Romans 4:17
What does Romans 4:17 mean?
As it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations.” This is in the presence of him whom he believed: God, who gives life to the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were.
The short answer
Romans 4:17 comes in the middle of Paul's long meditation on Abraham, and it packs two enormous ideas into a single sentence. First, Paul quotes the promise God made in Genesis: "I have made you a father of many nations." Then he describes the God who made that promise in two ways — as the one "who gives life to the dead" and who "calls the things that are not, as though they were."
Those two descriptions are the key to the verse. They answer an unspoken question: how could Abraham, an old man with a barren wife, believe such a promise? Paul's answer is that everything depends on who is doing the promising. A God who raises the dead and summons realities out of nothing is not limited by what already exists. Abraham's aged body and Sarah's empty womb were not obstacles to this God — they were the raw material of a miracle. Walter Brueggemann points to these two phrases as Paul's shorthand for resurrection and creation from nothing, the twin signs that God can do what the world calls impossible.
The quoted promise matters just as much as the power behind it. "Many nations" means the promise was never meant for one people alone. In the verses just before this one, Paul insists that the promise is guaranteed to all of Abraham's descendants — not only those who keep the Jewish law, but everyone who shares Abraham's faith. Charles Cousar observes that in Romans, Paul deliberately stresses this breadth: Abraham is the father of "all of us," Jew and Gentile alike.
So the verse holds two halves together. The character of God makes the promise believable, and the wording of the promise makes its reach universal. Abraham stood before a God for whom nothing is too hard, and the family that God promised him is open to anyone who trusts as he did.
What scholars say
Brueggemann reads the verse's two descriptions of God — raising the dead and calling nonexistent things into being — as Paul's declaration that God does the impossible, and a challenge to prayer that asks only for the plausible. Cousar, comparing this passage with Galatians 3, notes how Romans stresses the promise's breadth: Abraham is father of all who share his faith, adherents of the law or not.
“In the end, however, the one thing not possible is that an obedient Jesus should be rescued from suffering; in that suffering and death, faith reaches the edge of God's impossibility. In lyrical fashion, Paul lines out the great evangelical possibilities that open the world to joy. He speaks concerning the faith of Abraham, and declares the God of Abraham to be the one "who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist" (Rom. 4:17). In that doxological assertion Paul identifies resurrection of the dead and creation from nothing as the signs of God's power to do the impossible. The church, in much of its prayer life, has been cowardly and anemic, daring to pray only for that which the world regards as possible.”
“A brief comparison of our verse here with Romans 4:16–17 reveals something about Paul’s varying agenda: “For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise … may be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, ‘I have made you the father of many nations’)….” In Galatians 3 there is no such apparent breadth to Paul’s message or purpose regarding Abraham. Paul is here countering certain “adherents of the law” who are strongly suggesting or demanding that Gentile believers—who by definition are nonadherents of the law—become adherents. This is not the occasion for a broader consideration of “all” of Abraham’s “descendants.”
What it means for you
This verse invites an honest audit of our expectations. Brueggemann observes that much of the church's prayer life has been timid, asking only for what the world already considers possible. Romans 4:17 pushes back: if God raises the dead and creates from nothing, then a dead marriage, a lost cause, or a hopeless diagnosis is not the final word. Praying to this God means naming the impossible thing out loud.
It also settles the question of belonging. The family of Abraham is defined by faith, not ancestry or credentials. If you trust the God Abraham trusted, this promise includes you — that was Paul's point all along.
Romans 4 in context
Romans 4 is Paul's case study in justification by faith. He argues that Abraham was counted righteous because he believed God — before circumcision, before the law existed — so he can be the father of believing Gentiles as well as Jews. Verses 16–17 draw the conclusion: the promise rests on faith so it can be guaranteed to all of Abraham's descendants. Verse 17 then grounds that promise in God's character, setting up verses 18–21, where Abraham hopes against hope despite his age and Sarah's barrenness.