You if you have your Bible turn
back with me to the 13th chapter of the book of Acts Acts chapter 13 I'd like to begin
reading with verse 38 and read through verse 44 verse 38 through
verse 44 Be it known unto you therefore
men and brethren that through this man, this man, the Lord
Jesus Christ, that one that God said would not seek corruption,
this one who said, I will give you the sure mercies of David,
this one that God raised again. He said, Be it known unto you
therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. And by him, by the Lord Jesus
Christ, all that believe are justified from all things from
which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. No way that
you can receive a standing before God just as if you'd never sinned
by the keeping of the law of Moses. But through this man you
can be justified from all things as you believe in Him. Therefore, being justified by
faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Beware, therefore, lest that come upon you which is spoken
of in the prophets. Behold, you despisers, and wander
and perish, for I work a work in your days, a work which you
shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you. And
when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought
that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now
when the congregation was broken up, Many of the Jews and the
religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking
to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. And the
next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear
the word of God. Let us pray. Father, we're grateful
that we are assembled here today. We're thankful for the privilege
we have to open up your word and to read and to meditate upon
the message. And we pray for the anointing
of our Holy Spirit upon us, giving our Father the liberty of expression
and thought giving the ability to these that are here this morning,
our Father, to receive Your Word and to make application of it
to their own souls. Oh, our Father, that Thy Spirit
would come among us, and each one of us might be able, our
Father, to discern exactly where we stand in Your eternal purpose. whether we be in Christ or whether
we be reprobate, whether our sins are forgiven or whether
that great weight of guilt that will sink our souls to hell is
still upon us. Our Father, we pray that thou
be pleased to give clarity of thought and clarity, our Father,
to the words as they go forth that your people might receive
instruction and edification and blessing today. We do pray, our
Father, that there's some poor soul here. Only Thou dost know,
our Father, the hearts of men. And You do look upon the hearts
of men. We look upon the outward appearance,
but Thou dost see the heart. And our Father today, if there
be that one here who is Lord, this morning, weighted down with
a load of guilt, and who wants to find relief from their misery,
who would desire our Father to have everlasting life, who want
that their sins would be put away, and would desire that they
might know the free grace and pardon of the Lord Jesus Christ. I pray that today thou would
bring them out of their darkness and bring them into this state
of gospel liberty. And our Father we ask now that
you would give Lord, that which is required to Thy people. Thou
knowest the various ones of us, our Father, that struggle from
day to day, various needs, various burdens, our Father, which we
have. And I do pray that Thou be pleased
to give us out of Thy hand, O Lord, those things that our lives require. I do pray, Father, that You might
burden this people to pray. There's not many of us But Lord,
if we were to have a burden, and if we were enabled to seek
thy face, surely we would enjoy greater blessings than we've
ever enjoyed before. Surely, our Father, it would
be to thy glory. Surely, it would be to thy honor,
Lord, for you to pour out upon us the spirit of supplication,
the spirit of prayer. I pray your blessing on this
people, and I pray that thou will yet use us for thy glory,
and I pray that the ministry of the grace of God might continue
in this place till the Lord Jesus Christ returns. May your will
be done in our lives, and may power be given to overcome that
we might overcome in and through the Lord Jesus Christ, the captain
of our salvation. It may be, our Father, that it
may be to the glory of thy name to enable us all to overcome. We do pray for thy forgiveness,
thy mercy, O Lord, to abound toward us, our weaknesses thou
art acquainted with. Now, our brother read this morning
about how that Paul told the Jews how that the Lord had suffered
with them for 40 years, suffered and been patient with them, suffered
their manners. And Lord, we thank some time
that you've suffered our manners long enough. Be thou merciful,
O God, unto us and help us and strengthen us, we pray for Christ's
sake. Amen. I'd like to speak this morning
on the last part of verse 43, where the Apostle Paul and Barnabas,
speaking to those Jews and religious proselytes that had followed
