I invite you this morning to
turn back with me to my text in 2 Corinthians 12 verse 9. In answer to Paul's sincere prayer
to be relieved of some aggravating infirmity of the flesh. We don't
know what it is. Most believe it was his eyes,
some large scales that the Lord gave to him over his eyes. It
was some kind of infirmity that Paul said or felt like would
hinder him in the ministry. He was difficult to look at or
whatever. But here he says that the Lord
said to him, my grace is sufficient for you. My grace. It's not your looks that's going
to convert sinners. It's my grace. It's not your
presentation or your intellect that's going to convert sinners.
It's the power of God. It's the power of God. And Paul,
he said, without using his own name, speaks of himself in the
second tense. and talked about being caught
up to the third heaven and seeing things that nobody else had ever
seen. Things unlawful to utter. And
he said, lest I be puffed up beyond measure, God gave me this
infirmity and I prayed for it to be taken away three times. He prayed sincerely to God. And God told him no. He said,
my grace is sufficient for you. Or my strength is made perfect
in weakness. That's why God put this heavenly
treasure in pots of flesh. That's why he did it. And therefore,
he said, I most gladly would rather glory in my infirmities
that the power of Christ may rest on me. And my subject this
morning, and I pray it's God's message for this hour, is all
sufficient Grace. God's grace is sufficient. It's sufficient. The one thing
this world is not hearing in our day is that God's grace is
all sufficient. They're not hearing this. They're
saying, well, His grace has a mighty impact And I use this a lot, but I heard
a man say this, and it had its impact on me when he said it.
God has done all he can do, and the rest is up to you. Oh, my
soul. The God of glory has done all
he can do, and now he's gonna look to me? That don't even make
sense, does it? But that's what sinners are.
They're ignorant of God. All sufficient grace. The Apostle
Paul is using an experience of his own to point out to this
troubled church how the grace of God works in your everyday
lives, both physically and spiritually. And our text is not Paul's word
to the Corinthians so much as it is Christ's words to him. To him. A wise old preacher once
said, you can't tell what you don't know anymore and you can
come back from some place you haven't been. The Lord is going
to teach Paul something so that Paul can teach that something
to them. Believers are sinners being saved
by grace. Do you believe that? We're sinners. Man at his best state, he's all
gathered vanity. We're sinners. We're being saved
by the grace of God. By grace, ye are saved, he tells
us in Ephesians chapter 2. By grace, ye are saved. How's that happen? Way back yonder
in the purpose of God before the foundation of the world.
He made provision for my salvation. By grace you are saved. And then
in verse 8 of Ephesians chapter 2, he said, by grace are you
saved. Through faith, something present,
active, continuing. And he tells us this is a faithful
saying and worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners, of whom I'm chief. Salvation's of the Lord. It's about His glory, not ours. It's about His strength, not
ours. It's about His power, not ours,
and His purpose, not ours. And everything is geared to this
end. Everything, now listen to me,
everything that God demands from chosen sinners, He supplies to
chosen sinners in His Son. And it's a mistake to think that
there's anything in you that God's gonna use to save your
soul. Everything that God's gonna use
to save your soul comes from Him, not from you. That's the
amazing thing about it, isn't it? Paul said, they are all gone out of the
way They are together become unprofitable. None that doeth
good, no not more. All gone, become unprofitable,
nothing in us worth anything. And if I could magnify one attribute
of God, most dear to the heart of enlightened saints, it would
be the grace of God. The grace of God. Peter said,
But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto eternal glory
by Christ Jesus, after that you suffered for a while, make you
perfect, established, strengthened, and settled you, the God of all
grace. To Him be glory and dominion
for ever and ever. What's it about? It's about the
God of all grace. Paul said, For ye see your calling,
brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, there were
a few, but not many, not many noble are called. 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. and base things of the world, and things which are
despised hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to
bring to naught things that are. Why would He do these things?
That no flesh should glory in His presence. You know, if the
Lord let you do this much, you'd brag about it for all eternity.
You'd say, One thing I can say, I've heard that so many times,
we used to have testimonials in the church that I grew up
in on Wednesday night. We'd have testimonials and people
would stand up and they'd say, well, I ain't always done the
right, but one thing I can say, yeah, and if you said it, you'd
say it from now on. You'd have the angels up there
looking at you going, huh? You'd brag on it for all eternity.
And that's why God ain't going to let you have anything to do
with it. It's all going to be by His grace. He did this with no flesh or
glory in His presence. Salvation is by grace. And the
scripture says, if by grace, then is it no more worse. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. And oh, how we question the grace
of God in our everyday life. Contentment comes in relation
as we understand the sufficiency of His grace. You want contentment?
Understand something about His grace. He said, My grace, My grace is
sufficient for you. In what way? How is it sufficient? He said, for my strength is made
perfect in weakness. So let's look at some things
concerning His all-sufficient grace. First of all, the grace of God,
as is the love of God, and the mercy of God, and every other
attribute of God, they're revealed to us in the person and work
of Jesus Christ. You want to know something about
grace, study Christ. John writes in his Gospel, And
the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld
His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father.
