The Freedom of Grace
Tom Shrader examines the doctrine of eternal security, teaching that salvation is entirely God's work and cannot be lost. He addresses common fears about losing salvation and explains how grace provides both life (initial salvation) and living (ongoing Christian life). The teaching emphasizes that believers are sealed by the Holy Spirit and held securely in God's grip, not their own.
“It is not a picture of me holding on to God, but it's a picture of Him hanging on to me with a grip that will never let go.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Grace for Life, Grace for Living
Recorded: 2008
Duration: 54 min
Themes: grace, salvation, security, freedom, assurance, faith, gift, hope, doubting salvation, fear of losing faith, new believer, struggling with assurance, feeling insecure, questioning worthiness, seeking confidence, needing encouragement
Scripture: Ephesians 2:8-10, Ephesians 1:11-14, John 3:16, John 3:36, John 5:24, John 6:47, John 10:22-30, Romans 8:16, Romans 8:35-39, Philippians 1:6, Philippians 3:4-8, Acts 11:19-24, John 8:31-32
Theological Themes: eternal security, perseverance of saints, sola gratia, grace alone, regeneration, being born again, justification, sealed by spirit
Full Transcript
Open your Bibles, please, to the book of Ephesians and the second chapter, the eighth verse, which really provides the text for this series titled Grace for Life, Grace for Living.
I was not here last week. I was in the midst of—I intended to be. That was my plan. I taught on Thursday and my plan was to teach Sunday, but I had all this stuff all over me. It looked really bad, which I don't even care about that part, but I just couldn't even concentrate. So probably about noon on Saturday, I called Tyler and said, "You know that Grace thing? Have you got it figured out? Because you're going to have to teach it tomorrow."
What I told him is normally what the guys get to do is come in and do something they're teaching somewhere else, but I did not want to break the series. So I said, "Tyler, I want you to teach the sentence: God saves sinners." I had a chance to listen to his message on the web and he did a great job with it. Knowing you had less than a day to prepare for that was pretty impressive to me, but I think it flows so much from his heart. Honestly, I think it's so much ingrained in who we are here at East Valley Bible Church, but I want to pick up on that.
The Foundation of Grace
This series comes, its origin, from Ephesians 2:8, 9, and 10. "For by grace you've been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not as a result of works, so that no one may boast." That's the grace for life. We're dead in our sins and trespasses, and that's what we've spent, whatever it's been, four or five weeks on—that we're dead in our sins and trespasses.
Tyler diagrammed the sentence last week: God saves sinners. God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the triune God—saves, delivers, rescues, does everything that's necessary. This is really important: from first to last, to bring man into glory, to deliver us or to rescue us. God does that. God saves who? Sinners.
The Work of the Trinity in Salvation
We talked about how God the Father elects those that would be saved before the foundations of the earth—chooses us. Jesus Christ redeems us. He dies on the cross for that chosen group of people. Jesus came to save His people. He said, "It is finished," meaning He had done His work—the atonement was made for us.
Then the Spirit, at the appropriate time—and Tyler ended up last week in Titus 3, talking about how the Spirit regenerates us. We're born again by the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit comes into our life, takes out a heart of stone, replaces it with a heart of flesh, convicts us of our sin, gives us the ability to see the gospel, hear the gospel, understand the gospel, and the desire to respond to the gospel.
That's a work that's done completely by God. Salvation has nothing to do with us. All we bring to salvation is our sin. We are dead, and as dead people, there's nothing we can do to bring ourselves to life. That is completely a work of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Helpless But Not Hopeless
God saves sinners. God saves people like us who are helpless and powerless and unable to do God's Word and God's will, but not hopeless. When somebody says you're helpless and hopeless, no, that's not true. You're helpless but not hopeless. The hope lies in Christ.
Last week, as I was listening to Tyler teach, he used the scene from the movie Amazing Grace where John Newton is, as I remember the scene, scrubbing a floor and talking with this man. It's this beautiful line where he says, "Here's what I know: I am a great sinner, and He is a great God." That's what the doctrines of grace teaches us—that we are sinners separated from God by our sin. We're helpless in that. We're powerless. We're dead. There's nothing we can do to change that, modify it. We can't bring ourselves to life.
Something has to happen to us, and what happens to us is that God moves. The Father to elect, the Son to redeem, the Spirit to regenerate, and then continue to work in our life. Those are the beautiful teachings of the Scripture as it relates to salvation. We've done, I think, a wonderful job as we've unpacked it this time to say, let's forget, for sake of this discussion, Augustine and Calvin and Luther and all the others. What does the Bible teach us? And that's what the Bible teaches us.
