BACKGROUND:
This is an important foundational passage today. This passage speaks about our salvation. Our salvation comes from God’s special favor alone. It was appropriated when people believed. However, lest anyone should think a specific work or set of actions must be performed in order to receive salvation, Paul made it clear that people can’t take credit for believing, for it is a gift from God.
Paul is firm that absolutely nothing is of our own doing—not salvation, not grace, not even the faith exercised to receive salvation. Instead, everything is the gift of God. Salvation does not come from our self-reliance or good life or good works but from God’s initiative, love, grace and mercy. It is a gift to be thankfully accepted.
In other words, people can do nothing to earn salvation, and a person’s faith itself also is not to be considered a “work” or grounds that anyone should boast. Many people want to feel as though they did something to garners God's good favor - that we somehow earned our salvation by our merit.
That was how the Judaizers (false teachers who said Christians had to obey all the Jewish laws) regarded their laws and why they tried to impose them on the Gentiles—there had to be a certain amount of law keeping and goodness on people’s part in order for them to receive salvation. But Paul’s words are unmistakable—if salvation is by God’s grace and is accepted through faith, then it is “not a reward.”
If salvation could be earned by good works, then people would, by nature, “boast” about their good works, compare the goodness of their works to others’ good works, and do good only to boast about it. Then, what would be “good enough” for salvation? But no one could ever be good enough to please a holy God. He casts aside all human effort and pride by offering salvation for free to all people by simple acceptance. People are given salvation on the grounds of God’s grace alone.
But wait, there’s more in this foundational passage. We are God’s masterpiece. Salvation is something only God can do—it is his powerful, creative work in us. People are re-created into new people, and those new people form a new creation—the church.
People become Christians through God’s undeserved favor (his grace), not as the result of any efforts, abilities, intelligent choices, personal characteristics, or acts of service. Out of gratitude for this free gift, however, believers will seek to do good things—to help and serve others with kindness, love, and gentleness. While no action or work we do can help us obtain salvation, God’s intention is that our salvation will result in acts of service.
We are saved not merely for our own benefit but to serve Christ and build up the church. This solves the so-called conflict between faith and works. Works do not produce salvation but are the evidence of salvation.
The Greek word translated do means “to walk about in.” We move ahead in this life of grace doing the good works that God planned for us long ago. The new life that God gives cannot help but express itself in good works. This does not necessarily mean that God has set up all the specific good works each person will do—although there would be no point arguing against the possibility of our omniscient God doing just that. Just as God planned salvation in Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world, so he planned that believers should do good to others.
SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)
The setting was Barcelona, Spain -- the Olympics - August 3, 1992. Eight men lined up for the 400 meter semi final race. The starter gun went off and all eight men set off to try and make Olympic history. One man that day didn't finish the race. Derrick Redmond of Great Britain. After 4 years of training, four years of beating his body into submission, four years of denying himself what most of us take for granted, six days a week of training – five hours a day, in the race of his life, a race he was favored to win, he pulls a hamstring and is out.
Officially his race was recorded as "Race Abandoned" -- quit, gave up. But to Derrick Redmond and to everyone that was in that stadium that day and to millions of TV viewers, “Race Abandoned” are the last things we think of. You see, Derrick Redmons's father jumped out of the stands that day and helped his son finish the race - cross the line. Anybody who saw that race that day will never forget the scene.
I am here to tell you today that there is someone who wants to help you cross the finish line of life – his name is Jesus Christ.
While the story of Derrick Redmond finishing a race and displaying unbelievable amounts of perseverance is impressive, it pales in comparison to what Jesus Christ did for us during Holy Week. Jesus Christ is the epitome of Perseverance. Jesus Christ is the personification of perseverance. Jesus Christ is the model of never giving up.
If you want to cross the finish line of life, if you want to be a person of perseverance, if you want to learn how to beak through quitting points in life, if you want to be a person a leaves a mark on this world, you need to understand that you need help. All great athletes have trainers. All great teams have great coaches. All successful people have mentors– someone who shows them the ropes. We all need help in crossing the finish line.
If you want to have the endurance of Christ, the perseverance of Christ, the compassion of Christ. If you want to leave a mark like Christ, you need Christ in your life.
Listen again to Philippians 2:5. It says “Let this same attitude and purpose and mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus.”. How can we have an attitude and purpose and mind like Christ? We have to be trained or cached or mentored by Christ. When that happens, we are transformed. That’s what we want to talk about this morning - how to be transformed by God grace. There are two things that you need to know if you want to be transformed by God’s grace.
#1. Change who you live for. This is the starting point. 1 John 5:11-12 (LB) says “What is it that God has said? That he has given us eternal life and that this life is in his Son. So whoever has God's Son has life; whoever does not have his Son, does not have life.”
If you want Jesus Christ to change your life, transform your life, help you in life. If you want his attitude and purpose and mind, you have to have Him in your life.
