An Exhibit Of Grace

You’re in the business of proving that the grace of God is real and relevant and enough – the praise of the glory of His grace.


Scripture: Ephesians 1:6, Hebrews 6, Romans 12:1

Transcript

Alright, thank you very much and hello again dear radio friend, how in the world are you? You doing alright today? Well, I know some of you going through a rough time and the thing to do when you strike a rough day is to look up and say, “Lord, see me through this”, and He will. The keyword is through, “When thou passeth through the waters they shall not overflow thee.” So whether it’s a work, or health, or sorrow, or disappointment, or whatever it may be that may be your particular problem today, look up and let the Lord see you through it, Amen?

Well, dear friends we’re in Ephesians and we’re looking now at verse 5, “He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world”, Paul says in verse 4, before God ever started to create the universe which we now know He had you in mind. A mind-boggling thought but it’s there. God is a big enough God to plan for you before He ever threw the stars out in space. And He planned that we should be holy, that’s to share His nature without blame that’s to share His redeeming grace, before Him in love that’s to share the love relationship, why, because He said He’s predestinated us to the adoption of children. He said, “I want to love you as my own child, I want you to belong to me”.

Now remember all of these occurred before He ever built the universe which you and I now know, before God built the universe and the world in which we live He planned that you and I would be brought to faith in the Lord Jesus and that through that commitment of faith we would be adopted in to the very family of God, and we would share love for God. And so Paul says in another place that, “God hath sent forth the spirit of his son into hearts crying, Abba Father, Papa God”. Beautiful thought, isn’t it?

“Having predestinated us unto to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will and to the praise of the glory of His grace wherein He hath made us accepted in the beloved one.” In Him that’s in the Lord Jesus, we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace. Now let’s talk about this for a moment: the fact that you belong to the Lord today is not due to something you did or desired but it is because God willed it, He wanted you and He sought you, and He loved, and He paid for your redemption, and the blessed Holy Spirit of God dealt with you until you are willing to say, yes to Christ.

According, it says, to the good pleasure of His will. Now this is a mystery, the relationship between human choice and divine sovereignty and it’s certain that you and I are not going to settle that theological problem today, I shant attempt to solve it, I’m going to accept it instead. I’m going to say with millions of others, I don’t know how it is that God holds me responsible for my choices and at the same He is a sovereign God working out His will, I only know that it is true. D.L. Moody has said to have remarked, that when you approach the door of salvation, you’ll find the words on it “whosoever will” and you say “I will” and you enter in the door of salvation. But after you’re in on the other side safely in the folds so to speak of God’s people, you turn around and looked at that same door and on the other side of the door you find the words, “chosen in Him from before the foundation of the world” two sides of the same thing.

So let’s not argue about it let’s just accept it that that’s the way the Lord works. Yes, He gives you the right to exercise your own will and yes He reserves the right to make His own plans because He is God. And you put those two concepts together and you have a wonderful, awe-inspiring relationship because yes I am responsible and I can’t fool around with the things of God and I can’t play games with God, we read that very clearly delineated in, for instance in the 6th chapter of Hebrews. You can’t fool around with God but the 6th chapter of Hebrews ends with the reassuring statement that God will never play games with either and we have the hope of God’s faithfulness as anchor of our soul for He hath said I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.

So we take these two concepts and we bring them together in a life day by day of complete joy in the Lord, we’re trusting Him, we’re trying to obey Him, we’re trying to do our best, we’re using whatever willpower God has given us to will to do God’s will and at the same time God is willing to bless us and to guide us and to develop in and through us His perfect will so it says to the praise of the glory of His grace.

Yes, you will get to Heaven because you’re saved, but the number one reason for saving is not to get you to Heaven, but to prove the grace and the glory of God. You see the devil’s big lie as enunciated there in the garden of Eden was this, “the God isn’t gracious but He is cruel and God is trying to cheat you out of something that you could enjoy if you disobeyed Him”, that was the devil’s big lie and he has been telling it ever since, hasn’t he? Young people today are enticed into evil with the idea that you can have a better, more fulfilling, and a happier life if you’ll just break the rules and go on your own way, and do your own thing, and forget God, that’s the devil lie. And those who have fallen for it, like Adam and Eve did have ended with sorrow and regret.

