"Empowering Grace
2/10/08 AM R. Sams (Galatians)
BIG IDEA: Our faith, intermingling
with God�s grace, empowers us to really live, experience life in its fullness, a
life of right living and obedience to God.
SCRIPTURES TO VIDEOPROJECT (coded
with P ): Dt 30:19-20 OTHER SCRIPTURES:
OTHER ITEMS TO VIDEOPROJECT:
CALL
TO WORSHIP: Gal 3:2-3 THEMES/SONGS/STORIES:
GOSPEL/MISSION:
VISION/PRIORITIES:
ASSIGNMENTS/TESTIMONIES:
PASTOR�S
MINI-LESSON/PROMO/BIG QUESTION:
BULLETIN BOTTOM, p. 1 I. You�ve
heard of "Amazing Grace. Have you heard of "Empowering grace"? One
of my earliest memories of empowering grace was a college "December term.
This was a mini-term they wedged between Thanksgiving and Christmas at
Malone. Each professor was given the option of whether to make their
course pass/fail, something I fondly remembered from Kindergarten…something
college and K had in common. Rumor was you had to have the IQ of a cumquat
to fail. I was excited. But my old school prof wasn�t sure about
pass/fail.
I liked this man, actually I loved him. He was popular and
for good reasons: character, godliness, and, most important to us, his
humor. But he also had the deserved reputation of being one of the
hardest.
The subject he was teaching was interesting and in my major, so I
took the course, but it was unlikely he was going to make it pass/fail.
I
remember launching in with a great attitude. But it seemed like every
other prof had declared their course pass/fail, so no one studying except us.
I started to resent the course and this prof. He hadn�t changed, but
suddenly he wasn�t as funny or godly, nor did I like the subject matter
anymore.
But then it happened. Grace blew in like fresh air about half
way through as the impossible, the miraculous happened. We were be no
longer under law, but under grace, because, miraculously, he declared the course
pass/fail.
I couldn�t believe how much funnier he got, and how much more fun
the material got. I actually studied harder, I worked more. It
didn�t matter if others were coasting. I suddenly took on a new love for
the prof and the subject.
I was motivated and liberated by grace, not
grades.
II. (3:6-11) Our faith, intermingling with God�s grace,
empowers us to really live, experience life in it�s fullness, a life of right
living and obedience to God. The more we obey Him, the more we really
experience life abundant. Since God made us, he knows how we work best (Dt
30:19-20 P ).
A. In the middle of the letter Paul stopped and asked
the Galatians: "What has happened to all your joy (4:15)?
1.
Would the people who know you best wonder the same thing about you? Are
you experiencing the joy you believe God wants for you, the life abundant He
wants for you?
2. He�d been asking them about all the freedom they had
been experienced in a love relationship with Jesus Christ. But they have
now abandoned love for law, because the Judaizers have come in to tell them they
have to gain acceptance with God through obeying the Law given to Moses.
B. You�ll remember those laws touched every area of their lives:,
social, moral, religious, personal. They taught you had to obey it all or
you�ll not be accepted by God, you�ll not live abundantly here, you�ll not make
it into Heaven.
1. This sets up a condition Paul calls "slavery.
Whenever we operate under a religion of rules (law) we�ll always wonder: "Have I
done enough? People still do today.
2. Paul says this is not
good news/gospel AT ALL. It�s enslaving, death-producing, and
life-sucking. Sometimes we preach this gospel, but it doesn�t sound like
good news ("Gospel") to the people we�re trying to reach.
3. What does
it sound like when you tell it?
C. A false gospel was enslaving the
Galatian Christians, and it enslaves many today. Paul had some of his
harshest words for those teachers (1:6-9).
D. Those teaching the false
Gospel of religion by good works, religious rituals and rules had attacked
Paul�s right to tell the true Gospel of how to find real life through
Christ. Paul defends himself.
E. Note: how did call and empower
Paul? (1:15-16).
III. There�s an important point we could easily
miss about "leadings from the Lord. I get asked frequently: "How I can
know God is leading me? Great Q! Paul was certain he was called by
God. He felt the empowerment of that calling, leading. He felt God�s
empowering grace that comes from knowing we have his love, even though we can�t
earn or deserve it.
