[Steve Myers] Well, here we are. We were talking about our Sabbath instruction
recognition coming up, we're at the end of another school year. We saw our ABC video. Class is over with. Another little elementary school that's right
near our subdivision is about to be done. Class is going to be out for the summer. We're just at that time of the year, aren't
we? And thinking back of the days when I used
to be in school, do you remember what that was like? If it wasn't as long ago for you as it was
for me some things you think back on “Wow, that was such a great class.” Others like “Oh, glad I never have to do
that. I'm glad that's not a requirement to be a
minister.” Chemistry, well, I'm glad that wasn't a requirement. Used to give my chemistry teacher a hard time
because I was terrible at chemistry and she knew it, but she was really nice. And we always get kind of fun together even
though my grades didn't reflect, you know, my love for chemistry. I used to kid her with a joke or something,
you know, as often as I could. And the best one I think I told her one time
was that I asked her, "What do you do with a sick chemist? What do you do with a sick chemist? Well, if you can't helium, and you can't curium,
then you might as well barium.” F, that was my grade. And somebody said to me, "I think you need
a catalyst because your jokes don't get any reaction." Oh, boy. Now, if you think about that in terms of our
spiritual chemistry lesson when it comes to us spiritually. Do you know what the catalyst is? Grace is the catalyst. A catalyst is something that stimulates a
reaction. It's an incentive, something that spurs us
on or inspires us. And when you consider the whole aspect of
grace, how would you define grace? It is a multi-faceted concept that the Bible
has so much to say about. If you were to define grace, maybe you would
come up with the concept that it's a free gift. It's a free gift or maybe unmerited pardon
because we don't deserve a pardon. But we know passages like Romans 5:14, talk
about the free gift that we're given and that this grace of God is given to us through Jesus
Christ because we have a Savior. And so God favors us. He blesses us, He gives us the free gift,
ultimately the free gift of eternal life. And when we begin to think about grace, sometimes
we don't even recognize how many times it's mentioned in the New Testament. Do you know how many times that word shows
up throughout the New Testament? Now, depending on the translation you look
at, you could find it 155 times just in the New Testament. In fact, the apostle Paul alone, use the word
over 100 times, especially in the book of Romans, and Corinthians, and Ephesians. And as we think about grace, the free gift
or unmerited pardon is certainly not the only definition. We don't want to get locked into that. Because there's so much more to the concept
of grace. Because when you think about it, grace is
at the very heart of salvation. It's at the heart of salvation because we
have been given ultimately the gift of eternal life. And that's what salvation is all about. When we read passages like Ephesians 2:8,
it says, "We are saved by grace through faith,” that we have the faith and confidence in the
sacrifice of Christ. And that gift that we are given and ultimately
is given to us and we are saved. We have eternal life, ultimately. But there's even more to it than that. You can't just stop there. Because as you think about the concept of
grace, grace is what helps us to live righteously. How can I put on the character of Christ? How can I live a godly life? What makes that possible? It's grace. Grace makes that possible. In fact, I will turn to Romans 6:1, so we
can pick up on this facet of the concept of grace. So yes, it is a free gift. Yes, it is unmerited pardon. Absolutely. It is at the heart of salvation, and the gift
of eternal life that we are ultimately given. But in order to live a godly life, in order
to live righteously, there has to be grace. Romans 6, brings this out. Notice the very beginning of chapter 6, verse
1. Paul writes this, "What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" Answer, “Certainly not!” It really means that's ridiculous to think
that. There is no way that that could be possible. That's how strong those Greek words that Paul
wrote were certainly not. No way. "How shall we who died to sin live any longer
in it?" Then he goes on in verse 15, skipping down
just a bit. "What then? Shall we sin because we're not under the law
but under grace?" Once again, ridiculous. No way. “Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves
slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death,
or of obedience leading to righteousness?” So Paul makes this intricate connection between
living righteously and obedience, and the essential aspect of grace. Grace, it is such a big concept that it not
only includes these facets but also harkens to the fact we have to have God in us. We have to have His influence, His guidance,
His presence. And that grace includes that concept of God
working in our hearts and in our minds. So, ultimately, that it moves us and it inspires