And so what God has in mind not only to get you to Heaven safely, yes He’ll do that in the process but it says, “It’s to the praise of the glory of His grace”. God is proving by saving you and me that He’s gracious and that He’s good, and that He is right. Paul says in Romans 12:1, “That we should present ourselves a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto God which is our reasonable service, be not conformed, that means jammed in to the worlds mold”. Don’t get jammed in to the world’s mold, be not conformed with this world but be a transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye prove what is good and prove what is acceptable and prove what is perfect namely the will of God.

You see, the job you have as a Christian and the job I have as a Christian is not just to get safe home to Heaven, nor indeed not just to enjoy the Christian life while we are here but our commitment is to prove to all around us including Satan, and the angels, and the demons, and anybody else who watches us that God is right, that the will of God is good and that it’s acceptable, that is easy to take and that it’s perfect that there isn’t any better deal anywhere in the universe than the will of God. And you my friend, when you trust the Lord Jesus Christ and yield yourself to Him are proving that in a way that couldn’t be proved in any other way to the praise of the glory of His grace.

Paul says in another place that “in the ages to come He wants to show the exceeding reaches of His grace in His kindness towards us through Christ Jesus”. You my friend are going to be God’s exhibit A yonder in the glory, and God’s going to point to you and say look there! That’s what my grace did. He’s going to point to me and say look at that that’s what my grace did, to the praise of the glory of His grace through His exceeding kindness towards us in Christ Jesus, isn’t that something?

When you stop to think about that it puts a different cast on living, doesn’t it, beloved? We tend to think of our daily life in terms of the things we have to do and the things we want, either to possess or to achieve, and how we feel about all of that, that represents the package of life for any given day, isn’t true? You, mothers and a homemakers wake up and you think, “Oh boy I’ve got to do the wash, and then I’ve got to do the ironing of some of those things that need to be ironed are still damp, and then I got a plan for supper, I’ve got to shop because we’re out of milk and bread and coffee,” and so on.

“And I’ve got to do this and that and the other then I have to take junior to the boy scout meeting, and I have to take sister to her piano lesson,” and you’ve got it all lined out in your mind. Well, you’re really tired before you ever get up because of thinking about it isn’t it true? But that you say is your life, well in a way it is, but in another way life does not consist, dear friend of just a things that we do or the things that we want or the things we achieve or how we feel about all of them.

All of these elements are so to speak, are byproducts of something else. God wants you to be an exhibit of His grace to the praise of the glory of His grace, He wants you to be an exhibit of His grace to prove that the grace of God is real, to prove that the grace of God is relevant to your situation, and to prove that the grace of God is enough. That is the purpose of living. So when you awake, and if you’re a homemaker you think of the million and one things mothers have to do, or if you are a business person you think of all the jobs that are waiting for you when you get to the office or to the shop, or if you’re a sales person you think of all the calls you have to make, and all of that type of thing crowds in on your consciousness.

Right then at the beginning of your day turn to your blessed Lord and say, “Oh God, manifest your grace to me. Let the way I live today be to the praise of the glory of grace. Let people know that God’s will is good and acceptable and perfect. Prove today through me that the devil is a liar when he says that you can do better on your own by forsaking God. Prove through me today that God’s will is ‘good’ that means right, and ‘right and acceptable’ that means easy to take, ‘and perfect’ that means there isn’t any better deal in the universe. Prove that through me Lord,” you pray.

I tell you something if you’ll take that kind of a viewpoint in life as you begin your day the entire day will have a different cast to it and even the disappointments and trials and irritations and frustrations that come to all of us in the course of any given day will have a different meaning to you because you’re in the business of proving that the grace of God is real and relevant and enough, the praise of the glory of His grace. That’s what Paul said concerning his prayer to get rid of a certain trial; he said that God told him “My grace is sufficient for thee”. You try that on for size will you today?

Dear Father today, magnify your grace through us in Jesus name, Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!



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