What Does The Bible Say?
30 Minute Discussions Of Bible Subjects
What Does The Bible Say?
What Does the Bible Say About Being Justified by Grace?
In this episode, we begin our discussion on what the Bible says about how we are justified by grace. Paul writes to Titus noting our sinful behaviors, God's love of us and what He did for us, mentioning our topic for this episode. We discuss what grace is, how it manifests an attitude of friendly disposition from which a gift, kindly act, mercy, charity or lenience proceeds. We look at what Jesus said in Matthew 5 concerning what God does for all and how we ought to follow His example. Again, God's love of mankind is noted by Jesus and Paul in a couple of passages. We note those. We discuss the fact that this gracious attitude of God is undeserved by man, yet Paul notes in a passage in Ephesians that it saves. We talk about grace being a spiritual state or condition that is entered into by faith. We look at a couple of passages that say this. We note that grace is also a gift that God provides through Jesus and ultimately equals salvation. We complete this episode by noting that grace is not a reward for good works, works of merit, as if God owed us for them. Paul tells us that we are God's workmanship for He created us for good works, the works of faith that we do when we obey what He says because we love Him. Take about 30-minutes to listen in on our discussion. Have your Bible handy so you can verify what we are saying. There is a transcript of this Buzzsprout episode provided for your convenience.
This is a presentation of the Woodland church of Christ, meeting at 3370 Broad Street in Sumter, South Carolina. We meet for worship on Sunday at ten thirty am and five thirty pm. We meet for bible study at nine thirty am on Sunday and seven pm on Wednesday. If you have questions or comments on this lesson, you may email them to Fred Gosnell at fgosnell@ftc-i.net or to Arnie Granke at agranke440718@twc.com or to Glenn Landrum at scbamaboy2003@yahoo.com.
Arnie:Good afternoon. This is Arnie Granke and Fred Gosnell and Glenn Landrum. And this is what does the Bible say that's brought to you by the church of Christ at Woodland here in Sumter, South Carolina. Last week, we had the good fortune of having Eric with us as well, but he's ill and under a doctor's care, so keep him in mind as you, as you pray, and we're certainly going to to do that as as well. I think we're going to be talking about the subject of grace. Glenn, you want to introduce that for us?
Glenn:Yes. The study we just completed, God's plan of salvation, was presented, and we showed, by scripture, God's word, several things that God requires those who are saved or being saved. We showed that the first thing one needs to do is hear God's word upon and upon hearing that word, that person must believe what they've heard. Specifically, one has to believe in God. Now that would be found in Hebrews 11, verse six, and in His Son, Jesus, Christ. And even more specific, one has to believe the gospel, or the good news, which is the fact that Jesus died for our sins, was buried and he rose again on the third day, according to the Scriptures. And you'd find that in First Corinthians, 15, one through four. God also tells us that we must confess Jesus Christ verbally before others. We find it in Matthew 10, 32, and also in Romans, 10, nine and 10. We learn that we must be immersed in water or baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for forgiveness of our sins. That would be remission of sins or forgiveness. We find in Acts 2, 38, Acts 22, 16, Romans, six, three and four and second, Peter 3, 21. And in a number of other passages that tell us that. Most groups or denominations who call themselves Christian will agree with the first four of those requirements or conditions and simply sum them up in the act of belief. And we will, we will and will justify that by passages such as John 3, 16. Another passage that is often used to support this erroneous doctrine is Ephesians, two, eight and nine. For by grace, you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. Faith is substituted for belief in this passage. Yes, many will use this passage to say, see, salvation is simply a gift from God, and all one needs to do is, in their mind, believe in God and Jesus. We believe and will further show that salvation is indeed a free gift from God. But he has placed some conditions upon our acceptance of His most gracious gift, salvation. We will examine justification by grace through faith.
Fred Gosnell:Yeah, And Paul was writing to Titus and he, he he mentions grace in the in this section of scriptures from Titus three, three through seven. Now notice what he says. He says, For we also once were foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers, lust and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. But when the kindness of God, our Savior and His love toward man appeared, notice, not by works done in righteousness, which we did ourselves, but according to his mercy He saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus, Christ, our Savior, that being justified by his grace, we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. So so the hope we have is eternal life. That's his promise. But, but God didn't do these things because of good works that we did, as if he would owe us something. He did this because he wanted to save us. We were already foolish and disobedient. It says. So, so, so when we discuss Grace here, we'll find out that Grace is God's part and faith is man's part.