us. You could say it urges us, spurs us on so
that we can even serve God. You know, Paul wrote about it in that way
as well. Turn over to 1 Corinthians 15. Notices facet of grace as a motivation for
serving God. Now, it's found in an unusual chapter. You would think, well, wait a second, isn't
1 Corinthians 15 about the resurrection? Yeah, it certainly is, that's the resurrection
chapter sometimes it’s known as. But notice the connection Paul makes even
to his own life and by extension to all of us and his connection to this aspect of grace. 1 Corinthians 15:10. He says, "But by the grace of God I am what
I am." Of course, at this point, he's an apostle
of Jesus Christ, serving God, preaching the gospel, and that representative to the world,
to the Gentiles. He says, "And His grace toward me was not
in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God
which was with me." You see, God showed Paul, by His grace, that
he had a duty, a responsibility, an opportunity, a job that he was to do. And by the power of God's Spirit, God showed
His grace upon Paul, and it motivated and moved him to serve, and to preach, and to
teach. Now, these are just a couple of little thumbnail
sketches of various aspects of grace. And as we think about these different facets,
did you notice something missing? Something that… well, when we look at these
various aspects of grace, yeah, there is something missing. Is grace being easy on sin? I don't see that in those passages. Is it doing away with God's law? Does grace do away with… well, no, I don't
see that. “Certainly not!” Is what Paul said. Well, does grace lead to tolerating sin? Well, that's okay because God loves me and
is gracious to me. I don't see that. So how do we get to where we need to be? How do we live a life that is a godly, righteous
life? How do we put into practice the things that
God would have us do? We do that because grace is the catalyst. And by the power of God's Spirit, we can get
where we need to be. And perhaps you're like me, there was a time
I didn't understand this at all. I misunderstood because I felt it's the fear
of God that brings repentance. It's a fear of when you understand God, and
you fear God, and awe and respect Him, that brings about repentance. Wait a second. No, that is not the whole story. Now, yes, it's true. It's true that the fear of God is something
important that we need to understand. We need to awe, and honor, and respect it. No doubt about that. But when you read the Proverbs, Proverbs 9:10,
it says, "The fear of the Lord is" what? "The beginning of wisdom.” It's okay to start there, but it goes on and
says, "And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." So fear is a start, it's a beginning, but
it's not the full motivation to grow, and to change, and repent. Knowing that there are consequences, knowing
that there will be results from our wrong thoughts, our actions lead us in a whole different
direction. And so when we understand the fear of God,
it begins then, to open this door, I believe, to show the grace of God. That by the grace of God, we are led in the
right direction, because grace is the catalyst. It is the catalyst, it is the thing that is
the incentive, or the stimulus, or the motivation that leads us to do what is right. In fact, the apostle Paul wrote about this
in Romans 2. Take a look at Romans 2:4. Notice Paul's emphasis here as it connects
with this concept of grace being that stimulant, being that thing like a spiritual chemist
causes the reaction, and the motivation, and the inspiration. Notice what Paul says here, Romans 2:4, he
says, "Do you despise the riches of His goodness, His forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing
that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?" Now, if you were to look this up in the Greek
we would see that word for goodness, same base word as grace, that the goodness, the
grace of God should lead us to repentance. Because grace is the catalyst. It's what's motivating, and leading us, and
guiding us in that sense, through the power of God's Spirit. And over, and over, and over again through
the Word of God, we're showing examples and illustrations of that very fact. We're shown how grace should lead us to change
to a different mindset. It should lead us to the fear of God that
we awe and respect Him, and then help us to turn away from sin. Let's look at an example for a moment. The story of Zacchaeus is an interesting one
as we think of it in connection to grace. Now, you may have never thought of it in this
way before, but let's look at the story of Zacchaeus in Luke 19. Luke 19, right at the very beginning of that
chapter, it tells the story of Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus was an interesting man because he
was not very well-liked. You know why? Well, let's read the story here and we'll
probably pick it up pretty quickly. We start chapter 19 in the book of Luke, where
Jesus is entered and passed through Jericho. So as He goes on His way, verse 2, it says,
