Grace That Carries You (05-03-26)

Romans 5:1-6

God's grace carries us through life's ups and downs. Pastor Chad explores how we can lean on grace and how much we really need it. 

We hope this message was an encouragement to you. We would love for you to join us in person and worship with our church family. ISO Church meets Sundays at 10 AM at the Women's Club in Paramus. You can also reach us at our website: isochurch.org, or on Instagram @isochurch. Thanks for listening, and God Bless you!

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Hey ISO fam, Pastor Chad here, and you're listening to the message from our ISO Church Sunday service, where we are in search of the one and in service of the one. We pray that this message speaks to your life today, that you're encouraged but also impacted because of God's love and his grace.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

We hope that you enjoy. Thanks for listening.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

I'm very expectant for the word that God has put on my heart. I was really trying to decide what I wanted to preach on, and then God kind of said, you know what, we're gonna switch it up on me yesterday. So this is something that's really from my heart right now. But I want to read our vision verse together, if we could throw that up on the screen. Genesis chapter 12, verse 7. Let's read it together. It says, Then the Lord appeared to Abraham and said, I will give this land to your descendants. And Abraham built an altar there and dedicated it to the Lord who had appeared to him. You guys sound good. Turn with me to Romans chapter 5 this morning. I'm reading from the New Living Translation. Romans chapter 5, and I wanted to bring a message this morning titled Grace That Carries You. Grace That Carries You. And how many of us know that we could always use some grace, right? Especially when it comes to a relationship with Jesus, we can always use some grace. And Romans chapter 5, I'm reading verses 1 through 6. If we could throw that up on the screen real quick, it says, Therefore, since we have been made right in God's sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. I could probably stop right there and just park there and do a whole sermon on that one verse, but let's continue. Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand. And we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory. Verse 3, we can rejoice too when we run into problems and trials. How many of us love that line, right? For we know that they help us develop endurance, and endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment, for we know how dearly God loves us because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. And verse 6 when we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. I think I need to read that verse again. When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at not just some random time, not just a time of convenience, but at just the right time and died for us sinners. Let's pray today. God, thank you so much for your word. Thank you that your word is perfect and beautiful and lovely and timely. Thank you that you have given us this blueprint on how to live our lives and that we can still come to you knowing that you will answer our prayers, answer our cries, Lord Jesus. God, I pray for the word that will be brought forth today. Speak through me, let it be your words and not mine. Let us open up our hearts and spirits to receive all that you have in store for us, God. Lord, we are so grateful for you. We love you, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. My son is shouting me out from the front row this morning. He's uh he's been trying to talk, I think. He's making direct eye contact with me. So he's he was with me studying last night, which was cool. So he's heard this sermon already before, I think. So he's probably like, I already heard this one dead, what's going on? But I don't know about anybody else, but I'm grateful for the grace of God. I'm grateful for this passage of scripture. Because what I've come to realize as I open up my word, as I read my Bible, sometimes I just need to go back to things that I may have already read before, something I may think I'm familiar with. But what I've come to understand, and what I felt like we needed to understand today, is grace is not just something God gives, it's who God is toward us because of what Jesus did on the cross for us. And so we may think we're too far gone. We may think that, oh, we don't deserve it. You're right, we don't deserve it. But because of how much God loves us, we have the opportunity to receive it. If we could throw up the definition of what grace is, I believe that's the next slide.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

Thank you, son. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 4:54

