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Reveal God Through Your Good Works
29 Plays1 month ago
Eph. 2:1-10
Recommended
Transcript
Humanity in Flux: Past, Present, Future
00:00:01
Speaker
Dr. Max Anders once said this, he said, all humanity exists in a constant state of flux, forever being influenced by our past, attempting to live in the present, all the while anticipating the future.
00:00:20
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I thought about this this week, living in flux, us Christians in this society. And I thought, what better example I can give you this morning than simply driving your car?
00:00:33
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Think about it, while you're driving your car, you're constantly looking in the rearview mirror.
00:00:39
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You're also, at the same time, hopefully, looking at your speedometer, or your iPhone,
00:00:48
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or your audio book, for some of you. And at the same time, you're looking ahead to see what's coming down the road. All three of these things are happening simultaneous.
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And I believe as Christ followers, our walk, our Christian walk, should be like this.
00:01:11
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In other words, it's vitally important that as Christians we look at our past, which involves a very dire state that you and I were in.
00:01:23
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We need to understand where we came from. Because that informs our current present reality. What God saved us from then speaks towards our future and how we treat other people.
00:01:38
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How we show God's grace and mercy and kindness through our good works.
Exploring Ephesians 2: Spiritual Deadness and God's Grace
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Brothers and sisters, we have to understand our past to appreciate our present so that we can do good works in the future.
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This is where we're going to go today. You'll see from your outlines. Hopefully you grabbed one. It's in your bulletin when you picked it up on your way in.
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Ephesians chapter 2, just the first 10 verses, we're going to look at the past, which is a ruinous state for unbelievers, the present, which is the rich state of believers, and then third, we're going to look to moving forward in the future, how can we display God's Abundant mercy and grace and loving kindness through our good works.
00:02:25
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If you have your Bibles, I invite you go ahead open up to Ephesians chapter 2.
00:02:31
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If you were here last week, you'll know where we left off. Last week was of all about God's great powers. And how he's given us access to that power. and And often what we end up doing is we try to do things on our own power and ah and we're miserable, right?
00:02:48
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We used God's great power. We said we could live lives of happiness and not worry. Remember we talked about don't worry, be happy. We had that great tune at the beginning of the sermon. I know it was hard to top last week's sermon.
00:03:03
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And I thought what song would be better this morning? But seeing our IT problems, we're not even going to do that today. I'm just going to stick right with God's Word. What do he say about that? I'm happy this morning because this 10 verses, brothers and sisters, is packed with doctrine.
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Essential doctrine. Things you and I must know as Christians, as Christ followers.
00:03:32
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It's... A message that you'll see today, it's at the very core of when we evangelize somebody and we share the gospel message. We'll see that today in these ten verses. Look with me here starting in verse 1, chapter 2, verse 1, New Living Translation.
00:03:49
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This is the Apostle Paul speaking to this church in Ephesus. He says, "...you were dead because of your disobedience and your many sins." You used to live in sin, just like the rest of the world, obeying the devil, the commander of the powers in the unseen world.
00:04:09
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He is the spirit at work in the hearts of those who refuse to obey God. All of us used to live that way, following the passionate desires and the inclinations of our sinful nature.
00:04:21
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By our very nature, we were subject to God's anger, just like everyone else.
00:04:28
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But God is so rich in mercy. And he loved us so much that even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead. It is only by God's grace that you have been saved.
00:04:42
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For he raised us from the dead along with Christ, and he seated us with him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus. So God can point to us in all future ages as examples of the incredible wealth of His grace and kindness towards us, as shown in all He has done for us who are united with Christ Jesus.
00:05:05
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God saved you by His grace when you believed, and you can't take credit for this. It is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.
00:05:20
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For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus. So we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.
00:05:32
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It's interesting to me how the Apostle Paul starts this message. Imagine, if you will, you're this church. I'm sure it's church just like you guys here in Cameron.
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It's probably First Baptist Church, Ephesus. It's probably where he's preaching at. And he starts, in a loving way, pointing to you guys. And he says, you guys, right there.
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You're dead because of your sin.