Arnie:Well, Paul, the apostle Paul, used the phrase being justified by his grace to describe the condition of those who are saved, in other word, that their salvation was by God's grace. Grace is unmerited, divine assistance given to man for his generation, regeneration or sanctification. The verb to justify means to make someone just, to make just that which was unjust, in this case, to make righteous those men and women who have sinned. To be justified, means to be acquitted, to be absolved of guilt that that is to be declared not guilty. Response, responsible men and women receive justification when they become Christians and remain faithful. But the Bible says they receive their acquittal by God's grace, that is his undeserved kindness. Unfortunately, like so many Bible subjects, the matter of our justification by grace is enshrouded by doctrinal confusion in the religious world, where many so called theo, theologians manipulate Bible teaching to suit their own human points of view, rather than God's. And that's kind of a dangerous situation, because so many people are drawn in to believe that. Well, oh, Reverend so and so said this, or or father, this, and that said that, and it may not be what the Bible teaches.
Glenn:Well, we need to answer the question, what is grace? Uh, Arnie has just spoken about grace. He gave a good, good definition of grace. But what is grace? Grace is an attitude of friendly disposition from which a gift, a kindly act, mercy, charity or lenience, proceeds. God's grace is revealed in different ways. One is revealed in his kindness, His goodness, His generosity, constant readiness to give or forgive. Matthew 5, 44, and 45 says, But I say unto you, Love your enemies and pray for them that persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father, who is in heaven, for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and the good and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust. It's also demonstrated, as shown, in His love towards man that would be pity or compassion, humaneness. John 3, 16, and 17, in which we we all know particularly the first verse of that anyhow, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have eternal life. For God sent not the son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. And also Romans five, seven through eight supports that and says, For scarcely a righteous man will will one die. For peradventure, for the good man some would, someone would even dare to die. But God commended his own love towards us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. So you know, in Ephesians five, two, verse five says, By grace, you are saved, and that's by God offering salvation to us
Fred Gosnell:Well, and of course, this, this gracious, this spiritual state is or condition is entered in by faith. And Paul talks about that Romans, five verses one and two. He says, Now being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have had our access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. So, so this is a spiritual state or a condition and and it's as the passage says, We're entered into it by faith. And then in Galatians five, verse four. Now notice, of course, Paul's writing to the Galatians, and they had a problem. They had some Jewish people there that were trying to get the Galatians who had obeyed the gospel to go back under the Old Testament law. And Paul says, You are saved from Christ. You who would be justified by the law, you're fallen away from grace. Of course, the law was was designed such that if you made one mistake, if you violated one law, then then you were guilty, and there wasn't anything you could do to fix it. Of course, that's that's why Jesus came to obey that law perfectly.
Glenn:Real quick in your reading of that Galatians, five, four, you had read ye are saved from Christ, but what it reads is, Ye are severed from Christ, which meaning is that you've been, you've been taken away from Christ because of what you've what you've done.
Fred Gosnell:Yeah, that's why this program is called, What does the Bible say? Not, not. What does Fred say? And fortunately, we have Glenn here that pays attention.
Arnie:Well, and I'm glad it was you that made the mistake. I could have done it too. Well, so Glenn, you, you've pretty much defined grace as an as an attitude, you know, where there's kindly, this and and mercy and that kind of thing. Fred, you sort of identified it as a spiritual state or condition and and you, you enter into that by means of faith. Let me add a third definition to that, and I think there's another one probably after that as well. But it when, when God provides grace, it's really amounts to a a gift which God's will provides. And I'm looking at First Peter, chapter one is the reason I say that. And beginning in in verse eight is, this is about Jesus Christ in verse seven, and then in verse eight, whom you have not seen you love on whom, though now you see him not yet believing you rejoice greatly with joy, unspeakable and full of Glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls, concerning which salvation the Prophets sought and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you. So in in this sense \here, God's providing, providing his grace as a gift and and the salvation and forgiveness of sins and all of that are part of that gift.
Glenn:You know, concerning that, that passage I had made note of a couple of, a couple of passages also that, really, I think, give a lot of support to to the the true meaning of this. John 14, verse 15, says, If you love Me, keep My commandments. In first John five, verse three. First John Five, Verse three says, For this is the love of God that we keep his commandments, and His commandments are not grievous. Well, that's important for us to know. For us, in order to please God, we have to do something. We have to keep His commandments. And certainly there are many things that God has commanded us to do. There's many things he's commanded us not to do. So when we're talking about us having to do something for salvation, certainly we do. We have to keep his commandments, and that's we can make a long list of those things, and there are many passages that list the things we need to do and the things we need to to avoid.
Arnie:So it's matter of obedience, then.
Glenn:Absolutely. And and we need to understand that that this gift, this free gift of God doesn't necessarily mean that that that we don't have a condition in order to accept that gift. So, you know, I may give my offer Fred a gift, and we see this often in the law, particularly with wills. When someone has left a will after they died, many times, what they have left, which is kind of a gift, what they have left for for their their inheritors, is something, and often it will have a condition upon that in order for those people to accept that. And if they don't meet the condition, they don't get the gift. So I think it's very important for us to understand those things. Well, Acts 2, 38, Peter said to him after, after he had preached the first gospel sermon and told, and told all the people there, there were 1000s of people in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, celebrating that, that that holiday, so to speak, celebrating that day and that that feast. And he preached to them, and he told them what they had done and how Jesus had been condemned, how he died, he was buried, he was raised, and now sitting on the right hand of God. And he said, Said, and you are guilty. And they said, What shall we do? Well Peter answered. He said, Repent you and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Well, Peter told them two of the things that I mentioned in in the introduction, and we mentioned in our last lesson of he mentioned those two, two things, repenting and being baptized. And he said and said that the baptism was for remission of sins, therefore those sins are forgiven at the point of baptism.
Fred Gosnell:Yeah, and of course, grace is not some kind of reward for something that we have done specifically because of what Paul said to the Ephesians. In Ephesians, two, eight through 10. Notice what he said. He said, For by grace, having been saved through faith, that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, as Glenn noticed. Notice, Not of works that no man should glory, For we are His workmanship, created in Christ, Jesus for good works, which God before prepared that we should walk in in them. So, works was mentioned several times there. So, so by grace, we've been saved. It's through faith and again. I notice, grace is on God's side. That's God's part. Faith is on our part, And not of yourselves. It is a gift of God. God, it's God's grace that has provided this to us, not of works, not of works of merit, works that we do, and then we say, Well, God, you owe us something. God doesn't owe us anything. It was by his grace that he decided to send Jesus, and Jesus decided to die for us. So that no man should glory, so we can't say, Well, I've done this. I've got this checklist here, and so I follow this checklist. And so now that I've followed this checklist, now you owe me salvation. God doesn't owe us. It's not of works that we have done. But then again, he goes on to say, he says, But we are His workmanship. So we are His workmanship. God's doing something. He's doing some work. He's he's provided his grace, created in Christ, Jesus, for good works. So our good works are the works that our obedience, that you have mentioned, that we have have obeyed God, and that he identifies as those good works that we are to do, which God afor, prepared that we should walk in them. To walk in them, that's how we conduct our life. So by God's grace, he decided he's going to save us. And how's he going to save us? Well, he's going to send Jesus, and Jesus is going to die for us. So then what? So then he is involved. We are His workmanship. Now, what do we have to do? Now We have to do good works. What does God tell Fred to do? Well in Acts. Chapter two, verse 38 when those people were condemned, they said, Okay, what shall we do? And Peter said, Repent and be baptized. Everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sin, you'll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, which is, by the way, the promise of eternal life.
Arnie:You know, let me back up a little bit here. On, on Acts chapter two and verse 38 and the fact that that obedience to the gospel was involved us having sins washed away. I've known a lot of people, you all probably have too that think that that when they're baptized, that washes away all the sins that they've already committed, and it's like a credit card for the future, and they can commit sins and and those won't be be charged to them, because, after all, I was baptized, you know, and that's certainly not what Peter is saying there. And I don't think that Fred and and Glenn certainly meant that either with with regard to that. So one thing that I counsel people to to be aware of, and those of you who are listening to us as well, let's not think that that it's like a credit card. We've still got money on it there that we can, that we can continue to sin. And because I was baptized and God will wash it away, you've got a passage.
Glenn:Yeah, and I think this is, know it's one of my favorite passages, because it's within the passage that is my favorite. But First John, one, eight and nine. Now. Now keep in mind, John is writing to Christians. He's not writing to non Christians. He's not writing to people who have not already been saved. He's writing to people who have been saved. Now notice what he says. I'm going to start in verse six and read through verse nine. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son cleanses us from all sin. Now pay attention to that, that passage there, it starts with a but if, if is a condition, and what's the what's the condition? If we walk in the light, what's the light? The light is Christ. So if we, if we live our lives like Christ, we have fellowship with with him, Christ and with God. And what happens, Jesus, Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin. Now that means that he, he can cleanse us going on, going forward, but now we need to look at what the rest of it says. If we say we have no sin, that's Christians. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess ourselves, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanses us from all unrighteousness. So this is the follow on to what Arnie was talking about, Acts 2, 38 when we're baptized, all of our sins prior to that have been forgiven. They're wiped away. The slate is clean. But we as Christians, we are people, and we are going to sin, and we need to confess those sins, following and Christ will forgive us. So it's not an automatic thing like what Arnie was talking about. It doesn't cleanse usgoing forward, we have to take care of those sins that we do as we do them.
Arnie:On a, yeah, on a continuing basis there, Titus, chapter three is a is another passage, I think that that relates to this issue about not being a a reward for for good, good works. Titus writes, he said, beginning in verse four of chapter three, But when the kindness of God, our Savior and His love toward man appeared, not by works done in righteousness, but which we did ourselves, but according to his mercy, He saved us by the washing of regeneration and and the renewing of the holy spirit. And understand, we haven't renewed the Holy Spirit. We haven't done something for him, but rather, our holy spirit is, is renewed because of the sins that that perhaps have been committed, have been taken out of the way. Now it's, it's kind of like washing the dishes. You know, you might have a lot of food smeared all over the the plates and plates and so forth that you've that you've used, but when you wash that away and you dry it and put back up in the cabinet. It's ready for the next meal. And is, is still, is still still clean and safe to to eat of. Uh, Fred, did you, did you have Romans chapter six that you were thinking about, talking about?
Fred Gosnell:Well, just that. What Romans 6, 23, says, it says, The wages of sin is death.
Arnie:Yeah
Fred Gosnell:Of course, sin pays wages. There's this, there's something that that people get from that, but it's not good, it's death. And that's not talking about eterrnal death, even though sometimes when people sin, they do die physically, it's talking about eternal separation from from God. After all, death is just separation. When we die physically, our spirit is separated from our body. When they're dead, when we're dead spiritually, we are separated from God.
Glenn:How does that apply to Fred?
Fred Gosnell:I think that applies to everybody.
Glenn:Does it apply to Christians?
Fred Gosnell:The wages of sin is death.
Glenn:Absolutely it applies. We've covered this, I think, and covered it pretty good. Sin applies to both non Christians and Christians. The problem with with Christians is that, or the good thing with Christians is that upon being saved, upon being baptized, all the sins prior to were forgiven. So now we just need to take care of those that we do occasionally in our daily, daily walk. Now there's a good, good passage about what prop Fred was talking about being separated from God. Isaiah, 59 says, But your iniquities, iniquities is sin has separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you that he will not hear. So when we sin, even as Christians, when we sin, we have separated ourselves from God, and we need to do something about it.
Arnie:And maybe one other danger point there in in that is the fact when we when we sin, and aren't aware of it, and and so we don't seek forgiveness for it, because we don't know that. We don't realize that that's what we what we did so when we're seeking forgiveness, maybe on a daily basis, or even more often than that, I suppose you know, when you're kneeling down by your bed and and conversing with with the Lord, ask again for forgiveness for those sins that you were not even aware of because you may have committed, probably did commit. I think all of us do sins that we weren't aware and and we need those forgiven too.
Fred Gosnell:Well, yeah, David said, in Psalm 19, verse 12, he said, Who can understand his errors? Cleanse me from secret faults? So if we think that we can live a perfect life and know everything that we do and whether it's right or wrong, then David disagrees. And so as Arnie says, you know we need to be aware of that fact. Of course, how is it that we can learn what what are sins and what are not sins? Well, I think we need to find out what the Bible says about it.
Arnie:Yeah.
Fred Gosnell:Go ahead. You got something there I see.
Glenn:Well, I'm trying. You may know the verse off the top of your head, but there, there is a passage in Romans where Paul is talking about the Holy Spirit interceding. And I believe that has something to do with this, through through our manner of life and the way we continue to live our lives when we may, we may do things that we may not be aware of, and those things we need to be forgiven of. And I think I believe this is, this is Glenn speaking. I believe that the Holy Spirit knows our heart and will intercede on our behalf when, when we fall short, not knowingly. I maybe, I maybe be wrong on that, but I believe that's that's the case, and I couldn't find the passage right off top of my haed. I know one of the passages that could possibly support that is there is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ, Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. That's Romans eight, verse one. So in speaking with that, we would see that if we walk not after the flesh, but our general walk is in the light in Christ, the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is going to help us out and intercede for us. On, on those, those things, I think we've shown thus far that it's important for us to do God's will, to obey his commandments, to try to walk as Jesus walked, and and try to live like He lived. Of course, we're going to fall short. That's when we confess. We ask forgiveness.
Arnie:Thank you for listening to us. And brethren, we had a had a good discussion this afternoon there. Thank you for listening, friends. We look forward to being with you again next Lord's Day. Have a good week.