The Wednesday Word

 

Are you a Grace Believer? Part 1

 

by D.G. Miles McKee

 

Not everyone who claims to be a believer is a Grace Believer.  What about you? Are you a Grace Believer? It took me a long time to become a Grace Believer. Although I thought I was a Grace Believer I was more of a legalist than a grace man. 

Maybe you are struggling to know the difference between living in grace and living under law. If you are, I hope the following is helpful. 

 1. Grace Believers trust that they are saved entirely and utterly by someone else … the Lord Jesus Christ. They believe that their sole qualification for salvation is found, not in their worthiness, but in their unworthiness. You say... well OK I can agree with that. But hold on, we are not finished yet. The Grace Believer sees Christ as his complete and continual acceptance with the Father (Philippians 3:4-9).We are saved entirely by grace. 2) Grace Believers understand that to know Christ and Him crucified is not the minimum of spiritual knowledge but the maximum. The Grace Believer believes that the treasures of wisdom, knowledge and spiritual understanding are in Christ Jesus (Isaiah 45:3; Colossians 2:3).  Grace Believers, therefore, do not weary themselves by chasing after this or that new experience or supposed blessing.  The Grace Believer believes that almighty God has fully and finally spoken in the Lord Christ.The Grace believer knows that all doctrines find their hub in Christ Crucified. All teaching, responsibilities, and Christian activities find their center in Christ alone.3) Grace Believers, as they grow in grace, rather than becoming self-satisfied and hard-spirited, continue to develop in their understanding of their lack of worth (in themselves). As the gospel-hammer breaks them, they increase in the comprehension that they receive favour, not because of anything they are doing, but because of them being in Christ!  They understand that Christ’s worthiness is the source of all their blessings (Ephesians 1:3-4; 1 Corinthians 4:7).As the Grace Believers live before God, they learn to remember that they are treated as though they had never sinned.  Grace Believers know they are already standing before the Father in the immaculate righteousness of the worthy Lamb. 4) Grace Believers rest in the fact that they already have the full favour of God, not because of any works they have done or contributions they are making. They have the full favour in Heaven because of Christ and His finished work. By faith, they grasp that the Father is well pleased with them and indeed rejoices over them (Zephaniah 3:17).  Indeed, the Father cannot be more delighted with His people than He already is.  Let me emphasize, Grace Believers know they are not accepted by having a righteousness that comes to them by fulfilling rules and regulations. The Grace believer rests in the fact that they are in Christ and have Christ’s entire righteousness credited and reckoned to them (see Philippians 3:9). 5) As they grow in grace, Grace Believers refuse to make resolutions, vows, and pledges to change their behaviour.  Grace Believers put no confidence in the flesh (Philippians 3:3). David Brainerd, the dynamic missionary to the American Indians, knew this truth.  He said, “I never got away from Jesus and Him crucified in my preaching. I found that once these people were gripped by the great evangelical meaning of Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf, I did not have to give them many instructions about changing their behavior." 6)  Grace Believers are not so foolish as to try self-improvement techniques. Instead, they focus on the Lord Jesus. They know that change comes from looking outside themselves to the glorious person of Christ.  They rejoice in 2 Corinthians 3:18 which says; “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” And that’s the Gospel Truth!



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