Which turn back to Ephesians
chapter two. I hope you'll pray for me as
I attempt to bring this message on the who, the what, and the
why of grace. Now the who of grace are described
in these first three verses, Ephesians chapter two. I'm not
going to say much about it. We've dealt with this several
times in the last few weeks, but here is the who of grace,
you who were dead in trespasses and sins. That's the who of grace. You who were dead in trespasses
and sins. Wherein in times past you walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince
of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the
children of disobedience. You are under the control of
Satan. Strong language, isn't it? Among
whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lust of
our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind,
and were by nature. That's a very important word.
Were by nature. The children of wrath, just like
everybody else. Now, can anyone change their
nature? Under any circumstance? Can anyone
change their nature? The answer is no. By nature,
children of wrath, that's your nature. It's your nature, it's
my nature to be evil, to be bad, to be sinful. That is my nature. I act according to my nature. Just about everybody would say
they believe in salvation by grace and not by works, wouldn't
they? You come up to someone at work, you come up to someone
in your neighborhood, and you say, do you believe in salvation
by grace? And do you believe that salvation
is not by works? They say, oh yeah, that's exactly
what I believe. I believe in salvation by grace
through faith. I don't believe in salvation
by works, but by faith. By that, they mean you cannot
be saved by your works, but God accepts faith instead. He's lowered
the bar. Obviously, you can't be saved
by works, but God will accept faith in Jesus Christ, his son,
in its stead. Now, that's just another form
of salvation by works. God may have lowered the bar
and made it more attainable to you. Now, instead of having to
be perfect, now if you can just come up with faith, you will
be saved. But that is Still, salvation depended upon something
in you. Salvation by works. Somebody says, well, I believe
in salvation by grace. I believe it's all of grace.
I believe salvation by grace. I don't care if you're talking
to a Catholic, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, fill in the
blank. You ask any of these people,
do you believe in salvation by grace? Oh, yes. I believe in
salvation by grace. But what they mean by that is
grace offered to you. Grace offered to you. And it's up to you as to whether
or not you will receive it or turn it down. This grace that
is offered is still in your hand. And it's up to what you do. Now
once again, that is salvation by works. Salvation ultimately
dependent upon something you do. And in our preaching of the
gospel, we should never refer to the gospel as an offer. God
doesn't offer, God saves. Grace is not an offer, grace
saves. God doesn't throw his grace out
there to you and it's up to you as to whether or not you'll accept
it or reject it. God's grace saves. Now, offer the dead man described
in verses 1 through 3, who is by nature a child of wrath, dead
in trespasses and sins. Offer him grace. What good will
it do him? Tell him if he can just come
up with faith, God will save him. He's lowered the bar. You
no longer have to be saved by your works, but you can now be
saved by faith. Tell the man dead in sins that. who is by
nature a child of wrath, dead, completely unable. That's what
dead means. It doesn't mean you're bad. It
doesn't mean you need help. It means you need a miracle.
You're dead. You need God to do something
for you. Tell that man, dead in sins, grace is offered to
you, and what good will it do him? Now, the reason people get
upset with what we would call the doctrine of grace And they
do get upset with it. The fact that God elected who
would be saved before time began, and he didn't elect everybody.
He only elected a specific group of people. This is not everybody.
The fact that Christ died only for the elect, and he didn't
die for everybody, people get upset with that. And they get
angry with that. They think, how could that be
fair? For God just arbitrarily to choose one and pass by another
and to die for one and not die for another. And they don't understand
you're dead in sins. If you're wrong on the fall,
you're wrong on it all. If you don't understand this
thing of being dead in sins, none of this is going to make
any sense to you. But if God reveals to you that verses 1-3
describes you, dead in sins, by nature a child
of wrath, under the servitude of Satan and you can't get out.
