That’s not a bad way to characterize grace. One of the best-known definitions of grace is only three words: God’s unmerited favor. A. W. Tozer expanded on that idea by saying, “Grace is the good pleasure of God that allows him to bestow benefits on the undeserving.”
The key word in what have said is this, “UNMERITED” – grace, completely undeserved and therefore it leads to the conclusion that grace is in essence a free gift given to us by God through Christ.
ILL: A man visited a woman he knew to be in great financial need. He visited with a generous gift to help her with her expenses. He knocked at the door. She heard the knock, panicked and hid so no one would know she was there. The next weekend he told her about his visit. She said, "I heard you knock, but I did not realize it was you. I thought it was my landlord collecting the rent I could not pay!"
Let that sink in for a moment. The man came desiring to give, but she mistook him for someone coming to take. So often God is mistaken as one looking for something from people, when the fact is that he is the one giving gifts to people.
So many religions in the world today are geared to think, "Here is what you must do for God." In Christianity, that is turned around. Our message is, "Here is what God has done for you!" That's grace.
LET’S PRAY
Let’s read Ephesians 2:4-9
4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast
HERE ARE SOME CRAZY STATS ON GRACE
1?How many gallons of water are in the ocean?
Answer: 3.519 x 10²º gallons of seawater in the ocean. That is 3.612 x 1 with 21 zeros.
2?How many stars are in the known universe?
Answer: 70 sextillions (7 followed by 22 zeros) was calculated by a team of stargazers based at the Australian National University.
3?How many grains of sand are in the world?
Answer: 7,500,000,000,000,000,000, or seven quintillion five hundred quadrillion grains of sand. 75 with 17 zeros...
Even if some of these answers are a little off, here is my point: God’s grace is much much bigger than all these numbers!
EXAMPLE OF GOD’S KIND OF GRACE
ILL: If I borrowed Bill Gates’ credit card for just 24 hours. I had both his and mine in my pocket. Visit a fancy store with some restraint(his), Town center Mall(his), local car dealer (HIS), buy a second home (for sure HIS). Someone might stop me in the middle of all this madness, ‘Boy you sure are rich!’. Not at all but you are seeing are someone’s riches on display.
HERE IS ANOTHER GREAT DEFINITION OF GRACE
ILL: George Stanberry to a group of Bible college students: "If you leave this service today and see a needy person on the street and give him a dollar, that is unmerited favor. He did nothing to deserve it. But if you leave here and go to your car and find a man breaking into your car to steal your radio, and you give him a dollar, that is grace, because that is the opposite of what he deserves."
That is what God is interested in: His riches on display in our lives.
What better time as Christian then right now. To display this kind of Grace under these kinds of circumstances. If ever there was a time to display God’s grace these days are it. (cookies to neighbors)
Let’s look at three kinds of grace.
1. Growing Grace
The Apostle Peter tells us of our need to grow in God’s grace so we don’t fall into the error of sin. How do we grow in God’s grace, I think the Apostle Paul speaks to this the best in his letter to the Ephesian church?
Eph 2: 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast
So how can we grow in grace....
YOU GROW IN GRACE WHEN ----
?WE FEEL SAD & depressed but WE CHOOSE JOY
?WE FEEL FEAR but WE CHOOSE to have FAITH
?WE FEEL ANGER but WE CHOOSE LOVE
?WE FEEL WORRY but WE CHOOSE PEACE
?WE FEEL overwhelmed by temptation but WE choose SELF-CONTROL
THOSE ARE THE RICHES OF GRACE WHEN WE CHOOSE to make the right choices WE GROW IN GRACE
The Bible tell us in--2 Peter 3:18 “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”
Ephesians 4:22-24 “Put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.”
Growing in God’s grace, however, isn’t what many people think. It isn’t working hard and obeying rules; rather it’s by taking off the corrupt former self (OUR SINS) through renewing our minds in God’s word, so that we can then put on the new person that we’ve become through faith in Jesus Christ.
ILL: In the 60’s a Song: after car wreck where his girlfriend died, ‘Where, O where can my baby be? The Lord took her away from me; She’s gone to heaven so I got a be good, so I can see my baby when I leave this world’.
That is the false hope of the world WHO think being kind saves.
It’s in God’s Grace that we should be continually Growing in, not only in our relationship with Him, but also in how we SHOW it to others.
