You can sometimes be such hard-hearted people, but as we look at you and as we focus upon who you are, we are amazed at your majesty and your power. We look at who you are, Father, and we see that the whole creation came into being by the very word of your speaking. You spoke and it came to be. Lord, as we think about the beauty and the infinite variety of the creation around us, as we look at the sky, as we look at the trees, and all that you have made, as we look at the different faces, we are aware Lord of your might and your creativity that transcends anything that we understand, and so we praise you. Father, we come to you this morning thanking you for your wisdom and your mercy, your love and your kindness, that you are a God who is immutable, that you never change, and that you are always and entirely reliable to us. We come into your presence today and we worship you. We bow before you because you are worthy of all of the praise, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In Lord, as we come into your presence today, we confess our sins. We confess that oftentimes we haven't even thought about you. We go through a whole week and we haven't meditated upon your attributes and your glory, and Lord, Father, we know that you are always there when we need you, but Father, sometimes we don't think about you much. We confess that. We confess that sometimes, Father, we have erroneous ideas about you, and then we think that you are not powerful enough to meet our needs and that we become so fearful about the future, and we confess that, Lord, we are sinners and we confess that, but as we come as your people today, we come and are thankful for the cross and the gospel. The good news that we are yours not because we are good, but because of Christ. The good news that we are forgiven by faith in Him, not by what we have done, we come thanking you today for grace, and Lord, we just can't get enough of it. And we pray this morning that you would open our hearts and teach us, Lord, more about your grace, and that we would leave this place as changed people because of all that you are and all that you have done, and all that we are now in Jesus Christ. Father, we thank you for Him. We thank you for what you have done. We thank you for the things that you have done and are doing behind the scenes that we don't even know that you are doing, but Lord, we do know that you have done a lot, and we thank you for causing the rains to come and the fires to be put out, for the lives that were spared, but Lord, also, we thank you for how you have forced many people to face reality, and to see that life is more important than things and homes, and Lord, we pray that more and more you'd cause others to know about your goodness through even the tragedies around them. Father, we thank you for the two sons that you gave to the Smiths. Lord, you are truly a God of grace, and Father, they've waited a long time, but in your time, we provided, not one but two. And Lord, we're reminded that you have adopted all of us into your family, that none of us deserve to be in your family, but you have adopted all of us, and how thankful we are. And Lord, we pray that you which continue to build us into the image of your Son. Father, today, as we look into your Word, we pray that you teach us. We pray that you fill us with a love for you and a love for other people. As I had to take the truth of grace and the gospel to others around us that you would use this church as your missionaries for people that don't know, but need to know, and really want to know about your grace. Father, build in us and teach us this morning. We thank you for the one who comes to open your Word. We pray that you bless him, his ministry and his family. We pray that Father, you would make us the learners and him the teacher, but you through him. And now Lord, we are grateful that we can give. Father, you've given so much, it's a privilege to give back, and as we give of our offerings and our tithes, we know that we can never and have never outgiven you. And so we give, wanting to be a part of what you're doing, and also, Lord, desire to give honor and praise to your name. So here we give and receive, as we give these things in the strong name of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Thank you, Pete. To be perfectly honest with you, if I'd known Pete were here, I wouldn't be here. He was supposed to be on vacation. Don't you have a home? I mean, do you know why we come here? We come here because of Pete's preaching every week consistently, line up online and preceptive on precept. He teaches God's Word clearly with grace and freedom. And I feel like I can do another week after, and I hate it when I'm traveling on weekends and can't be here when Pete is preaching. So I was doing this because I thought he was gone. Man, I don't know. He's here. I'm really quite angry about this. They can be perfect. We came here because of Pete's preaching, but I want you to know that we just love being a part of this church. He's to be praying for my wife Anna. She's leaving this morning to see her doctor in Panama City, who was her doctor in