Grace - Holy Spirit wants you to know that you are righteous and sanctified

Which do you believe?

1. The Holy Spirit will convict you of your sins and failures.

or

2. The Holy Spirit convinces you that you are without fault and that the Father loves you?

If you believe the first choice, then you believe God's primary concern for you is to manage your behavior. If you believe the second, then you've responded to His kindness, changed your mind about Him (that's true biblical repentance), and you've given up your fight against sinful behaviors and rested in His love, thus finding the true power to be free from wrong behaviors. You can now finally enjoy life abundant. Only grace can do this. Your self-effort to act better will keep you in the never-ending cycle of effort, failure, and behavior modification and out of a life full of joy, peace, and righteousness

The Holy Spirit seeks to convince the world of their sin, which is unbelief in Jesus. But for you, a Christian, the Holy Spirit will never seek to convince you of your sin. How can He? All of your sin has already, once and for all, been both forgotten AND forgiven!

Consider the following:

"And He, when He comes, will convict the WORLD concerning sin and righteousness and judgment; concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me." John 16:8-9

"If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you ARE NOT of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you." John 15:19

"They [Christians]] ARE NOT of the world, even as I am not of the world." John 17:16

"Sanctify them [Christians] in the truth; Your word is truth." John 17:17

"But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you [Christians] into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you." John 16:13-15

"Since you [Christians] have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart..." 1 Peter 1:22

"But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed." Romans 6:17

"By this will [the will of the Father] we HAVE BEEN SANCTIFIED through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ ONCE FOR ALL...For by one offering He has perfected for ALL TIME those who ARE sanctified." Hebrews 10:10, 14

"...So I have sworn that I will not be angry with you, nor will I rebuke you...my lovingkindness will not be removed from you, and my covenant or peace will not be shaken." Isaiah 54:9

"...For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more." Jeremiah 31:34

Enjoy the blessings of complete righteousness and sanctification under the New Covenant. It's a done deal, our Great High Priest has secured for us a Great Salvation (Hebrews 2) has SAT DOWN (Hebrews 1). He is faithful and has not lied (Hebrews 6:17-19). Allow Holy Spirit to guide you into the fullness of THIS truth.


Grace=Peace,
Jeremy

Grace - Quotes from Bill Johnson and Phil Drysdale

Hi Everyone,

Bill Johnson and Phil Drysdale, both at Bethel Church in Redding, CA, had great comments on their Facebook pages today. Enjoy!

"Many believers would never think of condemning another, but have little problem condemning themselves. It's the same sin. What right do I have to condemn someone God has forgiven? And that includes self-condemnation!" -- Bill Johnson

"The basis of your relationship with God is not how little you sin but how much you choose to receive His love." -- Phil Drysdale

Grace=Peace,
Jeremy

Grace - Good News to be Believed

"The Gospel is not a call to constant confession, or to amendment of our ways, to make restitution for past sins, or to promise to do better in the future. These things are proper in their place, but they do not constitute the Gospel; for the Gospel is not good advice to be obeyed, it is good news to be believed." by Craig Glenn

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - A Great Book

Hi Everyone,

Below is a link to a PDF book on grace that I recently read. I highly recommend it!

http://www.thefinishedwork.org/Portals/0/Book-Download/Surpassing-Glory-by-Ryan-Sletcher.pdf


Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - Perfected

Hi Everyone!

The next time someone who is obsessed with behavior modification tells you that you should be obedient because God says "Be perfect because I am perfect", just look at them, smile, and lovingly point them to Hebrews 10:14.

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - What Righteousness Is Not

Hi Everyone!

Here's a grace quote from Joseph Prince:

"Righteousness is not right behavior. It is right standing with the Father. It is the clearance of all your guilt, which makes you able to stand before God. It is not something you get through right behavior. It is a gift from God. Paul calls it "the gift of righteousness". And to "seek" this gift is to be conscious of the fact that you have it, to confess that you are righteous in Christ." ~ Joseph Prince

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - Filled in Him

"For in him [Jesus] the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority." - Colossians 2:9-10

Below are some quotes from a book I am currently reading, "Surpassing Glory", by Ryan Sletcher.

