The Grace Driven Life
| 1. Grace vs. purpose paradigm - understanding grace vs. promise model |
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| 2. Growing in grace - with the Lord | |
| 3. Growing in grace - with fellow Christians | |
| 4. Sharing God’s grace - with unbelievers | |
| 5. Rejoicing in God’s grace - through worship | |
| 6. Living in God’s grace - in America | |
| 2. Growing in Grace - with the Lord | |
| “I don’t feel like I’m growing here.” |
How do you gauge such a thing?
This desire for a deeper faith motivates many to “seek a personal relationship with Christ.” According to the Purpose Driven Life, this is done in any number of ways -
- give it all to God
- put Jesus in the driver’s seat of your life
- don’t be afraid
- live a totally surrendered life
Warren: One of the great Christian leaders of the twentieth century was Bill Bright, the founder of Campus Crusade for Christ. Through Crusade staff around the world, the Four Spiritual Laws trace and the “Jesus” file, more than 150 million people have come to Christ and will spend eternity in heaven. I once asked Bill, “why did God use and bless your life so much?” He said, “When I was a young man, I made a contract with God. I literally wrote it out and signed my name at the bottom. It said, ‘from this day forward, I am a slave of Jesus Christ.’ (Page 84)
- use “breath prayers” - a brief prayer repeated to Jesus (You are with me) (I receive your grace) (Help me to trust you)
- read the Word
- think about his Word through the day - meditate
- be honest with God - “God doesn’t expect you to be perfect, but he does insist on complete honesty” (Warren 92)
- treat God like a friend
- choose to obey God in faith - with small opportunities
- choose to value what God values -
- desire friendship with God more than anything else
- go to worship and identify yourself as a Christian
- you are as close to God as you choose to be
James 4:8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
What is true about this approach?
What needs corrected?
What is the focus on when people talk about “establishing a personal relationship with Christ”?
One young Lutheran said to me, “I don’t have a personal relationship with Christ. He has a covenantal relationship with me.”
What was his point?
This covenantal idea is the very basis of grace. Jeremiah 31:31-34
“The time is coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD. “This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time,” declares the LORD. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the LORD. “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”
Who is the actor in the covenental relationship?
The Grace Driven Life takes great comfort in the actions of God primarily throughout His life -
Ephesians 1:4-6 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
How is grace seen in election?
Romans 5:8-10 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!
How is grace displayed in justification?
God’s grace is the core of our salvation from beginning to end -
1 Corinthians 1:4-9 I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way—in all your speaking and in all your knowledge— because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.
1 Thessalonians 5:23-24 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.
Ephesians 2:1-10 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
This doesn’t mean that we are completely passive in our Christian growth however -
2 Peter 3:17-18 Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen.
What does Peter coordinate growth in grace with?
The way to “developing” this grace relationship with God -
Romans 1:16-17 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”
2 Corinthians 8:9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.
Colossians 1:3-6 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints— the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God’s grace in all its truth.
According to these verses, what is the key to growing in grace?
Paul added another aspect to how God gets us to “grow in grace” -
Romans 5:20-21 The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Where does grace increase?
So how can we “grow in grace”?
How does this differ from the purpose driven life’s way of establishing a relationship with God?
Any connection to the Gospel of Christ is the key to growing in grace. So we need to ask ourselves, where can we find Christ and his forgiveness? Paul explains one place to go as he continues in Romans -
Romans 6:1-6 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.
Where do we find Christ in these verses?
How does this describe baptism as a gift of grace?
What does this gift of grace assure us of?
How does this help us to “grow in grace”?
When baptism is looked at as a way for man to come to God - what does it do to the idea of grace?
What happens when you don’t remember your baptism?
Matthew 26:26-28 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.” Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
1 Corinthians 11:23-29 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.
What words denote that this is a way to “grow in grace”?
What makes the Lord’s Supper a special gift of grace?
How is it an especially personal way of growing in grace?
What good does this “growth in grace” do for us?
Romans 6:11-14 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.
Where can we grow in grace best then?
Why is the 3rd commandment so important then?
This needs to be distinguished between the Catholic’s version of grace.
This growth in grace seems to fit the explanation of a proper relationship with the Lord -
Proverbs 11:2; When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.
Philippians 2:3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.
Why does this sin and grace approach frustrate some?
How do they remedy this?
How might it seem more “sloppy” than the purpose driven approach?
If people aren’t living Christian lives, what is the remedy?
Can you measure “growth in grace”?
What do we recognize about any growth we do have?