Right here. This is the simple definition of what we are talking about today: grace. God giving you what you have not earned or deserved. God giving you what you have not earned or deserved. I didn't look that up in the dictionary, I didn't look it up. This is my definition of what I think grace is. Very simply put, very efficiently, God giving you what you have not earned or deserved. And I read Romans chapter 5, these six verses, and it sticks out to me. But there's so many times where grace pops up in scripture that reaffirms this definition right here. I love Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8. God saved you by his grace when you believed, and you can't take credit for this. This is a gift from God. And so I look at this passage of scripture, and what we're gonna do is we're gonna kind of dissect what this is, and what I love, even just about verse 1. It says that we have a peace with God. A peace with God when it comes to the grace that God gives us. And in my mind, this is not a peace of mind, this is not a piece of our circumstances that we're experiencing, but this is truly peace with God in relationship with Him. Before Christ, there was separation, there was tension between sin and holiness. And after Jesus went up on that cross, the relationship was restored. So we need to stop living like you're still trying to earn what Jesus has already secured for you. And so today I want to look at some practical ways in which grace shapes our lives. Is that cool this morning? Can we do that? So when I look at this passage, what I realize, and if we could throw this up, the first thing, grace helps us stand. Grace helps us stand. You see, I I look at grace almost as a foundation of who we are, of our relationship with Jesus. Because you see, when it comes to grace, it's not something that you just visit. You don't visit grace, it's something that is more than just a moment. Right? Grace is a place in which you can stand in it, find security and hope for a better future. I look at what's taking place here. Because of faith, God has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand. So I can't say grace is just a moment and it's grace after grace after grace. No, when you receive the grace of God, when you receive the love of Jesus, you experience his grace and his mercy, and it's somewhere that you can stand and be secure and have a solid foundation as you build for the future that God has called you into. Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege, of grace where we now stand and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God's glory. See, grace is not a moment but a position of God's faithfulness. Your worst day may seem like the world is falling, but I'm here to tell you today that you can still find God's grace in it. The moments where you have the sleepless nights, where life is difficult. For anyone that was here early this morning, you heard a little tidbit of what Crystal and I have been going through with Genevieve. Just this week, I'm I'm now on leave, and so Crystal has left me to fend for myself from about 8 o'clock till supposed to be like 5.30, but it's been creeping more like 6.30. But that's another discussion for another day. Sometimes I think she just sits around the corner in the car for a second to regroup and prepare herself. And she'll check in and she'll be like, hey, how's it going? And I'm like, Your daughter is putting us through it today. I'm like, Trent is doing good, he's easy, he's been sleeping in the bassinet for the last week. Yeah, we can thank Jesus for that. Answered prayer. That's why he's been shouting me out this morning. He's gotten some extra sleep. But Genevieve, on the other hand, and listen, I love my daughter, she's the cutest. We go out, we went out for breakfast yesterday as we're walking up to our little spot around the corner from our house. This lady's walking across the street, and she's like, I'm sorry, you are the most adorable little girl ever. And she's like, Yes, thank you. And I'm like, This is her in public, you don't see her behind the scenes. And on Friday, we we picked up some food and we were having dinner as a family, and I say that very loosely because Genevieve decided it wasn't listen, this was not a tantrum. As my wife would say, Pastor Crystal was like, yeah, you see, now you understand there's a difference between a tantrum and a meltdown. And I'm like, no, that was, I don't even want to disrespect the phrase meltdown. This is ungodly. I was praying, I I fasted for about 15 minutes because we had paid for the food already, right? Like, and this girl is on the floor, kicking, screaming, crying, hitting, trying to knock the food off the table. And I'm like, this is so uncommon. And I'm like, Crystal, everything was good until you got home. No, I'm just kidding, right? Like, but you see, you may think like you're going through it, and and I was talking to somebody the other day, and I was like, you know, like, it's just been so tough, and it's just been so hard in the transition at times, like the jump from one to two kids has just been so much more different than I thought it would be. And this person has kids and they're older already, and they're like, you know what? When you look back on it in about 15 years, you won't even remember these moments. The moments where you didn't get to sleep too much, the moments where they were crying and maybe being a little annoying, or they were uncomfortable, they were upset. You'll remember the great moments, you'll remember the highlights and the thing, but