Living By Grace
What's So Amazing About Amazing Grace? • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
This series about grace has given me several reminders. We have defined grace in multiple ways using the letters of the word GRACE.
We have used:
God’s Redemption At Christ’s Expense
God’s Redemption Anyone Can Experience
God’s Redemption And Condemnation Expelled
Today, I want to introduce another:
Gracious Redeemer And Care Extended.
No wonder John Newton wrote, “Amazing grace how sweet the sound!” When we understand that our God is a gracious redeemer and extends His care to us, we too can sing with gusto such sweet words. So, how does God’s grace show us how He is a gracious redeemer and extends care for us? Not only does God give us grace to redeem us, but He gives us grace to live by. The example given by Jesus was that grace came through dying.
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
The redemption is that Jesus died, once and for all to atone for our sins. In His dying, we can live.
23 Then he said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. 24 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.
By denying ourselves and following Jesus, we will also die to self and live out the gift of grace that comes from God.
1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
How do we live our new life that God has given us in Christ? We learn to live by grace. Specifically, we take the gift grace that gives us gifts of grace and we gracefully live!
10 Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.
Today, we will understand how to perceive our gifts of grace, provide our gifts of grace, and practice our gifts of grace.
Perceiving Your Gifts of Grace
Perceiving Your Gifts of Grace
The gift of grace is provided to everyone that believes in their heart and confesses with their mouths, Jesus is Lord. In order to understand that you have gifts of grace, you need to accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior.
9 That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.
When you call on the name of the Lord and accept Him as your personal Lord and Savior, you unleash the gifts that have been divinely given to you. Under the umbrella of grace, we all have been given by the Holy Spirit different gifts. God has uniquely designed each of us to experience this.
4 Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7 If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; 8 if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.
The gift of grace is given to everyone and it is to be understood. Many Christians have no idea what their spiritual gifts are or how to understand how to use them. A detailed study of the passage just read from Romans will be helpful. 1 Corinthians 12 will also be helpful in understanding these gifts.
7 Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. 8 To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.
I want to encourage you to understand the gifts you have received through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. I want to help find your spiritual gifts. There are many ways to do this. One way through technology is to do a spiritual gifts assessment. There are many that you can access and use online. I have actually received permission to print one out for you. Copies are available that will be helpful for you if you should desire.
Understanding how grace is manifested in our life is absolutely a must in understanding how the gift of grace can be useful in your life and to build up the Kingdom of God on Earth. God’s design is one with purpose. God gives us grace not only to secure salvation, but God also gives us grace to live by in our daily lives.
The gift of grace is given to us to be useful.
5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.
10 Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, 11 and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Did you notice this list was similar to the fruit of the Spirit? These items come from grace which in turn help us carry out the gifts of the Spirit.
Providing Your Gifts of Grace (James 1:22)
Providing Your Gifts of Grace (James 1:22)
22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
I recently read that one of the Hebrew words in the Bible for “to act” is maaseh. It refers to your actions, your activity and your work. We are called to act out the gospel in our everyday life. It is one thing to ready the word of God, and it is another to live it out!
Referring back to 1 Peter 4:10, we see that we “receive the gift to serve others.” Here is a Spiritual litmus test: Are you serving others?
One pastor wrote, “If you are too big to serve, then you are too big to lead.”
The gift of grace is received to serve. When we serve, we are acting out grace that has been given to us!
4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Serving selflessly shows a sensational Savior! In other words, when we serve, we are serving others the way that Christ served us! We are given the gift of grace for others!
Jesus said in what we know as the golden rule, “Do unto others, then RUN!!” No! He says in Luke 6:31:
31 Do to others as you would have them do to you.
The gift of grace is received for others. It also helps restore and rebuild.
We learn through scripture that just as sure as we receive grace and we are restored, God provides grace for us to restore others.
1 Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.
In fact, Jesus gave us a 4 step plan where the gift of grace is extended to one that sins against you.
15 “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. 16 But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ 17 If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
Does this mean grace runs out? I do not think that it means grace runs out based on several other passages of scripture. I do think that it means that grace is freely given and it must be chosen to receive. I know many folks that have chosen not to receive God’s grace or His grace through others. God’s plan is for us to receive His grace but He will never force it on you!
This brings me to my last thought about living by grace. We are called to live by grace by practicing the gift of grace.
Practicing Your Gifts of Grace
Practicing Your Gifts of Grace
As we do, I am reminded that grace is from God.
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Our works cannot save us, only God can do that. When we catch what grace is, we will work for the sake of the kingdom. God does the saving and we do the serving. We serve to glorify the Lord! Why? Because the gift of grace is for God.
8 For you, O Lord, have delivered my soul from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling,
9 that I may walk before the Lord
in the land of the living.
Finally, we need to practice our gifts of grace because the gift of grace forever glorifies God. John Newton penned the verse we usually sing last in Amazing Grace.
When we’ve been there ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun, We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise than when we’d first begun.
I don’t think John Newton has been in heaven ten thousand years, especially since he died on December 21, 1807. Don’t you know that eternity is a long, long time. There will be no concept of time in heaven.
8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.
We will glorify God forever.
1 I will sing of the Lord’s great love forever;
with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations.
We will experience the great opportunity in heaven.
16 And the twenty-four elders, who were seated on their thrones before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, 17 saying:
“We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty,
the One who is and who was,
because you have taken your great power
and have begun to reign.
What’s so amazing about amazing grace? Everything. Everything God has done for us is His amazing grace. Don’t miss it.