When you see yourself in that light, you see God's sovereign
grace in a completely different light. You see that's the only
way you can be saved. Anybody who fits the description
of verses one through three, They're going to see that the
only way they can be saved is if salvation is all of grace. And somebody says, well, I just
don't see myself that way. Well, you're cutting your own
throat because that's the only kind of people God saves. If you don't see yourself
that way, you're in trouble. Ask God to reveal to you who
he is and who you are and believe what God says about you. Now,
you know, we ask, we ask the question, do I really believe?
that I deserve to go to hell? Well, God says I do. And that's enough. That's enough. I might feel like I'm a pretty
good person compared to other people, but I'm talking about
before God, what God says. And you know, sometimes I think,
do I really believe that? Well, if God says it, I do. That's
all I need. I need the word of God. Do you
feel you're desperate, sinful, a little soon enough? No, I don't.
I don't feel anywhere near sinful as I know I really am, but I'm
talking about believing the testimony of God, what God says concerning
me. Yes, I do deserve to go to hell. Yes, I am dead in sins. Yes,
I need his grace. Now that's the who, people who
are dead in sins. Now the what is declared in verses
four through six. Here's what God has done for
these people who are dead in sins. And remember, the only
people he saves are people who are, as verses one through three
describe. And what I want to ask you to
do by the grace of God is to believe this with regard to yourself,
that this is what you are by nature because God says it. Not
even so much because you feel it. Sometimes you feel it, sometimes
you don't. Believe it because this is God's
testimony regarding you. And God saw that the wickedness
of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of
the thoughts of his heart was only equal continually. Man drinks iniquity like water.
That's me. The cross is proof of that. But
for people Described, this is the who of grace. People just
like this. This is the who of grace. Here's
the what. Here's what God has done. Verse
four, but God. Not but you. Not but you saw
the evil of your ways and turned over a new leaf. Not but you
accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior and asked him
into your heart. Not but you saw. No, but God. but God, not but you, but God. That's what one man said is the
definition of grace. But God, in spite of you, but
God, who is rich in mercy for his great love, wherewith he
loved us even when we were dead in sins. These are the people
that he loved. Those who were dead in sins,
having no ability to save themselves, even when we were dead in sins,
have quickened us together with Christ. Here's what this means. By grace, you are saved. And
have raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus. This thought is amplified in
verse eight, for by grace are you saved? Amen. By grace are you saved through
faith and that that faith, it's not of yourselves. It's the gift
of God. Now, here's what grace means.
Not of works. That's a real simple definition,
isn't it? Grace means not of works. lest any man should boast. Why, the very faith we have is
the gift of God. It's not the result of us deciding
to receive Christ or accepting Him as our personal Savior or
letting Him into our heart or anything we've done. God gave
you life, he quickened you together with Christ, and he gave you
faith as a gift. Salvation by grace means not
of works. Now listen to me real carefully.
Not of works. What does that mean? Not of works. Works means
salvation in some way. Any aspect of salvation is in
some way dependent upon what you do. That's works. You can say, well, my salvation
began with me accepting the offer. I know God offered it, but he
offered it to everybody. My neighbor didn't accept it,
but I accepted it, and that's why I'm saved. I received the
offer of salvation. That is salvation by works. That's salvation dependent upon
something you do. Somebody else says, well, I'm
saved by grace, and through my acts of personal obedience and
my acts of self-denial and my reading of the scripture and
my prayer life, I suppress sin and I become more holy and less
sinful. So you become more holy and less
sinful by your works. That is called salvation by works. Somebody else says, well, salvation's
all of grace. But God's going to be fair. There
at the end, he's going to reward you and give you a higher reward
in heaven according to your personal obedience on earth. And if you're
not very obedient, you won't have a high place. You'll have
a higher place by your works, by your acts of personal obedience.
