The Christ Church Wednesday Bible Study Group is studying grace. The title of the study is "What's So Amazing about Grace"
There could have been no grace whatsoever for us but for the fact that God the Son volunteered to take our place and redeem us: Grace... came through Jesus Christ.
There are five areas where we need to claim rest in God's grace:
Insecurity=Claiming the grace to be what I am.
Weakness=Claiming the grace to learn from what I suffer.
Abrasiveness=Claiming the grace to respond to what I encounter
Compromise=Claiming the grace to stand for what I believe.
Pride=Claiming the grace to submit to what I need
We are using the books, "The Grace Awakening: Believing In Grace Is One Thing. Living it is Another", and "The Grace Awakening Workbook" by Charles E. Swindoll. You can study along with us by clicking the above links or the images after the notes.
These are the notes to Session 14
Ephesians 2:8-9 NIV For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.
To live in unity with one another they should stop passing judgment about “disputable matters”
Romans 14:1 NIV Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters.
Romans 14:12-18 NIV So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God. Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean. If your brother or sister is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ died. Therefore do not let what you know is good be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human approval.
Paul speaks about how we relate to differences within the body of Christ, saying that “each one of us will give an account of ourselves to God”. He then addresses how we, as believers, should relate to one another. Paul encouraged the Romans to stop making a point and to start making a difference in how they treated one another.
We should not put a stumbling block in somebody’s way. While we should not suppress others through legalism, we also must not entice ourselves or others to sin through an unhealthy use of freedom. Make sure that we are acting in love by not agreeing with sin but being cautious in
in instances where moral choice is an individual matter (v. 15). We must not use the freedom we have in Christ to destroy one another. If we do that, it is evil.
Sometimes we need to refrain from certain things in the presence of others. Even though you may not be sinning, you can restrain your actions based on the love for your brother or sister in Christ, choosing to put them above yourself.
1 Corinthians 6:1-8 NIV If any of you has a dispute with another, do you dare to take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the Lord’s people? Or do you not know that the Lord’s people will judge the world? And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases? Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more the things of this life! Therefore, if you have disputes about such matters, do you ask for a ruling from those whose way of life is scorned in the church? I say this to shame you. Is it possible that there is nobody among you wise enough to judge a dispute between believers? But instead, one brother takes another to court—and this in front of unbelievers! The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means you have been completely defeated already. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers and sisters.
What should you do when a disagreement escalates between believers? We realize that we are all sinners, and sin can draw a wedge between people. As Christians, we are not spared from these conflicts. But is legal action advisable between two Christians who clash?
In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul addresses some believers in Corinth who were at odds with one another. The situation had become so hostile that they were going to court. Notice Paul’s dismay when he writes, “[D]o you dare to take it before the ungodly?” (v. 1). Paul was not concerned that the Corinthian judges were unjust, but that believers would sue one another before an unrighteous judge and spectators.
In Corinth, the judge’s seat, known as the bema seat, was in the center of the town square. You can still see some court houses in town centers today. And much like today, lawsuits then were public knowledge. While cable news didn’t cover these trials 24/7, crowds gathered for entertainment, and reputations would be ruined.
It is no wonder Paul was appalled by the idea of Christians suing one another. It goes completely against the gospel message of grace, charity, and forgiveness. Paul reminded the Corinthian believers that they were citizens of another world and kingdom (vv. 2–3).
Paul was not against ever taking legal action. In Acts 22:25 and 25:10– 11, he appealed to the Roman courts for his own rights. Likewise, we are grateful for the legal experts who protect believers today. However, Paul thought it reprehensible for one believer to attack another in court. When possible, Christians should seek to settle disputes themselves according to the values, principles, and truths of Scripture.
Father, in recent conflicts, show us what we did or said wrong so we can ask for forgiveness. We ask You to work also in the people with whom we clashed. As Your children, help us make peace with one another.
MODELING GRACE THROUGH DISAGREEABLE TIMES
First, always leave room for an opposing viewpoint.
Second, if an argument must occur, don’t assassinate.
Third, if you don’t get your way, get over it and get on with life. If you don't get your way in a vote at a church, get over it.
Fourth, sometimes the best solution is a separation. There is good biblical support for this, remember. Paul and Barnabas simply couldn't go on together, so they separated. If you can’t go on with the way things are in a particular ministry, leave. Who knows? This may be God’sway of moving you on to another dimension of ministry.
