Let's open our Bibles together
to Colossians chapter 1. I've titled this message, The
Evidence of Grace. evidence of grace. What is the
evidence of grace according to God's Word? If we are tempted
to lose sight of free grace, sovereign grace, pure grace,
we will try to find evidence of grace in our works. We'll look to our lives and try
to figure out by what we're doing and by what we're not doing if
we have been the recipient of God's grace. But the scriptures
are very clear about what is evident in every child of God's
life when it comes to his grace. Colossians chapter 1 verse 3. We give thanks to God and the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you since
we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you
have toward all the saints. The evidence of grace in every
Believer is faith and love. I'll show you that in another place.
Turn with me to 1 John chapter three. 1 John chapter three. We'll begin reading at verse
22. And whatsoever we ask, we receive
of him, because we keep his commandments and do those things that are
pleasing in his sight." Now notice that keeping his commandments
and doing those things which are pleasing in his sight are
separated by an and, not They're separated, two different
things. And this is his commandment.
This is the commandment that the Lord tells us believers do. That we should believe on the
name of his son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as he gave
us commandment. And he that keepeth his commandments,
faith and love, dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth
in us by the spirit which he giveth unto us. It is the spirit
of God that confirms faith in Christ. And it is the spirit
of God that gives us love for the brethren. Now, I know what you're thinking.
My faith is not like it ought to be. Neither is mine. We all cry with that father who
brought his child before the Lord. Lord, I believe. Help thou mine unbelief. That
having been said, believers believe. And they can't not believe. They
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ for all their salvation. And
the Spirit of God confirms to their hearts that they are believers. You may also be thinking, you
know, I get aggravated with my brethren and I get put out with
them. And some of them I don't particularly enjoy being around. but I do love them. I do love
them. I have a love for the people
of God that I don't have for anybody else. It doesn't matter
who they are or where they're located. Some of you have had
opportunities to visit other churches, and you've met other
believers for the very first time, and you had an affection,
you had a bond with them that you don't have with anybody else. How could it be that such a motley
crew of people like us, I mean, from so many different walks
of life and so many different experiences and so many different
interests in the world could have such a bond together if
it wasn't for the love of God. Paul said, we thank God for you.
because of your faith and because of your love. This is the commandment which
I give unto you, that you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and
that you love the brethren. Now, what God requires God must provide. And he does. Faith is a work of grace in the
heart. Love is a work of grace in the
heart. But it is the only evidence that
we have. If we look anywhere else, we
look to our lives, we look to what we do or don't do or what
we ought to do. I want to speak for a moment on
faith, the nature of faith, the necessity of faith, the source
of faith, the object of faith, and the measure of faith. And
the things that we're going to see about faith apply to love
as well. The nature of faith is that faith is not our contribution
to salvation. The nature of faith is that it's
a work of grace in the heart. Faith by its very nature acknowledges
its inability. It is an expression of our dependence
upon God. Faith is that little child hiding
behind its mother's skirt or burying its face in the neck
of its father. The child has nothing to be proud
about, the child's afraid. The child runs to the one that
he knows he can trust to protect it. That's faith. Lest you become
as a little child you snide in the kingdom of heaven. Faith rests all its hopes outside
of itself on another. Faith believes. Faith trusts. Faith rests. Faith hopes. Faith relies completely
on the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ for all their
salvation. All that God requires of me,
he must find in Christ. And all I know to do is look
to the one that the Father said he was satisfied with. The Bible tells us that faith
is the substance of things hoped for. It is the evidence of things
not seen. The evidence of things not seen.
Unbelief says, show me and I'll believe. Faith says, I believe
and therefore I see. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
one, this is the example of the Lord. Hebrews
11, I'm sorry, I said one, Hebrews chapter 11. Verse one, now faith,
this is the very nature of faith. Faith is the substance, it is
the confidence, it is the ground of things that we hope for. It
is the evidence, the evidence. What is the evidence of grace?
