We read in Psalms 103, beginning
at verse 1, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within
me, bless the Lord. his holy name. Bless the Lord,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. I pause because
I want you to consider what we just read. Verse three, who forgiveth
all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases, who redeemeth
thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee with loving kindness
and tender mercies, who satisfies who satisfieth thy mouth with
good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagles. The
Lord executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are
oppressed. He made known his ways unto Moses,
his acts unto the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful
and gracious, slow to anger, and plench us in mercy. All righty. And I begin tonight's
study with a question that's very important. We want to know
if we're saved, don't we? Don't we look through God's Word
to find points in His Word that prove to us that we're saved?
We never want to look to flesh. We want to never look to our
own thoughts, to our own feelings, to our own actions. But we do
want to look to God's Word, because the Lord's Word promises there
is a people saved by the Lord Jesus Christ. And we want to
know, Lord, am I one of those? Lord, is it I? And I ask this
question, is the grace of the Lord sufficient for you? Is His grace enough for you? Or do you require more? There's
a lot of people who've come to this church who've said, oh yeah,
the Lord's grace is sufficient for me, but I do need more than
what his gospel is. I do need more than just the
preaching of his gospel. I need a deeper study in his
word. I need more programs in the church. for the children. I need more
music in my life. I need, I need, I need. God's
people need to ask themselves, is his grace enough for me or
do I require more? Do you require a sign or maybe
a deeper knowledge? In our Lord's own words to the
Apostle Paul recorded for us in 2 Corinthians 12 9, he says
in answering Paul's request to remove a thorn of pestilence,
a messenger of Satan to buffet me, he says, lest I should be
exalted above measure, the Lord Almighty answers these words,
my grace is sufficient for thee. Is the Lord's grace sufficient
for you? Is our great and loving Savior's
grace sufficient in your world, in your trials, in your temptations,
in your glories? We're not talking about our strength
in faith. We're not talking about something
of our ability. No, we're talking about his graciousness
to us, his chosen people, his blood-bought children, purchased
with the price of his own precious blood, trusting him as the sovereign. Is it sufficient for anything
and all things we need? If you've been called of God,
if God has shined the light of the world in your heart, the
light of his son in the world in your heart, the answer is
without question, Yes. To say that he could not be sufficient,
whether it be for this or for that, is to say less of who the
master is. It would be to declare him as
something he is not. Weak. God, in all of his attributes,
is sufficient in all things. Page 2. His sufficiency is always
in question to a soul who lives with an unregenerate heart. One
who still walks in the darkness that they are born into. Is God
able to save a senator as me? Could he save a senator such
as I? Is he all sufficient in all things? Or do I need something more?
The most powerful revelation of the true and living God is
his sovereignty, his sufficiency, his ability, his power over all
that is. And that sovereignty, that sufficiency,
that ability, that power is always in question to an unregenerate
soul. Mankind in their unregenerate
state trust in what they can see, what they can do, what they
can feel, or what they have knowledge of, or what they can buy, because
they do not believe the record given of God about His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to these words in 1 John
5, 7-12. For there are three that bear
record in heaven, the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost.
So we see God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost,
that's what the Word is. Remember what it says in John
chapter 1, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was God. And these three are one, it says,
and there are three that bear witness in earth The Spirit,
now I was talking with somebody the other day who was talking
about being filled with the Holy Spirit. You know what the Spirit
does? Spirit never speaks of Himself. Spirit always speaks
and reveals the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. And everything
the Spirit does, that's what He does. Revealing the Lord Jesus. So we see He's the first one
listed there as the witness in the earth, the water. We know
what that is, that's the Word of God. and the blood, the blood
of Christ. These three agree in one. If we receive the witness of
men, the witness of God is greater. For this is the witness of God,
which he hath testified of his Son. He that believeth on the
Son of God hath the witness in himself. He that believeth not
God hath made him a liar, because he believeth not the record that
God gave of his Son. And this is the record, that
God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his
Son. He that hath the Son hath life.
