As we've been going through different passages of Scripture and seeing
the different numbers that the Lord used in His Word, I was
very excited to know that it was going to be number five tonight.
It's the number of grace. And that's one thing any grace
preacher enjoy preaching on is grace. We know that That there's
no sweeter. There's no sweeter message than
that of sovereign grace than than that of true grace. There's
only one kind of grace and that's God's grace. And it's unchangeable. That means it has to be sovereign.
It has to be holy. It has to be perfect and so.
I would like to examine five throughout the scripture in different
places that reflect this and the first is going to be our
text that will end up coming back to this at the end. Lord
willing, We'll start reading in Ephesians chapter two, and
we're gonna begin in verse number four. And it says, but God, who
is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us, even
when we were dead in sins. Now notice that that is a past
tense, were dead in sins. If you're of the Lord, if he's
called you, if he's saved you, you're no longer dead and trespassing
in sin, but you've been quickened. And that's what he says next.
You hath he quickened us together with Christ by grace you are
saved. And hath raised us up together
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. That
in the ages to come, he might show the exceeding riches of
his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus. For
by grace ye are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. Now, grace has been mentioned
as meaning unmerited favor towards man, meaning we don't earn it
and we don't deserve it. And that's certainly true. But
Greg actually wrote an article recently on it being demerited
favor. And I hadn't put that in our
bulletin yet, but I'm trying to look for it for this week.
But what that means is that not only did we not deserve it, but
quite the opposite. Whenever you're demerited in
the military, that means you're taken from one rank down to another.
You go backwards. And that's exactly the point,
is that it's demerited favor. The Lord saw us not only as not
being good enough, but quite the opposite, being other than
Him in every way. So not only is it unmerited,
it's demerited. We know that grace is by the
Lord and His own design. It's by His purpose, and it's
only in the Lord Jesus Christ. If we are to have grace, it must
be bestowed upon us. And that's what our text says
right here, that we're saved through faith by grace. It's
not of ourselves, not of ourselves. Men in religion, every single
religion that professes Christianity. Now, there's only one true religion,
And that is, and only one true gospel. And that is what we are
trying to declare even this hour. But men all over the world that
preach Christianity are preaching a works gospel, a works religion. But if it's by grace, then it
can't be of works. That's literally by definition,
the opposite of grace works is. Turn back a few pages to Romans
chapter 11. Because of the importance of
it, I would like for us to see that. Romans chapter 11. And verse six. And if by grace, then
it is no more of works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. But if it be works, then it is
no more grace. Otherwise, work is no more work. If it be grace, then it is no
more works. That's as clear and as simple
if you ask if someone asks you how are you saved and you say
by grace. If they tell you that they're saved by grace, but there
is one thing that they have to do one thing, it doesn't matter
what that thing is. Fill in the blank. When the Lord
Jesus Christ, his instruction was coming to me, all you that
labor and heavy laden. When he would say, believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. These are not
things that we do based upon ourself or our own merits. These
are not things that we are able to accomplish in of ourself. We're saved by grace through
faith. So if by grace the Lord's given
you faith, you will come into him. It's not that we come into
him and then he gives us faith in the grace to believe upon
him. Men and religion have it completely opposite. If it's
by works, It's no more of grace, and if it's by grace, then it
is no more of works. It can't be by definition. By definition, works means the
same in all religion. There's something you must do,
but the Gospel, the good news of the Gospel, the good news
of God's grace is it's already done. It's finished before the
foundation of the world. The Lord purposed to save his
people and it is finished. We don't deserve faith. Brethren,
we don't deserve it. But grace says believe. Grace says believe it. Grace
says that the Lord knows that we don't deserve it, and that
is the definition of what grace is. That's the beauty of grace
is that we don't deserve it and let and yet it has been bestowed
upon us. We don't deserve life, eternal
life, and yet Grace says live through faith. We don't deserve
to be loved, but by Christ by Christ Grace says I have loved
you with an everlasting love. That's the hope that we have.
Our hope is that we have been found in grace that we have found
grace in the sight of the Lord. You remember whenever Noah in
Genesis Chapter 6 it talked about how the Earth had become exceedingly
wicked and men were given in marriage and all manner of different
evil things, and it says, but Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. That's our hope, is that we would
find grace in the eyes of the Lord. It doesn't say Noah was
a just and upright man until after it says, and Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord. How can that be? Well, it's the
same. It's the same grace that Joseph found. The Scripture says
in Joseph found grace in his sight. Moses found grace in the
eyes of the Lord. Moses went into the Lord and
said, Lord, if I have found grace in your sight, spare this people.