That means some part of your salvation is according to your
works. And that is works. But the Bible says not of works. If you are some way in salvation
and your neighbor is in it because of what you did, that means you
have some kind of ground to glory in. I did this. I did that. I asked a fellow
yesterday, what are you gonna say to God when he says, why
shall I let you into heaven? He said, I believed. If I is in your testimony, you
believe in works. I've given these four questions
before, but I always think they're so good. If God loves all men
the same, if somebody's saved and somebody's
not saved, that means it's not God's love that saved them. It's
something one did that the other didn't do. If God wills the salvation
of all men the same, And one's saved and the other's not. That
means it's not God's will that caused their salvation, but something
that the one did that the other didn't do. That's called works. If Jesus Christ shed His blood
for all men, the same, and some are saved, you're saved, and
your neighbor is lost, that means the blood of Christ didn't do
anything for your salvation. It's what you did that your neighbor
did not do. And that's what salvation by
works means. It means salvation is in some way, in some measure,
dependent upon what I do. Now, by grace, are you saved
and put to work anywhere there that you must do in order to
be saved? It's no longer grace. Now, let me verify that from
the scripture. Turn to Romans 11. Romans 11, verse six, or verse five. Even
so then, at this present time, there's also a remnant according
to the election of grace. And if by grace, then it's no
more works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace.
But if it be of works, it's no more grace. Otherwise, work is
no more work. You see, it's either all grace
or all works. You can't mix the two. It can't
be 99% grace and 1% works. It's either all grace or all
works. Look in Romans chapter four. He's talking about Abraham. He
says, For what saith the scripture,
Abraham believed God, and it was canon to him for righteousness.
Now to him that worketh is the reward, not reckoned of grace,
but of debt. That means God owes you what
you have. He's paying you the wages of
what you've earned. But to him that worketh not,
but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is canon
for righteousness. Now turn to Romans nine, verse 11. The children, speaking of the
twins, Jacob and Esau, the one that God loved and the other
that God hated. And let me remind you, God's hatred is not like
human hatred. Our hatred's wrong. When we hate
somebody, it's because of our evil natures. It's because of
our sinful violence. When God hates somebody, it's
because he's holy. He's righteous, he's altogether just in whatever
he does. Look down at verse 13 as it's
written, Jacob of my love, but he's all I hated. That's what
God said. Now verse 11 again, for the children being not yet
born, neither having done any good or evil. They didn't have
any good works to recommend them. They didn't have any bad works
to disqualify them. For the children being not yet
born, neither having done any good or evil that the purpose
of God according to election might stand. What are those next
three words? Not of works. That's God's purpose according
to election. Not of works. Lest any man should
boast. Now when we talk about the water
of grace, we talked about the who. The who is us who are dead
and sins. The what of grace, what God does. You've got to begin with election.
You've got to begin with election. That's where the book of God
begins. His choice of his people before time began. And this choice was not conditioned
upon him seeing what you would do. I foresee that one would
believe, therefore I'm going to choose him. That's foolishness.
God foresees all things because He's decreed everything. He's
determined everything. Yeah, He knows the future, but
it's because He's determined it. The future's in His hand.
He controls everything. But God, in His mercy and in
His grace, chose a people in Christ before time began, before
the foundation of the world. And if you don't believe that,
you don't believe grace. If you don't preach that, you
don't preach grace. I don't know how many times I've
asked people, I've said, well, does your preacher believe in
election? Well, you know, I don't know. I'd have to ask him. He
doesn't believe in election. He'd be preaching the glorious
truth concerning God being God and choosing who'd be saved before
time again. You can't preach grace and not
preach Christ being everything in salvation when he said it
is finished. The salvation of the elect and
the salvation of this sinner was finished. Excuse me. Somebody said, why
didn't you drink water this morning? I don't know. I had reflux last
night. When I had reflux, I coughed
the whole next day. Romans 3.24 says that both justification
and redemption are by grace being justified. Oh, what a gift that
is to stand before God without guilt. justified freely by His grace
through the redemption, through the redeeming work of Christ
on Calvary Street where He put away my sin. You see every aspect
of salvation is by grace. I love what Paul said in Acts
chapter 15 verse 10, by the grace of God I am what I am. I am, and I say this fearfully,
I'm not saying this flippantly, but I say this fearfully, I say
this believably, but I'm a sinner, and the only reason I'm a sinner
is by the grace of God. Not everybody views themselves
as sinners. Not everybody views themselves as dead in sins by
nature. Not everybody sees their need of God's electing grace
and Christ redeeming blood and the grace of the Holy Spirit
to give them life. The only people who see that
are people who really believe they're sinners. If somebody
argues, how can it be fair for God to choose one and pass by
the other? How can it be fair for Christ
to die for one and not die for the other? The only reason I
might not have this at the top of my mind, but the only reason
I'd make a statement like that is because I really don't believe
I'm a sinner. That is the only reason. To be a sinner is the
gift of His grace. Now, I'm not saying sin's okay,
and I'm not saying it's a good thing to sin, but to know I'm
nothing but sin in and of myself. I love what Joseph Hart, the
hymn writer, said, a sinner is a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost
hath made him so. I'm an elect sinner. That's by
the grace of God. It doesn't have anything to do with me.
