31 - From Effort to Rest – Living in the Finished Work of Christ

Many believers understand grace, but still feel pressure to perform. The Gospel invites us into a different way of living. Not striving, but trusting. Not effort, but rest in what Christ has already accomplished.

This episode will help you step into a life marked by peace, confidence, and assurance in Jesus.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to One Gospel, bringing you the full truth of God's Word, clearly explained. Together with our host, Johann Tuit, we'll unpack scripture to understand what's written and grow as a disciple of Christ. Ready to take notes? Let's open the Bible.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Hi there, and welcome to today's episode of One Gospel. I'm your host, Johan Tut, and as always, I'm excited to share the word of God with you. So I've started this teaching titled Because of You, with the big why, you know, because of God. You know, and I've I've shared a lot of stuff, you know, and I really want to encourage you to go back to those episodes and watch them so you can come with me to this point where we are now. But just quickly review, you know, is that I started with my testimony about how I felt unworthy to be a child of God because I had no full knowledge, you know, of the grace of God. So I thought, you know, that I had to do a lot of things to be still be uh pleasant to the Lord, that I've be uh still would be good enough for God. And um, you know, because I didn't understand, you know, the sacrifice of Jesus and what he done for me. And Paul, you know, I took him as an example, you know, also said, you know, I'm not worthy to be called an apostle, you know, and then he says, you know, if anybody thinks that he can boast in anything, you know, and then he describes all these things in uh in Philippians, you know, about how he was uh from uh circumcised on the eighth day, he was from the tribe of Benjamin, and he was out of the house of Israel and a Pharisee for the law, you know, and all this kind of things, but he counted it all rubbish to win uh, you know, Christ and you know, to be found in his righteousness and not in his own righteousness, you know, by dead works. And so he counted that rubbish. And so, you know, I explained that there is nothing that we can do to add anything, you know, to the finished work of Christ at the cross. We can do nothing to add anything. And still there are people that are afraid they can lose their salvation, or you know, they they think they need to earn their salvation, you know, and you know, and feel themselves unworthy like I did, you know, because they think that it's all based on your own performance, also, that okay, you were saved by grace, but now we have to do something, you know, to to stay saved, you know, or you know, maybe I'm saved and maybe I'm not saved, you know. It depends on whether I'm gonna do good or not doing good. It's always a business model where you can earn yourself into way in your way into heaven, which is impossible because it's grace, it's unmerited favor. Ephesians 2.8 says that we are saved by grace through faith, and this faith is of God, not of our own, and not by work, so that nobody should boast it is a gift that he gave us. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. But now the righteousness of God has been revealed in Christ Jesus, and we are saved by our faith in Christ Jesus, in his grace. And so there's nothing we can add to it. And so then I came to the point of Romans 11 29 where it said that God's gifts and his callings are irrevocable, they are without repentance, and I shared on how God doesn't repent from the fact that he called you, even though he knew that you would mess up big time after you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior. There are many, many, many, many, many Christians that accepted Jesus as a Lord and Savior and after that still messed up many, many, many, many times. You know, I can give you ex- I can give you example on example on example on example. But so, you know, um, but then that doesn't mean that you're no longer his child. It doesn't mean that God is no longer with you, that you are no longer saved, that you are no longer forgiven, that you're no longer righteous. That's a lie. And so I I place this statement in the end of my previous episode that I said that one saved, always saved. And a lot of people will disagree with me, which is totally fine. You can have your opinion, I keep mine, you know, and I won't agree with you, otherwise we'll both be wrong. But let me live in the hope and the certainty, you know, that my God is a good God who called me without repentance, who gave me his gift of redemption without repentance, and that he doesn't repent from the fact that he has forgiven me and called me his own. That will never ever be able to lose it again. And so I use a few Bible verses like Hebrews 6, you know, and Hebrews 10, 26 until 29, that it's impossible for you to lose your salvation, but if you would renounce it yourself after you have been, you know, a grown-up adult, spirit-filled Christian that walked in all the fullness of God and you know and all these things, and you yourself renounce it and walk away from it, then you were you are not able to be brought back to repentance, you know, uh and to come back to the Lord because you know um the fact for you to do that is already like almost near to impossible. But let's say that you would do that, that would be a very well um you know overthought decision that you take, and then you would renounce it and