March 03

Once I had the opportunity to explain how to play football to my wife.  I went through the concept of offense versus defense and the various positions as well as the responsibilities of each.  When I finished, she asked a very profound question: “What causes the action to start?”  This month we will consider grace, the thing that gets people to accept Christ, empowers them to work in the church and be transformed into the likeness of Christ.  The first aspect of grace is unmerited favor making salvation a free gift:

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Ro.6:23)

Eternal life is a gift of God.  We do not earn, it but it is offered free to everyone:

Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. (Ro.4:4)

One of the most difficult things for sinful man to grasp is that God not only forgives our sin, but he gives it as a free gift.  He could have asked anything for eternal life, yet to ask for anything would only cheapen His Son’s life.  Once there was a missionary in India who made friends with a devote but poor Hindu.  A Hindu believes that when he dies, if one lives a good life he is reincarnated as a higher life form.  If one lives a bad life you are reincarnated as a lower life form.  If one lives a series of good lives, then one eventually becomes god.  The missionary kept presenting Christ to the Hindu, and every time he responded, “It is too cheep, too cheep to be true.”  One day the Hindu came to say good bye; he was going on a final pilgrimage to some city.  He was going there on his knees, praying in the hope of gaining a better next life.  The Hindu presented the missionary with a small gift.  The missionary opened the little box and in it was a very large but perfect pearl.  The missionary was taken back by the worth of the gift and asked why he did not sell it.  The Hindu told the story of his only son, a pearl diver.  On the dive that took his life, he stayed down too long.  When he came up he had that pearl in his bag.  I could never sell it, for to receive anything in exchange for it would only cheapen my son’s life.  And now l give it to you as I will die on my pilgrimage, for I valued your friendship even though we could not agree.  The missionary’s eyes lit up.  He responded to the Hindu, “Friend don’t you see, all these years you have been telling me that my salvation was too cheep because God gave it free; but just like you, to place any value on it would only lessen how much he valued His Son’s life.” Yes, salvation is free, for it cost God so much and that is the heart of grace

So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace.  And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace. (Ro.11:5-6)

Man cannot do anything to receive eternal life otherwise it would not be grace.  Many people do not realize that even to require the sinner’s prayer is a work, if it is perceived as originating in man.  If we need to believe to be saved, then the act of faith causes us to earn salvation making it a wage and not a gift.  However, we read:

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--  not by works, so that no-one can boast. (Eph.2:8-9; Ac.15:11)

Our faith is not from ourselves; it is the gift of God by his grace.  Our faith comes from Christ:

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (He.12:2)

Yes, I made a decision to receive Christ; but it was God's grace which brought me to that decision.  He molds our will in the same way that a potter shapes clay on the potter’s wheel:

For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.  (Php.2:13)

God does not work against our will rather he empowers it to make the right decisions.  The Bible teaches us that it was by God's grace that we believed what we were told:

On arriving, he was a great help to those who by grace had believed. (Ac.18:27; Php.1:29)

We could not make a decision for Christ because our will was set against Christ:

All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. (Eph 2:3)

Before we accepted Christ, we denied Christ’s Lordship as we indulged in sin, being controlled by our sin nature:

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. (Co.2:13)   

A dead person cannot respond to anything; God had to make us alive and able to respond to the good news about Christ:

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions— it is by grace you have been saved. (Eph.2:4-5)

We were deadened by our sins, unable to save ourselves; however, God’s grace quickens our hearts enabling us to respond to the gospel:

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.  (Jn.6:44; Jn.6:65; Co.1:12)

Just like a bug on a summer’s night is drawn to the light, it was God who drew you to himself.  You might make the decision to accept God; but just as with Lydia, God opens our hearts to respond:

Ac.16:14    One of those listening was a woman named Lydia,  . . .  the Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. (; Ac.13:48)

Apart from this initial act of grace none of us would have turned to God.  Paul was on his way to Damascus to persecute Christians:

Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest  and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem.        (Ac.9:1-2)

He did not reach out to God; God reached down to him, stopping him in his tracks and drawing him unto himself:

As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.  He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"  "Who are you, Lord?" Saul asked. "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting," he replied.  "Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do." (Ac.9:3-6)

Paul later in life refers to God’s drawing him on that Damascus road:

But when God, who set me apart from birth and called me by his grace, was pleased  to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not consult any man, (Ga.1:15-16)

Paul had no desire and made no effort.  In fact his effort was to destroy the church.  Yet, God’s grace took hold of him as it took hold of us:

It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. (Ro.9:16; Php.1:6)

Grace, by definition, denies man any credit for coming to Christ in either effort or desire:

God, who has saved us and called us to a holy life— not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time,  but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, (2Ti.1: 8-10)

Therefore we are saved by grace and grace alone; our desire to come to Christ is a product of that grace, otherwise grace would not be grace.

