Three Five Letter Words
THREE FIVE LETTER WORDS
INTRODUCTION
Today my sermon is going to be on three five letter words. Usually we use as an idiom to refer to curse words as four letter word. But very much the opposite the three five letter words that I want to talk about today are not curse words but they are some of the greatest words in Christianity. It is amazing that in one verse in the Bible all three of them come together to demonstrate one truly AWESOME truth.
TEXT
Eph 2:1-9
(1) And you were dead in the trespasses and sins
(2) in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—
(3) among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
(4) But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
(5) even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
(6) and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
(7) so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
(8) For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
(9) not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
[Pray]
INTRO
In our text today Paul is explaining the marvelous nature of great salvation that we have through Jesus Christ. In the second chapter of Ephesians Paul tells us very plainly what our problem was and what unregenerate mankind is facing. He says, “You were DEAD in your trespasses and your sins.” D-E-A-D. Being dead is a very serious problem. You cannot be kinda dead or sorta dead. You are either dead or alive. That is a switch with no middle ground. It is either one or the other.
Leonard Ravenhill said words the effect that is not the job of the ministry to “make bad men good but to make dead men LIVE.”
That was our status we were in the state of walking after the temptations of life. We were once lead around bout the lusts of the flesh and living according to our own will and our own wrath. And that is also the state of everyone who are currently lost in sin.
Look at verses four through 7:
(4) But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
(5) even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
(6) and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
(7) so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
God is rich in mercy! And because of His great love, He made a way for sinful mankind to be reconciled to himself. Jesus Christ is our great Savior, He is our Hero, He is our Champion. Singlehandedly Jesus Canceled the power of Death, Hell and the Grave. By dying for our sins He Satisfied our need for a sinless sacrifice, and by raising Himself from the Grave he secured for us an eternal life with Him. His death and resurrection means abundance of Life for all those wo believe in Him.
People often want to know if in heaven will we know everything about God. Verse seven answers that question. In the coming ages He will show the immeasurable riches of His grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. This means that throughout eternity we will always be learning more and be discovering more about God’s goodness, His grace, His Kindness, Mercy and on and on it goes. We will never know everything there is to know about Him because He is Immeasurable. We will never plumb the depths of his Love. That is why being in heaven will never be boring or dull because there will always be something new to learn about God.
Verse 8 is our key verse today.
(8) For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
In this verse we see three Awesome five letter words come together to explain our salvation.
WORD #1:GRACE
G-R-A-C-E
I heard a great preacher describe grace using an acrostic.
God’s
Riches
At
Christ’s
Expense
I think that is the perfect way to understand grace. Grace by it’s very nature is undeserved. Someone wanted to know what the difference between grace and mercy was. And here it is. Mercy is where we don’t get the punishment that we deserve and Grace is where we receive the blessings that we don’t deserve. God is rich in both Grace and Mercy. Out salvation is based on both of those attributes.
The word for Grace in the Old Testament was also often translated “Lovingkindness” If you have been watching the Wednesday night bible studies we have been talking about God’s loving kindness quite a bit. But His lovingkindness is essentially His grace.
There is another major misconception that many people have regarding salvation that is cleared up by verse 8. That misconception is that we are saved by faith. Quite clearly we see that we are “saved by grace.” That means that Salvation was the gift of God. It was the unmerited favor of God that was extended to us by virtue of the work of Christ. Get that the Work of Christ. It is not by our works otherwise we would puff ourselves up. We are incapable of saving ourselves. We needed a champion to rescue us from the power of Sin.
THIS MISCONCEPTION CAN BE FURTHER DESCRIBED BY THIS ILLUSTRATION.
You have a problem, Say you are thirsty. You need a drink of water. So you fill up a cup of water and drink it. So what quenched your thirst, the water or the cup? It was the water that satisfied your thirst, the cup served as the tool to facilitate the process.
The same is true regarding Faith and Grace. We have a problem, we are dead in sin, we need salvation. So using the tool of faith we accept the free gift of God’s Grace and apply it to our lives.
We received God’s grace by the vehicle of faith which produces salvation. And that leads us to our second five letter word.
WORD #2:SAVED
“For by grace, you have been saved”
We have been Saved by Grace. Salvation is a very loaded term. In the church, you often hear people say things like: “I was saved on such and such date” “I was saved in that church” or ask “are you saved?” Some people may not even know what we mean. But in the context of our key verse Salvation or being saved means that we have accepted God’s gift of grace by faith. We have accepted that Jesus has taken care of my sins on the cross and resurrected securing my eternity.
Salvation also can be examined through the lens of time. There is a past, present, and future tense of salvation.
