Ephesians 2. As so often is, some of these
sweet and precious verses I've read my whole life. And I'm so
quick to quote them and say them. And so often I say prayer. How horrible that is. so often
I say scripture. I hope the Lord will be with
us today and allow us to hear it, allow us to see it, allow
us to know Him. Ephesians chapter 2 and verse
8, For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that, not
of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any
man should boast. Salvation is of the Lord completely,
in every aspect from beginning to end, so that God gets all
the glory. We can't boast, and a saved sinner
has no room for boasting. We don't have a leg to stand
on. And we look to Him only. It says there, God saves by grace. Verse 8 says, By grace are ye
saved. Salvation is all of grace. Every
bit of it. God elected a people to salvation
by grace. Paul told us there in Romans
11, grace is the opposite of works. If it's of grace, it's
no more works. And if it's of works, it's no
more grace. If we do something, grace is
gone. And if it's grace, there's no doing. It's done. The gospel
we preach, salvation by grace. There in Acts 20 it says, to
testify the gospel of the grace of God. That's what we preach
to sinners. And we tell them we are justified
freely by God's grace. Romans 3 says being justified
freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus. It's an act of grace. And we
are called by God's grace. He calls us to Himself. There
in Galatians 1, Paul tells us He separated Him from His mother's
womb and called Him by His grace. And that's where we stand. Romans
5.2 says, Grace wherein we stand. In our daily lives, we stand
on the grace of God. We breathe by the grace of God.
We look to Him by the grace of God. That's how we get through
this daily life. That's how we get through this world. And thanks
be to God, when this life is over, When the sins of this world
are gone, the worries and cares that we're just so wrapped up
in are gone, we'll stand on His grace for eternity, looking to
Him alone in Christ. And every believer, we are what
we are by the grace of God. If I'm tall and ugly, or I'm
short and handsome, If I'm healthy as a horse or if I'm sick, if
I'm rich or poor, whatever it is, if I'm a child of God or
I'm not, I am what I am by the grace of God. That's what Paul
told us in 1 Corinthians. But by the grace of God, I am
what I am. And His grace, which was bestowed
upon me, was not in vain. But I labored more abundantly
than them all." Paul wasn't boasting. Paul was telling the truth. He
wrote the majority of the New Testament. The Lord said, go
preach there. He went and preached. He said,
study it. He studied. He labored. Thoroughly labored. Yet not I. Oh, what hard work. He stayed
up late at night. He traveled all over. wrote the
bulk of our Bible, this New Testament. Yet not I, but the grace of God
which was in me. Grace purposed us. Grace found
us. Grace called us. Grace told us
we was justified. Grace saved us. And grace is
what keeps us, every bit of it. So why was this grace needed? Why do we need that? Follow up
to us in Romans 5.20, where sin abounded, grace did much more
abound. Sin was there. How did that sin
abound? Sin reigned unto death. We fell
in Adam, we fell in our conception, we fell from the moment we breathed
on this earth, and we fall every moment of every day. Sin abounds
into us, and it's always to death. Even so, might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace
must reign in us because we're fallen. We're depraved. Help
us. We need the Lord's grace. So
what is grace? We know grace is an unmerited
favor, but you must understand what grace is if you would have
a right understanding of how and why God saves sinners. You need to understand what grace
is to be able to understand the Scriptures. Grace is an aspect
of God's glory. That's part of His glory. Moses
asked to see the Lord's glory there in Exodus 33. And three
things were involved in God showing Moses His glory. First, God said,
I will make My goodness pass before you. His goodness is His
glory. His holiness, His perfection,
that's the Lord's glory. And He said, secondly, He goes,
I'll proclaim the name of the Lord before thee. His name is
His glory. Who He is, what His name declares. And then lastly, God said to
him, I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will
show mercy on whom I will show mercy. God's grace, His act of
divine grace is His glory. It's part of His glory. There
in chapter one of Ephesians in verse six, it says, to the praise
of the glory of His grace. His grace is glorious. Every
sinner who boasts that God chose him because the Lord looked down
through the annuals of time and knew that we would pick him, they are trying to rob God of
His glory. They say, that grace was something
in me. That's not what grace is. Every sinner who boasts of
His will, of their faith, of them bringing themselves to God,
I found him, they're attempting to rob God of His glory. They
justify themselves, they're robbing God of His glory. We're justified
through His grace, aren't we? But God says in Isaiah 42, my
glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.
That's what all of our works are, just graven images, something
we've whittled out of wood, out of rock swiftly, vanity. The
Lord said there won't be glory in that, glory's gonna be in
Him. It's all to His glory. God's completely sovereign over
all things. It's God's right as God over
all creation to be gracious to whom He will be gracious. That's
His prerogative. Everything is God's property.
This earth we're standing on, this pulpit, the air I'm breathing,
the lungs that breathe this air, the Lord owns it all. He made
it all. It's His. Every bit of it. He
created all things, including every person, throughout time. So God can do with His own as
He sees fit, as He wills. We do what we want with our property,
don't we? My careless parents just came
into town, and I went out front, and we got some hanging flower
baskets. And I took them flowers out, and I threw them over the
hill, and I put new flowers in those hanging flower baskets.
I wanted it pretty when my in-laws came. Now, if my neighbor came
over and yelled at me, what you're doing is unrighteous. That's not just throw them flowers
away, put the flowers you want in there. I would laugh at him
all the way out the gate. What absurdity! That would be
foolish, wouldn't it? Christ said, is it not lawful
for me to do what I will with mine own? God chose to be gracious to a
people. How could we get mad at that?
It's His people. He can do what He wants to with
them, can't He? He's the sole proprietor of this
universe. God alone puts a difference between
sinners. The Lord makes us to differ,
and He does so by being gracious to whom He will, and God's reasons
for being gracious are only within Himself. Why did He do that? Why did He choose me? He knows. I don't have to know. I just
have to be thankful, don't I? And it's not by any merit in us,
not by any merit in that creature. And he doesn't owe anyone, and
he is not accountable to anyone. He's God. He can do as he pleases. And we know that grace, there's
no cause for grace, a merit to favor. But damnation, there's
always a cause. It's never said, I will condemn
whom I will condemn. The Lord said He's turned them
to darkness. He's darkened their eyes. How did He darken their
eyes? He is light. He didn't shine on them. And
He hardened hearts. We looked at that before. I always
use concrete as illustration. How do you harden concrete? Stop
working it. Take your hand off of it, because that's its nature.
He leaves us to our nature. But God never condemns anyone
without a cause. He is just. And it would be unjust
if he randomly went around and said, you're condemned, and you're
condemned, and you're condemned, and pick some people to condemn. That's not just. God's damnation
of sinners is always the just wage of our actions, of our nature. And it's earned by us for breaking
God's law. A wage is something we earn. Grace can never be earned by
the sinner, but damnation's always earned by the sinner. Grace is
unmerited favor bestowed according to God's own sovereign prerogative
to do with his own as he will. But grace is the just payment
earned by the sinner. Aren't you thankful by grace
are ye saved? The only doing I can earn, the
only righteousness I can earn, the only salvation I can earn
is damnation. That's my wage. He saves us through
His grace. Now the next word there in verse
8 is saved. For by grace are you saved. It
wasn't enough for God to simply choose who He would be gracious
to. These are mine. Something had
to be done. God also had to do everything
necessary to actually save us. Not just in word only. It's not
pretend. He had to actually save us. And
it must be in a way that's consistent with His holiness. He has to
be just. He has to remain holy. Just think
of the Lord's wisdom in saving a people. His people. He purposed
to do three things in that. He's going to save His people
from their sins. All the while, Christ was going
to receive all preeminence in all things. All the while, the
Lord's glory is going to be manifested. He's going to retain His glory,
be just and the justifier. Christ will justify His people,
save us from our sins, and receive all preeminence. I couldn't have
figured that out. All three things are accomplished
in Christ and Him crucified. The Lord's glory, His preeminence,
and our salvation from our sins. In Christ crucified is where
God reserves mercy for thousands and at the same time will by
no means clear the guilty. Sin had to be punished. It was
punished in our substitute. That's why David wrote in Psalm
85, mercy and truth are met together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. it meets in Him. No sacrifice
that I could offer would work. The blood of bulls and goats
will not please God, but a sacrifice must be made. The Lord provided
Himself as the Lamb. He provided Himself a Lamb. We
read that as if it's something that wasn't Him. He provided
Himself the Lamb. It was Him. Righteousness is
freely imputed to the child of God, and God is just because
Christ paid all the debt that we owe to divine justice on that
tree at Calvary, and He justified us. It was all laid on Him. This salvation, Christ dying
for a people, saved by grace, it's more than just avoiding
hell and going to heaven. Any sane, logical person wouldn't
want that. But it's more than that. God's
salvation is being made perfect in the eyes and presence of God
through faith in His Son. By grace, He saved us. and made us conform to the image
of His Son, made us righteous, gave us a holy nature that can't
sin. A new man in us cannot sin. And therefore, we're allowed
to be in His presence for eternity. To understand that is to be given
faith, isn't it? That's our next word there, faith. For by grace
are you saved through faith. Now, God's gift of faith is the
means through which we receive salvation that's already purchased
by grace, by Christ. That's the conduit that it travels
through. That's just the way that we get
it. It's through faith. It says in verse 84, by grace
are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it's
the gift of God. It's a gift of God. If I come to your home, and I'll
rest up on the mantel, and I got down a little figurine that was
yours, your grandpa gave you, or whatever, and I wrapped that
up, and I said, here, I gave you a gift. That ain't much of
a gift, is it? It's from Him. If I have my faith,
and the Lord gave it to me, He gave me something that was already
mine. That ain't much of a gift, is it? He gives us the faith
of Christ. The faith of God is put in us.
That's His gift. It's His to give. But I've heard
a lot of men debate over what's meant here in this verse by the
gift of God. Do you know why they argue over
which one of these is the gift? Because sinners foolishly try
to boast that all three things mentioned here is something that's
in us. Somehow we received grace, we
did something to get it. Somehow we earned salvation and
somehow we mustered up faith. However, everything mentioned
here in verse 8, it's all a gift. Grace is a gift. Grace is given
from outside of us because of no reason in us. And yet we still
boast that grace was given because God saw something in us. No. Grace is a gift. Salvation is
a gift. How do we know that? Salvation
is of the Lord. But we still foolishly boast that something
that we did or said or prayed or whatever is the reason that
God saved us. No. Salvation is a gift given
by God. And faith is a gift to believe
Christ, to look to Him, to bow to Him, to turn from us, for
me to turn from me and turn to God, the faith it takes to do
that, it's a gift. The Lord gave that. And that's
what the Holy Spirit here is particularly speaking of when
it says, and that not of yourselves, it's the gift of God. And these
things that Paul's writing to us here, we always want to look
at them in context. Now from chapter 1 into this
verse, the Holy Spirit's been declaring to the Apostle Paul
that every blessing, every blessing the believer has was given us
of our Father in Christ Jesus. Every blessing that we have.
There in chapter 1 verse 3, He says, blessed us with all
spiritual blessings and heavenly places in Christ according as
he chose us in Christ from before the foundation of the world that
we should be holy and without blame before him in love. And
in verse five he says he's predestinated us into the adoption of children
by Christ Jesus to himself. Verse six, he made us accepted
in the beloved In verse 7, in Christ we have redemption through
His blood, even the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches
of His grace. Verse 8, He abounded. The Holy
Spirit charged towards us, abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence,
having made known unto us the mystery of His will. I pray that the Holy Spirit would
come to His child abounding. take our hearts by siege, like
a war, and make us known the mystery of God's will. He's going
to save a people from their sins. He's going to magnify His Son
for being our substitute, our propitiation, and He's going
to receive all the glory, being just and the justifier. What's
that something to know? What an inheritance. Verse 9,
he gave us an inheritance in Christ. Verse 13, you trusted
after that ye have heard the word of truth, the gospel of
your salvation, and we were sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise.
The Lord came to us, told us this salvation, told us what
we were and what Christ was. who He is and what He's accomplished.
And then gave us that inheritance of His glory in Him, the righteousness
that He earned and sealed us. That's a blessing, isn't it?
We can't lose it. Sealed us in Him. And then verse
19 and 20 compares the power to regenerate us, convert us
to the exceeding greatness of His power in raising Christ from
the dead. He reminds us, He raised Christ
from the dead. He can take care of our souls.
He can convert us. Then in chapter 2, He says, you
and I were dead in sins like every other fallen sinner in
Adam. We were no different. He's received all these blessings.
In verse 1, and you hath He quickened who are dead in trespasses and
sins. We were dead. Then here in verse 8, He says,
even your faith. All these blessings we've received.
multitude of blessings. Your faith's not of yourself.
That, too, is a gift of God. He's given us everything. We
received a plaque, a board, a sign. We hung it up in the bathroom.
It says, count your blessings. And I always think that's humbling
to me. Anytime I see that, you so flippantly
in our society, count your blessings. Try counting them. Real quick,
I see that and I think, I have nothing to complain about doing.
What blessings we've received. Let's start over in 1 Corinthians
chapter 4. 1 Corinthians chapter 4. Verse 7. Who maketh thee to differ from
another? Why did I receive all these blessings?
Who maketh me to differ? And what hast thou that thou
didst not receive? Anything I have the Lord gave
me. Now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory as if
thou hadst not received it? Anything we have. Why do I glory
in anything I have, my possessions or my thoughts, anything? Why do I glory? The Lord gave
it to me, as if I didn't receive it. Everything a believer has
is the gift of God, even our faith. Why am I laboring this
point? Faith is such a gift. It has to come from the Lord.
It's not in us. We can't boast in it. Because
a person has only confessed he's a sinner when he can confess
he can do absolutely nothing to save himself. That's confessing
I'm a sinner. That's confessing your sin before
the Lord. I have nothing to bring. I have no ability. Those who
say they're sinners, but then they talk about what they contribute
to their salvation, they've yet to truly confess that they're
a sinner. They speak about salvations by grace alone, through faith
alone, and Christ alone, but then they brag about their faith. Or they brag about the decision
they've made. Or they brag about how holy they're getting. Something
they're doing for God. They have not yet believed the
salvations of the Lord. They haven't confessed their
sin. As long as a sinner believes that something they did contributes
or aids in their salvation, they haven't believed salvations of
God, salvations of the Lord. It says in our text, For by grace
are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it's
the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. What
is it to have faith in Christ? When we believe Him, what is
it to believe Him? There's three things that go
with that. Turn over to 2 Timothy chapter 1. First thing, faith involves knowing
Christ in spirit and in truth. Now this knowing is more than
just believing facts about Christ. It's to know Christ because we've
been known of Him. So Paul told us in Galatians
4, but now after that ye have known God, or rather are known
of God. How can we know Christ? He has
to know us. It's that word before love. How
do we love God? He has to first love us. We have
to know Him. We have to love Him. And it's
not what our faith is in, but who our faith is in. If I've
got strong faith, who's it in? Faith's only as valuable as the
object of its faith. Great faith in a powerless object
is the same as no faith at all. If I made a parachute out of
chain link fence, and I had full faith that that was gonna keep
me from falling to the ground and dying, that faith ain't worth
anything, is it? Ain't gonna work. We have to be looking to Him. It's who our faith is in. So
first, faith is to know God our Savior. You have to know Christ.
Second, faith involves being persuaded He's able to keep us
of His ability and everything that we commit to Him. The Holy
Spirit makes us to know Him and then we're persuaded after we
know Him. We see who He is. We see who we are. We're persuaded
He's able. He is able. And then thirdly,
our faith involves committing everything to Christ. Complete
surrender to Christ. When God makes us know Him and
persuades us He's able, we will commit everything that's in us
or for us to Him. We'll bow fully to Him. Look
there in 2 Timothy 1, verse 12, second half. I know whom I know
whom I have believed, and I'm persuaded that He is able, He
knows him, He knows He's able to keep that which I've committed
unto Him against that day." What did Paul commit to Christ against
that day at Calvary? Everything. What about my wisdom? It's committed to Christ. What
about my righteousness? Committed to Christ. What about
me sanctifying myself? Committed to Christ. My redemption,
my decision, my anything, it has to be Him, it can't be me.
We commit it all. If we know Him, we know He's
able, we can't keep from committing everything to Him. Through the
gift of faith in Christ, Christ the Lord, our righteousness,
is received by us in our hearts and God counts us righteous.
We don't earn righteousness. Through faith, the person who
believes in God's Son is counted perfect before God in Christ
Jesus our Lord. That's how we're made holy. Through
Him, being made one with Him. And none of this is by our works.
None of this is by our works. Not the grace, not the saving,
not the faith, and not the receiving of the gift. We have so much
in this country, and our minds are so arrogant, I could get
a gift at Christmas and not receive it. No, I don't want that. We
receive it, just like that cup there. If I pour water into that
cup, it receives the water. We receive these gifts, and none
of that is because of us, of anything in us. Verse 9 in our
text says, Not of works, lest any man should boast. What's
not of works? First off, grace is not of works,
or it ceases to be grace. Paul is telling us in Romans
11, and if by grace, then it's no more of works, otherwise grace
is no more grace. Grace is not of works. Salvation
is not of works. If you're still there in 2 Timothy,
look up in chapter 1, verse 9. 2 Timothy 1.9, "...who hath saved
us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our
works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was
given us in Christ Jesus before the world began." How did this
calling come? God's grace. Why'd He do that? He did it on His purpose, by
His will. The work was given to Christ
to fulfill all righteousness, to justify His people, to declare
God just, and Christ came and said, it is finished. They're
saved from their sins. The majesty and glory of God
is upheld. It's finished. It's all done.
So salvation is not of our works. And lastly, faith is not of our
works. We just read that, that not of yourselves, it is the
gift of God. We didn't receive grace by doing
something. We didn't receive salvation by doing something.
And the faith that we have is not by doing something. Paul wrote to us in Romans 3,
where then is boasting? It's excluded. We're going to
brag. If you know the God of the Bible,
the salvation of His people, who He is and what it really
means, where's boasting? Where's man's boasting? It's
excluded. There ain't any. By what law of works? Nay, but
by the law of faith. We've been given the law of faith.
We don't boast because it's His faith. Any man that boasts in
his faith does not have true faith. And true faith excludes
boasting. Look over there in Titus chapter
3, a few pages. Titus chapter 3. There in verse 3, Titus 3, 3. For we
ourselves also are sometimes foolish. Disobedient, deceived,
serving different lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful
and hating one another. But after that, the kindness
and love of God our Savior toward man appeared. When it came to
us, His truth, His word, not by works of righteousness that
we've done, but according to His mercy He saved us. By the
washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost, which
He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that
being justified by His grace, we should be made heirs according
to the hope of eternal life. Those that boast will say, but
at least I believed. Man will, I mean, grasp, claw,
bite, and draw blood to anything they can to honor themselves.
And I put this down, use the illustration of fighting cancer.
I bet there's a lot of oncologists in this nation that if they was
behind closed doors, they'd probably whoop somebody. People would
say, I'm fighting cancer. I never saw anybody with boxing
gloves in one corner and cancer in the other corner. Whenever
people say, have this picture of fighting cancer, and they're
helpless. They're bald, they're weak, and
they don't believe the medicine will work. They're laid in a
hospital bed about to die. When you have that medicine put
in your veins, you start gaining strength, and you start getting
a little better, you believe the medicine is working. You
can feel it, can't you? You know that because it is working. That's how you start having your
mind back to you. In the same manner, a sinner
can't do anything but believe when Christ the life's breathed
into us by God. Faith that commits all to Christ
is the result of Christ the life put in us like breathing is the
result of natural life. How do we believe on Christ?
He breathed life into me. That's the nature and the instinct
of the new man put in us. We believe. How do we have faith? He breathed life into us, and
that's the nature and the instinct of the new man. What do we know
through that? The Lord was gracious to us and
He saved us. He'll receive all the glory.
In 1 John 5 it says, And this is the record that God hath given
unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath
the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath
not life." What is it to be saved? It's to have Christ. That's how you have life. He
is life. And all this, not of works, it's His doing. Salvations
of the Lord by His hand, lest any man should boast. Grace, salvation, and faith are
not of works, lest any man should boast. If any man contributes
even slightly, then that's boasting, and we'll boast. Therefore, God
does everything so that his people contribute nothing. We receive
everything unless we should glory in it. If anything was left to
us, we would cling to it. Paul told us in 1 Corinthians
1 29 that no flesh should glory in his presence, but of him are
ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness
and sanctification and redemption, that according as it is written,
he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. Any spiritual blessing
we receive, any temporal blessing we receive, it's of the Lord.
We're thankful in glory in Him only. And believers don't want
it any other way. We don't want it any other way. Because we're His workmanship.
We'll see that next week. For by grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. For we are His workmanship created
in Christ Jesus. We're the work of His hands.
That's why the prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 43, seven, everyone
that is called by my name, she's called by my name. I'm married. She got my name. I'm called by
his name. Everyone that's called by my name. I have created in
him for my glory. I have formed him. Yay. I have made him what a privilege it would be.
And my prayer, if the Lord would come to His people, form them,
make them, and give them His name, and then tell them about
it. Give them faith to look to Christ
alone. For by grace are you saved through faith. And that's not
of ourselves, it's the gift of God. I pray the Lord's gracious
to us today. Let's pray together.