Why Must We Be Saved By Grace?

I'd like you to stand with me and open your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 2. We'll read these first ten verses of chapter 2 that we've been looking at over the last few weeks. Paul writes:

"And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them too we all formerly lived in the lust of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ — by grace you have been saved — and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In order that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves — it is the gift of God — not as a result of works, that no one should boast. For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them."

Let's pause to pray. Our Father, as we come before your throne today, we have great needs in our lives. And right at this moment, we need you to empower the proclamation of your word — that the Spirit would be the teacher, the instructor — that he would touch our hearts, that he would penetrate to the very core of our being, that we could hear the voice of God as you speak to us through your word. May these truths about your grace embrace us, may they penetrate us, Father, I pray. And whatever need we come with today, I pray that we could see the power of God and the grace of God as it touches our needs, and may we respond in faith and receive from you. In Christ's name, amen.

You may be seated.

I'd like to begin by reading you a statement by one of this country's greatest leaders, some years back, about our attitude toward the grace of God and his great blessings. Listen to these words:

"We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven. We have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and which multiplied and enriched and strengthened us. And we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us."

Those words were written by Abraham Lincoln. And I think they certainly fit today in this country that has forgotten God. But probably more important is: what about the people of God? What about those who have experienced personally the grace of God in their lives through salvation? Do we really understand the grace of God? Are we moved by the grace of God? Does it affect our lives? Does it really teach us to live the way Paul said to Titus that we should live if we understand the grace of God?

Today we're looking at this last part of this section of Ephesians in which Paul is telling us why we must be saved by grace — that salvation by grace is the only salvation that God offers, and that salvation by grace is the only salvation that you could possibly have. If you're here today and you are saved by the power of God, it is through grace. God wants you to appreciate that grace. He wants you to understand it. He wants you to be affected by it. He wants it to motivate you in your daily Christian life.

And so we've been struggling to look at this statement concerning the grace of God. And we've seen that we must be saved by grace — first of all, because we were ruined by sin. In the first three verses of this chapter, Paul paints a dark, dark picture of fallen man: totally separated from God, dead in his trespasses and sins, under the sway of this world system, dominated by satanic influence, and headed for a day of wrath. But then he says, "But God, who was rich in mercy," has done something for us. He has saved us by his grace. And he did that through the Lord Jesus Christ. He raised us up with him, caused us to be seated with him in the heavenlies. We have experienced this great salvation.

And now in these final verses — verses 8-10 — Paul is going to summarize this whole issue. And in doing so, he implies that we must be saved by grace because grace is God's glory. It is the glory of God to manifest salvation through grace, to save us by his grace. And any other message, any other approach to salvation that leaves grace out will not bring glory to God and does not reveal the truth about this great salvation we've experienced.

Notice what the Apostle Paul says. First of all, in verses 8-9, he says that God is glorified through saving us by grace. All of you who are here this morning and have experienced salvation have been saved by grace, and God receives great glory from that, because salvation is the great display of grace. It is wholly and completely of grace.

Now, what does that mean? What does it mean that we are saved by grace? What are the implications of it? I think there are several things here.

First of all, it means that salvation is an extravagant gift — a gift that's been given to us, but a gift that is quite extravagant. If you notice, he said: "It is by grace that you have been saved." The way that Paul makes this statement emphasizes something very important — it emphasizes the tense of your salvation. That is, it emphasizes where you are in this process of salvation.

It's interesting that in the writings of Paul — and he wrote the majority of the letters in the New Testament — you find that his emphasis is normally on the future tense of salvation. That is, that there is coming a day in which we are going to be saved from the wrath to come. The Bible teaches that when God raised Jesus from the dead, he appointed him as the judge of the living and the dead. All judgment, according to John 5, has been handed over to Christ, and it is his responsibility to judge the living and the dead. This judgment day is fast coming, we are told.