And he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. So we see here, you and I, we're
right there. We were in that very same state
of darkness that the world is, that the unregenerate are. Trusting
in our own knowledge, trusting in what we could do, trusting
in our feelings, trusting in our wealth, trusting in self,
and not trusting Him. Page 3. I beg of you, as it says
in Proverbs 3 verses 5 and 8, trust in the Lord with all thine
heart and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy
ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. Be not wise
in thine own eyes, fear the Lord and depart from evil. It shall
be health to thy navel, and morrow to thy bones." Now there are
a couple of different Greek words of the Old Testament that are
translated to the word sufficient, and that's our subject tonight,
sufficient grace. Is God's grace sufficient for
us? One of those words being dei,
pronounced day, and it is used to define enough, sufficient,
able, much, according, often. Here's one way it's used in Malachi
3.10, bring me all the tithes in the storehouse that they may
be meat in mine house and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord
of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven and
pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough. And that's the same word there,
sufficient to receive it. So he's talking about pouring
out blessings, blessings that are so much that there's not
enough room for them to have in their storerooms. There's
not enough. Their storerooms aren't sufficient
enough to hold the blessings that God would pour out on them.
There's also a couple of different New Testament Hebrew words translated
to be sufficient. One being is hekanos, meaning
competent, as if coming in season, or that is ample, as in amount. or fit as in character, able,
content, enough, good, great, large, many, meet, Much, security,
sore, sufficient, worthy. Used as it is in 2 Corinthians
12, 9, he says, my grace is sufficient for thee. Or as it is used in
Mark 17, where it says, and preached, saying, there cometh one mightier
than I after me, the laches of whose shoes I am not worthy.
There's that word worthy is the same word. To stoop down and
not lose. He's not worthy. He's not sufficient.
Mark felt himself not sufficient. You and I feel the same way.
We're not sufficient. With that understanding of the
Word, let's look to our Lord's recorded Word to see His grace
and how it suffices His people. I've used many a time the Lord's
grace in dealing with Jonah. So for this study, I wish to
take a look at a couple of others. Consider the day our Lord spoke
to Abraham in Genesis 17, 15 through 19. And God said to Abraham, As for
Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah. Now, Sarai is a dominant woman. Sarah is a princess. So the Lord
has changed the name of Sarai to Sarah, shall be her name,
and I will bless her and give thee a son also of her. Yea,
I will bless her and she shall be a mother of nations. Kings
of people shall be of her. Then Abram fell on his face and
laughed and said in his heart, Shall a child be born unto him
that is a hundred years old? And shall Sarah? Notice that
he didn't call her Sarah again. Notice what he called her, Sarah.
Exactly what the Lord instructed him to do. That is ninety years
old bear. And Abram said, unto God, O that
Ishmael might live before thee. And God said, Sarah thy wife
shall bear thee a son indeed, and thou shalt call his name
Isaac. And I will establish my covenant
with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him."
So we read these words on the conversation with God and Abraham. Was not this birth of a woman
past the age of conception an act of our Lord's grace? Or could
you ask the question this way, was God's grace sufficient for
such a thing? Abraham did not think so at first.
