Part
14 of 22
God’s
Grace Working to Bringing One to Salvation
Acts
16:31 (AMP) …BELIEVE
IN (pisteou, trust in) THE LORD JESUS CHRIST
[give yourself up to Him, take yourself out of your own keeping and
ENTRUST YOURSELF INTO HIS KEEPING] AND YOU WILL BE SAVED,
[and this applies both to] you and your household as well.
The word “believe”
here has become corrupted in our modern English language. “Believe,”
from the Greek, “pisteuo,”
means to “entrust.”
The term, “believe in
Christ,” as seen in the Greek New Testament, would mean “to
trust in, cling to, and rely upon Christ alone as the basis of
salvation.” A person must “trust
in,” Christ to be saved “by
faith.” Most consider “believe” to mean a mere mental ascent or
acceptance that Jesus of Nazareth, the man, existed – this is not
sufficient for “saving faith.” After all, the Devil believes in the
existence Jesus of Nazareth in that way. “Believe in” is again clearly
as “trust in” again in this verse.
John
3:16 (AMP) God
so greatly loved and
dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique)
Son, so that WHOEVER
BELIEVES IN (pisteou, TRUSTS IN, CLINGS TO, RELIES ON) Him
shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal life.
But how does one arrive at
such a faith and trust. It is by God’s grace that brings us to faith. In
the Bible, the grace of God is seen as His loving unconditional favor toward
fallen man. God made a way to extend His self to man while man is yet a
sinner and hateful of God, through Christ. Romans
5:6 (KJV) For when we were
yet without strength, in due time Christ
died for the ungodly.
The Apostle Paul has more
to say about “grace” than any other Bible writer. He opens every one of
his epistles with; “Grace be unto
you…” I would suppose this is owing to the fact that Paul himself
was God’s greatest demonstration of salvation by grace. “[I Paul] was
before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious; but I obtained
mercy... and THE GRACE OF OUR LORD WAS EXCEEDING ABUNDANT....” (1Tim.
1:13-14)
Paul served Christ and suffered for Christ,
declaring; “But none of these things move me, neither count I my life
dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the
ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify THE GOSPEL
[GOOD NEWS] OF THE GRACE OF GOD” (Acts
20:24).
Salvation comes to men 100% by God’s grace,
not partly by man’s works “...if
[it be] by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more
grace.” (Rom. 11:6.) In
Rom.
4:4-5 Paul writes; “...to him that
worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that WORKETH
NOT, but believeth on
Him that justifieth the ungodly,
his faith is counted for
righteousness.” Thus, salvation is “not
of works” but it is “unto
good works” (Eph. 2:8-10). Good works is the fruit, not the root.
“All have sinned,” says Rom. 3:23 but, thank God, all may be
“justified freely by His grace
through the redemption that is in
Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:24).
It is God’s purpose “that
in the ages to come He might show THE EXCEEDING RICHES OF HIS GRACE
in His kindness toward us through
Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:7).
God has already made the
way for us and yet there generally is a process for one to come to what we
might call “saving faith.” There is a moment when we believe, saying
“yes” as it were, and we are immediately 100% saved from perdition, but
most of us come to that point through a process that leads us to say
“yes.” Most often, for one to be saved by faith, they have been prepared
by God to “believe” in
Christ. This is what we might call a “prevalent” work of the
grace God by His Spirit. By “prevalent” I mean it is God’s work
accomplished in us beforehand, to prepare us or bring us to Him. Jesus said;
“No
man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him…”
(John 6:44).
He speaks to us through
inspiration, as well as the circumstances and situations of our lives, to
turn our hearts to Him long before we actually come to believe. Some may
call it coincidence, but I call happenings like these God-incidences.
Here’s an example of God’s prevalent grace working in my own life,
preparing me to trust in Christ. One Saturday afternoon in 1968 Linda and I
were sitting in our den, me on the floor and she on the couch. I was
flipping channels on the TV and came across a man (now I know him to be
Billy Graham) who was preaching and saying “Christ is coming back, are you
ready.” I spontaneously said aloud, “No,” then turning to Linda I said
“are you,” she said “no.” We didn’t discuss it or go any further
at that time. Being raised a Catholic I had never seen a Bible and was
ignorant of what Billy was speaking of. It
was only a few months later that a neighbor invited Linda to visit her
Conservative Baptist church – I at that time had no interest except to
make money, fix up the house and be comfortable. Without all the further
details I’ll just say, after we had heard the gospel preached for a few
Sunday’s, we were both saved and we knew it. In retrospect, I can see now
that I had already come to the point of realizing there had to be “more to
life than this.” Such realizations come only by the grace and inspiration
of the Lord in His prevalent work. God was building His case for me …
leading me to that day that I said “yes” to receive Christ’s
salvation.
