The Christian Handbook - What Sets Christianity Apart

So here the roots. We've been going through our series simply titled the Christian

Handbook Fundamentals of the Faith. Our hope in the series series is to do

a couple of things, which is the discover or rediscover or relay the foundation

of what do Christians believe? And in light of those beliefs, what do

Christians do? How do Christians live their life? And have you guys been

learning through this series at all? Yeah, a little bit, because if

you haven't, you're probably just way smarter than me, and that's okay.

But and if not, if this isn't something that's new to you, then

hopefully it's a good reminder. Right, none of us are beyond these things,

Right, It's like none of us are beyond drinking water on a daily

basis, Right, We're like, it's basic. I don't really have to

think about it. But then you regret it if you forget it about it.

I know I do. So it's important that we're going over these fundamental

believes because it's our foundation, right, our firm foundation, what we believe,

how we live our lives, if what that looks like, and we

believe that it's important as a church to go over those things that it's beneficial

to us as a body, so that when we can kind of go like,

well, where are we going as a church, where are we going

as a Christian, we can just go like, well, God's made it

pretty clear in his word of what it looked what he requires of us,

or whether it looks like to live a life that glorifies him. And honestly,

just if we focus on those things, those things will keep us busy

pretty much until He comes back or we go to him. Okay, so

what we're gonna do is we're going to open our bibles today to our verse,

and then we will read the verse, pray, and then talk about

our fundamental topic for today. Keeping it a secret for now, all right,

So if you would turn with me to Ephesians two and guess what we

have three verses today? Do you believe me? It is three verses?

It is so it'll be up here on the screen. You can fall along

with me. If you don't have a we have them at the connect booth

for you. We regularly go through books of the Bible here and so it's

this is gonna be helpful so you can read along. We do have it

on the screen if you're not going to get up and go walk one and

get one right now, So let's get into it. Ephesians two eight through

ten. This is God's word, 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 wait wherever we so that no one

can boast, for we are God's handiwork created in Christ Jesus to do good

works which God prepared in advance for us to do. Let's pray, Lord

God, we lift this up to you. We just asked that after we've

sung the songs that lift up your name and glorify you, that you have

been using those words, using those proclamations of what you have done to soften

our hearts, prepare our hearts, or God, that is your word is

planted firmly and deeply, that you would provide growth, that you provide maturity.

And so we asked your spirit would be working among us right now as

we open your word it seek to understand it seems to glorify you with our

life and glorify you with every gift and blessing that you have given us or

gotten. That if we haven't seen those things. We haven't seen your goodness

or God that today would be the day that you would reveal yourself by an

amazing miracle. So we thank you, we love you, we give you

this time. And everyone said amen. All right. So now last week

we looked at the gospel. Right in our fundamental series, we've kind of

worked going through different aspects of fundamentals of the faith, and now we've recently

got into the Gospel and we're going to spend the next couple of weeks looking

at different facets of the gospel. Right. Um, we'd heard a pastor

kind of talk through preaching and they were they were saying that, like,

the gospel isn't it's not just like a blank piece of paper, right,

It's not just it's not just empty. It's it's not one dimensional or too

too much. I don't know, I'm not good with that, but you

don't understand what I'm saying. There is a sense in which it's multifaceted.

It's like a diamond or a jewel which you can turn and observe and appreciate

and see the light reflect off it in a different way, and it's all

glorious and beautiful and it's all the same gem. So that's what we believe

about the gospel, is that we could talk about the Gospel forever and ever

and ever, and honestly, if you if you actually kind of pick up

or maybe catch on a little bit, that's what we talked about every single

week, regardless of what the topic is. So we talked about the gospel

last week, talking about the fundamentals of that. What is the gospel,

and that is that Christ died for our sins, was raised or was buried,

was raised on the third day according to the scriptures, that there were

witnesses to these events to prove their authenticity and the truthfulness of this good news.

So my goal today is to dig into scripture to answer this question what

sets Christianity apart? This is today's message. This is also the question that

we're trying to understand, unravel and dig into what sets Christianity apart? And

if you want to, I thought about this early, write it down,

Write down what you think sets Christianity apart, and then we can see how

it measures up. It probably is right, hopefully right like hopefully hopefully it's

right. And the reason I say it probably will be right is because this

is a big question. This is a big question what sets Christianity apart?

