The Work of Grace in the Heart

In the last message we saw that grace is the effectual working of God’s power in the heart of man. It is not a new status, a legal contract, or the removal of a law for righteousness. It is the power of God, a measure of the life and light and Spirit of God that actually fulfills the requirement of righteousness in man by changing his nature. Grace removes condemnation, not by removing the requirement of righteousness, but by forming in man the righteous life and nature of Jesus Christ. Grace is power. It is the power of a new life, with a new nature. 

The law came through Moses, but the living and righteous power of God came through Jesus Christ. And though the power of God can be manifested outwardly, though God’s power can create stars and planets and mountains and oceans, its greatest manifestation, and its greatest miracle, is found in the dark heart of fallen man where it turns sons of wrath into children of light. The law described righteousness, but grace is the power of righteousness, goodness, life, love, etc. planted in the soul of man. 

It is, in a sense, the coming of Jesus Christ to His own temple, which had long been a den of robbers. It is the coming of a stronger man to his own house, where another strong man has previously lived. It is like Joshua crossing the Jordan into the land of Canaan, introducing a new kingdom into a land that is overrun with seven uncircumcised nations. Grace comes to man as the power of God, as the kingdom of God, but we saw last time that it begins in man as a small seed, a precious pearl, a talent, a little leaven. This is one of the great mysteries of the kingdom of God that Jesus described in so many parables, and that God illustrated in so many types and shadows in the Old Testament. 

What is this great mystery? It is the fact that God is a great and mighty King, and yet He begins His reign as a small stone cut out of a mountain without hands (Daniel 2:34), a mustard seed in a garden, as a baby in a manger. The King of Kings begins His reign like a David or a Joseph, unknown to the world and rejected by his own brothers. The power of God does not come like an army with banners, or like an atomic bomb, demolishing everything in its path. No, it comes like a humble King who sets his throne right in the midst of His enemies, and from there, expands His rule as he finds a heart that will join to Him voluntarily in the day of His power. This is what David declared in the famous Psalm 110.

The LORD said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand, Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.” The LORD shall send the rod of Your strength out of Zion. Rule in the midst of Your enemies! Your people shall be volunteers In the day of Your power; In the beauties of holiness.

Do you see what the Spirit is saying here? God’s power or kingdom does not come like the kingdoms of this world. The kings of this world first destroy their enemies and then set their throne in a conquered land. But here, God sets His king right in the middle of His enemies, and then waits for His enemies to be made His footstool. God anoints His king, sows Him like a seed into the heart of man, and then desires that His people will offer themselves voluntarily in the day of His power, when His light strikes their heart. And these two things are always part of the increase of the kingdom. I mean, on the one hand there are enemies that are being destroyed, and on the other hand there is a voluntary joining to the Lord in the light or day of His power. And perhaps I will just say in passing, that God’s dealing in this way is because there are two things in man (so to speak). There is a soul that is to be saved, and there is a nature that is to be destroyed. There is something that cannot be fixed, restored, or helped, and that is the uncircumcised nature of fallen flesh. This is represented by the Philistines, Amorites, and other uncircumcised nations in the land, and everything that breathes with that nature must be destroyed entirely and removed from land. And yet there is something that is under bondage to these nations, a slave to this nature, and this is the soul of man, created by God to be a temple of His glory. The soul is saved only by a true death to flesh, an experiential death to sin, and by the gift and growth of the life of God in the soul of man.

And this was precisely David’s experience and David’s mission when the Lord anointed him as king over His people. David’s kingdom, in so many ways, is as an outward picture of Christ’s inward Kingdom. He was anointed king when he was just a shepherd boy watching a few sheep, when nobody in the land, not even his brothers, recognized or understood what he was meant to do. God anointed him king, declared him the man after His own heart, and set him in the midst of his uncircumcised enemies. And you could also say, God gave David as a savior to Israel, desiring that his people would offer themselves willingly in the day of his power.

1 Samuel 22:1 David therefore departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. So when his brothers and all his father's house heard it, they went down there to him. And everyone who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was discontented gathered to him. So he became captain over them. And there were about four hundred men with him.

