Saved By Grace

AUDIO VERSION(click to listen/download) 

Ephesians 2:8-10

8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

NIV

FURTHER STUDY Eph 3:20-21 (click to read)

It is because of God’s grace that we have an opportunity of salvation. We normally as humans have squandered our chance of ever having any form of functional relationship with God, but God who is rich in mercy has chosen to save us and to call us out of the darkness of this world into His glorious light. The truth is that humankind chose darkness and turned her back on God and was therefore deserving of wrath. Grace is neither cheap nor common. The angels who fell from their estate were not given such as opportunity as we have to come back to God. God chose to show you His grace because He had chosen us from before the foundation of the world, to work in His glorious light. That is why it says “which God has before ordained that we should work in them…”

When there is a deadline for something and a number of people do not meet up to the deadline, if the authorities choose to be benevolent for that season, they may declare a period of grace so that defaulters will meet up. Anyone who comes in because of the declared period of grace came in not because of anything he or she did but because there was a period of grace declared.

Your salvation is a function of God’s grace and mercy, there is nothing you can do that would have been able to make you qualified to walk in God’s glorious light. It is strictly because of and through His grace that you have been saved. You have to KNOW this.

Now that you have been saved, you have to walk in the knowledge of this, knowing that everything you do will be through His grace and not a working of your power and might. You have to depend on Him to live each day through His grace, the same way you depended on Him when you came to Him as a sinner.

Stop trying to do it by yourself because each time you try you will fail. Depend on His grace and work the works that He has called you to work.

Prayer: Heavenly father, I thank you for your great grace that you have bestowed upon me. I thank you for choosing me out of the darkness of this world and making me your divine light. I ask that you show me signs and signals that will point me toward you and deliver me from the evil one who points me away from you under the pretext of pointing me towards you. Amen

By SD Abraham

God's Gift of Forgiveness

Audio Version(click to listen/download)

Ephesians 1:7 

"The forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace."

Could there be a sweeter word in any language than that word "forgiveness," when it sounds in a guilty sinner's ear, like the silver notes of jubilee to the captive Israelite? Blessed, for ever blessed be that dear star of pardon which shines into the condemned cell, and gives the perishing a gleam of hope amid the midnight of despair! Can it be possible that sin, such sin as mine, can be forgiven, forgiven altogether, and for ever? Hell is my portion as a sinner--there is no possibility of my escaping from it while sin remains upon me--can the load of guilt be uplifted, the crimson stain removed? Can the adamantine stones of my prison-house ever be loosed from their mortices, or the doors be lifted from their hinges? Jesus tells me that I may yet be clear. For ever blessed be the revelation of atoning love which not only tells me that pardon is possible, but that it is secured to all who rest in Jesus. I have believed in the appointed propitiation, even Jesus crucified, and therefore my sins are at this moment, and for ever, forgiven by virtue of His substitutionary pains and death. What joy is this! What bliss to be a perfectly pardoned soul! My soul dedicates all her powers to Him who of His own unpurchased love became my surety, and wrought out for me redemption through His blood. What riches of grace does free forgiveness exhibit! To forgive at all, to forgive fully, to forgive freely, to forgive for ever! Here is a constellation of wonders; and when I think of how great my sins were, how dear were the precious drops which cleansed me from them, and how gracious was the method by which pardon was sealed home to me, I am in a maze of wondering worshipping affection. I bow before the throne which absolves me, I clasp the cross which delivers me, I serve henceforth all my days the Incarnate God, through whom I am this night a pardoned soul.

Sppurgeon’s Daily Devotional