Well for those of us who believe, we name lots of reasons. There's

lots of reasons. But let's see if we can boil it down to its

fundamental element to where it's more clear for us, so it helps us not

only be more assured and firm in our own faith, but also confident in

how we share it. So we already we want to boil it down,

and this has kind of already been done, right, we just talked about

the five solos, right, Well, here we go, how we're phasingh

We talked about the five solos and that that was a summation, right that

we've been saved by grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone,

according to Scripture alone, to the glory of God alone, and those in

and of themselves are pretty good summation and they're they're helpful, and honestly,

it'd be great one day if we went through each one of those specifically.

That could be a future series maybe one day. But um, like we

said, we're preaching through similar things, are saying the same thing in different

ways weekend and week out, and so even through the series, we've actually

examined some of these things already to the glory of God alone, meaning that

he deserves all the glory because he is God, He is above it all.

He is a creator that we that you are saved in Christ alone,

because He is the one who paid for our sins and condescended to come and

die in our place that we would be made right with God. Cocording to

Scripture alone, we looked a couple of weeks ago at the Bible and how

to read it and why it's important, and the centrality and how it takes.

It helps us understand everything that we believe. When we go through these

fundamental beliefs, we're not just finding, we're not just making them up.

They come from somewhere. But today I want us to examine those first two

and that and I believe that they're what sets Christianity apart from any religion,

belief system, or our other idea on this planet. And that is the

idea that we're saved by grace alone through faith alone. Feel simple, We're

gonna break it down and then hold them up against each other and see how

they measure up. So let's get into our text. We're gonna start in

verse eight. Let's read, for it is by grace you have been saved

through faith. And this is not from yourselves, It is the gift of

God. Now easily we could spend, honestly, just the rest of all

of our lives in this verse, I believe, I think we could dig

into it. But today we're going to try and try and digest that,

try and extract from it what it is saying to us, which is going

to be helpful by knowing what preceded this text. And what preceded is that

Paul in verses one through seven of the same chapter, he starts off with

saying that we are dead in our trespasses, in our sin, that we

were following the ways of this world, following our own desires, and by

nature were children of wrath. So, in other words, left to ourselves

hopeless. But that God, because of his great love and mercy, made

us alive in Christ even while we were dead. And this dead is speaking

of spiritually dead. So we're talking about the miracle of spiritual death to spiritual

life. And why did he do this? And so that in the coming

ages he might show the incomparable riches the extent of his incomparable riches of His

grace and mercy that are shown in Christ Jesus by saving sinners and rebels,

by making those who were dead in and of themselves alive in Christ. So

that's kind of the summation. Let me actually get to the verse that we're

in today, and it says that for by grace, you haven't saved through

faith, and this is not from yourselves, It is the gift of God.

And so the things that I want us to start off with first is

that we are saved by grace through faith. Let's start with grace. Now,

the definition of grace in simple terms is goodwill, loving kindness, or

favor. The deeper meaning or kind of the deeper understanding of the way that

grace is being used. Here is this goodwill or kindness that is given to

on one to whom it is not deserved. Okay, So grace is undeserved

kindness, and it's extremely important that we understand this. It's extremely important that

we understand our relationship to God, because if we get it backwards, we

get it upside down, we won't We're not gonna have a proper view of

ourselves. We're not gonna have a proper view of God. So I need

you guys to do an exercise with me. Okay, you guys are gonna

have to help me here. Yep, exactly. We're gonna get up to

a little spin or something. I'm just kidding. No, we're gonna do

a thought exercise. So either keep your eyes open or close. It's up

to you. This is what we need to do. It's easier for me

to close my eyes. I am well, actually know I can't see my

notes now, but yeah, it's okay, it's all right. Just stay

with They stay with and they stay with me. We What do I want

you to do is imagine or think of someone who has wronged you, like

actually wronged you, someone who's wronged you, And that could be like someone

who's hurt you're not and like I'm not actually being silly, like it is

kind of silly, but really like I'm talking about like someone who's actually wrong

to you. Like we've lived some life and if, by God's grace we

haven't had someone wronged us, then well let's take him, Thank you God.

But stay with me. We have think of someone who's wronged you,

really wronged you. That could be hurt you, harmed you, has not

given you something that you are owed or really is their role to give you.