I'm a redeemed sinner. I'm a justified sinner. I've been born from above. Everything I have is by the grace
of God. Now you can tell people that
they've been guilty of committing sins and they'll agree, but tell
them that they don't do anything but sin. Oh, well, wait a minute.
Wait a minute. What about all the things I've
done for so and so, or fill in whatever you're thinking about.
Tell somebody they commit sin, I make mistakes, I do bad things,
I'll admit to that, but tell them that all they do is sin.
I'm not going that far. What about whatever it might
be? When you tell somebody that,
there can only be one of two responses. I don't agree or I need this grace you're talking
about. That's the only response there
can be, one of those two responses. I don't agree with that. I just
can't see that regarding myself. I hear what you're saying, but
I don't believe it. I don't agree. You can come up
with all kinds of objections from that point of view. But
somebody else says, I believe that that is the truth concerning
me, and I need the grace you're speaking of. Saving grace. Now, the what of grace, folks
described in those first three verses, dead and sins, or the
who of grace, folks described in those first three verses.
The what of grace, by grace you're saved, And here is the why of
grace. And this is what was such a touching
thing to think about. We see the who. We see the what. Back to our text in Ephesians
chapter 2. Here's the why. That, in order that, so that,
that's what the word means, that or in order that for this purpose,
for this reason, this is why this is, that in the ages to
come, he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness
toward us through Christ Jesus. Grace is who God is. When Moses said, show me your
glory, how did God respond? I make my goodness pass before
you. I'll proclaim my name before you and I will be gracious to
whom I will be gracious. Grace is who God is. When he passed by before Moses,
he said, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious. God must be gracious because
God is gracious. It's his nature to be gracious. We read of the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ. We read of the Holy Spirit who
is called the Spirit of Grace. Grace is who God is. I love that passage of scripture.
We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the
Father, full of grace and truth. Speaking of the Lord Jesus, what
about John 118? The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth
came by Jesus Christ. Are you saying the law's not
true? No, God wrote the law, you know that, through Moses,
but the law doesn't give the character of God fully the way
God's grace does. God's grace gives us the whole
character of God, his mercy, his grace, his love. All the
law does is show us His justice and His righteousness in condemnation.
But grace is who God is. He delights in being gracious. And in the ages to come, through
eternity, He's going to show us the exceeding, immeasurable,
surpassing riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through
Christ Jesus. That's what eternity is going
to be. And it can't even be told throughout all eternity. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all. Here's this thought. He spared
not him for them. He spared not him for them. And he's going to spend eternity
showing those people the riches of His kindness and His grace. You see, God does what He does
for His own glory. Look at Ephesians 1 verse 6. It says that we're saved to the
praise of the glory of His grace. Look in verse 12, that we should
be to the praise of His glory who first trusted in Christ.
Verse 14, which is the earnest of our inheritance and to the
redemption of the purchased possession under the praise of His glory.
