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<p>Having observed when Abraham was justified by faith, and why, for the honour of Abraham and for example to us who call him father, the apostle here describes and commends the faith of Abraham, where observe,</p>
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<p class="tab-1">I. Whom he believed: <i>God who quickeneth</i>. It is God himself that faith fastens upon: <i>other foundation can no man lay</i>. Now observe what in God Abraham’s faith had an eye to—to that, certainly, which would be most likely to confirm his faith concerning the things promised:—1. <i>God who quickeneth the dead</i>. It was promised that he should be <i>the father of many nations</i>, when he and his wife were now as good as dead (<a class="bibleref" title="Heb.11.11,Heb.11.12" href="/passage/?search=Heb.11.11,Heb.11.12"><span class="bibleref" title="Heb.11.11">Heb. 11:11</span>, <span class="bibleref" title="Heb.11.12">12</span></a>), and therefore he looks upon God as a God that could breathe life into dry bones. He that quickeneth the dead can do any thing, can give a child to Abraham when he is old, can bring the Gentiles, who are <i>dead in trespasses and sins</i>, to a divine and spiritual life, <a class="bibleref" title="Eph.2.1" href="/passage/?search=Eph.2.1">Eph. 2:1</a>. Compare <a class="bibleref" title="Eph.1.19,Eph.1.20" href="/passage/?search=Eph.1.19,Eph.1.20"><span class="bibleref" title="Eph.1.19">Eph. 1:19</span>, <span class="bibleref" title="Eph.1.20">20</span></a>. 2. <i>Who calleth things which are not as though they were</i>; that is, creates all things by the word of his power, as in the beginning, <a class="bibleref" title="Gen.1.3,2Cor.4.6" href="/passage/?search=Gen.1.3,2Cor.4.6"><span class="bibleref" title="Gen.1.3">Gen. 1:3</span>; <span class="bibleref" title="2Cor.4.6">2 Cor. 4:6</span></a>. The justification and salvation of sinners, the espousing of the Gentiles that had not been a people, were a gracious calling of things which are not as though they were, giving being to things that were not. This expresses the sovereignty of God and his absolute power and dominion, a mighty stay to faith when all other props sink and totter. It is the holy wisdom and policy of faith to fasten particularly on that in God which is accommodated to the difficulties wherewith it is to wrestle, and will most effectually answer the objections. It is faith indeed to build upon the all-sufficiency of God for the accomplishment of that which is impossible to anything but that all-sufficiency. Thus Abraham became <i>the father of many nations before him whom he believed</i>, that is, in the eye and account of God; or <i>like him whom he believed</i>; as God was a common Father, so was Abraham. It is by faith in God that we become accepted of him, and conformable to him.</p>
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<p class="tab-1">II. How he believed. He here greatly magnifies the strength of Abraham’s faith, in several expressions. 1. <i>Against hope, he believed in hope</i>, <a class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.18" href="/passage/?search=Rom.4.18">Rom. 4:18</a>. There was a hope against him, a natural hope. All the arguments of sense, and reason, and experience, which in such cases usually beget and support hope, were against him; no second causes smiled upon him, nor in the least favoured his hope. But, against all those inducements to the contrary, he believed; for he had a hope for him: <i>He believed in hope</i>, which arose, as his faith did, from the consideration of God’s all-sufficiency. <i>That he might become the father of many nations</i>. Therefore God, by his almighty grace, enabled him thus to believe against hope, that he might pass for a pattern of great and strong faith to all generations. It was fit that he who was to be the father of the faithful should have something more than ordinary in his faith—that in him faith should be set in its highest elevation, and so the endeavours of all succeeding believers be directed, raised, and quickened. Or this is mentioned as the matter of the promise that he believed; and he refers to <a class="bibleref" title="Gen.15.5" href="/passage/?search=Gen.15.5">Gen. 15:5</a>; <i>So shall thy seed be</i>, as the stars of heaven, so innumerable, so illustrious. This was that which he believed, when it was counted to him for righteousness, <a class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.6" href="/passage/?search=Rom.4.6">Rom. 4:6</a>. And it is observable that this particular instance of his faith was <i>against hope</i>, against the surmises and suggestions of his unbelief. He had just before been concluding hardly that he should go childless, that one born in his house was his heir (<a class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.2,Rom.4.3" href="/passage/?search=Rom.4.2,Rom.4.3"><span class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.2">Rom. 4:2</span>, <span class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.3">3</span></a>); and this unbelief was a foil to his faith, and bespeaks it a believing against hope. 2. <i>Being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body</i>, <a class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.19" href="/passage/?search=Rom.4.19">Rom. 4:19</a>. Observe, His own body was now dead—become utterly unlikely to beget a child, though the new life and vigour that God gave him continued after Sarah was dead, witness his children by Keturah. When God intends some special blessing, some child of promise, for his people, he commonly puts a sentence of death upon the blessing itself, and upon all the ways that lead to it. Joseph must be enslaved and imprisoned before he be advanced. But Abraham did not consider this, <b><i>ou katenoese</i></b>—<i>he did not dwell in his thoughts upon it</i>. He said indeed, <i>Shall a child be born to him that is a hundred years old</i>? <a class="bibleref" title="Gen.17.17" href="/passage/?search=Gen.17.17">Gen. 17:17</a>. But that was the language of his admiration and his desire to be further satisfied, not of his doubting and distrust; his faith passed by that consideration, and thought of nothing but the faithfulness of the promise, with the contemplation whereof he was swallowed up, and this kept up his faith. <i>Being not weak in faith, he considered not</i>. It is mere weakness of faith that makes a man lie poring upon the difficulties and seeming impossibilities that lie in the way of a promise. Though it may seem to be the wisdom and policy of carnal reason, yet it is the weakness of faith, to look into the bottom of all the difficulties that arise against the promise. 3. <i>He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief</i> (<a class="bibleref" title="Rom.4.20" href="/passage/?search=Rom.4.20">Rom. 4:20</a>), and he therefore staggered not because he considered not the frowns and discouragements of second causes; <b><i>ou diekrithe</i></b>—<i>he disputed not</i>; he did not hold any self-consultation about it, did not take time to consider whether he should close with it or no, did no
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