All Sufficient Grace

Now if you will turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 12. 2 Corinthians chapter 12. It is not expedient for me, doubtless, to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. I knew a man in Christ above 14 years ago. Now he's talking about himself. I cannot tell of whether out of the body, I cannot tell God knoweth, such a one caught up to the third heaven. He didn't know if he was in the body or out of the body. He didn't know. And I knew such a man, whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell God knoweth, how 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, yet of myself I will not glory but in mine infirmities. For though I would desire to glory, I shall not be a fool. For I'll say the truth, but now I forbear lest any man should think of me above that which he seeth me to be, or that he heareth of me.

And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a 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 is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, will I 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. For when I am weak, then am I strong.

I invite you to turn back to the passage I just read from in 2 Corinthians 12. We're going to be looking at verse 9. I was studying to prepare this message, and as I thought about what took place here, And what God said to the Apostle Paul, I look back over my own life, and there's nothing normal in my past in the dealings with God. Everything that God did was supernatural. It was out of line with the norm. Special. You could tell that God was intervening. I couldn't always tell at the time. But looking back on these things with eyes to see, I can see them.

And so it was with the Apostle Paul. The man who wrote this epistle was an apostle. That's the highest office in the church. He held the highest office. And before God was finished with him, he'd write nearly half of the New Testament, maybe a little over half. And because of God's purpose in his calling, everything about him was unusual. His background.

The Lord didn't save many Pharisees. In fact, in Matthew 23, our Lord calls them hypocrites. pronounces a woe on the Pharisees. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men, for you neither go in yourselves nor will you suffer them who are entering to go in. You stand like a roadblock into glory. You're a hindrance, not a help. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, For you devour widows' houses and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore, you shall receive the greater damnation. Don't sound like a man being prepared for the ministry, does it? But that's who Paul was. And I wasn't any different from him.

I was playing my guitar, thinking I was really doing God a service. And what I was doing was giving those folks some false security that they knew God. I'd go in there with a guitar and a song and try to get them in a mood, into a certain mood. I tell you, when you come in here, your mood better be set in your heart toward God. That's where the mood comes from. It don't come from music. Music is a good thing. I'm not trying to down music. But it can be a bad thing, too.

By Paul's old confession, he was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, which is why he called himself the chief of sinners. And his ministry was to the Gentiles, who at that time were despised by the Jews. The only reason they had any dealings with the Gentiles at all was because they had to. And when they saw that they had to, then they used the Gentiles to make proselytes. That's what the Lord said, you compass sea and earth to make one proselyte like unto yourself.

And when you made him, he's twofold more the child of hell than you were. And I can only imagine the hatred of the Jews for a man in that day who preached that a Gentile was a son of God. They hated this man, Paul. He was a son of Abraham and an heir of God in Christ.

When he said, I'm less than the least of all the saints, he said, is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ? That's what was given him to do. Isn't that a miraculous thing that God can speak to pagan religion.

That's what we came out of, most of us. If we were in religion, it was pagan religion. That's the only thing there is other than Christ. Paul, like the majority of this world, believed that men would and are blessed of God according to their obedience to the law. That's what he thought. Well, there's only two religions in the world, works and grace. That's all there is.

And I know there's untold. If you drove, I was going over to Mississippi and preaching a few years back. And we counted one time between here and there, and I forget the number. But it was way up there at the different names on churches that we saw as we drove through the various towns. It was like 50 or 60. just in a few hundred miles. Man, you go all the way to Kentucky on a trip and try to do that. You can fill up a notebook with various names and things on the signs.

Paul said of these two religions over in Romans chapter 11, verse 6, where he was talking about election, talking about God choosing a people. And here's what he said. If by grace, then is it no more works, otherwise grace is no more grace. There's no mixing of grace and work. There's no mixing of the religion of God and the religion of this world. It's contrary. It's totally opposite. But he said, if it be of works, then is it no more grace, otherwise work is no more work.

