Post by garywalker on Dec 31, 2010 1:27:57 GMT -5
Saved By Grace
If you don't know the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour, it is MY prayer that you might read something in the next few minutes that will convict you, that is, convince you that you need a Saviour. If you are already saved, then it is MY hope that you might read something in the next few minutes that will build you up in your faith and help to establish you in the truth of the gospel. I hope that you will understand that your salvation is based totally and completely upon the finished word of Christ at Calvary for you.
Your salvation is not based, in any way, on what you can do, or could do, for the Lord in order to find favor with God. Nor is your eternal security based, in any way, on what you "do for the Lord" after you are saved. For your salvation, God does not "require" a sacrifice from you. But, miracle of all miracles, instead of God asking you to bring Him a sacrifice God brought you a sacrifice, the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for your sins. The bible says that "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." So, the point is, that your sins are already paid for. God is not going to "reckon" or "impute" your sins to you, because nearly 2,000 years ago, He "reckoned" them to Christ, and the bible says, "God made Him to be sin for us." So, what's the problem then? You need Jesus Christ as your Saviour. One day, you are going to have to answer to God for what you believe. What you believe....about Christ. Are you trusting Christ? Is Jesus Christ your Saviour? Do you have a Saviour? Romans 10:9 says:
Romans 10: 9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Then, if you believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins, you believe that He died for all of them. That is, when Jesus Christ died, in A.D. 30, your sins were in the future. In other words, Christ died in A.D. 30, and you were not even born until this past century. So your life, and all of your sins, were in the future when Christ died. He died then and you are living now. If Christ died for your sins, then he died for all of them. To believe that Christ died for your sins...up to the day that you believed in Him, the day you were saved, and then believe that from then on you must live without sins....or else repent and confess daily in order to stay saved.....is not the salvation that is given through the Apostle Paul, the Apostle of the Gentiles.
To believe the truth of 1 John 1:9:
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.......Is to NOT BELIEVE the completeness of your salvation in Collosians 2:13, that God "has forgiven us all trespasses," or Ephesians 4:32, that God "has forgiven us." or Romans 5:11, that you have already received the "atonement" that Israel, Peter, James and John, looks forward to at the second coming of Christ. To NOT believe that your salvation is finished and complete in the finished work of Christ is to refuse to "rightly divide the word of truth" as in 2 Timothy 2:15 and is to fail to see the difference between prophecy and mystery. The difference between the things spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets (to Israel) since the world began, as in Acts 3:21 and the gospel which was revealed to the Apostle Paul who preached, "according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was (not spoken by anybody before, but was) kept secret since the world began," as in Romans 16:25.
You see, the message that Paul delivered to you was that Christ died for ALL YOUR SINS. So to believe in Jesus Christ as your Saviour is to believe that all your sins are PAID FOR....and that God will never call you into judgment for your sins ever again. Why? He called Jesus Christ into judgment for your sins. He placed your sins upon Christ. The bible says "God made Him (Jesus Christ) to be sin for us." Therefore God found Jesus guilty of your sins.
God condemned Jesus Christ for your sins. He poured out His wrath upon Him. He satisfied his wrath against you by pouring it out on Christ. So what do you do? You receive Christ as your Saviour. You believe on Him, not just in Him, you believe on Him as your Saviour. You accept Him as your Saviour. You believe the record that God gave through Paul, that Christ was judged for you, that Christ PAID FOR your sins. The wages of sin is death...and Christ died, according to 1 Corinthians 15, verse 3, FOR OUR SINS. The payoff for sin is death. The wages of sin is death. Now if God has already judged Christ for your sins...and He received YOUR WAGES then God is not going to judge your sins in you. That would be receiving double wages. Christ paid the wages, by dying...you need Him as your Saviour. Confess Him as your Lord and Saviour, believing that your sins are paid for. Trust the Lord for your salvation...not yourself.
If you believe, like I believe, that the Bible is the Word of God, then you must believe that God called Paul to be the apostle of the Gentiles. The bible says so in many places: Anyone who corrupts the gospel given to Paul by preaching it as "another gospel" as in Galatians 1:6-9, or who adds religious works to it, will be called for a fool and thrown out of the fight, 2 Timothy 2:5, and rejected by God for not receiving the love of the truth as in 2 Thessalonians 2:10. God said to consider them accursed in Galatians 1:8-9. In every debate which opposes the eternal security of the believer, those who claim that salvation can be lost also preach that it can be gained by works of righteousness, by good works...and they always go outside the body of truth committed to Paul for the church today....outside Romans through Philemon.
