While still in my teens I went
through a spiritual crisis. I doubted my
salvation. I couldn’t believe God loved
me. Fortunately, I laid aside a lot of
pride and called my pastor for help. He
helped the sun break through the dark clouds.
He challenged me to trust God’s promises and to recognize the riches of
God’s grace.
I’ve met a lot of people who
would never doubt that God would just naturally love them. But I think the majority of Christians have
probably known at least a few bouts of doubt.
Perhaps Paul felt that his
reminder of their previous spiritual condition might give rise to doubts in the
hearts of the Ephesians. So, in
Ephesians 2:7-9, he reminded them of “the immeasurable riches of God’s grace”
which motivated God to save them.
There may be several reasons why
you might need to be reminded of the vastness of God’s grace. You may be burdened with a sense of
unworthiness, convince that you could not be included under the shelter of the
gospel. You might have begun to believe,
unconsciously perhaps, that your turning to Christ is doing God a favor. In each case, you need to take a look at
God’s grace.
Saved by grace, we should bring
glory to God by consistent, confident Christian living.
Paul wants us to understand once
and for all that…
We Are Delivered by
God’s Grace
For it is by grace you have been saved,
through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by
works, so that no one can boast.
The old Sunday school definition
of grace as “God’s unmerited favor” can hardly be improved upon. But R. P. C. Hanson expands on the notion:
Grace means the free, unmerited,
unexpected love of God and al the benefits, delights, and comforts which flow
from it. It means that while we were
still sinners and enemies we have been treated as children and heirs.
Grace reminds us that God has
taken the initiative in our salvation, that He did for us what we could not do
for ourselves.
God acted in Christ on our
behalf. Nothing we did prompted him to
take that step. We find that hard to
take.
Human nature wants to boast of
its achievements, including spiritual achievements. There is a perennial resistance to the
message of salvation by grace alone.
When we visited Australia in I came across a piece written by an
Australian pastor. He said the great
“Australian sin” was the tendency of those challenged with the gospel to say,
“I’m a pretty good bloke; I don’t need grace.”
He called it the “Australian” sin but I thought it could as easily be
called the American sin. In fact, that
attitude knows no boundaries.
But if we take the Bible
seriously, neither the noblest pagan nor the most law-abiding Jew could claim
any saving merits. Salvation is God’s
gift.
Grace is not some heavenly
welfare system. Welfare is given because
we believe all persons, by virtue of their humanity, deserve a certain standard
of living. Grace is given to the
undeserving.
But why isn’t salvation by
works? Why can’t our hope for eternal
life be rooted in the good deeds we do in our lifetime here on earth? Here’s a little story to help explain.
Joe had dark circles under his
eyes as he shuffled into the office.
Bill said, “Joe, you look awful.
What happened?”
Joe said, “I had the same
nightmare again and again last night. I
dreamed I died and found myself standing in a long line to see if I would get
into heaven.”
“That is kind of a weird dream,”
Bill said, “but it doesn’t sound all that bad.”
“Wait,” Joe said, “there’s
more. Mother Theresa was standing in
line in front of me.”
Bill said, “Well, you’re no
Mother Theresa but you’re still a decent guy.
You shouldn’t have worried.”
Joe said, “That’s what I was
thinking until Saint Peter finished reviewing Mother Theresa’s files and said,
‘You could have done more.’”
The works of the best of us are
so tainted by sin, by mixed motives, that they are useless to secure our
salvation.
Then, too, salvation by works
would turn others into impersonal stepping-stones to heaven. Any good we did for them would be for our
benefit, not theirs.
If salvation were by works, it
would cast doubt on the wisdom and goodness of God. As Paul argued in Galatians, if we could save
ourselves the cross would not have been necessary.
Above all, salvation by works
detracts from the rightful glory of God.
Salvation is a gift offered
through God-proffered grace and received by God-prompted faith. Through the Spirit and the Word we enter an
atmosphere that encourages the birth of faith.
In the final analysis, faith is
the admission that God alone can do for us what we cannot do for ourselves and
the willingness to let him do it.
If we understand the nature of
God’s grace we will see…
We Are Destined to be Displays of God’s Glory.
God raised us up…in order that in the coming
ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his
kindness to us in Christ Jesus.
Both now and throughout eternity
we Christians will be trophies of God’s grace.
Graciously rescued we bring praise to the gracious rescuer.
Samuel Davies captured the
notion:
Great
God of wonders! All thy ways
Display
the attributes divine;
But
countless acts of pardoning grace
Beyond
thine other wonders shine:
In
wonder lost, with trembling joy,
We
take the pardon of our God;
Pardon
for crimes of deepest dye,
A
pardon bought with Jesu’s blood…
O
may this strange, matchless grace,
This
God-like miracle of love,
Fill
the wide earth with grateful praise,
As
now it fills the choirs above!
Who
is a God like Thee?
Or
who has grace so rich and free?
The greatest Christians have seen
themselves as trophies of God’s grace. The Apostle Paul, John Bunyan, John
Newton, C. S. Lewis. Listen as Lewis
describes his step from atheism to theism, the first step toward his eventual
acceptance of Christ’s claims.
You must
picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, [a college in Oxford] night after
night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the
steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet.
That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me. In the Trinity Term of
1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps,
that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England. I did not
then see what is now the most shining and obvious thing; the Divine humility
which will accept a convert even on such terms. The Prodigal Son at least
walked home on his own feet. But who can duly adore that Love which will open
the high gates to a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful,
and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape? The words “compelle
intrare,”
compel them to come in, have been so abused be wicked men that we shudder at
them; but, properly understood, they plumb the depth of the Divine mercy. The
hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our
liberation.
Sometimes our lives seem to deny
we are trophies of God’s grace.
--by our
spiritual ingratitude (Ro. 6:15)
--by spiritual
pride.
--by spiritual
anxiety.
Conclusion:
In time, I learned that I was not
alone or unique in my time of spiritual doubt.
Other Christians before me and after me had experienced the same
feelings. I needed to understand and
trust God’s grace. After all, what kind
of praise would come to God if he proved insufficient to save me or you?
Do you need to rediscover the
grace of God?
Listen to the great hymns. Listen
to the testimonies of the saints around you.
The flagellant must not trust his
whip.
The philanthropist must not trust
her purse.
The churchly workaholics must not
trust their labors.
Instead, by faith…
Receive the grace of God. Rest in the grace of God. Rejoice in the grace of God
