Ephesians chapter 2, we're going
to look at the first 10 verses. I think we're all like Fanny
Crosby said, we're going to sing the stories, tell the stories
saved by grace. And so I want to bring a message
from Ephesians chapter 2, especially focusing on verses 8 and 9. These
are verses that I hope you remember. More importantly, I hope you
remember what they teach. I hope that this is written on
your heart. And so before we begin, let's
pray together. Gracious Heavenly Father, thank
you for your word, especially this word concerning our salvation,
how you accomplished it, and why you accomplished it, and
the results of it. We thank you that the work is
all yours, all of your grace, and you give it to us freely.
We pray, Lord, that this truth would be the whole truth to us
about our salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ giving himself for
our sins, bringing us to glory. We pray, Lord, you'd write it
on our hearts. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. I'm going to read the first 10
verses of Ephesians 2 with you, just like I did last week. And
I hope last week's sermon will serve as an example, as I meant
it to be, of this text of scripture. Ephesians chapter 2, I've entitled
this message, Grace, Salvation, Faith, All of God, None of Us. That's really just what says
here in the scriptures that we're going to be reading here. I want
you, as we read through this, I want you to see something that
I hope God will impress on your heart. If He hasn't already,
if He has, He will remind you of it because, as I mentioned
last week, when we come through a great danger in our lives,
especially an accident where we are in danger of losing our
life or having something serious happen to us, and we look back
on it, it makes us afraid. It makes us stand still and think
about how God preserved us. That's what this chapter is intended
to do. It's intended to make us realize, as it says in Isaiah,
to remember the hole of the pit out of which we were digged because
it was a great and deep pit, a foul pit. In Ephesians chapter
2 we read, And you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and
sins wherein, in time past, you walked according to the course
of this world. That was the way you lived, you
walked. And it was according to the course of this world.
This religious world, this perverse world, this world that is opposed
to God and everything. It says in the next phrase, that
we walked according to the course of this world, according to the
prince of the power of the air, that's Satan. According to Satan's
dictates and his lies, we walked that way. We were happy that
way, just content to be deceived. We didn't want to be undeceived.
We weren't looking for the truth. We were serving the false gospels
of Satan. The prince of the power of the
air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience,
among whom also we all, no exceptions, had our conversation or our manner
of life in times past in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and of the mind. We not only thought,
but we did what we thought, and we were by nature the children
of wrath, even as others. We deserve the wrath of God,
just like everybody did. But we especially did. In verse
4, this is what happened when we were in this case. Now this
describes, the first three verses describes all of us dead in sins. In our sins, we were separated
from God. We did not know God. Had no spiritual
life. No spiritual ability. We were
without strength. We couldn't do what God required.
We couldn't take away our sins. We couldn't change our heart.
We couldn't take away the wrath of God against us. And we were
helpless. And we were content to be in
this condition. We didn't know we were in this
miserable, lost, ruined condition. But here's what happened. But
God, there's the words of grace, an intervention occurred. It
was God's work, He intervened, and what did He do? Who is He,
this God? God who is rich in mercy, for
His great love wherewith He loved us even when we were dead in
sins. What a proof that we didn't love
God first. That God loved us when we were
dead in sins. That He showed mercy out of His
rich mercy to us because of His great love. To know the love
of God is to have the grace of God. It's to have eternal life.
And this is what we all need. This is life. Even when we were
dead in sins, He has quickened us together with Christ. For
by grace you are saved, and hath raised us up together, and made
us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. He took us from
the lowest depths and raised us to the highest place, even
to be with His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who did everything
right, though we did everything wrong. All of this, considering all
this, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches
of His grace in His kindness towards us through Christ Jesus. God ordained, because everything
in the world is ordained by God. God ordained, but He didn't author
sin. He ordained that sin should enter
the world, and through that sin It would be the way in which
the Lord Jesus Christ would show his love for his people. He married
them before the world began. We know that's true. He's the
Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world. Therefore, he gave
himself for the church before she was ever created, before
she ever knew him, before she even fell in sin. But God ordained
this fall of Adam and ourselves into sin in order that he might
bring good out of evil. This is proof of the sovereignty
of God, that he brings the very best out of the very worst. There are two thieves on the
cross. I remind you last week the first thief, both thieves
really, teach us what we are by nature in ourselves. This
is all we are in ourselves and by nature. This is what God is
describing here to us. This is what we are, dead in
sins, under the wrath of God, and deservingly so. But God,
in his rich mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, he
saved us by his grace, he raised us up together with his own Son
to sit on the throne of his own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he did this in order to show
his grace and his kindness towards us throughout the ages to come. And then in verse 8 it says this,
it sums it all up for us. This is the teaching of scripture.
