{"id":14660,"date":"2017-12-02T17:34:56","date_gmt":"2017-12-02T14:34:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/?p=14660"},"modified":"2017-12-02T17:34:56","modified_gmt":"2017-12-02T14:34:56","slug":"reflection-on-rom-43-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/reflection-on-rom-43-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Reflection on Rom 4:3-4"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><span style=\"color: #000080;\"><strong><em><a href=\"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Abraham-believed-God.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-14662\" src=\"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Abraham-believed-God-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Abraham-believed-God-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Abraham-believed-God.jpg 301w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>\u201cFor what does the Scripture say? \u2018Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.\u2019 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Here the Word of God highlights the example of Abraham. The preceding verse reads, <em>\u201cFor if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.\u201d<\/em> And the following verse continues, <em>\u201cAbraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.\u201d<\/em> Here the meaning of righteousness is more like \u2018justification\u2019. Man does unspeakable injustice to God by sinning. The holiness of God is infinite, and so an insult to God deserves the highest punishment. <!--more-->If a person offends his friend, he deserves punishment. If he offends his boss in the workplace, it carries a more severe punishment. If someone offended the commander during the war, one would be punished with the most severe punishment. The higher the authority \u2013 though offended in like manner \u2013 the higher the punishment. And God is the highest authority, therefore an offence against God deserves the highest punishment in accordance with justice. We can offend God by our sin, but we cannot make amends for the offence by our works. Only the One who is equal to God \u2013 the Son of God \u2013 can make just reparation for our offence. He did so by His death on the cross. He took on Himself the punishment for our sins, the just punishment.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">We need to understand what grace is. Grace means getting something that we do not deserve. Someone else paid for us, and we are given it for free. There is only one condition on our part \u2013 to receive it by faith.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Wages means getting the just reward for our work. In relation to God we cannot demand the just reward for our works, however good they may be. Jesus is the only One who can demand the just reward for His work. He paid the just price for our sins. The just reward for our deeds would be death, because the wages of sin is death. Jesus took the just reward for our sins \u2013 death, and thus obtained the right to grant us grace. He wants us to do the minimum \u2013 to believe.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Download: <a href=\"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Reflection-on-Rom-4_3-4.doc\">Reflection on Rom 4_3-4<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cFor what does the Scripture say? \u2018Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.\u2019 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt.\u201d Here the Word of God highlights the example of Abraham. The preceding verse reads, \u201cFor if Abraham was justified by works, he has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14660"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14660"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14663,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14660\/revisions\/14663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vkpatriarhat.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}