A. NOTE, Paul did NOT just receive this leading
from God, then say "clear out of my way; I�ve got the calling, and you can�t
question it. I�ve received it directly from Christ.
1. He
took time to get the church to confirm his leading from the Lord. It�s not
the whole church; it�s key leaders of the church, recognized as key leaders by
the church. This is HUGE (2:1-10).
2. How often does someone get
a leading from God and woe to anyone who questions it?
3. Do you
realize the implications of this? It doesn�t matter who it is, leadings
from God are to be tested by other discerning Christians. I can�t tell you
how many or how big the decision has to be, but I see this principle that is
violated to the harm of many today.
4. I�ve told several of our elder
groups (five key lay leaders recognized and confirmed by the congregation as
leaders) that if I ever feel called to go elsewhere, I need them to test that
calling; they�ll be the first to know.
5. That�s just one
example. It needs to happen more for all kinds of leadings: from church to
personal leadings, in families, and even business decisions. It does not
have to be our elders that confirm it. It could be your SS class leaders,
a board. It could be a "clearness committee who tests it, an old
Quaker practice we have restored.
B. Even Moses developed a team of
leaders around him to help him lead. I submit that meant help him hear
from God; Aaron and the elders, then the priests (3:12-18a).
C. You
might think these guys were just "yes men, but if you read carefully how
involved in leadership they were all through Exodus, you�ll see this principle
of team leadership and confirming a leading (17:5-6; 18:13-23; 24:9).
Moses may�ve been THE leader among the leaders, but he clearly believed in team
leadership.
D. I believe Paul sets that same example as he always
appointed elders in all the churches he started to lead the church as a team,
not solo leaders, and not with him calling the shots by himself.
1. In
(I Cor 14:32) he says even the prophets must be subject one to
another.
2. I believe the Bible teaches all important leadings must be
confirmed. This has loads of implications for the church and
families. Men, your leadings as husbands and leaders in your home need to
run by your wives.
3. How does Paul start his great teaching on wives
submitting to their husbands? By telling us to "submit to ONE ANOTHER out
of reverence for Christ (Eph 5:21).
4. Guys, we�d like to
leave out (v 21), which in Grk is the controlling verse of the rest of the
chapter. This is NOT good hermeneutics (Herman who?). Women (and
God) tend to frown on that. We can�t run roughshod over THEIR feelings and
leadings. I know of countless bad business deals that could have been
avoided if guys would have listened to their wives--waited and prayed together
until God could lead them together.
IV. I have digressed. God�s
grace is empowering. When we realize how God accepts us through Christ and
not through our own efforts/merits/works, in a way I can�t fully explain, that
empowers us to love and live for Him. Fearing punishment can never empower
us that way. Focusing on our performance for Him can never motivate us
like love and grace.
A. It is BY OUR FAITH, intermingling with God�s
gift of grace, that enabled all the heroes in the faith Hall of Fame to do great
things for God.
B. Abraham is the hero of Hebrews 11 and
Galatians. It is by His faith intermingling with God�s grace that he was
declared right with God (Heb
11:6 by faith we receive empowering grace, Eph
2:8-10).
C. It�s by faith all these heroes received empowering grace
that enabled them to do mighty works for God (Heb 11:7a, 8a, 9a, 17a, 23-27, and
on and on; Gal 3:6, 11).
D. Grace enabled Abraham, and it will enable
YOU, to truly live! Have you "got grace (understand and received
it)?
V. John Newton got grace and it empowered him to give up slave
trading and become a minister of the Gospel. He wrote about Amazing Grace,
how sweet the sound… A. Martin Luther was enslaved and miserable in the
works righteousness of the Roman Catholic Church of his day. READ bottom
half p. 22 of "Galatians by W. Barclay DSB Series.
B.
Are you struggling up some set of steps: bloody, bruised, bleeding and
miserable, trying to be good enough for God? Do you need to really "get
grace, and "get life"?