you will never want to turn back. It's impossible to bring you back to repentance. It's not that God doesn't love you anymore or he doesn't see you as his child, it's you who have renounced renounced it. It's got nothing to do with you losing your salvation by your actions, losing your salvation by whether you did or did not do what God expects you to do, whether you lived or did not live in sin. That's got nothing to do with you losing your salvation. And then in Hebrews 10, in Hebrews 10 26 it says, So if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, then no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries. And so people say, man, you know, if I continue to live in sin, you know, there is no longer a sacrifice for my sins, then I'm I have a problem, I will lose my salvation. That's not what it says. But nevertheless, let me tell you this no one born of God, no one born of God will willfully, with full intention, you know, live and continue to live repeatedly in sin. You know, I mean that doesn't mean that there are no Christians, because I'm sure there are, that will have that sin in their life that they just can't see, seem to get rid of because of the lack of the renewing of their mind, so knowing what God says about it, they have no revelation about it or whatever, you know, but they just have this sin, you know, that's just they can't get rid of that one thing, it just keeps coming back in their lives. You know, is that willingly and willfully? I don't think so, because I believe that if you are a born-again Christian, spirit-filled Christian, and you commit a sin, you do a you you you do something wrong, immediately something inside of you says, Man, that's not me. I don't want to do this. This is not who I am. I don't want to give in to that. That's that's my old man, that's my flesh, that's my carnal man, that's not me anymore. I renounce it, I repent from it. Father, God forgive me. That is a proof that you didn't want to do it, it wasn't willfully, you were just weak in your moment because the spirit is willingly, but the the flesh is weak. And so that was a moment where you didn't have any control, you didn't take any control over the situation, and you gave into that weakness at that moment, you know. But it's not it was not willfully. I'm sure that you did everything to, you know, to resist it, but then if eventually you surrender to it, you know, and then of course there's consequences when you sin, but not with God. I will get into that later if God will allow me. So, you know, and so this got nothing to do with you being or not being saved. You know, you are saved by grace, you're not saved by performance and your own dead work. So I believe that once God has called you and once you are born again, you will become a child from the living God. So, Father God, thank you for this teaching, and I pray that it will really help them to understand the goodness and the grace that you have bestowed upon us through Christ Jesus. I give you all the glory in Jesus' name. Amen. So I received freely, even though I still made a mess out of it. I didn't deserve anything, I had nothing to boast in, as I shared also in the previous episodes. You know, I had nothing to boast before God, you know. So if I received it freely, when I still made a mess of it, if I received it freely when I still was an incredible sinner, you know, an unbelievable sinner that was still, you know, living in darkness and doing all these things that are completely not in line with the word of God, walking hand in hand with the devil in complete darkness and complete sin, emerged and surrendered himself completely to sin. And God came to me and loved on me and washed me in the blood, and he changed me and transformed me and made me a new creation and put his spirit within me and made me a child of the living God in whom he is well pleased. If he did that while I was yet a sinner, then why would I lose it now if I still sometimes make a mess of it? It just doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense that I will lose it because I still make a mistake, or I just misstepped there, or I was in my flesh, you know, or I was disobedient, you know. It doesn't make any sense. You can't lose it because you cannot be born again again. You know, you are once born again, and then you cannot be, when you make a mistake, not be born again again, and then when you repent, be again born again, again. You know, it does it's a one-time deal. You know, you can do nothing to be uh saved but by grace, and you can nothing to do to lose it, you know, because you are born again and his gifts are calling so without repentance. And so what you and I have received in Christ was freely. We were righteous for freely, and he has no uh repentance. God doesn't repent of that, you know, it's irrevocable. And so, of course, we are destined to bear fruit for the kingdom of God, you know, because this is what he called us to to bear fruit for the kingdom of God. Hearing my father will be glorified if you bear fruit, you know, and be my disciples. And so Paul also says, you know, uh, sorry, not Paul John says, you know, then bring forth fruits according to your repentance. So, yeah, it's good to bear fruit for the kingdom of God. I even believe that it's an automatic response, you know, when we once believed the gospel. After you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, the moment that you repented and accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you automatically are bearing fruit for the kingdom of God. And so you immediately let all things