them out of the synagogue as the meeting was breaking up,
Paul, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace
of God. I want to talk about continuing
in the grace of God this morning. Now, I recognize that you cannot
continue in something that you're not in. Paul said that he was
going to prevail, and he did prevail, upon these men in his
ministry, to continue in the grace of God. I believe that
to understand what he's talking about that it's necessary for
us to say a few words about how men get into the grace of God. Now we believe that all of those
that are the elect of God were put in Jesus Christ and thus
were put into grace, as it were, into free grace before the foundation
of the world. But we know that experientially
there comes a time in the life of God's people, in the life
of the sheep of Christ, when they must be brought by the Holy
Spirit into the grace of God, that they would experience the
grace of God. Now let me read to you a verse
of Scripture you don't have to turn there, but it's in Romans
5. In verse 1 and 2, Paul said, Therefore, being justified by
faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein
we stand and rejoice in hope. of the glory of God. The people
of God have a standing in the grace of God. And we believe
that a work of grace is necessary in the heart of a sinner before
that sinner can love and serve God. Now we know that many preachers
have been guilty of exhorting men and women to live like Christians
and to do good, turn over a new leaf, reform themselves, in order
that they would get closer to the kingdom of God, and maybe,
just maybe, that if they get good enough, they'll attract
the attention of God, and God will have mercy upon them. But beloved, that's not the way
that it works. We believe that God has to move
upon the sinner and that there's a great work that needs to be
done. But there is an hour of commencement,
an hour when God begins that work in the heart of a sinner.
And we maintain the incapacity of man in his natural state to
do anything good in the sight of God. Romans 3 verse 10 says,
as it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one. And verse 12 says, they are all
gone out of the way. They are together become unprofitable. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. And Paul is talking about sinners,
he's talking about men in a natural state, he's talking about all
Jew and Gentile included, lost men and women. He said, there's
not a one of them that doeth good. No, not one. There's not a righteous man on
the face of the earth. No, not one. Not one that doeth
righteousness. Now we contend that the condemnation
under which the sinner lies to everlasting misery necessitates
an entire change of heart, a new principle, a new nature, before
that individual can ever be a Christian, before he can ever say, I am
a believer, I'm a child of God. There's this necessity that there
be a change. Now this change cannot be brought
about by our formal admission into the external church. It cannot. Now, I know that some
people believe that there's a saving efficacy attached to joining
themselves with a body of professed believers. or that if you get
into the right denomination that surely you're going to be affected
graciously by that fellowship and that you become a believer
by doing so. Neither can you come into this
change of heart by participation in the ordinances of the external
church. Now we've read in history, and
I've read a great deal about church history, and there's been
many who have advocated, you know, that through the sacraments
of the Lord's Supper and Baptism that we come in to partake of
the grace of God. This is contrary to the teachings
of the Word of God. You are not ever converted by
taking the Lord's Supper or by participating in Baptism. Now,
in the Word of God, it is brought out very clearly that this change
that we're talking about, a man having a standing in the grace
of God, a man having participated in the death, burial, and resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ by faith, a man having been born again
that this takes place under the direct influence of the Holy
Spirit. It is given by God according
to the good pleasure of His will, of His free mercy, and it's given
for Christ's sake. It is given for Christ's sake. Now, this is clearly taught in
the Word of God. Now, one of the first evidences
that this vital change of the heart has taken place is that
there is repentance towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Paul talked about that here
in this 38th verse. And verse 39, he talked about
how that through this man, and we commented on that, and by
him all the beliefs are justified. And so, beloved, it's not what
puts us in, but it's an evidence that we are in. repentance and
faith, repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now the earnest of all future
good in this life and the life to come is you hath he quickened,
you hath he made alive who were dead in trespasses and sin. Now this conversion, this change
of heart, this new birth has been compared in the scriptures
