A Journey of Grace: Sustaining Grace
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We started this Journey of Grace several weeks ago.
Throughout it, we have seen that it is an invitation to draw closer to Jesus… to walk with Him… to grow… to be transformed by Him…
We’ve seen that it is a journey of submission to Him and to His will for our lives…
We’ve seen how Sneaky Grace saves us… and transforms us…
How Grace goes ahead of us making a way for us… empowering us to live faithful lives, even when we seem to keep failing ourselves.
Grace gives us a lot to celebrate!
It is a gift from God!
It changes everything!
Paul tells us in Phil 2:15 that Grace causes us to “shine like stars”, and in Rom 8:37 that it makes us “more than conquerors”
Grace enables us to overcome… to rise above sin… to be transformed into a new creation!
Grace makes all things new!
Except when it doesn’t!
You see… If we’re not careful, we can make Grace out to be a “get out of jail free” card… We can make it out to be some form of invincibility… as though we can just “pray it all away”…
What happens when that doesn’t work? What happens when we can’t just “pray it away”?
What happens when the depression and anxiety doesn’t go away?
When the person we prayed for dies?
When we still lose our job?
What happens then?
Life is rough… amen?
7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.
— Those Jars of Clay can get beaten up… cracked… and broken…
But here’s the thing…
No matter how broken we are…
No matter how many pieces our lives have been shattered into…
Grace is there… picking us up and putting us back together.
We need to understand what Grace does and doesn’t do.
— Grace doesn’t remove memories…
— Grace doesn’t exempt us from damage… from hard times.
— Grace doesn’t extract sorrow.
— Grace doesn’t resolve our fragile hearts…
But…
— Grace does reframe our story.
— Grace does the work in the cracks…
— Grace does deepen our intimacy…
— Grace does reveal God’s Work in our lives.
I. Grace Sustains us in the hard times.
6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say,
7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.
8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.
9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Paul is responding here to people who were demanding that he tell them all about his visions and blessings… That he boast about the gifts God has given him, and that he prove himself an apostle by doing so…
But he refuses…
Instead he talks about a “thorn in his flesh”…
Now… Paul was no weakling… amen?
He was not spiritually weak… would you agree?
In fact, Paul gives us a list of his sufferings: (I love the way the Message puts it!)
22 Do they brag of being Hebrews, Israelites, the pure race of Abraham? I’m their match.
23 Are they servants of Christ? I can go them one better. (I can’t believe I’m saying these things. It’s crazy to talk this way! But I started, and I’m going to finish.) I’ve worked much harder, been jailed more often, beaten up more times than I can count, and at death’s door time after time.
24 I’ve been flogged five times with the Jews’ thirty-nine lashes,
25 beaten by Roman rods three times, pummeled with rocks once. I’ve been shipwrecked three times, and immersed in the open sea for a night and a day.
26 In hard traveling year in and year out, I’ve had to ford rivers, fend off robbers, struggle with friends, struggle with foes. I’ve been at risk in the city, at risk in the country, endangered by desert sun and sea storm, and betrayed by those I thought were my brothers.
27 I’ve known drudgery and hard labor, many a long and lonely night without sleep, many a missed meal, blasted by the cold, naked to the weather.
And that’s not even to mention his Damascus Road experience!
Paul KNEW suffering!
Look at what he says:
2 Corinthians 12:8–9 (NIV)
8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.
9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” …
“So I gave up and walked away.” NO!!!!
2 Corinthians 12:9 (NIV)
… Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
Paul understood what God meant!
And he found contentment in his suffering because of it!
10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Paul understood that God was saying: “You are stronger in your weakest moments when I am with you than you are in your strongest moments without me.” — Dr. Busic
II. Sustaining Grace carries us when we cannot carry ourselves.
— “Footprints in the Sand” parable…
… One night a man had a dream… he was walking along the beach with the Lord. Across the sky flashed scenes from his life… For each scene he saw footprints in the sand, one belonging to him and the other to the Lord...
When the last scene played, he looked back at the footprints… He noticed that many times there was only one set of footprints…
He also noticed that they seemed to coincide with the lowest, most difficult moments of his life…
Confused and upset by this, he asked, “Lord, you said that if I followed you, you’d walk with me all the way. But… when I struggled the most, there is only one set of footprints. Why did you leave me when I needed you the most?!”
“My precious child,” said the Lord, “I love you, and I would never leave you. Those were the times when I carried you!”
How many times are we like that man?!
We look back at our lives… at the tough times… and we think God left us!
Hebrews 13:5 (NIV)
5 Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God [promises], “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
Look at that promise to Paul: “My grace is sufficient for you...”