The Lord said you have found grace in my side. It was not
that Moses or Joseph or Noah. Any of them had found grace because
they were looking for it. It was bestowed upon them. It
was bestowed upon them in the person of Christ before the foundation
of the world. That's how we find grace in the
side of the Lord. That's why grace is glorious
is it's we have nothing to do with it. That means I can't mess
it up. Remember whenever Esther approached
the king? I mentioned this, I think a week ago or so. Esther went
into the king and the king had the right and the authority to
anyone that approached him without permission. could kill them. And how they knew that he was
approachable is he would hold up his scepter. And Esther knew
that in desperation the Jews were going to be all but destroyed
because Naaman wanted to kill him. But the Lord, Haman rather,
Haman wanted to kill him. But Esther approached the king
anyways for the sake of her people. And we see that the king did
hold out his scepter. And you know what it says? And
Esther found grace in his sight. Esther found grace in his sight.
We see the picture of Christ in that, don't we? Approaching
the father on behalf of his people and the father being pleased
with his son and holding out the scepter. And because of that,
because of Christ satisfying the father, grace has been bestowed
upon his people, upon the ones that the Lord died for. Grace was upon the Lord Jesus
Christ himself. The scripture says in Luke chapter
20, verse 40, and the child grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled
with wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him. This is the
same grace that was found upon each and every individual I'd
mentioned up until here. This was grace that the Lord
Jesus Christ himself merited, merited for his people. This
is what he bestows upon us as his work, is his grace, is his
mercy, is his faith. This is what we rest in. This
is what we hope in. His grace is unchangeable. His
grace is all our hope and desire. All of the merits of the Lord
Jesus Christ that he bestows upon his people are our desire. That's our hope. John chapter one. And you know
the passage of Scripture in the beginning was the Word. The Word
was with God and the Word was God. And it goes on to say in
verse 14, and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. And
we beheld His glory as of the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace, full of grace and full of truth.
He's the only one that can bestow grace because He's full of grace.
Christ is the grace of God to the elect. Aren't you thankful
that his grace never gets old. It never gets old. We want to
hear more about his grace. Each time we come together, that's
what we want to hear about is not by works of righteousness,
which we have done, but according to his mercy, according to his
grace, he saved us. According to his grace, he loved
us. His grace is still amazing to the believer. Someone wrote
the song Amazing Grace, which we're going to sing that at the
end of this Lord willing. But the only way that grace can be
amazing is if you are the benefactor of grace, if it's been bestowed
upon you. Now, men, I've never been to any religious church
in Christianity, so-called, false religion, where men do not sing
the song, Amazing Grace. For one, there's not a lot of
gospel in that song, if you look at it, it's just true. It's a
wonderful song, only to the believer, though. We're the only ones that
can really enter in to God's grace being amazing because we've
seen ourself as the chief of sinners. If you see yourself
as the chief of sinners, you'll see grace as amazing because
you know what you are and what it took in order for the Lord
to save you, and we really don't understand what it truly took.
The only thing we do is just declare what it took. It took
the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. But the Lord's
grace is amazing to the believer, and it's always gonna be amazing.
Always gonna be amazing. It's amazing because we can't
approach God. We cannot approach God. Yet this
blood bought grace declares. We can come boldly to the throne
of grace, having obtained mercy to find grace to help us in the
time of need. This blood bought grace declares
you can worship a holy God, the Holy God. You can approach him
because of the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ. You can come
before his presence. This was reflected, the grace
that I'm describing in worship was reflected in Exodus. You
remember we talked a little bit about the tabernacle back in
Exodus, how they erected the tabernacle as a place of worship
and all the laws that were given that were very detailed and everything
that had to take place, even in the tabernacle itself. They
had five curtains, five bars, five pillars, five sockets. Even the altar was made five
cubits long by five cubits wide, and the height of the court within
the tabernacle was five cubits. What's the Lord saying even back
then? If we're gonna worship Him, it's by grace. It has to
be by grace. If we're gonna approach Him,
we're gonna approach a holy God, the holy God, the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's going to be by grace alone, by His merits, by the
faith of Christ alone. Worship by grace is simply looking
to Christ. Looking to Christ as all in our
salvation. By grace through faith. By grace
through faith. Grace is how He saves His people.