This is how David’s kingdom began. A few who were in distress, in debt, and discontent with the kingdom of Saul, and the wickedness of the uncircumcised, voluntarily joined themselves to him in the cave. They volunteered their lives when his power appeared. And in time, these became the mighty men of David, an invincible army that no enemy could resist.

And I am mentioning these things because they are all pictures, shadows, arrows, that point to how the power of Christ, the grace of Jesus Christ, works in the heart of man. Grace is not a divine declaration of toleration that somehow allows evil to remain in the kingdom of God. Grace is a living King that sets Himself in the midst of His enemies, with the intention of destroying his enemies, and filling the heart with the nature of God. 

Its first appearance is like a light that shines to manifest the difference between the seed of Israel and the Philistine nature. It is like the boy David appearing in the valley of Elah and crying out in the presence of Goliath, “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?” (1 Samuel 17:26) A light from above shines in the heart and gives man a glimpse of his rightful king, and also its true enemy. It shows you that Christ is David, and you are Goliath. The grace of God appears to all men and teaches us what we should deny, turn from, and forsake, and it also teaches us what we should look for and seek. And when we love His appearance, when we embrace, and submit and join our will to work of grace, then grace grows. Or you could say, then we grow in the grace of God. 

When Paul was leaving Ephesus after being with that church for three years, he warned them that savage wolves were coming who would not spare the flock, and that men would arise from among themselves speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after themselves. And then he said: 

Therefore watch, and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears. So now, brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. (Acts 20:31-32)

Do you see what Paul is saying here? “Watch, be on your guard! I am leaving you, but there is something staying with you. Danger is coming from within and without, but there is a power that will remain with you. I commend you to it. I point you to it as your only hope. What is it? It is the word of His grace, a seed of His grace, a gift of Christ’s living power, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified by it. This grace is the only hope you have. Love it, and it will grow. Obey it, and it will build you up. Submit to it and it will sanctify you.”

It starts like a light, like a small voice that shows you the way of life. Or in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “Your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, ‘This is the way, walk in it,’ whenever you turn to the right hand, or whenever you turn to the left.” (Isa 30:21) And when you love its light, then you begin to feel and find its power. You begin to see that it has an anointing from above to teach, to cleanse, to change, to put to death and to make alive. Grace does all things in the believer. Grace must do all in man, because man can do nothing apart from grace.

But now, let me warn you about a couple great errors or lies concerning the grace of God that have become extremely common in our day. And I do this, not because I want to criticize wrong ideas or make more divisions in the already divided church, but because I want all of us to actually experience the real work of grace. I want all of us to know the true gospel of grace, the sufficiency of grace, and a real growth in grace. I hope I can say in all sincerity that I have no interest in correcting wrong ideas merely from a doctrinal standpoint. No. The EXPERIENCE of Christ is everything with me. The inward, eternal, heart-changing, life-changing experience of a living God. And in so many ways, man is ALWAYS trying to claim spiritual things that we don’t really experience. Do you understand what I mean? I mean there is something so predominant in man that wants to believe we have a righteousness that we don’t actually experience or live. We want to call ourselves pure in Christ, even when we’re still very impure in our own thoughts and intentions. We want to claim to be something in the sight of God that we are far from being in the sight of our own families. Or as I have heard recently, we want to say that we are one thing in “eternity,” though we are another thing in time. 

These are not just doctrinal inaccuracies. These are enormous barricades that keep us from actually experiencing grace. And it was probably because of errors like these that the apostles felt constrained to write statements like: “Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous” (1 John 3:7) Or, “Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: ‘The Lord knows those who are His,’ and, ‘Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity’” (2 Tim. 2:19).

One wrong idea that I want to address is the idea that the grace of God automatically and instantaneously makes men righteous in the sight of God, or makes God see us differently than we really are. This is a great mistake, at least in the sense in which it is commonly taught in the church today. Because it is very commonly said that, as soon as a person believes in Christ, or says the sinner’s prayer, then everything is done!… except perhaps for our realizing what we already are, or manifesting what we already are, or enjoying what God’s grace has already accomplished for us. Some say that God immediately sees us as perfect, or that when He looks at us He no longer sees the sin that we live in, or that practicing unrighteousness doesn’t change the fact that God has already made us righteous, and sees us as righteous.

