Romans 4, Again: Faith in a Promise, Before Fulfillment

The God Who Counts Things That Are Not as Though They Are

1. Paul Tells Us Which Circumstance Establishes the Doctrine

When Paul explains how a person is counted righteous before God, he takes us to one particular moment in the life of Abraham. We might naturally want to look through Abraham's entire story and point out his faith, his obedience, his failures, and his good works. But Paul does not permit us to do that. As we explored in a previous postprevious post, Paul tells us the crediting of righteousness is "not found" at other places in the chronology of Abraham's life. He tells us exactly where to look:

“Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”
—Romans 4:3; Genesis 15:6

Why does Paul choose Genesis 15:6?

Abraham had already believed God in Genesis 12. He had already obeyed God by leaving his country and going where God told him to go. And there would be much more faith and obedience in Abraham's life after Genesis 15. Yet when Paul establishes the basis upon which righteousness is counted, he deliberately points to Genesis 15:6.

That is not an accident. Paul is the one interpreting Abraham's story for us, and he tells us which circumstance establishes his point.

This is not simply Paul's interpretation of an Old Testament story; this is the apostle entrusted with the gospel explaining the terms by which God counts righteousness under the New Covenant (Gal. 1:11-12). Paul takes us to this one event in Abraham's life to show us the grounds of the righteousness that God now grants through faith in Jesus Christ. If we want to understand Paul's doctrine, this is the story he tells us to understand it through.

But Paul does not merely point to Genesis 15:6 and leave us wondering why this moment is the basis for the New Covenant. He tells us why faith alone is theologically indispensable.

2. Abraham Believed God for What He Could Not Produce

He did not believe because the circumstances were favorable. He believed because God was able to do what He had promised.

Paul says Abraham was “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.” Then Paul repeats the conclusion:

“That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.”
—Romans 4:22

This is why Genesis 15:6 matters so much.

Paul is not describing righteousness as something Abraham gradually built up by combining faith with an increasing record of obedience. Abraham had faith before Genesis 15. He had works before Genesis 15. He had faith and works afterward. But Paul identifies one particular circumstance in which righteousness was counted to him: when Abraham believed God's promise concerning what he could not possibly produce himself.

The impossibility is important.  

Abraham could not manufacture the fulfillment of God's promise. His effort could not make the promised child appear. There was nothing he could contribute that would bring God's promise to pass. The fulfillment belonged entirely to God.

And this is where Paul moves from Abraham to us.

Paul says that the words “it was counted to him” were “not written for his sake alone, but for ours also.” We are to understand the same principle from Abraham's experience.

Now there is something fascinating happening in both directions.

3. Both Believed and Counted Before Seeing

Abraham called God able before the promise was visible; God called Abraham righteous before the righteousness was visible.

Abraham believed God could bring about what had not yet appeared. Though he and Sarah had no natural ability to produce the promised child, Abraham was “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.” He trusted God before he could see the fulfillment.

God, likewise, reckoned Abraham righteous at the moment of faith, before that righteousness had been fully manifested in his life.

Both were counting something before it could be seen.

God was not pretending Abraham was something he was not, nor was Abraham's later obedience unnecessary. Rather, God did not wait for a lifetime of righteous behavior before reckoning Abraham righteous. He reckoned him righteous when Abraham believed the promise.

And Abraham did not wait for visible evidence before trusting God. He believed in the God who “gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist” (Romans 4:17).

This is the New Covenant theme Paul gives us: Abraham trusted God for what had not yet appeared, while God reckoned Abraham righteous before that righteousness had been manifested.

Faith rests upon God's promise before the fulfillment can be seen.

The Complicated Relationship of the Church Fathers to Baptism in Water

It is sometimes claimed that the early church fathers were unanimous in teaching that "water baptism saves;" the person who believes in Christ is saved through faith only when that faith is followed by baptism. But there is another historical question that deserves attention: 

How did baptism become something that could be postponed for a lifetime by people who nevertheless considered themselves committed Christians, and then become urgently necessary when death was near? 

The evidence of the practices of the church fathers themselves is surprisingly difficult to reconcile with such a simple claim.

Baptized at or immediately before death

Constantine the Great (337)

• baptized during final illness, died shortly afterward.

