Overwhelming Grace

By

John Orlando

Grace Covenant Fellowship

Philadelphia PA

July 9th, 2006

Text 1 Tim 1:12-17

Pray

Intro

           For those of us that are Christians, we rejoice in the amazing grace of God, and we love the old hymn penned by John Newton; “Amazing Grace.”  And I certainly agree that God’s grace is indeed amazing, but today I want to talk to you about the overwhelming grace of God.  You see, the word overwhelming is defined as, “overpowering in effect or strength; awesomely intense; or so strong as to be irresistible.” And I find that definition to be quite interesting and applicable, particularly as it relates to what the Bible teaches about the radical depravity of man and the amazing grace of God. 

 The Bible’s description of fallen sinners is bleak to say the least, and nothing short of the overwhelming power of God’s grace will ever set a person free who is in bondage to sin.  And as we turn to our text this morning, we find the Apostle Paul, who sets before us just how overwhelming the grace of God was in his life and to every person that has experienced the saving grace of God in their life. 

 It is this overwhelming grace of God that ceases us, and changes us, and makes us new creatures, and causes us to reflect on the glories of our God and the salvation that He has wrought for us, and motivates us and enables us to live lives rooted, grounded, and built upon the sure foundation of the overwhelming grace of God as revealed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 And as we turn our attention to our text this morning, the first thing we see is:

 I.  Our Need of God’s Grace 

            A.  Look at verse 13 – Paul uses strong language to describe himself prior to his conversion, and says that formerly he was “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent (that is, a violently angry) man…” We are all probably familiar with Paul’s background: 

        He was a Pharisee of Pharisees, trained under the famous scholar Gamaliel, and as touching outward conformity to the law he was blameless.  He was, as he would say, more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of his father than anyone else.  And when Paul says that, it wasn’t just lip service.  Paul backed it up with his persecution of Christians.  Saul was the one who was standing by in approval at the stoning of Steven.  Saul was the one who was breathing out murderous threats against all Christians everywhere.  Saul was the one who was hunting down Christians and dragging them out of their homes.  Saul was the one who had orders in his hand to go to Damascus to arrest even more Christians.  He was on a rampage to wipe out every vestige of the sect that was following this Jesus Christ of Nazareth!   If he had been present at the trial of Jesus, he would have been the first one to slap Jesus in the face and declare, “tell us, who is it that struck you.”  He would have been the one that stood up and tore his clothes and declared in the face of Christ that Christ was a blasphemer, and, if it was in his power, he would have gladly brought the whip down upon the sacred flesh of the blessed One, and would have personally hammered the nails through His hands and feet. 

And so Paul has good reason to refer to himself as a persecutor and violently angry man, but the term blasphemer may surprise us.  After all, wasn’t he a lover of God’s Law? Yes indeed!  The reason Saul despised the Gospel is because he believed that it was robbing the Law of Moses of what he thought was the Laws purpose in salvation.  In Paul’s mind, one was deemed worthy of Heaven only by the strictest conformity to the Law of Moses. So why would someone who had such a love for the Law of God say that he was a blasphemer against God?                                   

B.  Blasphemer - Basically, a blasphemer is one who engages in a “contemptuous and profane act and impious and irreverent attitude against God.”  By exalting his own righteousness as the basis of his right standing before a Holy God, and rejecting God’s only provision for entering into His presence, namely, the perfect life and sacrificial death of God’s only Son, Paul was, in his own words, a blasphemer.  And it is here where we see that we have much in common with Paul. I may not be an active persecutor of Christians, or a violently angry person, but if I reject the only means God has provided to bring me into right relationship with Him, I am in essence what Paul was says he was:  a blasphemer, because rejection of the Gospel is in fact “a contemptuous and profane act and impious and irreverent attitude against God.” 

Paul then finishes his self-analysis by saying that he had done all of these things ignorantly in unbelief.  By ignorance Paul refers to the foolish miscomprehension and rejection of the truth of God which resulted in his disdaining Christ and the Gospel; that is, his unbelief.  And then finally in verse 15 Paul just simply refers to himself as the “chief of sinners.”  As we contemplate all of these things, I believe that we will also come to see the full scope of: 

C.  Our Own Depravity – You see; we are all in the same boat as Paul.  We cannot look down at Paul and shake our heads as if there is no point of comparison, for in a very real sense this describes each and every one of us in our fallen state to one degree or another.  God has commanded perfect obedience to His law in word, thought, and deed, and yet we are told that the heart of man is desperately wicked, who can know it.  We are told that prior to God’s saving grace, we are objects of God’s wrath; the enemy of God and without hope in the world.  We are so radically fallen; sin has so polluted our minds and corrupted our hearts that we are not even able to respond savingly to the Gospel, and we actually, in our heart of hearts, despise the sweet overtures of the Gospel.  