Faith. The evidence of things that I cannot see is faith. For by it, the elders obtained
a good report. Now I want you to notice verse
three in particularly. Through faith, we understand
that the worlds were framed by the word of God so that the things
which are seen were not made of things which do appear. What
does evolution teach? Evolution teaches that the things
which are seen were made by the things which preceded them. Faith,
you know, we're not looking for scientific evidence to prove
the existence of God. Faith just believes God. God gives you faith. You believe
every word that he has spoken. You don't have to see it. Physically,
you don't have to see it. And yet by believing God, you
do see, you do see. Your spiritual eyes are open
and you have understanding by faith, by faith. Through faith,
we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God. The word, the world was without
form and void and God sent his spirit. And God said, let there
be light. And there was light. And God
separated the light from darkness. And he separated the land from
the sea. And God's still separating, isn't he? God makes a difference
between the Egyptians and the Israelites. It is God that does
the separating. And God has made us to differ
in that we believe God. We believe God, we do. In a world that is filled with
nothing but unbelief, we've been brought by the Spirit of God
to believe God. These things were hid from the
wise and the prudent, and they're revealed unto babes. The proud, the self-righteous,
the worldly wise, the religious scholar, Oh, they're looking
for other evidences other than what God has said. Faith just
believes God. God said, thus saith the Lord,
that's all the believer needs. I'm giving you, this is the evidence
of grace in your life and in my life. Do you need something
more than God's word to convince you of the truth? Or is God's
word enough? If you're a believer, God's word
is all you need. It's all you need. That's faith. That's the nature of faith. It
just believes God. Faith is humble before God. And true faith. And here's, I hope this is a
word of encouragement to you, child of God, as we're talking
about faith. We're going to close this message
with the measure of faith. which God gives to each child
differently. But here's the nature of faith. True faith is the only thing
that acknowledges how weak faith is. So as we speak of faith,
if you have faith, you're not glorying in how strong your faith
is and how great your faith is. You're lamenting and grieving
over how little your faith is. And yet the Lord said, if you
have faith as a mustard seed, you can say into this mountain,
be cast into the sea. That has to do with the object
of our faith, but that's the nature of faith. Faith is believing
God. And this is the evidence of grace.
God has shut you up to his word. You've got no ifs, ands, or buts
to add to God. God speaks, you just simply say
truth Lord, truth Lord. And you rest there and you rejoice
in that and you're happy to have that as being all you need. Secondly is the necessity of
faith. Without faith, it is impossible
to please God for they that come to him must believe that he is
and that he's the rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
There's no salvation without faith. No salvation without faith. Faith is absolutely necessary. God says, the Lord Jesus Christ
said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.
Believe on him and you shall be saved. He that believeth on
him is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned
already because he believed not on the Lord Jesus Christ. There's
no salvation apart from faith. You say, well, what about someone
who's not had an opportunity to hear the gospel? Faith comes
by hearing and hearing comes by the word of God. How can they,
if, if they're one of God's elect children, the Lord is going to
get the gospel to them. Trust me, trust God. He's going to
do it. I was talking to Angus, Angus Fisher in Australia Friday
night. He was here a few weeks ago and Angus was flying from
Los Angeles to Sydney, Australia and sitting in the seat next
to him was a young man from Apopka, Florida. He had an opportunity to talk
to him on that 12-hour flight and that young man is sitting,
well was, yesterday was Sunday in Australia, came down to Nowra
and listened to Angus preach the gospel yesterday in Australia. God doesn't say without, now
I don't know if the young man's going to be converted or not.
I'm not, you know, we'll see. Time will tell. If he comes back
here to live, we'll see him. He'll be here. I'm sure of it.
But my point is that The Lord's not limited in how he gets the
gospel to his people. And there's not going to be any
salvation without faith. I've talked to people who have
taken the sovereignty of God to its extreme logical conclusion
and saying, well, you know, whoever God elected in the eternity past
is going to be in heaven. So, you know, what will be, will
be. Let's just, no. God uses means to save his people. And the means by which he uses
is the preaching of the gospel and faith in Christ. Without
faith, there will be no salvation. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
I love when that Ethiopian eunuch asked the apostle Paul, what
must I do to be saved? Paul didn't say, well, you know,
just go home and see what happens. You know, maybe the Lord will
have mercy on you. No, he said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shall be saved in thine household. We call on men to
believe. And if that call becomes effectual,
And you believe that's the evidence that you've been shown grace. So the nature of faith is that
we believe on Christ. The necessity of faith is that
we must have it to be saved. And the source of faith is God
himself. For by grace are you saved through faith, and that
not of yourself. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. We must come to him for faith. Faith is the evidence of the
new birth. We call upon the name of the
Lord shall be saved and he that calls upon him. How should they
call upon him in whom they've not believed? See, the Lord has
to do a work of grace. There's two callings in salvation.
We call upon the name of the Lord, but it's only after he
calls upon us. He calls us and we call him.
