All Of God (Part 1)

Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse, with No Compromise.

The Greatness of Salvation by Grace Alone

Could there be three better verses in all the Bible? For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourself. It is the gift of God, not a result of works, lest no one boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

That is sola gratia, by grace alone. And when you believe by grace alone, then it is to God alone be the glory. Let's turn our Bibles to Ephesians chapter 2 this morning, and let's talk about God's great grace.

The riches of God's grace will be displayed in eternity, therefore salvation must be of God's grace, and nothing we could do. I am the Lord, that is my name. I will not give my glory to another, especially in the role of salvation.

Salvation cost his son everything, and therefore he is going to receive all the glory in salvation. We're just deviating from our series because it was, I think we had like five people here first service, and you know once a year I pull up a different sermon because of our attendance, our lack thereof, and so I thought, you know, let's go back to Ephesians chapter 2.

Steve said to me today, Pastor Steve, he said, I can't hear Ephesians chapter 2 enough, and I said, you got a deal, Ephesians chapter 2. Now Paul in this book, Ephesians, everything for him is grace. If you go to chapter 1 verse 2, grace to you.

If you go to the very end of the book in Ephesians chapter 6, he's got the other book in, in chapter 6 verse 24, grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with love incorruptible. And then everywhere in the book is grace.

Even at the beginning, chapter 1, if you go there, there's this great praise in chapter 1 verses 3 to 14, all about God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ receiving blessings. Why would God receive blessings?

Well, he says in chapter 1 verses 4 through 6, because he chose us, unconditional election, verse 6, to the praise of his glorious grace. He also says God should be praised for grace because his son redeemed us according to grace.

Look at verse 7, in him, Christ, we have redemption through his blood. The forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us. Everything in this book shouts, great is God's grace.

Now when Paul was on the Damascus road and Jesus Christ interrupted him, how long did Paul wait before he wrote the book of Ephesians? In other words, what's the time frame between his Damascus road experience and writing Ephesians?

It was around 25 years, and you know what I love about Paul in this book? He hasn't gotten over the fact that God's grace is amazing and wonderful. So often in my life, I think, you know, I remember when I first was a Christian, I was fired up for the Lord in evangelism, enthusiastically telling other people, I mean, I was on fire.

And then it's like, well, you know what, I just kind of grew out of it. Sometimes we think that, you know, I just kind of grew out of those first love moments. I was at Ephesus not that many months ago with some of you here.

And you know, the thing about Ephesus now, it's dead, completely dead. There are just some buildings there. And Jesus, did he not say to the church at Ephesus, you've abandoned your first love. It's good to go back to Ephesians to make sure we understand that everything about us is received through grace.

And when you understand grace, it should lead to praise, God saving based on his good pleasure. So let me this morning in Ephesians chapter 2, verses 8, 9, and 10, give you nine reasons you can praise God for your salvation.

It's all of grace, God's grace and God's grace alone. Nine reasons you can give God, the triune God, all the glory for your salvation. And friends, I'm going to make it super simple. We're just going to walk through these verses.

One of the things that pastors do when they preach to you is they teach you how to study the Bible yourself. In other words, the passage is my outline and the outline comes from the passage. It's going to be super simple.

You could go home and recreate this very thing. As a matter of fact, I hope you do. This is a magnification of verse 7, so that in the coming ages, he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

You want to know what those are? You want to know why it's great salvation by grace alone? Paul is going to give us the reasons now in verses 8, 9, and 10. It's kind of like fireworks in one sense, and it's kind of like Paul's righteous stubbornness.

I will not move on until I've exhausted the topic of God's grace. I don't want anybody to get over it. I don't want anybody to say to people who are brand new Christians, oh, you'll get over that enthusiasm.

You'll get over that excitement. You'll be boring, dull, and dry like me later. Just wait until you grow up in Christ and you're a Christian for 25 years. That's not Paul. Paul was fired up, and that whole first chapter is about how to praise God for his salvation, the Father choosing, the Son redeeming, and the Spirit sealing to the day of redemption.

Salvation Is Something Done to You, Not by You

First reason you can give God all the glory for your salvation is found in verse 8. Your salvation was something that was done to you. Salvation is something that's done to you. Very simple today. You could all say these same things most likely, but good to be reminded.

Verse 8, you have been saved. Let's start there. Let's start with this key verb, you have been saved. This is a perfect passive. It means it's something that's been done to you. You didn't save yourself.