Now, understand this. This is so important for our
understanding. God does what He does for His
own glory. Now, we're the beneficiaries of that. Thank
the Lord Him acting in His own glory puts us in such a glorious
state accepted in the Beloved, but God does what He does for
His own glory to manifest who He is. Now, if a man acts for
his own glory, if he does what he does so people can see how
great he is, we're offended by it, aren't we? Why is it that
we're offended by somebody who toots their own horn and trying
to convince you about how great they are? Because we know they're
not. They're trying to rob God of
glory. They're taking credit where credit's not due. Who makes you to differ from
somebody else? What do you have that you didn't receive? Oh,
we find it so offensive when someone tries to seek the glory
because we know they don't deserve any more than we do. We know
that. We understand that. We believe
that. But God really does deserve this
glory because of who He is. He does deserve this glory. He really is like this. He really
is gracious and glorious and abundant in mercy and truth.
This is who He is. And it's only right for Him to
seek His own glory because who He is. He's the only being like
that. For me to seek my glory or for
you to seek your glory is utterly offensive. It's wicked. It's
wrong. It's trying to rob Him of the glory and do His name.
But it's only right for him to seek his own glory because of
who he is. Somebody says, isn't that being
egotistical on God's part? Well, that's because you think
he's like you are. If you make that charge against God, that
seems awful egotistical. That means you think he's like
you are. You see, you brought him down to your level. And I
like that as a man is, so he thinks others to be. And that's
what's going on there. Now that's born of a low view
of God. Now listen to this statement
real carefully. Before the fall of man, before
the creation of the universe, before the creation of angels,
Christ is called the Lamb slain. from the foundation of the world. And I love thinking about the
lamb slain from the foundation of the world. The cross is from
the foundation of the world before there was ever a sinner, before
there was ever the fall of man, before there was ever creation,
before there was even an angel. There's a cross. And the cross
is the declaration of who God is. Every attribute of God is
displayed In the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, we see His
justice. He's going to punish sin. We
see His holiness. We see His love. We see His grace. We see His wisdom in making a
way to be just and justify the ungodly. We see His power in
putting away sin. We see His mercy. Every attribute
of God is on display in the cross. The cross, I love saying this,
I don't know what it sounds like, but I've said it a lot. The cross
is the most God-like thing God ever did. The glory of the cross. The lamb
slain from the foundation of the world. The cross is God's
manifestation of his glorious character. And the fall of Adam
in the garden and the ruin of our race is for the cross. No fall, no cross, no sin, no
cross. The fall was decreed by God just
like everything else. And somebody's gonna get mad
about that. Why did he decree it? Well, if I get mad at that,
and I have gotten mad at it before, because I thought, there's nothing
I can do. I don't have any control in this
thing. It's all according to God's determined
counsel and decree and so on. Well, if I get mad at that, number
one, I don't love God. Number two, I don't trust him.
You see, if you trust him, you believe that whatever he does
is right. You don't look at him and say,
well, I disagree with that. I think that's wrong. You believe
that whatever he does is right because he's God. I trust Him
so infinitely more than I trust myself. And when folks start
getting upset, why didn't God save everybody? Well, it was
best for Him not to. That's why. It was best for Him not to. And
let me also say this. If it was up to me or you, who
would be saved? You know how many people would
be saved? One. You. That's it. Somebody would cross you, cross
you, cross you, cross you, do you wrong. That's it. more mercy. But God's rich in mercy. He's
rich in mercy and because of Him a great multitude are going
to be saved. Now, it's through this, oh the
third thing, you don't love God, you don't trust Him. The third
thing is you don't really believe you're a sinner. If you get mad at God
about anything He does that means you don't really believe you're
a sinner. If you really believe you're
a sinner and you think just and holy is he, if he passes me by,
he's right in doing so. Now, God, and I want to say this
carefully, but it's true, God never intended to save everybody.
Never intended to. Not everybody was elected. Christ didn't die for everybody.