This is how He saves His people. Let's turn to John 5. Grace is how He saves His people. Aren't you thankful for grace
if it wasn't for the grace of God? There would be no salvation. There would be no salvation if
it was not for the grace of God. John Chapter 5 and verse one
says after this, there was a feast of the Jews and Jesus went up
to Jerusalem. Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market,
a pool which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda having
five porches. Well, there's grace right there,
isn't it? five porches. In these lay a great multitude
of impotent folk of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving
of the water. For an angel went down at a certain
season into the pool and troubled the water. Whosoever then first,
after the troubling of the water, stepped in was made whole of
whatsoever disease he had. And a certain man was there which
had an infirmity thirty and eight years. When Jesus saw him lie,
and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he
said unto him, wilt thou be made whole? The impotent man answered
him, sir, I have no man when the water is troubled to put
me into the pool, but while I am coming, another steppeth down
before me. Jesus saith unto him, rise, take
up thy bed and walk. And immediately the man was made
whole and took up his bed and walked. And on the same day was
the Sabbath. We see this man, just like us,
impotent. Impotent means without strength,
unable to get into that pool when the water was troubled.
The only hope that this man had at this time before Christ was
that the water would be troubled and that he could be the first
one into the water. Now, brethren, the good news of the gospel is,
is that the Lord, as he's passing by, is not just troubling the
water just for one person. The Lord's love far exceeds,
the scripture says, it's a number that's innumerable. We don't
preach that the Lord only saved a small, little, tiny, insignificant
bunch of people. The scripture says from every
nation, from every tongue, from every kindred, he's elected a
people. And the number is a number that no man can number. No man
can number, but the Lord numbered it, didn't he? The Lord knows.
So our hope is when he passes by, when he passes by, we're
not looking to the troubling of the water. We're hoping that
the Lord causes us, as we read in Psalm, the very first, when
we opened the service this evening, we're hoping that he would hear
us. We're hoping that as he passes by, he would have mercy upon
us in our impotency, that he would show us our impotency,
that we're born in sin and have no hope. That was the man's confession. When Christ said, will thou be
made whole? He said, sir, I have no man. I have no man. He didn't know he was talking
to God. He had a man right then, didn't he? He had the Lord Jesus
Christ, the man, he had the man, the only one that could help
him. That's why we gather together is that we would see the grace
of God in the man, the Lord Jesus Christ. We're coming into this
place and if, If you ever felt like this before when it comes
to physical things, you feel beat up and kicked around all
throughout like a pinball machine in this world that we live in.
We come into this place and we're hoping for a brief moment that
we would see the man, the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, I don't have
anybody that can fight my battles. I don't have anybody that can
take my place, but you can. You did. The Lord Jesus Christ
did. He fought all the battles for
his people. He won the warfare. He got the
victory. He saved his people. That's our hope that the Lord
would say unto him, just like he said unto him, would say unto
us, rise, rise and give strength in his legs. And immediately
when the Lord speaks, there is no time that passes by. It is immediate. Now I don't understand that.
I don't know how you get. a zero amount of time in time,
but that's what it says is immediately. It happened instantaneously.
There was no time that passed in between the time the Lord
spoke and it happening, just like when the Lord said, let there
be light. As soon as he said it, it happened. That's how the
Lord saves his people. There is no hesitation on our
part. Our response is immediate unto
him. We have life. And it's all by grace. Grace
is how he saves us. Grace is how he saved this man. What glorious good news it is
to know, to know that the Lord Jesus Christ is passing by. That's
our hope, that the Lord would just pass by and he would say
unto us, rise. He would say unto us, live. And
if he does, it's all by his grace and he gets all the glory for
it. Grace is how he saves us and grace is how he feeds us.
The Lord Jesus Christ feeds us. According to his grace, turn
with me to Mark Chapter 6. Mark Chapter 6. And you know this. You know this passage well. Look in verse 32. And they departed
into a desert place by ship privately. And the people saw them departing,
and many knew him. And ran afoot thither out of
all cities, and out went them, and came together unto him. And
Jesus, when he came out, saw much people and was moved with
compassion towards them." Now, brethren, there's only one person
that we have to have compassion from, truly. We hope, we hope
that the Lord Jesus Christ would be moved with compassion towards
us. And if he does, it's by his grace
that he does. It's not that he passes by and
sees that we are feeble and insignificant. Yes, that's certainly true, but
that's not the reason that he elected a people. He did it by
grace. There is no distinction. God
is no respecter of person. The Lord chose a people solely
based upon his grace and mercy and gave them to his son. We
shouldn't think that ourselves in any way, shape or form was
the reason that God elected us, but it was only by His grace.