And so Paul’s experience and his description of his life teach us all both the depths of our own depravity, but also the glorious heights of God’s mercy and grace.  Look at verse 16 -“However, for this reason I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show all longsuffering, as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life.  Paul praised the glories of God’s grace because he understood how wicked he was, and he knew that there was nothing in him that would compel God to save him.  But Paul’s experience is also a pattern to those who are going to believe.  In other words, we all should be able to relate to the words and sentiments of Paul here, for if we are really honest with ourselves…if we really lay our hearts open and bare before the supreme majesty of Heaven and the splendor of the holiness of God, is there any one of us that would not, with Paul, refer to ourselves as the chief of sinners, or is there any one us that would not say with Isaiah when he beheld the glory of God and His holiness, “woe is me, I am undone!”  Thus we see our need for God’s grace.  We are in dire straights indeed, powerless in and of ourselves to rectify our dilemma, which calls attention to:

II.  The Power of God’s Grace

And this power can be seen in two ways.  First, we see it in terms of:

            A.  Salvation – Look at verse 14 “And the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant, with faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.”  The New International Version translates this verse, “The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love…”  Here we see the overwhelming nature of God’s grace. This grace isn’t just sort of trickling to Paul; rather, it is poured out on him abundantly!  It is a deluge of grace!  We all remember Hurricane Katrina and it absolutely destroyed New Orleans.  When the levy’s broke and the waters came, nothing could hold them back, and everything in their path fell under the force of the waters.  This is what God does to us in His grace…He breaks through our levy’s of sin and death and brings us under the irresistible power and the floodwaters of His grace, and as He does, we are submerged in His salvation. 

And this is precisely what must happen if anyone is ever going to be saved. You see, the only kind of grace that can subdue the heart of a fallen and unregenerate human being is a grace that is able to overpower and conquer our wicked hearts, and this grace must be overwhelming, that is, it must be “overpowering in effect or strength; or so strong as to be irresistible.”  A grace that does not display these qualities is of no use to anyone, and it is certainly not a grace that could be called “amazing.”  No!  We need a grace that is able to remove stony hearts and replace them with hearts of flesh; a grace that is so awesomely intense and overpowering in its effect that it never fails to release us from our bondage to sin and raise us from spiritual death to spiritual life; a grace that is poured out; not trickled to us, and produces within us saving faith and a love for God where previously there was unbelief and a hatred for God.  This is a grace that is worthy of the title “amazing” and a grace that truly is, as the hymn says, “greater than all of our sin!” because it is a grace that can utterly melt the heart of a God-hater and turn him into a God-lover.  

This grace teaches us that no one is off limits to God; it is so powerful, so overwhelming, that it can change a murderous persecutor like Saul of Tarsus into the Apostle Paul.  It is a grace that produces in Saul the unbeliever the faith to take hold of Christ; and turns this one who previously despised Christ and breathed out murderous threats against God’s people to one who loved Christ, and endured all things for the sake of the elect.  It is a grace that lifts us up out of the muck and mire of our enslavement to sin and causes us to adore this one that we previously rejected.  Next we see the power of God’s grace:

             B.  For Ministry – Look at verse 12.  Paul now expresses his thanks to this one whom he had previously despised and persecuted.  Some confusion might come though when Paul says the Christ enabled him “because He counted” Paul faithful. 

         Throughout Scripture we see the human and the divine sides of the equation in terms of sanctification or pursuing the Lord.  For example, in Phillipians 2:12-13 we are told to do all that we can, to work out our salvation (that is, to make every effort to perform the good works that flow out of a saving relationship with Christ).  We strive after godliness and holiness and performing acts of righteousness with all of our heart and strength.  Yet, we do so because, and in light of the fact, that God works in us to will (to even have a desire to do those things), and to act; to actually perform the things He purposes us to perform in the manner in which He prescribes, through faith union with Christ. 

I believe that this is basically the same idea Paul has in mind when he says that Christ enabled him “because He counted” Paul faithful.  The only reason Paul was a minister of the Gospel was because of the sovereign grace of God that was bestowed upon him.  From the human side though, there is a sense in which only those that demonstrate their faithfulness to the Lord are to be considered for certain offices.  Paul will elaborate more on that when he gives instructions concerning the character traits that must mark the life a person that is to be ordained as an elder or deacon in 1 Tim 3:1-13. 

