Ephesians chapter 2. The title of the message is,
Grace Greater Than Our Sins. Grace Greater Than Our Sins.
You know, Paul starts by Blessing God for all our spiritual blessings. That's where they come from.
God has given them to us freely in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
he continues to write about what God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit has done for us in salvation. God chose
us, the Son redeemed us, the Holy Spirit calls us, and we
are sealed by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is in every one
of you who believe the Gospel. He's in you. And then Paul lets us know without
a doubt that salvation is all of God. It's all in every one
of you. who believe the gospel, you know,
you know without doubt that salvation is of the Lord. That if God doesn't
save you, you're not going to be saved. You know that. That
if He doesn't have mercy on you and grace on you, you're a goner. You know that. Without a doubt,
you know that. and you know that you are shut
up to the mercy of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I cannot
think of a better place to be shut up than to God's mercy."
He delights to show mercy. God delights to show mercy. Then in chapter 2, Paul lets
us know, he reminds us, he reminds the church, of who and what we were by nature. And He lets us know of the riches
of God's grace in our salvation. For by grace are you saved. By grace you've been saved, by
grace you are being saved, and by God's grace you shall be saved. That's how it works. and He lets
us know of the riches of God's grace in our salvation and the
work of Christ in saving us. Wasn't that clear in chapter
1 and chapter 2? Isn't that so clear? I know before I heard the gospel,
believed the gospel, it wasn't clear. But it's so clear to me
now, how God saves sinners. It's so clear. And he tells us
that God is going to bring together both the Jew and the Gentile.
And He's going to make them one in the Lord Jesus Christ. The
Jews didn't like us Gentiles. But I'll tell you this, every
Jew whom God saves, every Gentile whom God saves, they love each
other in Christ. They are brothers and sisters
in Christ. They are one in Christ. Now he
says here in verse 2, "...and you," and you are verse 1, "...and
you," this is very personal. Salvation is. Salvation is very
personal. He's speaking to you who believe
the gospel. This is written to believers. For the most part, this is written
and the message this morning is to believers, those of you
who believe. He's speaking to you. Now who are the you He's
speaking to? You who have been blessed of
God with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places. And you
know it. You know it without a doubt.
You who were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the
world. That's the ones Paul's speaking to. You who are redeemed
by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and forgiven. Can't put a price on this. Forgiven
of all your sins. They're gone. Forgiven. You who have been sealed with
that Holy Spirit of promise, you who believe this gospel,
to whom the arm of the Lord is revealed, that's the ones He's
speaking to. You. You are the ones He's speaking
to. And you hath He quickened. God
has given you spiritual life in His Son. You have life. You have the life of God in you. And you're a partaker of it.
You're a partaker of it. Who were dead, now He's going
to remind us. And we need reminding. Or it
wouldn't be written. who were dead in trespasses and
sins." We were dead like the rest of this world is dead. Now
we all know what dead means. It means no life, no life. If you have a spark of life,
you're not dead. Here it says you were dead, not
even a spark, not a spark of spiritual life in any way, shape,
or form. Paul says, you were spiritually
dead to God. Dead to Him. And he's going to
give us the evidence of it in verse 2 and 3 by our walk. We're in in time past. He's going
to point us to our past. He's going to bring to remembrance
our past. We're in time past. We don't walk this way now. You
know, Paul said, Oh wretched man that I am, but he didn't
live like a wretch. But he knew he was one. He knew
he was one. That old way of living and walking
is past. But this, he says, is how you
walked. This was your life. We walked
after the principles of this world. and we were under the influence
of the spirit of disobedience." That's what's going on in the
world. It's a spirit of disobedience. That's what it is going on. You
were under the influence of Satan. Everyone who is not under the
power and influence of the Holy Spirit is under the power and
influence of Satan. No one's on neutral ground. You
don't have to teach your children to lie, do you? You got to teach
them to tell the truth. You don't have to teach your
children about being disobedient. They're naturally disobedient,
just naturally that way. Me and my grandson this past
week was having a conversation, and he can be a rascal. And I
told him, and in our conversation we were having, I said, I want
you to understand, he's 13 years old, I said, I want you to understand
this. For every thought, for every
word, and for every action, God will bring everyone into judgment.