go, you know, old habits, you know, you change your ways, you know, because you have changed your thinking and you let a lot of things immediately go just from the moment you heard it, you know, and then it goes on and on and on and on, and you will bear fruit. You become more kind, you'll become more forgiveness, etc. etc. etc. Let's quickly read Colossians 1, verse 5 and 6. Colossians 1, verse 5 and 6. So Colossians 1, verse 5 and 6 it says, Because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you have heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel, which has come to you and has also in all the world, and is bringing forth fruit, as it is also among you, since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth. Man, what a powerful verse! The moment you heard the grace of God, the grace of Christ in truth, and received it in your heart, bam, it bore fruit. Because it immediately transformed you, it immediately made you a new creation, it immediately made you a child of the living God, it immediately made you righteous before God, it immediately wiped away all your sins, blotted out your sin nature, it immediately put all the accusations nailed on the cross for you, bam, wiped out, clean shaped. Immediately you were quickly clean before God when you heard the word of truth, you know, when you heard the gospel of truth, you know, the grace of God in truth, immediately bam, bore fruit among you because that's what the gospel does. It sets you free. The goodness of God and the grace of God just sets you free if you mix it with faith. And so it's immediately fruit. But, you know, even though you know that is true, even if you wouldn't bear fruit, and we're not talking about your your born-again experience, you know, and your repentance and all this kind of, but just if it wouldn't bear fruit, like winning souls for Jesus, you know, you're not, you know, you're not testifying, you know, you you don't walk in the supernatural, you're not casting out demons, you're not healing people, and all those kind of things, it doesn't change anything. Anything to your salvation, it doesn't change anything because you are not saved because you do all those things, you are saved by grace. Now let's read quickly 1 Corinthians. I mean quickly because I've got a lot to share, and I want to I want to close it in this in this episode, but if I'm not gonna make it, then I'm gonna do another one. 1 Corinthians 3. In 1 Corinthians 3 verse 10, it says, According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it, but let each one take heed how he builds on it. For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now, if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, or precious stones, wood, hay, or straw, each one's work will become clear, for the day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test each one's work of what sort it is. If anyone's work which he has built on endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned, he will suffer loss, but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. So he himself will be saved, even though your works may be burnt, even though you know all the things that you have tried to establish for the kingdom and all the things that you, you know, God expected you to do, you know, to be to when Jesus is your rabbi and your teacher, and you you try to obey him, but you mess up big time in all kinds of ways, and you know, and it will be burned by the fire, you yourself will still be saved. Because God's calling and his gifts are without repentance, and it's not based on what you can do for God, but based on what God wants to do for you. Nobody, John 10, 27, says that nobody can snatch you out of the hand of Jesus, and nobody can snatch you out of the hand of his father. Nobody, and also not you. Now, you see, when I accepted Jesus, I tried to do everything to be good enough for God. And and and I mean, if I said I tried to do everything, I worked hard. 24-7, 7 days a week, non-stop, busy to earn, you know, the goodness and the grace of God in my life, to earn to be good enough for God. I've done so much to be good enough. And in the end, I was completely empty. In the end, I was completely miserable. You know, I have given everything and I was empty and I still was unhappy and I still didn't feel worthy. I had no more fun in it. I had I had no more, I didn't want to do it anymore. In Spanish, they say, no tengo más ganas. I didn't want to do anything anymore for the kingdom. I was completely tired of it. You know, but once grace got a hold of my heart, once I received the truth of the word of God in my life, once I understand, you know, how about how I'm righteous based on his goodness and his grace, and you know, not based on my own dead works, and I'm now have been made righteous with the righteousness of God through Christ Jesus. Once I understood grace, this unmerited favor, man, everything changed. Now there is full surrender. I go harder than I ever went before for the kingdom of God. But you know, it's it's not, you know, struggling, you know, that I need to do it or anything like that. You know, it's like a full surrender, unlimited. I want to be his servant, I want to be a good uh, you know, servant, faithful servant of the kingdom of God. I want to be a disciple of Jesus. I want to go, I want to do everything that God asks from me. I want to be obedient in everything he asks me to be obedient. You know, I don't have to do anything to be saved, I don't have to be any do anything to be blessed, to be forgiven, to be good enough. I don't have to because I'm