Maybe they hate you without reason or with reason, someone that you think

that you could never be made right with because maybe they're the crazy ones.

Someone who it feels like it doesn't deserve your forgiveness, doesn't deserve your kindness

just or even maybe doesn't deserve your love because of the way that they are.

Now, what I need you to know is that the person that you're

thinking thinking about is you before a holy, righteous God. It's you.

But God, being rich in his mercy, looked on us with grace,

incomprehensible as his enemies, and showed us undeserved kindness by sending his son to

die on the cross for our sins so that we could be made right with

him. Let's look at Scripture Romans five six through ten. You see,

at just the right time, when we were so powerless, Christ died for

the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for

a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own

love for us in this While we were still sinners, Christ died for us

since we have now been just to fight by his blood, how much more

shall we be saved from God's wrath through him? For if while 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.

Could you imagine giving up your life for your enemy, giving up your child

for your enemy. Probably not. And honestly, it's because, if we're

honest with ourselves, most of the time our enemies were just hoping that they

get what comes to them. Right, We're like, oh, like one

day that justice is gonna be sweet, But praise God that he's not like

us, right, or so we'd have that on our own head righteously.

So so we can stop imagining it, because it's what God did for us.

And this is grace that we didn't deserve this cella. We deserve the

wrath do our sin and rebellion. But God, entirely of his own decision

and out of the riches of his kindness, showed us grace and stepped in

to save sinners from themselves, stepped in to save sinners from their sin from

ourselves. He saved us from ourselves. He saved us from our sin.

Now, God and his graciousness shows kindness in a sense to all of the

world. Like there's a graciousness that can be called common grace, which is

a grace that's shown on. The rain shows up and everyone gets blessed by

it, unless you live in Washington, in which case you're gonna find one

reason to a complaint or another right or the sun comes out and we're like,

praise God, and everyone's praising God in one way or another. That

is common grace. That the rain comes on the righteous and the wicked.

But here we're seeing a special grace applied, or a special love or a

special attention, a grace that isn't saved or it's not affected by everyone isn't

affected by it. That God would save some of his enemies. And who

are the ones to whom God has shown this grace, All those who believe.

And Paul is saying here in Ephesians, by grace, you the believer,

have been saved. He's saying, by God's grace, by God,

you have been saved. He saved you. That's our grace, that's the

grace of God. It goes on to say through faith right there together.

Now, what is faith? Let's look at Hebrews eleven one. I think

it sums it up nice. Now, faith is confidence and what we hope

for an assurance about what we do not see. Confidence and what we hope

for an assurance about what we do not see. And in your Bible actually

might say assurance of things hoped for, in the conviction of things not seen.

The word faith here is this idea of trusting or believing something, and

all these haven't they kind of have this sense in which there's a trusting because

we know we are trusting because we know there's a conviction or an assurance that

is a part of this faith. When Moses said to God, who shall

I say sent me? God replied, I am who I am? And

I think for Christians or the believers, that there's an aspect of our response

where it's kind of similar when we're asked the question, well why do you

believe? There's a sense in which we might reply, I know because I

know. Why Why do I believe? Because I do? There are obviously

many reasons to believe, many reasons that could be given, but at the

end of the day, there's an aspect of not being able to help believing

almost this inclination of belief, which makes sense because faith is this fundamental part

of how we relate to God, whether as an unbeliever unbelief or a believer

with faith. Let's see here Hebrews eleven six. And without faith it is

impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to him or near to

God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

Does this make sense? Does this make sense? Does this verse makes sense?

And without faith it is impossible to please him? Okay, thank you

for that information. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he

exists. Right? That kind of that makes sense? Right? You don't.

You wouldn't go to something that you didn't think existed. So faith is

a fundamental part. And not only that, but it's nice and that he

rewards those let's seek him, that there's promises in who he is, in

his character. Faith is essential in how we approach or come to God.

Now, I do want to say, what about when we struggle with our

faith? Because that happens, that's real. So I feel like it could

be unkind to not talk about it. What about when we struggle with believing

or having faith in Him? Well, the first thing I want to say

is that when we struggle, what we turn to reveals what our trust is

in. Does that make sense? When we struggle, what we turn to

reveals what our trust is in. So give or take this? Okay,

this is up. This is up to you. If I'm struggling even my

faith to God or my faith with God, so I go to Google,

I'm like, help me here, I went to Google. It's not that

it's not helpful. It's not that there's other people, but the good people.