I said, just remember that. Everyone. I said, no one ever
gets away with anything. Anything. It's the spirit of
disobedience that our children and us, we are born with this. We're born disobedient. We are
born rebels. That's the way we're born. And
that's the way we will stay unless God does something. Unless God
stops us on our road to hell, unless He does that like He did
Paul on the road to Damascus, we'll perish. It's in their nature and it's
in our nature before conversion to walk after the lust of our
flesh and fulfill the desires of this flesh. That's the way
we walk. That's what we get up in the morning and seek after.
That's what we do by nature. We all have a fallen, depraved
nature at birth. Every last one of us. Every one
of us. This is why the Lord said to
Nicodemus, you must be born again. You must be. Nicodemus, while
our Lord was explaining to him about the Kingdom of God, entering
into the Kingdom of God, and Nicodemus started asking him
some questions, and the Lord said, Nicodemus, you must be
born again. Because you can't understand
what I'm saying. You can't enter into what I'm
saying. You can't see what I'm saying unless you're born again.
Because the nature you're born with cannot receive the things
of God. It can't do it. It cannot receive
the things of God. We don't need reformed. We need to be born
from above. That's what we need. We must
be given a nature that loves God and can receive the things
of God and will receive the things of God. Christ said to the Pharisees,
You will not come to Me that you might have life. That's your
problem, He said. You will. You will not come to Me that
you might have life. But God is going to have something
to do with us because it says that He's rich
in mercy. He's rich in mercy. But God, who is rich in mercy,
everyone here knows what rich means, don't you? You know what
it means. We all want to be rich. Usually,
though, in the wrong things. We want to be rich. That's why
you play the lottery. That's why people play the lottery.
They want to be rich. Usually we want to be rich in
material things. But God is rich in the right
things. God is rich in mercy. God is
rich in kindness. You read that. In His kindness. God is rich in love. And this
is what we need to be rich in. I would to God. And I mean this,
I would to God that we would come to the point, to the place
where our great desire would be to be rich in the fruit of
the Spirit and not in the things of this world. You will not find
love, kindness, joy, peace in the marketplace. You won't find
it there. You find it in Christ. And those
are the things I want to be rich in. Rich in faith. Rich in believing
God. Rich in love to God. Rich in
love to you. That's what I want to be rich
in. That's what we need to be rich in. Oh, that God would give
that to us. But I am thankful that God is
rich in mercy, so rich that it can't be measured. Someone said
this, if you can count what you have, you're not rich. If you
can count it, you're not rich. God's mercy, God's love, God's
kindness is immeasurable. You can't measure it. You cannot
measure the mercy of God. It's infinite. If you can measure
God's mercy, I guarantee you we could wear it out. We could
use it up if it could be counted. It's infinite. It's infinite. It says in verse 4 here, for
His great love, He's rich in mercy for His great love wherewith
He loved us. Let's never get over the love
of God in Christ Jesus towards you. Don't ever get over that. God's love is like Himself. It's
great. And it's infinite. It cannot
be measured. It passes all human understanding. And it's this great love, wherewith
He loved us, that He chose us in Christ and called us by His
grace. Great love. Greater love hath
no man than this, that a man would lay his life down for his
friends. But I'll tell you what's even
greater, that a man lays life down for his enemies, because
that's what we were. We were enemies in our minds,
it's said, by wicked works. We were enemies. Any other kind
of love, then this love will fail. It'll fail. Any other kind
of love than God's love. God's love reaches to the vilest
of men. God saves people you and I wouldn't
save. The fact that He has saved me
ought to be enough. That ought to be enough. You and I should not be discouraged
that God would save anyone if He has saved me, if He has saved
you. His love reaches to the vilest
of men. A love that reaches to His enemies
and reconciles them to Himself. That's the love of God. A love
that sends His Son to suffer and die for sinners so that He
can be a just God and be their Savior. Oh my. And He did this even when
we were dead in sins, at our worst, when we hated Him. Have you ever been around anybody
that's just absolutely hated you? I mean hated you. You've never been around anybody
that's hated you as much as you and I have hated God. I know
that. If God would allow the pure hatred
to come out of our hearts by nature now, it would be astonishing. astonishing. And yet He has reconciled
us to Himself through the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a love that
sends His Son to suffer and die in the place of sinners, to take
my hail, to take the wrath that I would get that was coming my
way. Children of wrath by nature even
as others. just like the ones that He's
already sent to hell. And yet He saved me from myself,
and saved me from Himself, and saved me from the curse of the
law, saved me from my sins, saved me from Satan. Oh, what immeasurable love! At
our worst, He loved us, chose us, redeemed us, and made us
alive in His Son when we were at our worst. When our Lord walked on this
earth in the flesh..." Listen to this, "...even when we were
dead in sins, hath He quickened us together with Christ." Made
us alive in Christ. When our Lord walked on this