When Paul talks about salvation, he talks about being saved from that future day of judgment — that those who come to put their faith in Christ are guaranteed that he will save them in the future from this judgment. But in this context, the Apostle Paul says that we have been saved in a most unusual way — he is emphasizing something quite important for the believer. And that is that you have been saved and you continue to experience the salvation. He says it in such a way that it emphasizes the fact that there is a completed work in the past in the life of every believer.

Every person who is a believer — and a believer in Scripture is someone who is continually believing in and trusting Christ, that is the manner of his life, he lives out his life trusting Christ — believers believe. Believers are continually trusting Christ. That is their manner of life. And he says: if that is true of you, it is evidence that you have been saved, because continuing faith in Christ is an evidence of your salvation.

And so what he says here is, quite literally: you are in a state of having been saved. God has done something for you. There is a completed work that has been accomplished in your life, and that work is going to continue on to its culmination.

Now if you think about it, what Paul has said to us is that we were spiritually dead, and now in verses 4 through 7 he said we have come to experience spiritual life. All those who were spiritually dead before and who are now spiritually alive have been saved. And that salvation will continue on. It is a present blessing, but it is not going to be fully realized until sometime in the future.

Back on — I think it was the fifth of March — there was a boating incident. One of the preliminary races of the America's Cup yachting — this big sailboat race — the Australian ship, which was a very high-tech ship, about a $2.5 million sailing vessel, simply snapped in half in rough seas. It took two minutes and twenty-two seconds for that thing to sink completely. And there were seventy-two members on that sailing vessel. They all jumped off the boat and were rescued by a safety boat that came up behind them. Well, when they got into that boat — I saw this event; I saw them pulling these guys up into this lifeboat — when they were brought into that boat, they were saved, but they still were cold and wet and uncomfortable until they got back to shore.

That's the way we are right now. Every believer has been saved — saved because of the work of Jesus Christ. He's been raised up with Christ, raised up into heaven with Christ and seated with him in the heavenlies. We have a whole new relationship with the living God, but there's still more to come. And you may be saved here this morning, but you still feel very wet and very cold and very uncomfortable in your Christian life — but there's coming a day when we leave this vale of tears and we are going to experience the full realization of this salvation. So there's a real sense in which we can say that we have been saved.

We were spiritually dead, alienated, under the wrath of God, headed for a day of judgment — and we have been saved. The gift of grace is an extravagant gift. God saves us graciously, and his salvation meets the need that we found ourselves in.

But secondly, being saved by grace means that salvation is a gift that is freely given. That is, there was no necessity in God whatsoever to save us. God did not save us because it's part of his nature to have to save the lost. There was no necessity in him, no obligation in God to save man. We had no hold on God whatsoever. God could have allowed the law — his holy law — to take its natural course. We were all lawbreakers, headed for a day of judgment. He could have let us go all the way into the day of judgment and experience the punishment and the penalty of the law.

Sometimes we are not really sure of that. We say things like, "To err is human, but to forgive is divine." Don't think because of that quaint little saying that God is obligated to forgive, that God is obligated to save the sinner. God saves freely. If it was a necessity, it would no longer be grace. But the fact that you've been saved by grace, believer, means that God freely, of his own will and his own choice, has saved you. There was no obligation upon him.

Notice he says, "It is the gift of God" — a very emphatic little phrase. It really is quite literally "of God." It is the gift. God is the one who is the giver of this gift, and he freely gives it. Salvation has its origin in grace. It is not won from God, and it is not wrung from his hand. God is not pleading with people to let him save them. God saves out of his own free, gracious will. It was his choice to get involved with you.

What would you think, ladies — you wives — if you discovered that the reason your husband married you was that there was a little statement in the will of his parents that said, "You have to marry this particular girl if you're going to get the inheritance"? What if he married you out of obligation? I was talking to somebody a few weeks ago about a marriage they knew of where someone married — I think it was a Russian girl — in order to get her to the United States. She paid him so much money to get her here, to marry her, make her a legal citizen. They would be married so long, and then ultimately the marriage would be dissolved.

