I'd like to ask you to turn in
your Bibles, if you would, to 2 Corinthians chapter 12. Getting the old thumbs up from
Garrett there. He must like that one. Then I'd like you to just take
your Bibles and just lay them in your laps for a little bit. In the last eight weeks, we have
been visiting different characteristics of God's grace. And we began
with regenerating grace, graciousness in making alive, quickening,
as it is used in the New Testament. You see, all are dead in trespasses
and sin. We all come into this world dead
in those trespasses and sin. all come into this world in sin
and degradation. Yet in Ephesians 2, 1, it says,
and you hath he quickened, you hath he made alive, you who were
dead in trespasses and sin, wherein times past you walked according
to the course of this world, according to the prince of the
power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children
of disobedience, among whom also we have all had our conversation
in times past, in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling the desires
of the flesh and of the mind. And were by nature the children
of wrath, even as others. Our Lord comes to each and every
one of His children, each and every one of His people that
He has known before the world was made. That love that He has
had for His people was there before anything ever was created.
Everything that was created was created because He loved the
people. Even as others, we walked according
to the flesh, fulfilling the desires of the mind, and were
by nature children of wrath. But God, but God, who is rich
in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were
dead in sins, hath quickened, given life. One must be brought
to life. Dead people can't come to Christ.
They have to have life in them first. When Lazarus was called
out of the tomb, the Lord came to Lazarus and gave him life,
because he was dead. He was so dead he stunk. His
body had started to rot. Surely, he'd been in there for
four days, right? Only not so. Our Lord gave him
life. and said, come. And what did
he do? He came. In fact, he came in a way that
cannot be denied. It wasn't any way him sitting
in that grave thinking, you know, maybe I'll accept this invitation. Maybe I'll come to the Lord now.
You know, I'm tired of walking that kind of path in life. I
need to turn away from the things that I used to do, the drinking,
the smoking, or whatever you might put in there. I need to
start following the Lord. That's not what Lazarus did at
all. No, he came to the Lord because the Lord has power. As
God Almighty in the flesh, He has all power in heaven and in
earth. And that's exactly the way He
called each and every one of you and I. With power. He gave us life. Lazarus came
to the Lord wrapped, still in his burial garments. Our Lord had to say, loose him. Picture it in your mind. That
means he couldn't walk, you know, because they wrap him up pretty
tight. Could you imagine seeing that? A body who had been in
the grave, all of a sudden he's got life in him, his eyes are
open, he hears, he sees, he's breathing, and he's floating
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Regenerating grace. Our Lord
must give life to the dead to hear His gospel preached. But
God, who is rich in mercy for His great love wherewith He loved
us even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together
with Christ. For Christ's sake, He gives life
to the people. With Christ, by grace ye are
saved. We next looked at justifying grace. By His grace, we are justified
in Christ, just as if we had never sinned. Our sins past,
our sins present, our sins future, have all been laid upon our Savior,
who bore them willingly, who took them into the grave, leaving
them there to be remembered no more. When God looks upon His
loved people, He sees the blood of His darling son, and He remembers
our sins no more. there is gone as far as the east
is from the west. In Romans 5, 1 we read, therefore
being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into
his grace wherein we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the
glory of God. Not only so, but we glory in
tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience
And patience experience, and experience hope, and hope maketh
not ashamed. Because the love of God is shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ
died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous
man will one die, yet preadventure for a good man some would even
dare to die. But God commendeth His love toward us, in that while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, much more than being
now justified by His blood, we shall be saved through Him."
It's all through Christ, folks. There's nothing you and I can
do for this salvation. We are but worms. We are but
part of the creation. The only path we can walk to
salvation is through the path of our Lord Jesus Christ. Next
in our series, our series brought us to look upon sanctifying grace,
grace that sets His people apart from the world, His remnant,
His chosen. We read this in Friday night's
Bible study. Many are called, but few are
chosen. Oh, how often in Scripture it
talks about the remnant of Israel. Those who truly believe that
Christ is God Almighty. Those who truly look to Christ
for their Savior, for their salvation. Those who have been brought by
the Lord to look to Him. In John 17, 9, we read this very
thing. Our Lord says, I pray for them. the sanctified, the set apart. I pray for them, I pray not for
the world, but for them which Thou hast given me. For they
are Thine, and all mine are Thine, and Thine are mine, and I am
glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world,
but these are in the world, and I come to Thee, Holy Father.