This is the truth of God revealed from heaven in the Lord Jesus
Christ in the gospel of our salvation. Listen to these words in Ephesians
chapter 2 verse 8. You can probably recite them
with me. And if you can't, I encourage you to take them home and read
them over and over again until they are burned into your heart.
For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God. There it is. Not of works, lest
any man should boast, for we are his workmanship, created
in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained
that we should walk in them. By grace you are saved, through
faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. I remember that verse from when
we were children. I didn't understand it then.
Nothing like I do now, but that's all by the grace of God. And Moses asked the Lord, after
leading the children of Israel into the wilderness, He asked
the Lord, show me your glory. Show me your glory. Show me your
own attributes that demand the admiration and worship of all
heaven and earth. Show me your glory. And what
do you think God would do to show him his glory? He said,
I will make, in Exodus 33, 19, I will make all my goodness pass
before thee. There is nothing in God but goodness.
But he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee,
and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee. And
he said, I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and
will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. That's God's goodness,
to be gracious to sinners. What is grace? What is grace? How can we know grace? When I
was younger, they would explain this verse, Ephesians 2, 8, and
9. They would say grace. What is
grace? And they would say grace is God's unmerited favor. Unmerited
favor. But that's a word that as a child
I wasn't familiar with. We never used the word unmerited.
Son, you're unmerited today. They just never said that in
my home. Except when we explained that verse, which made it a foreign
word to me. But it is truly unmerited favor. It begs the question, what is
merit? What is merit? Merit is something that you deserve
a reward for what you do or what you are. Let's say you won the
game in high school or you were the best in your performance
as a gymnast. Or maybe you did something to
bring attention to the right and to stop the wrong. Maybe
you protected someone from harm. So you're worthy of some kind
of acknowledgement. Look what he did. Look what she
did. That's called merit. That's what you've done. Grace
is not by what we do. It's unmerited. But grace is
more than just unmerited favor. Grace is actually something that
isn't given except where there is demerit, where there's no
deserving, not only no deserving, but where we deserve God's wrath,
where we deserve His punishment. Grace is God's favor to us and
His loving kindness towards us. It's undeserved favor from God,
undeserved blessings, It's not only undeserved, but grace is
favor and blessings given by God in love to those who deserve
the very opposite of His favor. Who deserve nothing from God. In fact, who deserve to be separated
from God and cast out of His presence and to never see the
light of God's goodness, His glory, and His grace. That's
what we deserve. But grace is giving us, in reward
for Christ's obedience, all the blessings in favor of God that
he would give to his most loved and cherished. It's giving us
the opposite of what we deserve. The blessings in favor of God. Grace means that God loves and
favors those who have no spiritual value in themselves. No spiritual
value. And no potential. No potential
to do any spiritual good. In fact, they're the very opposite
of good. They don't understand spiritual things. They don't
seek God. They don't do good. They don't
know good. And they're unrighteous. They're
opposed to God. They're His enemies. They hate
God. They offend God. They offend the only good and
true and holy God. But grace means that God chose
those worst of people favor and love and his great kindness. He takes us from the worst of
people and our helpless condition as slaves and servants of sin
under the wrath of God and he brings us from there to the very
highest place that God could give blessing to a man. Even
the place of his own son on his own throne giving them the title
and status of sons, and giving them all the blessings of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Those on whom God bestows His
grace are not good. They have no good. They have
no potential for good. Because grace is God showing
favor and loving kindness to those who deserve nothing but
punishment, those who are not good but evil in their nature
and in their sinful practice, it's clear, therefore, that God
does not look to us for a reason to show us grace. That's the
very opposite of grace. If God looked for a reason in
us to show us grace, it would be the opposite of grace. He
finds every reason in us not to show us grace. Grace is showing
us kindness we don't deserve in opposition to all that we
are. I've never lived in a country where there was a king. You know
what a king does. Whatever he says has to be done.
