CENTRAL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
Rev. Edwin Thomas, Pastor
March 4, 2007
SERMON TITLE: “Amazing Grace! — God’s Free Gift”
Ephesians 2:1-10

The Greek word for GRACE is charis. The Greek word for gift also comes from charis or to be more specific, charisma, translated in English is “charismatic,” ,pertaining to the gifts of ministry. This morning we will look only at “GRACE” as it pertains to the life, or salvation, which God bestows upon us.

If you had to pick one word to describe the God of the Judeo-Christian faith that sets us apart from the gods worshipped by the Hindus, Muslims or any of the other gods, what word would you choose? The word for me is GRACE. It is a word that reveals the true nature of the Judeo-Christian God. It describes God’s initiative toward mankind. It describes how God seeks us out, regardless of what foul condition we may be in. “WOW”!

Do you know in the. Islam faith, really the authority for this is Norman McCrummon from Springhill. Do you know that Norman has a degree in Middle Eastern studies and he spent three years in Egypt? I was talking to him about the Koran because he has read the Koran. I said, “What is heaven for the Muslim? He said, “Well, they don’t go directly to heaven. It’s sort of like a purgatory unless you are a martyr. If you’re a martyr, you go directly to heaven and get your rewards.” Seventy-two virgins, I don’t know if that applies to women or just the men or what. But there are women who are martyrs, too. So maybe there are 72 virgin men up there. Whoever, though, this is their reward. But that’s not the Jewish-Christian faith. We don’t have to appease our God. God is not somewhere over there. God desires to be in our midst. In the Old Testament when Moses was told by God, “Build the tabernacle for me,” but do not place it outside of the encampment of the Israelis but to put it in the very midst of the tribes so that all 12 tribes faced into the tabernacle and it symbolized to them that God was in their midst. When we come to the New Testament the angel appeared to Joseph and said, “You shall call your son’s name, ‘Emmanuel’ which in Hebrew means ‘God with us’.” The ultimate symbol of God’s desire was to send His own Son to be with us. Now that’s love! So the first thing that grace does is to declare that divine love to us. The second thing that grace does is to issue an invitation to be a part of what God is doing.

When I taught the Confirmation Classes I would tell the kids, “You know it’s fine if you know all the theological facts and all these facts about God, but God desires something more than just facts. God wants you to have a personal relationship with Him. He wants to live within you. He wants to have a primary place in your heart. You know, I’m a history major and I know a lot about a lot of historical characters (and I use that word lightly, ‘characters’) but I know a lot of names of a lot of presidents, but you know I’ve never had a single president to invite me to come to the White House and to sit down with him (or her as the case might be) and have a relationship with him, an intimate relationship. But here you have the One who created the whole universe, who is more powerful than all the kings and all the emperors than all the presidents and this Creator wishes to have a relationship with you, his child -~ “WOW!” And that’s what I would tell them at the Confirmation Class. AND THAT’S WHAT I AM TELLING YOU, TOO. It’s not the facts that you need so much as to really know this great Creator!

So, not only does grace declare God’s love, not only is it an invitation to have a personal relationship, but thirdly, it’s to invite us to be a part of His kingdom: His kingdom here on earth and the kingdom beyond. God wants us to enter into a relationship with the birth through the Holy Spirit and to become a new creation, a new creation! But, what He has begun in this life will be completed in the next. Once this was drummed home to me through a professor in my seminary when one fall day we were in class and he was teaching the Bible and he said, “I want you to look out the window. What do you see”? And there was this beautiful maple tree that was turning into the beautiful fall colors. He said, “Isn’t that beautiful?” We said “Yes.” Then he said, “But I want you to know that you don’t really see that tree as it really is because you are looking through eyes that have been tainted by sin. But one day when God is finished with that new creation in you, you will see the beauty of this earth in a way you have never seen it before.”

Paul said the same thing in ₁st Corinthians chapter 13. He said, “We, in this life look in the mirror as though it’s not a complete image.” You do not see yourself as you really are. You do not understand you even as God understands you, but one day you will see clearly and you will understand as you have already been understood by the God who created you. That’s GRACE. That’s WOW!

Now, in sin, we often denounce God as our God and Lord by our actions — by the things that we do, the things we think, and when we have this personal relationship with Christ, we gladly affirm God as our Savior and as our Lord. And we stop trying to be God and assume our rightful relationship as a servant. Not only does God, through grace, invite us to be a part of His divine presence; not

only does He want us to have a personal relationship, not only does He invite us to inherit eternal life in his kingdom with Him, but God is also a vulnerable God.

I don’t know of any other religion that talks about its God as being as vulnerable as our God. When we celebrate Christmas, we celebrate the vulnerability of God who became a little baby born in a manger. Paul writes this in his letter to the Philippians: “Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God did not cqunt equality a thing to be grasped, to be held on to, but emptied himself, taking trn the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form he became obedient unto the cross. Who, death of God’s son, on a cross God is offering forgiveness of sin and yet even on the cross, Jesus prayed for you and me. “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”.

