The Great Need. The last verse of Galatians chapter
6 verse 18. Paul closes this book the way
he closes many other books. But I want us to remember this
is not just filler space. This is just as inspired as Romans
chapter 8. This is just as inspired as Isaiah
chapter 53. Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with your spirit. The grace of Christ. Now you'll remember when he opened
this epistle, he said, I marvel that you're so soon removed from
him that called you to the what? Grace of Christ and to another
gospel. They were removing from the grace
of Christ to another gospel, and the only thing that would
prevent that defection is the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
being with your spirit. You know, it takes grace to keep
believing in grace. It takes grace to receive grace. It takes grace to love grace. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with your spirit. Now, this is always our great
need. It's what I stand in desperate
need of right now. It's what you stand in desperate
need of right now. And it's what everybody outside
of this room stands in desperate need of right now. The grace,
the grace Don't you love that word? The grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ be with your spirit. Now I want to give you, by way
of introduction, three things that are always true about the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. And you listen to these things
very carefully. This is always true regarding the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ. And if these three things are
not set forth, grace is not set forth. First, the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ is always sovereign. You know what that means? That means
it's completely up to Him as to whether or not you are going
to have His grace. As the father raises the dead and quickens
him, even so the son quickens whom he will. Now the leper understood this.
Lord, if you will. You know, I can't get away from
that. I can't get away from that. I
don't want to get away from that. I love that. Lord, if you will. If you
will, you can make me clean. Leper understood that clearly
and so does everybody else who knows anything about his grace.
His grace is sovereign grace. It's up to his to give or it's
up to him to withhold it if he's pleased to do it. Now, if it's
not sovereign, it is not grace. Of his fullness have we all received
in grace for grace. The law was given by Moses. but
grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. The grace of God is always
sovereign and the grace of God is always free. Now this is so incredibly encouraging
to me. The grace of God is always free. His grace acts from himself to
himself. He gives grace because that's
who he is. He's gracious. The Lord, the
Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering. That's who he
is. Now listen to this statement
real carefully. God's grace is not moved by any merit in the
object of its favor, nor can demerit or unworthiness prevent
His grace from action. I hope I said that right. God's
grace is free. That means there's nothing you
can do that would move him to give it to you because of what
you've done. His grace is free. That means that there's nothing
you can do that can prevent him from giving you his grace. His
reason for giving grace is found in himself. It's not found in
you. It's free grace. Now, I love that scripture. The word was made flesh and dwelt
among us and we beheld his glory. The glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. The law was given
by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Now the
law is true. Who's going to say it's not?
Moses didn't write the law. God wrote the law. He gave it,
he mediated it through Moses. And the law is true. Everything
the law says is true. But it's not the truth. How can that be? Because he doesn't give the whole
picture. You don't ever learn in the law, strictly speaking,
how God saves sinners by free grace, do you? You don't learn
about the forgiveness of sins through the law. And I know the
sacrifices in the law typify the Lord Jesus Christ, but the
law doesn't give the whole truth. And the whole truth is the truth. And if it's not the whole truth,
it's not the truth. And these are John's words, not
mine. The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ. If any merit, any idea of merit
is involved in this thing of grace, God's going to give me
grace because I asked for it, or because I repented, or because
I believed, or because I've stopped a certain sin, and I've started
doing a certain righteous thing, and I've spent more time reading
the Bible, and I've tried to beat my sin down more. Anybody
who thinks that God's grace is given in response to something
you do, that negates the very idea of grace. Isn't that good? I'm so thankful
for that. That means God can give me grace.
That's what that means. That means there's nothing about
me that could prevent God from giving me grace because he gives
free grace because he is gracious. Paul said in Romans 11 6, if
by grace then it's no more works, otherwise grace is no more grace.