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You once lived that way, you guys. How popular of a preacher Paul must have been at that church.
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You were once dead, he uses this word, meaning you were spiritually dead. You were unable to appreciate spiritual things.
00:06:27
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It's interesting that he uses this term dead here. And it's crucial for our understanding of of doctrine today. Right understanding of doctrine, we talked about, remember, at the very beginning of this book, guides us in our right living out of that doctrine.
00:06:43
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We have to know what God's Word says, and the Apostle Paul tells these people, you were once dead, meaning You can't get up. There's no middle ground being dead.
00:06:55
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You're either dead or you're alive. There's no gray area. And he says you were dead as an unbeliever. You were incapable of responding to the things of God. Just as a physical dead body can't respond to physical stimuli, a dead spiritual person can't respond to spiritual stimuli.
00:07:15
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Unless something intervenes. Unless somebody comes to the rescues. I like Warren Wearsby. He gives his take on this. He says, friends, a corpse does not hear the conversation going on in the funeral parlor.
00:07:29
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That corpse has no appetite for food or drink. That corpse feels no pain. He's simply dead. He's not sick. He's dead.
00:07:42
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He doesn't need resuscitation. He needs resurrection. Don't you love Warren Wearsby? Friends, the reason why I'm landing on this so heavily is we have to understand the unbelieving world we live in.
00:07:57
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Oftentimes, I'll hear this as a pastor. I'll hear a comment like, can you believe what's happening in the world today? And then they fill in the blank.
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Men dressing like women. Women dressing like men. Men wanting to beat women and competing in sports. Can you believe what's going on in society today, to which I always answer, you bet I can.
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Because they're dead, and they don't understand what God has to offer them. They can't. And so for me, it provides me a little sense of reassurance.
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It's not that they're actively denying my lifestyle. It's that they don't understand it at all. They're incapable of understanding spiritual things. This is the case of the unsaved person. This is the case of the unsaved person in your family or your neighbor or your spouse.
00:08:56
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They don't have the spiritual capacity, the spiritual faculties to understand the things of God. It takes God doing something to pull them out of this dead state.
00:09:13
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Takes us right back here, I put as a note, as I read this again this week. Right back to the garden. Right back to the garden of Eden. Chapter 3, verse 3. You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither you shall touch it, lest you die.
00:09:31
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Brothers and sisters, what did Adam and Eve do? They did it. They touched it.
00:09:38
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And they took of that, and death entered. Spiritual death. Paul tells us in Romans 6.23 that the wages of sin is death. And that state of the unbeliever is that they are spiritually dead and they are incapable of saving themselves.
00:09:56
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Why is this important? Well, it points to the fact you can't save yourself. You have inherited this sin nature from Adam and Eve. That's why, as an unbeliever, we refer to you as children of wrath.
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You're a child of Adam.
00:10:14
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Why is this important? Well, I'm going to let you in on a secret I've heard from the pulpit somewhere else. Just give me a couple minutes. I'm going to get there.
00:10:26
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Not only are we dead, Paul goes on verse 2, he says, you walked in the ways of the world. The Jewish people followed the law of conduct. Their law of conduct was called the halakha.
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halakka meaning to walk. This is where we get our term, the Christian walk.
Inherited Sin and Worldliness
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It means that you are living it out. doesn't mean that it's a one-time offense. It means these people are living and walking constantly in the ways of the world.
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They're not only spiritual dead, but they're part of this other non-Christian world system. He says this is the world system created and energized by Satan, who is the ruler of the air.
00:11:11
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He encourages unbelievers to have ungodly ungodly ungodly actions. Much of the same way that if you had a spirit of enthusiasm, say you went to a baseball game and you're cheering.
00:11:28
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Yes, and you're standing up and maybe you paint your face. Way to go, Houston Astros. i Sorry, I don't know, is there another team, another baseball team? Houston Astros, right?
00:11:41
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of and yes i mean You're and you're doing stuff, painting your face and jumping up and down and cheering based on that spirit of enthusiasm. Paul's saying it's the same way those who are plugged in to this spirit of the air, this satanic kingdom, they they simply are not dead friends. they They don't know anything about spiritual things and they are disobedient in their ways.