It was only by His grace. And Jesus, when He came out,
verse 34, saw much people and was moved with compassion towards
them because they were as sheep not having a shepherd. And He
began to teach them many things. When the day was now far spent,
His disciples came unto Him and said, this is a desert place,
and now the time is far past. Send them away. that they may
go into the country roundabout and into the villages and buy
themselves bread, for they have nothing to eat. He answered and
said to them, give you them to eat. And they said unto him,
shall we go and buy 200 penny worth of bread and give them
to eat? And he said to them, how many loaves have you? Go
and see. And when they knew, they say
five and two fishes. And he commanded them to make
all sit down by companies upon the green grass. And they sat
down in ranks by hundreds and by fifties, And when he had taken
the five loaves and two fishes, he looked up to heaven and blessed
and break the loaves and gave them to his disciples and set
before them. The two fishes divided he among them all. They did all
eat and were filled. And they took up 12 baskets full
of fragments of the fishes. And they that did eat of the
loaves were about 5,000. Before time ever began, The Lord purposed to bestow grace
upon his people. The Lord purposed to feed his
people with Christ, and that's what we're seeing happening right
here. Yes, this is a figurative story, but it's a reality for
the believer. The number five represents grace
and the bread here represents the Lord Jesus Christ himself
as the bread of life. The two represent the water and
the word. The scripture talks about the
church that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing
of water by the word. All of this being broken at the
same time as the Lord Jesus Christ being broken for his people,
he had compassion upon his people and offered up his body by grace
for his people that we would be able to have faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ, that it would be bestowed upon us. And the
good news of all of this is, you know how much grace was bestowed? He said it, 12 baskets full.
12 is the number that represents the entire nation of Israel.
That's the Lord's people. 12 baskets full. Every single
one that the Lord Jesus Christ was given in the covenant of
grace, every single one that he died for will be full up with
the body of the Lord Jesus Christ by his grace. He will be fed
by the Lord Jesus Christ all by grace. I like in verse 39, he tells
them, he commanded them to sit down. I'm reminded in Psalm 23.
In Psalm 23, it says, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. That's what a sheep
eats, isn't it? Is the green pasture. You and
I, as the Lord's sheep, get to feast in the Lord's pasture,
what he has prepared for us as our shepherd. And what is that?
It's his body. It's the bread, and it's been
given by grace, the five loaves here. My question, whenever I started
reading this initially, was, is it for me? Salvation is a
personal matter. If the Lord chooses to save you,
then we rejoice together in that. But the salvation of the Lord
is a personal matter. I need to be saved. I need to
be saved. So my question as I read this,
Lord, even me, is there enough for me to be saved? And this
is not Certainly it's unbelief at the present moment when I
was thinking those things, but isn't that our fear is being
left to ourself that we would not have any part in this, that
we're playing a game or that we're fooling ourself or that
we've not really ever feasted upon the Lord? If that's your
fear, then the command to you right now is come unto me. Come
unto Christ for the first time if you never have. Come and feast
upon him because he says in verse 42 clearly, and they did all
eat and were filled." That's the grace that he gives. If you're
hungry, he's given you the need to be hungry and he's going to
fill you. He's going to feed you the bread of life. He's going
to feed you by grace himself. Another place that 5 has mentioned
his bread that he feeds is found in 1 Samuel 21. Turn with me
there. 1 Samuel 21. Did you know that it is impossible?
To exhaust the grace of God. Think about that. It is impossible
to exhaust the grace of God. There is plenteous grace with
the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to cover all our sin. Everything
that was required for the Lord to give us grace has been accomplished
in the Lord Jesus Christ. There's plenteous grace in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Do you know why it's inexhaustible?
Because it's based upon the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ alone.
It's based upon him. It's based upon his merits. Now
in Psalm 21, we find that David had found himself at the temple.
He's fleeing for his life from Saul. Him and Jonathan had made
the covenant that he would look after. They would look after
one another's families long after this particular account was taking
place. And we see David running into the temple and look at verse
one. Then came David to Nob, to Ahimelech
the priest. And Ahimelech was afraid at the
meeting of David and said unto him, why art thou alone and no
man with thee? Now look at David's response
here. And David said unto Ahimelech the priest, the king hath commanded
me a business. Now, was that true? No. The king
had not commanded David to do any business. David was running
for his life. David was famished. David was
scared. He was hungry. And he runs into
this temple and lies to the priest. And he says, the king hath said
unto me, let no man know anything of the business whereabout I
send thee and what I have commanded thee. And I have appointed my
servants to such and such a place. Therefore, what is under thine
hand? Give me five loaves of bread. That's the number of grace,
isn't it? Five loaves of bread. David wanted
to have the grace right then. He wanted the five loaves of
bread. Or what is present? The priest answered David and
said, there is no common bread under my hand, but there is hollowed
bread. If the young men have kept themselves,
at least from women, and David answered the priest and said
unto him, of a truth, women have been kept from us about these
three days since I came out and the vessels of the young men
are holy, and the bread is in a manner common, yea, though
it were sanctified this day in the vessel." Now, here we are,
brethren. We are approaching the Lord,
desiring the bread because we're hungry, because we're famished,
and yet we're lying. Is that not us by nature? We
are literally walking in desiring the bread, but yet speaking lies
out of our mouth as we approach. And this is what David's doing.
