The Effect Of Grace Series

INTRODUCTION

• SLIDE #1

• Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.

• The last few weeks we have been examining the subject of grace.

• When you start to grasp the fact that grace is all that a loving God feels and does to save people, my prayer is that we start to see the value of grace, that grace is not something that is cheap.

• When you think of where you were before you were baptized into Christ, what comes to your mind?

• When I look at myself, I see someone who once was lost and now is found, was blind and now I see.

• The song Amazing Grace is a good song that summarizes how I feel about what God has done for me.

• I know that without God’s grace, I would be lost.

• The other thing I know is that because of God’s grace, I have been abundantly blessed in every way. God has given me a great family, and a great church family to serve.

• So, here is my question, what effect should God’s grace have in my life?

• Should my life be different that it was before I was baptized into Jesus?

• Should the expression and exercise of God’s grace in my life through what Jesus did for me on the cross change me in some way?

• We have heard people talk about experiencing a life changing experience, such as marriage, children, tragedy.

• These things are more circumstance related that will have an impact on one’s life; however, is Jesus just another circumstance that alters my life or is there something more?

• The expression of God’s grace in one’s life should do more than to change our circumstances, it should do even more that change where one spends eternity, God’s grace should have an effect on my life.

• When one experiences God’s grace through salvation and forgiveness through Jesus, rising and walking on a newness of life should be evident.

• It is not the difference between Dry Jeff (Before Baptism) and Wet Jeff (after baptism), it should the difference between Lost Jeff, and Saved By God’s Grace Jeff.

• So today, we will turn to a beautiful passage written to the Galatian Church by the Apostle Paul.

• This letter was written to the church at Galatia, one of the reasons Paul was inspired to write this letter is because Judaizers (People who were trying to make Christians follow Jewish laws and rituals before they could become a Christian) were seeking to impose rules on Christians from which they had been saved from having to do.

• Let’s turn to Galatians 2:19-20

• SLIDE #2

• Galatians 2:19–20 (CSB) — 19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live for God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

• SLIDE #3

The first effect that Grace should have on me is the fact that…

SERMON

I. I am a new person.

• Let’s look at verse 19 for a moment.

• Paul says, For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live for God.

• Remember last week when we discussed the phrase WORKS OF THE LAW found in Romans?

• Well in verse 16 of Galatians 2, we see it again. Then just a couple of verses down, we find verse 19 where Paul speaks of through the law I died to the law.

• Remember that from literature of the time we see that WORKS OF THE LAW refers to manmade laws or manmade additions to the Law of Moses.

• WE cannot be made right with God by making up our own rules is how we might say it today.

• In verse 19, we see the word LAW two times. Paul had to die to the law so he could live for God.

• The absence of the article before (LAW) ??µ? is noteworthy; whereas the Law of Moses, being the one revealed Law, is always designated the Law (? ??µ??), ??µ? denotes law in the abstract, so that this clause comprehends emancipation from all control of external law.

• Rendall, F. (n.d.). The Epistle of Paul to the Galatians. In The Expositor’s Greek Testament: Commentary (Vol. 3, p. 165). New York: George H. Doran Company.

• So, what Paul is saying is that through the works of the law he died to the works of the law, he knew that before he could become a new person, he had to rid himself of trying to do it on his own! He saw the futility of trying to live in that manner.