From faith to faith

For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “The just shall live by faith.” – Romans 1.16-17

The just shall live by faith is a regular them me in scripture going all the way back to the book of Genesis and the story of Abraham. Back before the Law we read that Abraham believed God and it was that which brought His righteousness. ‘The just shall live by faith’ is a common phrase.’

And that is why we need to not be ashamed of the gospel. It is only the gospel of faith in Christ that can save. There are no works good enough. There is no religion right enough. There is no philosophy strong enough. We have the message of hope for he world – ‘the just shall live by faith.’

But it goes deeper than that even. The life of the just ought to be a life of faith. That phrase ‘from faith to faith’ is a bit of an enigma. The commentaries have a lot of views and I don’t know enough Greek to dig it out myself.

I think the notion is this. The righteousness of Christ in us as we live by faith and the way to grow in faith is to exercise faith. Faith brings faith and that faith reveals God’s righteousness in our lives.

It all goes back to verse 16 – the gospel is the power of God to bring salvation. That produces the righteousness of Christ in my life as faith grows into deeper faith.