JUSTIFICATION
When someone says “I am/was saved” they are usually referring to the past tense of Salvation. The theological term for the past tense of Salvation is Justification. The Sunday school definition of Justification is “Just as if I had never sinned”
Justification is a judicial term it deals with being found guiltless. As we have already established we are guilty of sin. We were dead in our trespasses and sin. Justification is where Jesus' death was substituted for my death, thereby paying my penalty for sin. (Romans 6:23) “The wages of sin is death.”
Since Jesus paid my penalty I go free as though I had never sinned, as though I am not guilty. This concept is further brought home in the Rev 2:17
Rev 2:17
(17) He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it.’
In this verse, Jesus tells the church in Pergamum that the overcomers in Christ will receive a white stone with a new name inscribed on it. In ancient times someone who was accused of crimes would be brought to the gates of the city to be judged. On the occasion that the person was acquitted of their crimes, they would be given a white stone with the crime they were accused of written on it to show that they were found guiltless. That is what Justification means to us.
SANCTIFICATION
The present tense of salvation is what we call sanctification. Sanctification is the present tense because it is a process that we have been involved in since the time of our Justification. The time where we applied God’s Grace to our life by faith.
That process of sanctification is where the Holy Spirit leads us to perfect our character by becoming more like Jesus. There are a couple of places you can go to gauge how this process is going in your life. The first is the Fruit of the Spirit.
Gal 5:22-23
(22) But the fruit of the Spirit is 1)love, 2)joy, 3)peace, 4)patience, 5)kindness, 6)goodness, 7)faithfulness,
(23) 8)gentleness, 9)self-control; against such things there is no law.
A great study opportunity is to list our the fruit of the spirit and then go to the Gospels and look at story after story and see how Jesus sowed each of these elements.
After you have a handle on the Fruit of the spirit then take a look at the beatitudes in Matt Chapter 5 and do the same thing with them.
You see this is a process that we will not complete until we die or are caught up in the rapture. That leads to the Future tense of Salvation
GLORIFICATION
The future tense of Salvation is Glorification. This is future because technically it won't be complete until the Resurrection. Glorification is where our salvation is made complete. We will be completely removed from the presence and power of sin. One of my favorite parts of Glorification is that we will receive new bodies.
2Co 5:1
(1) For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
Paul is peaking of our bodies in this verse. Our earthly home that he is referring to is our earthly bodies. Later on, in that chapter, he refers to our current bodies as tents(a temporary structure) as compared to our heavenly bodies as a house(a permanent structure). Our future bodies will be like the difference in glory as a tent is to a house. These future bodies will be just like Jesus' resurrection body in the resurrection. And apparently we will be enough like Jesus that we will be able to See God as He truly is.
1Jn 3:2
(2) Beloved, we are God's children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.
The last verse of the Old Rugged Cross describes the future tense of salvation better that I ever could:
To the old rugged cross, I will ever be true
It's shame and reproach gladly bear
Then he'll call me someday to my home far away
Where his glory forever I'll share
Praise God For Salvation
WORD #3: FAITH
For by grace you have been saved through faith.
As we said earlier Faith is the vessel or tool through which we acquire grace. We are told without faith it is impossible to please God. Faith is necessary.
In (Gen 15:6) And he[Abraham] believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
If you break that verse down you will see that Abraham believed(Put his faith in) God and God (justified Him) placed righteousness in his account.
That is the same exact way that we are saved. We believe (put our faith) in the completed work of Christ. And God Justifies us (saves us in the past tense) Puts Christ’s righteousness in our account.
George Frederick Handel, the great musician, lost his health; his right side was paralyzed; his money was gone, and his creditors seized and threatened to imprison him. Handel was so disheartened by his tragic experience that he almost despaired for a brief time. But his faith prevailed, and he composed his greatest work, “The Hallelujah Chorus,” which is part of his great Messiah.
(1Jn 5:4) For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.
(1Jn 5:5) Who is it that overcomes the world except for the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
[CLOSE]
Today we have seen Three Five Letter Words
By
Grace
we are
Saved
through
Faith
I find it very comforting that God has made His Great Salvation very easy to understand. Three simple words are all that is necessary to make dead men live. For those of us that are saved, who have experienced God’s Great Salvation this is a reminder of just how simple our faith really is. And it should empower us to share its simplistic beauty to others and help them to come to experience God’s Grace being applied to their lives.
For those who have never taken the step to have their sins forgiven, it is a simple matter. God Loves you. God is rich in mercy. God has provided the Grace that will save you of your sins, that will declare you as righteous and will take you to heaven one day. All you need to do is receive that grace by faith.
Say to God, “I accept your Grace on my behalf. I believe that Jesus has paid for my sins. Transform me by your grace and love and save me by your Grace.