Abundant Life

Yesterday I listened to an inspiring message from Dave Kennedy at the NewDay SDA church in Parker Colorado. During this message Dave talked about Faith and Grace. He also contrasted grace with mercy. By doing this he was able to demonstrate the awesomeness of grace.

I’ve spent most of my life thinking that I received grace when I accepted Jesus and I will receive it again on judgment day. In between these two events it was my job to ask God to make me perfect and to work as hard as I could to accomplish this goal. It’s exhausting because I’m continually failing.

I’ve also worried about forgetting a sin and not asking forgiveness. I was haunted by the thought that if I didn’t ask for forgiveness of a particular sin that it could keep me out of heaven on judgment day.

As I listened to Dave’s message I heard what I can only describe as sweet music. Dave indicated that grace not only occurs at the beginning and end of my life but all the way through the middle. I have a sinned filled scarred life and grace erases my sinful record, which is my entire life, and replaces it with Jesus’ perfect record. This means when Jesus sees my life or hears my prayers he only sees the perfect life and prayers of Jesus when he lived on this earth.

Mercy would be erasing my poor record. That’s a great thing; however, grace takes it a step further and gives me Jesus’ perfect life-record. I love that part. Thank you Jesus! You are truly wonderful.

I also lived much of my life under the misconception that I should not ask Jesus for faith. I was once told that Jesus already gave us all a measure of faith and it was an insult to ask for more. In Dave’s message, he demonstrated via the Bible that asking for faith is ok and encouraged. I need a strong measure of faith to not lose hope in the beautifulness of grace.

The question was then asked, “Why should we strive to be good?” That’s simple – we are now part of a special family and it is our desire to represent that family’s good name the best we can. Love it! I’m no longer trying to do good works so that Jesus will love me more or my position in heaven will be strengthened. Instead, I’m just giving it my best effort to try and demonstrate to others what Jesus is like.

I liked the story Dave shared about David who searched for a decedent of Saul. Typically, predecessor kings searched and killed decedents of the former king. That was not so for David. He wanted to honor any living relatives solely for the purpose of demonstrating Jesus’ grace.

In summary, we are all saved now and throughout our lives by simply accepting Christ’s perfect life in place of ours. His life replaces our entire life. There is no part of our own life that assists Jesus in saving us. Praise the Lord because every second of my life is drastically inferior to Jesus’ life. In Jesus’ eyes I have never lied, cheated, stolen, killed, committed adultery, dishonored God, or was prideful. Now that’s a beautiful thing!

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 6th, 2008 at 10:03 am and is filed under Daily Journey. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Yesterday I listened to an inspiring message from Dave Kennedy at the NewDay SDA church in Parker Colorado. During this message Dave talked about Faith and Grace. He also contrasted grace with mercy. By doing this he was able to demonstrate the awesomeness of grace.

I’ve spent most of my life thinking that I received grace when I accepted Jesus and I will receive it again on judgment day. In between these two events it was my job to ask God to make me perfect and to work as hard as I could to accomplish this goal. It’s exhausting because I’m continually failing.

I’ve also worried about forgetting a sin and not asking forgiveness. I was haunted by the thought that if I didn’t ask for forgiveness of a particular sin that it could keep me out of heaven on judgment day.

As I listened to Dave’s message I heard what I can only describe as sweet music. Dave indicated that grace not only occurs at the beginning and end of my life but all the way through the middle. I have a sinned filled scarred life and grace erases my sinful record, which is my entire life, and replaces it with Jesus’ perfect record. This means when Jesus sees my life or hears my prayers he only sees the perfect life and prayers of Jesus when he lived on this earth.

Mercy would be erasing my poor record. That’s a great thing; however, grace takes it a step further and gives me Jesus’ perfect life-record. I love that part. Thank you Jesus! You are truly wonderful.

I also lived much of my life under the misconception that I should not ask Jesus for faith. I was once told that Jesus already gave us all a measure of faith and it was an insult to ask for more. In Dave’s message, he demonstrated via the Bible that asking for faith is ok and encouraged. I need a strong measure of faith to not lose hope in the beautifulness of grace.

The question was then asked, “Why should we strive to be good?” That’s simple – we are now part of a special family and it is our desire to represent that family’s good name the best we can. Love it! I’m no longer trying to do good works so that Jesus will love me more or my position in heaven will be strengthened. Instead, I’m just giving it my best effort to try and demonstrate to others what Jesus is like.

I liked the story Dave shared about David who searched for a decedent of Saul. Typically, predecessor kings searched and killed decedents of the former king. That was not so for David. He wanted to honor any living relatives solely for the purpose of demonstrating Jesus’ grace.

In summary, we are all saved now and throughout our lives by simply accepting Christ’s perfect life in place of ours. His life replaces our entire life. There is no part of our own life that assists Jesus in saving us. Praise the Lord because every second of my life is drastically inferior to Jesus’ life. In Jesus’ eyes I have never lied, cheated, stolen, killed, committed adultery, dishonored God, or was prideful. Now that’s a beautiful thing!

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 6th, 2008 at 10:03 am and is filed under Daily Journey. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.