I am sending them because I believe that one aspect of the Christian life that the "grace message" addresses is sorely lacking from the lives of most Christians--that is, demonstrations of God's spiritual and supernatural power to represent the truth of the gospel to a world in need.

Consider the following:

"The number one reason Christians are unable to heal the sick, raise the dead, preach the Gospel, perform miracles, prophesy, etc., is because they believe they lack something."

"The average Christian is living so far below his potential that when he sees a normal Christian doing normal Christian things like raising the sick and raising the dead, he calls him a 'giant in the faith.' The difference between a normal Christian (aka a giant in the faith) and other Christians is not their level of power or anointing. The difference is their revelation of the power and anointing that they carry, ***and their willingness to use it***."

If we could only embrace the fullness of the Gospel of Grace, we would realize that we are fully forgiven, fully saved, fully righteous, fully accepted, fully equipped, and fully able to destroy the works of the devil during our walk on earth. Why all the fullness? Because the same Spirit that was power-packed enough to raise Jesus from the dead now LIVES in us.

Now go lay your hands on someone and be amazed how God moves to heal them and/or speak prophetically through you.

Go!!!!


Grace=Peace,

Jeremy



Sent from my iPhone 4S.

Grace - Much more than we expected

Just as the "prodigal" son returning to his father could only imagine being received as a hired servant and never in his wildest dreams would have believed his father would fully restore his sonship, so most Christians have believed something less than the truly good news.  We've been told that we can't be fully restored, fully righteous, nor fully and always in perfect fellowship with a loving Father.

I imagine that the "prodigal" son had difficulty at first believing the loving actions of his Father--that it was too good to be true.  But that is how our thinking must change about ourselves and God as well--the Gospel of Grace truly does seem too good to be true, but that's the point.  This amazement, this overwhelming love is the inspiration that every person needs and how the Christian life is to be lived.

Show me a bored Christian or a "nominal" Christian, and you'll have shown me someone whose mind has not yet truly experienced the life-changing effect of a grace that is so over the top, so packed with goodness, that one needs the gift of faith from God just to believe it.

After all, it is His great kindness that leads us to change the way we think (repentance).

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - It's Offensive!

Hi Everyone,

Why is the finished work of the cross an offense to those striving to please God?  Because it invalidates every human attempt at spirituality. Though we labor to proclaim the cross, we do not labor to repeat it as religion does. We do not labor to strive toward our own holiness, sanctification or redemption. Just believe it's yours. Nor do we strive to enter into more of His fullness. For by our union with Christ we are already full of the Godhead.

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - Our sin nailed to the cross

Hi friends,

Remember this hymn?

"My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!"

from the hymn "It Is Well with My Soul"

Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - Our Salvation

Here's another great article by Mick Mooney. Read the bold print if you're short on time.

Grace=Peace,
Jeremy


Our Salvation
by Mick Mooney

"Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom!"
Luke 12:32

It really is beyond imagination. That the Almighty creator of the heavens, who designed the entire universe in all of its majesty as well as the earth in all of its detail, would offer us a better best friend, a better leader and a better hope than ourselves. He has given us his very own Son.

All of us share a similar moment in time. It was the moment we heard the good news of Jesus, and having believed, we were included in Christ. In this moment we went from being distant from God, to being even more than a friend, we became children of God! (Eph. 1:13)

We didn't earn our salvation, but Christ earned it for us. We didn't deserve to be favoured because of our own works and effort, but we were included in Christ who has earned God's full favour on our behalf through his perfect atoning sacrifice upon the cross. As Christians, we do not boast in our own goodness, we boast in the goodness of Christ. Our boast is not that we have earned our holiness, righteousness and redemption. Our boast is in Christ, who has become for us, our holiness, righteousness and redemption.

