Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Heir to the World

A. Heir not by law or Abraham doing good works

B. Heir thru Abrahams faith by his believing God

II.

14.

For if they which are of the law be heirs—If the blessing is to be earned by obedience to the law.

faith is made void—the whole divine method is subverted.

15.

Because the law worketh wrath—has nothing to give to those who break is but condemnation and vengeance.

for where there is no law, there is no transgression—It is just the law that makes transgression, in the case of those who break it; nor can the one exist without the other.

16, 17.

Therefore, &c.—A general summary: “Thus justification is by faith, in order that its purely gracious character may be seen, and that all who follow in the steps of Abraham’s faith—whether of his natural seed or no—may be assured of the like justification with the parent believer.”

17.

As it is written, &c.—(Ge 17:5).

This is quoted to justify his calling Abraham the “father of us all,” and is to be viewed as a parenthesis.

before—that is, “in the reckoning of.”

him whom he believed—that is, “Thus Abraham, in the reckoning of Him whom he believed, is the father of us all, in order that all may be assured, that doing as he did, they shall be treated as he was.”

even God, quickeneth the dead—The nature and greatness of that faith of Abraham which we are to copy is here strikingly described.

What he was required to believe being above nature, his faith had to fasten upon God’s power to surmount physical incapacity, and call into being what did not then exist.

But God having made the promise, Abraham believed Him in spite of those obstacles.

This is still further illustrated in what follows.