Grace - meaning & its application in life

>> What is Grace?  Is it a license to Sin?

Rom 6:1-10, Gal 2:20, Col 2:12

There is quite a lot of buzz about this word, ‘Grace’ in the Christian world.  The word ‘Grace’ means experiencing God in Jesus Christ in our lives.  Grace is Jesus Christ dying in our stead, thus we are at peace with the Almighty.  It is something that we received freely.  It is not a license to sin, but rather a provision to lead a holy life.  When I was explaining the meaning of grace years ago to a brother, he was offended thinking that I am proposing some kind of restrictions akin to law.  That was a shallow understanding.  Law has been fulfilled by the Lord Jesus and now we are not in the Law which is the oldness of letter (Rom 7:6), but rather we have been discharged from Law and now we need to serve the Lord in newness of spirit (Rom 7:6). 

We are born in the old man which is the realm of the first Adam.  Then one day we believed in the Lord and proceeded to receive baptism.  This baptism into Christ is, in reality, a baptism into Christ’s death.  We have been buried with Him through the baptism because in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we might walk in the newness of life.  If somebody says to you, ‘brother, you took baptism in the Lord, so you ought to walk in the newness of life’, then do not be offended because it is not law.  When we have grown with Him in the likeness of His death, indeed we will also be in the likeness of His resurrection.  So walking in the newness of life is grace.  I request all the brothers and sisters to understand this deeply, - 'Grace is experiencing God in Christ and this is possible when we walk in the newness of life.’  Gal 2:20 says, ‘I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live in faith, the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.’  Is it Law?  Absolutely not, this is the newness.  Grace does not mean that you can keep sinning because Christ has paid the price for your sins that have been committed and will be committed in the future.  Yes, it is paid in full and then some.  It is the perfect sacrifice to the satisfaction of God.  Therefore, Grace is our reaction to this perfect sacrifice on our behalf by the Lord Jesus Christ. 

How can we walk in the newness of life?

Knowing that our old man has been crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be annulled, that we should no longer serve sin as slaves (Rom 6:6).  Have you come across anywhere written in the Bible that you are free to go around and sin without inhibitions, as the Lord Jesus Christ had died in your stead?  No!  We need to believe that in our baptism, our old man has been crucified with the Lord and we are no longer slaves of sin.  We are free in the Lord and we have newness in life and a responsibility to walk in it.  Further, since we believe that we have been crucified with the Lord, we also believe that we will live with Him.  For the death that the Lord died to sin was once and for all; but the life which He lives, He lives to God.  Hence, we who are in the resurrection of the Lord, live our lives to God.  This is Grace.  Amen.

Why Jesus Christ died for the sins of many?

Through one man death entered and through another Man 
resurrection from death

Bible readings: Rom 5:12-21, 1 Cor 15:20-28

Why should God Incarnate - Jesus Christ die to save Mankind from sin?  Why should an innocent man die for the sins of others? 

These are a couple of questions, a believer has to face while working in a multicultural environment someday in their lives.  In a way, these queries are good for spiritual nourishment, if we with a seeking heart ponder upon them with the help of the Holy Spirit.  However, these questions could prove negative and time wasting if the people who are asking them are applying their shallow minds or if their hearts are stubborn or have a malicious intent to damage the faith of a believer.  Hence, beware of the children of the Devil in disguise and their lies.  It is futile to talk them, as they selectively choose topics to propagate their lies aiming to influence the gullible.  And to face such liars, a child of God has to build a strong faith upon sound reasoning.  I have heard hypocrites saying that God has given human beings two ears and one mouth to speak less and listen more as if God had given them two mouths and one ear.  These are people who don’t want to learn from you the Way of God, instead toil hard to corrupt your hearts with lies.  So, be watchful and beware of these Antichrists because the Lord has forbidden us to cast our pearls before such hogs, i.e., minister the truths of God to people who consider themselves religious but are unclean in the sight of God:

Matthew 7:6

Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.

Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden and through him, Sin entered mankind.  With the entry of Sin, death entered and started to rule.  Here we can see that Sin and death are closely connected like buddies.  Now, how can the disobedience of our forefathers affect us?  This is the reason that unbelievers might thrown at you.  They see themselves not at all responsible for a mistake which Adam did.  This is not important at the moment, as Sin had entered the world through one man and it is affecting every one of us.  If you move to another country today, will it not affect your children and their children?  You might be gone, but your decision will affect the generations to come.  This is the law of nature.  If you are brown, your children will have the same features.  If your father has left behind a huge inheritance, will you not legally claim it?  Or would you say that it doesn’t belong to you?  In another scenario, you are liable to pay your father's debt.  It's completely legal.  No court will accept the argument that it was your father who took the debt and you are not bound to pay it back.  Therefore, When Adam, the father of the human race had disobeyed God, the entire human race had disobeyed in him.  Do we not die today?  If we believe that death came because of Adam, it is a glaring fact that everybody faces death today. 

What is then the hope for humanity?  We need another great Man who could give us hope, i.e., resurrection from death.  When Adam had sinned against God, man as a creation failed.  God being the Creator, could wipe out the defective creation and start all over again or make it successful by some other means.  So, to make man glorious once again from the fallen state, another Man has to fulfill the righteous requirements of the Law which the first man had failed.  Can you now figure out the need for another Man to die for the sins of many?  Remember we are not talking about any ordinary man here; this is Jesus Christ, the Second Person in the Trinity who became a divine human.  For the second person in the Godhead to successfully take on our transgressions, He had to put on flesh.  Hallelujah.  For all those who say that God cannot become a creature, are you saying that God’s power is limited that He is powerless to do a certain thing?  You may then say, “Yes, God can become a human being, but there is no need for Him.”  So, let us first understand that God can do everything and to ponder upon the need of incarnation, we need to first understand that God is able to become a Man if He wills.  The Christian message is that God didn’t have the need to, but He did it because He loved us to the uttermost.  The freedom He had given Man in the Garden of Eden was still intact and He received those who voluntarily accepted Him.  Then, to those who believed that Christ was the only begotten Son, eternal life is promised and this is our true hope.  Therefore, this message does not limit the ability of God rather proves that He can do anything He wills. 

Was there a need to die for the sins of mankind?  He could have just forgiven them from His throne.  Again to those people who propound such a theory to reject Christ, I say, do not make the Lord Almighty less righteous and unjust.  If God had, without any compensation, accepted mankind with their sinful nature to Him, He will have to make a compromise in His attribute of being infinitely righteous.  Next, why would He accept people with the same sinful nature which was not dealt with or say put to a dormant state?  The man was fallen and will God do the same mistake of accepting the man to Heaven, once again.  Hence, there needs to be a process which renews man.  This is another message of the cross, where the old creation is annulled and new creation is formed in its place.  This new creation is because of the One divine Human, the Second person in the Trinity, Son of God, Jesus Christ, who came to Earth in flesh, lived, died, resurrected and then ascended to the right Hand of God.  Not only a person is saved from Sin and death, but he also reigns in life through this One Person, Jesus Christ.  Hallelujah.

As in the days of Noah

The Business of Ark Building

Bible reading:  Gen 6:14, Mat 24:37-39, 1 Pet 3:20-21, Luke 17:26, 1 Thess 5:2,3, Luke 21:36, Rev 3:10

Noah:

Gen 6:5-7

In the days of Noah, Satan made his move by corrupting the world and filling it with violence.  God was patient, but He saw that the wickedness increased on Earth.  Every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was only evil continually.  It was the time for the Lord’s next move against Satan’s.  He repented making Man on the earth and it grieved Him in His heart.  What did He do to deserve such a grief?  He was the life giver and He was blessing Man with life and light and yet he fell to a sickening extent that it grieved Him.  Among all the tragedies of this universe, this is the grossest.  In His next move, God could destroy everything and wrap up Earth or allow wickedness to continue in front of His eyes as it was.  Then, He decided to destroy everything from the man to beast to creeping things to the birds of heaven. 

Hallelujah.  Noah found favor in the sight of Jehovah.  He was a righteous man, blameless in his generations; and He walked with God.  Walking with God is a wonderful thing and is a continual process.  This meant that Noah like his great-grandfather Enoch walked with God.  This was a perfect living, where God is acknowledged continually and His will is ruling over man's will.  The amazing thing about walking with God is receiving victory over death like Enoch who was translated without death by God.  Don’t you want to overcome the ultimate result of man’s fall i.e., death?  If you want to, then walk with God every moment, every hour and every day of your life.

