"Trusting in the Grace of God" is the phrase that encapsulates today's little gallery. Pic #1 speaks to the bondage of the will; Pic #2 is Spencer Tracy (1958) as Santiago, a struggling aging fisherman in Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, seeking grace to bring home a prize Marlin; Pic #3 shows a young woman who has faith anticipates the grace of God to take her home; and, Pic #4 explains that Christ is always the object of faith who gives us grace.
This brings me to this mornings address:
“The Christian and The Grace of God”
1 Corinthians 15:1,2; 9-10 NKJV “Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you — unless you believed in vain…For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was in me.”
My Christian friends: Ernest Hemingway, who wrote “For Whom the Bell Tolls” and his Pulitzer Prize winning “The Old Man and the Sea” also coined the phrase, “courage is grace under pressure” which served as an inspiration for President John F. Kennedy’s book, “Profiles in Courage.” But as brilliant as Hemingway was, he failed to obtain knowledge in his pursuit of courage and grace. Hemingway did not receive the true grace of God to control his drinking; neither did he have the courage to live his life but chose death by suicide in 1961 at the age of 61. You, however, don’t have to come up with contemporary themes in order to apply God’s Grace to your lives. St. Paul says, “By which (Gospel) also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you - unless you believed in vain.”
Many modern theologians and teachers believe they must come up with new concepts of grace because they refuse to believe in that old, old story of Jesus’ sin-atoning death and physical resurrection. They must tell you that there is some universal truth that people are to search for so that all people can live a good and humane life of social justice. Seeking out God is one thing, but willingly pervert the Good News is another. If you were to look at yourselves objectively, you would see neither a Jesus nor a Paul. You would have to confess that you, more often than not, live your lives as if Jesus didn’t exist or that His physical resurrection was a myth (which is what has been taught in the numerous liberal seminaries for decades).
We all could view ourselves as practical atheists in most of our daily lives even when we say we are Christian. We often live as if Jesus were not ruling our hearts by His love. We wish to take our stand on those the perceived sure things of life; money, power, newer spouses that are more easily attainable than not, and trust in human institutions. But remember that Jesus once told His disciples, “What profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost?” (Luke 9:25).
To depend on God’s grace is nothing other than to trust in the promises of His Word. These riches aren’t in human resources or in elaborate houses or church buildings. But if you choose to worship here this day, it just might be that you want to take another look at the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and behold the hosts of heaven round about singing “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God of Sabbaoth!” Your desire will be to see beyond the limitations imposed on you in this world so that you might experience the Lord Jesus and the power of His resurrection.
You see how God loves you with a unique love, as it is written in James 4:6, “But He gives more grace. Therefore, He says (quoting Proverbs 3:34): ‘God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.’” Yes, as you firmly rely on God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense, the Holy Spirit moves your will to seek Him and will give you the strength to face family difficulties; financial problems; overcoming foul addictions; and, even to find peace in the present daily turmoil and rebellion against our free democratic republic. When you rely on God’s grace you can be at peace even among these greatest difficulties.
The apostle once said: “For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.” (Romans 8:6-10) This, friends, is the same apostle who spoke to the Corinthians saying, “His grace to me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet NOT I, but the grace of God which was with me.” We cannot take any credit for the workings of God the Holy Spirit in our new man, but only rejoice and boast in the cross of Christ.
To this point, I think it is appropriate to relate the famous story of St. Augustine shortly after his conversion. Augustine was the Christian Bishop of Hippo in North Africa. He helped to develop the true Biblical doctrine on original sin and more fully developed the teaching on the Trinity. Regarding original sin, he of all people had come to realize his will was held bondage to sin. So it was not long after Augustine’s conversion to Christianity, he was walking on the seashore when he heard the voice of his former mistress behind him, crying, “Augustine!” but he kept walking away from the voice. She cried even louder, "Augustine!! It is I!" To which he, still walking away and not looking back, cried out: “I know…but it is no longer I”
Oh, the joy that Paul found in knowing the resurrected Christ! Paul claimed Christ’s death to be his very own as he wrote to the Church in Galatia: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” God’s grace to you today is the Spirit moving in such a way that a newness of life, through His Word, is effective.
Many liberal churches, by the grace of Christ, could themselves experience immediate resolutions to their constant perversions of Scripture and pretending to believe that a godly church fellowship exists, if they would repent and abide only by the wisdom given Saint Paul and Augustine and confess, “Not I, but the grace of God which was in me.” Do away with the philosophical and vain theological speculations which might make for good intellectual discussions but only cause men to stumble in the true faith that was simply given them in the clear words of the Bible.