already I already am. I don't have to do anything to become his child because I already am. You know, but I say, yes, Lord, please, Lord, make me useful. I want to serve you with everything that I have within me. Not to earn anything, but because you're so good and your grace is so amazing and I love you so much. It's my motivation, it's love. I don't have to do anything, I don't must do anything, you know. I I but I want it so bad. I want it so badly. I want to serve my father because I love him. Well, whether I'm gonna serve him, I'm not gonna serve him, it's not gonna change anything in the way that he looks at me. It doesn't change anything in the way that he loves me, the way that he blesses me. It's not gonna change anything because he's not blessing me and loving me based on what I do for him, but what he has done for me. Man, it's powerful. It's powerful. Jesus says, if anyone loves me, he will keep my commands. It's an automatic response or under meant understanding grace. Automatic response. Now everything is based, the whole redemption plan is based on love and unmerited favor. God gave everything from love. In Romans 8 32, he says, He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? So he gave his son while we were yet sinners and didn't know anything from God and didn't want to know anything from God. We all were led astray and go our own ways. All of us, we were sinners in darkness. But nevertheless, he gave his son for us. Romans 5, verse 8 says that God demonstrated his love towards us in this that Christ died for us while we were yet sinners. We were yet sinners and Christ died for us. While you didn't want to know anything from God, Christ died for you. While you were an enemy of the kingdom of God, Christ died for you. While you were a sinner living hand in hand with the devil, Christ died for you. When you were using the name of Jesus in vain and using the curse on your lips, Christ died for you. Because it was never based on your goodness. Never based. He already loved you where you were a sinner when you were far off, without hope and without God in this world. We were dead in our trespasses and our sins, conforming, you know, the course of this world, you know, conforming the will of the spirit, the prince of the power of the air, you know, and the spirit that is now working in the children of disobedience. We were far off and we were without hope and without God in this world. Yet Christ died for me at the cross with love in his heart for me. He did it with love in his heart for me, because I have been saved by grace, not by my own performance. I am not worthy because I am worthy based on whatever I can do. I am worthy to be called his son because of the sacrifice of Jesus, because of grace, because of the fact that I am now in Christ and Christ is now within me. And when Christ when God looks at me, he sees his son in whom he is well pleased, Christ. Because no longer I live, but it's Christ who lives me. So it's finished, it's done. So why try to add anything to the finished work? Why try to, you know, to earn it yourself? Why? If it's already been finished, you know, why make the power the gospel of God, you know, powerless and of none effect by your own doctrines, you know? I know that I'm saved by grace, but now I know that I'm forgiven of my sins, but now. But now what? Why can't you just receive what has been given to you in so much love? Why can't you just be grateful and thankful for the fact that you have been saved by grace through faith and that you don't have to do anything yourself? It's just unmerited favor, it's a gift that He's given to you. Why is it so difficult? You know, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, 10 and 11, he says, but his grace, he says in verse 9, I am what I am by the grace of God, you know, and his grace for me has not been in vain. You know, uh in the opposite, you know, I have put more effort in it to all than all the others, but not me actually, but the gr but the grace of God that is with me. So you can by his grace you will automatically run harder than you could ever run before. Not because you have to, because that's what grace does you. What a glorious grace. What a love. You know, man made a mess of it. You know, the Bible says in in Genesis 6, verse 5 and 6, then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he made man of the earth, and he was grieved in his heart, not because he was sorry that he made man, he was sorry that men needed to live the life that they were living and the choices that they were making. He was sad for man, and it grieved him that man was destroying himself and his brothers and sisters. That was really not what God intended. But God could wipe away the whole world, he could destroy it and just start all over again. It would be his right, amen. But then he saw you. He saw how you walked in darkness and how you couldn't save yourself. He saw that how how you were rejected, how you were fearful, how you were lost, how you were broken and bonded and lonely. He saw that you were an orphan, that you were a slave of the God of this world and of the sin nature. He saw that you were a miserable, wretched, and hopeless, and that you couldn't save yourself out of this miserable state. He saw you. And when he saw you, and how you would be lost forever, how you would never know his goodness and never would know his love if he wouldn't do anything about it, you know, he decided that's not gonna happen. I'm gonna do something about it because of you, because of me. I mean, God Almighty, you know, if I look at the stars in the