The good people, when you were to ask that question, will always

point you back to God. Okay, when you're struggling with your faith in

God, those who are going to be most helpful are those who point you

back to God. The reason I say this is because this idea of trusting

in God with trust and with faith, you can have faith in God and

still struggle and wrestle with your faith in God. If you don't believe me,

let's let's turn to scripture. Let's see what it has to say.

There's a story where a father comes to Jesus because his son is demon possessed

and he wants Jesus to heal him. And this is one of my favorite

responses, not even from Jesus, from but from the death desperate father.

He says, it had often thrown him into fire or water to kill him.

But if you can do this, or if you if you can do

anything, take pity on us and help us if you can, said Jesus,

everything is possible for one who believes. Immediately, the boy's father exclaimed,

I do believe. Help me overcome my unbelief. He says, I

do believe, help me him overcome my unbelief. And I think that should

be our cry as a Christian, as believers. But there's this aspect of

like, I know what I know, and yet I still feel like I

don't believe where I'm struggling here, So I should turn to God. When

we struggle, we should turn to Christ. And there's a sense of like,

Lord, help me. I feel like I don't believe in you,

like I take that to I take it to God, which sounds kind of

like aren't you wresting with your faith in Him? Yeah? But I got

nowhere else to go. Nothing else is better, nothing else is going to

be my needs. So and I go to him to say help me,

because I believe that he rewards those who seek him because I believe. So

there's a belief even in the face of what feels like unbelief. And as

I said before, this actually kind of has that sense of conviction or and

with that conviction, there's still this sense of trust. Right Like I can

love my wife across the board in a sense, but I still have to

actively love her. Right, Both those things are there. I have the

conviction do love my wife, and yet I can't. That conviction alone should

drive me to actively trust her. Does that make sense? So it's the

same thing with our belief. We're trusting in God. We have this conviction,

yet we are still needing to trust and trust and what trust and what

he has said trust and who he is as revealed by what he has said.

What's amazing is that this is exactly the example that Paul points out is

in scripture for us in Romans. For what does scripture say, It's a

good question. Abraham believed God, and it was a creditor. It was

credited to him as righteousness. Now to the one who works, wages are

not credited as a gift but as an obligation. However, to the one

who does not work but trusts God, who justifies the ungodly, their faith

is credited as righteousness. We look to God, we look to what he

has said, regardless of our circumstances, regardless of our feelings. We trust

in what God has said, even if we have yet to see those things

come to fruition right confident, So what we hope for, there's confidence and

what we hope for, and there's assurance of what we have yet to see,

what we have yet to even take hold of Romans for eighteen. It's

a little ways down against all hope. I love as one of my favorite

places in scripture, Against all hope Abraham and hope, against all hope and

hope, Abraham believed and so became the father of many nations, just as

it had been said to him, so shall your offspring be without weakening in

his faith. He faced the fact that his body was as good as dead

since he was about one hundred years old. He literally looked around and was

like, it's gonna take a miracle. It's gonna take me to trusting you,

because I'm as good as dead. And not only that, and Sarah's

womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promises

of God. He looked to the promises of God, but was strengthened in

his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded. What is that

conviction and an assurance that God had power to do what he had promised.

This is why it was it was credited to him as righteousness. The words

it was credited to him were written not for him alone, but also for

us, to whom God will credit righteousness, for us who believe in Him,

who was who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered

over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification,

which means our right standing with God. We were we were not we we

had wrath doe us, and through our faith have now our in right standing

with God. We are justified. So the nature of faith is trust regardless

of the circumstances, and it can be regardless of the circumstances because God is

beyond our circumstances. And this is not a a blind faith or a blind

trust or a blind conviction. But it has this sense in which we actually

do see. But without seeing, we are able to see what's on the

horizon. We're able to see what's coming, see what's been promised by Him

who is faithful. There's a sense in which we can actually see that we

have faith yet without it being fully realized yet, and we'll get to that

very shortly. But by God's grace you have been saved through faith. So

trusting there is this trusting in God. God has shown us grace, and

through our faith in what He's accomplished in Christ, we've been made right before

him Romans five one through two. Look at let's look at that justification.