"Now behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus who was the chief tax collector, and he was
rich.” Of course, if we had a Jewish audience here,
we say the name of Zacchaeus and tax collector, you probably “Sss” “Boo" “Hiss”
thumbs down on a dude like that, right? Here's a guy that's in cahoots with the Romans. He's a bad dude. He's working against the Jewish people because
he's taking their money. How could you live and do that? So he's hated, hated by the Jews. And yet what happens? Christ is coming and he wants to check out
what this is all about. He's heard about the commotion, heard about
some of these things. So what does he do? He says “he sought to see who Jesus was,
but he could not because of the crowd, because he was of short stature.” So Zacchaeus is kind of a shrimpy guy. So I can kind of identify it was Zacchaeus,
right? He's short, can't see over the crowd. He's definitely not like a Ray Clore or a
Dan Peabody. He's more like me. I can't see over anybody. So what does he do? He goes and he climbs a tree. Verse 4, "He ran ahead, climbed up into a
sycamore tree to see Him." To see Christ, where he's going to pass that
way. So Zacchaeus is interested, “What is this
all about?” Well, here comes Christ, verse 5. "When Jesus came to the place, He looked up
and He saw him." He sees Zacchaeus and He said, "Zacchaeus,
make haste and come down, for today I must stay at your house." So what does Zacchaeus do? He gets down. He made haste and came down and received him
joyfully. Interesting. As a result of what Christ was going to do,
Zacchaeus is happy about this. He wants to meet Christ. He wants to talk to Christ. And as a result, what happens? When we see the people's reaction? Yeah, they don't like this guy. They hate these tax collectors. Verse 7, "When the people saw it, they all
complained, saying, ‘He has gone to be a guest with a man who is a sinner.’" That's all they could see, that bad side. But notice the result, verse 8, “Then Zacchaeus
stood and said to the Lord, ‘Look, Lord, I give half of my goods to the poor.’" If you read that in the original context,
"I will give." It's what he’s saying. "I'm going to change, I will give half of
my goods to the poor. And if I've taken anything from anyone by
false accusation, I will restore it fourfold." Zacchaeus has a change of heart. You got to change your perspective here. He has come to see his guilt and he's going
to change. I'm sure he must have felt a little guilty
in the presence of Emmanuel, God with us, and saw himself for what he was. Yeah, I'd say it was a little nervous about
his actions. And he comes to this conclusion. And then Christ says in verse 9, "Today salvation
has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham; for the Son of Man has come
to seek and save that which was lost." So Zacchaeus has this change of mind, a change
of perspective, a change of heart, and what was the incentive? What was the stimulus? What was the motivation? Grace, it was grace. Grace was the catalyst because Christ was
willing to eat with this man, to recognize him as a human being not just a guy that was
in cahoots with the Romans and a tax collector. Grace was the catalyst in this situation,
and that grace led Zacchaeus to a change of mind, change of perspective. I think a powerful lesson. In this lesson we see, grace ultimately reveals
God's great love. Because Christ loves Zacchaeus. He loved, not because he was a tax collector,
but for the potential that he had. And grace reveals God's love and in Zacchaeus'
situation, it certainly did. And that illustrated a character trait of
God and of Jesus Christ as well. If you turn back just a couple of passages,
if you look at Luke 6, we see this grace revealing God's great love and expounded upon Christ
Himself says very clearly about this kind of a scenario when it comes to this aspect
of grace. Luke 6:35, Christ says, "Love your enemies,
do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return.” Well, you know what, that's what God does,
doesn't He? What has God does? God does these very things, “love your enemies,
do good, lend, hoping for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will
be sons of the Most High. For He is kind to the unthankful and evil.” Yeah, that's God. That's His nature. That's who He is. And if we think about that in our life for
a moment, what has God given you? How has God poured His grace out on you? How have you been blessed? How many blessings have you received? I mean, can you imagine if you receive the
blessings that you deserve? Where would I be if I got what I deserved? Yeah, I'd be dead. Because that's what I deserve it. I deserved death. But God pours out blessing. Why? Why is God graceful? To help us to turn from sin. Grace is the catalyst to help us change our
thinking. It should change the way we perceive our own
lives, and how we perceive God as well. Like if we go back to Romans 2, again, something
interesting here in this section that we read a little bit earlier about the goodness of
God, God's grace. Go back to Romans 2:4. Remember, we read this and it asked that question