 

            One of the greatest problems in the gospel message is people teaching others about the grace that saves but not the grace that sanctifies.  We need to go beyond saving grace to a second aspect of God’s grace: sanctifying grace which is God's Riches At Christ's Expense:

All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God’s grace in all its truth. (Co.1:6)

The truth about grace is that it not only saves, the grace of God completes his work:

Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Php.1:6)

The grace to be saved is but a small sampling of all that God's grace wants to do in the lives of people.  Take note of the modifiers used in conjunction with grace in the following verses:

·             And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you.” (2Co.9:14)

·             For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. (Ro.5:17)

·             From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. (Jn.1:16)

·             The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. (1Ti.1:14)

Grace is more then coming to God and having our sins forgiven, for we are to continue in grace:

When the congregation was dismissed, many of the Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who talked with them and urged them to continue in the grace of God. (Ac.13:43)

If we are sharing with someone raised in the church, we need to express that grace only came with Christ:

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Christ. (Jn.1:17; Ro.1:5)

The experience of people in the Old Testament is totally different then Christians in the New Testament because of grace.  The difference between law and grace is: law says, ”Do this and you shall live”;  while grace says, “You have received life now walk therein.”  To try to live by law after we received Christ, violates grace:

You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace.  But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. (Ga.5:4-5)

Our holiness is from God as a product of his grace; for if it was of ourselves, it could have come by the law:

I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing. (Ga.2:21)

Law is opposed to grace, has law requires effort from man to attain a certain standard.  Grace enables man to live to the standard.   For grace freed us from our slavery to sin and continues to change man’s actions:

For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.  What then?  Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace?  By no means! (Ro.6:14-15)

Today the church has equated grace with mercy.  Mercy is reactive, forgiving us for the sins we have committed. 

Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. (He.4:16)

Grace is proactive.  Not only does it changes the very nature of man, it empowers us to say no to sin; it enables us to live for God:

For the grace of God that beings salvation has appeared to all men.  It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, (Ti.2:11-12)

If we are not saying “no” to ungodliness and worldly passions, then we do not have the grace of God that saves.  God’s saving grace changes our nature, transforming it into his:

But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth.. (2Th.2:13)

We do not become like Christ because of our own effort; we are being transformed by his Spirit.  Our holiness is a product of God:

Now this is our boast: our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially in our relations with you, in the holiness and sincerity that are from God.  We have done so not according to worldly wisdom but according to God’s grace. (2Co.1:12)

God’s grace instills holiness, yet many false teachers claim that God’s grace merely forgives sin:

For certain men whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you.  They are godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord. (Jude 4)

If we relegate grace to the realm of mercy, rendering it a cover-up for sin and thereby rejecting its power to transform lives, we will not only deceive lives but also will have received God’s grace in vain:

God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.  As God’s fellow workers we urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. (2Co.5:21-6:1)

Today, many have received God’s grace in vain as they claim to have received the grace that saves but do not reflect the grace that sanctifies.  Their lives are void of holiness.

You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God?  Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.  Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to live in us envies intensely?  But He gives us more grace.  That is why Scripture says, ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. (Ja.4:4-6)

God gives grace to the humble because the humble give God the glory.  God gives us abundant grace; it is proactive, which empowers and effects the total person:

When he arrived and saw the evidence of the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts. (Ac.11:23)

Therefore, if we have the grace that saves, it is accompanied by the grace that sanctifies, one that transforms our life to be like Christ’s.

 

            A study of grace would not be complete if it did not include the reason why God gives us his grace.  God gives us the grace that saves because he has a purpose for our lives after we are saved:

God, who has saved us and called us to a holy life— not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, (2Ti.1:9)

God not only gives the grace to be saved and sanctified, he gives us the grace to serve. 

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith— and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—  not by works, so that no one can boast.  For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Eph.2:8-10)

We are God’s workmanship to do good works which he has equipped us to do:

God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. (2Co.9:8)

Notice the “all” inclusives of the previous verse so that we can accomplish the work of God.  It is God’s grace that gives us our spiritual gifts to be used in the furtherance of His kingdom:

We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. (Ro.12:6)

God’s grace takes various forms, for a body is not just made of one part but many parts working to one goal:

Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms. (1Pe.4:10)

God has a specific purpose for you to accomplish in his body for which he has not only empowered you but also entrusted you to this purpose:

There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit.  There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord.  There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men.  Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. (1Co.12:4-7)

Paul received God’s grace on the road to Damascus, which equipped him for a life of ministry:

I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's grace given me through the working of his power.  Although I am less than the least of all God's people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, (Eph.3:7-8;  Ac.14:26)

You cannot claim to participate in God’s grace without acknowledging that you are equipped to fulfill his purpose.  There is no one who is exempt; we are not given grace to only be saved, rather grace is given that we might serve:

But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it.   ….    It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, (Eph.4:7&11)

In all that we are or ever hope to be, we can claim none of it for our own merit We must give God the glory:

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. (1Co.15:10)

Grace draws us to God, transforms our lives, and equips us for service. Therefore, the whole of the Christian life can be summed up in one word: grace