all those things fail in comparison to the future and the love that you have for your kids. And in the same way, I look at it and I think about grace because so often I feel like we think grace is this moment where we receive God's love and we receive the grace, the things that we don't deserve, right? And we receive it and then we go, okay, well, you know, that doesn't mean I can take this from the moment I'm in to the new season that I'm stepping into. No, grace is a place that you get to stand firm in who you are. And so when we looked at grace practically, when we look at a way that it can shape our lives, we need to understand that grace helps us stand. So the moments where we get knocked down, the moments where we get pushed over, the moments where we're uncomfortable, the moments where it's difficult, the moments where things change, those are the times where God is doing something and we need to stand firm in who He is. You can still find God's grace even in the moments where you think everything isn't perfect. Because what I love, verse 3, we can rejoice too when we run into problems and trials. For we know that they help us develop endurance. That verse really sticks out to me this morning. Because the second thing I want us to understand is grace turns trouble into something greater. We can rejoice too when we run into problems and trials. So in the moments where things are difficult, because it's laid out here, we understand it's inevitable, it will happen. For we know that they help us develop endurance. If there's never any pushback, how do we know where to improve? If there isn't the moments of acknowledgement, how do we know that something's even wrong? Right, and we push ourselves and we push ourselves and we push ourselves. There's been a bunch of marathons that have been happening lately all over the country, and so, you know, I'm watching all these things, and I'm watching this one guy, and they've trained for months on end and months on end, and he hits the home stretch, and he starts cheering before he even hits the finish line. How many of us have ever done that before, right? We see it's it's right in sight. And so he has his hands lifted up, he's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And in the background, you see the guy that's been in second place the entire race. Sprinting with every ounce of being that he has left in him. Why? Because he trained for this, why because he saw the goal that was ahead? Why because he saw the finish line? He didn't care that there was somebody in front of him, he didn't care that that guy was beating him the whole race, he didn't care that all these obstacles could have been in the way. A marathon is a long race, and listen, kudos to everyone that runs them. I'll pray a little extra for you because I think you need Jesus. I will never do it, but you never know. And I'm watching this guy sprint after this whole race, after miles upon miles upon miles. And right before this guy gets to the finish line, the dude that's in second place runs right by him and breaks the ribbon, and this guy's looking around, and everyone's yelling at him, run, run, he's right behind you. And this guy in second place ends up finishing the race first. And I'm sure he was struggling, and I'm sure he was cramping, and I'm sure he was uncomfortable, and I'm sure he was a little upset. Maybe he thought he was gonna run a little bit better. There could have been so many things going on in his mind, but we know that with grace it turns trouble into something greater. In the same way that I watched that race, I watched another race where the guy broke the world record for the fastest ever marathon in under two hours. Insane. Absolutely insane. And I look at it because they ran the same distance, they ran the same structure, they probably trained hard, they probably practiced a lot. But sometimes the outcome is a little different for somebody else compared to somebody else. And I think about this verse, we can rejoice too when we run into problems and trials. For we know that they help us develop endurance. I want us to really understand this today and pick this up. Don't waste your struggle. Don't waste your struggle. Because there's times where I see people that are putting in the hard work now to make things easier in the future, are going through the discomfort now for more comfort in the future. Going through the hardships now for more accessibility in the future. One of our pastor friends, she shared with Crystal and I she goes, Sometimes I need to say no to something good to experience something great. And the same can be said when we experience God's grace in our life. You can learn from right here and right now. And what I don't want is for us to look back on a season, look back on the moments where we were struggling and we didn't take anything from that season. Will we look back on the on the times where we could have invested more time, where we could have gotten off of work a little bit earlier, where you know we could have invested into our relationship a little bit more? And one thing that stuck out to me is I was reading this verse, and I was really just struggling with actually reading this because