THE GOSPEL NO ONE IS PREACHING

THE GOSPEL NO ONE PREACHES

                What is grace? People often say, “I am no longer under law, I am under grace. But when they talk about grace, they talk about something outside of themselves and detached. To them grace is like something up in heaven that has been added to my good guy account whether I am good or not. They call it “unmerited favor.”

                We like to say that we are saved.” By grace we are saved through faith and that not of ourselves. It is the gift of God.” So we say it is a gift of God and that there is nothing we can add to it. But again I ask, what is grace? What is grace doing in your life that saves you? What does it save you from? How can grace save you if you are not applying it by faith? And when you apply it, do you apply it to the outside   or the inside?

                If Grace saves us from sin, for instance, does it actually deliver us from sin or does it just cover it up? 1 John 5:4 says: “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world- our faith.” Paul says: “My children, with whom I am again in labor until Christ is formed in you.” Galatians 4:19. Well, is Christ formed in us as a legal declaration in heaven, or does grace actually get into us and conform us to Christ’s image?

                Paul said it first in Romans 6:14, 15: “For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be! “So many careless Christians say they are not under law but under grace, but they ignore the part where it says that this transaction somehow keeps us from sinning, which is the transgression of the Law. So what is missing in today’s brand of grace where they say they can do their own thing and God understands and forgives because you went to the altar 23 years ago? Is that true grace?

                Another question I could ask then is; what about the blood of Jesus? Some people say, “I’ll just plead the blood of Jesus over my life.” But again I have to ask, what does the blood of Yeshua actually do?  I know that Yeshua took His blood and placed it on the Mercy Seat in heaven, so is His blood then merely a legal transaction? Is it done strictly outside of us? And what is the difference between Yeshua’s blood and the blood of bulls and goats? How does it work differently? And if the New Covenant in His blood is strictly a legal transaction done outside of us, then why did Jesus tell us to eat His flesh and drink His blood at communion?

                So now we get to the heart of it. In John 6:53 Jesus said: “Truly, truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood you have no life in yourselves.” So the blood of Yeshua is to be taken in. It brings life to us and not just physical life, but eternal life. So let’s take a look at what physical blood does in our bodies.

                Blood doesn’t work well on the outside. In fact, if you get too much of it on the outside you will find yourself in the hospital, getting patched up and receiving a transfusion. Blood is made to work on the inside of us where it circulates to every cell in our body. It brings oxygen and nutrients to every cell and it removes carbon dioxide and impurities. So again, blood, even the blood of Jesus, works within us bringing life and removing death from us every moment. It brings in righteousness and carries away sin.

                John said in 1 John 1:1-6: “My little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for our sins only, but also for those of eh whole world. And by this we know that we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments. And the one who says. “ I have come to know Him” and does not keep His commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him; the one who says He abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.”

                What the church seems to forget nowadays is that Yeshua is in the business of making sons and daughters in His image and after His likeness. And of this new breed of man, He serves as a prototype so that in believing in Him, in dying to self and living by His Spirit, being daily cleansed by His blood and empowered by His grace and trained by His word, we are growing into His likeness.

                Just as it says in Ephesians 4:13, the various ministries in the church are building up the body of Christ “until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the MEASURE OF THE STATURE WHICH BELONGS TO THE FULNESS OF CHRIST.” So again I say, Yeshua is a prototype of the one new man and by grace we are being transformed into His image from grace to grace. In other words, much of what is being taught as Gospel today is a cheap imitation that is not really getting you saved, let alone transforming you into His image.

                Well then, what about the cross. What does it actually do? Well, the cross represents our last day in Satan’s kingdom. WE have broken the Law and so we are doomed to die. We repent. We confess our sins. We turn from our sins. We ask the Lord to come into our hearts. We are sinners. We are under the Law. We have been condemned to death. The Law commands our death because we have broken it. We have been cornered by the Law. There is no way of escape. Now what?

                Here is where Jesus dies for us. He takes our sins upon Himself and He dies in our place. But the problem now is that we are still cornered by the law. We are still alive in Satan’s kingdom and the law commands our death. How is Yeshua’s death going to help us? So once again we see that Christ’s death for us is not something He did strictly outside of us and apart from us. By faith we enter into Christ’s death with Him. In this way we die to Satan’s kingdom. But the only way we can pass through death unscathed is if we go through it with Someone who has never sinned.  He must also have the power to raise us up on the other side.

                So, once we have officially died, we no longer exist in Satan’s kingdom. The Law cannot condemn us because we no longer exist in that realm. So our death to the world must be real. If we are still alive in Satan’s kingdom, then we are still under the Law. Do you get that? The only thing that got you out from under the Law was your death. So if you haven’t really entered into Christ’s death, then you are still under law. As such, the cross has not been of benefit to you.

                That’s why Paul said:
“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and delivered Himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly. So that means that once we have died in Christ, the Law’s work is finished. From now on, we are going to live by the indwelling power of Christ in our lives. This does not do away with the Law because the Law is eternal. Instead it causes the Law to be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. Rom 1:4. The difference is that we are now obedient to Christ instead of to a list of rules on stone and He is in us fulfilling the Law in us as we live by the spirit and not by the flesh.