Now listen, full of grace and truth. Now watch this, and of
His fullness. What fullness? Fullness of grace
and truth. have we all received in grace
for grace. For the law was given by Moses,
but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man has seen God at
any time. The only begotten Son, which
is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. And Jesus
Christ, His prophecies, His appearance, His work, His resurrection, His
ascension, and His present reign and glory is sufficient. All sufficient for the revelation
of God. 1 John 5, 19, John said, and we
know that we are of God. Now watch this. And the whole
world, life and wickedness. Can you say that? Can you say that? Can you drive down the road and
see all these buildings and denominations and loop them all into one giant
category with the world lying in wickedness? John did. We know that the Son of God,
verse 20, we know that we are of God and the whole world lies
in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God
has come and given to us an understanding. That's why we're not still lying
in wickedness. He's given to us an understanding
that we may know Him that is true, the true and living God,
and that we're in Him that is true, even in His Son, Jesus
Christ. This is the true God and eternal
life. Turn with me to John 14. We're
talking about the sufficiency of the grace of God in Christ
as the revelation of God. Our Lord is preparing His disciples
for His death and His resurrection. He's going to the cross and there
He's going to give up the ghost. He's going to die and they're
going to take Him down and they're going to put Him in a tomb. And
He tells them in verse 4, now He's already told them He's going
to the Father. He's going to prepare a place
for them. And he's going to come back and receive them, that where
I am, there you may be also. And then he tells them here in
verse 4, and whither I go you know, and the way you know. And Thomas. Boy, I can identify
with Thomas, can't you? Thomas said, now wait a minute,
Lord. We don't know where you're going, and how can we know the
way? Huh? I don't know anything about heaven,
do you? I know that it is, but I don't know anything about it.
I've never been there. And the way. Thomas said, we
don't know where you're going and how we're going to know the
way. Listen to what the Lord tells him. Jesus saith unto him,
I am the way, and the truth, and the life. You want to know what heaven
is? Look at me. Huh? Look at me. I'm the way, I'm the truth, I'm
the life. No man cometh unto the father
but by me. If you had known me, he said,
you should have known my father. And from henceforth you know
him and you've seen him. That man to whom God reveals
Himself in Christ, he's seen the Father. He's seen the Father. How do
I know the Father loves me? Because I see Him in Christ,
giving Himself for me. There's the love of God. That's
right there in His Son. Right there in His Son. Paul
said, The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared unto
all men, that is, all those chosen in him, and all those who heard
him and have seen him. And what does this grace teach
us? It teaches us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts,
we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world.
How? Looking for that blessed hope
and the glorious appearance of our great God and Savior, Jesus
Christ. He is the all-sufficient revelation
of God to sinners. He that hath the Son hath life,
and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. And then
secondly, that grace revealed in Christ, was manifested in
Christ, is sufficient to save sinners like you and I. I like
to think that old John Newton was studying about the grace
of God, preparing a message on the grace of God, when those
words came to him for that blessed old hymn, Amazing Grace. I can
just see him say, I've had experiences like this, sitting in my study,
and just be overwhelmed by the revelation of God in his word. Just overwhelmed, and just sit
there and weep. I like to think that's what old
John Newton was doing. He was in his study preparing
a message on the grace of God and the Spirit of God just overwhelmed
him and he was sitting there thanking amazing grace. How sweet
to say. That saved a wretch like me. I once was lost. I was lost. I didn't know which end was up.
I didn't know which way I was going. I was lost. Old Scott
Richardson tells a story about one of the guys in the church
who took him deer hunting up in them mountains. If you've
ever been in the mountains and hills, you can get up on that
hill and go partway around and when you come down, there's nothing
familiar to you. You ain't very far away, but
you think you are. And it got dark and this fellow
was coming down from his stand up on the mountain. Scott was
already down standing around the truck. And he hears this
old guy start crying out. He could hear him thrashing back
and forth, going back and forth, but he couldn't find the truck.