God saved you. This is what theologians call the passivity of redemption. We are passive in redemption. God is active. We are passive. Jesus says on the cross, said on the cross, it is finished. All salvation work is done.

We are the recipients of this salvation. Think about temporal salvation for Israel when they were brought to the Red Sea, a mountain on the left, a mountain on the right, Pharaoh's armies behind them, and the Red Sea in front of them, and God is the one that brought them through.

He is the one who did everything. There's no other way of rescue, so God gets all the glory. Spurgeon said, this verse does not say you shall be saved. You may be saved. You're partly saved. You're on the way to being saved.

You're hopeful of your possible salvation. You're halfway there. You're out on the limb of being saved. What does the text say? You are saved. You have been saved. Salvation is not something we do and achieve.

Remember the old slogan, salvation isn't do, do, do. It's what? It's done. That's right. It's done, done, done, absolutely. God saved. It was his initiation, his energy out of his love and his mercy, and it had to be God doing it because look at chapter 2, verse 1, and you were dead in trespasses and sins.

This was a younger group, and I was doing a high school retreat or something, and somebody said, do I believe there are zombies in the Bible? Yes, right here in chapter 2, verse 1, the walking dead. It's just like a dog.

I think I've talked about it many times. You take a dog to Niagara Falls, and the dog cannot appreciate Niagara Falls even though the water spills on the dog. The dog can hear the roar. The dog can see the falls, and the dog has no appreciation for Niagara Falls at all.

If you think dogs can't appreciate Niagara Falls, how much less could a cat appreciate Niagara Falls? And we see God in his majesty and nature, and we hear about his salvation in the Bible, and we can't appreciate what he's done until God saves us, until God makes us alive as Ephesians says.

Romans said that while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. God is the one saving. We are the recipients of his salvation. God demonstrates his own love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

God is the mover. For if while we were enemies, Romans 5, we were reconciled to God through the death of his son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. So when you think about how do I praise God?

If I contribute a little bit to my salvation, then maybe I can carry some of the praise over into my own life. When you get to heaven, you will not high-five God and say, we did it. You will not fist-bump God and say, between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, and my work, we saved ourselves.

Pretty bread of Revelation chapter 5, the focus of heaven is Jesus Christ for he alone is the Savior. Number two, how do we increase our gratitude and praise? Is remembering our salvation, because number one, it was done to us.

Salvation Is by Grace and Through Faith

Number two is by grace. See this in verse 8 again. It's front-loaded. Many times in the Greek, the word order will help us with emphasis. There's no bold highlighters. There's no italics. There's no font.

So what do you do? You put something in the front of the sentence, and then it gives it gravity, and the same thing here, for by grace. Paul could have said, you're saved by grace, but instead for a word order for emphasis, he says what?

By grace, you have been saved. To highlight it, that the cause of salvation was grace. Say what is grace? I've learned a lot of definitions over the years. Here's an acronym I learned once, God's riches at Christ's expense, grace.

Unmerited favor, you probably learned that one. I like Sinclair Ferguson's the best though. Demerited favor. We've earned his chastisement, but he gives us mercy and grace. Grace is attributed to princes, Goodwin said.

They are said to be gracious to their subjects, whereas subjects cannot be gracious to princes. Now God, who is an infinite sovereign, who might have chosen whether ever to love us or not, decided to love us, this is grace.

My favorite definition is by Minton, and he said, grace is, charis is the Greek word for grace, God's utter generosity, unselfish, spontaneous, reckless generosity, which acts wholly out of loving concern for his people's need, even if they are completely unworthy of his love and help which he offers to them.

We are the ones dead in trespasses and sins, yet God still loves us, and as I've said often, if you ever think about a makeover, whether it's a home makeover or it is a facial kind of makeover, a personal makeover, they don't pick really beautiful people to give makeovers to, and they don't pick beautiful houses, they don't pick the hearse castle to give a makeover to it, why?

Because they as the makeup artists, they as the people who design the house and redo it, they show their skill based on working with things that are not that good. So I wouldn't take it as a compliment if you get asked to do a makeover, but that's another sermon.

When you go to work and you punch in, at the end of that shift, you have a wage, you've earned that, that has nothing to do with grace. If you run a race and you win, you get the prize, you get an award for a sales contest, you've earned it, but when you can't work, when you can't run, when you can't earn things and you still get something good, that's called grace.