#2. Change the way you think. That's the next step in being transformed by God's grace. Romans 12:2 says "Do not change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but be changed within by a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to decide what God wants for you; you will know what is good and pleasing to Him and what is perfect."
The word "changed" means "transformed". To really get the meaning of that word we have to go back to our high school biology days, the experiment with the glass case and the caterpillars inside of it. In a matter of days those caterpillars spun a cocoon and then a few days later a butterfly came out. We learned that this process was called metamorphosis. Metamorphosis really means change.
If you want to have the same attitude of Jesus Christ, you have to have Him in your life, and then you have to allow Him to change the way you think. Literally, to be metamorphosized by God's grace. When we are changed, when we are transformed, God says two things are critical if you are going to change the way you think.
A few years ago, I did was speaking in front of a pretty large group of students about the issue of GIGO. Garbage in – garbage out. I had giant beer mug and a two liter of coke. I sat the mug on a stool and poured the can of coke right to the brim where it was going to spill over. I turned to the students and said, "If I was to bump that mug, what would happen?" The bright ones said – “It would spill.” That's right I said. What would come out?" Coke would come out. You mean orange juice, water, milk wouldn't come out? No, if I bump the glass with coke in it, coke's going to come out. What happens when you get bumped? What happens when I get bumped? What happens when I'm sitting in traffic on the freeway when I need to be somewhere, what comes out? When your kids flush a toy down the toilet, what comes out of you? When people treat you in an unkind way, what comes out of you?
When you get bumped in life, what comes out? The answer is, whatever you allowed in. What do you allow into your mind? "Be careful what you think because thoughts run your life." Read the short story below, if you would.
I heard about a school teacher named Miss Thompson. Every year when she met her students she would say, `Boys and girls, I love you all the same. I have no favorites.' Of course she wasn't being completely truthful. Teachers have students that they like more than others. In fact, some teachers have students they just don't like.
Teddy was a boy Miss Thompson just didn't like. His hair was unkept. His clothes had a musty smell. He certainly wasn't an attractive boy. He wasn't likable. When she got his papers she got a certain pleasure of putting X's next to the wrong answers. Whenever she put an "F" at the top of the page, she always do it with flair. Knowing her dislike for Teddy, the school counselor one day allowed Miss Thompson to view Teddy's records.
The records read: `First grade: Teddy shows promise with his work and attitude but he has a poor home situation. Second grade: `Teddy could do better. His mother is seriously ill. He receives little help at home.' Third grade: `Teddy is a good boy but he's too serious. He's a slow learner. His mother died this year.' Fourth grade: `Teddy is very slow, but well behaved. His father shows no interest.' She knew more that she wanted to know. Christmas came and the boys and girls in Miss Thompson's class brought her Christmas presents. They piled them high on her desk and among them was one from Teddy.
His was the gift that was wrapped in a brown paper bag held together with some scotch tape. On the package was written the simple words, `For Miss Thompson from Teddy'. When she opened Teddy's present out fell a gaudy rhinestone bracelet with half the stones missing and half a bottle of cheap perfume.
The other boys and girls in Miss Thompson's class began to laugh over Teddy's gift, but she quickly put on the bracelet and put some perfume on her wrist and held it up for the boys and girls to smell. They took their cues from Miss Thompson's and they responded with the oohhs and aaahhs. `Doesn't it smell lovely?' said Miss Thompson. The children agreed.
At the end of the day when school was over and all the children were leaving, Teddy lingered behind he finally came over to her desk and said softly, `Miss Thompson, you smell just like my mother and her bracelet looks real pretty on you, too.
I'm glad you like my present.' When Teddy left that day, Miss Thompson got down on her knees and she asked God to forgive her. The next day when the children came they were welcomed by a new teacher. This Thompson had become a different person. She was changed. She was transformed. There was a metamorphosis that happened. She was no longer just a teacher. She had become an agent of God. She was now a person committed to loving children and doing things for them that will live on after her. She helped all the children, especially Teddy and by the end of the school year all the children in her class showed improvement especially Teddy. He had caught up with most and was ahead of some.
She didn't hear from Teddy for a longtime. Then she received a note that read, `Dear Miss Thompson, I wanted you to be the first to know I'm going to be graduating second in my class. Love Teddy." Four years later she received another noted, `Dear Miss Thompson. They just told me I'd be graduating first in my class. The university has not been easy. I wanted you to be the first to know. Love, Teddy." Four years later: `Dear Miss Thompson, as of today I am Theodore Stollard, M.D. How about that? I wanted you to be the first to know. I'm getting married next month, the 27th to be exact. I want you to come and sit where my mother would have sat if she were alive. Dad died last year. You're the only family I have now. Love, Teddy.' Miss Thompson went to that wedding and she sat where Teddy's mother would have sat. She deserved to sit there because of the time and the effort and allowing God's transforming grace to metamorphosize her, to transform her."
Today, who will you touch - who will you impact with God's grace? I love you guys. Stay faithful. Stay the course.
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