And he was dug deep into the stronghold of Antichrist religion. He said in Philippians 3, 5, he was a Hebrew of the Hebrews. As touching the law of Pharisee and concerning zeal, he persecuted the church. He said, I believe what I, where my hope was. I believed these things. That's why I put men to death. Man ain't serious he don't put men to death. He was serious. He believed these things. And God arrested this man.

Just plucked him up by the roots and transplanted him in the garden of grace. The same thing he does for us. And here in our text, he's relating some of what God had done for him and in him and as to why he bore this infirmity in the flesh. He was given of God what nobody other than himself received.

Caught him up. In such a way, he didn't even know if he's still in the body or out of the body. He didn't know. But in his mind, he was in glory. Caught him up into paradise and heard things, unlawful to even speak. That's what the Lord said to John, put your pen up, didn't he? Not everything you see up here can be written and preached. You just preach what I show you. And Paul said, I was up there and heard things, unlawful to speak.

And he didn't know. I don't know. I don't know. We want to talk about, how did you get this? How did you come to understand? I don't know. I don't know. In my study, reading, praying, the Lord opens a passage of scripture to you and you see it. I don't know how to explain that. It just happens. It just is.

And that's what Paul was saying, and God brought him to such revelations and visions of the Lord that he had to give him this infirmity in the flesh, otherwise he'd be so puffed up. And it's the story of every believer. They shall, Christ said, be all taught of God. In Paul's testimony, he said, I can't tell whether I was in the body or out of the body, but I've caught up to paradise, heard these unspeakable words, and though we receive our revelations through the preaching of the gospel, these revelations are confirmed in us.

I mean, you know a lot of things about the Bible you don't even think about that you picked up along the way that aren't so, but you bring them in. Why all of a sudden is this a revelation? Because God gives it to you. That's what makes it special. And then you go into scripture, and here it is. Boy, it fits every passage. Wow. Nothing in religion ever did that to me. I'd look at it once because they had people be saved. You're saved, and you give your little testimony. You come to the front. You did everything they said to do. You joined the church. You go back, sit down in your pew.

Well, two weeks from then, you're lost again. Now you've got to be saved again. You can't find that in the scripture. Nobody's saved again and again and again. You're saved or you're not saved. If you're saved, God does a work in you, preserves you, keeps you. Isn't that what he said? We live by faith. By faith. And he finishes the work that he started.

That's what he said over in Philippians 1.6. God has begun a good work in you. He's going to continue that work to the day of Jesus Christ. You're not going to be saved and then lost and then saved and then lost. If you're saved in Christ, you're saved forever. The guarantee of that is sitting at the right hand of God. But to know these things. And then have them verified as you read the scripture. Boy, this fits everywhere, don't it? This thing of Christ, salvation in Him, fits everywhere. Fits all the old prophets. Fits the picture of the tabernacle. Fits everything.

You think you wouldn't be puffed up from that? And we do, from time to time, get puffed up. We get around somebody who don't know too much, and boy, we know it all. We don't know nothing. I'll tell you a little bit we know ain't worth talking about. There's a tendency to glory in what you know, and the Lord knows how to bust that bubble. There's no such thing as a preacher who don't get puffed up with vainglory, but God knows exactly how to bust his bubble, and he does. And sometimes by physical suffering, sometimes by a handicap, sometimes by a deeper revelation of our sin and ungodliness.

One time I was seriously considering getting a pilot's license, and my friend owned the airport, so I could have got him pretty reasonably. He was an excellent pilot. But he sat down to talk to me, and he said, I'm going to tell you something. He said, there are some old pilots and some bold pilots.

But there are no old bold pilots. And there's some proud preachers and there's some humble preachers, but there ain't any old proud preacher. God will put you down. We must give an account of what we do before the Lord. And that ain't talking about in the last day, it's talking about every day. And we've seen that. We've seen preachers taken down in our day. just removed, I mean, faster than they could even think about it. They were gone. They were gone.

God's given me, I was thinking about myself, he's given me revelations of scripture and an understanding of things that go beyond anything that I'm capable of sitting down and reasoning out. I know it was given to me of God. How do I know that? Because I read the writings of other men and they're not in there. Not in there. And I won't bore you with a list of physical infirmities that comes along with that, not to mention the persecution of men, the loss of my wife, the separation I have with my family, and the list goes on and on.

