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Romans 4:17 |
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(As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, [even] God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.
Audio commentary on this verse
Note 6 at Rom. 4:17: The phrase, "and calleth those things which benot as though they were" is referring to the instance Paul had just cited when God changed Abram's name to Abraham (Gen. 17:5). The name Abram meant "high father." The name Abraham meant "father of a multitude." The Lord changed Abram's name to Abraham one year before the birth of Isaac, thus confessing that Abraham was the father of a multitude before it happened in the physical.
This illustrates God's faith. God says things are so before there is physical proof that they are so. The same thing was done at creation (Gen. 1). God spoke everything into existence and then it was so. He spoke light into existence and then four days later created a source for that light to come from (Gen. 1:3 with 14-19).
God has given us the power to create with faith-filled words (Prov. 18:20-21; see note 4 at Mk. 11:14, p. 422 and note 4 at Mk. 11:23, p. 426). If we are going to operate in God's kind of faith, we have to learn to call those things which are not as though they were.