Now, it is absolutely true that God has given man an unspeakably great gift through the outward work of Jesus Christ. He has worked a miracle of redemption and salvation for man through the incarnation, life, death, burial, and resurrection of His Son. He has given His only begotten Son as a sacrifice for sin, so that repentance and forgiveness of sin can be preached in His name to all nations of the world. He has torn the veil that leads into the Holy of Holies, opened a door out of our inward slavery to death and darkness, created a new and living way for the redeemed to walk in. He has overcome the power of spiritual Pharaoh, the one who held the sons of Adam by the power of death. He has given us a perfect captain of salvation, cast up a highway through the wilderness, and become our leader and merciful High Priest. And He has reconciled us to God in the sense that He has taken every obstacle out of man’s way. He has removed the immoveable wall of partition, brought us into covenant with Him, and sown a seed of His own grace, light, and Spirit into the heart of man, so that every human being is enabled to work out their salvation with fear and trembling. Everything impossible has been done, the wedding feast is ready, the invitations are sent to all, and nothing remains in man’s way besides his own desires for other things. All of this and more God has accomplished through the outward work of Jesus Christ. And without all of this, man would be hopelessly lost forever. 

And yet, as great as this gift is, it does not automatically and instantaneously change the NATURE that is living and reigning in man, or make God see you differently than you really are. God has done absolutely everything necessary, and everything possible, in order to redeem man out of His fallen condition. But all that He has done outwardly, was not so that He could call you something that you are not, but in order to make you like He is. I mean, it was all done so that by abiding in Christ, clinging and submitting to the grace of God, or the effectual working of His power, He could actually remove from your heart every form of selfishness, pride, envy, anger, fear, lust, darkness, and death, and fill you with the power of His light, life, and love.

And although Adam, from the very beginning, has wanted to hide his true condition from God behind a variety of fig-leaf masks and excuses, the idea that God sees us differently than we really are is contrary to so many Scriptures that describe God as always seeing and judging the hidden intentions, thoughts, and desires of our hearts. Even to those who are Christians, the Apostles warns that God is a “discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart,” (Heb 4:12), that he “brings to light the hidden things of darkness and reveals the counsels of the heart” (1 Cor 4:5). And in Revelation, Christ Himself, who is described as having “eyes of fire” sees into the true condition of all seven churches, and gives encouragement, correction, or strong warning according to their various states. 

And while I am on the subject of man’s tendency to claim to be things and have things that he is not truly experiencing, permit me to beg you not to ever settle for something less than the righteous kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ reigning in your soul. Don’t content yourself with a name that you live, when you are really dead; a name that you are a Christian when you still live and think and act like a fallen son of Adam who finds his home in this world. Don’t sit down in what Christ has done for you outwardly, even while you are still so short of experiencing what He desires to do for you inwardly. This has been one of the most common errors of the church in all ages. The church cries out, “Grace has done everything!”, but what has grace done in you? Generation after generation we do the same thing. We believe doctrines, set up churches, change some behaviors, but do not allow Him to change our hearts. We want Him to call us by His name without changing us into His nature. In other words, we say that all is grace, and that grace is everything, but we don’t know the work of that “Word of grace” of which Paul speaks, that (in actual experience) builds us up and gives us an inheritance among those who are sanctified.

And ONE of the reasons why we have fallen so short of God’s eternal purpose and desire in this respect, is because we have believed the lie that God’s outward work of grace has instantaneously and automatically done all for us, even when we know little or nothing of His work of grace, His Word of grace, within us. 

And now let me mention a SECOND reason why this word of grace is so little known or experienced: it is because of another lie that grace cannot be resisted, or at least to the unconscious assumption that we are NOT resisting it. 

Many Christians are aware that Calvin popularized the concept of “irresistible grace,” and that this idea remains very popular in many protestant churches to this day. But as popular as it is, I cannot conceive of a doctrine that is more contrary to Scripture, or contrary to the experience of every individual human soul. And I personally believe that Calvin only reached for this doctrine because, as unbiblical as it is, it was a necessary pillar to support and defend the idea of unconditional election, or individual predestination of souls to heaven and hell (another great mistake). But I’ll leave that for another time.