How would it be if you knew that God only saved you because he had to — that he was obligated to, that it was a necessity within him? But you need to know that he freely chose you, that he freely chose to save you from your sin out of his own free gift. You didn't wring it from him — he freely gave it.

But grace also means that salvation is an undeserved gift. In other words, when it says that we are saved by grace, it means this: that there is no merit whatsoever in the person who's being saved. Grace is the exact opposite of merit on man's part. If there's any merit in man, then salvation is not by grace. If you could merit one percent — or one tenth of one percent — and God only had to supply 99.9 percent, it would not be grace. When it says that God saved you by grace, it means that you were totally and completely without any claim upon God.

God had a claim on you — his justice, his high and holy justice, had a claim on you — and you were headed for judgment. But you had no claim on God. Paul is going to say in these next few verses — in fact, in this chapter that we'll look at later in a couple of weeks — he says that we were at that time separated from the covenants and the promise of God. We were without God in this world. We had no claim upon God, no merit within ourselves. He was under no necessity to provide the salvation, and we didn't merit it.

In fact, notice what he says: "And that, not of yourselves." What does he mean by that? What does this "that" refer to? "And that, not of yourselves — it is the gift of God." What does he mean by that? Well, "that" refers not to the faith, but to the salvation by grace through faith. Salvation by grace through faith — that method of saving you from your sins — is a gift of God. It's not from you. In other words, you didn't even produce the faith. Let alone the grace — the faith itself was a gift from God. Everything about this salvation is a gift from God. The source and the cause of your salvation — of your faith, of the reception of salvation — is not in you, but it is in God.

And he says, "Not as a result of works." And what he means by that is human effort of any kind whatsoever. There is no human effort that you could ever put out that would earn you this salvation. This salvation is of grace — totally unmerited. Salvation cannot be achieved by human performance. There is nothing you could do to warrant salvation before a holy and righteous God.

Why did God decide to save in this way? Why did God decide to save by grace through faith? For two reasons. One, because of the condition of our lostness — there was no other way to save us, because there was no merit in us. But the second reason he gives you here — and this is really the high and lofty reason — is so that no one should boast.

You see, saving faith — the thing that you should understand about saving faith — is the exact opposite of boasting. It's the exact opposite of man boasting about what he has done in order to be saved. Because saving faith comes out of a condition when the Holy Spirit works in your heart and you are brought to a place of true humility and gratitude — humility, because you are lost and have no way to save yourself from your sins, and gratitude, because your eyes are open to this free gift of salvation that God offers to you.

Let me turn to John 16 for just a moment. This is the upper room — the last time Jesus is going to be with his disciples before he goes to the cross. And as he speaks to them on this night, he tells them some of the most important things in all of his teaching. His teaching of his disciples, of his apostles, is found right here in this upper room discourse in chapters 13 through 17. But notice what he says in verse 7 of John 16.

Jesus says, "I tell you the truth — it is to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the Helper shall not come to you." Now the reason for that is because Jesus said it was his responsibility to send the Helper to them. But he wouldn't be able to send the Helper to them until he was raised from the dead and seated at the right hand of the Father — until he had the authority to direct the Holy Spirit to come into the world to accomplish his work of applying the cross work that he had accomplished on the cross. And so he says to them: "It's to your advantage that I go away, because it's not until I go back to the Father and take my seat of authority that I can send the Spirit to you." And so he says, "But if I go, I will send him to you."

And now notice why it's so important for the Spirit to come. He mentions several things, but notice in these next few verses one very specific thing: "And he, when he comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment."

Now the word "convict" here means to drive home the case so strongly that it is undeniable — that it cannot be denied. It is a law term. It's a term that would be used of a lawyer who would present a case. You've all seen some of the O.J. Simpson trial. And what these prosecutors are trying to do is what this verse says the Holy Spirit will do — to present the case in such a convincing manner that it cannot be denied. And what the Spirit of God is going to do is he's going to bring home this truth to the hearts of men in the world, the lost. He is going to convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.