about God's grace and how He has this wonderful forbearance. Romans 2:4. It says this, “Do you despise the riches
of His goodness, His grace, His forbearance, longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness
of God leads you to repentance?” There's an expected motivation that we should
change. So if God has blessed you, God is poured out
His grace upon you. Should we change? What if we haven't turned from our sin? We just slough it off? We just shrug off the kindness of God. We just put it off. Don't take it into account. We take it lightly. We take God's grace lightly. Romans 2 gives a warning. Right after what we just read. Look at verse 5. You take it lightly, he says, “In accordance
with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in
the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” You see, this grace should motivate us to
repentance because now is the time that God has shown us His kindness. He has shown us His love. He's been merciful to us. And you better turn to Him. You better change. You’d better not shrug it off. If you just shrug it off and take it lightly,
what lies ahead? Judgment, judgment. And so when we consider that very fact, God
wants the best for us. He wants us to change. He wants us to grow. He wants us to be like His Son, and He is
graceful. Because it's who He is. It's who He is. I was reminded of this fact, thinking back
on an old cartoon. Anyone ever read the old cartoon “Dennis
the Menace”? Okay, that shows how old you maybe are. Okay, not everybody that’s old remembers
Dennis. Dennis the Menace always in trouble with Mr.
Wilson. You know, the guy next door, the man… he
was always in trouble with always something going on with Dennis and poor Mr. Wilson. Well, this cartoon Mr. Wilson wasn't around
for whatever reason. But the cartoon series is a little box to
start it with. Dennis and his buddy, Joey, walking away from
Mr. Wilson's house, and they both had hands loaded down with cookies. And they're walking away from the house. And in the next frame, Joey is saying to Dennis
the Menace, he says, "Wow, that Mrs. Wilson. Can you believe this? I wonder what we did to get all these cookies." Then you look at the final frame and Dennis
is answering Joey and Dennis says, "Look, Joey, Mrs. Wilson gives us cookies not because
we're nice, it's because she's nice.” Yeah, that's it. Why does God give us cookies? “Well, not because I was so nice this week
and I was a good boy. And, you know, I tried to do well and serve
people.” No, He's nice. God is graceful. God is amazing. And when we recognize the fact that every
good and perfect gift is from God, we recognize that very fact. Why does that happen? God is good to me because God is good. God is full of grace. And He reveals Himself in that very fact. Grace reveals God's great love. Fantastic lesson. But there's more to the story than just that
as well. When we think of the grace of God, especially
considering it as this motivation, as this catalyst in our spiritual life, there's an
illustration that maybe is unexpected and it's in the calling of the disciples. In fact, in Peter's calling, now remember
as Christ is calling the disciples, He calls people from various professions. You remember what Peter, and James, and John,
remember what they were doing? They were fishermen, they were fishermen. In fact, if we turn back to Luke 5, I should
have had you hold your place there. Luke 5, right at the very beginning of the
chapter tells that story of Simon Peter, and the calling to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Notice this particular story and the connection
to grace. Luke 5:1, it says, “So it was, as the multitude
pressed Him to hear the word of God,” now that's talking about Christ. There was this multitude following Christ. They’re on top of Him, trying to hear, trying
to understand what Christ is talking about. And here He is by it says “the Lake of Gennesaret.” So He's by the Sea of Galilee. And so what does He do? It says, verse 2, Christ “saw two boats
standing by the lake; but the fishermen had gone from them and were washing their nets. So He got into one of the boats, which was
Simon’s," Simon Peter, “and asked him to put out a little from the land. And He sat down and taught the multitudes
from the boat.” And so we see Christ take advantage of this
beautiful natural amphitheater because sound reflects off the water so that this great
multitude could hear Christ, that sound would permeate this multitude so that everyone would
be able to hear. And so as a result, He preaches, He teaches,
and then verse 4, “He had stopped speaking, and He said to Simon, ‘Launch out into the
deep and let down your nets for a catch.” Now, that confuses people. Verse 5, “Simon answered, said, ‘Master,
we've toiled all night and caught nothing; nevertheless at Your word I'll let down the
net.’ And when they'd done this,” what happens? I mean, if you can imagine this picture, these
guys were out all night, they are exhausted, they are disappointed, they're discouraged. They came back, doesn't even seem like they