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God

through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into

this grace in which we now stand and we boast in the hope of the

glory of God. So grace is undeserved favor or kindness from God. Do

you understand that we got that? And faith is belief and or trust in

God. So now let's look at the second half of this verse. Here,

in the second part of the verse, we're told something astounding starts off,

or it is by grace you have been saved through faith. Here's the

second half. And this is not from yourselves. It is the gift of

God. It says, this is not from yourselves, meaning not from us

at all. But who does it say it is from Who's to say it's

from God? Right? Easy enough? What is from God? The grace,

the faith, the salvation? Well the answer is yes to all of

them, Yes, all of it, yes, yes, and yes,

all of this is from God. All salvation is from God, meaning He

accomplished our salvation completely, He saved us completely. You may be asking,

well, what does this mean? Well, luck, I was realizing it

as we were singing the songs. I was like, I don't know why

I'm a preach date because we just sung everything, and I'm gonna say I'm

not kidding. I literally walked up to join. I was like, Bro,

that's my message. He's like, I know, So here we go.

But this is what Scripture is saying to those who are saved. He

said, you were dead, but God made you alive. You were lost,

but now you're found. You do not deserve grace, but God gave

grace. You were faithless, but God has given you faith. You were

blind, but now you see, and this is not of yourselves, but

it is the gift of God. And this is why scripture tells us that

we must be born again. Let's look at it. This is what Jesus

tells us. Jesus replied, very, very truly, I tell you,

no one can see the Kingdom of God unless they are born again. How

can someone be born when they are old? Nicodemus asked, fair question.

Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother's womb to be born.

Jesus answered, very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the

Kingdom of God unless they are born of water and of the spirit. No

one can see the kingdom. No one can enter the Kingdom unless they are

born of water and of the spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but

the spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not you should not be surprised

at by saying you must be born again. The wind blows wherever it pleases

you hear it sound, you cannot tell where it comes from or where it

is going. So it is with everyone born of the spirit. And first

I wanted to say that this kingdom, this idea of the kingdom. When

the Jews were expecting the kingdom to come. It meant their salvation, that

they would be free from the bondage that they were in. But Jesus was

being bringing a greater kingdom, a more thorough kingdom that didn't just save on

a surface level, but saved their soul. So where it says, not

from ourselves, but we have faith and just because God has made us born

again, so that we can see how all of it works, Jesus tells

us. For us, it's as mysterious as the wind. It's not very

helpful, but it's what Jesus gives us. So we go, yes,

Lord. But what is made clear here is that what is that we have

as much to do with our salvation as much as we had to do with

our being born. How much how much work and effort did you guys put

into that? You were there? Right at least that's what you've been told

you were there. This means all the heavy lifting has been done for us,

and we can't make ourselves born again. It is a gift from God.

It's like at John one twelve thirteen. Yet to all who did receive

him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to

become children of God, children born not of natural descent, nor of human

decision or a husband's will, but born of God. So we're starting to

kind of see a little bit of this. These two truths that we see

in the scripture that God saves entirely, and that he is sovereign over our

salvation, and that he saves completely. And yet man is one hundred percent

responsible for his belief. God saves completely, and man is held responsible to

believe and for his unbelief. But we can be grateful that we have a

good God James one, seventeen through eighteen. Every good, imperfect gift is

from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does

not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the Word

of Truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all that

he created. We see, it's a gift from God. And this gift

has been expressed in the Good News, which is why it's so important that

we share this good news. And we've been kind of harping on this the

last several weeks, But actually, what's funny is I realized I think it

was last Sunday I forgot to finish. I forgot to finish my Romans text

that I finished with, so today we're going to finish it. Let's see

what the end says Romans ten seventeen. Consequently, faith comes from hearing the

message, and the message is heard through the Word about Christ. And this

is good news because God has taken care of every requirement for you to be

right with him. Salvation is from God and he saves us. Now,

why is this a big deal? Because this sets Christianity apart from any other

well, any man made tradition, any man made religion. It's completely different.

How So, let's look at verse nine in Ephesians. Not by works

so that no one can boast, not by works, so that no one

can boast. This salvation is not by works. We got that, yeah,

Meaning there is nothing you can do to save yourself. There is nothing

that you can do in your own strength to make yourself right before God.