There'll be some who experience His wrath, and I believe, from
what I can see in the Scriptures, that the lost and the condemned
are going to outnumber the saved. Now, I've heard people say, well,
God's gonna have more in heaven than there are in hell. Well,
that's not in the Bible. And somebody says, well, what about
infants? Wouldn't that make believers outnumber unbelievers? Well,
I don't know. I hope infants are saved. You can't prove positively from
the scriptures they are. You could prove that some are,
but I think they all are, but I don't know. I don't know. I
hope they all are, but I don't know. Whatever God does is right
and you see the wisdom of God. If he said all infants will be
safe, you'd have people killing their children in order to make
them safe. And if you said infants are not safe, somebody that loses
a baby is going to be in despair and upset and just forlorn over
that. And you can see God's wisdom
in not giving us an exact answer as to what happens in that situation. But the Bible never says there's
going to be more in heaven than in hell. As a matter of fact,
the Lord said broad is the gate and wide is the way that leads
to destruction and many there be that go in there. But straight
is the gate and narrow is the way that leads to life and few
there be that find it. God's people on the earth are
always described as a remnant, as a small number. Now turn with me to Romans 9
once again. I want to look at another passage of scripture
in Romans 9. Verse 22. What if God, Romans
9, 22, what if God willing, to show his wrath. And he is willing
to show his wrath and to make his mighty power known. Endured
with much long suffering, the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction. Now, what's that mean? Just what
it says. The vessels of wrath marked out,
fitted for destruction. Now I know this. If a man goes
to hell, he's got nobody to blame but himself. If you go to hell,
you're not going to go to hell because you weren't predestinated
or because you weren't elect. It's because of your sin. That's
the only reason God sends a man to hell. And I know this too.
Those people were fitted for destruction before of old ordained
to this condemnation. Now, that's the teaching of Scripture. Do I understand it all? No, I
don't. But I know this. If I go to hell,
it's all my fault. And if I go to hell, it's because
I was foreordained to that condemnation. God does what is right. And that's what we got to leave
it here. Whatever God does is right. But
here he's talking about these vessels of wrath fitted to destruction. And let me say this, God doesn't
do any unbeliever wrong in sending them to hell. They hated Him.
They sinned against Him. They had no desire to be with
Him. They had no desire to be like Him. As a matter of fact,
if they could, they'd put Him out of existence. They'd kill
Him in that scene on the cross. So God's doing an unbeliever
no wrong in sending them to hell. The punishment always fits the
crime. God gives exactly what men deserve.
But look what it says in verse 23. that he might make known
the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy which he had
aforeprepared under glory. Against the black backdrop of
these vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, we have the glittering
diamond of God's mercy shown in the vessels of mercy. God is good all the time. God is good all the time. And if this is the way he does
it, it's good. And what I'm giving is the teaching
of scripture. I ask you to see if what I'm
saying is not according to the scripture. I'm just reading scriptures
and this is God's word. And God is good all the time. He's God, shall not the judge
of the earth do right? And you know what my response
is? Why me? Why would he select me to be
the object of his mercy where he's going to spend eternity
showing me the riches of his grace and his kindness toward
me? Why me? Now, some would be angered by
this. They don't feel like God is doing
them right. And that's born of a low view
of God and a high view of self. That's all that's born of. And
others will say, why me? I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me, a sinner,
condemned, unclean. I love that song we sing Here's
one of the verses by Robert Murray McShane. When I hear the wicked
call on the rocks and hills to fall, when I see them start and
shrink at the fiery dayloose brink, then Lord, shall I fully
know, not till then, how much I owe. When I stand before thy
throne, Dressed in beauty not my own, when I see thee as thou
art, love thee with unsinning heart. Then, Lord, shall I fully
know, not till then, how much I owe. Now, I don't want to start
charging God with injustice, being his judge. I want to say,
Lord, why me? And I want to spread the gospel
message of salvation by grace to everybody in this planet by
the Lord's grace. May the Lord enable us to do
that. So there is the who, dead and
sins, what? By grace you're saved, why? that
he might show forth the riches of his grace to you throughout
all eternity. Let's pray. Lord, we ask in Christ's name
that you would cause us to know who you are and who we are. and cause us
to depend wholly on Thy Son and His grace. Lord, we say, why
me? Why such mercy to one such as
I? Lord, cause us to always be amazed
at Your grace. Cause us to be gracious, men
and women. Cause us to be heralds of your
gospel to men and women seeking their salvation, but being faithful
in the declaration of who you are and who we are and how you
save by your grace. I bless this message for the
Lord's sake. In his name we pray.