Boast in God for your righteousness

Article for Sunday March 1, 2026

Romans 4:1–3 1What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh? 2For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”

There is a massive amount of people who believe they need to be good to go to church.  Also, there are as many who think only the good will go to heaven.  The truth is only the righteous will go to heaven, but it is important to know those who are considered righteous did not achieve this title through their own works.

Is there a difference between being good and being righteous?  There are a lot of people who do good works and help others but their deeds if not in the name, that is in the will of God are mute.  There are those who might not have great works but have faith and are considered righteous by the definition of Jesus Christ, that is they are forgiven.

Pastor Greg Finke who pastored the Messiah Lutheran Church I attended before becoming a pastor said something that stuck with me.  What Pastor Finke said doesn’t quite set right to many who believe but the fact is true. 

Pastor Finke said, and this is paraphrased, “Your nice sweet little aunt Mable who bakes the best chocolate chip cookies and always treats you with exceptional love but does not believe in God or Jesus Christ, will not be going to heaven.”  Very sad but true, good works does not give you free passage to heaven.

Romans 4:4–6 4Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. 5And to the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, 6just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works:

This is not to say we should not have good works for God tells us through Paul in Ephesians 2:10 that we were created for good works.  God is giving us a gift that is unearned.  And if we work for the sake of receiving this gift of God, we have belittled the gift and insulted God. 

I know it seems unfair that God would give this free gift to those whom we feel do not deserve it.  Let me remind you nobody in this world deserves this free gift from God.  And if you are self-righteous, you deserve it even less.  But the one giving the free gift, God, gives out of His will not our will.  And again, we are counted righteous not because of our works but because we are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ through forgiveness of sin, and we all sin.

Did you read the part that says Jesus Christ justifies the ungodly and counts them as righteous.  So, if you boast as Paul says, boast in God for your righteousness not in yourself.  Do you get it, we cannot achieve righteousness on our own.  But through faith, as James 2:14-26 says we will have good works.  Ephesians 2:8-10 tells us we are saved by faith not by works, and again that we were created for good works.

Romans 4:7–8 7“Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered;8blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.” . . .

Jesus said in John 8:7 let the one without sin throw the first stone at the sinful woman.  Jesus was then and still is without sin.  Jesus could have thrown the stone, but instead He forgives.  Everyone who held a stone dropped them as should we.  Yet some are eager to pick up stones of hard words and throw them at others.  If you have no sin or say you are more righteous than others, you might as well say you are Jesus Christ, which you are not. 

Here it is those of us who are sinners, are blessed because our lawless deeds are forgiven.  The law comes from the precepts of our God, and from these precepts we are judged.  But because God came to us in the form of Jesus Christ we were acquitted for our lawlessness and forgiven from Christ crucified.  This is a blessing when you consider that we cannot stop our sinfulness, and this is where we boast in God.

Romans 4:13–15 13For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. 14For if it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no transgression.

Not that the law is no longer important, it is even more important as it should help us to fear our Lord who made the laws.  God’s laws bring balance to life and even death when you consider the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

Now that Jesus Christ came and died for our sins and has defeated the sting and demands of sin, we can rest assured that Jesus Christ has fulfilled the requirements of the law.  Jesus did not take the law away but rather justified us so that we do not have to suffer the law and are now governed by the gospel of forgiveness.

Romans 4:16–17 16That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17as 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 things that do not exist.

We who believe have been made offsprings of Abraham through the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ.  We are from the nations promised to Abraham from our Father in heaven.  Now we can boast in our savior, our Lord, Jesus Christ.  We can realize the blessings David spoke about in Psalms 32:1-2.

And the blessing does not stop at our justification as it continues in our resurrection that gives us an eternal life and relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

John 3:16–17 16“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

      Written by Pastor Curtis A. May