"Concerning sin, because they do not believe in me." And all of our sin — all of the sin that is upon us, that he has described in these first few verses of Ephesians chapter 2, all of that sin, the entire sinful condition — is brought to a point at this place: a failure to believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the great manifestation of the sinfulness of our heart — a refusal to believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ. And so the Spirit comes to do this work, and he drives it home to the heart of the individual who hears the gospel and upon whose heart the Spirit is working. And when he drives this truth home to the heart, the person cannot but believe the truth that his sin is overwhelming and is manifested ultimately in his rejecting Jesus Christ.

He says, secondly, he will convict the world concerning righteousness, "because I go to the Father and you no longer behold me." He is going to present a case. When Jesus was here upon this earth and he was walking with his disciples, you could see righteousness manifested in a human life. You could see in the life of Jesus Christ what righteousness really was. But Jesus is gone. And so he has sent the Spirit, and what the Spirit does is he drives home to the heart of the person who is under the convicting work of the Spirit the fact that they need the kind of righteousness that Jesus Christ has to enter into the presence of God. And apart from that righteousness — if they don't receive the righteousness of Christ — they are going to perish.

And then finally, "concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has already been judged." He's going to convict the heart that there really is a judgment coming. We can talk about that all day long — you can get loud, you can say it quietly, you can read every verse in the Bible that talks about judgment — but until the Spirit of the living God drives home to the heart of the individual the reality of coming judgment, it will run off like water off a duck's back. It will have no impact.

There may be somebody sitting here this morning who doesn't know Christ, and maybe you've heard us talk about judgment, and it means absolutely nothing to you. But if the Spirit of God drives home to the heart that judgment is coming, then you will be in a state where you can believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ.

You see, that is why saving faith is the opposite of boasting — because when the Spirit does his work, it drives us to the place where we experience true humility before an awesome God. And we realize that we are lost and undone and headed for a day of judgment, and we will perish unless God saves us by his grace. And then our heart is filled with gratitude because our eyes are open to the salvation that the Spirit of God is offering to us.

See, when the convicting work of the Spirit took place in your life, Christian, something happened to you: you became convinced — you understood — that you were guilty and you were unable to win a pardon from God. The only way you could receive a pardon was if God were to give it to you and you were to receive it by faith. You became convinced that you were dead, and the only way you could get life is if God granted it. You came to believe that favor — and nothing but favor, nothing but grace — could possibly give you the salvation that you desperately needed.

If what we've received in salvation is nothing else but a gift, if it's nothing else but a grace gift in our weak and meritless state, then that is salvation by grace. It is a salvation that's given as a gift that finds no merit in the object, but is merely a demonstration of the great love of God in giving a gift freely to the person who comes to him in faith. That leaves no contribution for us.

Salvation is of Jehovah. Salvation is of the Lord. It's not a partnership. It's not: God does a lot and you do a little. It's not synergistic — God works and you work. It is monergistic — it is God and God alone who saves. That's an amazing thing: that every person sitting in this room has had his sins forgiven and knows deep in his heart that it is God and God alone who has brought salvation to him. This salvation is by grace, and it brings great glory to God for us to learn that.

And then the fourth thing he says here is that salvation is a gift that must be received by faith. The only way that a person can receive salvation is by coming to God with empty, open hands. You have to come to God and open your hands and receive a gift. Grace is the cause and faith is the instrumental means. Throughout the word of God, grace and faith are always inseparable companions — you never find one without the other. Grace and faith. If it is by grace, then it must be by faith. Because grace and faith together do away with any suggestion of human merit.

God's act of grace in sending Christ to redeem his people from their sins is the ground of salvation. And faith is what you exercise to receive personally the benefits of that work that Jesus Christ did on the cross.

Let's look at a couple of verses. Turn over to Romans chapter 4. This is a constant theme in the writings of Paul when he talks about grace and faith. Notice in Romans 4 verse 16, he says: "For this reason it is by faith, that it might be in accordance with grace." Well, that little phrase "in accordance with" means "to the standard of." If the salvation is going to be to the standard of grace — if it's going to be a truly grace salvation — then it has to be received by faith. It has to be received not because you deserve it, because you deserve just the opposite; not because you can earn it, because your best efforts would never put a dent in your sin problem; but simply because God offers it and you receive it by faith. And he says if it's going to be in accordance with this grace, it must be received by faith.

