The Grace Of God

Grace will set you free from the tyranny of other people. Some of you are prisoners to other people's foolish opinions, their unreasonable demands, their domination and manipulation of your life. I want you to hear this. Quit trying to please the tyrants who are trying to control you. Take charge of your life or someone else will. Regardless of what you do, and I can tell you this from experience, it makes no difference what you do or don't do: you're going to be blamed for something by somebody. So go on and enjoy your life and make the decisions you and God make together, and it's going to be a wonderful life. Many of you are prisoners of the performance trap. You're trying to earn other people's approval by what you do. Give it up.

Have you ever made other people your master? You shouldn't. Paul says in Galatians 1:10, "Am I seeking the favor of men or God"? That's a powerful question. "Or am I striving to please men? If I'm striving to please men, I cannot be a bondservant to Jesus Christ". You cannot please both men and God. The fact is, and listen to this, you are either going to be a Father pleaser or a people pleaser. Which one of those two do you choose? Grace will set you free to forgive others, free to allow others to be who they are even when they're different from you. How many of you like to hang around only people who agree with you all the time? All of you, because it's in our nature. But don't write people off who disagree with you, because they have the right to disagree as long as you're not arguing about a Bible truth.

A preacher wanted to know what his teenage son would to be in his future life. So he thought he would give his son a test. He put on his son's dresser a Bible. And if the boy took the Bible it meant he would be a preacher. Then he put a silver dollar by the Bible. That meant he would be a banker. And then he put a bottle of whiskey and if he took that, he's going to be a worthless drunk. And he put playboy magazine beside those things. And if he took that, he's going to be a womanizer. The preacher hid in the closet waiting for his teenage son to come in. The teenage son came in, saw the four things and picked them all up and carried them out. And the father said, "Uh-oh, the boy's going to run for congress". God's grace is greater than all of your sin. Romans 5:20 says, "For where sin did abound, God's grace did much more abound". That is an awesome verse of scripture! Where sin did abound, God's grace was much greater than the sin.

I've heard people say, "Well, I've committed adultery". God's grace is greater than that. "Well, I've horribly failed". Everybody on planet earth has failed. God's grace is greater than your faults and failures. "But I'm in the occult". The grace of God is greater than the power of sin and Satan. "Well, I've committed murder". That's terrible. But Moses killed the Egyptian. He committed murder. David committed murder. He killed Uriah, the husband of Bathsheba, the woman he impregnated. He killed her husband to shut him down: yet, God used him in the future. Paul killed Christians. He put them in jail when he was a pharisee. And some of those Christians were put to death. He was a monster before he came to know Christ, because God's grace is greater than all of your faults and failures. Grace is greater than legalism.

Listen to me, church members. Legalism is Satan's theology. Legalism is Satan's theology. Legalism defined is keeping man-made religious rules to obtain righteousness with God. You should write that down. You cannot live under grace and law at the same time. Paul said that. You must choose one or the other. And I can tell you, if you choose legalism, you're going to be one miserable wretch until the day you die. Paul said in Galatians 2:21, "if you can be saved by what you do, Christ died in vain." Get that in your brain, because that's what it's about. If some group of men can make up a set of rules that guarantee you Heaven, Jesus Christ went to the cross in vain. And Paul attacked legalism with a ruthless writing that just cut it down to the ground. You are not saved by what you do. You are saved because of Who you know, Jesus Christ, the son of the living God.

In the theater of your mind, go with me back 3,000 years ago to Israel. King Saul and Jonathan have just been killed in bloody, hand-to-hand combat on the Hills of Gilboa. The news of their death reaches the capital city of Jerusalem. It was a brutal time in history. It was customary for all of the members of the royal family to be slaughtered: lest, the new king in the future would find a legitimate heir for claiming his throne. When the word reached Jerusalem that Saul and Jonathan had been killed, the nurse of Jonathan's infant son raced into the nursery. She grabbed this baby, Jonathan's baby, and they ran for their lives. She dropped the baby, and the baby was crippled in both of his feet for life. His name is Mephibosheth. A name like that makes you appreciate the name of John or Tom. He failed the third grade trying to spell his name.