I was like, man, like so many times when I think of problems and I think of trials, I'm like, God, like I love you so much, and I invest into my relationship with you. Like, why do I experience this? And it's because no matter who you are, where you have come from, you will experience problems and trials. But the thing that kept sticking out to me as I was praying and I was looking over my notes, God just said something so clearly. He said, You don't need to wait for things to get better to know that they will. You don't need to wait for things to get better to know that they will if you have a relationship in Jesus. Because that's not who Jesus is. He does not leave you in the muck in the mire, he does not leave you in your brokenness, he does not leave you in your shame. But because of grace in your life, trouble can turn into something greater. Well, I have a quote, if we could throw this up. Charles Spurgeon said this. He's he says, a Christian man should be willing to be tried, he should be pleased to let his religion be put to the test. There, says he, hammer away if you like. Do you want to be carried to heaven on a featherbent? But what I love is the first part of this quote. A Christian man should be willing to be tried. He should be pleased to let his religion be put to the test. As believers, we should be confident when there's the opportunity to put God to the test. When somebody is on the outside looking in, they don't have a relationship with Jesus. You can go, listen, there's plenty of things that I have been through, and I do not deserve God's love. I do not deserve his grace, I do not deserve his mercy, but because he loves me so much and because he loves you so much, I'm confident in who he says he is. I'm confident in the promises that he's laid before me. I'm confident in the times where he's answered, I'm confident in the moments that I'm still praying for. But you don't need to wait for things to get better to know that they will. I'm a sports fan. I love it. You guys know I love it for everyone that's here consistently. And you know, I I remember the first, probably the first week of the baseball season. Because I go all in with all of my sports teams, and so the Cubs were terrible the first week, and we got a lot of injuries, and I was like, the sky is falling, we are terrible, blow it all up, fire everybody. And now we're first place in our division, right? And it's because like it's at bat after at bat, it's moment after moment, it's game after game, and things build and things shift and things change. One guy I was like, listen, trade him. He's now like our best, one of our best hitters on the team, right? Like, it's so many different things. But I look at these guys, these professionals that do this for a living, that get paid millions upon millions of dollars. And I'm like, why can't they hit the ball like this? Why can't they do this? Why can't they do this? And for a good player, it's good to bat a little bit over 300. So, what that means to me is not every person is going to bat a thousand. And so, why do we walk around in life thinking that we'll be doing the same? I'm here to tell you today nobody in this room, nobody Nobody watching this stream, nobody listening back via podcast will ever be perfect. Husbands can look at their wives, wives can look at their husbands, and they can be confident. Except for me, Pastor Crystal. You guys heard her laugh, but you know. But we will all experience trials, we will all experience problems. And when I even read this verse, I'm like, this verse is backwards. This does not make sense. And I'll be honest, sometimes I'll read it and I've read it before, and I'll probably read it again in the future. It's a little annoying. We can rejoice when we run into problems and trials. Because of grace, we can rejoice when we run into problems and trials. And I'm annoyed because as I sit in my problems, and as I sit in my trials, and as I sit in my discomfort, and as I sit in my unwillingness to be wrong, and as I sit in all the different things, I reflect back on this verse. We can rejoice when we run into problems and trials. Because how many of us know that our trials have purpose? The pushback has purpose. The pain has purpose. Frameworked in a relationship with Jesus. I'm not saying to go outwardly looking for pain and looking for trouble, no. But guess what? It will find you. But it's our responsibility to be standing in God's grace and know that we can be confident and we can rejoice when these problems and trials arise because they'll help us develop endurance for the journey ahead. Next thing today, grace shows hope, will not disappoint you. The NIV says verse 5 like this and says, and hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Not measured, not sprinkled, not misted, or a little trickle of it, but it is poured out. Because we need to understand today that our hope is no longer based on people, emotions, or our circumstance, but when our hope is anchored in God's love, it cannot collapse. Grace shows you that hope will not disappoint you. That there is more ahead, that there is more in the future, that there is more in store for us. That God loves us so much that He still