Miami, and they found what could be a problem. We don't think it will be, but she and our daughter have left early this morning, so be praying for her. And I know you will. Because this is a praying church. We came for Pete and we stayed for you guys, and I wish you had said one of the tremendous voices in the choir who has added so much to the music ministry of this church or something like that. I would have felt better about it, if they put up with me in the choir, and I'm so glad to be a part of it. I haven't had so much fun in my entire life in the church. It's singing in the choir. It's better than being the preacher Pete. Trust me. A lot better. If you have your Bible, and if you're spiritual, you will. Turn to the third chapter of the book of Galatians, and we're going to be looking at the first 13 or 14 verses in that book. Before we do that, let's pray. Father, we're glad that we belong to you. We're glad for the laughter of your people. We're thankful for the place you found us and the place you're going to get us. Father, we're grateful for Pete and for Karen and for the staff and the elders and the deacons in this church. For the times we rejoice when our family has something happening good, and when we weep, and taste salt together. Father, we're thankful for the word that's preached so clearly in this place. We're thankful for grace. We're thankful for home. Father, remind us this morning of home. Remind us that we don't get there because of the calluses on our hands, but the nails, the scars through the hand of another who died in our place. Father, we praise you, and we worship you, and we adore you. And now, Father, we pray for the one who teaches that you would forgive him his sins while they are many. We would see Jesus and him only, and we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Pete was a general assembly last week, and as you know, Pete and I do a question and answer program on our national radio program every Friday. And I asked Pete what he was going to be doing, and I said, boy, I'm glad I'm not. If I get to heaven, and Jesus calls the meeting, I'm not in heaven, I'm in the other place. But Pete said, I'm going to general assembly, and he said, I'm going because a lot of people in our general assembly have said, we've got to watch this grace thing. It's getting out of hand. That makes me angry. It really does, and I know I'm a man of God. I'm not supposed to be angry, but I want you to know it really does. It burns my chicken. It makes me very upset. And then I realize I'm not called to be upset. I'm called to teach. I'm going to recommend a really good book to you. It's by a fellow by the name of William Hendricks, and it's called Exit Interviews. There are a lot of books on church roads where somebody goes to the church, interviews, people in the church about why they came. They find out where the needs are, and then we can grow a church. But they're very few who stand at the back door and interview people as they leave. And so this book is published by Moody, and I would recommend it highly. This book is written by a man who stood to the back door and he asked people why they were leaving the church. And what he found was so overwhelming that I'm still thinking about it, and I read the book two years ago. One of the things that he says in the book, and I'm going to read a rather long passage in it, is that he heard a pastor say, we've got to be careful of this grace thing, people will misuse it. And then he writes as follows. Modern-day American Protestantism has given back a lot of theological ground that Luther and Calvin and other reformers in its heritage paid for in fears, and that Christ paid for in blood. He said he not only heard, they're going to take advantage of it, but he heard it over and over and over and over again by leaders in Christendom throughout America. Most churches preach grace and live works. Story after story bore this out. The results were invariably tragic. Perhaps the greatest tragedy was that a system promising forgiveness to people and freedom from guilt ended up making so very many of them feel so very guilty. We need a theology of grace, here's the situation, never have the expectations on believers dim higher. We know too much, for example, think how much we now understand about family relationships and the development of children, for parents that knowledge translates into a longer list of shoulds and ideals at which past generations would have gassed. They're so very many of them, and they are so very high, and the family is just one area of responsibility, similar list of what committed Christians ought to do could be generated for the believer's work, participating in the church involvement in the community, responsibility in the world so on and on and on. Get it up, and it's a crushing burden, and it's absolutely staggering. Yet never have people been less able to live up to these expectations. The standard response to the fact is that, of course, where weak as human beings, but with Christ, we can do all things with all due respect to that point of view. Let me say plainly that it's not going to happen that