By Grace Through Faith

A Pocket Paper
from
The Donelson Fellowship
______________

Robert J. Morgan
November 26, 2000

Most of my messages are about thirty minutes long, but occasionally I’ve dragged on for forty or forty-five minutes. Sometimes when I’m leading a seminar I may fill a time slot of one hour. I’ve never preached a sermon that lasted four hours, but one man did. His name was Peter Gabriel.

In the mid-1500s the Reformation was spreading through Europe. The established church at that time had become very corrupt, not only in its moral behavior, but also in its theology and doctrine. There was a belief that a person had to do certain things to be saved. If you wanted to establish a relationship with God and be assured of heaven, you had to keep the sacraments, observe certain ceremonies, go through certain motions. These good works qualified you for heaven, it was thought.

But Martin Luther came along in Germany, and John Calvin in Geneva, and Zwingli in Zurich--the great reformers. They thundered back and said, "No, we are saved by grace through faith and that not of ourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast."

Well, the Reformation reached Holland in the mid 1560s. There was a man named Peter Gabriel who began teaching Reformation truth to a small group in his home every Sunday. Along with some fellow Christians, he began preaching in the reeds and thickets outside Amsterdam and throughout Holland. These Dutch reformers were threatened with the gallows and with confiscation of all their goods; a price was put on their heads. Still they preached.

Well, outside of Amsterdam was an estate owned by a very wealthy man. It was announced that there would be a great preaching service on this estate on July 14, 1566. Authorities in Amsterdam tried to block the meeting by shutting the town gates and forbidding anyone from leaving the city. But people found ways of getting outside the walls, many of them by swimming through the canals or by forcing their way out of the gates in the early hours when the milkmaids were leaving for the fields. By 11 o’clock, the authorities relented and opened the gates, and thousands of people gathered on the grounds of the estate.

Peter Gabriel stood up and announced his text--Ephesians 2:8-10: "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast."

He preached for four hours, but apparently nobody minded. They hadn’t heard the gospel preached for a thousand years, and they were hungry for its message. And Peter Gabriel’s sermon that day helped establish the Reformation in Holland.

Today in our study through Ephesians, we’re coming to the same text. My sermons isn’t going to be as long as Brother Gabriel’s, but it is on the same theme and it conveys the same truth. As we read this Scripture today, pretend that you haven’t heard it before. Listen to it as though you were hearing it for the first time in a thousand years:

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not of works, so that no one can boast (Ephesians 2:1-9)

The theme of this passage is salvation by grace through faith. Verse 5 says: it is by grace you have been saved. And verse 8 repeats: For it is by grace you have been saved through faith. The word "saved" is part of our Christian vocabulary, but it might not mean a lot to someone who didn’t grow up hearing it used as we often use it. In church language, we say, "I got saved on such and such a date." We ask, "Are you saved? When did you get saved?" What do we mean by that?

When Paul wrote here that we are saved by grace, he used the word swvzw, which literally means, "to rescue from danger, to deliver." A couple of years ago there was a terrible flood where my mother lived. She lived beside the Doe River, but up the hill on the side of a mountain, so she was not in danger. But just below her several people were swept out of their homes and perished. Across the road lived a woman who was recovering from hip replacement surgery and confined to her bed. The flash flood occurred at night, and the waters swept up her yard and into her house. She was in danger of drowning in her own bed until the paramedics arrived and rescued her. She was saved.

The Bible teaches that all of us are sinners and that the flood of God’s judgement is rising against us. We need a great, divine paramedic to come and rescue us from drowning in the floodtides of the wrath of God. When you reach out and trust that divine One to save you, at that moment you are saved. When you trust Jesus Christ as your personal Savior and Lord and when you receive Him by faith, at that moment you are saved.

Now with that as background, let’s just give this wonderful paragraph of Scripture a brief overlook.

Human Condition

The first thing we notice in verses 1-3 is the hopelessness of our human condition. In these three verses, Paul describes our condition without Christ in six different ways.

First, we are dead in our transgressions and sins. The root word in the Greek for transgressions is parapivptw, which comes from two smaller words: the prefix is a preposition meaning beside, and the stem is a word meaning to fall. The word transgression literally means to fall beside the road. Have you ever tried to climb up a steep path when you’ve lost your footing and slid back down. Have you ever taken a false step? That’s the idea here, and all of us have done that morally. We’ve messed up. We’ve fallen. We’ve lost our footing morally and spiritually.

The word sin is aJmartiva, a word meaning, to miss the target. No matter how hard we aim at perfection, we keep missing the mark.

The Bible teaches that outside of Christ, everyone is dead--separated from God--in transgressions and sins. This world is being run by dead men and women. The vast majority of the politicians and business leaders and educators and journalists are dead. We’re surrounded by dead people, millions of them, billions of them. They are running around in circles, seeking pleasure and success and security, but on the inside they are morally and spiritually dead. They are dead in terms of a relationship with God.

Second, without Christ we are described as following the ways of this world. Jesus said there are two ways, two highways, two pathways. One is wide and bright and crooked and it leads to destruction. The other is straight and narrow, but it leads to life. Without Christ, we’re on the wrong road. We’re dead people traveling down a dead-end street.

Third, without Christ we are following the ways of the ruler of the kingdom of the air (vs. 2). That is a clear reference to Satan, but why is he called the ruler of the kingdom of the air? Commentators are divided. Even the great commentator R. C. Lenski confesses that he just doesn’t know what to do with this term. Most interpret this in one of two ways. Some take it literally, that Satan’s demonic hosts fill the air and pollute the atmosphere. They are everywhere if only we had eyes to see them. Others take this phrase figuratively, that Satan is the prince of the moral atmosphere of earth. Perhaps both meanings are true.