                So, there is only one element remaining… the resurrection. So how does the resurrection actually help us? Does it only declare us alive or does it actually fill us with resurrection power so that we are alive in this new kingdom? To this Jesus said: “The thief comes to steal and destroy; I came that they might have life and might have it abundantly. This new life is not something on the outside of us. It is the life of Christ being lived through us with abundant joy and overcoming power. This new life that He gives us is called Zoe life. It is eternal life and He has given us His Spirit as a pledge of our inheritance.

                Being saved then must be a complete process. We confess our sins and repent and turn away from them. Then we ask Jesus into our hearts even as we enter into His death. There we die to the Law and to Satan’s kingdom and we are born again into Christ’s kingdom by the power of His Resurrection. Jesus fills us with His Holy Spirit and empowers us with His life. We have died in one kingdom and we have been born into another kingdom.

                Through His blood, Yeshua takes away our sins. Through His cross we die to Satan’s kingdom   and through resurrection power we are born into His kingdom and given new life by His Holy Spirit. The Word of God now teaches us how to live by the spirit and not by our flesh. Our flesh has nothing to do with this new life. Flesh and blood will not even inherit the Kingdom of God. So why struggle on in the flesh when we can live by the new Spirit and eternal life that we have received through Jesus Christ?

                Did you know that when the Holy Spirit comes into our spirit it marries our spirit so that our spirit and His Spirit become one? Jesus prayed in John 17:11 “That they may be one, even as We are one.” So as believers we are part of a body that is becoming one, even as we are becoming one with Christ. You can’t get any more intimate than that. John said in 1 John 4:7 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. “So, as the Body of Christ we are all one in the Spirit. We are one with each other and we are one with Christ. And He put us in the church to learn how to come into unity with each other and with Him. We are in training for eternity.

                So, why did I ask all of these questions? It is because there are so many Christians living under the false assumption that they are saved, that the law is done away, that they can plead the blood over their lives, when none of these things may be true for them. They never really died, so they are still under Law. They were never really born again and so they have a form of godliness but no power. They presume to live the Christian life when in fact they are still living by the flesh and not by the Spirit.

                Paul says in Romans 8:12-14: So then brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh- for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die, but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live, for all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God.”

                Friends, don’t presume that you are a real Christian. This is something you must be very sure about especially in these days, when true Christianity is rarely being taught. We have been sold a cheap Gospel that in the end may not save us.

                Come to Jesus now. Confess your sins to Him. Repent and turn away from your sins. By faith receive Christ’s death in your place, and realize that unless you enter into that death with Him, you will not really be dead to Satan’s kingdom and if you aren’t really dead, then you are still under law. And without His resurrection power you will not have resurrection life with which to come alive in God’s Kingdom and if you don’t receive His Holy Spirit, you have no life in yourself. His blood needs to flow through your veins because the life is in the blood. His grace must bring you power to live and to overcome even as He overcame.

                You will never know true freedom until you have experienced authentic Salvation and new birth. It is only in the real thing that you are truly free from the condemnation of the Law. When you are dead, the Law can no longer find you. So the law is not done away. Its job is to bring sinners to the cross. And now that the Holy Spirit lives in you, the Law will also be fulfilled in you because you now live by the Spirit and not by the flesh. Rom. 8:4 The flesh is dead and your spirit is alive in Christ Jesus. Welcome to the church of the first born.

                We can have absolute assurance of salvation. He who has the Son has life. “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the IMAGE OF HIS SON, that He might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us …who can stand against us?” Romans 8:29-31.

                We don’t really know what is coming next. Is it rapture, tribulation, war, natural disasters, persecution, financial collapse…what? But we do know this; being fully in Christ we are ready for whatever the future can dish out. Paul put it this way: “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain, but if I am to live on in the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose. But I am hard-pressed from both directions having the desire to depart and be with Christ for that is very much better; yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake.”

                Should we not have this same attitude then? Revelation 12:11 describes us saying: “And they overcame him (Satan) because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony and they did not love their life even to death.”

                So back in Philippians 1, Paul is expressing an attitude of unselfish love saying: “I would really rather die and be with Christ, but I am willing to live on in this flesh for your sakes.”  And we too, should condition ourselves to think in this way. How many Christians do we see today that are pouring out their lives for the sake of the Gospel… for their brothers and sisters in the faith? Are not most of them saving themselves, holding back, looking out for number one… worshipping self rather than God?

                It is time for us, as we face the Day of Atonement this Saturday to come to the foot of the cross and to become a real Christian. We need the whole package and not just the bumper sticker version that people toss around. Come to Him with your whole heart and He will give you His whole heart in return.

                Salvation is really very simple. We can come to Him as little children and place our faith in Him to save us. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. This is how it should be.

                 Instead, people have made it very complex because they have tried to figure out some way to enter into Christ’s kingdom without leaving Satan’s kingdom. They want the world and Jesus too. And so we have to break the Gospel down into its component parts so that those who have been fed this new false grace can see where they are selling themselves short of salvation.

                We are moving into a great time of shaking where everything that can be shaken will be shaken so that what remains cannot be shaken. As such we want to build our lives upon the eternal principles of the Word, rather than the fables that are being passed off as the Gospel. Selah.