Keep, keep through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given
me, that they may be one as we are. I pray not that thou should
takest them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep
them from evil. They are not of the world, even
as I am not of the world. Sanctify them, set them apart. Sanctify them through thy truth,
through the truth of His Word. Not the interpretation that man
might have, but through the truth of His Word. Every person here
today should have a Bible. Don't trust this man who is standing
before you, because that's all I am. I'm just a man. Any man who stands before you. We're no different than everyone
else. We're saved by the grace of God,
just as all of His people are. Turn to the Word. Look to the
Word. It'll set you apart. Sanctify them through thy truth,
thy word is truth. Grace, it's a grace that is shed
upon his people by his will and his will alone. In Hebrews 10.10
it says, by the witch will we are sanctified, by his will we
are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once
and for all. We are set apart because Christ
came to this earth as God in the flesh and sacrificed Himself,
shedding His own blood for our sins. We are set apart for that
very reason. If it hadn't been for Christ
going to the cross, then we couldn't be set apart. We would be just
as dead as everyone else is. But because He has loved us from
before the foundation of the world, He shed His blood for
us. He set us apart. In the 14th verse of that same
chapter, it says, for by one offering. We spoke about this in the Bible
study this morning. The high priests, they come into
the holiest of holies. The very back place of the tabernacle. A big old huge curtain. A heavy,
heavy curtain hangs so that no one else can see what's back
there. That's a picture of heaven. The Shania Glory. The holiest
of holy. There's only one priest who could
go in there. And he went in there with blood. This is what our Lord Jesus Christ
has done for us. He went into the holy. The holiest
of holy. The Shania Glory. with His own
blood and shed it on this mercy seat for our sakes. For by one offering He hath perfected
them, perfected forever them that are sanctified." Next we
looked at preserving grace, God's grace that keeps His people. grace that will not let us go,
no matter how hard we try. And oh, I try. It doesn't take
very long for me to get outside of this building and just forget
about everything else and see the world in front of me. Things
glitter to me just as they do to anyone else. Kind of like the bird that likes
the shiny, bright things. Attracted to them. Oh, how hard we try. Yet our
Lord has loved us with an everlasting love. You know what that means,
right? That means He has loved us from
ever before things ever started, till ever before anything can
finish, from ever to ever. And if He's loved us with that
kind of a love, can anything, can anything get in the way?
If it could, then he wouldn't deserve to be called God. In Romans 8.35 it says, who shall
separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or
distress, or persecution? What about famine? I stopped on that one because
I know a little bit about what it's talking about in the famine
thing. I hear what my brother tells me about Colorado. There's
nobody there. They have nobody to worship with,
just one other family. And sometimes they travel. Could
that not be called a famine of the word? We have the Bible with
us. They have TV and stuff that they
can stream nowadays. But how often do they get to
hear the word preached in full as they do today? Can that separate them from the
love of God? Absolutely not. If it could, then he wouldn't
be called God. What about nakedness, or peril,
or the sword? As it is written, for thy sake
we are killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the
slaughter. Nay, in all these things, in all these things we
are more than conquerors through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded
that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature, Is there anything else we can
add to that list? Nothing shall be able to separate
us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Our confidence is in Him. We have no confidence in the
flesh. God's people are taught, sometimes
in very hard ways, taught not to look to the flesh for anything. And I've said this to you many
a time before, when my own mother has told me, John, that problem
you have, take it to the Lord. Lift it up to Him. We can be confident of this very
thing, that He which has begun a good work in us, He which has
begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus
Christ. That message we followed with
the message of instructing grace. Where our Savior comes in the
Spirit of God and He teaches His people the truths of His
Word. How many people hold this Bible
in their hands today, right now, just within a mile of here? This
very same Bible, and read it, and don't know the Lord. How
many people in the world today see the Word of God and cannot
understand the truths that He is Sovereign, the Sovereign Ruler
of everything, including the will of men? Not many. It takes the Lord Jesus Christ
to come to our hearts and teach us who He is. We're back to that trusting in
the flesh thing again. We don't want to do that. Let
the Lord be our Teacher. It's a grace where our Savior
comes in the Spirit of God and He teaches His people the truths
of His Word. In John 16.12 it says, I have
not yet many things to say unto you, I have yet many things to
say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now, speaking to these disciples.
