Episode 019: The Gift of Grace

This is the Promises of God Podcast and I’m your host, Tracie Rollins. This podcast is about you, your ability to hear and believe and take action on God’s promises in your life because all of God’s promises are yes and amen. Resources mentioned in today’s episode can be found on PromisesofGodPodcast.com. Now, let’s get started.

Welcome back to the promises of God podcast, episode number 19. My name is Tracie Rollins. Thank you so much for spending some time with me as we learn and take action on God’s promises in life. This month series is about grace, and we’re working out of the momentum devotional offered by a Bible Journaling Ministries, the devotionals titled Saved by Grace, and you can learn more about Bible journaling with our free 10-day course at BibleJournalingMinistries.com. Today we’re talking about the gift of grace. Our verse is Titus 3:4-7, and it reads, “but when the kindness of God, our savior in his love towards mankind, appeared not by works of righteousness which we did ourselves, but according to his mercy, he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ, our Savior that being justified by His grace, we might be made errors according to the hope turned life.”

When my friend adopted her son, he was still reeling from the effects of the drugs that were left in his body. He had quite a few problems that continue to surface almost five years later, but all the hurt and all frustration that happened and and as a result of working with the many departments that she worked with as they were helping him kind of grow and battle a lot of the effects of the drugs had on his system. She never left his side. She is his mother even though it’s not by birth; it’s by adoption. She’s still there, and she’s always with him. She doesn’t treat him any differently. Even when he was her foster child, she still treated him precisely as a son, and after she adopted him, she treated him the same just as he was her son. She doesn’t treat him differently. She doesn’t treat him with more or less favorable than her daughter. He didn’t earn it by birthright, yet he is still air to her heart, into her home. Just as a daughter, she carried for nine months is you are adopted into the Kingdom of God because you’re justified by His grace. You can’t earn your salvation, and your works or deeds don’t save you. Salvation as a gift is a wonderful gift as a child of God, your heir to the earth, the world, and all of the things you were air to the planet. If you look at Matthew chapter five verse five, it says, blessed are the gentile, for they will inherit the earth. You’re an heir to the world. Romans 4:13 says, for the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he should be heir of the world, wasn’t through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

That is 1Corinthians 3:21-23 where it says, Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are your’s; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are your’s And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s. So if that’s the case, then why do Christians could do good deeds If we’re saved, can’t we just sit back and relax and not do anything, but what we want to do Well, patients chapter two verses eight through 10 says, for by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It’s the gift of God, not of works, that no one can boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, listened, listened there one more time. We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared. Before that, we would walk in them doing good deeds and loving people in being a good person that isn’t natural. You can see it here. We’re created in Christ Jesus for good works. It’s not a salvation issue. It’s something that comes naturally out of the response of your love of Jesus Christ. If you love Jesus, if you love God, your natural reaction is to want to serve him, to do the works that he has prepared for you. It is not required that you must do all the right things you were to do. The works that God made. Have you ever thought that you needed to do good deeds to receive God’s grace? I know a lot of us to do. Sometimes I even wrestle with that as well. I have to always double check myself, but it’s good to go back to Ephesians 2 and read that verse again.

We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared before that we would walk in them. Now, does that mean that I have to do all the good works in the world? Absolutely not. This is the works that God has prepared for me. Those are the ones that want to do. I’m not going to do you what works, and you’re not getting in my works. Of course, I can help you, and you can help me, and that’s a great, beautiful thing because we’re sisters in Christ. That’s amazing, but you have a purpose in this world, and you have a path that God has put you on. So yeah, do the things that he has planned for you, but it is not for salvation because salvation is a gift.

I hope this week that as you kind of think of this whole topic of the gifts, the gift of grace, think about the deeds that you, you feel like you’re doing because you want to earn your way to heaven, like think about those. Write those downs right then those things that you think you’re trying to do to earn, earn your way to heaven, you know, and then read them in light of Ephesians to read them in light of the verses that we’ve talked about today, and consider receiving the gift of grace from God just out of love just because he loves you. Just receive it. You don’t have to earn that. He’s given it to you. Just receive it and then do those works because you love him back because you want to do something because you have so much joy in your life. You want to give to others.

Do it out of love but not out. I have to receive anything. I hope this week that you will embrace God’s amazing gift of grace and if you’re here today and you’re struggling with giving or getting grace, I encourage you to invite God into your life. Today I know the love of God in my life, and it is so amazing and has transformed me as a woman. If you know the love of God in your life but you straight away and he feels like he won’t forgive you or you can’t come back, I encourage you to get down on your knees and pray to him to ask you to forgive. Ask him to forgive you because he will come back. Come back home. He wants to welcome you into the family. You are. You’re his child. He wants you to be with him, and he wants to love you. Romans 6:23 says, the wages of sin is death. Sure we deserve death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus, our Lord. So turn to him, confess your sins and follow his will in your life and you will feel the love of Christ that surpasses all understanding. Thank you so much for tuning in today, and I’ll see you in the next episode of the Promises of God Podcasts. Goodbye.

Thanks for listening to the Promises of God Podcast. This podcast is sponsored by Bible Journaling Ministries where thousands of women grow in the word creatively. It’s your free 10-day course for other ministries and other episodes resources at the PromisesofGodPodcast.com.