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We've been talking about grace. Today, we're going to talk about the immense reality of the gift called grace. Amen. Welcome to Living Influence. Bill, the immense reality. You coined those words. Those are big words. Those are big words. Those are big words. Well, let's just keep thinking about this gift for a minute. Yeah. For many years, Scott, we, I, have been teaching out of 1 Peter 5, verse 5, verse 5.

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This truth, God gives grace to the humble. Right. Okay, God gives grace. Oh, this gift of grace, God gives it to the humble. Yeah. And this gift of grace to the humble. And so a lot of times we keep trying to imagine this gift of grace. And that's great. We keep working on that these weeks. But for right now, I'm going to just pay two minutes' attention to something different. Who in the world are the humble?

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If God's going to give this immense gift of grace to the humble, it would be a real good idea if I knew who they were or what that means.

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And so for many years, for centuries, the church has struggled with this concept of humility. And it's a virtue that many teach that if you talked about it, it would mean you didn't have it. So what is it? What if humility was a relational word? What if humility was this? A human being choosing to trust God.

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That's the home wall. Yeah. So how do you, what does that mean to trust God? That's a great question. Push in there. Yeah, it's a great question. What does it mean to trust God? At the heart of man, there has to come a time when we understand we cannot do what is best for us.

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We can't do it. People are spending billions of dollars on therapy every week trying to get somebody to convince them they can do it. But really what it means to trust God is to trust somebody who can do what is best for us. It means to trust. It means to rely upon. It means to lean in. I like to say that. It means to lean in. Is my God.

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Someone I can trust with me. And when I choose to trust him, his promise is this, I will always experience grace. So I remember...

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When I began to get serious about like, okay, I need to make a decision about God and am I going to follow him? Exactly. Are we going to, Bev and I, going to keep going to this church? And there was this fear. What if he makes me do something I don't want to do? Yeah. You ever had anybody? Oh, lots and lots of somebodies. And what that says, it's an honest fear, but what that says is this.

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Oh, I see. My problem is not my fear. My problem is I've missed who God is. God loves me. Yes. God's grace is for my best. Oh, why would I fear a God who lives for my best, in fact, died for my best? Yes.

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But I hear it a lot. A misunderstanding of trust can leave a man with the thought of, well, there's nothing for me to do. It's a misunderstanding of trust. Trust is something to do. Trust is something to do. Trust is a something that says, is there a somebody who...

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that I can lean into, who can do in and for me what I cannot. That is something to do. What we want to say is, well, trust leaves nothing for me to do. Oh, wait, you forgot to have the magical words. Love needs nothing for me to do, oh, except trust. Now, you know what I've discovered after just a few years of being in the ministry?

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It is always easier to try to do something for God than it is to trust that God wants to do something for me. Yeah. The human dynamic is I'm going to demonstrate what I can do. And humility says I need to learn to lean into what God can do. The fear of trusting God.

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is not understanding who God is. Exactly. If I understood who he was, why would I fear trusting him? Exactly. You know, the very first week we started this series, these talks on grace, it was back to this. Who is he? Yeah. Is he really a God of love? Is that who he is? Is he a God of grace? Does he really live in a realm in which he gives him, the Trinity gives themselves their best, and he wants to give that to me?

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Now, how would I learn to understand? Just last week, we talked about our salvation experiences. Right. I, at 17, made a decision to believe and trust that Jesus was God and my Savior. Yeah. And am I able to trust him? And I know my next words confuse people. I want to keep working at making them better. But can I learn to trust him with me?

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with me, who am I? Do you know how many of us struggle with any sense of identity? Any sense of a reality, any way of being able to describe who I am. And yet, it's in this thing called experiencing grace. Can I believe

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that God's declaration of himself is that he is for me. I wanna trust that God. I wanna trust that God. I wanna trust the God who went to a place called Calvary for me. As we go through this time together, we'll learn together some aspects of grace that are broader than my salvation experience. Yeah. The eternal God

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coming from the realm of grace to die on a cross so that he could take me into his realm. That God can be trusted. I want to trust that God. Yeah. And when I do, he promised me grace. So what does it look like when you trust him with me? When you say, trust God with me? Yeah. Does that mean you...

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You stop hiding from God. Ah, excellent. What it means, in part, yeah, it means that. It means that I'm a character. My name is Bill. I have a life, and I'm afraid to be known. Life has taught me something. People who probably should have loved me didn't. Some people abused me. I've learned to shut me out from you.