Noah lived such a life that God became a winner.  He destroyed the evil part of the world, yet saved a handful to carry on with His plan.  Amen. Noah's generation was corrupt and was filled with violence.  God said that He was going to destroy the wicked people from the face of the earth.  But the good news was that He had a plan for saving his favored children.  He instructed Noah to build himself an ark of gopher wood.  The exact duration of the Noah’s Ark project is unknown, but, we know that it took 75 to 100 years for the Ark to get completed.  God gave adequate warning to Noah and enough time to complete the ark.  

Noah was a herald of righteousness (2 Pet 2:5) in his generation.  Surely people of his time must have noticed the things that were about Noah and the ongoing project which might have led to some curiosity in the people about the ark.  So, Noah as a man of righteousness would have given sufficient warning to the people about the impending judgment of God.  Yet, they didn't care much and they were eating and drinking and living a violent, corrupt and sinful life.  People would have mocked Noah and persecuted him for propounding a theory of an unimaginable thing like a flood that can disrupt their present sinful lives, even though they knew that their sinful lives deserved divine judgment. 

Gen 7:1-16

God invited Noah and his household to enter the ark.  There was a 7 day notice period after the entering and the commencement of flood.  The world around him would have seen Noah abandoning everything and entering the ark, yet none repented.  The door of the ark was open still during this period as the final preparations were going on for 7 days.  After a week, the springs of the great deep burst and the windows of the heaven opened.  And on the same day, Noah and his family entered the ark which he was built for about several decades against the mocking, against the evil generation, against all opposition of the devil and men.  Now, here is the awesome part, Jehovah shut the door behind Noah.  It reminds me of the shutting of the door for the 5 foolish virgins in the parable of ten virgins who didn’t have extra oil with them.  Once you entered the Ark, there is no way out because God had shut you inside.  And Jehovah, the evil generation with all its corruption and violence and the rising flood were outside.  Now, who can save the wicked people from the wrath of Jehovah?  The flood was a surprise for them since they never believed Noah, never cared for God and the theory of Ark would have seemed foolishness to them just like how the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is foolishness to the world today.  The moment Noah received the revelation of the coming destruction, he would have forsaken his everything that was in the world that was destined to be doomed, and he would have worked to build the ark full time along with his family that would save him in the future.

Today, we are just like in the days of Noah.  We are building the ark in one sense and have entered the ark in another, but the door is open still just like it was during 7 day notice period.  We are mocked and called fools for the sake of our Lord, but, we are building an ark and also have entered it.  Just like Noah, we have received an adequate warning and the time of the flood has been announced.  Like Noah, we know that the world which is full of violence and corruption is destined to be doomed, and it will be unwise on our part to put our faith in the world which will be destroyed anyway.  Nevertheless, you go into the world, learn your skills and have your training under the supervision of God and build the ark.  You have some extra money, give it to the workers of the Lord and in a way you are building the ark.  You serve the Lord with your first and best love, you are building the ark.  Use your gifts in the church, you are building the ark.

The Lord Jesus has instructed us clearly in Matt 24:37-39 about His second coming which would be like in the days of Noah when people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered into the ark.  The Lord’s second coming is His shutting the door of the ark from behind Noah.  No more chances after that; no more grace time.  It’s all over.  For Christians, the Lord has instructed to be vigilant and watchful of His coming which will be like a thief in the night.  His day will dawn upon us quickly, but we don’t have to be surprised if we are in the business of building the Ark, and our Ark is our Lord Jesus Christ.  For when the world will say Peace and security, then the sudden destruction will come upon them, they shall by no means escape (1 Thess 5:2-3).  

Watch out brothers and sisters, build your ark.  Don’t build boats, but build the Ark.  Ark is built in the church.  An individual boat cannot withstand the ferocity of the flood, but if we are in Jesus Christ our Ark, we will be saved.  Do not worry too much about the world which is full of violence and corruption and is destined to be doomed, but rather worry about the Ark.  Let the world worry about the peace and security, for you are safe in the Ark.  Hallelujah, this is the ultimate move of our beloved God, the Creator.  Amen.  

William Wilberforce's legacy

William Wilberforce (1759-1833)

William Wilberforce was born on Aug 24, 1759, to a wealthy family in the East Riding of Yorkshire.  Being affluent, he became well known in several social circles while still a student, mostly because of his partying, gambling and playing cards.  This is also the time when he met William Pitt the younger, which marked the beginning of a lifelong friendship.  Both Wilberforce and Pitt became members of the House of Commons.  Then, in 1784, William Wilberforce won his campaign from one of the largest constituencies of England and was elected as a Member of Parliament.  His eloquence and pleasant demeanor might have done the magic for him in the elections.  

