Amazing Grace!
Sunday Sermon
June 10, 2007
Victory Native American United Methodist Church
Rev. Larry S. King
Scripture References
Psalms 1:1-3; John 3:16; Ephesians 2:4-19
Main Hymn: Amazing Grace
Page 378, Methodist hymnal
1. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me,
I once was lost but now I’m found, was blind but now I see……
2. Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved,
how precious did that grace appear, the hour I first believed.
3. 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 first begun.
Those words written so long ago still have the power to move the heart today. The words still speak to our souls today if we will just let them. The story of these words tell us of a loving God, a heavenly father that loves us so much that he provided a way for us to reconnect to a
relationship with Him through the sacrifice of his son. These words describe the doctrine of God’s divine grace, and God’s mighty power and grace are still attached to them to this day.
Definition of Grace: Old Testament:
GRACE can also mean: to stoop in kindness to an inferior, to bestow, to implore, and to move to favor by petition.
New Testament: GRACE can mean: God’s goodness, love, mercy, and kindness toward people without regard to their work, deeds, and in spite of what they deserve.
For a while now, I have had this hymn going around in my head. It is one of those things that happen when God is trying to tell me something. I can’t always figure out right away what it is he is trying to say, but I try to listen.
I’ll go to a quiet place, maybe read some scripture or just pray quietly throughout the day, take a drive or go to a park to listen to the Lord. Usually one of these techniques will let me be quiet and still long enough for God to get what He wants me to understand through my thick head. This time it wasn’t so easy. It took a drive to the mountains, Lake Junaluska in fact to understand the message.
God’s amazing Grace! I am so thankful for the loving grace of God. I am thankful for the fact that God wants the best for his children and that he loves us enough to correct us when we stray.
• He offers us life when we deserve death.
• He offers us mercy when we deserve judgement.
• He offers us unconditional love when we can’t love ourselves.
God’s amazing Grace! I am so thankful that about 2,000 years ago, a man named Jesus, laid down his life for us then took it up again. In doing so, He defeated death, hell and the grave. He went to be with his father, our heavenly father, to prepare for us a place so we can be with him eternally when our race on this earth is over. What he has prepared for those who trust him as savior our human minds can barely perceive.
As I was sitting at Lake Junaluska, watching the beautiful lake, watching the sun go down with all of the beautiful colors in the sky reflecting off the lake, all I could think of was the words to this old hymn of the church. I thought, my God, my God, what amazing grace that you would give us something as beautiful as this earth with all of its wonders when we deserve nothing.
I thank you God that you would make a way for us to return to you even though it meant the suffering and death of your son Jesus. I thank you God that you would include us in your family and make us joint heirs with Christ, if we only put our trust in Jesus. It is such a simple thing but so hard for some of us to do.
I thought I needed to revisit this old hymn and let it speak to me once again. When I see the evil in this world, the deaths, the violence, the wars, and the way people treat each other I wonder what God sees in any of us. What is it about this creation is so special that he would care so much for us that he would send his only son to die in our place? It is because he loves us so very much!
I think God looks down on us and in his glorious infinite wisdom, he sees the state we have let ourselves fall into. He sees a creation that cannot repair or redeem itself. He sees a creation in desperate need of divine intervention. He, out of his infinite love and compassion, sees a creation crying out for a savior, crying out for mercy, crying out for help, knowing that we cannot help ourselves!
Church, I may not be a bible scholar with letters behind my name or multiple years of pulpit experience behind me but I am smart enough to understand that God loves us all, unconditionally and does not want any of us to be separated from Him. He prepared a way for us to receive eternal life and that path is through Jesus Christ, God’s only son. There is no other name by which we can be saved. Salvation is only through the precious blood of Jesus, and HE alone is worthy. He died for our sins, he stayed in the grave 3 days but he was not just laying around waiting.
He was very busy with the saints in the Bosom of Abraham leading them up to glory because the covenant between GOD and man was fulfilled by the sacrifice of Jesus. I picture Jesus marching with them right into heaven and presents them to Our Father God, introducing them each by name. After this was accomplished, I picture Jesus marching right up to Satan himself, looks Satan squarely in the eyes as He takes the keys of death, hell and the grave right out of Satan’s hands. I picture the very gates of hell were bursting apart because of the holiness of our Lord.
I often wonder each time that I hear people say that there is no God or they have no time for church. They may say they don’t care whether they go to heaven or hell because they will have friends in both places. When I hear of those misguided people that actually say that they worship the devil, I wonder why they would rather serve a being who dosen’t even have the keys to his own house. Why not worship a loving, gracious and merciful God who loves us and wants the best for us? After all, God has prepared such a wondrous home for us in glory.
It wasn’t Buddha; it wasn’t Mohammed, it wasn’t Reverend Moon, and it wasn’t any of the things the world worships today. Riches, good deeds, good intentions and noble thoughts cannot save us. Even if you bury your riches with you, you cannot take it with you. Even then, it is not safe because your riches can be recovered by anyone with the nerve to dig you back up.
Good works cannot save us. The bible is very clear about this. It says that all of our good works are as filthy rags in God’s eyes. Our salvation is by grace through faith. It can’t be earned or bought. It is a free gift from God, we have only to repent and accept it. Good intentions cannot save us. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. There have many people throughout history that had good intentions that did not save them. Only the blood of Jesus Christ can save us and wash us white as snow, making us acceptable to God.