The simple truth that we see over and over again from Genesis to Revelation is that, although God is certainly FAR stronger than man, yet man is very able to resist the power, will, and grace of God. There is nothing clearer in the history of men and angels. God is omnipotent, but in His dealings with fallen man, He has never used His power to force compliance, or obedience, or love. And truly, if there was ever a time or a condition where grace would have been irresistible, one would think that it would have been before the fall, when everything existed in a state of perfect harmony, order, blessedness, heavenly righteousness and peace. But even then, when no created thing had ever stepped out of God’s righteous law of light and love, we find that both men and angels had the ability, if they were so inclined, to resist the gracious power of their loving Creator. First angels, and then man, demonstrated clearly that grace could be resisted even when grace was ruling everything in the created universe. 

And if this was true then, how much more is it true now, when so much both around us and in us, tempts and pulls and allures the fallen nature of flesh to turn our heart away from our Maker! Because now, after the fall, and IN the fall, there is a nature in man that lusts after his own destruction. There is a law of sin and death that cannot be disobeyed except by careful submission to a stronger Law. There are desires of the eyes, desires of the flesh, pride and selfishness and lust that mixes with everything man does and seeks. And there is a company of fallen angels who go about like roaring lions, seeking whom they may devour, always looking for something of their own darkness in the heart of man where they can enter,  unite, influence, deceive and ensnare. How can anybody say that grace is irresistible, when the condition of the world makes many believe that SIN is irresistible? 

Was grace irresistible when God called Israel out of Egypt to follow Him across the wilderness? Was grace irresistible when God brought His people into the Promised Land and told them never to depart from His laws and statutes? Was grace irresistible in the days of the judges or the kings or the prophets? 

And what about the testimony of the apostles in the New Testament? In Acts 13:43, Paul and Barnabas spoke to the converts and endeavored to “persuade them to continue in the grace of God.” In 2 Corinthians 6:1 Paul “pleads” with the church “not to receive the grace of God in vain.” In Galatians chapter 1, he marvels that the church is “turning away so soon from Him who called them in the grace of Christ to a different gospel.” Later in chapter two of the same epistle he speaks of the possibility of “nullifying” or “setting aside the grace of God.” And then in chapter 5 verse 4 he warns Christians who were returning to the law that they had “fallen from grace.” Jude speaks of those who were “turning the grace of God into licentiousness.” In Hebrews 12:15 he warns the believers to “look carefully, lest anyone falls short of the grace of God.” And in chapter 10 he has this frightful warning: 

Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

These are all verses that specifically use the word grace. But there are multitudes of other verses that speak of the same possibility and tendency, only using slightly different language, such as resisting, quenching, grieving, and rebelling against the will and the work of the Spirit of God in the heart. And it is because of this proneness in man to turn from and to kick against the work of grace, that the Bible is so filled with warnings, admonitions, and cautions against it. And on the other hand, we read over and over again in Scripture of messengers, prophets and apostles, sent by God, to invite, call, and encourage all to continue in submission to the grace and power of God, so that it will go well with them. 

It is therefore put beyond all doubt that it is not only possible to resist grace, it is indeed common, and even prevalent! And I mention it, because this universal propensity in the fallen nature of man must be recognized as a very present and powerful one in every one of our hearts, if we have any hope of living in careful submission to the power of grace. 

Because, returning to what I was saying previously, grace doesn’t come to man like an enormous army with banners, immediately destroying and conquering all resistance in its path. The way of the kingdom, one of the great “mysteries of the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 13:11) is that God sets His king in the midst of His enemies. He anoints His king, sets him in the land, and then gives everyone who feels the plague of his own heart—everyone who is in distress, in debt, and discontented with kingdom of Saul or the oppression of the Philistines—He gives these the opportunity to join their heart to him in the day of His power. This is how grace is received, and how grace comes to have power over nature. The grace of God that brings salvation appears to all men. It comes bringing hope, bringing power, bringing a Savior, but it does not save all men, because all do not “volunteer in the day of His power.” All do not love His appearing, receive His teachings, turn at His reproof, unite their heart and their will to the “word of grace” that builds them up, brings them to experience the inheritance, and sanctifies them.