The Crucial Question
Now, there are all sorts of questions that come out of that, and it would be impossible, really, in a setting like this to begin to answer them all. But there is one giant question at this point, a question that I get more often than any other question once we get to this point. Let me just read you a little sentence from an email I got: "What if God changes His mind and decides to condemn me?"
Let me say it another way. Is there anything I can do to lose this salvation? Is there anything—so now that I've entered into this relationship with God, I now know Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, I've come to repentance and faith—is there anything I can do to undo this, or God would do to undo this? Or any sort of external force that could come upon me that could somehow sever this relationship?
God's Commitment to Complete His Work
You're in Ephesians 2. Let me invite you to turn just one page to the left to Ephesians chapter one. God says it, or Paul says it so simply in Philippians chapter one, verse six: "I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus."
Ephesians chapter one—Paul identifies himself, identifies the recipient of the letters. He says in verse three, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundations of the world, that we may be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will."
God did all of that. God redeemed us. There's the picture there.
The Father chose those that He would save before the foundations of the earth as we saw a couple weeks ago. Not because of anything we did, but in spite of us. Jacob I loved, Esau I hated. Jacob I'll show favor on, Esau I will simply let be Esau. To one I'll give justice, to the other I'll give mercy.
So our immediate cry is that's not fair and Paul anticipates that and says wait a minute, there's no injustice with God, is there? No, He'll have grace and mercy on who He has mercy. God's sovereign will do as He pleases. No one is ever treated unjustly. There's no one who wants to come to Christ but God's holding him away. That person doesn't exist.
Predestined and Sealed
I predestined into adoption. Now look at verse 11. Also we've obtained an inheritance having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after His counsel. To the end that we who are the first in hoping Christ would be to the praise of His glory in Him you also after listening to the message of truth that is the gospel of salvation having also believed you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise. The Holy Spirit who, verse 14, is a pledge of our inheritance.
God sends the Holy Spirit into our life, He indwells us, He empowers us, and He works as a seal. John MacArthur writes this: When a person becomes a Christian, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in his life. Life in Jesus Christ is different because the Holy Spirit of God is within us. He is there to empower us, equip us, and function through the gifts He's given us. The Holy Spirit is our helper and advocate. He protects and encourages us. He also guarantees our inheritance in Jesus Christ.
Romans chapter eight, verse 16: The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs of Christ. He is the seal. He is, verse 14, the pledge, literally the down payment, the earnest money that would secure a purchase. The Holy Spirit comes into our life and takes up residence there. He seals us. He becomes the picture of security and authenticity and of ownership and authority. That's what the Holy Spirit does in our life. He who began the work, God, will continue that work through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Nothing Can Separate Us
So in answer to the question, is there anything that I can do, or would God do, or would happen from anyone else in our lives, is there anything that could usurp this or change this plan in any way, shape, or form? The answer to this is no. Paul says it this way in Romans chapter eight: What should we say of these things? If God's for us, who's against us? Who can separate us from the love of Christ?
And then he has this list: Tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword. It anticipates all sorts of circumstances from life. The word tribulation means literally to squeeze under pressure. Distress is the idea of being hemmed in. Persecution is the idea of affliction for the Lord's sake. Famine is the absence of the necessities of life. Nakedness is the inability to even take care of our basic needs. Peril is the overarching idea of danger. The idea of a sword - there's actually a small dagger that was used to perform assassinations. It was a concealed weapon.
If God's for us, who can be against us? What can separate us from the love that Christ has for us? These things? No. But in all these things, we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. Paul writes this of our relationship with God: I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor heights, nor depths, nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Is it possible for me to pull myself away from God? No. From God to pull away from me? No. Is it possible that the circumstances of life will become so overwhelming that they would separate me from the love that God has for me? No.
Jesus on Eternal Life
Let me read you four passages from the Gospel of John where Jesus Himself talks about believing in eternal life. John 3:16: For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. If I believe, I have eternal life. John 3:36: He who believes in the Son has eternal life. John 5:24: Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life. And lastly, John 6:47: Truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life.
Now what those four passages have in common is this: Jesus is connecting, if I believe, I have eternal life. He doesn't talk about eternal life in something in an abstract way, or in the future way, but in the present. He who believes has eternal life. So think with me now. When does eternal life for us begin? Well, it begins right now. When does eternal life end? It has no ending. What is Jesus teaching us? If I believe, and this is a genuine Christian, orthodox, biblical Christian belief. If I believe, if I've come in repentance and faith. If I believe, I have eternal life. And nothing can separate me from that. Nothing can put an end to that.
Jesus' Teaching in John 10
I thought it would be good, as we close out this first part of the series, to look at Jesus' teaching Himself. Because there's a wonderful passage, turn with me to John chapter 10, where Jesus teaches essentially what we've been looking at as it relates to salvation. John 10:22: At that time, the Feast of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, Jesus is walking in the temple in the portico of Solomon. And then the Jews gathered around Him. Now these would be the Jewish leaders. So Jesus is there, you have the
The Jewish leaders come, they gather around Him, and they say to Him in John 10:24, "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you're the Christ, tell us plainly." If you're the Messiah, we've been waiting for hundreds and hundreds of years for the Messiah, for the Anointed One. If that's you, tell us. Tell us plainly. Tell us in a way we can't possibly misunderstand. Shoot straight with me.
And Jesus says, I did that. Verse 25: "I told you, and you don't believe. The works that I do in my Father's name, these testify of me." I've told you this, you've seen this, you've seen these miracles, you've seen these things happen, but you don't believe. You don't believe, why? You're not my sheep.
The Heart of Grace: My Sheep Hear My Voice
Really, here is the teachings of the doctrines of grace here in a nutshell, from the lips of Jesus. My sheep hear my voice. You didn't hear me, why didn't you hear me? Well, you're not one of us. My sheep hear my voice. There's an understanding. What the Holy Spirit does is to open our eyes to begin to see, and our hearts begin to understand.
Jesus, at times, and it's so interesting when you're just brand new to this, and you read these things, you go, that's weird. But there's times where Jesus would be teaching, and then He would say this: "He who has ears to hear, let him hear." And I always think, what are we, you got a bunch of guys that don't have any place to put their glasses, or what is that? What He's saying is, you that are my sheep, listen to me. My sheep hear my voice.
And I, look at that, I know them. It's a picture of intimacy here. It's not that I know about them, it's not cognitive, it's relational. It's not just that I know about them, I have information about them, He's all-knowing. He's saying, I know them. The same intimacy, or the same idea, when we say, Adam knew Eve, there's an idea of intimacy here. There's a relationship here. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them. There's relationship there.
Transformed Hearts Follow
And here you go, and their life changes. Look at, they follow me. They're really my disciples. Their lives begin to change. They hear the truth, and the truth matters to them. They begin to have a desire to do the things that I command them to do, and avoid the others. There's a heart that is transformed. We've said it this way: the heart's transformed, the mind's informed, and now I'm living this radical life. And by radical life, what we mean is the supernatural life.
So even when we talk about something like love itself, we define love not in some gushy way, though I'm all right with gush, and not driven by feelings. I'm okay with feelings, man, I like that. But it's love as Paul defines it, where he says it doesn't seek its own. I haven't loved unconditionally in my life once. The closest I ever came - I've talked to a lot of guys about this, and they'll kind of go, you know what, I think that's true with me too - the closest I ever came to unconditional love was the birth of my first daughter. By the second daughter, I was already out of this.
The birth of the first daughter. And then it was only for a second. There was this moment in there where I had this almost unconditional love, and I even started to think about it this way. She's just a blob, she can't do anything. But then I realized the only reason I'm attracted to her is why? She's my blob. There are a whole bunch of blobs in there I didn't care about. Even that was conditional. But all of a sudden, God begins to allow you to love and live in a whole new way.
Life as an Open-Book Test
So we discover life becomes really an open-book test for us, and here's the answers. Those are always my favorite. That was a thing I always loved about math books. I always had the answers in the back. I always got them all right, but I never knew how I got there, but I didn't really care. What do I do to get a C? That was my goal. I wasn't as motivated as I should have been.
It's an open-book test, and He tells you in almost every circumstance we face, right? Here's what to do or not do, or at least here's principles from which I can derive a sound spiritual answer. So my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.
Eternal Security: He Will Never Let Go
Here you go. "And I will give them eternal life." I will enter into this relationship that will not be broken. Make sure we understand this now. The union is rock-solid. The communion is shaky. Not based on Him, but based on my sin. Based on me grieving the Holy Spirit. Based on my times where I don't respond to Him.
So the classic term that we use to describe this is called the perseverance of the saints. It's probably better stated this way: the preservation of the saints. The perseverance of the saints makes it sound like it's me hanging in there. The preservation of the saints communicates the idea that I'm being preserved.
So here's the picture. It is not a picture of me holding on to God. It's not a picture of me hanging on to Him, because you know what? There's a problem there. Because my grip gets weak, my arms begin to shake, and I begin to say, "Come quickly Lord Jesus." It's not a picture of me hanging on to Him, but it's a picture of Him hanging on to me. With a grip that will never let go. He has a hold of me, not me a hold of Him.