Paul said in Romans 2:16 that God would judge the secrets of men, "according to my gospel." He said in Romans 16:25 that his gospel was the revelation of the mystery "kept secret since the world began." Paul told Timothy in I Timothy 1:3 to "charge some that they teach no other doctrine." He said, in 2 Timothy 1:13 to "hold fast the form of sound words that thou hast heard of me," and in 2 Timothy 2:2 he said to "commit these things to faithful men." The gospel of the grace of God is just that. It's about grace....not religion. It's about salvation without religious works of any kind, repentance, water baptism, keeping the law, the Lord's Supper, or any other kind of human effort, through faith in what Jesus Christ did for us instead of what we are doing for Him. The salvation message that Paul preached is this:
Titus 3: 5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
Romans 11: 6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Romans 4: 5 But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.
Galatians 2: 16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
Ephesians 2: 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Ephesians 2: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Any attempt to preach any form of works of righteousness for salvation in this age, in the dispensation of the grace of God, is to pervert the gospel of Christ and those who do are to be accounted accursed. Compare these verses in Galatians:
Galatians 1: 7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Galatians 3: 10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.
Galatians 5: 4 Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.
It is impossible to be saved by grace through faith in what Christ did for you, while at the same time "working for your salvation."
Romans 11: 6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Peter told Cornelius, the Roman Centurion, in Acts Chapter Ten that those who "feared God and worked righteousness" were accepted of Him. But Paul said something entirely different to Titus:
Titus 3: 5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
Anyone who says that those two verses say the same thing....has a reading problem. You cannot work righteousness and not work righteousness at the same time. Paul said, in 2 Timothy 2:15 to "rightly divide the word of truth," and he said in Phillipians 1:10 to "approve things that are excellent." Paul has the salvation message for you, today, not Peter. Peter preached the gospel of the Kingdom In this age, people are saved by identification with Christ. To identify means "to prove to be the same, or to treat as one." 2 Corinthians 5:21 tells us that God made Christ to be sin for us. In other words, He was treated as one with us and our sin on the cross. In Adam, we are identified with the sin of Adam
Romans 5: 12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
"In Christ" we are identified with the death of Christ. People die because of Adam's sin. Believers live because of Christ's death for sin. The word "for" in Romans 5:6,7 and 8, means "in behalf of," or we might say "instead of." Christ died instead of the ungodly, and Christ died instead of us. On the Cross our sin was laid on Christ and he was judged as a sinner in our behalf. God identified him with us and our sin. Now, those who believe the gospel are identified in Christ, in death, on the cross. God identified us as dying with Christ, being buried with Christ and raised with Christ. That's what the word baptism means, identification. Now:
1 Corinthians 12: 13 For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
That's a spiritual baptism that takes place the instant you trust Christ as your Saviour. It is the seal of God's Holy Spirit which identifies you with everything Christ has done for you and puts it to your account. There can be no charge made against us who believe the gospel, According to Romans 8:33-34, because all of our sins were charged to Christ and he died for them. Not only that, the law, which is against us and contrary to us, was also taken out of the way, and nailed to the cross, Collosians 2:13-14.
So a saved individual is "dead to sin" according to Romans 6:22, "free from sin." The Law is also taken out of the way by the cross of Christ. So in Christ you are a new creature, and Paul tells us that we also should walk in newness of life. God has finished all the work required for your salvation and that's the end of it. Walk in it. Live in it. Trust in it. Trust what God has done....not what you can do for the Lord.
In Christ is the most fantastic reality in the universe. That phrase appears more than 160 times in your bible. In Christ you are righteous BY HIS FAITH. Romans 3:22. You are justified BY HIS FAITH. Galatians 2:16. And you have life BY HIS FAITH. Galatians 2:20 In Ephesians 1:13, those who trust the Lord for salvation are sealed by the Holy Spirit. The seal of God cannot be broken. "The Lord knoweth them that are his..."