way. Spirituality is a process, and that process includes failure. However, not everyone who claims to speak for Christ speaks the language of the good news of grace, and therein lies the tragedy and the crisis of the church, especially for the conservative evangelical side of the church. Based on the stories presented here in this book, I believe that the church needs to decide how long it's doing to cobble legalism in its ranks. By legalism, I mean people who preach grace but practice works. People who inflict guilt on others for being human let alone sinful. People who say, well, we don't want to go overboard on this grace thing because people will take advantage of it. The church has made it comfortable for those who hold that position, but at what cost? It's keeping people out of the church. It's driving people away from the church, and it's poisoning the lives of those who remain in the church. So why permit it? Why even tolerate it, especially when Jesus and Paul, among others, reserved their harshest words for those who compromise grace? I was invited to teach at a Christian college, or a lecture at any rate, and one of the classes on the concept of leadership. And when I was speaking during that particular time, a young man sat on the front row in his body language, which was very angry and withdrawn and so on, and after it was over, he came up to me, and I said, son, did I say something to offend you? I mean, what do you have to say? No, you didn't say anything. He said, I just don't like what you are your church does. And I said, what's that? He said, you're not biblical. And I said, well, son, a lot of people don't like what we do, but rarely are we accused of not being biblical. And then I said, what are you doing some specifics? He said, well, you have jazz in your church. Well, we did have jazz in our church. We invited people from the University of Miami and the School of Jazz to sometimes jam, and they did it for the glory of God. And then I showed him some Psalms, and then I asked him, what was so spiritual about the no-day? He said, what do you mean? I said, what's so spiritual? Is it secular? Or is it sacred? What's so spiritual about the no-day? And he said, well, nobody ever asked me. Now I have to think about that. And then in his face cleared, and he smiled, and he said, oh, I see what you mean. I walked out of that classroom, and there were a whole lot of students that gathered around me and started asking questions, and one young man came up to me and said, I've got a problem with your church. I said, well, get in line. We had just done God's spell in the church, and the church where I was the pastor was a theater in the round. And God's spell was an interesting thing, and don't let anybody kid you. That was a wonderful presentation of the gospel. In the clown who was Jesus, and his disciples were clowns, when he said goodbye to his disciples before he was killed, I would sit every night in the back of the auditorium and say, I ain't going to cry. And I'm an old cynical guy. I don't cry about much. And I couldn't keep it in the tears, so it would start coming down my face. But the word damn was in the play, and we prayed about it, and decided to lead it there, because it was a part of the script, and it was right in that particular place, and I knew he's going to jump on me about that. And I said, you had a problem with that word, didn't you? And he said, no, no. He said, my girlfriend is a brand new Christian, and I brought her, and what we had a problem with was the prostitute. Now, at a certain point in the play, there's a song called Turnback O Man, and one of the ladies who starred in the play would come down the aisle singing Turnback O Man, and she would pick the most uptight legalistic Pharisee in the church and sit in his lap, and sing that song. And I used to sit in the back of auditorium and say, no, not him, man, I need this job. Don't do that. And I thought, I said, the prostitute, and he said, yeah, you can't do that in the church, and I said, son, have you ever thought that if you had lived in the first century, and you had been around Jesus, you would have seen the real thing, and you said, well, never thought of that. I said, well, good, think about it. Now, I've got in the car and drove away that morning from that Christian college, and I was so angry, I'm a spit. And that's when God spoke, may have been rich a little, but it sounded like God. And God said, Steve, those people love me more than you do. They're my lands. You don't beat them. You teach them. Let me tell you something that God's done in my life, and I'm not really spiritual. This is family, so I can be honest. I don't live it all the time. God's given me a love for people who are struggling with sin, and it become hard and brittle and legalistic and fair say, a college just get mad at them. And now God is giving me such compassion for that, and it's nothing but a gift from Him. I'm going to talk about grace this morning, and I'm not going to do that to teach you because you know it. Our pastor's been teaching us about this for a long time, but this take is going to go to some