You get the gift anyway. Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ was on the lips of Paul all the time because he wanted to make sure that the praise went to God alone, not for him. Just imagine Paul for a minute, in the world of grace, the biblical world of grace, outside of that world is our world and we're steeped in it, a works world.

Everything about us is works. We work, we earn, we get. That's Paul as a Pharisee. Paul understood that if I do this for God, then he'll do that for me. But that Phariseeism is basically paganism. All paganism is this, we've got a problem with fertility, problem with famine, problem with crops.

If we do something for God, maybe he'll do something for us. If we do something for the goddess, maybe she'll do something for us. But friends, Ephesians 2, 1 to 3 is true. We can't do anything and God does the work.

Number three, salvation was done to you. Salvation is by grace. Number three, parsing our salvation. Salvation was only through faith. Through faith. Friends, it was not because of faith. There's a different Greek word for because.

If you're saved because of faith, now faith becomes a work. Faith is something you do and your friend didn't do. I have a friend, his name's Scott. He has kind of a big ZZ Top beard and he is not a Christian.

He's a drunk and whenever I see him at my mom's funeral, at his mom's funeral, whenever I see him, he's just a complete drunk. What's the difference between Scott? Our parents were friends. Our parents had the same cabin on the lake on the Missouri River.

I went to the same high school. I had my first job with him as a first job. What's the difference between Scott and Mike? I believed. I earned my own, my salvation by my belief. No. Look at the text. By grace you have been saved through faith.

If you have a commitment and a confidence in and a trust in God, it is not because of faith because dead people don't believe. It's through faith, this non-meritorious instrument of salvation. If you're trying to get, if I was trying to explain it to a kid and say, you've got water here and you want to get the water over here for irrigation.

Here's a pool of water, a tub of water and I get a PVC pipe and run it down here. This is a, it's just a channel. That's a good illustration of grace. True or false? Grace is God's part, faith ours. I love preaching to you guys.

Yes, we believe. God doesn't believe for us, but it's a non-meritorious, non-work. It's through faith, not because of faith. God votes yes for you to be saved. Satan votes no and you cast the deciding vote.

We talked about that last week. God's not tapping his toes up in heaven hoping for us to open the doors of our hearts so he can save us. Ian Murray in his book, Forgotten Spurgeon, said this, for example, a booklet which is much circulated in student evangelism at the present time, lays down three simple steps to becoming a Christian.

First, personal acknowledgement of sin. Second, personal belief in Christ's substitutionary work. These two are described as preliminary. But the third's so final that to take it will make me a Christian.

I must come to Christ and claim my personal share in what he did for everybody, and here's what the booklet says. This all-decisive third step rests with me. Christ waits patiently until I open the door, then he will come in.

Once I have done this, I may immediately regard myself as a Christian. The advice follows, tell somebody today what you have done. If that's true, then how could Romans 11 be true? For from him and through him and to him are all things except my faith.

To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. What's the cause? If we have to have the because word, you're saved because of faith isn't true. It's through faith. What's the cause? Where's the because word?

I'll show you where it is, verse four. But God being rich in mercy, Ephesians 2, 4, theirs are because. You want motive, you want motivation, you want first cause, you want the great mover, you want a reason for your salvation.

Because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, he made us alive together with Christ. And here's this refrain, by grace you have been saved. Raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

There's a word in Ephesians 2, 8 that he could have used for because, he could have used that word in Ephesians 2, 4, but he didn't. So I ask you a question, if you're a Christian, why are you a Christian?

If you're a Christian, why are you a Christian? And the answer is, God made you a Christian. God saved you. Faith isn't a meritorious work. It's through faith, the channel by which you receive salvation.

Galatians 2, man is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Christ Jesus. Romans 3, even the righteousness of God through faith in Christ Jesus. Romans 3 .25, who displayed publicly as a propitiation in his blood through faith.

God doesn't do 99 of the work and you seal the deal by giving God faith. That isn't salvation at all, by grace. That's salvation by works, because one part works with 99 of 99 parts of grace. Make it all works.

Thomas Hooker said, God justifies the believing man, not for the worthiness of his belief, but for the worthiness of him in whom he believes. When you're persuaded that Jesus is God, God has already worked in you to give you that.