No, he laughed. But that did not diminish the
character of God's grace one bit. Abraham didn't believe at
first, he laughed about it. But it didn't diminish God's
character one bit, did it? Aren't you thankful that God's
grace does not depend on our faith? Continuing with Abraham,
let's go a little further. Abraham has been taught of God
a few things now. He has grown in the Lord's grace
and in the knowledge of his Savior. We read in John 8, verse 56,
your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it
and was glad. So God has been teaching Abraham
a few things now. And we come to Genesis 22. beginning
at verses one and two, and it came to pass after these things
that God did tempt Abraham and said unto him, Abraham, and he
said, behold, here I am. And he said, take now thy son,
thine only son, the very one that he was, that God was talking
about Abraham a moment ago, take thy only son. Did you notice
he didn't say anything about Ishmael? He said, thy only son,
Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah,
and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains,
which I will tell thee of. Now, how do you think Abraham
thought about that? Now, we don't know, so we don't
wanna guess too far with that, but I can imagine my own self,
I can imagine how I would feel, If it weren't for the God's grace
doing a work in me, I'm sure I would be kind of like, wait
a minute, this is the son you promised me. But let's not forget
what God also promised with Abraham, that son. He also promised that
in that son would be many nations. In that son, another part of
the scripture, I don't think we read that, the seed, the savior
would come through that seed. So Abraham had an idea here about
something, about the Lord's promises for a burnt offering, one of
the mounds of Tertullo. So Abraham had been promised that through
Isaac, through his seed, would come the Messiah, the Deliverer,
the Anointed One, who would deliver his people from their iniquity. In Genesis 22 again, verses 3
through 6, we read, And Abraham rose up early in the morning,
and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him,
and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering,
and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him.
Then, on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the
place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young
men, Abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder
and worship and come again to you." So what Abraham had been
taught of God to this point had been to believe God, to trust
the Lord. Abraham had been through many
other things through his time, but here the Lord has told him,
Abraham says, we're going to return again to you. Because
he's been shown who God is, just as you and I have been shown
the truth of who the God is. He's God Almighty of everything
that is. Nothing, nothing is outside the
hand of our God. And if he promises something,
it's gonna come to pass, period, page five. And Abraham took the
word of the burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac his son, and
he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went both
of them together. Now I ask you, was God's grace
sufficient for Abraham? You bet it was. Where was Abraham's faith? Was
it not in God's word, the word of his grace? Was it not the
promises? Was it not the power to fulfill
those promises? Where else could it have been?
Abraham knew it could not be of himself. Only God can raise
the dead to life, and that's exactly what Abraham believed.
God had the power to do so, and he promised it, and he would
do so. In verses 7 through 28, I don't think that 2 is supposed
to, I think I typoed there, it's supposed to be 7 and 8. And Isaac
spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father? And he said, Here am I, son.
And he said, Behold the fire and the wood. But where is the
lamb for the burnt offering? And Abraham said, my son, God
will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went
both of them together. And we know the rest of this
story. The Lord provided a ram caught in the thicket by his
horns, a picture of the all-powerful Son of the Most High, Jesus Christ
himself. Folks, our faith may be weak
or it may be strong. It has no bearing. on the graciousness
of our God. One of the many names that declare
the Lord for who he is is Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will see or the
Lord will provide. All of this story is a declaration
of the sufficiency of God's grace If it weren't for the Lord's
grace, Abraham would have died with no sign of promise. Folks,
this is the bottom line of his grace. God became a man. He didn't have to do that. Yet
he did have to do it. What do you mean? What do you
mean, John? What do I mean by that? God is God. That's what
I mean. And he's not bound by anything
other than himself. Whatever he does is or thinks
is right. If he had chosen to do away with
man and go a different direction, that would be right, because
he's God. And because there is a price
for sin, he had to become a man to fulfill his own law, to establish
a righteousness for the unrighteous whom the Father gave him from
before the world was. He had to save his loved ones
from their sins. He had to shed his own blood
to ransom us from the bondage of death. He had to be holy in
all that he did so as to conquer that death. That's grace. And
because it is of him as it is with everything about him, page
six, it is sufficient. It is enough. It is ample in
the amount. It is fit in his character to
fill its intended purpose. Another of God's saints dealing
with the perils of this world, Job. He had much of this world
and the Lord brought testing to Job, allowing Satan to take
his sons and daughters and servants, all but one. And again, the Lord
allowed Satan to take Job's livestock. And again, the Lord allowed Satan
to afflict Job's flesh with boils and such, yet by God's free and
sovereign grace was Job delivered from all that worldly pain. Our Lord doesn't always deliver
us by healing. I'm speaking ad-lib now and I
want to step away from our handouts for just a moment. Our Lord does
not always deliver us from our trials by healing us from the
pains of this flesh. Sometimes Our Lord takes us from
this world. Our brother Bill Silva, we all
know the day he left, the Lord took him from this world, Bill
left all the pains of cancer behind. All the pains of not
being able to speak clearly behind. all the pains of being alone
in this world with no one to love other than his church family
behind. Sometimes the Lord delivers us
by taking us from this world. That's important. I want you
to consider that. Going on, third paragraph from
the top of page six, and the word of the Lord tells us this,
Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head,
and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped." Notice what
he did. Notice what he did. He humbled
himself. He abased himself. He got down
to the ground of where he was worthy to be, and worshipped
the one who deserves worshipping. And he said, "'Naked came I out
of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.' The
Lord gave and the Lord have taken away. Blessed be the name of
the Lord. In all this, Job sinned not,
nor charged God foolishly." That's in Job 1, verses 20 and 22. Why
did this man charge God? Why did not this man charge God
in foolishness for what had happened? What made this man different?
Who made this man different? We know God is the one who makes
us different, but what was it that made him different? God's
grace is sufficient. That's what made him different.
the grace of God towards his people. God's grace is what kept
him. God's grace is what did not let
him turn from the truth to a lie of self, to the lie of I. In
Job 13, 14, and 15, it says, where do I take my flesh and
my teeth and put my life in mine hand? Though he slay me, speaking
of the Lord God Almighty, yet will I trust in him. Though my
trials are as raging waters, I will trust that He is the Lord. Whatever He allows is right. His grace is sufficient to get
me through it, even if that means taking me from this world, even
if that means taking a loved one from whatever my Lord chooses. To exercise His grace in my life,
it's right. The Apostle Paul states this,
he says, For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth
to himself. For whether we live, we live
unto the Lord, or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Whether
we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end
Christ both died and rose and revived. that he might be Lord
of both the dead and the living, Romans 14, 7 through 9. Now one
last thing that points us to his sufficiency, our commission
is to go into all the world and preach the gospel. Now before
I begin on page 7, the reason I want to bring this up is because
there are I get bombarded all the time, and I've shared this
with you. All of God's ministers do. People send out blanket advertisings
just because there's the word church, or religious phrase Baptist,
or Methodist, or Catholic, or whatever. We get all these advertisements.
We can help you build your church. We can do this. We can go about
guiding you in how to make a better website to attract people. Those
who trust in those kinds of things get exactly what they expect. more people, and that's it. I
didn't say more Christians. I didn't say more of those who
believe. I said you get more people. They get lots of people.
Lots of people. Their coffers grow in huge amounts. Their churches are built bigger
and bigger and better. Huge churches. They get more
people, but that's it. Only by God's grace are there
those who are added to the church daily, such as those who should
be saved. Only by God's sovereign, free
grace. Men can speak till their face
turns blue, yet it must be God who makes the word effectual
in cold, dead hearts." Again, I want to stop because that brings
me back to the memory of when the Lord called me out of darkness.
I never saw a heart so cold and so dead until the day the Lord
gave life to it. I never understood what it meant
to be dead in trespasses and sin until the Lord pointed it
out to this man who stands before you how much I was involved in
the sin of life. Only God can make his word effectual
in cold hearts. Paragraph two, page seven. Every
preacher, God's preachers that is, know the only power in our
message is the power of the Holy Spirit, the result of his sufficient
grace, We read from 2 Corinthians 3-5, not that we are sufficient
of ourselves, says Paul, to think anything as of ourselves, but
our sufficiency is of God. We preach Christ Jesus the Lord,
as Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 1 verse 17, for Christ sent me
not to baptize, but to preach the gospel. not with wisdom of
words. That was Paul's biggest fear.