Lock him up and nobody is going to oppose the king. There's no
congress to oppose him. There's no courts to oppose him.
Just the king. He does what he wants to do all
the time. Just think of this king now going to his palace
in a great procession with all of the majesty of the king. And
people are lined up along the street, hoping to get a glance
at the king's majesty. And as he parades through the
streets of his kingdom, on his way to his palace to sit on his
throne and to take his place there as a sovereign over his
kingdom, he stops. And he spends time talking to
a filthy beggar who has no money, no worth, no potential to help
this king. But out of the king's kindness,
he spends time talking to this beggar while everyone else is
watching and wondering, what's the king doing? We would think
that that's a kindness of the king, wouldn't we? You can tell
true kindness because true kindness does, for those who can't do
anything for them, it shows kindness to those who can't return that
kindness. It forgives those whose forgiveness won't pay them back. And that's what we would admire
that in people. In fact, we've experienced that
kind of kindness in our own lives, haven't we? Our moms showed us
that kindness when we were born. We couldn't help them. We couldn't
do anything for our moms. They took care of us. They changed
our diapers. They fed us. They washed us. They comforted us. They took
care of us, fed us all our lives. All those things. That's kindness.
It's not looking for something back. It's just being kind. With no expectation of a return. We would see that in a king and
we would admire him, wouldn't we? But the grace of God is infinitely
higher than that kind of a comparison. Because the king of kings and
the lord of lords not only stopped to do kindness to the unprofitable
and the offensive poor man. But He Himself made Himself poor
in order that He might make us rich with all the blessings that
only the King deserves. In 2 Corinthians 8-9 it says,
You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though He was
rich, yet for your sakes He became poor that you, through His poverty,
might be made rich. That's grace, isn't it? God doesn't
need to find a reason in us to show grace because all the reason
comes from God. It comes out of His character.
God is called in scripture the God of all grace. In John chapter
1 it says the Lord Jesus Christ is full of grace. And it also
says that grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Because when
we see Christ in his life, in his sufferings, in his death
for sinners, we're seeing the very goodness of God. The very
glory of God. That's what Moses asked for.
Lord, show me your glory. Let me show you my son. That's
where all my glory will be seen. In the grace of God, in the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's the brightness of God's
glory. He takes the most undeserving and gives them the greatest blessings,
to be loved with everlasting love and to know that love and
to receive the highest blessings that God can give, to receive
the tender instruction and intimate comfort of God Almighty as our
Father, acceptance before His throne, and an eternal inheritance
that only His sons receive. That's what He does to those
who are the most undeserving. They bring nothing to the table.
Grace, the grace of God, is not God offering something to us
if we do what He requires. That's quid pro quo. Grace is
the exact opposite of that, because we call that works. Doing something
to earn what is beyond all price is futility. It's an insult,
isn't it? That's what the scripture says
is, Ho everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, the waters
of everlasting life and blessing. And you who have no money, come,
buy and eat. Yea, come buy wine and milk without
money and without price. Because God's riches are without
price. They can't be measured. They
can't be estimated. They can't even be known. It
passes knowledge and He gives all out of His grace. And grace
is not a two-party transaction. Where God says, if you do this,
I'll do that. I'll bless you if you do something.
That's the way men think, and that's the way we treat each
other. Men do nothing unless they expect something in return.
But grace is not that. Grace is not something given
in exchange for something else. Grace is not an offer to do good
to us if we meet some conditions. That's the very definition of
works. Grace is not God's offer to bless us if we accept God's
grace. That's what men have said. That's
what we've done. In religion, we've made God's
grace hinge on a contingency that we have to meet. Well, I'll
let you have grace on me if I accept it. And if I accept it, then
I have something to boast about because he didn't accept it.