And this is in stark contrast to everything that the world has to offer.

This is what sets Christianity apart. That salvation is not by works, but

by grace through faith. Just because I gave you the answer to the question

doesn't mean we're done. Okay, let's keep going. The salvation is not

by works, but by faith or by grace through faith. Galatians two sixteen.

Know that a person is not justified by the works of the law,

but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we two have put our faith in

Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by

the works of the law. Because by the works of the law no one

will be justified. Right, what will justify us our faith? Right,

we saw that in this faith that we are in, with this faith that

we have, that we're justified before God. But of the law, no

one will be justified. So let's think about it for a second, because

this is what the world has to offer. The world says, believe in

yourself, get on that grind right, you do these things so that you

can be right before God. Or hopefully so. There's those who are searching

her, searching for their their inner peace. Right, they're gonna find it

somewhere out there in the mountains by myself. There's those who are trying to

reach and grasp for enlightenment, trying to work on yourself. It's all work,

work, work, work, and more work. And even among atheists

the motto is just like, at least just try and be a good person.

I mean, it doesn't matter, but you could try and be a

good person. So the world says believe in yourself, and Scripture says,

don't bother believe in Christ. Let's look at Romans nine or three, nine

through ten twenty. Sorry, ha ha, I was like, that is

not two verses. Let's look at it. What shall we conclude then,

Do we have any advantage? Not at all, for we have already made

the charge that Jews and gentiles, that's Jews and every other person on the

world alike, are all under the power of sin. As it is written,

there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one

who understands. There is no one who seeks God. All have turned away.

They have together become worthless. There is no one who does good,

not even one. Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice deceit.

The poison of vipers is on their lips, the mouth or their mouths are

full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, ruin,

and misery mark their ways in the way of peace. They do not

know. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we know

that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law,

so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to

God. Therefore, no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by the

works of the law. Rather, through the law we become conscious of our

sin. That is the purpose of the law. The purpose of the law

is to go like, oh, I'm reading this and I just feel like

I'm a failure. Welcome to the club. That's what it's there for.

What are we going to do about that? We're given a savior because by

ourselves. As we've gone down that list and apply one of those to yourselves,

and you quickly see that we're utterly helpless. Everything that the world has

to offer is works based. And what makes it worse is that what we

do have to offer, what we do have to offer, are works that

are stained by sin, rebellion and hate, unfaithfulness and shame. That's what

we do have to offer. But God, God has set his way apart

from how the world tries to achieve being right with Him, and he has

accomplished salvation. He has saved us, saved us from ourselves, saved us

from our sin. And why is this apart from works? Why is this

all of God? Well, let's look again. Infusion's two nine. What's

the second half? So that no one can boast? No one gets the

credit except for God alone. It's all about him. He gets the credit

alone in our salvation. He gets it all, which is good. That's

good news. I don't want to rely on myself. Thank you God for

taking care of it. I'll take it. No one can boast, No

one gets glory but God alone. God alone is our savior. God alone

makes the dead sinner come alive. God gets all the glory. And one

of my favorite quotes is from a Puritan preacher. He said this. He

said, you contribute nothing to your salvation except the sin that made it necessary.

Oh oh oh right, well I'm done. There we go. I

can just wrap it up there. I'm just kidding. You contribute nothing to

your salvation except the sin that makes it necessary. It's right that God should

get all the glory because he is God. He is good, righteous and

holy, and we already saw that we're a sorry bunch without him. Right,

Nothing on that list I wanted to be associated with. So there's no

room for us to get any glory. It's all for God's glory. And

here's the thing that's offensive, that's as to the world, and that might

even be offensive to us or you, because it's not about you. It's

all about God. It's all of God. It's all for God. It's

all accomplished by God. No one gets to boast but God alone. And

there's a purpose in this. God's ways are higher than ours. In God's

way are not our ways. Let's look at this beheemeth of a chunk of

scripture. For the message of the Cross is foolishness to those who are perishing,

but to us, who are being saved, it is the power of

God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,

the intelligence of the intelligence I will frustrate. Where is the wise person?

Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this

age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world. He does

things different, For since in the wisdom of God, the world, through

it's wisdom, did not know Him. Trying through their own wisdom, they

did not know God. God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached

to save those who believe. Jews demands signs, and Greeks look for wisdom.

