Someone posted a video in our church’s men’s ministry WhatsApp group. “I am confused,” he confessed, and this is why. The person in the video claimed to have ‘experienced hell’ in his sleep one Friday evening. He saw pastors who had robbed God of his tithe in hell, which raised a crucial question in this brother’s mind: how are we made right with God? On what basis does God accept us—sinners, such as you and me? Is it based on what we do for him or our family heritage? Or are there other grounds on which God accepts sinners? How do I become right with God?
On what basis does God accept us?
In Romans, Paul engages these questions extensively, as he deals with the broader question of how one joins God’s family. Do we belong to God and his people through our works? Would God consider our family heritage or the faith of another enough to accept us? Particularly in Romans 3:19-4:8, Paul labours to show that we can only have a right standing before God by our faith in Christ. For Paul, there is a spanner in our works. God does not accept us based on what we do or our family history.
The Problem with Works
In Romans 4:1-8, Paul argues that human works cannot make us right with God. Why? Because they are naturally transactional. Paul uses the word “wages” (Romans 4:4) to explain his meaning. Think of this as a worker. You expect your bank statement to read differently at the end of the month. You have spent your energies, time, and skills doing what your employer asks, and in return, you expect payment, a salary or wage. It is your right. You earned it.
Works are naturally transactional.
This transactional approach is well and good for a capitalistic economy. But God is not a trader or employer. Nor is he in a quid pro quo arrangement with us. Thus he doesn’t owe us wages for our good works. We owe God our whole life, for he made and sustains us (Romans 1:20). What can sinners give God in exchange for eternal life, seeing that everything good we have is his gift and the evil in us is our debt? If we wronged him, could we really avoid judgment by simply adding a few coins to the offertory basket or buying new chairs for our village church? No. Our debt is too deep for our empty pockets or petty achievements.
Transactional Works aren’t The Solution
The other problem with relying on ourselves for salvation is that our troubles begin with this self-focus. In Romans 1, Paul explains the painful cosmic consequences of our rebellion as the good Creator confronts his sinful creatures in wrath (Romans 1:18). We are self-focused people who exchanged the immortal God for “images resembling mortal man.” Our inward bend created a deep relational divide between us and God, a torturous gap that some scattered sin-tainted works cannot bridge.
We cannot look to self to bridge the divide we created by looking to self.
So the more we try to work our way out, the more guilty we look. “Since through the law comes knowledge of sin” (Romans 3:19). If we do good to get noticed and if our ‘godliness’ is to settle the score with God, we hold the hoe that digs us into a deeper and darker dungeon. We cannot look to self to bridge the divide we created by looking to self.
Neither can we rely on our ancestors, family, godfathers, or mothers. It is not enough to be born in a ‘Christian home’ or to be a pastor’s kid. That will not make us right before God. The pastor, Reverend, godmother, or ancestor, like you and me, have the same problem before God, and their help—and ours, must come from elsewhere.
Salvation is in Christ, Not the Self
For Paul, the only solution to our sin is the self-sacrifice of God’s Son “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood” (Romans 3:25). By propitiation (or expiation), Paul means that Jesus removed God’s wrath against us and the guilt of sin from us, through his blood. By his death, Jesus paid all our debt. We are like that poor person who has accrued a life-long debt by eating at an expensive restaurant without cash, hoping they won’t notice. Notice they did, and we faced a lifetime in jail. Our pockets are empty—and so are our options.
By his death, Jesus paid all our debt.
But by grace and to our shock, the hotel owner reached out for his checkbook and cleared our bill, setting us free. What’s more, he invites us to the table! Can we argue with this benefactor or pretend to be rich enough to pay from our pockets? We shouldn’t even dare offer to wash dishes as repayment. We have been accepted by grace. Why must we look to our poor self, performance, or ancestry for peace with God? God himself, in his humanity, at the cross, paid the price and released us from our sin-dug dungeon so that our acceptance is not in what we do for God but in what God did for us in Christ. Do we then mock such rich grace with pennies and pocket change?
Faith Receives without Earning
No. Christ’s wrath-removing sacrifice must “be received by faith” (Romans 3:25). The phrase “received by faith” reveals that faith, by its nature, is receptive. Like a street beggar stretching his hands in need or a poor prisoner in handcuffs, faith is that confidence that receives what God freely gives to the undeserving. As those drowning in self-created debt, we have no grounds to bargain for eternal life. We bring nothing good to the table—we have nothing good to bring.
Knowing both our need and poverty, faith looks to God, who is rich in mercy.
But, as Paul puts it, “to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Romans 4:5). Faith, on its knees with empty hands, looks to the crucified Christ for salvation and rests entirely in his sacrifice for us. Knowing both our need and poverty, faith looks to God, who is rich in mercy (Ephesians 2:4).
By Faith, Grab God’s Wonderful Assurance
Assurance transforms and frees us from the anxiety of not meeting God’s standards.
In a nutshell, our performance cannot pay our debt. But the good news is that our bill has already been cleared. God has accepted us by grace alone so we can freely live for him alone. Like beggars, we must stretch out our hands, distrust ourselves, and look to God expectantly in faith. When we do, the Saviour’s blood will drip down our head and heart, cleansing us of all sin and guilt and removing God’s wrath far from us. This assurance transforms and frees us from the anxiety of not meeting God’s standards.
Only when “we have been justified by faith” can “we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). And only those who already have peace with God can successfully wage war against sin and Satan.