to many things. It resembles various things. Let me explain. First of all,
it is the giving of eyesight to the blind. No man is able
to see and understand who he is or who God is until God opens
his eyes. And thanks be unto God that God's
in the business of opening the eyes of sinners so that they
can see themselves and know who they are and that they can also
see the Son. The Bible says in John 6 that
the man who sees the Son and believes on Him has everlasting
life. Well, you don't see the Son until
God opens your eyes. And without this opening of the
eyes, then a man cannot begin to see. The Scripture says, over
in the third chapter of John, that unless a man is born again,
he cannot see the Kingdom of God. It is the bringing also
of the dead to life. It's a man coming out of sin's
death and coming into life in the Lord Jesus Christ. And there's
a big difference between being dead and alive. And a man must
be brought into life because he is dead in a state of nature
and sin. And without which he cannot begin
to exercise the functions of life. How is a man going to live
like a Christian and live in obedience and live responsibly
before God and act as a believer ought to act if he hadn't been
brought out of his death and been brought into life? It's
only as you experience life in Jesus Christ that you begin to
live out the life of a man who is alive from the dead, one who
has been brought back from the dead. And then also I think it's
as the release of a slave from bondage. The scripture teaches
that and without this release the Lord giving us a release
from our bondage, then we cannot enter into the service of another
master. And this is so important for
us to see this, and this is what grace does. Grace opens our eyes. And grace gives us life, and
grace delivers us from bondage, and delivers us from the old
master of sin, and enables us now to serve our new husband,
the Lord Jesus Christ, to serve our new master. Now, beloved,
listen, unless you have a new master, and unless you have life,
and unless you have eyes to see the truth as it concerns you
and concerns your substitute, then you're not a Christian.
You're not a child of God. Now, while the heart is unaffected
by the grace of God, the heart of the sinner, while it is unchanged
and his spirit is unrenewed, it would be vain for any preacher
to get up and exhort those people, try to motivate those people
to lead a Christian life. Now you say, preacher, I think
I ought to teach my children to live like Christians. Well,
it's okay for you to do that as long as you explain to them
that by living the life of a Christian and imitating a Christian, you
do not make them one. They can never become a Christian
by acting like one or by living like one now That's one of the
fallacies of our day And whenever you preach like this people say
well now that fella is against he's against people doing right
he's against morality this preacher is against things that he ought
to be for and My friend, I am for absolute total holiness. I am for things being done on
earth as they are in heaven. I am for a man being ever bit
given over unto God and to the obedience to the Word of God.
I'm for that. But I'll tell you this, that
no fleshly obedience to the law of God, no fleshly obedience
to any of the duties and statutes of the Word of God will ever
render a man a standing in the grace of God. God must put you
in His grace, and God must give you that standing, and that comes
through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I think that to
demand or to in any way exhort men and women, boys and girls,
to live like a Christian before they are one, through the grace
of God, would be to demand the fruit before the tree is ever
planted. It is to reap the harvest before
the seed is ever sown in the field. Now I'm not saying the
tree should not bear fruit, and I'm not saying the field shouldn't
produce grain, but beloved, you've got to plant the tree before
the tree can bear fruit, and you must sow the seed in the
field before it can come up and produce grain. So repent and
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Repent and believe. You're here
this morning, what should I do? What should my children be taught?
You teach them that God has commanded them to repent for what they
are. Teach them that God has told them that they must have
a change of heart about who they are, what they are, and what
they've done. Be conscious of your need of
this change. this need to have a standing
in the grace of God and believe that it's the gift and purchase
of the redeeming love of the Lord Jesus Christ, even the gift
of the grace of God. Every one of us here this morning
that are blessed to have a standing in the grace of God, We are blessed
by the grace of God to have that standing. Now this is the foundation
of Christian character. This is the living principle
without which the action and duty and service to God of life
can never be faithfully carried on. Now you see, I know that
there's a lot of people that they have put out an effort.