got a rubber boot and the tin can, nothing. They didn't come back with anything. And you know, they've given up. They'd given up because it says here in verse
2, they “were washing the nets.” They were washing the nets. It's over, the day's done. Fine. “We've got nothing.” But Jesus says “Cast out your nets” they
do and what happens? Verse 6, “they caught a great number of
fish, and their net was breaking. So they signaled to their partners in the
other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that
they began to sink.” I mean from nothing to wow! Look at this amazing turnaround. Now, why? Why did that happen? It's grace. Grace. Christ was gracious with them and blessed
them. Now that's not the important part of the story. Look at Peter's reaction. Verse 8. “When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at
Jesus' knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!’ For he and all who are with him were astonished
at the catch of fish which they had taken; and so were also James and John, the sons
of Zebedee, who are partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid.’” The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. That's the beginning. “'But from now on you will catch men.’ So when they brought their boats to the land,
they forsook all and followed Him.” Amazing reaction. Peter had a change of heart, change of perspective. Why? Because of the goodness of Jesus Christ. Christ's goodness led Peter, you can say to
it repentance. The incentive, the catalyst was grace. Grace led Peter to this change of heart. And in fact, it caused him to look at himself
differently. He saw himself for who he was. And so this grace of God reveals sin. That's lesson number two. Not only does grace reveal God's great love,
but the grace of God reveals our sin. Because God's intent by this great haul of
fish was not just “Hey, here's some money, you're going to profit for a while from this
big haul." That wasn't the point. The point was to get to the heart and mind
of Peter, and James and John, God's intent was to expose sin, to reveal sin, to uncover
them for who they really were. Because ultimately, true repentance isn't
thinking, "Well, hey, I did this nice thing the other day, or I wasn't all bad. I did write them a letter and encouraged them." Know this grace caused Peter to see himself
as he was and had to admit he was a sinful man. And grace should lead us that way, should
motivate us that way to admit that we are sinners and not to cover it up. Because grace does not paper over sin, doesn't
paper over it and hide it. Because sometimes we have that tendency to
think that's what grace does, what God's love, and mercy, and it causes us not to even have
to think about those bad things. And sometimes we just get it backward. Because repentance does not bring grace. That's backward. Repentance does not bring grace. Grace is the catalyst, and it should bring
repentance. It should bring repentance, should help us
to see ourselves as we really are. In fact, as we think about it, Paul gave more
than just one warning not only to the Romans, but he also reminded the Corinthians about
this very fact as well. Look at 2 Corinthians 6. 2 Corinthians 6 at the very beginning of this
chapter. Here we see God inspiring Paul to help us
to get it right. Not to have it backward in our thinking, but
to get it right. Notice what he says to God's Church in Corinth,
certainly to us by extension, talking to the Church here, talking about those who work
together, those who are part of the family, the Church of God. 2 Corinthians 6:1, it says, "We then, as workers
together with Him," we are a part of the Body, we're working together with Christ. He also then says, "We plead with you not
to receive the grace of God in vain." What do you mean, receiving the grace of God
in vain? I mean, vanity, vain is useless. You mean, you could take grace uselessly. What is he talking about here? What would you consider this passage is the
subject really grace? See, emphasizing God's goodness here or is
this more of a warning? You see, God is kind, God is tolerant. God is patient. But why? Because ultimately, God will judge sin. We know that judgment has begun at the house
of God on us the Church right now, we know there's a time coming when God will judge
the world, and they will face God's holy wrath. That will happen. And God's grace should convict us. And we should be convicted and humbled before
Him, as we deeply understand that need, that need for forgiveness. And here we see Paul is not saying, “Oh,
don't talk about sin. Don't talk about judgment. Just bask in God's grace.” That's not what he's saying here. You see, it's the message of grace that helps
us to change. And not just talking about nice and fluffy
things. You see this is an admonition, this is really
like a command. And it's a sober warning about impending judgment. That's what Paul's emphasizing here. And so when we consider the grace of God,
we know ultimately, His judgment will be upon those who do evil, who practice those things. In fact, that's how he got into that whole
scenario in Romans 2. And so as we think about the grace of God,