He knows how to keep you humble. And here's what I've come to see, the very same thing that Paul came to see and what I hope everyone in here can come to see. His grace is sufficient. We're constantly questioning ourselves about this, that, and the other and coming up short. Of course you're going to come up short, you're a sinner. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Here's the mark. We're way down here. We come way short. But our hope's not in our coming. Our hope's in His coming, and He's expressed image of God's person. He met the mark. We fell short of it.

But his grace is sufficient, and his grace points us to Christ. All great grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. That's where it's at. Don't ever take grace and try to apply it to everything under the sun. It doesn't. It applies to Christ. In Christ, I have full sufficiency. Outside of Christ, I have zero. I have nothing. That's the faith of God's elect. They rest in Christ alone.

Christ alone, and salvation so contrary to our nature that we wouldn't find it in a hundred lifetimes. It's the free gift of God's grace. And after stating our incurable sinful condition by nature children of wrath, even as others in Ephesians 2, 3, he makes this statement, but God. That's grace, but God, who's rich in mercy for that great love wherewith he loved us.

Oh, my soul, when I think of even what I am now, let alone what I was back then, and I think about that love not being hindered one bit, not one bit, it's not hard for me to love you. in spite of some things that you say from time to time. That I say the same thing applies the other way around. I hope those things don't separate you from me. I was apt to say these things as you are.

But God's love is not affected by any of that. His mercy is not affected by any of that because it's secured in Christ. Isn't that what he says over there in Ephesians 1? All these blessings that he blessed us with before the foundation of the world are in his son. And he did that that we might be holy, always in perfect harmony with his character, always. And without blame, because all of our sins were laid on Christ's charge to him, and he paid for them in full. So this love that was secured in Christ, these provisions secured in Christ, They're always the same.

They don't go up and down. It's our mind that goes up and down in this old heart. Christ don't go up and down. He's just steady, steady, established. That's what he calls it in the faith, established. That means we got a place to stand, not wobbling around. We're not blown about by every wind of doctrine. We stand on him, secure.

And he said, in love, before him in love. That is, being loved all the time in him. You and I have nothing to offer, but he's rich in mercy. I don't need to offer anything. He's rich. He don't need anything. That great love wherewith he loved us quickened us together with Christ, made us one. God saved us when he chose us in Christ, made full provision for us in his Son. He saved us by putting us into an eternal covenant union with him, made us one with him.

Is Christ the Son? Then so am I. Is Christ the heir? Is he the true heir of God? Then so am I, if I'm one with him. Was Christ justified? Was God just when he raised him from the dead? Did he actually do what he was sent to do? Did he satisfy God? Then I did too. You see what I mean? Is Christ accepted of God?

Says he is. Said he sat down at the right hand of the Father. Then so are we. In him, Paul said, dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and we're complete in him who's the head of all principality and power. By grace, ye are saved. Our salvation's secured in the risen Christ, and all the means are secured in him. He's the one managing everything, providence, all things.

He's managing these things. Boy, wish this man would do that or this man would do that. When God gets ready for him to do it, he'll do it. Huh? Sure he will. He said they're giving him power over all flesh that he should give eternal life to as many as the Father had given him. Well, he can't do that if he ain't sitting at the right hand of God. wouldn't be his to give, it would be God's to give. It's our ancient covenant union given us of God that brings about all of the means of salvation. They're all going to be effectual because he's managing, he's on the throne, he works. And that's what Paul's saying, his grace is sufficient.

You didn't just acquire these scales on your eyes. I put them there, and I put them there for a reason. You didn't have that heart attack, that stroke, that colon disease. You didn't have all that because you acquired it. You have it because God sent it, and there's a purpose in it. So glorify God and quit whining.

I'm talking to myself now. And there's four things that's going to take place when God shows us his kindness in Christ, giving us the gift of his grace. When by his grace I learn who he is, I'll understand exactly who and what I am. When I see him for what he is. Boy, that's like looking at...