And that gets exciting because He loves to have fun. He loves to go with you sometimes and shake you down and take you out. But He'll never let you go. They have eternal life. "They shall never perish. No one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father's given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand." Now that should answer the question, is it possible for me to somehow lose this salvation? The answer is no.
The Unity of Father and Son
There is just a little sidebar here. Let's look at it real quickly in verse 30. "I and the Father are one." What does that mean? Well, you don't have to guess. The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him. And Jesus answered them, "I showed you many good works from the Father, for which one of them are you stoning me?"
And the Jews answered, "For a good work we do not stone you, but for blasphemy, because you being a man make yourself out to be God."
So when you're having a cup of coffee with somebody in the commons, and you're talking about Jesus, and they go, "Well, Jesus never said He was God," you take them right to John 10. That's exactly the point. That's what the Jews were going to stone Him for. They understood Jesus' claim. When He says, "Before Abraham was, I am," they got it. They go, "Wait a minute, you're not even 50 years old. How could you have possibly been with him?" That was Jesus' claim.
Grace for Life and Grace for Living
So the series title is Grace for Life, Grace for Living. Grace for Life meaning we're dead in our sins and trespasses, what we looked at - kind of springboard from Ephesians 2 into Romans 12, back into Genesis 3, to see that's the condition of man. Not that we're as bad as we can possibly be - Hitler didn't kill his mother - but we're as bad off as we can possibly be. Sin has filled us, and we're dead in that. If something doesn't happen to us, we will remain dead.
But we have, back to Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8, grace for life. "For by grace I am saved." How? The instrument: through faith. There's the evidence of that grace - through faith. It's not of myself, it's not from anything that I did, it's not from a decision I made, it's not because of something in me that's intrinsically valuable or good. I'm saved in spite of me, not because of me. I'm saved by grace through faith, not of myself - it's a gift of God.
There's a stake in the heart of religion - me trying to please God. All religion, shapes and sizes, doesn't matter. It in essence is this: somehow a sinful man trying to appease a holy God. Biblical Christianity is about a holy God reconciling to a sinful man. "Not as a result of works, so no one would boast." Grace for life.
Verse 10, grace for living: "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, so that we would walk in them."
The Challenge of Grace for Living
Now I've spent, I assume you would assume this, a ton of time thinking about the grace for living part. The grace for life part frankly is pretty easy. We've talked about it and talked about it. I personally have spent thousands of hours studying it, and I feel very comfortable there. The grace for living gets a little tougher, because it's not just the grace that brings me into the relationship, but it's the grace that sustains me in this relationship. I've thought over and over again how to present it to you.
By the way, we brought in - and we do this constantly - I don't know, my sense is, especially here in the chapel, some of you kind of come in through the parking lot off Elliot, and come in and then leave, and never get to the commons. There are two wonderful assets in the commons. The best drinks you'll find anywhere in the commons. I mean that. It's unbelievable. Susan and I have this conversation every time we're stuck in a Starbucks or something, because they can't compare. But the bookstore is phenomenal.
Recommended Resources
Every time that I talk about this series in the Doctrines of Grace, we try to bring in some really helpful literature. There's no exception. When you walk in the bookstore, right in the front there, there's a big table that's featuring this literature. There's probably five or six books. I wanted to grab one - a grace for life one, and a grace for living one.
This is called "Chosen for Life: The Case for Divine Election" by Sam Storms. I have not read this book. Those who screen these things have. John Piper's simple endorsement, one sentence, is this: "I can't know and love and serve God if I don't know the truth about God. This book describes God the way He really is." That sentence alone makes me want to read this book. I've read some other stuff by Sam Storms. It's really good. That's the grace for life part.
The grace for living part came from this book: "When Grace Comes Home," and endorsements all over. James Boyce, the late James Boyce, speaking of this author Terry Johnson, writes this: "Terry has provided a splendid work on how right theology bears upon worship, character, suffering, witness, growth, life, and Christian life." On the front, Boyce writes, "Whether evangelicals know it or not, their future as a viable movement depends upon the rediscovery of such God-honoring theology."
"When Grace Comes Home," subtitle: "How the Doctrines of Grace Change Your Life." When I started, I was about halfway through this book, and I got hold of Brenna in the bookstore, and said you need to bring these in for when I teach the series. She came back and said, these are really hard to get. We had to get them out of Scotland, and they're published over there and not here. So we brought a bunch of them in. I'm going to be stuck with these if you don't buy them. That's my whole point. But even then, I'd eat them before I'd give you something that was lousy. This is really, really good.