 Paul could say that Christ counted him as faithful, and as a result he was put into the ministry.  But, it was certainly not lost on Paul, nor should it ever be lost on us, that the only reason that Paul was faithful was because Christ enabled him to be so.  As Paul says in 1 Cor 7:25, “I give a judgment as one who by the Lord's mercy is trustworthy”, and 1 Cor 15:10, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them-yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.”

             Think of a light bulb.  The light bulb is created for one thing:  to give light.  But a light bulb cannot give the light that it was created to give without first turning on the power switch.  Once the switch is turned on, the power gets distributed to the bulb, and the bulb then begins to do what it was designed to do:  give forth light.  As a matter of fact, it necessarily gives this light.  As long as the power is enabling it, the light bulb necessarily shines its light.  We too, like the light bulb, are created for a purpose; namely for good works, or if you like, to shine forth the glorious light of Christ to a lost world, as Paul tells in Eph 2:10.  But, just like the light bulb, we can only shine forth the light that we are created to give if we are empowered to do so. 

 So, we have seen our need for grace, the power of grace, and now we shall see:

III.  The Source of God’s Grace

The source of such overwhelming grace is ultimately rooted and grounded in:

             A.  The Nature and Wisdom of God – Verse 17 – “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”

Here Paul just bursts into praise to God, and he focuses all of the attention, all of the credit, and all of the glory to God alone.  And the specific words he uses to describe God in his praise are telling:  God is the King, which refers to His absolute sovereignty, and He is eternal, immortal, and invisible, which refer to His transcendence and the incredible nature of who God is in the infinite perfections of His being. 

And it is this God who alone is all of these things is alone wise!  All of man’s ideas and intricate philosophies are brought to nothing in the face of the glorious wisdom of the One true and living God.  And it this God, and Him alone, that we honor and glory in—not our works, not our abilities, not the fact that we somehow figured it all out ourselves and chose God—but to God alone and His power, His wisdom, His ability, and His overwhelming grace whereby He made us accepted in the Beloved before time even began.

This amazing grace that is ultimately rooted and grounded in the nature and wisdom of God is secured and made effective for us by and through the:

B.  The Perfect Work of Christ - Verse 15 This is a faithful saying and worthy of all

acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.  Here Paul tells us the primary reason that Jesus was sent and the mission He was sent to accomplish.  Jesus didn’t come into the world to make sinners savable; rather, He came to actually, not potentially, save them.  And by God’s infinite wisdom, the grace that He purposed to bestow on wholly unworthy creatures was given to them before time began in Christ Jesus, and was poured out upon them because of the perfect work of Christ on their behalf.  Paul speaks to these things in Eph 1:3 –7 when he says, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, 5 having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, 6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved. 7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace .”   

So Paul doesn't forget who he used to be and realizes that but for the grace of God, he would be nothing.  He reflects on the glories of God and His grace and bursts forth in words of praise and adoration to the Lord, and glories in the infinite perfections of God and the perfect work of Christ on the cross, where the Prince of Glory, the One who was utterly righteous, bore the wrath of God and curse for those who were utterly unrighteous.  

IV.  Conclusion 

Have you experienced this grace in your life?  If you have been refusing to bow to the Lord, then you too have something in common with Paul prior to his conversion…you may not be a persecutor of Christians, or a violently angry person, but by your refusal to submit fully to the Gospel, you’re acting in a contemptuous and profane manner and displaying an impious and irreverent attitude against God.  Turn to the Lord now.  Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners by living the life that we should have lived and dying the death we deserved to die.  Escape the condemnation and wrath that is to come by turning from your sins and receiving Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. 

And for those of us today that name the name of Christ, we, like Paul, must never lose sight of the depths of the depravity that marked our lives prior to coming to Christ, and the depths of the depravity that still resides within us.   And like Paul, we too rejoice and give praise to our great God and King who has lavished His overwhelming grace on us…a grace that ceased us, and conquered our sinful hearts, and changed us, and made us new creatures.  May we be moved in our daily lives to reflect and meditate upon the glories of our great God and Savior and the salvation that He has wrought for us, realizing that as we do we shall be motivated and enabled to live lives rooted, grounded, and built upon the sure foundation of the overwhelming grace of God as revealed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

I can think of no better way to close this sermon than to simply echo the praise that Paul gives to God for such an overwhelming grace in verse 17 of our text this morning:

 “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”

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