Grace, Beautiful Grace

Grace, Beautiful Grace Ephesians 2:1-10 New King James Version (NKJV) 1 And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, 2 in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, 3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Let us pray Holy Father, the Alpha and the Omega. Creator of moonlight and spring days. We thank you for for all of the blessings in our lives, both large and small and we ask that you bless us once more with your presence here today. Lord we pray that Your will be done in this message here today. We ask all of these things in the name above all names, Jesus Christ.....Amen. Today we're reading from Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians. So, first of all, what is an epistle? Quite simply, an epistle is a letter, especially a formal communication of something. Paul's letters to the churches he had founded in Christ's name make up the better part of our New Testament. Without the instruction on church edicate, his teaching on Christian doctrine, his description of spiritual gifts, and warnings against living as the world, we would not have the same church we have today. Thank you Lord for giving us our beloved St. Paul. I want to start by reading the first verses to you again from the 1611 King James Version. I sometimes love to hear the beauty and grace of the Olde English language; Verse 1And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; 2 Wherein in time past ye 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. Verse one tells us that God has quickened us, made us live again. He made us live again? When were we dead? Well, when we have not accepted God into our hearts, though were are living and breathing, our soul is still dead to everlasting life in God's kingdom. We have to remember He gave us freewill to accept Him or not, so we actually choose eternal life or condemnation for ourselves. God gave us this chance at saving ourselves from spiritual death through His son Jesus Christ. Jesus gave Himself as an ultimate sacrifice for our sins, because no amount of animal sacrifices were enough for atonement of our sins and no amount of laws were enough to govern our behavior. The laws only gave man a sense of self-righteousness, not God's righteousness and the animal sacrifices were akin to a bandaid on a gaping wound. Nothing that mankind could do was enough to erase our own sin. Only the blood of the Lamb of God was and is enough to wash away our sin. Only salvation from our Father through his Son is enough to save us. Only sanctification through the Holy Spirit in our life and staying in God's Word are enough to give us His righteousness. Only the beautiful gift of God's grace is enough to erase our tespasses and our sins. Next, the Apostle Paul tells us of how in time past we walked according to the course of this world. This sounds exactly like what we are facing as a church today. The world we live in is so enticing with all of it's distractions. Everything that is 'of the world' seems so pleasing to the flesh, it's so hard to resist. The early church was facing the same thing in Paul's day. The lifestyle of the Greek's and Roman's was so decadent, so much about pleasing the flesh, so much about embracing sin. It's quite the same as the modern culture we see today. Our television programs, movies, and print media promote everything that is about pleasing our flesh and our pride, and finding our true selves. Pretty much promoting everything that is against the Christian teachings we try to live by. It's kind of ironic in fact. Back in the 1960's the world saw the emergence of the hippie generation. Throughout the 1950's and early 60's, America had a very reserved, wholesome, and sometimes even legalistic culture. Everyone dressed a certain way, spoke a certain way, or they were looked at very differently. The hippie's were the counterculture. They looked, talked, and acted very differently, embracing a lifestyle of experimenting with many things, free love, no responsibility, and no accountability for their actions. Today, society has embraced those views as the culture of the day and those of us trying to live a Christian life have become the counterculture. For our views of trying to be a spiritual people, feeling a repsonsibility for doing good in our world, and bieng accountable to God for our actions, we are looked at differently. We're even looked at as radicals or rebels in some people's eyes, because we've given ourselves over to Christ and to living in His ways instead of spending our days trying to satify our flesh and 'find ourselves'. In fact, it reminds me of a quote from N.T. Wright the former Bishop of Durham in the United Kingdom. He once said Today we have a worldview which is about ideas, which is about self-realization, hugely popular in our culture just now, discovering who I really am. For goodness sake, Jesus didn't come to help me discover who I really am. He came to tell me who He knew I was really was and to do something about it and that's much better news! It's much better news indeed. To me, this is another example of the beauty of God's grace, if we will just open up our eyes to it, submit ourselves to His will for our lives and start living in it. Paul goes on to say; we walked according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience. The belief among Jews at the time was that air was full of spirits. The air was of the devil's kingdom and people doing evil were serving these spirits in the air and thus serving the enemy. The devil was the prince of the air. He was believed to be ruler over this fallen world and those living in sin were the 'sons of disobedience'. There's a lot of truth in this. The enemy is loose in this fallen world reeking havoc in it, encouraging sinful lifestyles, and causing pain; everything opposite of our loving Creator, but he's cleaver enough to fool people in blaming God for his handywork. How many times have you heard someone ask God why He would do something so terrible? How many times have you heard someone blame God for some tragedy? All too often people blame God for their child having cancer, a friend being killed in an auto accident by a drunk driver, or a town being destroyed by a tornado, but these things are not the work of God at all. Our God is not some cruel puppet master causing pain on His children. All of the manmade pollution, radiation, chemical