I don't know how many are over there, and I know getting more was hard, but "When Grace Comes Home" - either of those resources, these are great resources. You need to be reading. I'm not a reader. I'm a slow reader. You need to be reading. What becomes really important is to make sure you're reading the right stuff. On this topic, the books on that table are really helpful. I really recommend all of them. This one, "Grace Comes Home," is really a helpful tool.
The Difficulty Ahead
Well, when we're talking about grace, and as I'm putting together the grace for living part of this, and I start talking to the guys - different staff guys, and leader guys, and people in my life - I'm realizing this grace for living part is going to be the tough part of this.
The reason grace is risky is that it's so easily misunderstood. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, who is not a screaming liberal but rather an orthodox, conservative man teaching in Westminster Chapel with all sorts of credentials that we would admire, writes to those of us who preach. He talks really about the risky business of teaching grace.
Let me just read you a part of what he writes: "If it's true that where sin abounds, grace abounds much more, well then shall we continue to sin that grace abound more yet further? May it never be, obviously." That relates to what Paul said in Romans 6.
The Test of True Gospel Preaching
"First of all, let me make a very important and vital comment. The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this: that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this—that because you've been saved by grace alone, it doesn't matter at all what you do. You can go on sinning as much as you like, because it will rebound all the more in the grace, the glory of grace. That is a very good test of the preaching of the gospel. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation doesn't expose it to that misunderstanding, then it's not the gospel at all."
Lloyd-Jones goes on to explain that if you teach salvation by works—anything other than grace alone—people will never give you that charge. They're going to feel this sort of restriction. But when you talk about grace, there's always the possibility of misunderstanding.
A Real-Life Example of Grace
I'm walking with a guy who comes from a deep, deep, deep, deep, deep Catholic background. We're walking along and I'm explaining the gospel. I'm explaining salvation by grace alone. He's steeped in works. So I explain it.
We have this moment, literally, where he stops in his tracks. He says to me, "Are you telling me that if I believe this gospel, and I come in this repentance and faith, and I kill somebody tonight, I'm still going to heaven?" I said, "Yes, that's what I'm teaching you. We don't, as part of our discipleship, recommend it. I mean, it's not something we'd say. So many people you can kill yet today." But all of a sudden, that's how I knew—I don't know whether he got it or not, but that's how I knew that I'd communicated grace, that it's not based on our works.
I don't enter into this relationship with God based on my works. It's not continued based on my works. When you talk about grace for life—and I'm telling you, especially when you start talking about grace for living—people are going to say, "Well, wait a minute."
In fact, I had a sentence in an email that was sent to me a couple of years ago. I wrote it down: "If I thought I could never lose my salvation, I would certainly feel more free to sin." That's the natural response. That's a natural response. We're not operating naturally anymore, are we? We're operating supernaturally.
Historical Charges Against Grace
Just to close this out, Martin Lloyd-Jones continues: "Nobody has ever brought this charge against the Church of Rome, but it was brought against Martin Luther." He goes on to talk about Martin Luther and the charge against him that he just wanted to go and justify his sin. Then he mentions it was brought 200 years ago against George Whitefield.
"It is a charge that formal dead Christianity, if there's any such thing, has always brought against this startling, staggering message that God justifies the ungodly." That's his comment, and it's a very important comment for preachers.
I would say to all preachers: if your preaching of salvation has not been misunderstood in that way, then you had better examine your sermons again, and you better make sure that you're really preaching salvation that is offered in the New Testament to the ungodly, to the sinners, to those who are dead in their sins and trespasses, to those that are enemies of God. There's a kind of dangerous element about the true presentation of the doctrine of salvation.
Grace Is Risky Business
Here's what he's saying: grace is risky business because it can easily be misunderstood. No way would Martyn Lloyd-Jones, or any other Christian, certainly not Paul, nor the Lord Himself, suggest to us that for a second we can just go and sin freely because grace will abound and there's forgiveness. No, but he's on the other hand saying you have this freedom that's been brought to you. This freedom to live a life that glorifies God. That's not in bondage to some ritualistic, legalistic system.
Probably ten or fifteen years ago, I read a book by Chuck Swindoll called "Grace Awakening." It was kind of the first time in an organized way I'd bumped up against this thought of grace, and the dangers of grace.
The Alternative to Grace
Swindoll does two things, and I want to share them with you. He talks about the alternative to grace, because there really is only—again, I come back to it—in my mind, there's only biblical Christianity and everything else.