00:12:06
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They're controlled by evil. They're not only... dead spiritual things, they're not only disobedient, it says they're depraved. Paul uses this term.
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Verse 3, look with me. He says, not only you, as he points to the Ephesian church, he says, all of us. All of us used to live that way.
00:12:31
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You're somebody whose circles are underlined, you might just want to underline all, all of us.
00:12:38
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All have fallen short of the glory of God. All have sinned, Paul is saying. He's including himself in this. All of these unbelievers who were spiritually dead, who were controlled by evil, who were influenced by the world, live in a very fleshly world. This is this term.
00:12:57
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The desires of the flesh and the wishes of the mind. That's the literal translation here. You're living worldly. You're doing the things of the world. It's no wonder when we watch the TV and things look so askew, it should.
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it should, because that's the world, and we are not of the world. We're in it, we're not of it.
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Their actions should look different. Their appetites should look different. The things they do should look different. And I put down here, when it comes to appetites, what do you and I crave?
00:13:35
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This is what I thought a lot about this week as I looked at my own appetites. What am I comfortable doing? Where am I comfortable being?
00:13:46
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Worldly events, worldly things. Do you feel comfortable and at home at a heavy metal concert?
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All you Ozzy Osbourne fans, don't send me an email on Monday.
00:14:02
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Is that what you enjoy? Is that what you are consuming?
00:14:08
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Because we consume that which is appealing to you and I. It's because we have an appetite for it. It's the universal condition of all fallen humanity.
00:14:21
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It's that they indulge in the things that they want. had a former pastor who told me, that you know the reason why you sin.
00:14:31
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because you love it so much. And if we really did some self-reflection this upcoming week, friends, we love the sin that we do. Otherwise, we wouldn't do it.
00:14:44
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We're all born with this fallen nature, this desire to do wicked things, to constantly turn from God. ah pastor, ah very famous pastor, once said this, 99% of us are basically good.
00:14:59
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And when I say that, you should know who I'm talking about.
00:15:03
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If I could tell you he's 100% wrong, 100% of y'all are bad, me included. We're all fallen.
00:15:14
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We're all sinful. We all have a bent towards fulfilling our own evil desires. And the consequence, Paul tells us right here at the end of verse 3.
00:15:25
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He says, because of that very nature, that thing that is in you, we are subject to God's anger, or if your translation says this, wrath. The kids don't these days don't know about wrath.
00:15:36
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That's an Old Testament term. That means because you're living out and you're walking constantly in that manner, you're on God's radar. And you are the target of His anger.
00:15:48
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And you should expect to that. Because that's what He says in His Word.
00:15:59
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Walking this type of walk, I put, or living in this type of manner... we should expect God's wrath. Calvin said this, he said, without Christ, everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, is guilty.
00:16:11
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Brother P's in our class today, he said, you're you know, when you sit in the in the courtroom, you're either innocent or you're guilty. We often like to think we're innocent, but he says, you you're guilty, Calvin says.
00:16:23
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Outside of Christ, there is no righteousness, no salvation, no excellence. You're the children of wrath, and those children are those who stand condemned in the sight of God, and rightly so.
00:16:37
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Why is this important when you present the gospel to an unbeliever?
00:16:44
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Well, because you have to impose upon them just how dire their situation is. Every great gospel presentation that you will do at some point gets to how bad their situation is as an unbeliever.
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And if it doesn't, you're doing them a disservice. They have to know how bad it was so that when they're saved, they can appreciate just how good that saving is.
Transformation and Union with Christ
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What is that rich state of the believers? What does that look like for for you and I? That's where we're going next. You'll see in your outline. Look with me in verse 4. Verse 4 starts with the the term, but.
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right Chuck Swindoll once said he wanted to write a book entitled The Great Butts of the Bible. But he says might not be the best title it might not be best received.
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But he said, if this is ever an important but, it's this but right here at the beginning of 4.