And the evidence that he has called us is that we're calling
out to him. See, faith is the... Paul said,
I'm thankful to God for you, and I pray for you because of
the faith that you have in the Lord Jesus Christ, and because
of the love that you have for the brethren. The object of faith is not doctrine. We don't put
our faith in the sovereignty of God. Our faith is in a person
who is sovereign. Big difference. Our faith is not in the doctrine
of election or predestination. Our faith is in a God who has
the right and has shown the grace in electing a particular people
unto salvation. Our faith is not in particular
redemption or limited atonement. Our faith is in the glorious
Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, who successfully redeemed a particular
people when he bowed his head on Calvary's cross and said,
it is finished. I mentioned this in the first
hour, I'll say it again. The spiritual blessings that
men are interested in, faith, hope, forgiveness, joy, peace,
righteousness, love, are all in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He himself is the object of our
faith. He manages these blessings. He distributes them at his own
will and as he sees fit. As I said earlier, he does not
deposit them into our account to be withdrawn at our pleasure. Listen to Numbers chapter six,
the Lord make his face shine upon thee and be gracious unto
thee. If you rejoice in the face of
the Lord Jesus Christ, then you'll be able to enjoy the benefits
that he has in his hand. So many people just looking for
a handout and looking for what God has in his hand. And the
Lord said, seek my face continually and what's in my hand will be
yours. But here's the thing, it's like I said earlier, men
want these pleasures and benefits that God has to give, but they
will not bow to the Lord Jesus Christ. In their hearts, I'm
not going to have that man reign over me. I'm not going to bow
to him. I'm not going to submit to him.
But these blessings come in the person of Christ. They are part
and parcel of who He is. And there's no way to have them
without having Him. Faith has the Lord Jesus Christ
as its object. It looks to and rests in and
believes on the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. It rejoices
in the God-man, the Son of God. We believe on his person and
we have confidence in the accomplishments of what he did. He was able to
accomplish what he accomplished because he is who he is. He's
the son of God. How could he fail? How could
he fail to save his people? How could he fail to put an end
to sin? How could he fail to conquer death and hell? How could
he fail to establish an everlasting righteousness? How could he fail
to fulfill the law or to redeem his wayward wife? How could he
fail? No, he can't fail. He destroyed the works of the
devil. He fulfilled all the promises of God. He met all the conditions
of the everlasting covenant of grace. Mercy and truth met together. Righteousness and peace kissed
each other when he bowed his mighty head on Calvary's cross.
We're looking to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. The second
person of the triune Godhead. The Son of God. Assurity. sin bearer of his people. We don't put our faith in faith. We're not looking to how much
faith we have as the assurance of our salvation. We're looking
to the person of Christ. Faith is always about an object. If you have the faith to board
an airplane and let it take off with you on the inside of it,
it's not your faith that keeps that airplane in the air. Your faith's not going to keep
that airplane in the air. Well, I'm just going to trust, you
know, I bet. No! You're putting your faith
in the object of that plane. And though you know very little
about thrust and lift and aerodynamics, you figured out that that plane's
going to get me where I'm going, I'm going to trust it with my
life. Your faith is in the plane. By the way, don't ever get on
a plane with this man right here, because he knows too much about
thrust and lift and aerodynamics and what he, you don't want to
know what he knows. You don't want to know what he knows. It's
better just to get on a plane and ignorantly trust that that
plane is going to get you where it's going. Because the more
information you have, the less faith you're going to have. You
see that? Faith is believing that which
you can't see. You enter into a marriage, it's
not your faith that's going to keep you in that marriage, it's
the faithfulness of the one you're committing yourself to that's
going to keep that marriage together. You see, you're placing your
faith in a person. And you can remain faithful,
but if that person you're trusting is not faithful, then the marriage
won't work. Every time you eat or drink something,
your faith is not keeping that food or drink from keeping you
to get sick. It's the person who prepared
it and where the food came from. You're putting your faith in
that. You see, faith always has an object. It's not faith that
saves. It's Christ that saves. And we're
placing our faith in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. You trust Christ. Believe on
Him for all your acceptance before God. And you, child of God, you're
saying, yes, I do. You're saying right now, yes,
I do. I can't add anything to Him, and I dare not take anything
away from Him. If He doesn't save me, I won't
be saved. I believe on Christ. Brethren, that is the evidence
of grace. That is the commandment of God. The measure of faith. The Lord, don't be intimidated
because of another child of God, one of your brothers and sisters
has greater faith than you have. It's not the amount of your faith,
it's the object of your faith. In Ephesians chapter four, the
scripture says, there is one Lord, there is one faith, there
is one baptism, there is one God and father of us all. There's one body. But the next
verse says, unto every one of us is giving grace according
to the measure of faith. So God distributes the amount
of faith to each one of his children as he sees fit. And some have
greater faith than others. But all believe, they all believe
God. And they have no place else to
rest the hope of their salvation than the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Am I describing you? Is this
who you are? Is this who God's made you to
be? I am what I am by the grace of
God. This is the evidence of faith
or the evidence of grace. Romans chapter 12, the Lord says,
but I say through the grace given unto you, Paul speaking, I say
by the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you,
not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think,
but to think soberly according as God has dealt to every man
the measure of faith. God measures out. Some faith is easily shaken. Some faith remains strong, but
God's people believe according to the measure of faith. The evidence of grace, faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ, And every child of God, every
one of us can say, my faith's not what it ought to be. But
I do believe. I do believe. And I've got no
place else to go. And I know, you know, if I know
anything at all, I know who the Lord Jesus Christ is. And I know
what he's accomplished. And I'm resting. the hope of
my immortal soul on him, on him. And your love for the brethren. Paul in writing to the church
at Thessalonica said, but as touching brotherly love, you
need not that I write unto you, for you yourselves are taught
of God to love one another. Now, herein is love, not that
we love God, but that he loved us and gave his son as a propitiation
for our sins. And like I said at the beginning,
the things that we said about faith can be said about love
as well. The nature of it, the source of it, the lack of it that we have in
our lives, and all that having been said, God's people love
God's people. They do. They have a union in the body
of Christ that they don't have with anybody else outside of
the body of Christ. No unbeliever in their life,
no family member, no other person in their life has the union that
they have with believers. Michael, you read that. Let us
consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works,
not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is some
men. In Hebrews 13, verse 16 says,
to do good and to communicate. Now, some people are more communicative. you know what the word I'm trying
to come up with, are able to communicate better than others.