There's a lot of people that's tried. There's a lot of people
that have stretched themselves out in the direction of living
a life that is becoming to man and to God. But those people
are going to hell if they've never been regenerated, converted,
quickened by the Spirit of God, if they have not been brought
into faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And if their whole hope
is not in Christ alone, Those people are wasting their time. Now, well, Paul and Barnabas
here, he persuaded these men to continue in the grace of God. Now, if you are in the grace
of God, then you can continue in the grace of God. But the
question comes to me, Paul, what are you talking about when you're
talking about continuing in the grace of God? What is the grace
of God, Paul? Well, Paul has told them that
they can be justified of all things, from all things, meaning
that their sins can be completely blotted out. Everything they've
been, every sin they've ever committed can all be forgiven,
and this is through believing. Through believing. Well, that's
grace. That's grace. Now, Paul tells
us over and over again, let me try to explain if I can. I don't
want anyone here to be confused as to what the grace of God is. What is the grace of God? Well,
Paul tells us over and over again in his epistles that we are saved,
that we're justified, that we're called, we're sanctified, preserved,
and glorified by the grace of God without our works. Now then, almost to the very
last one. of all the professing churches
that we're acquainted with say that they believe that salvation
is by grace. Now the Word of God lays such
heavy emphasis upon the fact that salvation is totally, utterly
by grace that it's very difficult for anyone to claim to believe
the Bible and yet openly deny that salvation is of grace. Very
difficult indeed, because you just can't read the Bible and
dismiss the fact that salvation is of grace. Now the Catholics,
the Pentecostals, and the Fundamentalists all claim to believe in salvation
by grace, but the grace that most people talk about is not
the grace That Paul's talking about. It's not the grace of
the Bible at all, not the grace of God at all. It is so mixed
with human merit and human works that it is no more grace. It is no more the true grace
of God. Now look in Romans chapter 11
with me. Romans chapter 11, and I want
us to look here at a couple of verses. Look at verse 5 and 6.
Even so, in verse 5, then, at this present time also, there
is a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by
grace, then is it no more of works. Otherwise, grace is no
more grace. But if it be of works, then is
it no more grace. Otherwise, work is no more work. How plain can you get? That,
my friend, is a very clear and plain definition. Brother, sister,
the grace of God, and listen, any grace, professed grace, that
people talk about, that looks to the worth of man, that waits
upon the will of man, or depends upon the work of man, is a frustrated
Grace, mark it down. Wouldn't you conclude that? If
a man's works had to qualify him for grace, or if grace was
only effectual when a man did good, wouldn't it be a frustrated
grace? And then if it waited on the
will of man, if grace had to wait until man was willing, before
grace could move, Saul of Tarsus would have been in hell ever
since he had his head cut off, instead of in heaven, if that
was the case. It would be frustrated grace,
and frustrated grace, my brother, my sister, is not the grace of
God. It is not the true grace of God. It is not. This is the reason
that Paul said in Galatians 2 and 21, I do not frustrate the grace
of God, for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ
is dead in vain. Christ died in vain if a man
can get right standing before God any other way except by grace. Grace is the unmerited favor
of God. Grace is unconditional. Anything earned, anything merited
or deserved by you is not grace. Mark it down. It's not grace. If you earned it, if you merited
it, if you deserve it, it's not grace, brother. It's not grace. The man who thinks that he deserves
God's salvation does not believe in God's grace. If there's anybody
here thinks that they ought to be saved, that God ought to save
me, God ought to save me because of what I've done, because of
what I've suffered, because of the life that I've lived, my
friend, if you believe that, then my friend, you do not believe
in grace. You do not believe in Bible grace. The person who imagined that
his acceptance with God depends upon his will, his works, or
his worth does not believe in grace as the Bible speaks of
grace. I'm being as clear as I know
how to be. That man has fallen from grace. You've fallen from grace. And
that's the way men fall from grace, brother. You fall from
grace by getting to the place where you think that God ought
to save you, now not everybody else, but you, on some other
basis, but by grace. Now you see, now everybody else,
I know why God had to save them by grace, because they're rascals.
They're sinners indeed. I mean, you just, I mean, they're
something, they're just, but I'm about, I'm just a foot above
everybody else, and God ought to save me on another basis.