How be it when He, the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you into
all truth. For he shall not speak of himself,
but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will
show you the things to come. He shall glorify me, for he shall
receive of mine, and shall show it unto you." Our Lord said to Peter, when
asked, who do you say that I am, Peter? Peter says, well, you
are the son of the living God. And our Lord turned to him and
said, Blessed art thou. Flesh and blood hath not revealed
this unto you, but my Father who is in heaven. Instructing grace. Next we turn to directing grace. The grace that God uses in guiding
the paths of His people, even when that path is hard as Jonah's
was. We looked at Jonah and how difficult
that path was for him to walk. And though he may have thought
for just a second that his path was set before him by his own
will, the Lord told me to go preach to the Ninevites. I ain't
going to preach to those people. They're me. That would be like
me going into the Hell's Angels den down in Sacramento and saying,
I think I'll go preach to them. That would not be a good thing
at all. Well, that was what Jonah was feeling. So he ran. And he may not have known it
at the time, but that was exactly God's guiding path for him. Why? Because he had to die in
the belly of that fish. He had to learn the hard way that salvation is of the Lord. And of the Lord alone. Our paths
can be definitely difficult. Hard as Jonas. In Proverbs 3,
5 we read, Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lead
not unto thine own understanding. Again, we have no confidence
in the flesh. Trust in the Lord, in what He
has said. Trust in what He has said in His Word. He says, I
shall never leave you nor forsake you. Even when you feel like
He has, He said He won't, and He cannot lie. Guiding grace. Be not wise 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. After that we came to comforting grace. We take great comfort
in knowing that our Savior is gracious to His own. In Lamentations
3.22 we read, it is the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed.
Because of our Lord Jesus Christ, the sons of Jacob are not consumed. Because His compassions fail
not. Standing on the promises of God. We can stand on the promises
of God because they cannot fail. When He says He will take us
into His own and He's going to prepare a place for us in heaven,
that's exactly what He's doing. To be absent from the body for
one of God's people is to be in the presence of the Lord.
We may go through the troubles of this world, but these troubles
are just to turn us to the One who has conquered those troubles
for us. It's to remind us that there's nothing in our flesh
of any good, that we have to look to Him. That we have to
look to our Savior for all things. 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. Oh wait a minute, that was the
last one. It is the Lord's mercies that
we are not consumed, because of His compassions fail not.
They are new every morning, great is Thy faithfulness. The Lord
is my portion, saith my soul, therefore will I hope in Him.
The Lord is good unto me, unto them that wait for Him, to the
soul that seeketh after Him. And then in our last meeting
here last week, we looked at reviving grace. That's grace
when we have become weak. Weak in our faith. Our Lord,
in His grace, He revives our souls in His Word. He brings
us back. He draws us into His Word and
He lifts us up through the preaching of His Gospel. When I am low,
I need to seek my Savior, and He revives my faith in Him. He
reminds me that my faith is a gift from Him. He reminds me that
even when my faith is very little, even if I'm in a place where
David was at once just before Psalms 23, where he said, Lord,
where are you? How come you've left me? He cried
unto the Lord for the burden that was on his shoulders. Yet
at the end of that, and into the next one, he says, the Lord
is my shepherd. I shall not want. He guideth me into pastures of
green and waters that will. He is the one who guides our
paths and gives us comfort by it. In Isaiah 57, 15 it says, For
thus saith the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth eternity,
whose name is Holy. He says, I dwell in the high
and holy place with Him also that is of contrite and humble
spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the
heart of the contrite ones. And now this morning, We come
to our final character in our list describing our great God's
graciousness to his people, those who deserve his wrath. Sufficient grace. I wanted to go through each one
of those messages for this reason, folks. As I went through those, every
one of those points pointed us to the grace of God to His people. You see, the grace of God is
not something to be fluttered with, to be, yeah, I got a little
grace going on. The grace of God is greater than
anything we can think of. When we come to the understanding
that we deserve His wrath, Yet He has loved us so much so
that He would give His Son for us. Can there be anything bigger
than that grace? Can there be anything more important
than that grace? Every one of those points, every
one of those points point to this very thing that we want
to look at this morning. Sufficient grace. Because it's
the grace of God, it's effectual, it's sufficient, and it's sure.
What more do we need in this life where we walk through this
world of the valley of the shadow of death? Where we walk through
this world that is consumed by sin? Where we walk through this
world in this body that has the lust of sin still in it? What
more do we need but the sufficient grace of our Savior? Our God. Our Lord. Our King. Our Priest. Are you with me in
2 Corinthians? Chapter 12, verse 1. Paul, writing to the Corinthians,
writes, It is not expedient for me doubtless to glory I will
come to visions and revelations of the Lord. Could this not be Paul declaring
the messages that the Lord is talking to him? I've shared this with you folks,
most of you, a time or two. One of my greatest fears in preaching
the gospel is my own pride. When people come to you and say,
John, that message just blessed me so... I have to fight. I have to fight
that down. That pride. It's not me. It's
not the man who's standing before you who's blessing you with this
Word. It's the one who's teaching. It's the one who is guiding.