We can freely choose to
cooperate with the inspiration of God to say yes or no. If we don’t
cooperate, then perhaps God tries again a little while later. If we deny
this prompting we miss out on God’s will and what He is offering me
through this prompting, at least for a time. Though I may fail to respond He
still will never abandon me because He remains
faithful even when we are not faithful; 2Timothy
2:13 If we believe not,
yet
he abideth faithful…). (See also the author’s article
“God’s Unspoken Yes.”)
No person arrives at the
point of genuine “saving faith” by or of their own self. It is the
result of God’s work of God in our life. God’s Spirit works by
witnessing to us in our human spirit, often via our spirit’s conscience
and/or intuition. As I noted earlier by my own testimony, He speaks to us
through inspiration and the circumstances and situations of our lives, to
turn our hearts to Him before we actually come to believe.
In our lifetime we may
receive a glimpse or snippets of the reality of the truth of God, perhaps
via a serious life-event or time, such as the death of a loved one, or
simply by viewing the awesomeness of the ocean, the heavens, or the desert,
or the design and working of the physical body, human cells, or the
universe, etc. Paul says the things of God may be seen by the creation. Romans
1:20 For
the invisible things of him from
the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the
things that are made, even
his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
God’s grace is at work
to “prepare” unbelievers, to bring them to “saving faith.” Salvation
comes to us by divine providence. Salvation comes to us includes by these
elements.
1.
We must come to a recognition or awareness of our need of
salvation.
2.
We must become conscious of our estrangement from God, and of
our hopeless and helpless condition apart from God (Isaiah 64:6; Romans
3:10, 11, 18, 23; Ephesians 2:12).
3.
We must also have had presented to us information, the message
of God’s love and the hope that may be found in the substitutionary death
of Christ, His resurrection, and the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice in
dealing with our sins. (1Cor 15:1-4).
Romans
10:14-15 How then shall they
call on him in whom they have not believed? and how
shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how
shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And
how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the
gospel of peace, and bring glad
tidings of good things!
Salvation “by
grace through faith” requires God’s enablement – “it
is the gift of God” (Eph 2:9). An unsaved man cannot pump this up
genuine faith because he is spiritually dead (Eph 2:1). Each of us therefore
must be enabled by the Spirit of God to believe. This involves the
convicting work of the Spirit of God, then enabling us to see the following
items with spiritual eyes.
·
To See our neediness.
Ephesians 2:12
That
at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of
Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and
without God in the world:
·
To See our present
lost and blinded condition of unbelief. 2Corinthians
4:4
In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which
believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the
image of God, should shine unto them.
·
To See our own
sinfulness. Romans
3:23
For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.
·
To See the fact
that Christ died for our sins to reconcile us to God, to make us right with
God. John 3:16 For
God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth (trust) in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God’s
great prevailing work for us is found in the cross, upon which our salvation
stands. 2 Corinthians 5:21 For
he (God) hath made him (Jesus) to
be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him.
·
To See the
availability of Christ’s righteousness, this is available to be bestowed
upon us. “Nevertheless I (Jesus)
tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I
go not away, the Comforter (The Holy Spirit) will not come unto you; but if
I depart, I will send him unto you. 8 And
when he is come, he will reprove (Gk. elencho, convict)
the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9
Of sin, because they believe not on me;
10 Of righteousness, because I
go to my Father, and ye see me no more; 11 Of
judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.” (John
16:7-11)
The unsaved person must
be enabled by the Spirit of God in order to see the truth and believe with a
“saving faith” in order to become a rebirthed child of God.
Ephesians
2:8-10 “For BY
GRACE ARE YE SAVED THROUGH FAITH, AND THAT
NOT OF YOURSELVES, IT IS THE
GIFT OF GOD, NOT OF WORKS
lest any man should boast.”
John
1:12
But AS MANY AS RECEIVED HIM,
TO THEM GAVE HE POWER TO BECOME THE SONS OF GOD, even
to them that believe on his name:
