Rejoice Always: Guilt, Grace, and Gratitude

``If you're a Christian, you take zero credit, not because your goodness is insufficient. It's because your goodness is irrelevant. Your rescue had nothing to do with your earning, your resume, your record. And this is what makes the gospel such unbelievably good news because salvation is God's work and not yours. So you can finally exhale. You can't ruin it. You can't break it. It's not on your shoulders. It's not another box to check. It's not in another arena for your performance anxiety. [00:54:55] (30 seconds)  #AllGraceNoCredit

Listen. The Lord Jesus is so committed to your good and your joy that he suffered the excruciating death of the cross for you. Physical agony, social rejection, public shame strung up naked before the whole city of Jerusalem on Passover weekend, and the spiritual darkness of God's silence as he cried out and forsakenness, and he did this. He did all of this. Hebrews 12 tells us, for the joy set before him, and the joy set before him is you. [01:04:15] (33 seconds)  #JoySetBeforeHim

According to scripture, sin is the default default condition of every human soul. The acts that we call sins, envy, lust, racism, pride, they're all symptoms of a universal terminal disease. Universal terminal disease. Universal. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. This is Romans three twenty three, and it's terminal for the wages of sin is death. Romans six twenty three. Apart from Christ, we are, as Ephesians two puts it, we are dead in our trespasses, not struggling, not limping, not sick. We're dead. Sin has corrupted us to the point that we cannot take a single step towards God, not because he blocks us, but because spiritual death leaves us unable to respond. [00:52:32] (46 seconds)  #DeadInTrespasses

And this isn't like a plastered smile. This this sort of gratitude begins deep within the heart, and it comes from recognizing the gravity of Christ's work on the cross, which saves us from sin and death. It it looks at the cross and it can truly sing the hymn, it was my sin that held him there until it was accomplished. His dying breath has brought me life. I know that it is finished. It's the finished work of Jesus Christ that gives the Bible its joy. [00:56:10] (29 seconds)  #GratitudeForTheFinishedWork

And when you remember that God has erased your guilt through his matchless grace, your heart will roar to life with gratitude. When he grants you the strength to comprehend what is the breadth and the length and the height and the depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, you won't be able to help but spill over with joy at the wonders of the riches that you have in Christ. [00:57:24] (24 seconds)  #GraceThatErasesGuilt

So let me ask you this. Do you rejoice in your trials? Did you wake up on Sunday morning to freezing rain, a flooding bay basement, no power, and say, Lord, what might you want to do in me through this? I didn't. I didn't, but that's the question before me. Right? That's the question before. What Lord, what might you want to do in me through this? Right? Do we do this? Do we rejoice in our sufferings? Do we rejoice in our difficulty? This is what the Bible calls us to do. [01:02:31] (29 seconds)  #RejoiceInTrials

Over lunch a few months ago, we were laughing about how God answers prayers. We said, you really want God to answer your prayers. Add whatever it takes, Lord, to your prayer and see what happens. So question, are you willing to do this? Are you willing to add whatever it takes, Lord, to your prayer? Lord, give me your joy, whatever it takes. Teach me to rejoice always, whatever it takes. Make my life bloom with the fragrance of Christ, whatever it takes. [01:03:49] (27 seconds)  #WhateverItTakesForJoy

Okay. But do you know what's not on that list? Entitlement. Entitlement is not one of the fruit of the spirit. And yet how many of us tasted the bitterness of the fruit of entitlement this week? Like acid reflux, you could feel it rising when you found water in the basement or when the power still wasn't back on, or when you were crammed into a hotel room with four other humans, or or when your kids wanna leave you alone and the schools still weren't open, or when you saw the NES truck drive by again without stopping. [00:41:45] (35 seconds)  #NoRoomForEntitlement