Turn back one chapter to chapter 3 — verse 27; this is the one I'm looking for. Verse 27: "Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law." That is, a man is justified by faith apart from any of his own efforts to do the will of God. But it must be received by faith.

Paul says the same thing throughout his letters — in Galatians, chapters 2 and 3. He makes a point of this, that there can be no reception of salvation except by faith. There can be no experience of salvation throughout your life except by faith, because it's by grace. If it is a gift, then you can't work to earn it — you must simply reach out and receive it.

Now notice what he's going to say in verse 10. Not only is God glorified by saving us by grace, but he is glorified by manifesting his grace through our good works.

I think there is a lot of confusion about the relationship of works and salvation. There is a teaching floating around the church that's been there for years and years — decades, and probably longer than that. It's called the "exchange life" approach, and a lot of good people believe this. I think their motivation is good. But it's a real distortion of what Scripture teaches — this idea of the exchange life, or what one man calls the "funnel theory" of the Christian life. That is: I'm to be totally passive, and I'm to let Jesus live his life through me. Then I'm just this funnel — he pours his life in me and it comes out. I do away with my own faculties, my own mind, my own will. I let Jesus will, Jesus think, Jesus act — and I just am limp. And they use pictures like the vine in the branch: you never see the branches struggling and agonizing to produce fruit, do you? They just hang there. And so the Christian life is just to be one of passive faith. I just go limp and I let Jesus live through me.

Besides the fact that that won't work, it's just not biblical. God addresses — over and over again in the New Testament — every single faculty you have. You are commanded to use it in obedience to the living God. You're commanded to use your mind to think on things above. You're commanded to use your hands to work for the glory of God. You're commanded to use your feet to flee from immorality. He doesn't say "let Jesus flee from immorality" — he said, you flee from immorality.

So if you're just hanging around waiting for some fruit to be borne in your life, you're not going to experience what he's going to talk about in verse 10. Now it's true that you in your own self and your own energy cannot do one good thing before God — it must be done under the influence of the Spirit — but it must be you that does it. Jesus won't make your decisions for you. Jesus is not going to decide not to sin this next week for you. You have to make the decision. You must act.

But notice what he says here in verse 10 about these good works and about God's role in these good works that he produces through the believer. And this is what brings great glory to God. He says: "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them."

Now notice what he's already done: he has rejected works as the basis of salvation. He says we are not saved by works — we are saved by grace through faith, apart from works, not of ourselves. Then where do good works come in? We are not saved by works, but we are saved for good works. In verses 8 and 9 he eliminates works as the source of salvation, but in verse 10 he establishes good works as the effects of salvation by grace through faith. If you have been saved by grace through faith, you will produce good works — good works will be a part of your life. That's the guarantee we have in verse 10, and this brings glory to God.

Notice first of all: by God's mind and artistic hand — he says we are his workmanship. He's done something. God has created something in the believer, and it's something beautiful, something marvelous, something wonderful. It's his poiema.

Now it's true that we are in the process of being shaped. Romans 8 says that this process begins in eternity past — when God decided to take this lump of clay and make something out of it — and we begin to experience that the day we came to faith in Christ. From that day until we see Christ face to face, there is this process going on in our lives: God is shaping this work of art that he has created, in order to bring glory to him.

But what he says here is that we are right now his workmanship. We are his poiema. We are the creation of his creative mind and ability. What he's referring to is regeneration. Regeneration is a deep, radical transformation at the deepest level of your person.

I think one of the shameful things that's happened in the church in America is that we have so watered down the gospel in the proclamation of the gospel that we have thousands upon thousands of people who profess Christ and have never experienced one iota of change in their inner man. The Bible says the reason the Christian lives differently is because God's given him a new heart. How can a new heart live exactly like the old heart? If I've been given a new heart — it's not to say that I can't sin, and it's not to say I can't fall, it's not to say I can't struggle — but how in the world can I be exactly the same in my lifestyle as I was when I had the old heart?