(stop pretending that being kind will cover the sin’s we don’t stop doing.)
2. Transforming Grace
God’s grace transforms us. Now in many ways God’s transforming grace is the same as His growing grace. It does not depend on our working our way through it; rather it is God working His way through us.
Romans 12:2 “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”
What Paul is saying is that if we want to live in God’s good, acceptable, and perfect will, it doesn’t come through our abilities, but rather it comes through God’s grace. To conform in the Greek language means a change based on outside pressures.
ILL: You’re going to a Dolphins or Marlins games. As you near the stadium there are ‘scalpers’ along the roadside selling tickets. “Save time, don’t stand line, buy below face value”. Playoffs vrs Denver. So hundreds of dollars are spent by fans who high-fived each other all the way up to the entrance gate: Sorry these tickets are fakes, bogus. Can u Just imagine how that feels?
It FEEL BAD, but this is Going to happen to many at the moment of death: Those who have trusted in bad information, they think they got the answers. but REAL SALVATION IS ONLY: By GRACE, through FAITH, of GOD
Paul is telling us not to let the world change us from the outside-in, don’t allow the outside pressures of this world change us into its image, what it considers a Christian to be. Rather, Paul says that we are to be transformed from inside-out work.
ILL: The best example I can give to help us understand is how a caterpillar turns into a butterfly. The ugly caterpillar spins a cocoon, and then inside that cocoon its changes into a beautiful butterfly.
That is transformation, and Paul says it happens when we renew our minds, that is, to change the way we think, allowing God’s word to change us as we begin to take it in. And so, God’s transforming grace should be changing us more and more into the image of Jesus Christ.
1. Growing Grace2. Transforming Grace
3. Sustaining Grace
People are going through so much with this pandemic it’s really unbelievable. It ranges from those with a wide variety of illnesses to those whose stress levels have reached so high they’re one tick away from a heart attack. This virous has us all stressed to the max. I heard my fridge door say to me... “can you please replace the hinges?” our emotions are so out of control that we are turning to food or substances or reruns for relief, or so we think it relief.
People today are going through what some have affectionately, or not so affectionately, call, “The Ringer.” What we need to help get us through to the end of this quarantine, is God’s sustaining grace. This is something Paul knew well and used the analogy of a fight and race to reveal its truth.
2 Timothy 4:7-8a “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness.”
How can depend upon this promise, that when we accept Jesus as our Savior and Lord we will spend eternity with God on the other side?
?WITH God’s sustaining grace that gives us the strength to finish the race.
?WITH God’s sustaining grace that keeps us going when/ I feel like quitting.
?WITH God’s sustaining grace that helps us do what is right, when doing wrong is so much easier. Therefore, let God’s sustaining grace see you through. This is what Paul counted on to get him through.
And so now you see why it is so important to build our lives based upon God’s grace. “If were not living in God’s growing, transforming, and sustaining grace, and extending the same grace to others, then we’re living outside the will and way of God?” And so, it is important for us to get back to God’s grace, or should I say,???“Reboot to God’s grace.”
Closing ILL: I cannot tell you how many times I’ve been working at my computer when everything freezes up. I try just everything to get it working again, from clicking every possible button to yelling at it threatening it within an inch of its technical life. Addie can be my witness here as she has heard me cry out many times knowing I just lost everything I had been working on. (SAVE AND SAVE OFTEN) I look up, say a little prayer, and hold down the power button to reboot it. I think there is a saying in the computer industry that says, “When in doubt, reboot.” When nothing else seems to be working, reboot. Rebooting seems to have miraculous healing powers for our computers. What it does it that it shuts down programs or functions that may be running in the background that is slowing our computers down. Further, it allows the computer’s automatic defense systems to identify and deal with unwanted viruses and malware. Then bring the computer back to life.
This is what grace does for our lives. Grace reboots our lives. It allows us to shut down hurtful programming like guilt, shame, fear, legalism, and the ever-malicious virus of sin that is sapping our energy from living the life God has designed for us.
The problem many people have when it comes to God’s grace is that they have a hard time accepting it, receiving it, and giving it. And that’s because grace shocks us in what it offers.
Grace is a gift that costs everything to the giver and nothing to the receiver. It is given to those who don’t deserve it, barely recognize it, and hardly appreciate it. So, let me asks you... what dose Grace mean to you? And do you have the peace in your life, in this trying time that come with it?
Let’s pray