When you say to yourself, I deliberately trust my eternal life with Jesus, the risen savior, who gave you such a faith? You didn't come up with that on your own. We were children of wrath, even as the rest.

No wonder Philippians says, it's been granted for you to believe in him. No wonder Acts 18 says, he helped greatly those who had believed through grace. No wonder 2 Peter 1 says, they've received a faith of the same kind as ours.

Baptists said, it is not thy hold of Christ that saves thee, it's Christ. It's not thy joy in Christ that saves thee, it's Christ. It's not even thy faith, though that be the instrument. It is Christ's blood and merit.

That's why when you struggle with assurance of salvation, what do you do? Scurry after assurance. I've got to have assurance, I've got to have assurance. Not having assurance is a bad feeling, and that's good that it's a bad feeling.

So how do you get rid of that feeling if you're really a Christian and you have no assurance of salvation? Well, could there be sin in your life? The answer is yes. But your focus needs to be not assurance because you'll never catch it.

The focus needs to be, I'm going to look at who Jesus is. And then assurance will come. All the time people come to me as a pastor and they'll say, I'm struggling with assurance. And nine times out of 10, they've made an idol out of getting assurance.

Instead of saying, I'll forget about assurance, I'll focus on Christ's finished work. I tell them, read Galatians because Galatians will show you Christ plus nothing is salvation. And then when you realize that again, then as Spurgeon said, the dove of assurance will sit down on your shoulder when you keep your eyes on Christ.

Salvation Is Not of Yourselves, but the Gift of God

Number four, salvation is not of yourselves. Salvation is not of yourselves. This is almost a double saying. He's already said this, but he's trying to make it emphatic. Your salvation is not from you.

The Greek is, and this is not of you, and this is not of you. Every aspect of our salvation, we could say, and this is not of you. R. Kent Hughes tells a funny story. There's a frog that fell into a large milk can.

He kept paddling until it turned into a pad of butter, and then he jumped out. So it's like self-salvation launching pad. How do you save yourself? Salvation by grace through faith, not proceeding from yourselves, not of yourself.

Now, sometimes it'll be translated, and this is not your own doing. That's the ESV. What's the this referred to? Does it refer to faith? Does it refer to grace? But the way, yeah, there you go, yes. It's salvation by grace through faith.

It's this whole thing. This whole concept of salvation by Christ's finished work on Calvary, confirmed by the resurrection, is not of us. This refers to faith, grace, or the entire salvation process. The entire salvation process is not from us.

We don't do any self-salvation because all our deeds are like filthy rags. That's why we say God did it all. Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe. Number five, your salvation is a gift of God, a gift from God.

Kind of parsing our salvation, I'm just taking one little segment, then the next, then the next. You could probably guess what my next few points are. Salvation is a gift from God. It's emphatic in the original.

God and no one else. It's not from me, it's from God. Salvation not of you, of God as the gift is a good way to translate it. Salvation is the gift. We can't earn it, and it's a good gift. I don't know, does God give any bad gifts?

I was reading about an American Express survey about Christmas gifts. Some of you are very kind and give me gifts. This particular thing I still would receive with a thank you, but in my mind, I'm not too sure.

Fruitcake, it says, Christmas gifts found that the fruitcake was chosen, most often, 31 from a list of worst holiday gifts. But this gift, think about it, I deserve hell, I get to go to heaven at the basis of someone else.

I didn't earn it, I wasn't there, I wasn't born when my salvation was accomplished. And neither were you, before you were born. Sometimes I talk to my kids and we'll say, well, we moved to California, and Maddie and Gracie, you weren't even born yet, you didn't even exist.

And to think, in eternity past, I ask you the question, when were you saved? I hope when anybody asks you the question, you give them the right answer. Mike, when were you saved? Well, my salvation is so wonderful, I don't really know what you're talking about, so do you mean in eternity past, when the Father, Son, and the Spirit, in a council of peace, got together and decided to send the Son to go rescue me, that's salvation?

Or how about at Calvary, when Jesus died on the cross for my sins and was raised from the dead? Or how about in 1989, when God regenerated me and applied that salvation? How about now, I'm progressively sanctifying, being sanctified, I'm progressively being saved, to use the terminology of Paul.

Or when I get glorified, whether that's in the Czech Republic from nuts, or today, or any other day, which salvation is it? And it's all of God, every bit of it.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please, come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m., and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m. We're located on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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