But that's not the way grace works because grace brings everything,
everything, and does for us what we cannot do. And that's the
message of the gospel. Grace is not God asking you,
do you? And then we say, I do. No, grace
is overwhelming us with God's love and persuading us and opening
our blind eyes lifting us out of our pride to humble us to
see that we're recipients of God's grace in order that we
might be saved. That's grace. Grace is the free
outpouring of God's loving kindness and favor on the helplessly hopeless
sinner who deserves God's wrath. The sinner to whom God is gracious
has nothing, but in God's grace He gives us everything to save
us to the uttermost and to bless us with the highest of all blessings,
as His sons even married to His Son. With His Spirit dwelling
in us, knowing Him, the Eternal God, and all of His blessings,
this is grace. Can you think of examples in
scripture where God showed grace to a sinner? Think of the thief
on the cross. That first thief is a mirror
of ourselves, what we are by nature. But that second thief,
the one that Christ saved, is a reflection of the grace of
our Lord Jesus Christ. The first one, he's us. The second
is the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can't credit that
second thief for anything. Everything, everything that he
said and did and thought was the result of Christ's grace
to him. And that's what Ephesians 2 is
telling us. When you were dead in sins, even when you were dead
in sins, when you walked your lifestyle, your thoughts, you
fulfilled those things that were in your thoughts, those evil
desires. Living for yourself, proud and arrogant against God,
hateful and hating one another. All those things God describes
us as. That's what God is showing to us here. The objects of God's
eternal saving grace. For by grace you're saved. Amazing,
isn't it? Grace excludes all works of men. God's work doesn't require man's
work. Have you ever noticed that? When
God created the world, he didn't wait until man could help or
didn't seek man's advice. He just spoke and it was done.
That's the work of God. Whatever God does, he does by
himself. He doesn't depend on man to do
it. Whatever God enables men to do, He gets the glory for
it. But whatever men do, they get to boast in that. So there's
no boasting in grace because man brings nothing to the table.
God saves us in direct opposite of what we are and want. And
therefore God alone deserves a credit for His work. And His
work, because it's His, is all to His glory. It must be all
his work, because it's all to his glory. And if man does it,
then man deserves some reward for it. Here's a key verse of
scripture. I want you to look at this with
me. Romans chapter 11 and verse 6, when it defines the opposites
here between grace and our contribution. If by grace, then it is no more
of works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. So it can't be both grace and
works. It's either grace or it's works,
but never a mixture. And since it's of grace, it cannot
be of works. That's what this verse is saying.
And he gives the exact opposite. But if it be of works, then is
it no more of grace. Otherwise, work is no more work.
That's a key principle God has revealed to us from scripture,
that grace and works are mutually exclusive. They exclude one another.
You can't have both together. They're like trying to mix things
that are opposed to one another. Simply put, grace is whatever
God does of His own will and for His own glory by His work
alone to save sinners without regard to anything in them or
from them, but by Himself through Jesus Christ. That's what grace
is. It's what God does by Jesus Christ
to save sinners, all His work and all to His glory. If God
does it, it must be by grace. If God does it, it's all to his
glory. And if we're saved, it must be to God's glory. It must
all be by his grace. And this fact helps us to identify
all that is of grace. In short, our salvation, all
of it, is of grace alone. It is not of us at all. It is
not by our works. It is God's work and is therefore
to his glory. In Ecclesiastes 3 verse 14 it
says this, I know that whatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can be put to it, nothing
can be taken from it, and God does it that men should fear
before him. That's our salvation. God did
it. Nothing can be added to it. Nothing
taken from it. God did it in order that we should
fear before Him. Worship God for it. Stand in
awe of it. And never think that we can do
anything to contribute to it. But we are desperately in need
of it, aren't we? Psalm 72 verse 18. Blessed be
the Lord God, the God of Israel, who only doeth wondrous things. But throughout scripture, God
only does what's right. He only does what's holy. And
in the New Testament and elsewhere, God reveals that His work, this
work of grace, is all of God. He says in 1 Corinthians 1, verse
30, of Him, of God, are you in Christ Jesus. Let's look at that
together. We know it's grace if God did
it. to save us. We know it's all
God's work because God will not allow us to do one thing to save
ourselves. We can't. We're helpless, hopelessly
evil, and dead in sins, and God has to rescue us. 1 Corinthians
1.30. But of Him, see there? It means
it's God's work. It comes from Him. It's of His
will and His work alone. Of Him are you in Christ Jesus.
And this is what grace does for us. Who of God, in case you missed
the first of Him, of God is made unto us. What does grace do? Wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. It does all this for us, that
according as it is written, he that glorieth, boasteth, let
him glory in the Lord. Look what God has done. Jeremiah
9, 23 and 24 says, don't let the rich man glory in his riches,
don't let the wise man glory in his wisdom, and don't let
the strong man glory in his strength, but let him that glorieth, boasteth,
boast in the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, of him. In 2 Corinthians
5, 18 it says, all things are of God in our salvation. And in Romans chapter 11, it
says, of him and through him and to him are all things. You
see, if it's God's work, we can't add to it, we can't take away
from it. God did it, he gets all the glory,
and it's all by his grace. So scripture draws the conclusion
for us. Since all of our salvation is
of God, we must credit him for it all. In our heart of hearts,
we must know that God did it, and therefore, only he deserves
glory for it. Now, when we think of grace and
God saving grace to us, the next question, I guess, to ask is,
what does it mean to be saved? Look at Ephesians 2, verse 8.
By grace you are saved. Do you see that? By grace you
are saved. Now, I don't know the Greek language,
but I am able to read from people who do know the Greek language.
And they tell me that this word saved here is a verb and it has
a particular tense to it. It's in what's called the perfect
tense. And it has something else called a voice, which is called
the passive voice. Now, what that means to us is
probably lost on you and me unless we let someone explain it to
us. But the explanation is this. The perfect tense means it describes
an event that was done in the past at a point in time. And it never needs to be repeated.
But it was done once for all time. That's the perfect tense. The word saved is in the perfect
tense. It was done in the past. It never
needs to be repeated. It was done once for all time.
Nothing can be added to it. Nothing taken from it. You can't
change history. You don't need to because God
did this. It's forever. And then it's also
in the passive voice, which means that we are the ones who were
saved without any contribution. We were the objects of God's
work. When the pot is on the wheel
and the potter shapes it, the pot is passive. It doesn't do
anything. It sits there like a lump of
clay and the potter shapes it into the vessel that he wants.
That's what this word saved means. We were saved by God's grace
in the past. We were absolutely non-contributive
to it. God did it. It was His work.
So what does it mean then to be saved? Well, we just read
in 1 Corinthians 1.30 some of what it means. It means that
Christ has made to us wisdom. in sanctification and redemption. But what else does God say about
this word, saved? He also says that everything
about our salvation is of grace because He says, by grace you
are saved. But scripture also uses this
word. That he speaks of the election of grace in Romans chapter 11. The election of grace. Which
means God's choice of us was a choice out of his grace. We
didn't choose him. Jesus said you haven't chosen
me. I've chosen you. So God's choice of us was a choice
of grace. And his adoption of us was an
adoption of grace. Adoption to be his sons. He predestinated
us unto the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ. That was an
adoption of grace. Because he goes on and says,
to the praise and the glory of his grace, in Ephesians 1.6. So our adoption is of grace.
We were made the sons of God, not because of what God saw in
us. Oh, look at that cute child there. No, it was the opposite
of that. Look at that revolting Man there,
dead in his sins and God chose us and made us his sons by his
work. So our adoption is of grace and
our justification is of grace. Being justified freely by his
grace. Not by works of righteousness
which we have done, but by his grace he justified us. In Titus
3 and verse 7 and Romans 3 and 24. So we're justified by his
grace and we're sanctified by his grace. We were given life
by the Spirit of God, by His grace. We read about it here
in verse 4. God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love
were with, He loved us, quickened us, gave us life by His grace.
We know it's of grace in Galatians 3, where we've been studying.
Paul asked the Galatians, when you heard the gospel, when you
received the Spirit of God in the hearing of the gospel, was
it by the works of the law or was it just by the hearing of
faith? If you began in the Spirit, are you made perfect by the flesh?
If you began in the Spirit, then it was all of God's Spirit. He
did it at His prerogative, by His power, by His work, His operation. And therefore it's all of His
grace. So our sanctification is of His grace. Our preservation
is all of His grace. He keeps us. Do you know that
we grow in grace? And that growth in grace is the
result of God's grace? The disciples said to the Lord,
Lord increase our faith. It was a request for the Lord
to do for them what they couldn't do. Everything in our salvation
is of God. It begins with God the Father.
He chose us in Christ to be holy and blameless before Him in love.
And it's given to us in Christ. It comes to us by the Spirit
of God. And it finds us in our sin and rebellion, even in our
deadness in our sins. But it raises us to life to give
us God's Spirit with every grace of faith and love. God's grace
turns us. He grants us repentance, he turns
us from unbelief to faith and he raises us to life with Christ.
And it's sovereign and saving and keeping and conforming and
drawing and fetching grace. All these things are God's grace
to us. It's almighty. Nothing can prevent him from
having the objects of his grace. This is all what God has done.
And you can think of all these things in scripture of those
who were saved by his grace, can't you? I love to think about
the examples of scripture. Think of the prodigal son. Did
he deserve his father's love? Absolutely not. Dad, give me
what's coming to me. And then his dad gave him his
part. And then he took it all and he wasted it on his own self,
a riotous living, spent it all on harlots. And then when he
was at the end of himself in that far off country, taking
care of the unclean pigs, living like a pig, and came to himself
and he says, even the servants in my father's house have better
than this. And he said in his heart, I will return to my father,
I'll arise and return, and I'll say to my father, father, I have
sinned against heaven. His own admission was that he
deserved nothing from his father. I'm not worthy to be called your
son. And when he came back to his father, his father saw him
when he was a long way off, and his father ran to him, and he
fell on his neck, and he kissed him. That's grace. And then he said, bring the best
robe, the very best for my son. and put a ring on his finger,
the ring of sonship, and put shoes on his feet and kill the
fatted calf, make merry and make a feast. Tell him what the Lord
Jesus Christ has done and rejoice over this sinner who was brought
back by the grace of God. That's grace, isn't it? The son
did nothing. He was drawn by the spirit of
God. We saw the thief on the cross.
There's the prodigal. What about King David? Remember
him? Committing adultery. Having his own faithful servant
killed by his servant's enemies and his own enemies. What a horrible
thing. And then covering up like a hypocrite
and lying about it. And acting like everything was
okay. And he didn't even acknowledge his sin until God sent his prophet. and told him the parable about
the rich man who had all these sheep, and then spied his neighbor
who had only one. And the rich man had someone
come to him for dinner, and he said, go get that poor man's
sheep and bring it over here and kill it. I want to feed it
to my friends. And David was so indignant against that rich
man, he said, whoever this is, let him die. And Nathan the prophet
said, you're the man. Then, and only then, did David
see what he was before God. Grace is required for our eyes
to be open to what we are. And then grace is required for
us to see where all of our salvation is, that it's in the Lord Jesus
Christ. There's so many examples of grace
in scripture. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. The very first one in scripture
who's mentioned there in connection with God's grace, even though
he wasn't the first. All the world, God said, he looked
on the hearts of men and the imaginations of their heart was
only evil continually. But Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. No different than the rest. God
just had grace on him. That's amazing grace, isn't it?
We're saved by grace. God saved us. God called us.
Look at 2 Timothy chapter 1. In 2 Timothy chapter 1 and verse
9, this summarizes the whole gospel in a nutshell. It says
in verse 9, who hath saved us, that's what we're talking about.