That is God’s way of saying: “When you come to the end of your strength, I will give you mine. When your energy runs out, I will give you mine. When you cannot go any farther, I will pick you up and carry you. You will rest in my arms.”
Over and over in scripture, we find this to be true… God’s grace sustains us!
III. His Grace is enough.
Let me tell you… God gives us the Grace we need for today. No more, No less!
In Exo. 16, we find the story of the Israelites in the wilderness… (explain)
— God gives them Manna from Heaven.
— It was a gift from God… All they had to do was pick it up and prepare it… But…
— They couldn’t horde it…
— God gave them enough for today! They had to trust Him for tomorrow!
That’s Sustaining Grace!!!
— They didn’t deserve it… but God provided it…
God gives us what we need for today… Tomorrow He’ll give us enough too!
God says: “Whatever you need, I WILL provide. Why? I AM!”
There was a pastor in Penn. After church one day, he noticed a man with a bulldog pin on his lapel… So he asked, “What does the bulldog stand for?”
The man answered, “Well, Pastor, the bulldog symbolizes the tenacity with which I hold onto Jesus.”
The pastor replied, “It’s a wonderful symbol — but bad theology.”
Surprised, the man asked, “What do you mean?”
“It should never stand for the tenacity with which you hold on to Jesus… It should stand for the tenacity with which Jesus holds on to you!”
IV. Sustaining Grace holds on to us!
“Faith in difficult times… Faith in the storms of life… is not a matter of how strong we are, or how much faith we have. Faith in the darkest moments is a matter of how strong God is!”
Do you trust Him completely?!
God will see us through the fire… If we-will-trust-Him!
3 Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance;
4 perseverance, character; and character, hope.
5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
Sustaining Grace gives us hope… not to be delivered from the storm… but within the storm…
It walks us through the hard times… carrying us when necessary… in order to build our HOPE in Christ.
“Hope is the calm, certain belief that God is with us” — David Busic
Sustaining Grace reminds us that God holds the future.
That doesn’t mean that we ignore the present and look only to the future… It means that we allow the promise of the future to guide our dealing with the present.
“Hope does not defer the future; hope reshapes the understanding of the past and determines life in the present.” — Thomas Langford
Grace reminds us the God holds the future… that means He also holds our past… and because of that, we can trust Him in our present situation!
Think about it!
If God has our future, then we don’t have to worry about today!
The problem is… Many of us “Hope” that…
… God loves us…
… He won’t turn His back on us…
… that He cares about our problems…
… that He WILL hold us up in our weakest moments…
BUT… there’s doubt… we look at our cracks… our chips… our brokenness… and we wonder “Why?”
— Why did God let this happen?
— Where was He?
— Why didn’t He answer my prayer?
Sometimes it’s hard to see…
Let me tell you…
God DOES love you!
God DOES care!
God WON”T leave you!
God WILL carry you!
Those aren’t empty promises…
But… We have to let Him!
We have to surrender!
I want you to see something today…
Christian Hope is grounded in the Cross!
46 Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.
That is a HUGE statement!!!!
— There is a huge difference between a life that is taken and one that is given.
Jesus knew that His life was in the Father’s hands.
18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
Jesus willingly laid down His life.
He did it for you… and He did it for me… KNOWING that because it was in the Father’s hands, NOONE could take it from Him!
That’s why He could say…
17 The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again.
Is your life being given, or taken?
The difference is Trust.
— We can give our lives to God, trusting Him for our future, or this world can take it from us… by beating us down…
Luke 23:46 (NIV)
46 … “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” …
… Means that we trust God COMPLETELY… that we trust that our life is being given something bigger… something better… something more beautiful than we can imagine, or receive apart from God!
“Father, Into Your hands...” — Is a prayer of surrender.
— We are taking ourselves out of the hands of others… out of our circumstances… out of our own plans and purposes… and putting our lives in God’s hands.
It means that we are totally committed to the Journey of Grace… We have given God the pen… that He gets to write the rest of our story!
“Father, Into Your hands…” turns what looks like loss and destruction into something that is pure gain!
“To sacrifice something is to make it holy by giving it away for love.” — Fredrich Buechner
We have a choice to make!
We can play the victim… “God took it from me”… or “God doesn’t care about me.”
OR…
We can surrender it to God…
“Father, Into Your hands… “
What is it that you are holding on to?
Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. I surrender myself to your plans and purposes. Our lives are not our own. We lay them down because we belong to you, and we give them up for love so that you can make them holy. We know the mess we’ve made of them. We know the failures we’ve faced. But we also know Your Love and Your promise. To care for us. To provide for us. To recreate us into Your glorious image. So right here, right now today… Father… we give you the pen. Rewrite our stories. Rewrite our hearts. Give us the strength, the courage, the fortitude to live lives worthy of You.