But if it be of works, it's no more grace. Otherwise, work is
no more work. It's really this simple. It's
either all of grace or all of works. There is no in between. God's grace is always sovereign. God's grace is always free. And
God's grace is always saving. Always. You see, grace is not
something God offers you, and it's up to you to accept it or
reject it. And that's the way most religion
presents God's grace. He's offering you grace. Listen,
the gospel's not an offer. He's not offering anything. It's
what He does. And God's grace always saves. Acts chapter 15, verse 11. Peter
said we believe that by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ we shall
be saved just like those Gentiles are saved. The only way a Gentile
can be saved is by grace. Those Gentiles were saved the
same way they are by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Ephesians
2 says by grace you are saved. By grace you're saved through
faith, and that's not of yourselves, it's the gift of God. Not of
works, lest any man should boast. Salvation is all of grace. Now remember, if anybody ever
presents grace in such a way as it doesn't save, they haven't
preached grace. Grace is always sovereign, it's
always free, and it's always saving. And that gives hope to
the vilest sinner this side of hell, doesn't it? Thank God for
the freeness of His grace. You know, the first time the
word is used in the New Testament is in Luke chapter 1, verse 30. And that's where the angel said
unto Mary, fear not, thou hast found favor. That's the same
word. It's the Greek word charis. Thou
hast found favor with God. Now why did Mary find favor with
God? Because he's gracious. It wasn't
because she was some kind of holy, especially good woman.
She was just as sinful as you are. She's just as sinful as
I am. She had a wicked nature. People tried to present Mary
as some kind of super holy individual. One reason she had the Lord was
because of grace. That's it. No other reason. The
only reason you'll be saved is because of grace. There's no
other reason. Turn with me to Psalm 45 for
a moment. The psalmist says, my heart is
indicting a good matter. That means my heart is literally
bubbling over. My heart is indicting a good
matter. I speak of the things which I've
made touching the king. My tongue is the pen of a ready
writer. Thou art fairer than the children of men. Grace is
poured. into thy lips, therefore God
hath blessed thee forever." Now who's that speaking of? That's
speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ. And grace is poured into His
lips and out of His lips. Now this grace that's poured
from his lips cannot be resisted any more than a lighted match
can resist the Pacific Ocean being dumped on it. That's how
powerful, that's how strong this grace is. This is grace that
cannot be resisted. That grace that comes from our
Lord Jesus Christ. It's invincible. It's saving
grace. Now think of this. Grace poured
from his lips Grace poured into his lips. You cannot separate
the grace of Christ and what he said. You cannot separate
the grace of Christ and his word. As a matter of fact, in Acts
chapter 20 verse 32, it's called the word of his grace. The word
of his grace. Grace is meaningless without
the words of Christ. Now would you turn with me for
a moment to John chapter 6, verse 59. These things said he in the synagogue,
as he taught in Capernaum. Many, therefore, of his disciples,
when they had heard, said, this is an hard saying. Now that word hard means austere,
harsh, disagreeable to humanity. That's how they viewed His words. These are harsh. These are unloving. These are austere. We don't like
hard words. Who can be expected to hear this?
Who can be expected to listen to such teaching as this? As
a matter of fact, if you go on reading, they ended up leaving
Him. All of these people. Verse 61, When Jesus knew in
Himself that His disciples murmured at it, He said unto them, does
this offend you? Are you offended by what I just
said? Are you troubled by what I just said? Are you offended
and scandalized? Verse 62, what and if you shall
see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before. Now what
the Lord means by that is if you're offended now, you're really
gonna be offended then. When you see me in my glory and
in my throne, and you see the authority of these words, if
you're offended now, you're really gonna be offended then. Verse
63, it is the spirit that quickeneth, that gives life. The flesh profits
nothing. The words that I speak unto you,
they are spirit. Notice, not just they're spiritual,
they are spirit. And they are life. But there
are some of you that believe not, for Jesus knew from the
beginning who they were that believe not and who should betray
him. And he said, therefore said I unto you that no man can come
to me except it were given him of my father. From that time,
many of his disciples went back and walked no more with him. Now these are the 5,000 that
he fed. They had experienced this physical miracle, and they
went back and walked no more with him. Now in this message
that they were so offended by, look at the attitude of the disciples. Verse 67, Then said Jesus unto
the twelve, I think this is so solemn. He
was watching them leave, and he didn't say, wait a minute,
let me try to, maybe you didn't understand, let me try to rephrase
this. He didn't ask them to come back. He watched them leave. And he looked at the 12th, and
he said, will you also go away? What a piercing question. Will
you also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him,
Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. These words they find harsh are words of eternal life. And
we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son
of the living God. Now, in this message we have
these two completely different responses. The multitudes leave
him and walk no more with him. They're finished with this stuff.