other people, and I hope they hear it, and I hope there's some people in our general assembly who get a chance to hear this particular tape. If it's grace, what is it? Well, grace in both its Hebrew and Greek form does not mean what we think of when we think of as a person with grace. It means the unmerited favor of a superior for an inferior in the Bible, where the inferior, finite, he is the superior, infinite, he is God, and we are nobody's. And grace is the love with which he loves us when there is no conceivable reason why he should. Grace and the teaching of the Bible is built on three premises, and the first is we were sinners, and he found us and loved us because of the blood sacrifice of Christ, and called us to himself. You knew that? Let me tell you the second premise. We are still sinners, and he still holds us. He still loves us because of the blood of Christ's own son. And thirdly, we are sinners who are saved and held and empowered and loved for only one reason, and that is his grace. The methodology of faith alone, the reality is that he holds you. You don't hold him, no matter what you do. By the way, somebody made a cartoon in Senate to our ministry, it's hanging in the lobby of our building, and it shows me standing in front of people like you and their hair is standing on the end, and they let this shot look on their face, and the pastor is explaining, well, there are other interpretations. I want you to know, I know what you're thinking right now because you're religious and God hates religion. Listen to me. You're thinking, well, you can't possibly mean what I think you're saying. That's exactly what I mean. So, well, he's not talking about that. Yes, exactly what I'm talking about. That's what grace is. It's what you are, and what I am. The question is this, why grace? Why is it so important? Why would I take valuable time in our church and talk about this subject? Why spend so much time? Well, we're going to talk about that, and I move the previous question in the scripture is Galatians 3, starting in the first verse, and you're looking at the NIV version in your bullet, and if that's what you're using, I'm reading from the new King James, just because it's the Bible that I use, the NIV is probably better, but it's similar, and you'll get two versions while I read it to you. All foolish Galatians who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified. This only I want to learn from you, did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by hearing of faith? Are you so foolish having begun in the Spirit, you're now being made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered so many things in vain, if indeed it was in vain, therefore he who supplies the Spirit to you, and worked miracles among you, does he do it by the works of the law or by hearing of faith? Just as Abraham simply believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness, therefore know that only those who were a faith are sons of Abraham, and to script your foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel to Abraham before saying, in you all the nations shall be blessed. So then those who are a faith are blessed with believing Abraham. For as many as are the works of the law or under the curse, for it is written curse it is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them, but that no one is justified by the law, and the sight of God is evident for the just shall live by faith. Yet the law is not a faith, but the man who does them shall live by them. Christ is redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written curse it is everyone who hangs on a tree, that the blessing of Abraham might come up on the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the spirit through faith. I move the previous question, and the first thing I want you to, I want you to see in the text that I just read to you, is an amazing slippery slope. Look at the first verse, and then look at the third verse in the text. Old foolish Galatians, who in the world has bewitched you, that you should not obey the truth before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. And then look at the third verse, are you so foolish having begun in the spirit, are you now being made perfect in the flesh? Jerry Bridges is one of my favorite people in the world. If you've read his books, you've liked him, but you ought to read his books on grace, because Jerry and I discovered grace at about the same time, and I got a letter from him not too long ago. You know, he said, he said, Steve, are you sure we're right? And I thought, I can't believe Dr. Bridges steals that way, sometimes I wonder, you know why? Because there's something in me that's wrong to do in it, or whether it's just way again. Something in me that is a slippery slope, that if I don't, as Martin Luther says, preached the gospel to myself, over and over and over again, I will become discouraged. I love teaching it to seminary, but I've got students who come and preach, and sometimes I say to them, son, you could preach that sermon in any synagogue in America. Now, I love Jews, I'd give a right arm if I could be