“And he believed the Lord and it counted it to him as righteousness.” (Genesis 15:6)
This is in a sense on the most important sentences in all the Bible. It’s not about Abraham after God has made promises to him and Genesis 15:6 says, Abraham believed God and God counted that to him, his believe to him as righteousness. How can you be counted righteous before God? And what scriptures teaching here and all over the Bible, this is the essence of the gospel is that the only way we can be made righteous before God is through believing in God through faith, through trusting in his promise. You think about it, this is how we are saved from our sins. So how do you come to salvation? Because it’s not through your works. It’s not … You do all these things and then God counts it to you as righteousness. No, it’s you believe.
Only through faith in Christ can sinners be counted as righteous.
This Verse Shows Its Belief in God
You believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins and rose from the dead. You confess him as Lord over all. And you believe that he is who he says he is. You believe that he has done what the Bible has said he has done. He’s lived a perfect. He’s died a substitutionary death on the cross for us. Then he’s risen from the grave.So what does Romans 9:10 say? “If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” That’s how we’re counted righteous before God through belief in him. Don’t forget, Christians you have put your faith in Christ. Don’t forget that the reason you’re counted righteous before God is not because of your works, it’s because of Christ’s work on your behalf and your belief in him.
And then flowing from that, live how? By faith. By belief in God. For instance, let your life be driven by belief in God. Believing his promises. Believing his word. Trusting that he knows what is best for your life. So live by faith. It’s what Paul says in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. I no longer live. The Christ lives in me. The life I now live today, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.”
Genesis 15:6 Prays In The Belief In God
So we pray, God we believe you. We believe your word. We believe that in Christ and what he did on the cross for us, we have salvation. And we trust in Jesus as our Savior and Lord. We know this is how we are brought into relationship with you. And then flowing from that, God we pray to you to help us to live by faith in you today.
Or help us to believe you all day long. Help us to believe your word, to believe your goodness, to believe in your guidance, to believe your promises. No matter what’s going on in our lives right now, I just I can only imagine there are people walking through some really challenging things who are listening to this right now. Therefore, Lord help them to believe your promises. Then God help us to live by faith in you. Just as we’ve been saved by faith in you, help us to live by faith in you today. So may it be said of our lives that we believed God and it was counted to us as righteousness. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
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David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