Is this just, you know, Madison Avenue gobbledygook? Is this just exaggeration — that Jesus makes all these promises like the infomercials, and says, "Well, if you have this product, this is what's going to happen — you're going to lose fifty pounds in three days"? Or is he really telling the truth — when he says that when you're begotten again, when you're born of God, you are transformed at the deepest level of your person, so that whereas before you could not see, you could not hear the things of God, you could not receive the things of God, you could not welcome the Holy Spirit into your life, you could not respond to God — and now because of regeneration you have eyes to see, you have ears to hear, you have a heart that has been touched, and you can obey the living God, you have a desire to obey God. Is that reality or is that just theory?

Let me take you back to John for just a minute — look back at the first chapter of the gospel of John. In verse 10, it says that he was in the world, and the world was made through him, and the world did not know him. He came to his own things — that is, his own created world — and those — that is, the nation of Israel — who were his own did not receive him. But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become the children of God — even to those who believe in his name. Now notice this: who were born? They experienced a spiritual birth — not of blood, not of the will of the flesh, not because they desired it in their lostness and in their undoneness, nor of the will of man, but of God.

Now don't lose the sentence because of all these intervening phrases: he says they were born of God. That is, God is the one who did this work of regeneration — of the new birth. Turn over to chapter 3 of John. Notice what Jesus says to this teacher of Israel — Nicodemus — who comes to him and is trying to feel him out, to find out what is so special about him. He knows there's something, but he has not yet believed upon him. And so Jesus says to him — because he's kind of displaying his knowledge and his understanding of things — Jesus says to him in verse 3:

"Truly, truly, I say to you — unless one is born again, or born from above, experiences this new spiritual birth — he cannot see the kingdom of God." You can't see it. He doesn't have the eyes to perceive. He doesn't have the spiritual sight to see the things of God.

Notice in verse 5: "Truly, truly, I say to you — unless one is born of water and the Spirit." And he's using this picture of this new birth, this cleansing and renewing of the inner man in the new birth — he says unless you experience this, you cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

Now, how is it that a person can get into the kingdom of God and there be no internal change in his heart that's displayed by his external activity? Is it possible for a person to be regenerated, born again, transformed at the deepest level of themselves, and continue to walk in disobedience to the Lord? Absolutely not. It is certainly possible for a regenerate man to be disobedient at times — to resist the will of God — but it is impossible for the regenerate person to live out their lives in sin. First John 3:9 says: if you've been born of God, you cannot plan and carry out a life of sin. There has been a real change that's occurred.

And we are the poiema of God. We are his creation. This is something he's done. And what God does at salvation is to literally transform the person at the deepest level of themselves. He remakes them. And what he remakes them for is to become image bearers of the living God.

God originally created man to bear his image — he created him in his image and after his likeness — so that he could function in this universe in such a relationship with God that anyone who looked at these image bearers could see and understand what God was really like. That image-bearing ability was nearly destroyed — was really destroyed — except for the work of God, at the fall.

And so now God is doing something. Every time a person comes to faith in Christ, what is happening is that God is reaching down and restoring an individual in such a way that he's going to become a perfect image bearer of the living God in the ages to come. He's at work doing it now, so that we begin to experience life in the age to come right now. A believer can experience what it's like to live before God in such a way that they reflect the glory of God.

Faith, always in the New Testament, is manifested by obedience. Faith is always manifested by obedience. You can't say that you believe and trust God if you're living in disobedience. When you're disobeying, you're not believing, you're not trusting. When I am in disobedience to the Lord — this past week, when I disobeyed the Lord on those occasions — I was not trusting Christ, I was not exercising faith toward him. So obedience is the demonstration of our faith, the manifestation of it.