Yes we can reject God’s gift because we are creatures of free will which God allows us to do, but, and we can ignore grace, but when we do we miss the plan and purpose that God has for our life. Believe me, every one of you has a purpose in the heart of God. Every one of you has a ministry. When you are called by God to be His child, that calling is not just for salvation, it’s a calling to be a minister. Now, I used that with God to try to get out of going to seminary. As matter of fact when I was in college, I made two decisions: 1. I did not want to be a schoolteacher; and 2. I did not want to be a minister. Don’t ever tell God what you are NOT going to do. I’ve done it too many times. I even told him that I would never live in Alabama. Now that was the ultimate one, wasn’t it? And I’ve been here longer than I’ve been anywhere in my life. So, God knows what He wants, you know! But, the point being is, that what I was trying to say to God, God you don’t need any more preachers. What you need are dedicated lay people who can serve you where they are planted, whatever position they may hold in life because you are on the cutting edge. You have an opportunity to affect and witness to people that no preacher can ever witness too.

Now you know God can reach anywhere and the proof of that is, as I say, in the song that we will sing later, “Amazing Grace” because Amazing Grace is a testimony of John Newton who committed every sin that was possible to commit, able to commit. He was so miserable that he announced and prayed that God would forgive him. In the film, John Newton had this horrible nightmare of all the ghosts of all the slaves that he carried in his slave ship. And if a slave ship held 600 slaves, sometimes less than 300 arrived alive at their destination. “Amazing Grace, I once was lost, blind, but now I see”! John Newton was blind at the end of his life but he saw, he saw for the Spirit. The real main character in that film is William Wilberforce who fought to set England free from the slave trade. It took him 27 years to do that. “Amazing Grace!”

Another hymn that you have is, “I Sought the Lord.” It came from the old red hymnbook. And that is my story. When I knelt seeking God, later on I realized that it was God who caused me to kneel and to ask that he would show himself to me. I sought the Lord. Every time you seek the Lord and you look back on your life, you realize that God moved you to seek him. You’re here today ~because you initiated, you thought, but you didn’t — The Holy Spirit initiated it in your life and you responded.

When I was in the fifth grade and sixth grade my father was a superintendent of the agricultural farm for the penitentiary of the state of Georgia, both the men and the women’s prisons. They had almost 10,000 acres and on that land my father was responsible for growing the crops that were to feed the prisoners, the cattle, the pigs, the chickens, and whatever it took to supply the food for the prison. Now one of the fringe benefits was that we got free dental care in the prison. While I was there, there was a notorious prisoner, not notorious because he killed so many people, but because he was an escape artist. That guy escaped twice during the three years that I was there. He was clever in devising ways of escaping but he was always caught. Somewhere after one of those times either through the chaplain or the reading of the Bible the Holy Spirit reached him just like he did John Newton and his life was changed. He gave up trying to escape and asked if he could serve a meaningful place in prison because he knew that God had called him to do something. Well, I went to the dentist office and when we got out my father said, “Do you know who was helping the dentist this morning?” I said “No sir.” “That was Forest Turner!” “FOREST TURNER! Do you mean the guy who escaped so many times?” He said, “Yes.” I said “WOW!” God had called Forest to be an evangelist to teen-agers. Now how are you going to be an evangelist to teen-agers when you’re locked up in prison? He proved himself true and the Governor of Georgia pardoned him so that he could become an evangelist for the youth. That’s the Grace of God!

It’s easy to get discouraged and I know you get discouraged; I know my church that I was pastor of, Westminster, gets discouraged. I know Cottage Hill where I have been associated with gets discouraged because all three churches are not at the hey-day that they once were. Do you remember that I preached a sermon to you one time titled, “Who Stole My Cheese?” Do you remember that sermon? And I think, we wonder as we look around, who stole my cheese, what happened to my church? I want to say to you “God” (our liturgist referred to that) God who continually moves forward - He’s not going to go back, He’s not going to resurrect any great preacher like John Crowell and bring him back or any of those things, but He’s going to continue to work where you are. He has a purpose for your life. He has a purpose for the church and the doors of the church don’t close until God says they’ll be closed. I’m excited about the person you called to be your interim. When I heard him about three years ago I immediately resonated with that young man, Tom Boone. He’s a great preacher. He’ll be a fine pastor. I want to challenge you, also, to do some praying. Now there are two kinds of prayers. ‘There’s the kind of prayer that — to use the term, we talk to God! There’s the other kind of prayer in which we listen to God. Now which one do you think we do more of? The talking, right? About three weeks ago, we had a pastor’s retreat and the minister said that for three minutes I want you to pray silently. I want you to count the number of thoughts that go through your mind because everyone of us, when we try to pray silently, we are bombarded with thoughts. “Now”, he said, “when you do this next time I want you to write down all of the thoughts that go through your mind while you’re listening? You can choose a word that brings you back to God. It could be ‘Jesus’; it could be some key word and pray that and it will bring you straight back from your thoughts as they stray. But listen to your thoughts because, as they say, your thoughts are your subconscious and sometimes it might be the Holy Spirit talking to you.”

I would challenge you, as a congregation, to gather yourself in groups of 7. Find some scripture that a committee in your church says ‘look at these as a group of 5 groups or how ever many groups you have and go home and read that scripture and think about it, meditate upon it, and then come back together after you’ve been apart and having written down all your thoughts about that scripture and about your prayer time, show them together. Now, at first it may be a jumble but after you do it about 3 or 4 times, you can begin to see the Holy Spirit moving in such a way that He’s giving you a picture about your life, yes, but about your church as well and that’s exciting! Some of the most exciting churches I know have less than 100 members, but they’re committed! They’re committed to listen to what God is saying and doing. O.K? A challenge!

GOD BLESS YOU-- IN THE NAME OF GOD THE FATHER, GOD THE SON AND GOD THE HOLY SPIRIT. AMEN