How about that? But this word communicate means to share. We
have a love for Christ. We have a
love for his word. We have something to share with one another.
We share our faith with one another. We share our possessions with
one another. He said, don't forget to communicate
and forget not for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. By this, the Lord told the disciples,
by this shall all men know that you are my disciples because
of your love for one another. Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God. And he that loveth is born of
God and knoweth God. And he that loveth not knoweth
not God, for God is love. And he that saith, I love God,
but I hate my brother is a liar and the truth is not in him. This is the evidence of grace
in every believer's life. Faith and love. James calls love the royal law. You remember when there was a
lawyer, the scripture calls him a lawyer, who came to the Lord
and tempted him and said to him, what is the greatest commandment,
master? You know, disciples never referred
to the Lord Jesus Christ as master. They called him Lord. I hear this Pharisee, okay, master. What's the greatest commandment?
And the Lord said to love the Lord your God with all of your
heart and all of your mind and all of your soul. And the second
was like unto the first to love your neighbor as thyself and
all the law and the prophets hang on this law of love. It is the royal law. The Lord said a new commandment
I give unto you. that you love one another, even
as I have loved you. Say, well, my brother's offended
me. Forgive him. Forgive him. Say, well, I can't. Well, then
you need to seriously question whether or not you've been forgiven.
Because your offense to God is a whole lot more than whatever
that offended brother did to you. And forgiveness comes from
being forgiven. You see how this is the evidence
of grace. If you can't forgive, then you need to seriously question
whether or not you've been shown any grace. Faith and love is
the evidence of grace. Sometimes we hear people in religion
talking about election and predestination and particular redemption as
being the meaty matters of the gospel that are intended only
for the mature in the faith. They are what they call in-house
debates among theologians. That is the farthest thing from
the truth. Sovereignty and election and
predestination and particular redemption is the milk of the
gospel. It is the milk of the gospel.
Every babe in Christ bows to these things and agrees to them. You know what the meat of the
gospel is? Love. That's the meat of the gospel.
Love. Only the mature, Only the maturing
grow in this grace. Paul said, we give thanks to
God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always
for you. And I can say that I give thanks
to God and the Lord Jesus Christ, and I pray for you. Since we heard of your faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ and your love for all the brethren,
all the brethren. Amen. Father, thank you for your word.
Forgive us for our unbelief. And for our lack of love, grow
us in this grace, we ask it in Christ's name, amen. 224 in the hardback temple, let's
stand. I know not why God's wondrous
grace to me he hath made known, nor why unworthy Christ did love,
redeeming for his own. But I know whom I have believed
in, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've
committed unto him against that day. I know not how this saving
faith to me he did impart, nor how believing in His Word brought
peace within my heart. But I know whom I have believed
in, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I've
committed unto Him against that day. I know not how the Spirit
moves, convincing man of sin, revealing Jesus through the Word,
creating faith in Him. But I know whom I have believed
in And am persuaded that he is able To keep that which I've
committed Unto him against that day I know not what of good or
ill May be reserved for me of weary ways or golden days before
his face I see. But I know whom I have believed
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that I know not when my Lord may come,
at night or doomsday fair, nor if I'll walk the vale with Him,
or meet Him in the air. But I know whom I have believed
in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've
committed unto him against me. Bye!