Now, the important thing is that the reason you are a believer is because God caused you to be begotten again. He regenerated you. The very first thing that happened when you were regenerate was that you began — immediately, at that moment of regeneration — to believe in Christ. You remember that day. It's like night and day when you begin to believe and trust Jesus Christ. And now the effect of that new birth goes on and on and on. That's why God saved us — for good works — because good works are a manifestation of faith.

Turn with me over to Titus for just a second — Titus chapter 2, verse 11.

Paul says: "For the grace of God has appeared." And what he's talking about here is the cross work — the coming of Christ to go to the cross for his people, to die in their place. That was the appearance of the grace of God, the great demonstration of his grace.

He says: "The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires." What is instructing us? Grace. Grace instructs us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires, and to live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ — who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself a people for his own possession, who are zealous for good deeds.

In other words, it's the drive of their life. See, that's what happened to you when you got saved — God changed you so much on the inside that the deepest drive of your life is to obey Christ. That's what you want to do, isn't it? And that's because you've been born again. So the grace of God's salvation shows up in this workmanship of God — that God so affected you at the deepest level of who you are that now your whole orientation of life has changed, that you have become an image bearer of God, and you do that through a life of obedience to Christ.

Notice the relationship of good works — the implications here in Ephesians chapter 2 about the relationship of good works and salvation.

First of all, works come after salvation. You see that: we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works. Good works come after regeneration. There are no good works before regeneration. And the reason for that is: before you are born again, you will never — under any condition, under any circumstances — do a work for the right motivation. It is only after you are born again that you actually do something because of your love for God, and that's the only proper motivation for good works. So good works come after salvation.

That's the reason God does not look to the unregenerate for good works, because all of his works are motivated by the wrong thing. It'd be like a father who has a rebellious son who hates his guts and tells him so every day — a total rebel, hates his father, lives in total rebellion against him — but because he likes his house to look good, he always goes and mows the lawn every Saturday morning, even though he spits in his father's face. That's no demonstration of love. And it's true that we could do works that we could look at externally and say, "That's a good work," but we could never be motivated by an absolute love for God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength until God changed our heart. So good works always come after salvation.

Secondly, good works are the result of salvation, not the cause of it. We were created for good works. The law says: "Do this and live." The gospel says: "Live, and do this." You see that: the good works that we are to do are to be the result of our salvation, not the cause of it — but the result of it, because God has done a work in the heart.

The third thing is that the power and desire to perform good works are from God. He's the one who produces the desire, because he has changed us — we are his workmanship. So salvation is not of works, but it is for good works. Don't ever mistake grace for teaching that it doesn't matter what you do after you come to faith in Christ. God has manifested his grace by saving you for good works. You are his workmanship.

And then notice third: God has prepared good works for the Christian. He says he has created us for good works — we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand. What in the world does it mean that God prepared them beforehand?

Look with me at the only other place this word is found in the New Testament: Romans chapter 9, verse 23. The Apostle Paul writes: "And he did so in order that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy." He's picturing God as a potter who makes pottery and makes these vessels for different uses. In verse 23, he says he's making some vessels that are vessels of mercy for his own glory, and then he describes it this way: "which he prepared beforehand for glory." What does it mean to prepare beforehand? It means that God, in his sovereign wisdom, in eternity past, decided and chose the good works that he wants you individually to fulfill. He has prepared beforehand good works for you.

This isn't fatalism, and it's not determinism. Notice: God has prepared the good works in advance. He says, in order that we might live in them — he has prepared them beforehand so that we, in our activity, can fulfill them by our own decisions. These are real decisions that you have to make. And there have been times in your life — as you look back over your life, you know there have been times you have resisted doing what God has laid before you, these opportunities for good works. But God has prepared them beforehand in order that we should walk in them.

The actual living out of God's purpose in the world is for you to do the good works that God has prepared before you. Just think about that. Some of you — all of you — have come to faith in Christ. Somebody brought someone across your path to share the gospel with you. That was a pre-planned, prepared-beforehand good work that God had prepared for that person to share the gospel with you, and it's going to redound to his glory for all eternity.