earth in the flesh, we were in Him. He was our federal head. We were in Him. We lived in Him,
we died in Him, we arose in Him, we ascended on high in Him, and
we are seated at God's right hand right now in Him. I'm seated
at God's right hand in Jesus Christ right now, and you are
too who believe the gospel. You're seated there. You're seated
here in the flesh, but you're seated there in your representative
in Christ. But there comes a time when God
calls us by His grace and gives us spiritual life in Him and
raises us from the dead, the spiritual dead, and makes us
a new creation in the Lord Jesus Christ. A new creature, it says,
over in Ephesians 2nd Corinthians chapter 5. Makes us new creatures. And Christ is really formed in
you. When I stand here and preach
and I look at you, you who believe the gospel, I realize that Jesus
Christ is formed, that He really is in you. He's seated at God's
right hand, right now, in the heavenlies. And at the same time,
He's in you. His Spirit is in you. You are in Him and He is in you. And this union is real. It's a real union. Christianity
is not a system. It's not some things to be believed. It's a real living union with
God Almighty in Jesus Christ. That's what it is. And it says in verse 6 and 7,
"...and God hath raised us up together in Him." Here's what
he's saying. We are so intimately joined to
Jesus Christ that what happened to Him happened to me. What happened
to Him has happened to me. As He is, it says, so are we
in this world. We are His body and where He
sits, we sit. We are in Him. God has raised
us up together in Christ and in the ages to come. We've seen nothing yet. Brethren,
we've seen nothing yet. There's a little sign Vicki has
at the house, come grow old with me, the best is yet to come.
The best is yet to come. This is just the beginning. The
best is yet to come. And in the ages to come, God
is going to receive all the honor and all the glory and all the
praise, and He's going to show off. He's going to show off His trophies
of grace. You know that's what you are?
I used to have some wrestling trophies at the house. You know,
they sat up on the shelf when I was young. They sat up on the
shelf, and you know there's a reason why you've got them sitting on
the shelf. It's not for you to look at. It's for whoever comes
in to look at. For somebody else to see and
say, well, I see you... What's this? What's this? Everyone whom God saves, He saves
as a trophy, a trophy of His grace. That's what you are. And in the ages to come, He's
going to display His trophies. And He's going to receive all
the glory and the honor from it. Because if somebody asks
you about your trophy, what do you do? Well, that's a match
I won. That's a tournament I won. Or this is something I... It's
a story. There's a story behind it. And
there's a story behind every one of God's trophies. And it
has to do with the Lord Jesus Christ and His redemption of
us. Christ being made sin. Christ
dying in our place. God becoming incarnate. We will not go off on our own
anymore and build our own houses and buy our own lands and lay
claims to earthly possessions, but we will give unto Him the
glory due unto His name. We will sing, worthy is the Lamb
that was slain to receive power and glory and honor and praise.
We'll sing that without sin. And we'll acknowledge that the
earth is the Lord, the fullness thereof, and they who dwell therein. And this thing, this matter of
me and mine will finally be over with. I own this. I bought this. I've worked for
this. That'll be over with." That's all he is. Now I know
this. I'm convinced of this. We're
not going to be floating around on a cloud playing a harp for
eternity. There's a new heaven and a new
earth, and it's going to be active. God's very active. You know,
when God created the Garden of Eden, and He created Adam, He
put Adam in it. What did He tell Adam to do?
Dress it and keep it. That's what we'll do on that
new earth, I have no doubt, whatever that consists of. We'll dress
it and keep it and be busy and we'll be doing our Father's business,
whatever that is. But it'll be in righteousness
and holiness and won't be any sin, won't be this fussing and
fighting and jealousy. That'll all be gone. That'll
all be gone. We will acknowledge in truth
it's all His. It's all His. Thank You, Father. Thank You, Father, for letting
me be here. Thank You, Father, for bringing me here. Thank You,
Father, for saving my soul and making me whole. And we're going to know this,
by grace you are saved through faith, and that faith is not
of yourselves, it's the gift of God. God has given you the
faith to believe Him. Some of you believe the gospel,
and then you have others in your family, you may have others sitting
beside of you that don't believe at all. Faith is a gift of God. Repentance
is a gift of God. It's a gift. It's a gift. I pray for family members all
the time. I do. I pray as long as they've
got a breath in them, I pray God have mercy on them, save
their soul. But I do know this, the salvation
is of the Lord. It's in His hands. They are in
His hands. And He'll do right. He'll do
right. And we're going to know this,
"...is not of works, lest any man should boast." Everyone who
stands in His presence is going to know they are there not because
of anything, anyway, shape, or form, at any time. It was because
of what they did. Not because of what He did. What He did. And we know this. Every believer knows this. We
are His workmanship. I'm His workmanship. You're His
workmanship. We know that salvation is a total
work of God. We know that. It takes the same power that
God exerted when He created the heavens
and the earth. It takes no less power to save
me, to create a new, make me a new creation in Christ Jesus.
