Embracing God's Grace: Our Call to Transformation

You know, but it really is a humbling reminder of just our weakness and the fact that God meets us in our weakness. I know it's not a big deal. It's not like I'm dying or anything at the moment. But it's a humbling reminder of the fact that, like, that in all circumstances, whether I'm feeling good or I'm struggling, that I can lean on God and that he is there. And he's reliable and that if I lean on him, he's not going to let me fall. [00:01:34]

What you have done for us in saving us is described as you extending the riches of heaven to us. And God, often we treat it like you've thrown us a dollar or something. Like you bought us a snack at the vending machine. And so my prayer for your people, your movement church people here today, God, is that you would just open their eyes to the greatness of your grace and your salvation. [00:19:40]

And so because Jesus said it, I don't have any problem saying it even if it makes me unpopular. And so I just want to tell you this morning, I want to encourage you to check not just your finances and whether every dollar is going somewhere, I want you to check your priorities as well. What matters most to you? Is it obedience? Or is it maintaining some status or pleasure in your life? [00:33:39]

So God has placed this calling on our life, and the calling is not your job, and it's not your family, the calling is a calling to salvation, it's a calling to eternal life, it's a calling to a relationship with the God that made you. God has called you to himself. And so because of this great calling that we have on our lives, he says, now that you have it, you need to walk or live in a manner that is worthy of the calling. [00:33:46]

And so from Adam on, people have been unable to, gosh, have been unable to perfectly live for God, as he's called it, as he's called us to. This is who we were. We were dead in our trespasses. In that time, Paul says, he says that we followed all kinds of things, basically anything that wasn't God. So he lists three things specifically in the passage we just read. [00:48:28]

And so we're following these things, the ways of the world, Satan, and the cravings of our flesh, and the consequence of this rebellion against God is that all of us, every single one of us is deserving of wrath. There's just no way around it. I could sugarcoat it, but it's not going to taste good going down no matter what. [00:57:49]

And so God values us. Loves us so much that it says here that God who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable. [01:03:34]

And so what we need to do with this info first of all is we need to believe that it's as good as done. One of the things that's interesting about the phrasing here is that when he's talking about the sinful life that we used to live he uses the past tense but when he starts to talk about how Jesus has seated us with him in the heavenly realms he doesn't use the future tense. [01:09:39]

He says for it is by grace that 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. For we are God's handiwork created in Christ Jesus to do good works which we have not done before. Which God prepared in advance for us to do. [01:11:08]

And so the challenge for us this morning with this very elementary foundational thing, the challenge is very simple, and yet as simple things often are very difficult. The first is this. If you're someone here this morning that has either been in a relationship with God or been living for yourself, you've been following the ways of the world, you've been following Satan, you've been following the desires of your flesh, you've not been living for Jesus, you don't have a relationship with God, you are still dead in your sins, the call is very simple. [01:22:59]

I thank you for this message that grace is a gift, salvation is a gift, and not something we have to earn, because Lord knows we've tried over and over and over again to make ourselves worthy of you, and we've failed every time. And so, Lord, I want to pray for those this morning that maybe are trusting you for the first time, believing in you for the first time. I just thank you for your sacrifice for them. [01:25:29]

Lord, I also pray for those of us that have been walking with you for some time that have just taken your grace for granted. I pray that we would not do that any longer, that we would step into the good things you've called us to do, that you've planned for us to do. God, when we see the person that's struggling in our office or at our home or in our school, and we see them struggling in our home or in our school, and we see them struggling and we say, I wonder if God has put them in front of me. Help us to not wonder anymore. [01:27:46]