THE PROCESS THAT LEADS TO GRACE AWAKENING
Five areas where we need to claim rest in God's grace: insecurity, weakness, abrasiveness, compromise, and pride.
Insecurity Claiming the grace to be what I am
1 Corinthians 15:6-11 NIV After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Whether then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.
Because of his history of persecuting Christianity Paul could have easily felt insecure in now preaching the gospel and being compared to men and women who walked with and talked with and saw and heard Jesus.
But Paul refused to cringe and hide, crippled awakening, invigorating grace changed his whole perspective.
“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them,
yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Cor. 15:10).
Grace made him what he was. Grace gave him courage to be who he was. Grace energized him to accomplish what he did. By realizing that he did not deserve and could never earn the privileges given him, Paul was freed to be exactly who he was and do precisely what he was called to do.
When you understand that God is the one, by His grace, that enables you to do what He has gifted you have no reason to compare yourself to and compete with anybody else. Grace relieves us of all that. God is the one who qualified you.
Weakness: Claiming the grace to learn from what I suffer.
2 Corinthians 12:5-10 NIV I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Because we are human even though we are saved, sanctified, Holy Ghost filled, fire baptized, we still have weaknesses. We suffer. We hurt. We fail. We blow it. We feel bad. We are imperfect.
Even though we have weaknesses we like Paul need to come to the realization that God's grace overcomes weakness.
You don't have to rely on material things or the acceptance of people. How easy for those things to become unspoken grace killers.
Abrasiveness Claiming the grace to respond to what I encounter
Colossians 4:5-6 NIV Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
This “grace” has to do with our response to people. We need to use tact in the way we respond to difficult circumstances and people. We have to depend on God’s grace so that we respond with grace.
Even if our response is true and right. Truth alone can be a bit harsh and abrasive. Occasionally it is too sharp, sometimes brutal. Grace helps us cushion our words so that the truth can be received without needless offense
Compromise: Claiming the grace to stand for what I believe.
Hebrews 13:7-9 NIV Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teachings. It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace, not by eating ceremonial foods, which is of no benefit to those who do so.
Grace gives us the courage to stand when confronted by those who do not believe as we do. Grace strengthens us. Grace helps us to be ourselves so that when we speak of our faith it rings true.
Pride Claiming the grace to submit to what I need
James 4:6-7 NIV But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.” Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
1 Peter 5:5 NIV In the same way, you who are younger, submit yourselves to your elders. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.”
Few qualities are more persistent within us than pride. as Paul put it earlier we don't have anything to feel proud about. Because it doesn’t fit the Christian life for anyone to be overly proud, we find our pride in other ways: our work, our salaries, our prestige, our power and influence, our titles, our clothing, our approach to people, our tendency to manipulate. It's All so unattractive, so inappropriate.
1 Corinthians 1:26-31 NIV Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.”
Are You Really A Minister of Grace?
Some questions
When you do what you do, do you dispense grace?
• Are the people you serve given the freedom to be who they are, or do you force them to be who you expect them to be?
• Do you let others go, or do you smother them . . . control them?
• Would folks feel intimidated or relieved in your presence?
• Are you cultivating spontaneous, creative celebrants or fearful captives?
• Do you encourage, build up, and affirm those to whom you minister?
Are you one who models and ministers grace or not?
Is what you’re doing the work of your own flesh energized by your own strength?
Are you relying on your charisma to pull it off?
Do you often have a hidden agenda?
How about your motive?
With a captive audience hanging on to your words and following your ministry with unquestioned loyalty, do you exploit them . . . do you use your power for your own purposes?
Is the enhancement of your image of major importance to you, or can you honestly say that your work is directed and empowered by the Spirit of God?
Is yours a grace-awakening ministry?
Don't rely on your own charisma. If you don’t, you will live to regret it.
Zechariah 4:6 NIV So he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty.
If you operate in grace you are not operating in the energy of the flesh. Operating in the flesh is a grace killer.
Those who operate in the flesh use human might in order to accomplish things visible you can see. Great emphasis is placed on “success.” There is no hesitation to use strategies from the world, secular managerial styles are employed, impressive techniques are used, size and numbers mean too much, and manipulative methods are used for raising money for ministries or churches. A person who uses power and might uses them for unfair advantage, bullies them if they get in the way, and discard them once they are no longer “useful.”