We can listen to feel good gospels all day long. We can love our neighbors as ourselves, we can give money to the poor, we can feed the hungry or clothe the naked, and we can carry people back and forth to the doctor’s office if they have no transportation, moreover, these are all good things and we need to do them, but they can not save us. What the world needs is Jesus!
Listen Church, the world needs people who will take a stand for the gospel of Jesus. The world needs someone who will not water down the message. The world needs people who are willing to be laughed at, talked about, and yet stand fast in the word of the Lord to proclaim the good news of the gospel! We have to be a little politically incorrect and take a stand against all of the things in this world that goes against the gospel of Jesus.
Stand against such things as abortion, murder, mistreatment of women and children, corruption in government, waste of natural resources, failure to help the poor, and the list could go on and on and on. At the same time, we need to be offering the message and reality of hope, love, mercy, and grace to a lost and dying world through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
Church, we need to be thinking of God’s amazing grace and what it means to us. Do we take it for granted? Have we forgotten what it was to be lost, without hope, and feeling as if we have no one to turn to, and that nobody cares? The only gospel some of your neighbors will ever hear will come from your mouth. They may never step foot inside of a church but they may talk to you.
The people you associate with who are or aren’t saved may never read a bible, but they will watch what you do, how you act or react to things and situations, or how you speak and conduct yourself. They will essentially be reading you…..You may be the only “Bible” they will ever read. We need to be transparent so Christ can be seen in us. This means being prayed up, studied up and to be presenting ourselves in a way which shows Christ to a lost and dying world.
You know, we should be the happiest people in the world, yet often, we Christians seem to be some of the unhappiest. When the world looks at us, what do they see? Do they see anything different from what they see elsewhere in the world? Do they see anything that would make them want to experience the love of Christ or to want Jesus as savior? Do they see unhappy people struggling with problems that overwhelm them without leaning on the very God They claim to serve, even though God tells us to cast our burdens upon him? Do they demonstrate personal faith in God that lacks even the smallest speck of joy?
The image we as Christians project to the world should be one of sure, secure faith in the one who died for us. We should be so happy that we want to share what we have and tell others about Jesus and the love, grace, and mercy that God give us all freely if we just accept Jesus as savior. It’s one thing to know this but another to do it. Is this the image people see when they look at us or do they see tired soldiers of the cross worn out, played out, and sitting around waiting on the “Old Gospel Ship” to sail them away to heaven? Or do they see strong warriors of the Cross projecting a living faith?
Church the old world is getting dark! Things we read about in the bible concerning the last days are coming true all around us. Some scholars and preachers say we may be are living in the last days and we need to be busy about God’s work. No one knows how much time any one of us has left. We do not know when Jesus will return, but I believe it will be sooner than later.
False prophets are popping up all over the world and many are beginning to follow the teachings of some of these people. People are falling away from the Church and the bible is coming true before our eyes.
We need to be busier now than ever about God’s work and by this I mean the real work of God. This work I speak of is for all of us to do. This work is telling the world that there is hope! There is a God that cares about each and every one of us! There is a savior, Jesus Christ who died for us! He took upon himself the punishment we deserved! He defeated death, hell and the grave and he ascended back to heaven to sit at the father’s right hand to be our intercessor.
Each and every time we stumble and fall, Jesus is there to pick us up and to stand with us before the throne of God the Father and tell our God, I paid for that sin, I know this child. God’s work is not about the ABC”s....Attendance, Buildings and Checkbooks...It is about telling the whole world that Jesus is alive and his grace is sufficient for all of us and that we all can partake of the riches in glory if we will just accept his free gift of salvation.
God’s work is not about building larger churches, fellowship halls, advancing one denomination over another by increasing the number of people on church membership rolls or increasing the size of the church’s bank account. It is about one thing and one thing only and that is getting the message of Jesus out and seeing souls saved. This is the message of Amazing grace
Before the trail of tears, a great many of the Cherokee had already converted to Christianity, Many, many long years before the removal. We had our own churches. Some of us were ordained ministers. After the long, long journey west, at the end of the trail along which so many of our people suffered and died, the survivors sang a song with thanksgiving and praise. It was a song they sang from their hearts as they walked along this Trail of Tears.
It is a song which sustained the people through many, many hardships and heartaches. The people sang this song for their dead, for those born along the trail, and for those who survived. This song which the Native peoples loved so very much was AMAZING GRACE.
God’s amazing grace. We do not deserve it but I am thankful we have it. It is up to us, God’s people, red and yellow, black and white to let those others around us who do not know him, to tell of this wonderful mercy God offers to us.
Ask God this week for an opportunity to witness and be ready to be used of God. He will make the appointment; we just have to be willing to keep it. Pray that God will open your eyes and ears so you do not miss the divine appointment he sets for you. Ask God to help you recognize the appointment when it comes. Ask him to give you the words to say and be prepared to step back out of yourself and let the Holy Spirit step forward so that the person hearing the words will know and understand that the words are not your words but God’s words. He will never leave you or forsake you. He is always there for us. God bless you all.
May the Lord bless you and keep you.
May the Lord make his face to shine upon you.
May the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace,
Now and evermore,
Amen…
