An Overflow Of Grace

INTRODUCTION

Grace is one of the most important subjects in the whole of scripture because it is by grace that we are saved and it is through grace; through God’s help, that we are able to continue our Christian journey (Ephesians 2:8-9).

THE THRONE OF GRACE

Hebrews 4:16 tells us that God is seated on a throne of grace, and we are all encouraged to boldly and confidently approach His throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. What that scripture is simply telling us is that it is at God’s throne of grace that personal needs are addressed and attended to.

We have so many personal needs we want God to attend to. Some people badly need strength to pray and fast, some need a new beginning; a complete change from how things have been in past years, some are about to make a crucial decision and need God to guide and direct them, while there are people who are in a serious mess right now. It could be a financial, marital or sexual mess and they desperately need God to bring them out of the mess they are in. For some it is like everything around you seems to be collapsing. It looks like your marriage or your business or even your ministry is about to collapse.

Whatever the size or length of your problem or need, I want to assure you that God is seated on His throne of grace and as you come before His throne of grace, you can receive an overflow of grace to meet whatever need you have brought into God’s presence.

What does it mean to experience an overflow of grace?

1. The first thing is that an overflow of grace is an abundance of blessings, testimonies and breakthroughs you don’t deserve.

Matthew 15:21-28 is an example of someone who experienced this in her life. The woman in this passage wasn’t entitled to healing; she was a complete stranger to the common wealth of Israel, she wasn’t a beneficiary of the covenant promise of healing and so wasn’t entitled to healing. Jesus out rightly told her this (Matthew 15: 24, 26); that it wasn’t her right, she didn’t deserve or merit it, yet we saw grace in action in her life and she was able to receive a breakthrough that she wasn’t ordinarily entitled to. Why?

She prayed THE MERCY PRAYER. The prayer for God to have mercy on you is a very simple and short prayer, but we see from the lives of those in scripture who sincerely prayed this prayer that it is the most comprehensive and powerful prayer anyone can pray. In fact, if we understand how powerful this prayer is we would spend more time praying it and less time praying about so many of the things we pray about.

The first thing this prayer does is to remove the sin barrier. It’s a prayer that takes away every barrier created by sin. Isaiah 59:1-2 makes us understand that sin can be a barrier or obstacle to the hand of God touching a person. The prayer of mercy is what removes that sin barrier standing as an obstacle to your receiving your breakthrough (Psalm 51:1). David said he was able to scale over walls by God’s strength (2 Samuel 22:30, Psalm 18:19). The mercy prayer filled David with divine grace to scale over walls of sin that stood as a barrier/hindrance to his breakthrough.

The prayer of mercy gives you victory over your enemies. This is because when God looks upon you with mercy, you are immediately put in a position where your enemies can never triumph over you. David prayed this prayer for God to have mercy on him many times in his life (Psalm 4:1, Psalm 6:2, Psalm 25:16, Psalm 31:9, Psalm 51: 1, Psalm 86:3, 16, just to mention a few). It was because of this prayer that he gained victory over enemies that were coming against Him on all sides. In Psalm 3:1 he said how many are my foes, how many rise up against me. In Psalm 3:6 he said I will not fear the tens of thousands drawn up against me. So he had so many people against him, but none was able to defeat him because all through his life, his simple prayer was for God’s mercy to locate him and that prayer shielded him from all his enemies.

It is a prayer that you don’t just pray once and give up. You have to PERSIST even when you don’t see or get an immediate answer because it is one prayer that can bring about an overflow of grace; an overflow of blessings, testimonies and breakthroughs you don’t deserve or aren’t qualified to receive. When the woman asked Jesus to have mercy on her, He didn’t answer her but she still persisted. When Blind Bartimaeus called out to Jesus to have mercy on him, people shouted on him to keep quiet but he still persisted (Matthew 15:23, Mark 10:48). Their persistence in praying this prayer gave them a major breakthrough.