OBVIOUS MARKS OF GRACE-AWAKENING
Absence of selfishness
2. Absence of predictability
3. Absence of dogmatic Bible-bashing
4. Absence of expectations
5. Absence of shame
The first of these characteristics is generosity with personal possessions
Acts 4:32-35 NIV All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.
An atmosphere of grace creates an absence of selfishness. After all, it isn’t your money; it’s God’s money. So you give it. It isn’t your church; it’s God’s church, so you share it. They aren’t your people, they’re God’s people, so you release them. It isn’t your project; it’s God’s project, so you rely on Him..
Second characteristic of a grace awakening is the absence of predictability. Where grace abounds you will not only find generosity with personal possessions, you will also find encouragement in unusual settings. Grace keeps us flexible, and willing to adapt.
Acts 11:19-20 NIV Now those who had been scattered by the persecution that broke out when Stephen was killed traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, spreading the word only among Jews. Some of them, however, men from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus.
They first went to Jews alone, but later they found themselves surrounded by Greeks, and so they went to the Greeks also. They didn’t change their message. They were still preaching the Lord Jesus. The target changed from strictly Jews to Jews and Gentiles.
Missionaries who do the best job are people of grace. If they minister cross-culturally, they don’t try to change people into Western Christians.
That is grace! There is a lack of predictability, true freedom,
willing adaptability—a sense of comfort in other methods of expression. The absence of a narrow, rule-book mentality frees anyone for an open-hearted ministry. There is affirmation along with a lot of flexibility.
Rather than requiring a predictable style of response, grace-awakening people encourage openness, acceptance, and a willingness to go with the cultural flow. We don’t force people to be like us to worship like us to praise like us. Corporate praise and worship is okay but we can’t dictate what other believers do even when they are with us. New believers need to be given plenty of freedom to learn and to grow.
The third characteristic is life beyond the letter of Scripture. When there is a grace-awakening ministry, there is an absence of dogmatism and Bible Bashing.
2 Corinthians 3:5-6 NIV Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant—not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
The emphasis here is on a ministry of grace rather than law.
2 Corinthians 3:17 NIV Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
The scripture we just read also give us a fourth characteristic of a grace-awakening ministry: liberty with creative expression. When grace is present, there is plenty of freedom provided for creative expression.
We are very liberal when we are evangelizing a non-believer and Most of us don’t require the lost person to clean up his life before he comes to the Savior. We flex, we bend, we forgive, we tolerate whatever among the unsaved. But we don’t provide nearly as much liberty once folks come to the Savior.
Once they are converted, however, where’s the grace? We expect everything that we ignored before conversion to be reversed immediately after conversion. We forget that sanctification takes time and we forget that we weren't spotless after conversion and we are not spotless today.
Why are we so intolerant of and impatient with our brothers and sisters? Where's the grace? Think of what others must put up with when it comes to you and me.
Think of the things in your life that are not yet cleaned up. Where is all this liberty and freedom we’ve been talking about?
If the Spirit of the Lord provides liberty,mhow great it would be—how full of grace, actually—to give them all the room they need to fail and recover, to learn and grow. Just like we had.
One more characteristic is release from shame or past failures. A ministry of grace doesn’t keep bringing up the past for the purpose of holding it over people.
1 Timothy 1:12-14 NIV I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service. Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
Paul had every reason to feel ashamed. He was one whose past was dreadful. Yet he wrote that he wasn’t ashamed because God’s grace was so abundantly pored on him. Blasphemy had abounded in his past, but grace superabounded. You could change blasphemer to homosexual, drug addict, alcoholic, murderer, whatever. None of those things in the past is allowed to hold those people in bondage. They are released, forgiven, and the believer is allowed to go on to a new life in Christ.
Grace releases people not only from sin but from shame. If a person wants to use their past in their own testimony that’s great but we should never remind a Shame is a classic grace killer.
Christians can be such shamers! We not only make people ashamed of their wrongs, we shame them for being different
Let’s look at Shame-Based Spirituality vs. Healthy Spiritually
2 Timothy 2:1 NIV You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
Make grace your aim, your pursuit, your passion. Model it. Teach it. Demonstrate it.
No comments:
Post a Comment