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Set against the desperate condition of fallen in humanity, where we have death to spiritual things, where we are controlled by evil, where we are influenced by the flesh, and we are entrenched in the world, says, even in that state, says, but God.
00:18:04
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But God is so rich in mercy. And he loved us so much that even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead.
00:18:16
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And it is only by God's grace that you have been saved. You've been moved from the ruinous state to a rich state. You've been moved from a dire state to a delivered state.
00:18:28
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You didn't do it. God did it. You couldn't do it. God had to do it. But just how rich this is, well, he gives us three great terms here.
00:18:41
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You've been made alive, you've been raised with, and you've been seated with.
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You've been co-enlivened, your notes may say, co-raised and co-seated. God made us alive even though we were dead in our sins, and he accomplished this spiritual resurrection by the power of the Spirit using the Word.
00:19:05
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And our spiritual resurrection is much greater because it puts us in union with Christ. And and brothers and sisters, when you see us baptize somebody up here in the baptismal, you'll notice that we say you are baptized with Christ, right?
00:19:21
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Buried with Christ, and you are risen with Christ in new life, right? It is this close union that we have with Christ that makes this spiritual enlivening happen.
00:19:35
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Because Christ was raised, we are raised. He didn't leave us dead and the graveyard. We are raised and united and we are exalted with Him and we share His throne um in the heavenlies.
00:19:50
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We're co-seated, meaning our physical presence may be here on earth, but our spiritual position is in the heavenly places with Christ Jesus. Since you then, Paul says in Colossians 3, since then you have been raised with Christ and set your hearts on the things above where Christ is seated at the right hand.
00:20:09
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Therefore, Brother Billy taught us this on Saturday morning, set your minds on the things above and not on the things of this earth.
00:20:19
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We're saved, we're made new, we're given new appetites. Therefore, we should be thinking and consuming new things, heavenly think. So I put this week, what are you thinking about in your home?
00:20:32
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What are you watching on the television? What are you listening on the radio? Which books are you picking up and reading? All of that is informing our thoughts.
00:20:47
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God's rich mercy, his great love, his surpassing grace and kindness, this is the act in salvation that God has made for the unbeliever. And he's made it as an act of grace. We talked about grace. I'm going to say this every time I bring up grace. Grace is what?
00:21:04
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Getting something you don't deserve. Easiest way to remember that. It's a free gift.
00:21:10
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As soon as you attach something to grace, it's no longer free. It has to be free. It has to be from God, this act of salvation.
Salvation and Good Works: A Theological Clarification
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It's something you can't deserve.
00:21:24
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And I put, just as a matter of fact, for those of you who are taking notes, you might want to write this down. Even if you wanted to somehow work your way towards God, you are incapable of doing it.
00:21:38
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Why? Because you're spiritually dead. Spiritually dead people can do nothing. They can't seek after God. This is why last week when I had my sermon, I said, Many people who say, oh um um my um my journey includes seeking after God. No, you're not. You're not seeking God. He's seeking you.
00:21:56
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You are incapable as an unbeliever to seek God. You're relying on this free gift from the Savior.
00:22:07
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You have been saved by grace. The basis is is grace. Through faith, the means is faith. And the object of that faith is Christ alone. the saving work of Christ on the cross.
00:22:19
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paul Paul elaborates this. He says, not only is this not from yourselves, it's a free gift of God. The source is not in man. It's not in yourself. You couldn't save yourself if you wanted to. But he says, it only comes from God. Verse 9, look at me. It reinforces this.
00:22:37
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Since no person who can bring salvation to himself by his own efforts, no one can boast I like the New Living Translation. Listen, the New Living Translation softens this. He says, salvation is not a reward for good things we have done.
00:22:54
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It's not a reward for the good things you've done. Matter fact, you can't do good works apart from Christ.
00:23:06
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Salvation is not a reward for the good things you have done so that none of us can boast about it. But look at verse 10. I love verse 10. If you're highlighter, highlight verse 10.
00:23:21
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God's pleasure in doing good works that he's already prepared ahead of time. This word is poiema. God's masterpiece is who?
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Brothers and sisters, it's you. His masterpiece is you.
