Romans 4

1What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found?

2For if Abraham was justified by works, he has a boast—but not before God.

3For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.

4To the one who works, the wages are not credited as a gift, but as an obligation.

5But to the one not working, but believing in the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.

6Just as David also speaks of the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:

7Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, and whose sins have been covered.

8Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will never count sin.

9Is this blessing, then, for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? For we say, “Faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness.”

10How then was it counted? While he was circumcised, or uncircumcised? Not while circumcised, but while uncircumcised.

11And he received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness of the faith that he had while uncircumcised, so that he might be the father of all who believe while uncircumcised, so that righteousness might be counted to them also,

12and the father of circumcision to those who are not merely circumcised, but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had while uncircumcised.

13For the promise to Abraham or to his offspring that he would be heir of the world was not through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

14For if those who are of the law are heirs, faith has been emptied and the promise has been nullified.

15For the law produces wrath, but where there is no law, neither is there transgression.

16For this reason it is by faith, so that it may be according to grace, in order that the promise may be certain to all the offspring—not only to those from the law, but also to those of 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 the things that are not as though they were.

18who, against hope, believed in hope, so that he might become the father of many nations, according to what had been spoken: “So shall your offspring be.”

19And without weakening in faith, he considered his own body as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and the deadness of Sarah’s womb.

20Yet regarding the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God.

21and being fully convinced that what he had promised, he was also able to do.

22Therefore it was counted to him as righteousness.

23It was not written for his sake alone that it was credited to him,

24but also for us, to whom it will be credited—to us who believe in the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead,

25who was handed over because of our trespasses and was raised for our justification.