He shouldn't save me like he saves the harlot. Oh, no, no,
no, no. And he shouldn't save me like
he does the whoremonger. No! God ought to save me some
other way. No, sir. God saves everybody
by grace. And if you think God should save
you on some other basis, then you've fallen from grace. There's
no hope for you. Salvation is by grace. You mark
it down. No one will ever honor and no
one will ever extol the grace of God until they have experienced
the grace of God. And to talk about grace. Listen. As I hear people talk about the
grace of God and to praise God's grace. You see, when men talk
about grace, Their grace doesn't mean to them what it does to
me. It doesn't mean to them what
it does to a poor and helpless, guilty, bankrupt, self-condemned
sinner whose only hope is the Lord Jesus Christ. They can talk
about grace and just talk about it and talk about it. But you
can tell it don't mean to them what it does to a poor sinner
like me. It just don't mean anything to
them. When I say grace, brother, I
feel it all the way down to my toes. Grace means something to
me because it's the only chance I've got. to miss hell and to
be with the Lord forever and ever. It's the only chance I've
got to sit down and commune with the saints of God who's gone
on before. It's the only chance I've got
to ever see the glory of God. It's the only chance of grace.
It's all the chance I've got. And so when I talk about grace,
I'm talking about something that means something to me. It means
something to me indeed, you mark it down. Nobody till they've
experienced the grace of God will be able to extol and honor
the grace of God. It was only after Paul had experienced
the grace of God that he declared, by the grace of God, I am what
I am. I am what I am by the grace of
God. Before, he experienced the grace of God. He was a religious
lost law keeper. He was a blasphemer who hoped
for salvation by something that he did. Paul nowhere in the Word
of God takes any credit for his salvation. He ascribes the whole
of his salvation to God's free grace alone. Is that right? I
never found any place in the Bible where the Apostle Paul
ever took any credit for the grace and even his ministry.
He said it was not I, it was the grace of God in me. I worked
more abundantly than they all, but yet it wasn't I, it was the
grace of God in me. God's grace moving and working
in me. Now he knew that he did not make
himself to differ from other men. He knew that he had experienced
the mercy of God, but he knew that God had just simply, out
of free grace, had had mercy upon him. God had mercy on him. He did not attract that mercy
by something that he was doing. It wasn't that God said, now
this Saul, he's a zealous man, and not only that, but he's a
good man at heart. Oh yeah, he's a good man at heart,
wasn't he? He really was. He was killing Christians, doing
all things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. God struck
him down and Paul said, my salvation was a pattern to show forth the
long suffering of God to poor sinners that don't have any other
way of missing hell except through his grace and his mercy. Now
then, his opinions, his affections, his ambitions, his desires, and
his hopes and his motives, they were all radically changed when
he experienced the grace of God. Now, and he attributed the change,
always, you'll find it in the word of God, to the grace of
God. Well, how does grace save a man? Well, the grace of God
does not save us by looking over our sins, just overlooking our
sins and pretending that they don't exist. Now, some people
get that idea in their mind, somehow or other, that God saves
a person by just saying, well, so what? They sinned, they did
this, they did that, but so what? It don't matter. Nope, that's
not the way it is. And grace does not save us by
enabling us, while we've been lawbreakers
all of our life, to suddenly begin to keep the law. That's
not the way God saves sinners. Because the Bible says, by the
deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight. Paul
said that you can't be justified from all things by the law of
Moses, but by faith you can be. Now then, if righteousness come
by the law, Christ is dead in vain. He died in vain. Keep that
in mind. Grace does not save us by giving
us religious ceremonies to observe and good works to perform. Because
the scripture says in 2 Timothy 1 and 9, who has 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. And Titus 3 and 5, not
the works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
his mercy he saved us. And so, well, then we get positively
to give the answer, how does grace save? Well, listen to me
very, very careful because I won't spend much time on this. I've
got to get on with the message, but listen to me very carefully.