00:23:43
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that just blow your mind? We are His good masterpiece. Romans 1, 20, and here are the only two places this word is used, by the way.
00:23:54
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We are His masterpieces, His craftsmanship, created only by God. He's the only person who can create anyhow. He's created you in such a way in Christ Jesus with one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to do good works.
00:24:12
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It's not that the good works you do to earn salvation, you can't do them. But it says on the other side of salvation, you're called to do good works. Do you see how that plays out? It's real important, this this understanding.
00:24:26
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Because quite often what happens is there's another branch of Christianity that believes you are earning your way towards God. That you are earning, somehow co-opting your way with God through salvation and and you couldn't be further from the truth.
00:24:46
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Catholicism is is that group of people. um And I say this lovingly because I came from that background. Many of you know that. oh So lost.
00:24:58
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If you have Catholic friends, brothers and sisters, those are people that need the gospel preached them as well. You cannot... You could not save yourself. There is no works you can possibly do to save yourself.
00:25:11
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It's only God's free gift and you placing your faith in Jesus Christ that saves you.
Reflecting God's Grace: Love and Action
00:25:18
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But once you're saved, how do we play out good works? How do we do good works? What does that look like? Well, that's where we're going to end today How do we display the abundance of God's mercy and love and grace and kindness through our good works?
00:25:32
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I thought about this this week. If it was easy to love people and to treat them well, we would all do it.
00:25:43
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But the person that's the toughest to love, the toughest to show forgiveness to, the person that that doesn't reciprocate that love to you, brothers and sisters, that's who we're called to do good works for.
00:25:58
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It's easy to do good works for my wife because, well, she's my wife and she's pretty and she wears a pretty dress today.
00:26:09
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That's little inside joke. It's easy to love her because she's lovable. But many of you know people, some of y'all in these seats that are unlovable at times.
00:26:21
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We're called to extend love and kindness and mercy and grace to these people. I just put this week, think to myself, think to yourself, somebody's coming to mind right now.
00:26:40
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Somebody in your life right now that's difficult to love, that's difficult to forgive, that's difficult to show mercy towards.
00:26:52
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Everybody has somebody in their mind this week. I would just ask you, as Brother Pease so eloquently said and in Bible study today, it's one thing to be convicted, it's another thing to take action on that conviction.
00:27:05
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And so while I want you to think about that person, I want you to write that person's name down in your notes. Just make a note, that person's name, and just say, I'm going to show this person mercy.
00:27:17
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I'm not going to allow them who slighted me to affect me. Matter of fact, I'm going to call them and I'm going to offer them a friendly ear, a helping hand, a kind word.
00:27:35
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Of that list, I circled kind word for myself because I find that so difficult for me. It's super difficult, I think, when dealing with difficult people to to offer a kind word.
00:27:48
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That might come very easy to you. um It doesn't for me. And so I want to work this week. I want to think to myself just how dire that situation I was before I became a believer, just how bad that situation was.
00:28:02
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And I want to be so thankful for God saving me.
00:28:07
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Then he reached down and he pulled me out. And that's changed my life so radically that I can't help but demonstrate that same loving kindness, that same grace, that same mercy to somebody else.
00:28:19
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And I have that person in my mind. I have that person here on my notes.
00:28:24
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And I just put this week, I'm going to show that person something through kind words.
00:28:31
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It's amazing how something small and simple as a smile can change somebody's entire day How we can convey grace to somebody just with a nod.
00:28:43
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Hey, I see you. I see the struggle you're going through.
00:28:52
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Sometimes, brothers and sisters, that's all it takes to open up a spiritual conversation. Hey, I see that pain you're going through. I know that kind of pain. I used to be you. And then you just open the door just a little bit to have that conversation.
00:29:07
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And then you just let God dictate the rest of that conversation. You don't have to go into a spiritual conversation trying to convert somebody. You just allow the Holy Spirit to do that.
00:29:18
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I just put, finally, let's walk in the peace that comes from being justified by faith and hold on to the hope of God's glory. That we might be those who walk the Christian life, not those who talk the Christian life.