I'd go into her room, and it looks pretty good, and you turn the light on. Uh-oh. She comes in my room, turns the light on. Uh-oh, he didn't take his shoes off before he come in. Look at that mess. Turn the light on. Oh, we were pretty good folks in the dark. But when that gospel light shines in, David said, I hate myself. Man, you look at his life. He was blessed, golly. How many men you know that could tackle killing a lion with his bare hands? David did. Blessed.

Stood up against that giant with nothing but a sling and put him on the ground. Raised him up to be king over Israel. People trying to kill him couldn't touch him. God's elect couldn't touch him. If you're chosen of God, I'm going to tell you something. This ought to give you some assurance. You are immortal until God takes you out of this world. And nothing can touch you. Nothing can touch you until God takes you out of this world. That's so. But I tell you, along with those blessings come a lot of infirmities. When by His grace I learn who He is, I'll understand exactly who and what I am.

In Hebrews 1.10, He tells us about Him. He said that God appointed Him heir of all things. What's that mean? That means He owns it all. He's got it all. He's heir of all things. It all belongs to Him. Now watch this. By Him, He said, God said, I made the worlds. What on earth is he talking about? He's talking about this world and the world to come. Worlds.

Verse 3, he tells us that Christ is the brightness of the Father's glory and the express image of His person. And express means explicit, distinct, specific, precise, exclusive. No man knoweth the Father save the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him.

The whole of God's eternal purpose of grace is trusted into the hands of God's Son. He upholds all things by the word of his power. That's what he says there in Hebrews 1. Our salvation altogether owing to his representation and substitution. It said when he by himself purged our sins, he sat down on the right hand of God.

Jesus Christ is everything I'm not, but need to be. Holy, righteous, faithful, affectionate, loving, merciful, gracious. And then secondly, when by his grace I learn what he did, I'll know what I could never do. Isn't that what you learn when you heard the gospel? Christ did what you couldn't do. What God demands is something you can't do.

But he did. He did. He said, it's finished. You reckon he meant that? He'd spent eternity coming to this place. He'd come to that place. He accomplished what he came to do. And he sighed and said, it's finished. It's done. It's done. Oh, that I could see that rest in that. It's done.

As our Savior and Federal Head, He must be partaker of our flesh, be bone of our bone. He must be born under the law, accountable to God, obey God perfectly, satisfy His justice and wrath against sin, and then be raised from the dead. Now, if you can do that, you can save yourselves. But you can't do that. But He did. He did. Only one could and did, Jesus Christ our Lord. Once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. He put it away.

You know what that means? That means I can stand before God if I believe on him. I can stand before God without fear of one sin being brought against me. The all-seeing eye of God. He looks at me. and finds me unreprovable. He can't even find a fault. Faultless before the presence of his glory.

That's how it's stated in the scripture. And then thirdly, when by his grace I understand why he must suffer and die, then I'll understand how he can be just and still justify ungodly sinners. He was delivered for our offenses. He was. And he was raised again for our justification. He and he alone satisfied God.

Paul said he is the propitiation, the mercy seat, the way God saves sinners through faith in his blood to declare God's righteousness for the remission of sins. God took away the sin of the believer and he was righteous in doing it because he didn't just rub it out. He put it on his son and his son paid the full bill. To know what God demands from the sinner will shut every mouth and bring us all guilty before a holy God and show us that our mediator, or there's just one between us and God, And he satisfied God.

And then lastly, when by his grace I know where he is, I'll have my assurance that when I leave this world, I'll be present with him. Jesus didn't cause his father to compromise anything to save anybody. not even himself. Scripture said he spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all.

Now then, Ephesians 2.8, by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It's the gift of God. My grace, he said, is sufficient. And that's my message to you and to me this morning.

His grace is sufficient, sufficient to raise the dead sinners to life, make them accepted of God, give them power to become sons of God, keep them from falling, and present them holy and blameless and unreprovable in God's sight. Amazing grace, how sweet to sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost. You ever been lost? Can't be found till you're lost. I once was lost, now I'm found. Have fun!

All Sufficient Grace

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