heavens that he has made, the work of his fingers, no, who are we that he thinks of us and that he is mindful of us? But yet, he shook the whole world, he shook the foundations of the universe. He did the almost impossible and unthinkable, he gave his son as a ransom for you and for me to pay for us while we were yet sinners. And anyone, any. Anyone who believes in his name will not perish but have everlasting life. I mean, that's a promise for anyone who believes. Do you believe? Do you believe? If you believe, then you are his sheep. Are you his sheep? Because he says, I know my sheep, and my sheep know me. And no one will snatch them out of my hand. And my father who is greater than I, you know, he has given them to me. Nobody will be able to snatch them out of my father's hand. No one will be able to snatch them out of my hands. We have been bought and paid for with precious blood, and he did it from grace, because we didn't deserve it to be redeemed, and nobody can snatch us out of his hands. I am because Christ became sin for me, 2 Corinthians 5.21. I am because he died for me, because he went to death and the grave for me, because he took the lashes in his back. I am now the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Deco. De Kio. I have predestined to become, you know, conformed to the image of his Son, Romans 8.29. I am predestined. I'm chosen and I've called on the grace and the goodness of God. And now, because I'm righteous by the sacrifice of Jesus, you know, I'm innocent before God. I am righteous with his righteousness. I'm innocent. Innocent, like I have never sinned before. Even though my sins were like scarlet, he washed them whiter than the snow and then on my way to the uttermost parts of the earth and he doesn't remember them anymore. You know, there is no more crema, there is no more katakrima, there's no more condemnation for me because I'm in Christ Jesus. I am now Dekayo, which means righteous, which means innocent. So when God looks at me, I'm innocent. No matter how many times I still go flat on my face and make big mistakes, it's stupid to commit sin. It's stupid. It's stupid to commit sin. You know, but you know, and it will cause a lot of bad fruits in your life because you know this the fruit of death, uh, the fruit of sin is death. You know, but it's not God who is punishing you because you are sinning, it's this the consequence of you sinning. But you know, God still loves you. I mean, doesn't your children ever make mistakes? Don't they mess it up and act like complete idiots and fools? You know, do you not love them anymore because they did that? Are they no longer your children because they were disobedient, because they didn't obey you, because they didn't do what you want them to do? Are they not your children now anymore? Because they are lost sometimes? I mean, if I look at my own children, they mess up so many times, but they still continue to be my children. They have disappointed me many, many times, you know, but I they are still my children in whom I'm well pleased. I love them and I wouldn't change them for nothing in the world. And you think that God is worse than that? Would you give your son a stone if he asks for bread or if he asks for fish, you give him a snake? The Bible says in Matthew 7.11, then if you are being evil, know to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your father give you good things to those who ask him? God is good and his mercy endures forever. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And you know, by his grace you don't want to live in sin. By his grace, you don't want to be disobedient, by his grace you want to do his will, by his grace you want to do all these good things for him. You know, you wanna you wanna please him by his grace, but he is already pleased with you. And so everything that you do, do it from a point of love and not to become better for him. It's because of him that you are saved, it's because of him that you are righteous, it's because of him that you are loved, it's because of him that you are blessed, it's because of him that you are now holy, pure, righteous, and blameless before him in love. It's because of him, it's because of his grace, of his sacrifice and his goodness and his unconditional love for you, because of him, not because of you. It's because of him. And all you need to do is receive that, accept that, embrace that, and I promise you, you will be more free than you ever was when you try to make it and do it all yourself. You are not worthy, I am not worthy, you know, based on our own works and performances. We are now worthy to be called children of the living God by the grace, the unmerited favor, and the goodness of God in our lives because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Man, that is powerful, man. I had so much, so much to share. But you know, I think I'm gonna leave it with this. You are loved, you are perfected in Christ, you are holy, pure, blameless, and righteous by the blood and the sacrifice of Jesus through grace, and that will never ever change again. God will always see you like that in Christ Jesus. Hallelujah. That's beautiful. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you for this word, thank you for this teaching. And um, if you have any um if you have any questions or comments or you know testimonies, please contact me in the link below. I'd love to hear from you. And I hope to see you in a new episode of One Gospel. God bless you. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_00 27:02

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