Same power. It takes the same divine power. It takes the power of God to
make an ungodly man a godly man. It takes the power of God to
transform this rich to a saint. It does. It takes the power of God working
in you to make you a good work in Christ Jesus. It takes that. And God is going to demonstrate
His grace and His power in you before this ungodly world. A
city that sits on a hill, He said, cannot be healed. And you
do not light a candle and put it under a bushel. You wonder why God put you where
you are. Why did I have to work here? I'll tell you why. You're an
example of His grace, and He's going to put you where He's going
to put you. And the people there are going to, over the time and
over the years, they're going to watch the grace of God be
demonstrated in you. That's what they're going to
watch. They're going to see a wretched man walk and talk like a godly
man. They're going to see a man who
was a lover of darkness become a lover of light. I had a friend say to me one
time back years ago, He said to me, he said, I wish, and he
didn't understand it, but this is how he understood it. He said,
I wish you hadn't got saved. I wish you hadn't. And I know
what he said, I wish the Lord hadn't saved you. We became different. How could
two walk together except they agree? We were still friends,
we still spoke, we were friendly, but when he went his way, I went
my way. A different way, a different
path. And only God can do that. Only God can do that. One who
used to walk after the course of this world now walks after
godliness. That's a work of God. One who
used to be so mean, be so kind. How'd that happen? Did he go
to therapy or something? God saved him. One who hated
to one who loves. One who whined about everything
to one who waits patiently on the Lord. That's the work of God. The work
of the grace of God. And I'm going to close. Remember
this. Remember this. At one time, you
were Gentiles in the flesh. There in verse 11. You were Gentiles
in the flesh. You were not counted the children
of promise. Our ancestry, you go back far
enough. Now, you go back far enough in
your family tree. Go back far enough. And the gospel wasn't sent to
them. It was given to Israel. The promises, the types, the
pictures, was all given to Israel. It wasn't given to any of our
ancestors. You go on back, I'm talking about
a few thousand years. They didn't have it. But now
here you and I sit and we have it. And it's worth saying, remember
this, remember this, at one time you were Gentiles in the flesh,
you were not counted the children of promise, and outside of the
covenants of promise, you were strangers and aliens to the commonwealth
of Israel. That's the way you were. At that
time you were without Christ. You were aliens from the commonwealth
of Israel, strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope. You go back far enough into your
ancestry, there was a time that they had no hope. The gospel
wasn't sent to them. But the gospel has been sent
to you. He says, don't forget that. Don't forget that act of
mercy and grace of God to you. Without hope, without God in
the world. But now it's not that way. That's not the way it is
right now. But now in Christ Jesus, you
who sometimes were far off, out there in idolatry, out there
in sin, out there in ignorance, out there in darkness, you are
made nigh by the blood of Christ. God's brought you into the family.
He brought you into the family. The Jews called the Gentiles
dogs. He's let the dogs in the house.
He's let the dogs in the house. He brought some dogs in the house.
But you've been made nigh in no other way but by the blood
of Christ. For Christ is our peace. I didn't
make peace with God. I did not make peace with God.
Jesus Christ did that. Christ is our peace. And He has
broken down, "...who hath made both one," and He's broken down
that middle wall partition between us, "...and He abolished in His
flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in
ordinances, for to make Himself of two," two people who were
separated, two people who couldn't get along, "...one new man, so
make Him peace." No matter where you come from,
whether you're Jew, Gentile, black, white, red, yellow, it
doesn't matter. In Christ, all are one. Now listen,
and Jesus Christ is all. He's all. Grace, greater than our sin. By grace are you saved through
faith." That's not of yourself. You didn't come up with it. You're
not smarter than the next person said to you doesn't believe.
You're saved by the grace of God. Okay, Craig.