Jewish in them aside, but let me tell you something. Jesus went through a lot of trouble, a whole lot of trouble, to teach us that there's something more than the wonderful law that has been given to the Jews, and that's what we are to preach. It is the essence. It is an abomination that I should have to preach a sermon on grace, as if this were something special. This is the gospel folks. One time Martin Luther would get with us all the time. Jesus asked, Dr. Luther, what about works of tenets and goodness and righteousness? People are going to go out and say, and he said, that's okay. He said, what is it about us that is so arrogant, that makes us think that anything we could do or not do would be more sufficient than the blood of God's own son. Guys, you've got to think about it all the time, you get religious. Do you know what legalism is? It's dancing while looking at your feet. And that's not dancing, that's marching. It's dancing while looking at your feet, and we've got Christians all over America that keep looking at their feet and saying, am I doing it right? Jesus said, dance for God's sake, dance, but am I doing it right? And Jesus said, cut it out, look at me, but I want to do it right because you will love me. Jesus says, dance, risk, let go, be mine. And if you don't fight it every day of your life, you'll become religious. Let me taste something else God will do. God will allow you to sin or allow you to see the bitterness of your sin in order to teach you to dance. Jesus didn't die to make you nice, Jesus died because he likes you, because he wants to be in a relationship with you. It's not our sin, and I know you guys, I've been a pastor, Pete hadn't told me anything about you, but I know you, you're bad. You think with your Bible, you fool me, or Pete, and you have, and I know about you, I know your secrets, that you don't share with anybody, because you're afraid somebody will find out, and then you'll have to die, you'll jump off the nearest, I know you're bad. It's cool, it's not your badness, that's what the cross was about. Secondly, I want you to see not only slippery slope, I want you to see if you will have catastrophic curse. Look at verse 10, for as many as are of the works of the law, those are the stiff ones who dance looking at their feet. Our under-occurs for it is written, cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them. That means if you're going to do it that way, you've got to do it the whole way that way, and you're not good enough. I know that. That means that if you're going to be saved by your religion, it doesn't going to take you on those terms, and you're going to be lost. That means there's only way, one way, and that's the imputation of price for righteousness and can we talk? You have the setting sense, and you say, I can't go to God with that again, man, I've been waiting every day for the last 40 years. I think I'm just going to sit over here in the corner and keep my mouth shut, that's the curse. You ever wanted to be better than you are, and you thought, yes, I mean, I really tried and I blew it. I wish I could be better, that's the curse. You ever blush at night when you think, I don't believe I thought that, I don't believe I did that, up along the hand, I don't believe I said that, that's the curse, that's what Paul's talking about. You ever think, I've got to do this a little bit harder, I'm doing too good, I think I'm going to go, I think we need to start a Wednesday service around here so I can go twice a week. I've got to read the Bible more, and I've got to pray more, and I'm going to be good, I'm going to be good, I'm going to be good, if it kills me, I'm going to be good, I'm going to be, that's the curse. And all of us play that game, Paul says, that's a horrible course, Robert Robinson, in 1738 wrote a hymn that we sing, come now, sounds of every blessing, remember it, it's a great great hymn, prone to wander, Lord I feel it, let me tell you the rest of the story. After he wrote that hymn, the one who was prone to wander wandered. Left the Christian faith completely, and for years spent his life hustling filthy lucre. And toward the end of his life, he was riding down in London a street, with a woman friend of his, and they were having an evening service, and he heard the song that he had written so many years before being sonned by the congregation in the evening service, and he broke down, and he went. He said, give everything that I have, if I felt what I felt then when I wrote those words. We shouldn't get a bin there. He had a pagan lady with her, he should have had a brother who could have said, Robert, you still is, you can't do anything, you can't wander so far, that he doesn't say, come on home, it'll be as if he had never left. I never stopped loving you, the curse is, the statement. I'd give anything if I could be as good, if I could know him the way I used to know him. And then thirdly, I want you to see, if you will, a boundiest blessing. Look at the eight and nine, and the scripture foreseen, the God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, in you all the nations shall be blessed so