,

his children are 35% more likely to attend

when they're adults.

35% more likely than if he doesn't attend.

You want to deep dive these stats, they're crazy.

It's so heavy for us to begin to think through.

And then I begin to think through the very perspective

that's just as we closed last week's message

of looking and calling Abraham,

telling us to follow after the very foundations,

the footsteps of his faith.

And then I look practically

what that actually looked like in our life and go,

hey, you know what?

Trust and faith glorify God

with every single trust decision that I make in my life.

It's not easy.

I wish I could get up and say,

hey, trust in God.

You will have no,

I wish I could get up and say that,

but that would be a lie.

Trusting in God.

In spite of what my eyes,

in spite of what my feelings,

in spite of what my senses may say,

I trust in him.

See, Abraham glorified God with his faith.

It brought him to righteousness

and he was example for all generations.

And that is my challenge,

even to simply you,

but also to the dads.

Be that example for the next generation

as faith followers.

For your kids, for your grandkids,

for your nieces, for your nephews.

You're sitting here as someone

that doesn't have kids anymore.

There are students,

there are children in our churches.

Vacation Bible School this week

that you and I as adults,

we can be the very example of faith

for the next generation.

We be that.

People see us as that very example.

Trusting in God.

I love verse 18.

In hope, he believed against,

hope, he had faith and trust

and a God who said it

and he knew he'd do it.

I pray for you this morning.

God, we love you.

We praise you.

We honor you.

We glorify you.

God, I know there's ones in this room,

ones joining us in line that said,

Caleb, and faith is easier said than done.

God, I know that.

I know there's ones dealing with

doctor's notices that were given this week.

Emily, this exploded.

Feeling like Abraham, everything is dead.

There's no future.

God, I trust you,

but I don't know how you're going to do it.

Yet, he didn't waver.

May we follow after that example

because in that moment,

we can glorify you.

Thank you for Romans.

Thank you for this challenge,

even in my own life.

God, do not see what the next steps are,

but I know your word is a lamp to my feet,

a light to my path.

God, I just seek to glorify you.

We as a church,

we as married couples,

as individuals,

as followers of you,

just seek to glorify you.

Help us to do that in our trust,

confidence in our hope, God.

We love you.

We glorify you.

It's in Jesus' name I pray.

It's in Jesus' name I preach.

It's in Jesus' name that we have full trust and hope

because we know that Jesus came,

died on a cross,

and rose again,

became sin so that I could become righteous.

God, thank you for that.

Thank you for the cross.

Thank you.

Praise you in Jesus' name.