has a plan and a purpose for us. That there's value in each season that we're in, in each struggle that we're in, because of grace. Because of a grace that doesn't just show up in a small moment. No, but it's a grace that sustains us and carries us through season after season after season. Because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. And we've been leaving it outside, and she runs outside and she'll fill it with water, and then she just pours the water out immediately. But she has the most fun ever doing it. And so the other day I had to clean it out real quick, and so I got the hose, and my hose has a nozzle on the top of it, and it has all these different settings. And so Genevieve is like, I want to do it, daddy, and I was like, okay. And so I put it on, you know, the little mist feature so that it doesn't blow her back like a fire hose, and she sprays it and she's like, no. I'm like, what do you mean now? She's like, no, no, no, more daddy. So I was like, okay, so I turn it up a little bit, changed the feature. So now it's just a little bit more water, and she's like, yeah, no. And I'm like, okay. And she's like, and she's trying to turn it, and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's not how this works. And so I turn it again, she's spraying it, she's like, no. So I turn it to the highest setting, and I'm like, okay, well, what about this? And I spray it, and she's like, yes. And she's blasting this water table, she's cleaning it off, she's cleaning off all of her toys. Sometimes if Uncle Quillin's there, or Uncle Coco now, she's blasting Uncle Coco with the uh with the hose. Pray for Quillin, he doesn't like the new nickname, but we don't get to decide. The kids do, right? But she'll go around and she's like, she's spraying this, she's doing this, and so then we we we get the bubbles, and my daughter's obsessed with bubbles right now, and so we have seven different bubble machines and all the things. So she has the water table all set, and she has this. I I pour out some bubbles into the smaller container for her to be able to hold and open and everything. So she looks at me and she's like, Dada, bubbles in the water table. I was like, no. And she goes and she gets upset with my response, and so she opens up her bubble container and she pours it right on the ground, empties the whole thing out. And I'm like, what are we doing here? And she's like, I wanted to put the bubbles in the water table. And I said, Yeah, and I said no. And she goes and just points at her, pouring it out all over the ground. And I was like, Alright, well, time to go inside. And then guess what? Another meltdown, right? But I say it because I think about so often how how long it sometimes takes to fill some things up. How it takes time, it takes effort. Sometimes it takes giving of our finances, our being generous with our relationships with people to be filled up, but how quickly things can be poured out. And what I love about this passage right here is when it comes to the Holy Spirit, he's not waiting. He's not waiting for us to experience his presence. It's poured out. It's poured out for each and every one of us. It's poured out into our hearts so that we can understand the hope that we have for the future, the hope that we have for something better, the hope that we have for that prayer to be answered is right around the corner because of grace. That hope will not disappoint us, that hope will not let us down. That when your hope is anchored in God's love, it cannot collapse. And then, fourth thing today, grace shows that God moves when we can't. You see, when I think of the gospel, I think of verse six right here. When we were utterly helpless. When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. He died for you, he died for me, he died for your family friend miles away, he died for somebody on the other side of the country, he died for somebody on the other side of the world. When we were utterly helpless, when we were lost, when we were broken, when we were ashamed, when we were, you can throw any adjective under the sun there. When we were utterly helpless. I love that it says utterly helpless, not just helpless. To show when we were at rock bottom, Christ came at just the right time and died for us. Not when we had it together, not when we had everything in order, not when we were strong enough, not when we deserved it. When we were helpless, God didn't wait for us to get better, He stepped in at our worst. 