Ephesians 2: 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Ephesians 2: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
If you don't know the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Saviour, it is MY prayer that you might read something in the next few minutes that will convict you, that is, convince you that you need a Saviour. If you are already saved, then it is MY hope that you might read something in the next few minutes that will build you up in your faith and help to establish you in the truth of the gospel. I hope that you will understand that your salvation is based totally and completely upon the finished word of Christ at Calvary for you.
Your salvation is not based, in any way, on what you can do, or could do, for the Lord in order to find favor with God. Nor is your eternal security based, in any way, on what you "do for the Lord" after you are saved. For your salvation, God does not "require" a sacrifice from you. But, miracle of all miracles, instead of God asking you to bring Him a sacrifice God brought you a sacrifice, the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for your sins. The bible says that "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." So, the point is, that your sins are already paid for. God is not going to "reckon" or "impute" your sins to you, because nearly 2,000 years ago, He "reckoned" them to Christ, and the bible says, "God made Him to be sin for us." So, what's the problem then? You need Jesus Christ as your Saviour. One day, you are going to have to answer to God for what you believe. What you believe....about Christ. Are you trusting Christ? Is Jesus Christ your Saviour? Do you have a Saviour? Romans 10:9 says:
Romans 10: 9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Then, if you believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins, you believe that He died for all of them. That is, when Jesus Christ died, in A.D. 30, your sins were in the future. In other words, Christ died in A.D. 30, and you were not even born until this past century. So your life, and all of your sins, were in the future when Christ died. He died then and you are living now. If Christ died for your sins, then he died for all of them. To believe that Christ died for your sins...up to the day that you believed in Him, the day you were saved, and then believe that from then on you must live without sins....or else repent and confess daily in order to stay saved.....is not the salvation that is given through the Apostle Paul, the Apostle of the Gentiles.
To believe the truth of 1 John 1:9:
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.......Is to NOT BELIEVE the completeness of your salvation in Collosians 2:13, that God "has forgiven us all trespasses," or Ephesians 4:32, that God "has forgiven us." or Romans 5:11, that you have already received the "atonement" that Israel, Peter, James and John, looks forward to at the second coming of Christ. To NOT believe that your salvation is finished and complete in the finished work of Christ is to refuse to "rightly divide the word of truth" as in 2 Timothy 2:15 and is to fail to see the difference between prophecy and mystery. The difference between the things spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets (to Israel) since the world began, as in Acts 3:21 and the gospel which was revealed to the Apostle Paul who preached, "according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was (not spoken by anybody before, but was) kept secret since the world began," as in Romans 16:25.
You see, the message that Paul delivered to you was that Christ died for ALL YOUR SINS. So to believe in Jesus Christ as your Saviour is to believe that all your sins are PAID FOR....and that God will never call you into judgment for your sins ever again. Why? He called Jesus Christ into judgment for your sins. He placed your sins upon Christ. The bible says "God made Him (Jesus Christ) to be sin for us." Therefore God found Jesus guilty of your sins.
God condemned Jesus Christ for your sins. He poured out His wrath upon Him. He satisfied his wrath against you by pouring it out on Christ. So what do you do? You receive Christ as your Saviour. You believe on Him, not just in Him, you believe on Him as your Saviour. You accept Him as your Saviour. You believe the record that God gave through Paul, that Christ was judged for you, that Christ PAID FOR your sins. The wages of sin is death...and Christ died, according to 1 Corinthians 15, verse 3, FOR OUR SINS. The payoff for sin is death. The wages of sin is death. Now if God has already judged Christ for your sins...and He received YOUR WAGES then God is not going to judge your sins in you. That would be receiving double wages. Christ paid the wages, by dying...you need Him as your Saviour. Confess Him as your Lord and Saviour, believing that your sins are paid for. Trust the Lord for your salvation...not yourself.
If you believe, like I believe, that the Bible is the Word of God, then you must believe that God called Paul to be the apostle of the Gentiles. The bible says so in many places: Anyone who corrupts the gospel given to Paul by preaching it as "another gospel" as in Galatians 1:6-9, or who adds religious works to it, will be called for a fool and thrown out of the fight, 2 Timothy 2:5, and rejected by God for not receiving the love of the truth as in 2 Thessalonians 2:10. God said to consider them accursed in Galatians 1:8-9. In every debate which opposes the eternal security of the believer, those who claim that salvation can be lost also preach that it can be gained by works of righteousness, by good works...and they always go outside the body of truth committed to Paul for the church today....outside Romans through Philemon.