Constantius II (361)

• baptized when facing his final crisis/illness, died shortly afterward.

Baptized because death appeared imminent, but survived

Novatian (c. 250)

• catechumen, gravely ill, received clinical baptism on his sickbed, recovered, later became a prominent Roman presbyter.

Baptized during illness but lived for years afterward

Theodosius I (380)

• baptized while ill, but lived another ~15 years.

1. Augustine's writings penned before he was baptized:

Augustine converted to Christianity in 386 and was baptized by Ambrose at Easter in 387. During the months between his conversion and baptism, while he was still a catechumen, he composed the famous Cassiciacum dialogues:

• Against the Academics (Contra Academicos)
• The Happy Life (De Beata Vita)
• On Order (De Ordine)
• Soliloquies (Soliloquia)

He also wrote letters to Nebridius during this period. Augustine himself later refers to these works in the Confessions, describing what he had written at Cassiciacum before his baptism.

There is also On the Immortality of the Soul (De immortalitate animae), which is generally associated with this same pre-baptismal period, although its exact chronology relative to the Cassiciacum works is less secure.

So we're talking about at least four major surviving works, and probably five, written by one of Christianity's most influential theologians while he was still technically a catechumen, or by some people's theology, "unsaved."

2. Ambrose - baptized after becoming bishop of Milan

Ambrose is perhaps the most astonishing example.

He was raised in a Christian family but had not yet been baptized when, in 374, the people of Milan suddenly chose him to become their bishop.

Theodoret reports that when the people demanded Ambrose as bishop:

“up to this time he was still unbaptized.”

He was then baptized and subsequently ordained/consecrated bishop.

And, of course, this is the same Ambrose who later defended the salvation of the unbaptized Valentinian.

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3. Basil the Great

Basil's delay wasn't because he rejected Christianity. Quite the opposite: he was raised within an intensely Christian household.

Interestingly, Basil later became strongly opposed to delaying baptism. He actually rebuked people who kept postponing it.

The practice of delayed baptism existed even among deeply committed Christian families, but later Christian leaders increasingly criticized the practice.

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4. Gregory Nazianzen - baptized around age 30

Gregory is another especially interesting case.

Gregory's own writings are particularly revealing because he later became an extremely strong advocate for timely baptism.

In Oration 40, he warns people not to use Christ's baptism at age thirty as an excuse for delaying their own baptism. He says, in effect, that Christ had a unique reason for waiting, whereas ordinary Christians face real danger in dying without baptism.

This is fascinating historically: Gregory himself had delayed baptism, yet later strongly opposed the practice.

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5. John Chrysostom 

Chrysostom was also raised in a Christian environment. His widowed mother, Anthusa, was a devoted Christian.

The same Chrysostom who himself had been baptized relatively late later described martyrdom as a form of baptism.

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6. Constantine the Great - baptized on his deathbed

He was not baptized until the final illness of his life, in 337.

Eusebius gives us an unusually detailed account. When Constantine became convinced that his death was approaching, he went to the church, confessed and prayed, and then summoned bishops to baptize him.

Constantine himself said:

“The hour has come in which I too may have the blessing of that seal which confers immortality.”

He had apparently hoped to be baptized in the Jordan, but instead was baptized at Nicomedia shortly before his death.  This delay was deliberate on his part.

The practice was connected in part with the widespread fourth-century concern that baptism remitted sins and that serious sins committed after baptism created a grave spiritual problem. Contemporary and later historians specifically identify Constantine as the classic example of this practice.

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7. Novatian - baptized during a serious illness

Novatian, a prominent third-century Roman theologian and later the leader of the Novatianist schism, was baptized while seriously ill and thought to be near death.

According to Cornelius of Rome, Novatian had been a catechumen when he became gravely ill:

“he was, therefore, given baptism by affusion as he lay on his bed.”

He survived, but apparently did not subsequently receive the other rites that normally accompanied baptism.

This is an early example of clinical baptism—baptism administered to someone on a sickbed because death seemed imminent.

Summary

These examples make the sweeping claim that the fathers simply taught “water baptism saves” far less adequate as a description of what they actually practiced. Their behavior suggests that the relationship between faith, baptism, forgiveness, and final absolution was considerably more complicated than that formula implies.