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I've learned to not trust anyone. I don't want to get hurt anymore. So when I say trust God with me, can I trust God with my reality that I am alone, afraid? We talked about this last week. And he can sympathize with me.

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Because he's been there, but without sin. I love that God. I love that Jesus. I want to trust him with the essence of who I am. It's amazing, Scott. As you know, I sit across table from lots of people. It is amazing the number of leaders that I've met with who have preached the gospel their whole lives and they've trusted Jesus with their sin, but they've never trusted Jesus with their lives.

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my life, Jesus. Yeah. And so that miracle of the gift, let's take a couple of minutes, Scott, just read that portion from Romans chapter 5. Yeah. So it's Romans 5, 15 is where we're going to start. Yeah. But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man's trespass, much more,

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have the grace of God and the free gift of the grace of the one man Jesus abounded for many. And the free gift is not like the result of that one man's sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. If because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man much more

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will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by one man's disobedience, the many were made sinners. So by the one man's obedience, the many will be made righteous.

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Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness, leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. These are big words. Oh, big words and big thoughts. In that portion, Paul is describing the tragedy of,

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The human tragedy of the condemnation on humanity because of Adam's sin.

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And the death, the separation from God reality in that condemnation because of Adam's sin. But the words he uses that I really want us to pick up on today as we think about grace, he says, but much more. Much more will those who receive the abundance of grace. Much more. What he's saying is this. Guys, I, Paul, I'm going to describe something to you. The greatest day of human tragedy is this.

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Oh, but I want to tell you something. Much more than that, much more than the immense extension of that into all humanity, I want to tell you something even greater called grace is this. What Adam did is he led man to condemnation in his sin. Jesus much more came to do something to justify the sinner.

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Much more did Adam bring humanity to death. But Jesus, much, much more did Jesus come. And in the gift of righteousness to all who accept Christ leading to eternal life. What?

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You mean no matter how broad and deep and sick and reality of, by the way, humanity's been around a while. Sin's been doing its work. I don't know. I don't know a lot about history, but I think there's some places in history that didn't go so well. And that's horrific. Yeah. But he says much more than that. I want to tell you something. Much more than that. The grace of God is greater than all of that. All of that. The grace of God is greater.

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What Jesus did is he offered life to all who have died. That's what he's done. What Jesus did is he's come to bring into a right relationship with God all who have been brought to condemnation. How big is this gift?

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This gift is greater than the immensity of sin. Yeah. That's how great this gift is. Yeah, when you think of the mess that the world is in.

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Oh, I watched a movie the other day about World War II, and I'm going the mess of those five years. I mean, what grace is greater than that? Yeah. It is. And sometimes we hear people say, why didn't God do something about this? Every time I hear somebody say that, no, not every time, but every time I get a chance, I'll say to them, he did do something about this. He did, didn't he? Yeah. He did something about this. You know what he did? He went to a place called Calvary, and he actually died for the tragedy that you are wondering why he didn't do something about.

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And you know what he did? He did that to bring life to those who have now caused such tragedy of death. We started this by you asking me a question. Can we sometimes think too little about grace? We can. We can think too little about grace because we can start to blame God.

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for not love, not being love. We can blame God for not being of grace because we look at the circumstances for which we see no solution. Yeah. Instead of at the God who has created at Calvary a solution to all of our circumstances. That's the gift of grace. Yeah. That's the gift of grace. Romans 11, verse 6. Yeah. Just read that one verse. But if it's by grace...

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It's no longer on the basis of works. Otherwise, grace would no longer be grace. Do you know how we limit grace? Not because we don't trust its immensity. You know how we limit it? How do we limit it? We limit it because we think we have a part in it. Right. You know how you limit grace? Yes. By making works part of your reality. Yeah. For my grace is safe.

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and not by works. So what robs me of grace, my effort to do something about my reality? What limits grace? My looking at my circumstances and wondering why God doesn't do something about them. When he already has. When he already has. What limits grace when I misunderstand

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I teasingly said to you recently, this whole concept of sin management, this whole concept of attempting to work harder on my sin to become godly is in fact robbing me of a grace I need that is in fact the foundation for my godliness. And so what limits grace, I do.