Fourth, without Christ we are following the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient (vs. 2). This is another reference to Satan, who is prominently mentioned in the book of Ephesians. He is active and at work in the lives of those around us. His invisible hand, his subtle influence, and his deceptive tomfoolery are closer at hand than we realize.

Verse 3 goes on to say: All of us also lived among them at one time, and here’s the fifth characteristic of the person without Christ: …gratify the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. The devil, who rules the air and works in the ungodly, finds an able and willing ally in our own sinful natures. We’re trapped between the fallen nature inside of us and the fallen angel on the outside of us, and none of us can escape. The Bible says, "There is none righteous. No, not one!"

Sixth, we are by nature children of wrath. That is a Hebrew idiomatic phrase meaning we are under the sentence of wrath. We are all facing the wrath of God. This doesn’t mean that God is mad at us in an immature or juvenile sort of way. It refers to God’s right and necessary response to objective moral evil.

In John, chapter 3, we have the wonderful 16^th verse--For God so loved the world…. Jesus was talking to Nicodemus about being born again. But we forget that the last verse of that chapter, John 3:36, says: Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.

I suppose that all of you have read about the Hindenburg, the German airship or zeppelin coming in for a landing at an airfield in New Jersey on May 6, 1937. It was 7:25 at night. The Hindenburg was a thrilling sight, three football fields in length and held aloft by 7 million cubit feet of hydrogen. It could fly 84 miles an hour. It was luxurious, with a dining salon, lounges, and staterooms. Gigantic Nazi swastikas were painted on its tail fins. Hundreds of people had gathered to watch it land. Suddenly a lapping tongue of fire appeared near the stern, and within a few seconds the Hindenburg exploded in a huge ball of fire, falling tail first with flames shooting out the nose. In one moment, the wonder and excitement and beauty was turned to fire and terror and destruction.

Without Christ all of us are passengers aboard the Hindenburg. We may be enjoying ourselves to the fullest, but we don’t realize that the next moment is going to bring us to judgment.

Ephesians 2 says, "You were dead in your transgressions and sins. You followed the ways of the world. You followed the ways of the ruler of the kingdom of the air. You followed the spirit who is now at work among the disobedient. You gratify the craving of your sinful nature. You are all objects of wrath.

Divine Motivation

That’s our human condition. But notice the next verse, Ephesians 4:4: But because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--for by grace you have been saved.

According to this verse, God has two great motivations for wanting to save us from judgment. The first is: "His great love for us." He loves us. The aforementioned John 3:16 says, "God so loved the world."

The Bible teaches us that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.

Jeremiah 31:3 says, "I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you."

Romans 5:8 says, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

1 John 4:19 says, "We love Him because He first loved us."

So loved He the world that He gave us His Son…

God’s second motivation is His rich mercy: But because of his great love for us, God who is rich in mercy…. Mercy is a feeling compassion that makes one person want to save or rescue someone else. And God’s great love and His rich mercy combined to send Him to this earth for the express purpose of being nailed hand-and-foot to an upright post, the blood flowing from his forehead where the thorns had been, the blood flowing from his back where the scourge fell, the blood flowing from his hands and feet where the nails were, the blood flowing from his wounded side, pierced by the soldier’s lance.

And the Bible says there is something about the blood of Jesus Christ that satisfies the wrath of God.

Romans 5:9 says: Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him!

His great love and rich mercy give us Eternal Salvation, and that’s the third thing to notice in this text: Our Eternal Salvation

Eternal Salvation

God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions…

When we come to Christ, we move from death to life. We experience a spiritual resurrection.

God does three things for us:

• He makes us alive in Christ

• He seats us with Christ in the heavenly realms

• In the future, He will show us the incomparable riches of His grace. When Paul wrote this he was imprisoned in the city of Rome, but he had the attitude of someone living in heavenly realms.

Over the years I’ve very frequently quoted from my favorite preacher, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, who preached and pastored in London 100 years ago. There are so many stories about Spurgeon, but one of my favorites has to do when he was a teenager. He had been invited to preach one evening in Suffolk, but he was late in arriving. His grandfather, also a preacher, finally began the service by reading Ephesians 2. He began preaching on the theme, "For by grace are ye saved through faith…." He had gotten some way into his discourse when there was a little commotion at the back door and in walked his grandson, arriving late. "Here comes my grandson," exclaimed the old man. "He can preach the Gospel better than I can, but you cannot preach a better Gospel, can you, Charles?"

Charles, walking up the aisle, said, "You can preach better than I can. Please go on." The grandfather refused, but he told him his text and explained that he had already shown the people the source of salvation--grace--and was now speaking about the channel--faith. The younger preacher stepped into the pulpit and took over just where his grandfather had left off.

After a few minutes, the grandfather interrupted, wanting to preach a little more of the sermon. Then he sat down, and Charles resumed preaching, with the grandfather sitting behind him, saying, "Good! Good! Tell them that again, Charles. Tell them that again."

Ever after that, Charles Spurgeon said that whenever he preached from Ephesians 2, he could hear his old grandfather saying, "Tell them that again, Charles. Tell them that again."

Seem hungering and thirsting to hear it like the rest…

Maybe you’ve heard this before, but I’d like to tell you this again. By grace are we saved through faith. Perhaps today you need to be rescued, you need to be saved. Perhaps today you are dead in your sins, following the ways of the world, following the ruler of the kingdom of the air, following the spirit that now works in those who are disobedient, gratifying the cravings of your sinful nature, an object of wrath.

But God in His great love and rich mercy loves you. He wants to raise you from the dead, seat you with Himself in the heavenly reams, and show you the incomparable riches of his grace in Christ Jesus.

Will you come to Him today?

For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest no man should boast.