Why did Jesus come?

Welcome

Holiday seasons

Christmas trees, singing, cookies, and then January we move on.

We never stop and ask Why did Jesus come?

Dietrich Bonhoeffer movie

Shannon and I recently went to see this movie last week. Very eye opening. Encourage you to see it, I’ll take you if you want to go. Brief overview of who Bonhoeffer was.

Pastor. Martyr. Prophet. Spy

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) was a German Lutheran pastor, theologian, and anti-Nazi activist whose spiritual and theological insights have profoundly shaped Christian thought. A vocal opponent of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime, Bonhoeffer became a key figure in the Confessing Church, which resisted the Nazi-controlled German church. His writings, especially The Cost of Discipleship, emphasize the difference between "cheap grace" (grace without discipleship) and "costly grace" (grace that demands commitment and sacrifice). Bonhoeffer's deep understanding of Christian ethics, combined with his courage in standing up to evil, has inspired generations of believers to live out their faith with integrity, moral responsibility, and a commitment to justice. His involvement in the resistance against Hitler led to his arrest and execution in 1945, but his life and writings continue to influence spiritual seekers, offering a powerful example of living a life of radical discipleship, even in the face of tremendous personal sacrifice.

As I was watching I was just blown away at how serious his faith was to his life. Every moment, every decision, everything he did was because of his faith.

He let the grace of Jesus Christ truly enter into every domain of his life. Here was a man who fully surrendered all that he had unto the Lord. Because of grace.

That is why Jesus came as a baby. Because of grace.

But a very specific kind of grace. Bonhoeffer describes 1 kind of grace this way called Cheap Grace.

“Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Unfortunately I think cheap grace is something a lot of us are all to familiar with.

We live in a time where following Jesus can fall anywhere on this spectrum. In other areas of the world, or time periods like Bonhoeffer. You were either all in following him or you weren’t at all.

Today we have an all over the place option to pick from. And a lot of us lazily follow and accept cheap grace.

Yet.

That is not why Jesus came.

Jesus didn’t come so that we could read 1 verse from the book of Luke to make our conscience feel good before we totally abandon Him the rest of Christmas. Christ came because of so much more.

Let’s open our bibles to Titus 2.

Grace and Grit: Living Out Our Faith

Bible Passage: Titus 2:11–14

1. Grace: A Global Gift

Titus 2:11

Titus 2:11 ESV

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,

Grace has appeared and His name is Jesus!

Luke 1:31–32 ESV

And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,

He is here! Praise the Lord that in his Grace he sent Jesus.

Jesus came because of His grace, mercy and compassion for His people that were broken and not where they should be.

The latter part of this verse says ‘bringing salvation for all people.’

The greek word for salvation here is σωτήριος (soterios) from the root word σῴζω which means to save OR deliver. Jesus came to deliver you.

We are in the season of black fridays and cyber mondays and month long christmas deals. It never ends!!

Maybe many of us have bought a lot of gifts for ourselves or for others.

Isn’t it incredible when you buy that gift. You purchased it with your money and you can’t wait for that package to arrive on your front steps so that you can have it. It’s yours now!

It’s the same way with God and what he did for us. We were broken and in

God sent his son Jesus because of grace. To deliver you! So that he could come get you and bring you to the front steps of the Lords house. Where we are supposed to be.

Oh and the price. Jesus paid for it, he purchased it. Jesus didn’t just pay for the price he also delivered you to the presence of the Lord to be transformed because of his GRACE for you.

Grace is not just something that took place a couple thousand years ago. Grace is something that is a current reality that demands a response from YOU.

If Jesus came to deliver YOU.

What is your response to Jesus coming to deliver you?

If it’s yes, then we must consider this cheap grace we read about to not be the way. It can’t be the way to respond to the extraordinary arrival of Grace onto the scene here.

Let’s continue in Titus 2.

2. Grit: Grace In Action

Titus 2:12 ESV

training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age,

We just had a great series on Holy Living. Recap for a few.

It can seem overwhelming or maybe even legalistic, which neither of them are true.

The reason being, grace. Grace here gives us the power and freedom to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

Knowing that the life Jesus came to deliver me from was a dead one. Grace opens my eyes to the real true life we have in our savior Jesus.

If I have Jesus in my life then I have grace in my life. Day after day after day.

James 4:6 ESV

But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”

But he gives more grace.