Grace saves the elect of God by imputing the sins, their sins,
imputing, accrediting their sins to Christ and hanging him on
a cross and punishing him for those sins as our substitute. That's exactly how God saves
a sinner. God took your sin, laid them
on Christ. That's what 2 Corinthians 5 and
21 says, that God hath made Him to be sin for us. He knew no
sin, but that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
The just for the unjust. He was put to death on Calvary's
cross that we might be brought to God. Romans 3 and 24, therefore
being justified by faith, there in that verse of Scripture says
that being justified freely by His grace, we have redemption
through the Lord Jesus Christ. And Ephesians 1 and 7, we have
forgiveness through the riches of His grace. Now grace saves
us then by imputing our sin to the Lord Jesus. You see, somebody
had to pay for our sin. And you can't go to heaven unless
your sin's paid for. And Christ paid our sin debt. Now grace saves us also by giving
us the gift of life and faith in Jesus Christ. Grace makes
Christ and his sin-atoning death precious to the believing sinner's
heart. Has Christ and His work, has
His person and work been made precious to you? Well, that's
the way God saves a sinner. And whenever a sinner sees Christ,
And Christ is precious to him, and Christ is so precious that
he esteems him to be the pearl of great price, and if he never
has anything else in life, he's He feels wonderful because he
has the pearl of great price. He has the precious gift of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now the death of Christ is of
no benefit to any sinner until that sinner is enabled to believe
the gospel. Until he's enabled to believe.
Now he that believeth on him is not condemned, John 3 and
18 says. But he that believeth is not
condemned. Now then, this is how grace saves. We are brought and given, we
are given the gift of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'll
tell you what, you just try to believe. Tell somebody to believe
and let them try it on their own. Nobody can believe savingly
without God imparting the gift to them. Well, Paul persuaded
these people to continue in the grace of God. Now why should
he not do so? Why should he not do so? Why
not? Why should we not, all of us, if we've experienced the
grace of God and have been saved by the grace of God, why should
we not continue in it? Well, beloved, you know, this
is rather astounding to me. It's an astounding statement
indeed. that the Apostle Paul would have to, as it were, prevail
upon, and that's the meaning of the word, that he would have
to prevail upon these people to continue in the grace of God. It's like, let me try to illustrate
it if I can. Knowing what we know and what
the Lord has taught us, and what we've tried to expound to you
this morning already in this service, it's kind of like saving
a man from a burning building, And that man has been burnt,
he has some burns on him, and you save that man from a burning
building, and you get him out, and you doctor him up to where
his pain is gone, and then you have to prevail on that man.
to keep him from turning around and running back into that burning
building again. Now that's exactly here the way
that we are to look at this. How inconceivable it is that
it's necessary to persuade people to continue in the grace of God. It's kind of like a man who jumped
off a bridge into the water and he could not swim and you swim
out there and you rescue that man and then you get him back
on shore and you get the water all pumped out of him and you
get him going again and then you've got to prevail upon that
man to keep him from jumping in again. That's what this is.
That's exactly what this is. Now, to have to persuade a poor
sinner who's tasted of the grace of God to continue, it's just
beyond me, but it's a fact. Now, it's a testimony, I think,
to the fickleness of the human heart. I'm surprised that God
puts up with us, saints and sinners alike, that we're so blind and
so hard of heart and so arrogant that we have to be persuaded
to continue in the grace of God. It's no wonder that there's so
few grace preachers around. It's a wonder to me that God
would still let us meet together, people like you and I. We come
together, we've experienced the grace of God, we've tasted and
seen that the Lord is good, we know how God saves sinners, and
we come together, but we just simply do not have the appreciation
for the grace of God that we ought to have, and we're not
zealous. in continuing in it as we should. Now to the average religionist,
in our day and time, a grace preacher I think is probably
the most useless preacher on the face of the earth. We don't
need anybody to persuade us to continue in the grace of God. They don't know what the grace
of God is and so therefore they cannot appreciate a preacher
preaching and telling them to go on. But God's good to his
people. God is good to His people. God
is good to you. God is good to me. God has given
us a place here. We may not be particularly satisfied
with it, but He's given us a place here to come and to meet. God has given us chairs to sit
on, and we can come in here and sit down. God has given us good