2 Corinthians 12.9 says, My grace is all you need. God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can't take credit for this, for it is a gift from God. How many of us like gifts? Shout out Hector, you put both hands up. I'm like, hey, come on now. And what I love about a gift is more often than not, if you give a gift, you are not expecting something in return. When I receive a gift, I'm not like, okay, well, now you know I'm keeping track of this, so I better give a gift back. No. God saved you by his grace when you believed, and you can't take credit for this, for it is a gift from God. So even when we don't deserve it, God still blesses us, God still loves us. And so I want to encourage you today, stop thinking that you're too far gone. Stop thinking that you're too lost, stop thinking that you're too broken, stop thinking that you're, you know, for some of us, we disqualify ourselves before we can ever receive anything. When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. This is the gospel. This is the gospel right here. This is the moment that we can look back on. This is the moments where everything changes for us. And sometimes we make it more complicated than it needs to be. But when somebody asks you, why do you believe in Jesus? Why do you go to church? Why do you why do you go to Bible studies? Why do you do this? Why do you do this? Share that verse with them right here. Romans chapter 5, verse 6. When I was broken, when I was lost, when I disqualified myself, when I was utterly helpless, Jesus came at just the right time and died for me. And in the same way, he came at just the right time and he died for you. And this is what I love about this verse right here. It's not when we had it all together, it's not when things were orchestrated perfectly, it's not when our finances were in place, it wasn't when, oh, we bought that dream house, it wasn't when we finished paying off our debt for school and all these things. At just the right time. At just the right time. Christ died for us. And so what this means to me is that if God moved then, not only will he move now, but he hasn't stopped moving since. And so I'm grateful for grace today. Because the moments where I mess up, the moments where I fall short, guess what? God hasn't stopped moving. The moments where I'm not enough, God has still been doing something. The moments where we're inadequate, the moments where we fall short, God's still working on your behalf. God saved you by his grace when you believed, and you can't take credit for this, for it is a gift from God. And I really truly believe today that God wants you to simply receive the gift of his grace. But it's not just a grace for a moment, but it's a grace that carries me. That whatever situation, whatever circumstance, whatever season that I may come in contact with, Grace is carrying me along the way. Right? My daughter, when she's tired, when she's upset, sometimes she just needs mommy or daddy to go and pick her up. And just hold her. And just carry her. And in the same way that I pick up my daughter at a moment's notice, even when she's upset, even when she's annoyed at me, even all the different things, because of how much I love her. I wouldn't even think about it for a second. I'd run up and scoop her up. And if we could do that as earthly parents, imagine how much God wants to do that as our Heavenly Father. That He cares for us so much that He's willing to provide us with a grace that carries us and sustains us for the journey that's ahead. A grace that provides us endurance during the seasons of difficulty. Because endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment, for we know how dearly God loves us because He has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. I see a grace that carries me. I see a grace that isn't just for a moment's notice, but that sustains me for the long haul. That prepares me for the future that's ahead. And so today I'm gonna ask us to close our eyes, bow our heads this morning. I'm just gonna ask us a simple question in this room. If you want to experience the grace that carries you and sustains you, can you just raise your hands super fast? A grace that works on your behalf even when we don't deserve it. A grace that carries us again. Just shut up your hands super, super quick, and then you can put it back down. Lord, you know our hearts. And Lord, you know how much we need your grace. Not just a grace for a moment, but a grace that sustains us. A grace that carries us, a grace that shapes our future. A grace that protects us, a grace that continues to move. Even in the times when we don't deserve it, Lord God. And so, Lord, I pray for all the hands that have been lifted up this morning. For all those that have said that they need your grace. And Lord God, that they can understand that it is a gift that has already been given to them. They don't need to pay for it because you went up on that cross and paid for it. You rose from that grave and paid for it. And so it is a gift that is freely given at just the right time. And so I pray today that we don't wait for another moment, but that we acknowledge that right now is the right time. Lord, because there is no one like you. Thank you so much for your grace. We love you. We thank you. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Can we just give God a clap offering in this place? I hope this message was an encouragement to you and that it blessed your soul today. Give it a like, comment, whatever it may be, and give us some support as we unleash this new version of our Sunday services. We would love for you guys to join us in person, worship with us and our church family. We meet Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. at the Women's Club of Bramis. You can also reach us at our website, isochurch.org, or on Instagram and other social media handles at IsoChurch. Thanks for listening. God bless and have a great day.