What is salvation? It's what Christ did. And what
did he accomplish by what he did? He made us God's sons. He perfected us forever by His
one offering. It's all done in the past. It
was a perfect work, never to be repeated. Justified us, sanctified
us, perfected us, redeemed us, reconciled us to God by His own
death on the cross. He forgave us all of our sins
by His redeeming blood out of the riches of His grace, it says
in Ephesians 1-7. All of it. is Christ's accomplishments
done in history, outside of our lifetime. Without our contribution,
that's grace. That's our salvation. And so
he speaks of it here. 2 Timothy 1 verse 9. God has saved us, that's what
we just spoke about, the Lord Jesus Christ work, and called
us. He separates those two things,
what Christ did and what the Spirit of God does. He saved
us and He 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 can we think that something
we are or do or think or could be someday could influence God? Especially in this matter of
his grace which was given us before the foundation of the
world. Look at Hebrews chapter 9. It's almost the same verse
of scripture spoken in a different way. Hebrews chapter 9 verse
15. Speaking about the Lord Jesus Christ and his redeeming blood,
it says, Hebrews 9.15, He made it in the blood of his own son. for this cause he is the mediator
of the New Testament that by means of death, his own death,
for, this is why, the redemption of the transgressions that were
under the First Testament, under the law we sinned against God,
that they which are called by the Spirit of God to Christ might
receive the promise of eternal inheritance, given to us in Christ
before the world began and made ours by the death of the Lord
Jesus Christ, called by His Spirit to know it. And that brings us
to the third part here in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8. He says you're
saved by grace through faith. And then it says, immediately
after that, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. Some people
have said, what does the word that refer to in this text of
scripture? Well, it seems pretty obvious
to me that it refers to faith. I'm just a simple minded person. It says, if you read it again,
it says, by grace you're saved through faith, and that not of
yourselves, it is the gift of God. And of course, you get these
people who want to say, well, no, faith is not really part
of this grace. Faith is something that we bring
to the table. Faith is our decision to receive
Jesus. But that contradicts all of the
rest of Scripture. It certainly contradicts this verse. You see,
what does it say here? Read it carefully. Not of yourselves. Not of yourselves. Not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. In other
words, it's not your work. It's God's work. And faith itself
is not of yourselves. It's the work of God. Not of
works. It's guarded here, lest any man
should boast. In other words, if you think
in your heart, in your proud heart, that what you do in believing
makes God's work work for you, because you brought faith to
the table, then what you're saying there is your salvation must
be all of your work, because it's not of your works, it's
not of yourselves. But you say, but faith comes
from me. I have to believe, I have to
repent, I have to do all these things in order for God to give
me his salvation. And you completely deny where
it says we're dead in trespasses and sins, and you deny where
it says God grants repentance to us out of his grace, and you
deny the fact that God says they believed by grace. Unto you it
is given on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but
to suffer for his sake. Faith is the gift of God. Jesus
Christ is the author and finisher of our faith. Faith is by him. Acts 3.15. All these scriptures,
and I could heap them up, but I won't right now. It's because
God wants to hedge up our wicked, proud hearts thinking that somehow
faith is our part in this matter. It's not. It's God's doing. It's
not of yourselves. It's the gift of God. And so
our salvation is entirely the gift of God. It's all of His
work. In fact, He says it in verse 10, you are His workmanship. You see, it's underscored here
many ways. You can't wiggle out of this. You little slimy, proud-hearted,
sinful people. That's what we are. We're dead
in sins and if God doesn't enclose us and smash us down and humble
us to see that we're opposed to him in our hearts and minds
and only if we're saved by his grace will we ever be saved. So he hedges us in. He says,
we were created. Where were you before you were
created? I can't say because I was nothing. He created me
out of my nothingness and he created me in Christ. He made
me part of the body of Christ, a very intimate part of Christ
himself. It's all of grace. We're saved
by grace through faith, God-given faith. And that faith which sees
Christ and looks to him and receives in his heart the full persuasion
of it, That faith itself is a gift of God. And you know what the
grace of God does for us? I'm gonna have to spend another
sermon, I think, really expounding this. You know what the grace
of God does for us? It makes us want, above all other
desires, to know and live upon the love and grace of God. And
that's why over and over in scripture it says, grow in grace and in
the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Be strong, my son, be
strong, Paul told Timothy, in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. As newborn babes desire the sincere
milk of the word that you may grow thereby. All these things
are teaching us we live by grace, we're saved by grace, and we
grow in grace. We're made strong through grace.
we look to Christ by his gift of grace and his faith. True
faith comes to God for faith itself, for everything in salvation,
and true faith hates the thought of thinking that anything comes
from me, because if it does, I'm lost. My goose is cooked,
because everything must then come from me. It all has to be
of works if it comes from me. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we thank
you for your mercy, rich mercy, shed upon us by your great because
of your great love and all this mercy and love has saved us by
your grace through the Lord Jesus Christ We can't scale the heights
of it. Though we were in the depths
of our sin, you brought us up and you told us where we're seated
now with Christ. And we just can't take it in,
it's too great. Eye hasn't seen and ear hasn't
heard the things God has prepared for them who love him because
he loved them first. So we stand in awe and we ask
you, Lord, show us your grace in the Lord Jesus. Save us by
this grace. We have no strength. And yet
we find in our hearts a desire to know and love you. And not
only know and love you, but also to show this love and grace to
others because you're so great. We want them to know you too.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.