clothes to wear, and He's given us automobiles, good automobiles
to get to church in, and He's given us clothes to wear to church,
and He's given us songs to sing, and He's given us a preacher
for us to listen to, and He's given us a Bible to read. And
still, it's necessary for somebody to get up and persuade us, prevail
upon us, to continue in the grace of God. It shows how low down
and depraved and ungrateful we are by nature. What else can
a sinner do but continue in the grace of God? Now listen, it's
a fact, though it is a sad fact, that we have to be persuaded
to continue in the grace of God. Now I'm the one who is supposed
to do the persuading. I'm supposed to stand up here
week after week and persuade you, prevail upon you with argument
that you would continue in the grace of God. But listen, every
once in a while, I need that someone would call me up, someone
would write me a letter, someone would take me aside and encourage
me to keep on keeping on. Because like I said, a grace
preacher ain't worth much in this world. He's not worth much. Now, what Paul is talking about
here when he's talking about us continuing in the grace of
God, is he means that we ought to continue in the belief of
the gospel of grace, and the doctrines of grace, and the teachings
of grace. Continue to believe them. Continue
to propagate them. Continue to allow, as it were,
those doctrines to permeate our soul. And we need to come to
the place where we depend upon the Spirit of grace. And then
also he meant, you continue in the means of grace. Well, why is this so? Well, I
say that it's so because I mentioned that it's because of our lowdown
depravity and our hard-heartedness and blindness and stubbornness
by nature, but it's I think also because we're all Arminians and
we're all free willers And we're all legalists by nature. Isn't
that true? Isn't that the natural religion
of man? Man's natural religion is for
him to always think, first of all, that he can do more than
what he really can do. He always thinks he's alive when
he's dead. And man always feels that he
can work when he's completely out of work, and that there's
something he can do, even though he really can't, but he really
would like to think that there's something he can do. Now, beloved,
listen, we will forget God, And we will forget how God saved
us in a minute if he doesn't keep somebody around to remind
us and persuade us to continue in the grace of God. Now you
can teach a man to be a plumber, and you can teach a man to be
an electrician, you can teach him to be a welder, a carpenter,
and you don't have to stay around that fella day after day and
keep going over the basics of those traits. You don't have
to do that. But listen, when it comes to
the grace of God, it has to be kept before the people or we'll
let it get away from us. Because it's our nature to let
it slip. And it's our nature to go back
to something that we heard before and it's always easier to believe
a lie than it is the truth. And so we must be persuaded.
That's why we need one another. That's why we need a preacher
and that's why we need good hymns and sound preaching is because
we're going to forget and we're going to slip back and we're
going to start talking like free willers and we're going to start
talking like Arminians if somebody don't persuade us to continue
in the grace of God. Now then, we must continue. It
won't be long unless somebody is around to keep on prevailing
upon us that we'll just lose sight of what the truth is. We must study and meditate or
we will fall back into thinking and talking like people who do
not know the grace of God. We will not do our duty, listen
to me, towards God or toward this generation unless we maintain
and encourage and support the ministry of the grace of God,
because without it, in a few years, even this group will slip
back and probably call an Armenian preacher to preach to you. We
don't have to get a man to lie to us, we lie to ourselves. We'll first thing you know, we'll
lie to ourselves and tell ourselves that really there's not that
much difference between this church and another church. That
really that preacher over there that he's saying just as many
good things as what we're saying here. And sometimes people go
off from here and go other places and first thing you know they
fell right in with some legalist somewhere or fit right into somebody
that don't know a thing on earth about the grace of God and somebody
that won't preach it fit right in just like they are fitting
into a puzzle. And that makes me wonder. That
makes me wonder indeed. I tell you we don't have to hire
a man to lie to us. We all lie to ourselves. We don't
know our own hearts. You stay away from the preaching
of the grace of God for a while and only God knows what you'll
do. Only God knows what you'll do. It scares me because I am convinced
that even though our churches are not full, Sovereign Grace
churches have a lot of people in them that has everything they've
got in their heads and they've got nothing in their hearts.
And that's where you've got the problem. If this thing don't
get worked down into your heart, you may have a head full of truth,
but if you don't have it down in your heart, you're in trouble.