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But how do I limit grace? Oh, I need grace. No. You know how you limit grace? When somehow you think you're partnering with God in the development of your reality.

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In Galatians, he talks about this phenomenon that took place in that early church in which he says that, who has bewitched you? Right. And he's talking about who has preached a gospel other than this gospel of grace? Yeah. And the question I write there is, who would make a requirement of law a condition of grace?

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You know how we live with grace? When we make the requirement of law a condition of grace.

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And what is that? That needs to be, he says, let him be accursed. It's like he's saying the worst of all things. Set them aside. But we don't do that today. Church after church, Sunday after Sunday, century after century, keeps preaching a message that you get saved by grace, but your whole godliness depends on your effort. Yeah.

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You're becoming more godly because you somehow can work on sin. Sin management is an oxymoron. You know why it's an oxymoron? Because sin can't be managed. Sin management says that we don't need the cross of Christ. Exactly. We just need our effort. Is there a way to deal with sin...

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apart from Calvary. The answer will always be no. The answer will always be no. Sin cannot be managed. It has to always be redeemed. This is an interesting insight. When Jesus went to the cross, he shed his blood for my redemption.

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That's what he did. There is no redemption apart from the shed blood of Christ. None. Right. None. No religion, no faith, no church, no cult. Nobody can do this thing that can match this amazing grace of God that Jesus did at Calvary. What did he do?

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You and I just last session, we talked about receiving Jesus as our personal saviors, trusting him, us, trusting my sin with to him. And over these many years, as we'll talk about in coming weeks, trusting my life with him. As I have received Christ Jesus, my Lord, I will walk in him.

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Are we preaching a consistent message? Are people really hearing that the way to godliness is the same as the way to salvation? It totally depends on the work of Christ. Yeah. That's the gift. When I've taught this before, the objection then comes, well, you mean we're supposed to do nothing?

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Which is interesting because what it means is what they've been doing is trying to manage their sin. Exactly. And what actually happens when you lay down, you surrender to God's grace and you let, you know, God, I can't deal with this. We then get to...

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actually love one another. We get to enjoy life. We get to actually begin to discover our gifting. We get to begin to labor into a calling. That's what we do. Amen. But everybody else is doing this other thing. Exactly. To get to some place where we already are. But you just said something, and I just can't pass on it. It's that, sis. You mean I get to do nothing.

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I've had the privilege of Scott sitting across the table pretty close to somebody, looking him in the eyes and saying this. I think you've discovered, haven't you, how hard it is to let go? Yeah. You don't get to do nothing. You need to let go.

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I can't let go. See? It's hard, isn't it? Yeah. It's hard. You're not the answer. I know I'm not the answer. Then let go.

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Well, I can't let go. Oh, it's harder than your thought, isn't it? So trust isn't just a blind eye, don't gun to do anything. You actually get to do something. No, and then when people really get it, and they start to like, you start to see them change, they're like, oh my gosh, this is way harder than I ever imagined. Exactly. And you go, oh, I can see why people don't do it. Yeah. It's an old truism, but it's always in the human heart easier

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To imagine you're doing something for God than it is to let God do something for you. Yeah. That's our tragedy. I've got to learn to receive a gift. I've got to let this God who loves me. Give me this gift. Give me this gift. Could I just do that? Sure. If I receive the gift, I've got to let go.

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But that's really hard. Yeah, it really is. But I don't know if you have enough courage to look at your life. Did you notice it ain't going well? Have you ever thought about the fact that you're holding on to something that ain't working? Hello? So not to get into that except to say this. As hard as it is, can my God meet me there?

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Yeah. Teach me, God, to trust you with me. It's an amazing place to begin to get there. Oh, my gosh. Because when you get there, you no longer have to defend yourself. No. And when you get to lay that energy down...

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And instead... Receive. Receive. Amen. It's like putting a new pair of glasses on where you see leaves on the trees. And you didn't see them before. Exactly. The whole world looks different. It does. And it should. Yeah. And it should.

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So this gift is amazing. Let's keep experiencing it together. All right. We'll keep working on this grace topic, won't we? Exactly. All right. Hope to see you next week. Thanks for joining. Thank you. Thank you for listening to the podcast. We're really glad that you're here. We'd love to know that you're here. And so if you could leave a comment, we would appreciate that. But more importantly, if you know someone that should listen to this or hear it, we would love for you to share it with them. Thanks again.