He said here's the alternative to grace, and it's marked by four things. Number one: it emphasizes work over grace. Even as Christians, we talk about a deeper commitment. "Are you sold out to Jesus?" I don't have the foggiest idea what that means. There's a song that we sing in here, and you've never seen my lips move when we sing it. I won't sing it: "I surrender all." I don't. I surrender some. I surrender a chunk. I surrender and then take back some. But the alternative to grace is works.
Here's the second: to get a list of do's and don'ts. That's what religion is. I'm amazed, as I talk to some guys, more my age, who came up really strict—because I wasn't raised in this kind of environment—really strict, conservative ethic, where they didn't play cards. They didn't play pinball machines. I never got that one.
play pinball machines. They didn't go to movies. They didn't dance. They didn't do any of this stuff. There's that whole list of do's and don'ts.
That was my favorite thing about the movie The Passion of the Christ. I loved it when that movie was rated R for the conundrum that it presented to so many people who never would go to an R-rated movie under any circumstances. Now they're boycotting The Passion of Christ. The dilemma there is beautiful. I love that stuff. But we kind of look at that and spot that really easy. Like if some guy said to you, if you're really a Christian, you don't play pinball machine, are you nuts? I mean, I don't even find myself wrestling with that.
From Religion to Relationship
But you're in Ephesians 2. Turn to the right to Philippians chapter three. I tried to make this point, both in church here and in PL, maybe a year ago, and I didn't get any response, which is kind of interesting because it seems so important to me. Let's see if I can make it again because I think Paul, in Philippians 3, is making a case here where he's saying I was religious, but I moved from religious into relationship.
So he's got it in Philippians 3. Watch out for the false teachers, and then in verses four, five, and six, he said here's my credentials, here's my resume, here's my pedigree, and you know it, it's all there. He was literally, and I don't mean this in a pejorative way at all, he's saying I'm the super Jew.
But these things, verse seven, which were gained in me, those things I count of loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I've suffered the loss of all these things, and I count these things—this stuff, this religion—as the New American Standard says, as rubbish. I think the King James says dung.
Here's what he's saying. I had all that religion, all that pedigree, and that stuff is rubbish compared to knowing Christ. I moved from religion into a relationship with Him.
The Danger of Moving Back Into Religion
The point I was making, and I hope it comes alongside the point that Swindoll's making here, is you take grace away, and now, even once I've had this relationship, it's very easy for me to move back into religion. Back into this whole list of checks. What you do, what you don't do.
So I will say to people, how you doing spiritually, and they will tell me what they're reading. That drives me crazy. I didn't ask how you're reading. I didn't ask what books are new. And it seems to me we need to be very, very careful.
I don't have, and I struggle like mad in all of this—I never know how much to say or not say—but I don't have a particular part of my day that's my quiet time with the Lord. I don't get up every morning and start my day this way. I don't carve out a time in the middle of the day. I don't necessarily get to this specific time at night. And some of you do. You just got this time, here it is. It's the first thing every day, I got it. But I want you to know, I'm not going to hold that against you. And I would ask you to reciprocate.
We can get very, very, very rigid in this. So all of a sudden, a Christian is one who does this and does it, and I'm not talking about biblical mandates here. We're not saying adultery's okay, go ahead and lie. Gossip is fine, we're not saying that. But we're saying these other expressions and these preferential issues—there's not a singular right way, and yet we treat them so often as there's this way. You don't do that? There's not a third thing that's the alternative. I have no room for a gray area.
When Standards Become More Important Than Relationships
Here's what Swindoll writes: fellowship is based on whether there's full agreement. Herein lies a tragedy—the self-righteous, rigid standard becomes more important than the relationships.
I was not here last weekend, and you all know I had all my thing going, but I was hosting a retreat Monday and Tuesday. So Sunday, I had to go up, and there was a group of us pastors there. And I will tell you, I don't agree with these guys on a lot of stuff, maybe even certainly some stuff. And I'm not sure 15 years ago I would have even hung around with these guys. And I consider this a mark of maturity and growth, not of weakness, not of compromise. That there are certain non-negotiables upon which we cannot waver. But we are fighting over stuff that doesn't matter.
Here's the fourth thing: you begin to cultivate a judgmental attitude toward those who don't agree with you. Grace killers.
The Freedom Grace Provides
Grace sets us free. Jesus said that, right? John 8: He spoke these things, and many came to believe in Him. And Jesus, therefore, was saying to those who believe in Him, "If you abide in my word, then you're truly my disciples, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free."
Swindoll writes, free from what? Free from oneself, free from guilt and shame, free from damnable impulses that I couldn't stop when I was in bondage to sin, free from the tyranny of others, free from opinions and expectations and demands.