But we preach Christ and him crucified a stumbling block to Jews, and

foolishness to gentiles. But to those whom God has called, both Jews and

Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the

foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is

stronger than human strength. Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when

you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards. He's

just calling it like he sees it. We already looked at the list.

We agree not many of you, or not many influential or influential. Not

many were of noble birth. But God chose the fool 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

despise things, and the things that are not nullify the things that are,

so that no one may boast before him. It's a constant theme. It's

all throughout scripture. It is because of Him that you were in Christ Jesus.

What it is because of Him that you were in Christ Jesus, who

has become for us wisdom from God, that is our righteousness, holiness and

redemption. He's done it all. Therefore, as it is written, let

the one who boasts boast in the Lord, we boast, and God's God

chose us, and God saves us. And you're not only And yet this

wasn't just to put the world to shame and say you can keep trying,

you can build your towers, you can try and achieve what you want,

but there's no room left for that. But that's not the only thing that

he's trying to do here. He's not just trying to put the world to

shame and our own pride to shame. But there's so much more than that.

And I need the band to come out, please. Ephesians two ten

our last verse, for we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to

do good works which God prepared in advanced for us to do. Here it's

just confirming what we've seen all along, that we are God's handiwork. He

has fashioned us, He has made us, not just in our original being

but He's made us new creations. It says we are God's handiwork, created

in Christ Jesus for what obviously for his glory, right no one else,

no one else gets the boast. But what does it say creating in Christ

Jesus to do good works? So surprise, good works. Works are still

a part of the equation, but we have to understand it correctly. These

works are of a radically different nature. Last week, at the end of

the message, we talked about Paul talking and saying, by the grace of

God, I am what I am. He says, I worked harder than

all of them, yet not I but the grace of God that was in

me. Okay, So there's works on the other side of the salvation.

But these works are what God has prepared in advance for us to do.

He has a plan. We see. God created us as his handiwork for

a purpose, and that plan is for good works, which pl He's going

to use our lives for his glory and for our benefit. We get a

benefit from that. But these works are not like the worst before, because

those works were striving and trying to be right before God. But God says,

I have come, I've finished it. I've completed it. And now

as you live out your life, you go, well, you've saved me.

Now what? And he says, I have a better life for you,

created in these good works, prepared in these places where even if you

were like, this doesn't seem like a good thing, this doesn't seem like

a positive area where I get to pour into. God has placed us in

specific places. He's molded us and shaped us from our life so that we

could pour into the areas where no one else wouldn't necessarily have that opportunity as

a believer. As God's workmanship, So this faith is not without effect.

It produces something in us. It's not just clean slate, you're good.

It now produces, It produces a good work, It produces fruit. We

don't work to earn our salvation because God has accomplished salvation for all who believe.

But now we live to work out our salvation, which means just to

walk in it, to live in it. If we're not supposed to be

those things, what should it looked like? What should it looked like?

This means as God has saved us, and God has created us in Christ,

and God has a plan, and that plan isn't for us to twiddle

our thumbs until he comes back. Okay, he has a good plan and

good works prepared for us. He wants us to live out all that he's

called us to. And where do we find what he's called us to?

God's word which is incredible because it's the same word that brings about faith.

It's the same word that we cling to by his grace, and it's the

same word and that contains the promises and hope that we put our faith in

trust him. So let's summarize what's that's Christianity apart answer that we are saved

by grace alone, through faith alone, not by works. That every every

system that you will find on this planet has works in it somewhere that you

must do or work or be this, or do that or accomplish this.

But the thing is that the reason that this is good news, the Gospel,

is because what it offers is not what the world has to offer.

It has to offer real grace, real grace. You don't deserve it.

Lean into that. That's okay, that's a burden off your shoulders. Yeah,

it's gonna humble you, it's gonna hurt your pride, A little bit,

But I mean, who cares. It's real grace and it's real faith.

It doesn't leave any room for us to have confidence in ourselves. We

saw left to ourselves. We're faithless, we're rough, we got issues.