And it's getting darker and darker. And pretty soon that man cries
out. He said, where's the road? Where's the road? And he said,
after letting him cry out a time or two, he said, it's right here. Took him about three minutes,
he was right down to the throat. I once was lost. Was you? I was lost. But now I'm found. I cried out. And the Lord answered. He answered. My grace is sufficient
for you. It's sufficient. Why don't you
preach something else? Nothing else is sufficient. If I knew something else, I'd
break it. But nothing else is sufficient. And this, God said,
is sufficient. Jesus Christ is the unspeakable
gift of God's grace. All provision purposed in Him,
manifested in Him, accomplished in Him, secured in Him. We're
preserved, He said in the book of Jude, preserved in the Lord
Jesus Christ. The lid's popped. You ever canned
something? You sit around listening for
that lid, after a while, pop, it's sealed. I'd go put it in
the cupboard now. We're preserved in Jesus Christ. Of God, listen to this. Of God
are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. What else do
you need? Oh, my soul. Brethren, I'm laboring on this
point because simply knowing the grace of God won't give you
any peace. You can run around and talk about
believing in grace your whole life. It ain't gonna give you
any peace. You got to know Him through whom that grace is given. Grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ, brought down to chosen sinners by Jesus Christ, made
a picture by Jesus Christ. We know something about God's
justice, but until I know him who satisfied that justice, the
justice of God won't give me any peace. But oh, when I see
him who satisfied the justice of God. Delivered from my offenses,
raised again for my justification. So the sufficiency of God's grace
is set forth in the person and work of Christ. The grace of
God is revealed in Christ. And we see that sufficiency in
Him. And then thirdly, all the means
of salvation are means of grace. All the means are means of grace. Now I'm going to narrow down
the subject because I don't have time to get into it, but let's
narrow it down to after the ascension of Christ. And let's begin with
the gift of the Holy Ghost. The sending or pouring out of
the Holy Spirit to His church is a gift of God's sovereign
grace. Sovereign grace. Let me show
you something over here in Hebrews chapter 10. How would God's grace be effectual
in the means of salvation apart from the Holy Ghost? He's talking here in Hebrews
10 verses 25 through 29 about willful rebels who blatantly
disobey the commandments of God to assemble themselves together
and they look elsewhere for their joy and comfort in this life. He's talking to those who have
no appetite for the gospel of Christ but rely on old experiences,
feelings, and decisions. If we look elsewhere for sufficiency
of grace than Christ, he's telling us that there remaineth no more
sacrifice for sins. What's he saying? He's saying
there's one sacrifice for sins that's sufficient to save your
soul. If you look elsewhere, There remaineth no more sacrifice. This is it. There's nothing else. Nothing else. Nothing but a certain fearful
looking for judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour
the adversaries. Of how much sore punishment,
suppose you, shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden underfoot
the Son of God? Oh my. This ain't my church. This is his church. This ain't
my worship service, it's His. It's not my gospel, it's His.
And when you ignore it, you're ignoring the Son of God. That's what you do. You trodden
underfoot the Son of God. You counted Him like an old rug
and you just walked on Him. on His love and His mercy and
His grace and His glory and His Godhead. You walked on it like
it was a common road. And listen to this, not only
that, but you counted the blood of the covenant wherewith you
were sanctified an unholy thing. And then listen to this, and
you've done despite Unto the Spirit of what? Grace. All you mean the Holy Spirit
is the Spirit of Grace. That's what I'm telling you. How do people do despite unto
the Spirit of Grace? By denying and ignoring His being,
His reason for being, and the power that He manifests. They
deny His powerful operations performed through the preaching
of the gospel and the revelation and application of Christ to
the heart. Ignore it. Now, I'm going to tell you something.
You believe it or do what you want to with it, but I can show
it to you in the Word of God. You're going to have to hear
the gospel to hear from Christ. He that heareth you, He said
to those He sent out. He that heareth you, Here is
me. You go to Romans chapter 10.
He is talking about the faith of God's elect. He said, Whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But how
are you going to call on Him? How are you going to call on
Him in whom you had not believed? How are you going to believe
in Him of whom you had not heard? And how are you going to hear
that preacher? How is he going to preach if God's providence
don't open that door? So then, he said, faith cometh
by hearing. What faith? The faith of God
to live. Cometh by hearing, hearing by the Word of God. It ain't
the preacher's words that saved, it's the Word of God that saved.
But my friend, if I tell you something that's in the Word
of God, you better believe it. That'll hold you accountable. And there's no crime, according
to this that I've just read in Hebrews 10, there's no crime
more horrible than turning your back on the assembling of the
saints and the gospel that saves sinners. He walks on Christ like he's
common dirt. The Holy Ghost is the Spirit
of grace. The gospel is the gospel of the
grace of God. Paul said he was called of God
to testify the gospel of the grace of God, Acts 20, 24. And having preached this gospel,
he said, I am clear from the blood of all men. I had not shunned
to declare unto you the whole counsel of God. And the faith of God's elect is born
of gospel seed. You read 1 Peter 1, verses 23-25. Being born again, not a corruptible
seed, but incorruptible by the word of God. And then you read
on down to verse 25. And this is the word which by
the gospel is preached unto you. He's born of gospel seed. And
then He shows us something about His justification, being justified
freely by His grace. Whose grace? His grace. In Him,
the fullness of grace. Justified freely by His grace
through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. Righteous. What
about righteousness? I do not frustrate the grace
of God. For if righteousness come by
the law, then Christ is dead and vain. What about hope? Christ in you,
the hope of glory. Huh? And then lastly, the wellspring
of all grace. Paul over and over in his letters,
here's how he writes. Grace and peace be unto you. from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. Every good gift, every perfect
gift comes down from the Father of life with whom is no variance. His grace cannot fail because
he cannot change. Paul looked at that Philippian
church, probably began with a Philippian jailer, Lydia, And here they
are, and he writes to them this letter. And he said, My confidence
in you, in you saints, is this, that he which hath begun a good
work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. I don't know what's going on
in your lives, maybe something huge, maybe something little.
It don't matter. If you're a believer, he's saying
to you, My grace is sufficient for you. My grace. My grace. May the God of all
grace be pleased to reveal it afresh in every heart.