by-products, and the evil of this fallen world cause all of this suffering, not our loving God. There is no evil in God. He didn't do these terrible things to you or your loved ones. He is the one whom you should be turning to for comfort, guidance, and healing when these things happen. Your pain is the work of the enemy, satan and man's sin which satan promotes. God is the one who gave us salvation from the evil of this fallen world in the form of His Son, Jesus Christ. That is the beauty of God's grace. When I was gathering my thoughts for this sermon, I ws trying to think of some things to compare the eauty of God's grace to, but I'm not sure if any of them can do it justice. One thought that came to mind was a picture from my childhood. It was a picture my brother had took while him and our dad were deepsea fishing with some friends of ours. He was facing off the back of the boat as the sun was rising over the horizon. A sunrise over the ocean is so awe inspiring. The hues of yellows, reds, oranges, and pinks against the blue of the sky and white of the clouds are almost indescribable. Then when you add their reflection off of the waves and the ripples in the water, it becomes a scene that leaves you speechless for a time. I loved this picture so much, that when we had to find something to draw portrait of in Junior High art class, I used this picture of course. It was truly beautiful and truly inspiring, just like God's grace. Enjoy those gift's like that that He gives us and don't let them pass you by. Another thought that came to mind was Niagara Falls. I've never been there, but after seeing so many pictures and films of the falls I know how beautiful they are. It's one of God's most beautiful creations. They're so majestic, so eternal, so wonderous, and so powerful. The flls are such a wonder for us to be able to view, but they are also very powerful. They're so powerful that if you get too close to them, the roaring of the water falling actually hurts yours ears and the power of the falls is so immense that it's crushing under their full power. Very similar to God's gift of grace, so beautiful and so powerful at the same time. Another example of God's grace was the season were in here in the United States right now. All of the plants are budding and flowers are beginning to bloom. Soon the bees will be out gathering nectur from the flowers, while unknowingly carrying pollen from one plant to another, which inturn garauntees another generation of plants, who in turn take sunlight in and carbon dioxide out of the air and through photosythesis, produce oxygen for all animal life, including us to breath and insuring another generation of us while we in turn breath out carbon dioxide for the plants to absrob again. It's a very beautiful circle of life, but does it yet compare to the beauty of God's gift of grace to us? I don't think so. The gift of God's grace is so amazing, that I don't know of anything that compare to it. This next part may be a little hard to listen to, but it's true. When you think of the awful things that this world can do to someone and what path it can lead them down, it's truly tragic. Let's take this story as an example. There's a young man whose home life is far from ideal. Maybe there were parents who had addictions and these addictions also made them abusive toward their children. Their son grows up in an environment of dependency and abuse. Without any good example of how to live and no family support, he ends up out on the streets trying to survive on his own. The odd jobs he used to find have dried up and he needs money badly. He not only needs the cash for food, but he also needs it because he's found alcohol and other chemicals as an escape to help him cope with his situation. He's desperate for money and out on the streets, so he does something that we think is unthinkable. He starts selling his own body in order to survive. As time goes on, his addictions become more consuming and now he's not only selling himself, he's pimping for three women as well. On top of all of this, he's got health problems that could kill him. He's as lost as lost can be isn't he? There couldn't possibly be anything than can save this young man's soul is there? A Christian woman who witnessed to him without end, no matter how rudely he treated her in return finally got through to him one day. After the lifestyle he had lived nearly killed him, he broke down and prayed to God for deliverence. God saved his life, freed him of his addictions, put him amongst good Christian people, and changed his life. Today he is a retired pastor who has ministered to people in both North and South America. He's even ministered to the women he used to pimp out on the streets. He's help to clothe and feed the needy. He's helped many people to have hope for their future and shown them that they aren't as lost and helpless as they thought they were. When people come to him and tell him of all the terrible things they've done and how they can't be saved, he tells them his testimony and they walk away with a spark of hope in their hearts. They say to themselves, if God can take someone like him and make him a pastor, there may still be hope for me afterall. I could tell you many more things about this man, but I don't want to give away too many details about his life story and give away his identity. You see, he's a close friend of mine and I love him like my own family, but I didn't tell him I was gonna use his story for a sermon, so I didn't give too much detail, but what I've told you is the truth. God has used my friend to do a great many things to further the kingdom of heaven here on earth. Don't you see the beauty and grace in all of this. God can take all of the ugliness, the lies, the addictions, the expoitation and the brutality of this fallen world and turn it into something beautiful enough to have a place in heaven for eternity. That's why I say that there is nothing more beautiful than God's gift of grace and all you have to is be willing to submit to God's way of life. When God see's that in your heart, grace is given to you out of His pure love, not by anything you ever did by your own hands. Remember what Paul told us: 1 And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, 2 in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, 3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit....Amen God bless you my friends, Pete.