Listen to Martin Luther who explained Biblical doctrine this way: “The will is a beast of burden. If God mounts it, it wishes and goes as God wills; if Satan mounts it, it wishes and goes as Satan wills; Nor can it choose its rider... the riders contend for its possession.” Selfishness always tries to justify itself by convincing others to live as you want them to live. But it is only by God’s grace that you can actually live as God wants you to live…and to die.
Have you ever heard people who were carnal minded say they wish they were Christian? I have not. But I know that many people who are Christian do a lot of wishing. Many wish they could live out their Christian life; and yet many that stay away from those “Bible-thumping” churches really do deprive themselves of coming to the knowledge of living that Christian life. Their newness of life does not and cannot be experienced when God’s living word, the Bible, up until the time of death only remains a wish book for them.
However, St. Paul also had wishes. For example, in Romans 9:3, he said “I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh.” Yet in that wish he was not only expressing deep love and sorrow for those who are on their way to hell because they rejected the grace of Christ, but he was expressing the same mind of Christ who lamented over Jerusalem. Paul also knew that his wish could never be realized since Jesus Christ had already become the curse who had taken the sins of the world with Him to the cross! Therefore, St. Paul says here, “But by the grace of God I am what I am.” What a contrast to the famous people of the world who have no idea of what the grace of God really is.
Call upon your churches publicly to repudiate their empty philosophies and then their simple faith and trust can return. Give your congregations back the Bible only! And you know what? When the philosophies of man are repudiated, then the Gospel of Christ will shine the brighter as you give the God of your salvation all the glory.
As Paul says, in 2 Corinthians 4:2, “But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” Why is it that many cannot be simple in their faith? Why cannot they set forth the truth plainly without getting involved with the philosophical and psychological methods of this world?
We all should take note that Paul was not just saying that about his being saved by God’s grace (which is true enough) but that he labored more abundantly...talking of his sanctified life in Christ as a grateful missionary and apostle. Paul had all the reason to boast of what he did for the Lord, but he knew what the grace of God was all about. If we imitate these saints who imitated Christ, we will be relying on God's grace. Then life isn’t a mere existence, dreary as the most humid, overcast, day of summer. Life is then embedded in grace. The message of the gospel is nothing other than the Easter message: the resurrection causes us to take another look at life. It’s forgetting the things past and freely reaping the benefits of Christ’s death and resurrection that are manifold.
Luther has on more than one occasion stated that by faith we are in need of nothing and have all we should ever want; on the other hand, in love we are to serve our neighbor because we have what we need by faith. By faith we receive everything good from above, from God and in love we let them flow out of us below to our neighbor.
Do not trust in your own abilities to come to know the richness that God has for you in Christ. Paul didn’t; Paul couldn’t! The truth of the matter is simply this (Ephesians 2:4-6 NKJV): “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” This is how the psalmist in Psalm 82:6, could write: “I said, ‘You are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High.’”
What you should not be find as trustworthy is that which is preached about grace by your prosperity TV preachers like Bishop Jakes and Jesse Duplantis. The gospel they preach is that grace is equivalent to having power in this world: Power to be healed of every known disease; power to have an important high-paying job; power to live in a beautiful home and drive luxurious cars; power to be debt free and power to have plenty of money so to be gods in this earthly realm; but, never the power to overcome by grace your sin, death and the devil. The idiocy of it all was culminated in a sermon that Crefloe Dollar preached: When St. Paul complained about the “thorn in his flesh” asking God to remove it three times, God “reminded Paul” that he already had it within himself by grace to be healed of his infirmity! Just think about it.
Unlike Crefloe Dollar, you recall the Bible verses Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10, “And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore, most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
You tell me: Is God’s grace synonymous to earthly power, health and wealth? And is this power that resides in you the ability for you to remove all infirmities and obstacles in this life? Dollar said that St. Paul understood it that way. But all you have to do is see what Paul writes earlier in 2 Corinthians 11:23-31 where Paul states, “Are they ministers of Christ? — I speak as a fool — I am more: in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often. From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep; in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness — besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I do not burn with indignation? If I must boast, I will boast in the things which concern my infirmity.”
This message of Christ’s resurrection power not only bestows grace but it truly brings like-minded people into the community of faith, Christ’s Church; even suffering people, who by His grace, are indeed worthy because the grace of Christ remains sufficient for the Christian. Amen.
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