Paul said in Romans 2:16 that God would judge the secrets of men, "according to my gospel." He said in Romans 16:25 that his gospel was the revelation of the mystery "kept secret since the world began." Paul told Timothy in I Timothy 1:3 to "charge some that they teach no other doctrine." He said, in 2 Timothy 1:13 to "hold fast the form of sound words that thou hast heard of me," and in 2 Timothy 2:2 he said to "commit these things to faithful men." The gospel of the grace of God is just that. It's about grace....not religion. It's about salvation without religious works of any kind, repentance, water baptism, keeping the law, the Lord's Supper, or any other kind of human effort, through faith in what Jesus Christ did for us instead of what we are doing for Him. The salvation message that Paul preached is this:
Titus 3: 5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
Romans 11: 6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Romans 4: 5 But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.
Galatians 2: 16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
Ephesians 2: 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Ephesians 2: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Any attempt to preach any form of works of righteousness for salvation in this age, in the dispensation of the grace of God, is to pervert the gospel of Christ and those who do are to be accounted accursed. Compare these verses in Galatians:
Galatians 1: 7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Galatians 3: 10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.
Galatians 5: 4 Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.
It is impossible to be saved by grace through faith in what Christ did for you, while at the same time "working for your salvation."
Romans 11: 6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Peter told Cornelius, the Roman Centurion, in Acts Chapter Ten that those who "feared God and worked righteousness" were accepted of Him. But Paul said something entirely different to Titus:
Titus 3: 5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;
Anyone who says that those two verses say the same thing....has a reading problem. You cannot work righteousness and not work righteousness at the same time. Paul said, in 2 Timothy 2:15 to "rightly divide the word of truth," and he said in Phillipians 1:10 to "approve things that are excellent." Paul has the salvation message for you, today, not Peter. Peter preached the gospel of the Kingdom In this age, people are saved by identification with Christ. To identify means "to prove to be the same, or to treat as one." 2 Corinthians 5:21 tells us that God made Christ to be sin for us. In other words, He was treated as one with us and our sin on the cross. In Adam, we are identified with the sin of Adam
Romans 5: 12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
"In Christ" we are identified with the death of Christ. People die because of Adam's sin. Believers live because of Christ's death for sin. The word "for" in Romans 5:6,7 and 8, means "in behalf of," or we might say "instead of." Christ died instead of the ungodly, and Christ died instead of us. On the Cross our sin was laid on Christ and he was judged as a sinner in our behalf. God identified him with us and our sin. Now, those who believe the gospel are identified in Christ, in death, on the cross. God identified us as dying with Christ, being buried with Christ and raised with Christ. That's what the word baptism means, identification. Now:
1 Corinthians 12: 13 For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
That's a spiritual baptism that takes place the instant you trust Christ as your Saviour. It is the seal of God's Holy Spirit which identifies you with everything Christ has done for you and puts it to your account. There can be no charge made against us who believe the gospel, According to Romans 8:33-34, because all of our sins were charged to Christ and he died for them. Not only that, the law, which is against us and contrary to us, was also taken out of the way, and nailed to the cross, Collosians 2:13-14.
So a saved individual is "dead to sin" according to Romans 6:22, "free from sin." The Law is also taken out of the way by the cross of Christ. So in Christ you are a new creature, and Paul tells us that we also should walk in newness of life. God has finished all the work required for your salvation and that's the end of it. Walk in it. Live in it. Trust in it. Trust what God has done....not what you can do for the Lord.
In Christ is the most fantastic reality in the universe. That phrase appears more than 160 times in your bible. In Christ you are righteous BY HIS FAITH. Romans 3:22. You are justified BY HIS FAITH. Galatians 2:16. And you have life BY HIS FAITH. Galatians 2:20 In Ephesians 1:13, those who trust the Lord for salvation are sealed by the Holy Spirit. The seal of God cannot be broken. "The Lord knoweth them that are his..."
Ephesians 2: 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Ephesians 2: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.