That is the way we need to go and live our lives each day. Recognizing this truth.

I used to get so nervous when I would preach or lead worship.

As I would get ready I would just be thinking how I didn’t want to mess up. I even had this thinking when i played sports.

I can’t mess up, I don’t want to mess this up. etc.

How enjoyable do you think that was for me?

Yet, so many of us do that when we live our lives. Especially if your view of following Jesus is off.

We live each day thinking I can’t mess up, I don’t want to mess up.

How enjoyable do you think each day is for you if that is how we lived?

The last couple of years my passion for what I love overgrew my fear of failing.

I knew I’d probably make a mistake here or there, but that didn’t drive me. My passion to worship the Lord which I love is what drove me, preaching the word of God gets me pumped up.

Now I don’t get nervous because when I go up I’m not thinking I can’ t mess this up. I am thinking I can’t wait to worship God right now and that’s all I was thinking.

Do the mistakes come, yeah, you’ll hear them.

But I know there is grace. Which gives me the freedom to joyfully worship and preach instead of fearfully avoid messing up.

It’s like I tell my team. Sometimes we are playing not to lose, fearful and scared. Versus playing to win. Bold and confident.

Because of grace, we can be bold and confident even knowing there will be mistakes.

Are you following Jesus fearful of mistakes or confident in grace?

3. Glory: Hope Drives Holiness

Titus 2:13

Titus 2:13 ESV

waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,

We are waiting.

It is so important to look back and celebrate Christmas. To remember, because we are often forgetful people. But when we look backwards it should drive us to look forward to the time he is going to come back again.

We also wait with hope. We don’t wait on the edge of our seats wondering if we are going to win the game. We don’t wait with our arms crossed like yeah right like thats gonna happen. We don’t wait focusing on something else.

We are waiting with hope knowing what he has done before he will do again.

But often we all too focus on the things of this world. Things that are here today and gone tomorrow. Transient things. Which means things that only last for a moment.

During the Bonhoeffer movie there was this small scene when he was talking to his sister.

They were reminiscing about their brother and other things when they were younger and how they would just look up into the sky and say

Eternity, Eternity, Eternity

For some reason that small scene hit me. I couldn't stop thinking about that.

Eternity, eternity, eternity.

Picture a line going around this whole room. This little dot is your existence, and this even smaller dot is your time in school.

How much of our time, of our thinking, of our frustration, of our anxiety, is over this tiny little dot.

We worry so much and do so much based off if people like me.

We get all amped up and upset when I have a full pimples on my face.

We get all angry and lose our minds when we don’t get into the college we wanted to.

We react as though this dot is all there is. When in reality, all of this.

Eternity, eternity, eternity exists.

Jude 21 ESV

keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.

Do you live your life in light of eternity, eternity, eternity?

4. Good Works: Our Godly Identity

Titus 2:14

Titus 2:14 ESV

who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Christ gave himself up, on the cross to die for our sins. So that we would be forgiven. So that would be made right before God. So that we would have eternal life with God. So that we would be transformed into the image of Christ, holy and purified.

The cross has become not a symbol of death to the end. But it has become a symbol of death to ourselves and a true life in Jesus.

Bonhoeffer said this about the cross.

Thus it begins; the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise god-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

We must lay all our treasures down. We must lay all our idols down. We must lay all the transient things of this world down before the cross.

As the disciples were called, they left everything in the boat.

Are you trying to bring something along with you?

As the disciples were called, they left immediately.

Are you hanging around waiting for when your ready or done having fun?

As the disciples were called, they left their family.

Are you willing to leave your family and friends to follow Jesus?

As the disciples were called, they only followed Him.

Are you chasing after multiple things in this life?

As the disciples were called, they said yes.

Will you?

Even if it means death, a physical death, a reputation death, a career death, a friendship death.

Come and die.

Bonhoeffer took that call seriously. It was costly grace and he recognized it as such.

This is what that grace meant to Bonhoeffer.

Costly grace is the gospel...

Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: "ye were bought at a price," and

What has cost God much cannot be cheap for us.

... Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.”

We are waiting. We look back to celebrate this costly grace that was wiling to be born so that it would be willing to die. From the moment Jesus took his first breath he marched every single day towards that cross for you and for me.

We are waiting. We look forward to the day he returns and we live every single day as though it were soon. Because of costly grace we do this.

This is why Jesus came. Because of Costly grace given to us.