In 1785, while traveling with his mother and sister around England on vacation, they were joined by an acquaintance named Isaac Milner, who was the younger brother of William's friend Joseph Milner.  Mostly, they discussed the New Testament in Greek during the trip.  William maintained a private journal and read the Bible regularly.  It was like a rebirth for him when he found God or rather as he described to one of his acquaintance that God found him.  This was preceded by several months of introspection and regrets of the sins committed.  Later, William decided to become a devout follower of Christ.  At this juncture, he contemplated his next move whether to leave politics for good and along with it the social circles?  For guidance, he approached John Newton, an Anglican clergyman, a former slave trader himself who repented before surrendering his life to Christ.  John Newton also wrote one of the all-time favorite Christian Hymns, ‘Amazing Grace’ after experiencing firsthand, the love of God in his own life.  He advised William to stay in the politics that God could use him in a better way.    

William Wilberforce then engaged himself in the parliamentary affairs with increased diligence and conscientiousness, making up for the lost time now effectively as a Christian.  He advocated various reforms by introducing several bills in the parliament for the betterment of life for all.  And for his spiritual growth, he adopted a rigorous routine of self-examination, Bible study, and fasting.  He set goals and evaluated his motives on a regular basis.  He deeply inspected his words and actions of the day in the evening and prayed about it.  Further, he wrote a list of people who needed prayers and would pray sincerely for them.  God used William in an instrumental role in the complete abolition of slavery by the year 1833.  The struggle that took 55 years to succeed from the time Thomas Clarkson and his team of abolitionists first approached William Wilberforce for his help as a politician. 

John Wesley, founder of Methodism once referred to Wilberforce and said, “Unless God has raised you up for this very thing you will be worn by the opposition of men and devils.  But if God be for you, who can be against you?”.  William's legacy proved that God had indeed raised him for the very thing and the mighty hand of God led not only William but others who toiled for the sake of human equality against the opposition of man and devils to victory.

    

William Pitt the younger

William Pitt, the younger, a lifelong friend of Wilberforce was born on 28 May 1759.  He became the youngest Prime Minister of Britain when he was just 24 years of age and had the favor of King George III in his political career.  Later, he became the PM for the second time in 1804 until his death in 1806.  His career was dominated by major events in Europe like the French revolution and the Napoleonic wars. Further, he engineered the Acts of Union 1800 and tried to get Catholic emancipation which didn’t succeed much.

The crux of the Message 

Now, I come to the crux of this message.  In his deathbed, William Pitt, a man who had a super successful political career and a long list of achievements to speak for, said to his dear friend William Wilberforce that he was scared and wished he had Wilberforce's faith.  You might be a Christian, but faith needs to be built up over time.  It is not a momentary thing but a long journey of spending quality time with the Lord Jesus. 

No matter what you do in this world, it will all boil down to the climax of our lives when faith will seem the most important thing to take on death fearlessly.  All your earthly accomplishments and efficiency will not speak for you before the Lord, but, your faith and your belief in the Lord will save you.  To face the inevitable door of death and the uncertainty that lay ahead needs courage.  A Christian should amass this courage throughout his lifetime, disregarding all the labels given by the world like freaks, fools etc., while tarrying long in faith to meet his greatest love and His Creator beyond the dark plunge. 

One of the tactics of the devil today is to sedate you with the earthly affairs and indulgences of this world and make appear the nearness of death as a faraway or an alien experience.  However, when death will knock seeking us specifically, then our hearts and minds will take a sober view of the solemn matter and in those moments only the faith in the Lord can truly comfort us. 

The story of William Wilberforce is a common Christian story of finding God and following Him voluntarily with steadfastness and courage in a true sense.  William found his gifts and used it for the welfare of others and his faith in the Lord Jesus had changed the course of history.  But, I go a step further and remind you of the young man, Isaac Milner, who had fellowship with Wilberforce during the European trip.  A simple sharing of God’s word with one another can alter the history in a true sense.  Isn’t this a wonderful example?  May the Lord encourage us to have a faith as strong and as consistent like William Wilberforce's,  and at the same time, remembering other iconic figures in William's story like Thomas Clarkson, Isaac Milner, John Newton, Barbara Spoon, his wife and his dear friend, William Pitt, let us remind ourselves that God is the ultimate Winner.