It's the one who's giving you comfort when you hear the grace
of Him, though you hear about the one who loves you. It's very, very difficult. Could Paul not have been speaking
of that very thing he says, when I will come to visions and revelations
of the Lord? He says, I knew a man in Christ
above fourteen years ago, whether in the body I cannot tell, or
whether out of the body I cannot tell. God knoweth though. Such
a one caught up into the third heaven. And I knew such a man,
whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell, but
God knoweth. How that he was caught up into paradise, and
heard unspeakable words which is not lawful for a man to utter.
Of such a one will I glory. This One who was caught up into
the third heaven, that's the One that Paul wants to glory
in. Not in the things that he might hear, the revelations or
the sights that he has received from God, but in the One who
was caught up into the third heaven. Our Lord Jesus Christ. That's where the glory belongs. Of such a one will I glory, yet
of myself I will not glory, but in my infirmities, in my troubles,
the things that humble me, the things that remind me that I'm
not this great man that people want to think. You don't think
I'm talking about preachers? I know of several who used to
come to this very church who lifted our preacher up onto a
pedestal and held him above what he was. And when they found out that
he was just a man capable of anything every other man could
do, it tore them apart. So much so that it split this
church in half. At one time, I understand there
was something like 50 or 60 people who showed up here every Sunday
morning. But there were also times where only five showed
up. Be careful. Remember the men that stand before
you are just that, men. Paul was afraid of the same thing. He glorifies in the infirmities
because they bring him low. The troubles we have in our lives
bring us to that point where we look to our Lord and Savior
for what we need. And His grace is sufficient to
get us through those infirmities. For though I would desire to
glory, I shall not be a fool. For I will say the truth, but
now I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which
seeth me to be, or that he heareth me. And lest I should be exalted
above measure through the abundance of the revelations there was
given unto me, a thorn in my flesh, a thorn in the flesh,
the messenger of Satan, to buffet me, lest I should be exalted
above measure. For this thing I besought the
Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And He said unto me,
My grace is sufficient for thee. for my strength." Not your strength. For my strength, he says. For
the strength of God. You see, getting through those
troubled times, coming through the rough road that the Lord
has put you on, will bring you to glorify Him if you're one
of His. And in the end, you'll sing praises
unto the one who brought you through it, for his grace is
sufficient to get you through. And in your weakness, in your weakness, his strength
is made perfect. Most gladly, therefore, will
I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may
rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in
infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions,
in distresses for Christ's sake. When I am weak, then I am strong. The trials and storms in our
lives are for the teaching of our souls to lean upon Him, to
look to Him, to turn it all over to Him. The very sin that we
have within our flesh brings us to Him seeking sufficient
grace to save us. And sufficient it is. In Romans
8.31 it says, What shall we say then to these things? If God
be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not His own
Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with
Him also freely give us all things? If the Lord Jesus Christ came
to this earth to die for His people, how shall He not give
His people all things? Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who
is He that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea,
rather than is risen again. who is even at the right hand
of God, who also maketh intercession for us, who shall separate us
from the love of Christ. If anything could separate us
from the Creator's love, He could not be called God. His love is
perfect. No matter what we're going through,
no matter what sorrow, comes our way, but also in all the joy that
we might have. I remember a time on a motorcycle
with my wife in Canada. They have a place up there called
the ice fields. And you're going on this highway.
And in Canada, they've got valleys and high mountains everywhere
up there. And you're going on this road right down the middle
of the valley. And on both sides are these extremely high cliffs. And then above the cliff is another
100 feet of solid ice. And when you look at it, if you've
ever been to Yosemite and seen El Capitan, or the Half Dome
for the first time, and you look at it and you go, oh wow, look
at that. That's what I did with these sheets of ice. It was just
the most beautiful color, most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.
And I looked at there and I said, wow, look what God has created. That is just the coolest thing
in the world. That's almost as good as Yosemite. Even in that,
folks, even in our joy, Even our joy, we lift up our Lord
and praise Him for it. I know, I know the tough times
and the paths that we go through, family members with cancer. I
know that's hard. Kathy and I go through the same
stuff. But our Lord will get us through
it. It's only a short time here on this world. There's a time
coming real soon, maybe sooner than we know, where our Lord is going to return,
and He's going to take all of His loved ones, and we're going
to be with Him for the rest of eternity. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? If the blood of the ever-living
Jesus Christ, the Lord, was shed for you, could anything get in
the way of your salvation? If so, then it could not be called
salvation, could it? Salvation is of the Lord. The death of the God-man. The blood of our mighty Creator. is sufficient to save. Amen. Please stand with me.