that those who are at faith are best blessed with believing Abraham, what does that mean? You know what I do, I tell people God's not angry at them, you say you can't do that, that's what keeps them in line. You just said we were banned, if we didn't thank God, we're going to hit us with a lightning blow, we wouldn't be good. If that's the reason you're good, you're not his, I'm not very good, but I'm better. Some of you think I'm arrogant and mean spirit, got a bad mouth, are prideful in your right. Gosh, you're right, I just thought of it, you're so right, it scares me to death. Let me tell you something, he loves me anyway, and I'm better than I used to be and I have been redeemed. I'll give you another one, and then I'm finished. I want you to note not only a slippery slope and a catastrophic curse and a boundless blessing, I want you to notice a prime promise, look at 13 and 14. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. For it has written curse it is everyone who hangs on a tree, but the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, here it comes, sports fans, that we might receive the promise of the spirit through faith. You say you keep talking like this, people don't take advantage of it. Do you know what Luther said to Melanchand, who was a wiry legalist who couldn't dance? He said to Melanchand, this is the founder of the Protestant side of the Christian faith. This is the man who translated the scriptures into German, the one who is our forefather. You know what he said to Melanchand? He said, Melanchand, why don't you go out and send some? So you have something about which to repent. You say, if you're talking like this, people who go out and send for God's sake send. And as Luther said, if you send symbolic and then repent boldly and you'll get better, you know why? Because of a principle and you'll find it in first Corinthians. 12, the ninth verse, the Holy Spirit is attracted to human weakness. Let's say that again, the Holy Spirit is attracted to human weakness. My power, that's the Holy Spirit, is made perfect in weakness, Jesus said. And so if you can do it on your own, if you're good and pure in righteous and you've been working at it or not doing a half bad job, and people think you're wonderful and pure, go right ahead. And you go die and go down the tube and blow it big time. But when you know what I just told you, which is the gospel, the basis of the entire Christian faith, when you understand that, that attracts the Holy Spirit. And what does the Holy Spirit do? And that's your spiritual like me. If you believe that, you'll be, you believe it makes you spiritual more than you are right now. And so Christians walk it and I love the fear of the Lord and what Mark said about the word of the Lord. That's good stuff. But only case, nothing. That stuff is meaningless outside of grace because it's the understanding of our need of grace and I know you guys. That attracts the Holy Spirit to our lives and makes us any better than we are. And so Paul could try out with great wisdom and profundity. Listen to this. I am constrained, not by the law. I am constrained by the, no, not by the wrath. I am constrained by the brothers and sisters who hope, no, no, no, no. I am constrained by the love of Christ. One story, I may have even already told you because when I was in Pittsburgh and watching religious television, I don't do much of that. Mostly I pray and fast in hotel rooms. And I was watching this lady who was given her testimony and she was crying. And she said that she was an atheist, had grown up in an atheist family, had never gone to church in her entire life except once in her 30s when she was a tourist at a cathedral in England. And she said, and then my daughter was hit by an automobile and was in a coma in the hospital and she said, she said, I went to visit her and then I went to visit the attending physician and I asked the prognosis and he said it's not good. She could be a vegetable for many years so she could die tomorrow. She said, I walked from the hospital across the street to a bar and I got sourced. Then I got in the car and I drove home and it was raining and I drove into the driveway of my house and I could see the windshield knocking the droplets of water as I turned the engine off. Then she said, I began to curse God and she said, I knew how to curse. She said, for half an hour I poured out all of my anger and my venom at this God that I had never been close to in my entire life. She said, when I was spent after a half an hour there was a silence. And then the silence, there was a voice and the voice said, that's the first time you've ever spoken to me.
And I love you. Why grace? Because without it we're dead. Why grace? Because we keep doing it without it. Why grace? Because without that we're not Christians. We have to call this a synagogue. Why grace? Because that's what Jesus was about. You think about that. And now may the amazing grace of our Master Jesus Christ, the outrageous love of God the Father and the intimate friendship of the Holy Spirit go with you this week as you remember His deep love and concern for you. Amen.