His kindness is not about the absence of judgment, but instead, it's about the absolute certainty
of judgment. We look at it this way. If you were to imagine for a moment, you're
driving along on the interstate and God reveals to you, He opens your mind to the fact that
three miles down the road, the bridge is out. And cars are speeding along at 70 miles an
hour just plummeting over that bridge that is no longer there into this watery mess that
has washed out the bridge and they are just being carried away. And you recognize this, God has shown this
to you, He's revealed that to you. Every single car's being lost and ends up
destroyed. So what are you going to do about it? I mean, you'd be a fool to continue to drive
in that same direction. I mean, you know, the danger ahead. The reality is that's a couple of miles ahead. God's shown this to you. What are you going to do? Well, you’ve got to do something. This is down the road. You've got time. You've got time to turn the car around. You see God revealing that to you, has shown
you that you got to stop the car. This is the catalyst to about-face, reverse
direction, go the other way before it's too late. Because God has mercifully shown you this. And that is the story of grace, that ultimately,
we all deserve to go over that bridge. We deserve God's wrath and His judgment, but
He gives us grace. And in a sense, He's holding back this powerful
righteous indignation and anger and gives us grace so that we will change and if we
don't repent, we reject that opportunity. We reject… what are we rejecting? We're rejecting His kindness. We're rejecting His love, we're rejecting
His mercy, we're rejecting His grace. And if we do that, there's nothing to look
forward to, but ultimately going over that bridge to destruction. And you see that as such a far cry from what
most of the religious world understands grace to be. It's a far cry from, “Eh, who needs God's
law. Oh, we don't want to talk about sin. Oh, we don't want to warn about judgment. You know that law's done away." No, when you really understand, grace is the
catalyst to be godly. In fact, there's a beautiful summary scripture
back in the book of Isaiah, if you'd like to turn to Isaiah 30, kind of summarizes this
whole aspect of God's grace in an interesting way. Isaiah 30:18 is where we'll pick up the story. Isaiah 30:18. Now, here this passage it says, "Therefore
the Lord will wait.” What is He waiting for? Of course, this is interesting. A millennial passage, this is the way, walk
in it. Pointing to God's patience, His love. It says “wait, that He may be gracious to
you; therefore He will be exalted, that He may have mercy on you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed
are all those who wait for Him." Of course, as we read this in our King James
or a New King James, maybe not quite as clear as other more contemporary translations may
be. If you look at verse 18 once again, we were
to read this in The Voice translation, here's what it says verse 18, "The Eternal One yearns
to give you grace and boundless compassion; that’s why He waits. For the Eternal God is a God of justice. Those inclined toward Him, are waiting for
His help. And they will find happiness.” You see, those are the ones that have allowed
grace to be that catalyst, to be that stimulant, to be that motivation and encouragement to
change." And so we've got to be sure we're resolving
not to miss it, to take that grace in vain. Because so many stories in the Bible point
to those that missed the boat. They kept on that road and went over that
bridge. And time, after time, after time, that story
is told. Whether it's the story of Joseph and his brothers,
they missed the boat. Whether it's the story of the 12 spies, they
were spying out the Promised Land and only Caleb in Joshua got the point. Those spies came back. They came back with an evil report. And yet this was the land of milk and honey. This was the gracious land that God was giving
them. They didn't see it. What happened to Israel? Forty years in the wilderness. What about Adam and Eve? God poured His grace upon them and yet when
they were tempted, what happened? And Israel itself, 720 years in the Promised
Land. How did God treat them? With mercy and love. How did they respond? With apostasy. Terrible sins, violating God's covenant. We can't be like that, we can't be like a
Solomon, the wisest man who couldn't see it. He couldn't see it. God tolerated and blessed him in so many ways,
designed to bring Solomon to change, but he didn't grasp it. And they all, in these instances, refused
to repent. Ultimately, by failing to see the goodness
of God. It doesn't have to be that way with us. It doesn't have to be that way. We can determine to be different. We can stand fast in God's grace, and learn
the lessons of grace, that grace reveals God's great love. And the fact that grace reveals our sin as
well. And so we can use that inspiration, that incentive,
and it should bring about repentance and change. And so let's let the goodness of God motivate
us and recognize the fact that grace is the catalyst.