You have the 12 who say, we don't even have any choice. There's
nowhere else for us to go. These are the words of eternal life.
Well, what did he say? What did he say? Well, look back in John
chapter 6. This is what is known as the doctrines
of grace. I don't even like using the word doctrines in the plural
because it's the doctrine of grace. It's the doctrine of grace. Well, what is the doctrine of
grace? Well, first, you can't have grace unless you understand
man's state. Verse 44, no man can come to
me. No man can come to me. No man
has the ability to come to me except the father which has sent
me draw him. Invincibly and irresistibly draw
him because man is unable Unable. Unable to come to Christ. Unable
to believe. Unable to repent. Unable to love.
Unable to do anything but sin. Now, no man can come to Christ
unless they're drawn by the Father. But there are some who come.
And who are they? Look in verse 37. All that the
Father giveth me shall come to me. And him that cometh to me
I will in no wise cast out. You see there are some who draw
to Christ and they come to Christ. And who are they? They're the
ones given to him by the Father in eternal election before time
began. Let me tell you something else
about these people. These are the people that Christ
died for. Look in verse 39. And this is
the Father's will, which is sent me, that of all which ye have
given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again
at the last day." Everybody that was given to Christ, He's going
to save every single one of them. Effectual redemption. If He dies
for you, you must be saved. Isn't that wonderful? You know,
that's really the only hope I have. The only hope I have is that
Christ died for me. And what a hope that is. And then we also
have, during this message, what is known as irresistible, invincible
grace. Verse 45, it's written in the
prophets, and they shall be all taught of God. Every man, therefore,
that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh unto me. Every single one of them. Every
one of them. Why? Because his grace is invincible. If He has grace toward you, you're
not going to be able to resist it. You won't want to. You'll
find Christ irresistible. That's the thing about irresistible
grace. It's not like you're being drugged by the hair against your
will. Your will's changed. That's what
you want. You want to be saved by the grace of God. You want
to be saved by Christ. You want to come to Him. And
every one of these people, look what's said of them, verse 7.
47, Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me
hath everlasting life. Everlasting, eternal. They will
persevere all the way to the end. Now those are the gracious
words of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the majority of the people
found these to be harsh, disagreeable words. Hard sayings, and there
were some who, like Peter, said, these are the words of the kernel
of life. Now, grace poured from his lips.
Grace poured from his lips here. Some people didn't see it graciously,
but some people did. Grace poured from his lips. Now, grace poured from his lips when
he agreed to be my surety before time began. He said, as Judah said of Benjamin,
I, listen to these words, I will be surety for him. Of mine hand shalt thou require
of him. If I bring him not before thee
and set him before thee, Let me bear the blame forever. Now those are the words of the
Lord Jesus Christ as the surety of all his people. Whatever you
require of him, you look to me for. I take full and complete
responsibility. Are those gracious words? Words
of grace pouring from his lips. This was all done before time
began. And then when he entered time, what grace was poured from his
lips when he said, a body hast thou prepared me. Lo, I come. In the volume of the book it's
written of me, I delight to do thy will, O God. What grace was poured from his
lips when his parents came looking for him and he said, how is it
that you sought me? Wished you not, knew you not that I must
be about my father's business? How could you, how could you
say anything else? And all of his life he was about
his father's business, the business of saving his people. from their
sins. I think of the grace that was
poured from his lips during his earthly ministry to so many people. I've already quoted the leper,
Lord, if you will, you can make me clean. Listen to his answer,
I will. I will be thou clean. Remember the man in the cot that
they let down through the roof, and he looked at that man and
he said, Son, be of good cheer. Thy sins be forgiven thee. Now wouldn't it be something
if he by his Spirit lets me and you know, be of good cheer. Thy
sins be forgiven thee. Think of the grace that was poured
from his lips when that woman at the well said, I know that
when Messiah comes he'll tell us all things. And he said, I
that speak unto thee am he. Think of the grace that was poured
from his lips when that woman taking an adultery in the very
act is brought before him. And he says, woman, where are
those unaccused? She says, no man can condemn
thee. She said, no man, Lord. He said, neither do I condemn
thee. Go and sin no more. What grace was poured from his
lips when the thief on the cross said, Lord, remember me when
you come into your kingdom. And he said, today thou shalt
be with me. paradise. And what grace was
poured from his lips when he said, it is finished. There's a grace of his words, but that's behind the grace of
his actions. I love his words. I love his
actions. Oh, he was rich, rich in righteousness, rich in
power, omnipotence, Rich in communion with God. He always saw the shining
face of His Father. What communion there was between
the Father and the Son. Rich in peace. Rich in goodness. Oh, the riches of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Rich in praise. Yet for your
sakes, He became poor. Who can describe the poverty
of Christ. He, you know, when he was made
sin, he still never sinned. He never sinned. He never, even
when he was forsaken by God and couldn't see God, he'd never
quit believing. That being said, he became absolutely
destitute of righteousness when he was made sin. He had no communion
with God. He had no praise only the butt
of jokes. Oh how poor he became. You know the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ that though he was rich yet for your sakes he became
poor that you through his poverty might be rich. Turn with me for a moment to
Luke chapter 4. This is the Lord's first public
statements in Nazareth. And look in verse 22. And all bear him witness and
wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth.
Now, that word gracious sounds like an adjective. But you know,
it's the same word translated grace. You could literally call
these grace words. Grace words. All wondered at
the grace words which proceeded out of his mouth. Now, what were
these grace words? Remember, this is when he came
to Nazareth for the first time back home. He'd left, he'd done
miracles have occurred to him and he comes back to his hometown
and they've heard all these things about him and they're all excited
about hearing him for the first time. Here's this one hometown
boy made big, he's done all these miracles, so we hear and we want
to see these things. So we read in verse 16, and he came to Nazareth where
he'd been brought up and as his custom was, he went into the
synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for to read. And
there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he had opened the book,
he found the place where it was written. And this is written
in Isaiah chapter 61. As a matter of fact, turn back
there with me. Isaiah 61. Hold your finger there and look
for Verse 1, the Spirit of the Lord
God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good
tidings unto the meek. He hath sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening
of the spirit prison to them that are bound. to proclaim the
acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all that mourn, to appoint unto them that mourn
in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for
mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness,
that they might be called the trees of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord, that he might be glorified." Now this is a quotation
from Isaiah 61. He opens up, they didn't have
chapters back then, I don't know how long it took him to find
it, it was on a big scroll, and he found right where it was written. And he says in verse 18, back
to our text, wouldn't you have loved to heard him read this?
Oh, I would have loved to hear how he read the scriptures. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me. because he hath anointed me to
preach the gospel to the poor. He hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. And he closed the book and he
gave it again to the minister and sat down and the eyes of
all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. They knew what he meant. You're
saying it's you? I'm sure you could have heard
a pin drop at that time. And he began to say unto them,
this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. And all bear him
witness and wondered at the grace words, the grace words, which
proceeded out of his mouth. I like that, don't you? The grace
words, the grace words. Here's grace words. The Spirit
of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to preach the
gospel to the poor. Those who have nothing to recommend
themselves. They're poor. They don't have
anything. The only recommendation they
have is that they have no recommendation. Oh, if you're thirsty, come ye
to the waters. He that hath no money He that hath no money, come buy
and eat, yea, come buy wine and milk without money and without
price. Whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. He comes to preach the gospel. And so it's only a man who has
nothing that can hear the gospel. It's only when you have nothing
that Christ can be all to you. Now, if you have nothing, Christ
is all to you. If you've got something, Christ
isn't all to you. These are grace words. He came to preach the
gospel to those who have not one shred of righteousness that
could recommend them to God. They're plumb destitutes, beggars
on the dunghill. That's who he comes to preach
his gospel to. Listen to this next grace word.
