What Grace Teaches Us
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Intro:
Intro:
Good morning!
It is a wonderful testament to God’s love, mercy and grace that we are here this morning.
Have you ever thought about that?
How do you think of worship? In what TERMS do you think of worship?
Do you think of worship as a mandate? (Well, it is!) — We MUST worship God in Spirit and in Truth! (John 4:24)
But is it ONLY a mandate?
No, it’s also a PRIVILEGE, and OPPORTUNITY, something we GET to do, not something we should BEGRUDGINGLY do in order to just check off a box for the week!
It’s an opportunity to come before a holy God and simply say, “Thank you for what you’ve done for me!”
As we PRAISE HIM, as we reflect on what He has done, as we sing to Him — Col. 3:16 says “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with GRACE in your hearts to the Lord.”
The verse right before that says - “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be THANKFUL!”
Are you truly thankful for what the Lord has done in your life?
Because you show me a Christian that is THANKFUL, and you’ll show me a Christian that you won’t have to BEG to come to worship services, and to participate and to sing and to do his or her part!
They will naturally do those things because those things EXUDE from a person who is truly thankful!
This morning, in light of the GRACE that was mentioned in our singing in Col. 3:16, and in light of the face that this is the grace that exudes from OUR hearts, and in light of the fact that the grace that flows out of our hearts is reciprocal/proportional to the grace that was shown from GOD …
We want to examine the topic of “What Grace Teaches Us!”
(This is an incredibly important topic).
(And much of the religious world around us doesn’t get this right at all.)
Most probably take things way too far in the direction of “grace only,” while neglecting human responsibility; a few take things too far the other direction and more or less act like grace doesn’t exist.
BOTH are wrong!
So we embark on our study of What Grace Teaches Us …
Titus 2:11-15:
Titus 2:11-15:
Titus 2:11-12
For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age,
Notice first of all in v. 11 that the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to ALL MEN …
That’s important because it shows that Jesus gave an opportunity for His grace to be available to all men …
That does NOT teach, however, universalism (the idea that everyone will be saved) — There are too many clear cut passages that clearly teach that that will not be the case.
However, God does DESIRE that all men would be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (1 Tim. 2:4).
Jesus is the Mediator of said salvation (1 Tim. 2:5), as He says in John 14:6 — “I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father except through me.”
But secondly, notice in Titus 2:11-12 that grace TEACHES us something.
Again, just as there is a proper way to REACT to the fact that we worship God with thankful hearts, so there is a proper way to react to His saving grace!
Maybe you have sung “His grace reaches me” — a beautiful song!
Well, also, His grace TEACHES me as well!
Teaches me what?
“Teaching us that DENYING ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in the present age!”
That’s a mandate (in other words, a command) …
But it’s also a PRIVILEGE, something I GET to do as well!
I get the privilege of representing Christ by the way I live my life!
Jesus is the (capital ‘L’) Light of the world!
And you know what He tells me? He tells me that I am to be the (lowercase ‘L’) light of the world, too, as I represent Him to the world — Matt. 5:14
“You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.
I can’t do that properly if I don’t deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, if I don’t live soberly (in a self-controlled way), if I don’t live righteously and godly in this present world!
GRACE teaches me that! (Without God’s grace, I’m nobody!)
And praise be to God, and THANKS be to God that Somebody named Jesus Christ came to save me!
The least I could do for Him is LIVE for Him!
Titus 2:13-15
looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works. Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you.
Remind you of last week’s sermon? (Scratches head: “What was last week’s sermon?”)
Remember, the substance of things hoped for?!
:)
Paul says we are to LOOK FOR the blessed hope (The Christian truly should be the eternal optimist)!
The blessed hope and the glorious appearing of Jesus!
Then there’s a recap of the Gospel when he writes — “who gave Himself for us, that He might REDEEM us from every lawless deed and PURIFY for Himself His own special people, **ZEALOUS for good works!!!**”
Now, tell me what grace teaches us?!
And tell me that good works aren’t important! (That’s sarcasm, because this tells us that our good works are VERY important!)
We do them BECAUSE of what Jesus did for US!
Paul finishes this section up by saying - “Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you.”
In short, PREACH IT, preacher!
You’ve got authority from God to say it!
To say what? All this we’ve been looking at, plus everything earlier in the chapter, too! (Don’t forget that!)
Plus everything else that the Bible talks about!
So grace, then, teaches us a lot!
Romans 6:1-7:
Romans 6:1-7:
Now this is one of my most oft quoted passages in Scripture, but for good reason because it’s extremely important!
Paul jumps in on Romans chapter 6 and preemptively answers those who would take what he says in the previous chapters to an incorrect extreme.