And free to what? Free to obey, free to love, free to forgive others as well as myself, free to allow others to be who they are even if it's different from me, free to live beyond the limitations of human effort, free to serve and glorify Christ. In no uncertain terms Jesus assured His own that the truth was able to liberate them from the needless restrictions bondage to be free indeed.
Our Struggle with Grace for Living
My fear that I see among people like us who I think have grace for life figured out—and I don't mean that in a negative way, I don't mean in a boastful way, I think we understand what the Bible says about that—is we are not the best at grace for living. We become all of those things we look at people and become almost instantaneously judgmental. We begin to look at people who agree with us, and so I go to meeting after meeting where the same group of guys read the same books and pass around the same things and encourage
Each other about how smart they are and how stupid everyone else is. That really is the meeting. Of course, the alternative to grace is to do just that.
So Paul closes this opening section of his book with four expectations if you really start to live by grace.
Four Expectations of Living by Grace
**Number one:** You can expect to gain a greater appreciation for God's gifts to you and others. When you get over to the bookstore and get this book "When Grace Comes Home," the very first thing he does is build a case for what he's doing, then talks about the theology of the doctrines of grace. The very first chapter after that is worship, and it's not coincidental to me at all that the next one is humility.
If you want to jumpstart your worship for God, then you begin to understand how great a sinner you are and how great a Savior He is. How lost you are, how desperate you are, how helpless you are, how powerless you are. In spite of you—not because of you—He saves you, and now your worship begins to grow. You begin to see Him in all aspects of life. You understand He's sovereign in all things. You can expect, when you start this grace for living, to gain a greater appreciation for God and His gifts.
**Here's the second thing:** You can expect to spend less time and energy being critical of and condemning those around you, concerned about their choices. I'll add this to it—or concerned what they think of you. Election times are always difficult times, but I can't tell you, I think Christians performed exceptionally poorly this election cycle. I got the stupidest emails about 666 and the anti-Christ—the dumbest stuff that people send out en masse. I can't imagine who you're sending these things to, just this whole proliferation. "You couldn't possibly be a Christian and vote for this person or for that proposition."
I know people who love Jesus who voted on all sides of all types of issues and candidates. To make this a dividing issue, some sort of "Jesus is a white middle-class Republican," is driving me crazy. There's great freedom here.
**The third thing:** You become more tolerant, less judgmental. You can now begin to engage people. It doesn't matter whether they have money or don't, whether they're black, whether they have a green card or don't have a green card. None of that stuff matters. I'll let the government work that stuff out. He put you here to love as ministers of reconciliation to a lost world, and we're letting all sorts of stuff that doesn't matter get in the way of that. That isn't grace—that's a step back into religion.
**Here's the fourth thing:** You can expect a giant step toward maturity. You're going to grow. I was at a funeral four weeks ago, and it was interesting because there were a whole bunch of people there who over the years we had a lot of history with. It really struck me afterwards—Neil was there, Jerry Smith was there—how here are these people, some with whom we had very strong disagreements over the years, and ultimately death solves all those problems. It really made me wonder how much of the stuff we broke fellowship over really was worthy of something like that.
The Risk of Grace
Grace for living is a risky way to live, isn't it? I can tell—just look at your faces. Some of you aren't liking this at all, and I'm alright with that. I can understand that. Some of you are perhaps confused by it. I'm telling you, we have turned this relationship with Christ right back into religion, right back into walking and thinking in lockstep on every issue all over again. "Got to have your quiet time, got to do this, got to do that. Read this, not that one."
I'm not saying—and that's the risky side of it, isn't it? You all know me well enough to know I'm not just jettisoning all this stuff.
Witnessing the Grace of God
Turn to Acts chapter 11, and then we'll stop mercifully. There's a little phrase in Acts chapter 11 that fascinates me. What's happened is the gospel is spreading out, moving from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria out to the uttermost parts of the earth. Verse 19: there's persecution, so the church scatters and they arrive in Antioch.
Verse 20: "And they came to Antioch and began speaking to the Greeks also, preaching the Lord Jesus Christ. And the hand of the Lord was upon them, and a large number believed and turned to the Lord." So the gospel has now spread out. Word comes back to Jerusalem to the church, and they're going, "This isn't something we've seen typically. You better run out and make sure that this is okay"—which I understand, that's wisdom.
"So the news about them reached the ears of the Church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas off to Antioch." Barnabas is on this reconnaissance mission. He's out there to gather the facts, to see if what's going on at Antioch is real.
Look at verse 23: "Then when he arrived"—look at this phrase—"and witnessed the grace of God, he rejoiced and began to encourage them all with resolute heart to remain true to the Lord."