And that's why that one day, one day, In the future, you're
gonna hear somebody say, or you're gonna say it yourself, oh, really,
I don't think there's that much difference between this fella
up here and our church. Well, I mean, our church is just
about like all the rest of them. And you see, the problem is,
beloved, that you slipped, that you forgot the truth of the grace
of God. Well, what is it? not to continue
in the grace of God. I'll have to hurry here, I'm
about finished in more ways than one. If you ever take away from
the person, from the purpose, and the work of our Lord Jesus
Christ, if you ever tarnish his work by adding anything to it,
if you ever rob him of an ounce of his glory in the salvation
of a sinner, you're not continuing in the grace of God. You're not
continuing in His grace. Now, the scripture says, of God
are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. So it sounds
to me like that He ought to get all the glory and that His person
and work ought to be honored as the only possible way of salvation. And next, How are we going to
cease to continue the grace of God when we do not attend to
the means of grace? What are the means of grace?
Well, it's private and public reading, studying, and availing
yourself. to preaching and to books, good
books, good literature, anything that you can read that would
encourage you in the things of God. Now listen to me and listen
to me carefully. I'm going to have to give an
account of what I preach and what I say from this pulpit and
give an account of your soul. But listen to me. It is a dead
giveaway if a man is careless about his attendance to the ministry
of the Word of God. If a man is careless about it,
it's a dead giveaway that you don't have anything except what
little bit of something you've got in your head. Listen, ever
since God saved me, there's been one thing that I know that He
put in me and that has been in me ever since God saved me, and
that is strong desire to be in a meeting where the Word of God
is being preached. I want to be there. I must be
there. And I cannot easily, listen,
I won't last without the means of grace. I won't last. You say, Preacher, don't you
believe in eternal security? I do. Pink said that God's people
will persevere, but they must persevere. the means of grace. I need it. I don't know about you, but I
need it. We are on bare rations as it
is. Just bare rations. Just enough to get us by. You
ever feel that? That's the way I feel. I feel
that way, and I study more than you do, and I read more than
most of you do. I read all the time, but I know
I'm on bare rations. I tell you, I need the services.
Well, what is it? Quickly, to continue in the grace
of God? Just a couple of statements.
Listen to this. To continue in the grace of God
is to place your very soul, your very life, everything you are
into the able and willing hands of the Lord Jesus Christ and
be glad that you did. That's what it means. All you
have been, all that you are now, and all that you hope to be,
put it all into His hands. all into the hands of the Lord
Jesus Christ, because He's all our hope, and He's all that God
demands that we have, is Him, the Lord Jesus, and His righteousness.
Paul said in 1 Timothy 1.12, For I know whom I have believed,
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed
unto him against that day. To find comfort there and there
alone is to continue in the grace of God. It is to find in Him
all you need for time and for eternity. It is for your soul
to be alarmed if you were to find yourself looking for comfort,
for rest, for refuge in anyone or anything else besides Him. to be alarmed over that, for
you to be scared about that. Running to a work, a righteousness,
a duty, and finding comfort in that, it must scare us to death. Christ is all that God requires. He's all that my soul needs.
Now those who continue in the grace of God, they do so by the
grace of God. Now the first step that we take
into the kingdom is by grace, the last step I expect to take
by the grace of God. Now we try from the time our
children are born to instill in them the ability to go out
into the world and stand on their own two feet and to take care
of themselves and to do what they can out in the world to
provide their own needs. And you know that God, all of
my life, has been teaching me that I cannot stand on my own
two feet, that I cannot maintain myself, that I cannot make it
on my own, that I am utterly dependent upon Him and His grace. Now we've got to learn both lessons,
don't we? It's right for your children
to learn to stand on their own two feet out here in this world.
But it's also right for all of us to learn that we stand by
the grace of God alone. and that it's only God that enables
us to persevere. And so I hope this morning that
these things that we talked about will be some encouragement, some
support, and some help for each one of your souls. I felt the
Lord impress me with these truths, and I hope that all of us will
continue in the grace of God. And if you don't