The whole point is that good works are not a novelty — they're not an accident, they're not just going to happen. God has prepared for them. He has prepared for you good works that are going to bring glory to him. And he's done that in several ways: he's given you the gift of faith, he's given you his word which reveals his will, he has given you Jesus Christ who is your great example and your great enabler, he's given you instructions in the word, he's given you the Spirit, he's given you a spiritual gift — and he's laid before you good works that he has planned before the foundation of the world, that you should walk in them.

And notice this last thing — the last phrase. God has purposed that the Christian fulfill these good works. That's his purpose, that brings glory to him. He says: he prepared them beforehand in order that we should walk in them.

Notice that this is a kind of poetic device. If you look back at verses 1 and 2, it begins this section — this is called an inclusio. In the first two verses, he says we were walking: we were walking according to the course of this world, we were walking in our trespasses and sins. And then he ends the section by saying that we should walk in them. What he's doing here is putting little bookends on this section. He began by talking about what we used to walk in — which was in trespasses and sins. We walked in independence and rebellion against God and failed to meet our obligations before him. But God has saved us, and he has saved us so that we could now walk in these good works that he has prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

In other words, God's goal of grace is going to reach its intended purpose and goal through a changed life. God saved you so that you would do good works. The purpose of his salvation is to totally transform and change you so that you could reflect his glory in the decisions of your everyday life. But you have to make the decision — you have to decide to walk in these good works. There's no saving merit in good works whatsoever, but they demonstrate the genuineness of your faith.

The power of saving faith consists in its acceptance and continued possession of God's promises. Because we believe the promises of God, we experience salvation, and the works that we do simply prove that we have this faith. James says the only way that you can demonstrate that the faith you have is saving faith is by your works, by your obedience.

When I say works, I'm not talking about doing great feats in the visible world — I'm talking about the simple life of obedience to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has given you commandments, and the good works that he has set for you is for you to obey those commandments in the context of your particular life situation. Are you obeying his commandments? He's told you to flee fornication. He's told you to set your mind on things above and not commit idolatry by worshiping things in this world. He's told you to tell the truth. He's told you to be faithful to your commitments, to be faithful to your marriage covenant — that's a commandment of Christ. He saved you to fulfill those commandments, to do good works that would redound to the glory of God.

By his grace, this salvation is by grace from beginning until end. And when we get to the end of this thing and look back on it, we'll all say: the reason I obeyed him was because of his grace; the reason I believed was because of his grace; the reason I was faithful was because of his grace.

If you're here today without Christ, I can tell you there's only one kind of salvation that God offers, and that salvation is a salvation by grace. It's a salvation that's given as a gift, and it can only be received by faith. You must open your hands and say, "I have nothing to bring to God except my guilt and the damnation that I am headed for, and I come to receive the gift of forgiveness, the gift of eternal life." You can come no other way.

And I can also tell you this: when he gives this gift, he will so change your heart that your life will become characterized by good works — the good work of obedience towards Jesus Christ. And that's a good life to live, a life of obedience to Christ.

Would you stand with me as we pray.

Our kind and gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you for the gift of grace — and for the gifts of grace that you have poured out into our lives. This great gift of salvation that we received by faith — and the faith that we exercised was the faith that you gave us by regenerating us and giving us new life. And now, Father, you give us this great privilege of living in obedience to Christ, so that our lives — the very decisions that we make this week — when we say no to sin and yes to the Holy Spirit, it brings glory to you. It's a manifestation of your grace.

I pray that you would help us, Father, to be rational in our decisions this week. When we have those desires that seem so overwhelming — when our greatest desire at that moment is to sin against you — I pray that we would rein in these lusts of the flesh, that we would say yes to the Spirit, because it brings glory to you. And every time we say no to sin and every time we say yes to the Spirit this week, it is going to redound to your glory — the glory of your grace. We pray that we would be that kind of people. Help us to be people who walk in obedience to the grace of God. We pray in Christ's name. Amen.