Everything that we have is a gift from God based on our belief upon Jesus. It's amazing to know that even our holiness is a gift. We are not just holy, but we have actually become the holiness of Christ. That means that when God wants to define his holiness he simply points to you! If you are in Christ then you have become his holiness, his righteousness and his redemption.

This blessedness is not only for the moment we are included in Christ, but for every day we walk on earth and for eternity to come. You are forever in the position of blessing. You are forever loved. You are forever forgiven. You are forever favoured. You are forever accepted. You are forever credited as righteous, holy and blameless in God's sight. You are forever set free. Not by your efforts, but because you belong to Christ. This is the good news for your life!

For many believers, when we first believed in Christ we were so in awe of his greatness. As time went on we began to take our eyes off of Jesus and place them back onto ourselves. This is a common process that has a domino effect which leads a believer back into a false religious mindset, instead of remaining in our glorious new covenant reality. When we do this, we become self-focused (or ministry-focused, or church program-focused) and not Christ-focused. The result of changing our focus is a change in our relationship with God.

Instead of thanking God that we are included in Jesus, our prayers become consumed with how sorry we are to God. Not sorry that we have sinned, but sorry that we are just not better Christians. We work harder for God, but feel less worthy of his presence. We begin to believe that we have to do everything for God (work harder in our ministry, work harder to build the church programs, work harder in our prayer life!)

When we begin to believe that we have to earn everything from God we start living by worldly principles instead of by the reality of Christ. Instead of remaining in the truth that we receive all things from God because we belong to Christ, we begin to believe some other fine sounding argument that doesn't depend on the reality of Christ at all. It is this very problem that the Apostle Paul addresses with the Colossian church.

"See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ."  Colossians 2:8

We can't earn anything from God for the very fact that Christ has earned it all for us already. Christ now gives everything to us as a gift from God. As Christians we need to remind ourselves why God sees us the way that he does and why God favours us the way that he does. It is based on Christ's finished work, not our unfinished work.

The simple gospel truth is that we have not earned any of the blessing and benefits of God, but we have freely received them from God because we belong to his Son, Jesus Christ. We, as the church, need to take our eyes off of ourselves and place them once again upon Jesus and his perfect life and sacrifice. When we do this, suddenly everything starts to make sense; we begin to accept that we really are loved, accepted, holy, righteous, blameless and favoured. We don't accept this reality based on our works, but based on God's abundant provision of grace! (John 1:16).

All of these blessings belong to Christ, all of the promises belong to Christ, the fullness of the Holy Spirit belongs to Christ, and the kingdom of God belongs to Christ. It all belongs completely to Christ. No one else could ever earn, buy or deserve them. By the grace of God when you believed in Christ you were placed in him and you were credited with all of this.

The good news of Jesus Christ is that in him and through him we can rejoice that God has now given to us his kingdom of peace, righteousness and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Gospel of Grace DVD by Rob Rufus

Hello Everyone,

Rob Rufus' 12-DVD set on the Gospel of Grace is available through the following link:

http://gospelofgracedvd.org/

In the set are 9 DVDs of teaching material and 3 DVDs of questions and answers about grace.  The teaching material includes video sermons all under 60 minutes each, mp3 versions, and even transcriptions in PDF files.

If you purchase this for yourself, I guarantee you will not be disappointed!


Grace=Peace,

Jeremy

Grace - Turn away

Moses turned aside to see the marvelous sight of the burning bush (Exodus 3:3). This is the same verb used to describe Isaiah's guilt being taken away by the Lord (Isa. 6:7). We need to turn aside each day and take time to see the marvelous salvation Jesus has provided for us. Such joy is incredibly empowering. Like Moses and Isaiah, we can turn nations to God, when we turn to see that our sins have been sent away forever.

Grace=Peace,
Jeremy