He was afraid that men would start to follow after his words,
his words, not the word of God that he was preaching, but his
own words of eloquence. He thought he was afraid that
he would be winning men over for him rather than God winning
men over themselves, lest the Christ of Christ should be made
of none effect, he says in verse 17. Verse 18, for the preaching
of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto
us, unto God's people by his grace, which are saved, it is
the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy
the wisdom of the wise, verse 19, and will bring to nothing
the understanding of the prudent. Folks, there are people who have
studied God's word so much, they put caps on so that people will
know they're leaders of some church somewhere. They wear these
big, beautiful robes. They can quote scripture perfectly
without even looking at the Bible. They've read it so many times,
they know it by heart, but they have no heart to know it. To
them, the cross is foolishness. For it is written, I will destroy
the wisdom of the wise, and I will bring to nothing the understanding
of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the
scribe? Where is the disputer of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? The
Jews of that day were the most religious people walking this
earth. They were the wisest people in
religion on the entire earth and yet their wisdom meant absolutely
nothing. 1 Corinthians 1 verse 21, for
after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew
not God. It pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. That's what Paul's talking
about up here in verse 17, for Christ sent me not to baptize,
but to preach the gospel, not with the wisdom of words, the
words of men, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none
effect. That's what he's talking about. We preach Christ back
in 23, crucified, and the Jews unto the Jews a stumbling block.
Now I skipped verse 22. For the Jews require a sign,
and the Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified
unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness.
But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, unto those
who have had the grace of God shined in the new heart, those
who are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God
and the wisdom of God. Because the foolish of God is
wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For you see your calling, brethren,
how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not
many noble, it doesn't say none, it says not many are called. Verse 27, but God hath chosen
the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. And God
hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things
which are mighty. Page 8. And the base things of
the world, and the things which are despised, hath God chosen,
yea, the things which are not, to bring to naught the things
that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence. But of
him are ye in Christ, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and
righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption, that according
as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. We
glory in Him. We glory in His grace. We glory
in the fact that through by His grace, He became flesh. God didn't have to do that, folks.
But He's loved a people from before anything else was ever
created, before the world was. And because He has loved that
people, He chose the wise thing to do, and that would be to shine
His grace in their hearts. How? The best way He knows, save
them from their sins. I shouldn't have said the best
way he knows. Folks, our Lord knows the way our Lord thinks
is the best of everything. The right way that he knows is
to save us from our sins. We glory in what he's done, and
that's exactly what he's done. He said it is finished on that
cross. Brother Kevin Thacker brought
a message last Wednesday night, the haves and the have-nots.
I tell you, if you haven't listened to that message, go to Sermon
Audio, pull it up, and listen to it. What a fantastic, wonderful
message, a message I needed to hear that very moment, the haves
and have-nots Wednesday night. We glory in what our Lord has
done, we glory in who He is, and we glory in where He is this
very moment. And we do that because of His
grace working in us. That's one of the most clearest
things in our minds, those who have been given the sight to
see the truth. A clearest thing in my mind is
this, that if it wasn't for God, I'd still be on that path to
destruction. If it wasn't for His grace, I'd still be wandering
around in this world in darkness, on my way to hell, what I deserved.
We do that. We glory in Him this very moment
because of His grace working in us, sufficient grace. And
I want to close with 2 Corinthians 1 verses 7 through 10. And our
hope of you is steadfast, knowing that as ye are partakers of the
sufferings, whether it be the sufferings of this world, the
sufferings of your flesh, the sufferings of the sin within
you, So also the consolation. What is the consolation of knowing
the trials, that these trials are actually trials sent our
way of God? What is the consolation of knowing
that there's sin in his flesh that still needs to be battled
and that the Lord has won that battle? Consolation is that he
has won the battle. For by grace are we saved, through
faith, not of ourselves, lest we should boast. For we would
not, it goes on to say, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble
which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure.
Paul was pressed so hard above strength, insomuch that we despaired
even of life. Paul was wanting the Lord to
take him, right there, take him from this life. But we had the
sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves. but in God, which raiseth the
dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver
in whom we trust, that he will yet deliver us. I ask you again,
is God's grace sufficient for you? And let me answer it for
you. If you belong to him, it will
be sufficient. It is sufficient, and he'll make
it so. Amen?