“Oh, so you’re saying that we don’t DESERVE what Christ did for us (because we all sin), and you’re telling us that grace is the critical component, without which we would have no hope?”
“Well then! I like the sound of that. I might as well sin it up, get more grace, and glorify God because of more grace!”
Right???
WRONG!
And Paul goes into that in the entire chapter of Romans chapter 6 (and also goes into it in chapters 7 and 8)!
Paul ends up getting personal, going into his own personal struggle with sin, and he refers to himself and says: “O WRETCHED man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Rom. 7:24)
O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
The answer is, Jesus!
Rom. 7:25
I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.
Look at chapter 6 now.
Rom. 6:1-2
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
You can keep reading, but Paul goes into the fact that we were made DEAD to sin when we obeyed Christ’s Gospel.
That takes place when we are baptized into Christ! (That reenacts the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ).
And in the rest of the chapter he shows that we are no longer to be servants of SIN, but servants of RIGHTEOUSNESS through Jesus Christ!
Again … GRACE … TEACHES US … We are to be servants of RIGHTEOUSNESS, which means LIVING righteously!
But I want to go now to another verse while we are thinking along those lines, and that is:
Luke 17:10.
Because if we aren’t careful, we can begin to have this mentality of “Look at me!” “Look at what I have done!” “God OWES me!”
No you don’t!
Brethren, God demands our very best! And yet, when you truly think about it, is our “very best” good ENOUGH?!
If it was, then what would have been the need in sending Jesus?!
So likewise you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.’ ”
We know God DEMANDS our best, but at the end of the day, we’re still “unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do!”
We’re still subject to the fact that “there is NONE righteous, no, not one!” (Rev. 3:10)
That’s where Jesus Christ comes in, that’s where God’s GRACE comes in, and makes up for what we could never do!
One more main verse we want to look at, and then a passage to compare it to …
John 1:14:
John 1:14:
John 1:14
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
Jesus is the ultimate bodily fulfillment of these wonderful things called “grace” and “truth!”
The important thing we need to remember is that these things do not conflict with one another.
How could two things who characterize the perfect person in Jesus Christ conflict with one another?!
Grace and truth, then, are not mutually exclusive!
As I’ve said in a sermon before, and I’ll say it again here — Don’t let anyone fool you into making a false dichotomy (or false dilemma) out of grace and truth!
Speaking of that, earlier this week I saw something about an Andy Stanley sermon from about 10 years ago.
(Andy Stanley is a false teacher who’s off on a lot of things, and heads up a megachurch in Atlanta and has a bunch of satellite churches as well).
But Andy Stanley came out (pun intended, I suppose) as more or less affirming homosexuals in his congregation recently, and there was a big uproar about it (rightly so).
But this video I saw pointed out that Andy Stanley has been like this for a long time!
It showed his sermon called “When Gracie met Truthie,” (a “cutesy” and ironic title because there was no truth in the sermon!), which included a bizarre story that he told his congregation about 10 years ago.
He tells the story of how this married couple got divorced because the husband left the wife for another man!
Now, Andy Stanley calls out the man for doing this claiming “you’ve commited adultery.”
(But what you notice in the video is that Stanley doesn’t say ANYTHING about the other elephant in the room — you know, the homosexuality!)
He even talks about how this guy who got with another MAN was not allowed to be on a service committee in the church (“because the divorce wasn’t final yet, so he shouldn’t have been with anyone else.”)
Um, any other problems Mr. Stanley?
(Yes, he was living in open homosexuality!)
But you see, when people go to extremes — in this case, all “grace, grace, grace” at the expense of “truth” — we run into massive problems!
Both grace AND truth are important, and they are BOTH embodied by Jesus Christ!
Finally, 1 Cor. 6:9-11:
Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.
What does this passage teach? It teaches that people before they came to Christ WERE those things, but they repented, they obeyed the Gospel, and now, they were washed, justified, and sanctified!
He goes on at the end of the chapter and says, “For you were BOUGHT AT A PRICE; therefore GLORIFY God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s!”
What’s that a depiction of?
It’s a depiction of God’s GRACE … and our RESPONSE to His grace!
It is the grace of God that teaches us these things!
Conclusion:
Conclusion:
“There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains. Lose all their guilty stains, lose all their guilty stains. And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains.”
When’s the last time you sang that song, and a tear came to your eye?
You see, when Christians truly get it, you don’t have to BEG them to come to worship services, to sing, to give, to study, to pray, to serve and so forth!
Christian, do you get it?!
One cannot properly reflect on the words of that hymn “There is a Fountain” (and many like it), nor reflect on verses like “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (the ungodly),” and not truly APPRECIATE what He did for us!
It is His GRACE that teaches us what we need to know, and Christians truly dedicated … RESPOND to that grace in lives lived faithfully!