But if it's from God, then we have conviction and we have assurance because

our heavenly Father will give us these things and has blessed us with these things

in Christ. And in that we can actually feel confident because we know who

our God is. So God has made a way for you to have peace

with Him, to stop from all your work in striving in this life and

know that there's actually rest in Christ. And you kind of might say,

well, didn't you just say there's works on the other side of this thing?

You know, you said there's still something to do. But the thing

that's amazing is that other places in the shripture tell us that those who love

Jesus here his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome. He's lifted the

weight and enabled us to live out the life that he has created for us,

which is amazing. Let's look at Matthew eleven twenty eight. Come to

me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you

rest. This is Jesus. Take my yoke upon you and lean or learn

from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will

find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is

light. Why can he give us rest? Because the work is finished.

He finished the work. Jesus lived the perfect life that you and I could

only dream of. He lived the perfect life that we could not live.

He died the death that we deserve, to die for our sins, and

he rose on the third day from the grave, proving that he had accomplished

this great work out. My hope is that as we've gone through this,

as we're looking at it trying to better understand our faith and our hope,

that this has enriched our view of God and his mercy and his grace in

this great gift of salvation that He has given us. And I hope that

in our eyes, our Lord has been magnified. And I also pray that

God would be drawing you to himself. He's working on your hearts right now,

that you would long to truly see Him as he is, and that

it would ignite a faith that's like fire, that all you know is that

you want to know him and belong to him and be able to trust him,

because that's firm foundation's that's firm footing. Something you can actually put your

foot on him. Right, you're gonna get on a boat. You know

he's gonna sink. You're not gonna do that. You're not gonna walk into

a house where it has a crumbling foundation. But a lot of us are

okay with living like that or just not looking at it. Well, I'm

just not gonna look down. So my hope is that if you've been hearing

as you've been hearing God's word, that you're not hopeless but actually filled with

hope in light of this news, knowing that we can rest in what He

has accomplished and how He has saved you and provided for you every step of

the way. And if just today this is all new to you, maybe

that could be the case, This could be all be brand new to you.

Then I pray that it is that God is working in you with this

news, that you would feel his call, that you would feel his pull,

and that you would respond to him. I pray that he would take

away the veil that is blinding you and let his light shine on you so

that you would see the glory of our great King and Lord. Would you

guys please stand. So I don't have a connect card with me, but

we have connect cards, and the purpose of these connect cards is who we

want to be praying for you. We want to be able to connect with

you if it's your first time or any of those things like that. We

just want to be able to make sure that you if you wanted a space

to have questions answered, or if you want to be able to be prayed

over, we pray over those regularly. Our leadership, our elders pray over

those. And so we just like with the other needs of our church,

we want to meet those needs. That's why God has created us for those

good works, so we can give ourselves, give up of ourselves to the

good of others. So the glory of God right. So our hope is

that when we can pray for each other and share those prayer requests as we

believe in who we pray to, and be able to have more brothers and

sisters come alongside us and do that is a real blessing. So if you

have any prayer, please write it on the back of the connect card.

You can put it in the offering box that is out the doors right there.

If you don't want, if you just want the elders to see it,

just mark private on there and we'll only send it to the elders to

be praying. We're gonna have prayer on the sides, and if you can't

prepared to give today, you can have the opportunity to do so as well

in the offering box out there. Let's pray and let's sing praises to our

glorious and gracious Savior, Father God. We love you, we thank you,

we give you all glory. We thank you that you've left no room

for our boasting, no room for our arrogance or pride to be found,

Lord God, but you have squashed that completely in your finished work. Or

God, that we are called sons and daughters of you, or God,

that you've provided a way of salvation, of good news that is spread,

and that you use, Lord God, to be the seed that is planted

in our hearts, that you use to grow or goad. That you would

give us a new heart with new desire, a new mind, that we

no longer live in a rebellion as your enemies, but as servants, as

sons and daughters or God, who have a good father who loves them,

who takes care of them. So, Father, we just asked that the

word that was preached today, that they were your words. Everything else that

wasn't, Lord, God just goes away or good. We know your word

does not return void, but accomplishes all that you have sent it out to

do. And so Lord, we're believing that. We just asked that even

in our lives as believers, that as we redig down and even examine our

foundation, that we remember why it's good and why you are great, and

why we have reason to praise and sing and rejoice. And we just asked

that that would actually be expressed in this time that we have with one another.

To your glory and Jesus name. Everyone said Amen,