He's literally lying about his purpose of being there and what
he's doing. He couldn't tell him, no, Saul wants to kill me
and I'm trying to get the bread for myself, because then the
priest certainly wouldn't have done anything for him. So he
tells him, the only thing I have here is the sacred bread, is
the bread that's separated, that's purposed, for the Lord's worship. It is the hallowed bread. I have
no common bread. Did you know whenever you approach
the Lord, he has no common bread as it is of men? He has one bread
and it is holy bread. It is the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's why we come. We come to feed upon the holy
bread. We don't just want common bread. If you've tasted of the
good bread of the Lord, if you've tasted of his grace, no other
bread will do. We won't be able to leave and
go into another church that preaches a different gospel because it
tastes funny. It doesn't taste good. It's not
sweet to our mouth and bitter to our belly that we need it
to be being the Lord Jesus Christ himself. We need the bread of
life. And the only place to find it
is at the preaching of the gospel under the sound of the preaching
of the gospel. In verse six, he says, so the
priest gave him hollowed bread. For there was no bread there
but the showbread that was taken from before the Lord to put hot
bread in the day when it was taken away. And look in verse
eight, he says, and David said unto Ahimelech, and is there
not here under thy hand spear or sword? For I have neither
brought my sword nor my weapon with me because the king's business
required haste. And the priest said, the sword
of Goliath, the Philistine, whom thou slewest in the Valley of
Elah. Behold, it is here wrapped in
a cloth behind the ephod. If thou will take that, take
it. For there is no other save that
here. And David said, there is none like that. Give it me. Brethren, here we see that the
Lord Jesus Christ gave himself for his people that we could
have the bread of life. And this sword, this sword is
the same sword that chopped off the head of the flesh. Do you
remember when David faced the giant? Prior to that, he had
faced the bear and he had faced the lion. We have the law, we
have the flesh, and we have the devil right there at the same
time. And it's our David, the Lord Jesus Christ, going to battle
for us, slaying the giant, chopping off the head of the giant. That
is the sword of justice. This sword that he's talking
about wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod. The ephod was a holy
priest garment that it was behind the Lord Jesus Christ offering
himself up for his people, this sword of justice being drawn.
That's why David said there's none like this sword. This was
the only time that that sword ever awoke is whenever the Lord
saw sin upon his son and he executed his son for his people so that
surely goodness and mercy so that surely grace will be, we
will find grace in the eyes of the Lord. Surely this grace would
be bestowed upon his people because the Lord hath put away their
sin. This is what he feeds us with is his body. This is what
he feeds us with is his blood. This is what we feast upon is
the satisfaction that the father was pleased with his son. Now
in closing, I want to go back to Ephesians chapter two again. All this was done, brethren,
so that the Lord could show grace into His people. In verse 4. But God, who is rich in mercy,
for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were
dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ By grace
you are saved. And hath raised us up together
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus that in
the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace.
In his kindness towards us through Christ. For by grace are you
saved through faith in that not of yourselves. It is the gift
of God, not of works, less any man should boast. Brethren, we
see here that grace is how the Lord saves us. Grace is how the
Lord's keeping us, how the Lord's kept us, how the Lord's going
to keep us. We see that grace is how he feeds
his people by giving them his body and his blood to feast upon. We see that this is how we worship
him is by grace alone. And we see that grace will lead
us home. There's a song that says, marvelous,
infinite, Matchless grace, amazing grace, grace that is greater
than all our sin. Why is it amazing? Because it's
not by works of righteousness which we have done. It's not
by works of anything that we have merited or anything we've
accomplished, but it's all been through and by the accomplishment
of the Lord Jesus Christ. The songwriter wrote was grace
that taught my heart to fear and grace. My fears relieved
how precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed. Through many dangers, toils and
snares I have already come. T'was grace that brought me safe
thus far, and grace will lead me home. Let's stand together
and sing that. Number 236.