What did he see? He witnessed—he saw it. It's visible, tangible. He could see it, feel it, touch it. It wasn't just some spirit. It wasn't a spirit of Christianity. He was witnessing the grace of God.
What was he witnessing? He was witnessing people being the church—people loving one another, caring for one another, studying God's Word together, praying together. He saw people using their gifts. He saw people giving a rip about lost people. He saw manifestations of the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. He saw them.
When I'm reading through this, my first thought was, "What did he see?" My second thought was, "If he came to East Valley Bible Church, would he see the grace of God here?" I'd personalize it even more: if he drove up in your car...
With me for a week, would he see the grace of God in my life? That's what grace for living is. Grace for life is being born again through the power of the Holy Spirit, and that relationship is sustained through the power of the Holy Spirit. But now I have grace for living, and that's risky business because it isn't uniform. It isn't singular. It isn't monolithic.
There are non-negotiables to be sure. There are things upon which we never waver. But God's going to work one way in one person's life and another way in another person's life. Just as I said before, it's National Adoption Month, and you're out there saying, "Gosh, go over there, look at this." You start to talk to people who engaged in adoption—they are strong advocates of this. I don't have one adoption bone in my body. I thought, "Not my deal." Well, you know what? I thank God that they do. I don't have a huge vision for international stuff, and there's not a big international guy, but I am sure glad that God's got people who do.
Living Under Grace
Are you living life under grace? You don't do that. I look at him—well, they're doing this and I don't care. I don't care what they're doing. This isn't about what they're doing. What is God gifted you to do, giving you a passion to do? Now there's some things that are not optional. I'll talk about one of those in a couple weeks. But are you living this way? And you know what? There's great freedom.
I'll tell you another thing. Here's another thing about people who are living in grace, and I'll tell you, the huge difference you see between people who are living in grace and those who aren't—one huge visible difference. You know what it is? Joy. There's no joy in religion. There's no joy, not even a superficial happiness in religion. But there is a joy when I know who God is and I know I've been set free and I know I'm forgiven.
That doesn't mean I can go and live any old way I want, but it means as God begins to change my want and my desire, I can pursue those and be the person God created you to be and the person that God has forgiven you from. So now you can love Him in the way He's wired you to be. Isn't that great?
The Beautiful Messiness of Grace
It's sloppy, isn't it? It's kind of sloppy, because now you've got people together with all sorts of different passions, and we'll flinch toward religion real quickly. But grace for living means that we understand who He is, and we understand we've been delivered, and we are not about to shackle ourselves to a bunch of rules and regulations and do's and don'ts all over again that are man-made.
Freedom to rejoice that He made you that way, that He's put in your heart this desire to go do this. I am so happy that He did that, but your thing doesn't have to be my thing. My thing doesn't have to be your thing. Isn't that great? Now some of these obviously are non-negotiable.
Looking Ahead
Here's what we're going to do. Next Sunday morning, 10 o'clock at Mesa Amphitheater, I want to talk about God and the fact that He is faithful and the promises and the fear. I feel it all around me. I'm talking to people. It's all I'm hearing. I'm hearing this fear, trepidation, concern. We have all sorts of words we're using. Well, I want to go to the scripture and unpack some of those common concerns we have. So it'll be a great opportunity, not only because it's not here, but it'll be a very different environment. We'll all be together. Great opportunity for you to bring some friends.
Then the following week, I want to come back, and this is amazing to say, close this section of the series. Because we're going to do something different this year. We're going to take the four Sundays before Christmas and do Advent, take an Advent season leading up to Christmas. We've never done that before. So we're going to take that, which will be the last Sunday of November, the first three Sundays of December for that. So I want to talk especially about those things that God has left. God's left you here for a reason. So I'm going to give you some of those big bullet points in two weeks.
Let me remind you that there'll be pastoral staff members, pastors in the front of both the conference center and the chapel who are here to pray with you, and maybe items of praise or concern, whatever. They're here to pray with you and talk with you, so please take advantage of that.
Closing Prayer
Father, thank you for this wonderful truth. God, thank you for the risky business of grace. And God, I pray we would resist the temptation to head right back to religion. And that we would love what You love, that, God, we could begin to see people as You see them. So, God, thank you for that.
Thank you for the gospel, the gospel that delivers us from death to life, and the gospel that sustains us, for forgiveness that doesn't become a license to sin, but a real reality for us that as we blow it, as we sin, we know we're forgiven. We're Your kid, and we cannot out-sin Your grace. God, let this change the way we look at You and us. Let us begin to enjoy this relationship with You and live in a way that brings freedom to us. Not freedom to do whatever we want, but freedom to be who You created.