He has sent me to heal the broken hearted. Broken hearted. Now that's not talking about
broken hearted when your romance goes sour. you're, somebody leaves
you, that's hard to deal with. There's no doubt about it. I
wouldn't in any way suggest that I'm hard-hearted about that,
but that's not what he's talking about. When he's talking about
broken-hearted, he's talking about a heart that's broken.
It's no good. That doesn't work. It's broken. It can't be fixed. It's beyond
repair. It's no good. It's broken over
sin and it can't make itself better. It's broken. What do
you do with broken stuff? You throw it away. Yet the heart
is in its best state when it's broken. Broken before God can't
do anything. Can't do anything. Broken of
self-righteousness. It seizes righteousness as nothing
more than filthy rags. Broken. Broken before God. No good. He was sent to heal
the brokenhearted. Every, I said this a few weeks
ago, every spiritual problem you and I have arises from not
being brokenhearted. Every one of them. but he was
sent to heal the broken hearted. A broken and a contrite heart,
oh God, thou will not despise. And look what he says next, these
grace words. He has sent me to preach deliverance
to the captives. Deliverance to the captives.
Now what's a captive? He's in jail and he can't get
out. He can't get out. The very idea
of free will is ludicrous. He can't get out. He's stuck. He can't do anything. He's captured. He's captured. He's in jail and
he can't get out. If he could get out, he wouldn't
be captive, would he? It's that man who can't get out. Here's Grace's words. He came
to preach deliverance to the captives. Now this deliverance
is such that he saves you with absolutely no contribution from
you. Now those are grace words. He
by himself purged our sins. Here's some great words. Stay
there in verse 18. He came to preach recovering
of sight to the blind. Recovering of sight to the blind. Now if you're blind, what's that
mean? It means you can't see. You can't see. You look at yourself
and you can't see any reason why God would ever look your
way in favor. You can't see. Yet what did the
Lord say? He said, For judgment have I
come into this world, that they which see not might see. Everybody who can't see in themselves
any reason why God would ever do anything for them, He gives
you sight. And He lets you see that He does
it for Christ's sake. And everybody who can see, I
can see why God would save me, because I, He makes them blind. These are grace words, aren't
they? Recovering in sight to the blind. And then he says,
last phrase of verse 18, to set at liberty, to set free them
that are bruised. You see, if the sun make you
free, that means crushed, shattered. If the sun make you free, you're
free indeed. When he said, it is finished,
everybody he died for was set free. Set free. And the last grace
word is found in verse 19 to preach the acceptable. The acceptable year of the Lord
and what that's a reference to. is the year of Jubilee. I love
the year of Jubilee. Happened every 50 years. Well,
actually, there's no record of it ever happening. And I can
see why. I think you'll see why after
I tell you what the year of Jubilee is. In the year of Jubilee, in
the land of Israel, every 50 years, A silver trumpet would
sound announcing the year of Jubilee had come. Now in the
year of Jubilee, if you're a Hebrew slave and you were in debt, whatever
your debt was, was canceled. If you were a slave, you were
set free. Whatever you lost, let's say
you lost your property, it was restored back to you. and the
land was given a full year of rest. You had a year's vacation.
Now, who loved the year of liberty? Well, you know who loved the
year of liberty. If you were a slave, if you were in debt,
if you'd lost everything, and you were just a slave working
like, you loved the year of jubilee. Who didn't like it? Somebody owed you money? If they
were your slave? If you had to set them free? If you had to restore everything
that they'd lost? If you had to cancel all their
debts and they couldn't work for you anymore? You wouldn't
like it. You wouldn't like it. Now, why
I think it's so interesting that we don't have one recorded instance
of the Year of Jubilee ever being observed. But you know what the
Lord said? He said, this day is the year
of jubilee fulfilled in your ears. Now these are grace words. Is there any question that my great need And your great
need is the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. I love the way
that sounds. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. That was his prayer. May that
be with your spirit and with mine. Let's pray together. Lord, we come into your presence
in Christ's name, and we ask that we might have the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, we need grace to see our need
of grace. We need grace to desire thy grace. We need grace to receive that
grace. Oh Lord, may we be graced in thy son. In his blessed name we pray.
Amen. Well, that's the last