Sunday, January 23, 2005

Abounding Grace To Help The World

“And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work:” 2 Corinthians 9:8

Our Father is willing and able to make all grace abound towards us, so that we will always have all sufficiency in all things, and so that we may abound in every good work! That was such an awesome verse that I just had to repeat it! God teaches us that faith is believing that He is able and that He is willing to perform His Word, Romans 4:20-22. And faith comes for us by hearing God’s Word. “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” Romans 10:17 So we need to hear each and every day, and even multiple times a day, that our Father will make all grace abound towards us. We need to hear that through Christ we will always have all sufficiency in all things, so that we may be used by our Father to abound in every good work!

With that being said, what exactly is grace? The Strong’s Concordance defines grace like this: that which affords joy, pleasure, sweetness, and delight. Grace means favor, the merciful kindness of God exerting His influence on our souls that causes us to turn to Christ and that which keeps us, strengthens us, and increases our faith, knowledge, affection, and Christian virtues!

Using the Strong’s definition of grace lets read 2 Corinthians 9:8 again. And our Father is able to make all favor, influence, strength, faith, affection, virtue, and protection that causes joy, pleasure, and delight to abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound unto every good work. Our Father will always favor us, and He will always strengthen us with affection, virtue, and faith so that we can be used by Him to perform every good work that is needed, wherever we go! Our Father will always protect us as we are always used by Him. Our Father will always influence us, so that it is always Christ Who is strengthening us! So that we can be used by Him in all things through the power of Christ! Our Father will always do this for us and Jesus ever lives to intercede for us that we are saved to the uttermost!

Our Father will always cause His grace to abound towards us so that we will always have all sufficiency on all things! God will always exert His influence on us, because He will never leave us or forsake us, Hebrews 13:5. Because of Grace we will always have all of the love, wisdom, knowledge, power, faith, hope, forgiveness, joy, health, money, resources, and Anointing that we need! And since we have all of these things in abundance, God will always abound through us in every good work! Jesus came that we might have life and have it more abundantly, and grace is the power of our Father working for us that allows us to live in His abundance!

Is this grace just for pastors or evangelist? No, it’s for all believers! “But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ.” Ephesians 4:7 We all have grace that has been measured to us according to the gift of Christ! That means we all have tons of grace! The gift of Christ is measureless, and since it is, the grace that we all have been given is measureless! God without measure will always pour out His influence in our lives, so that we may always abound in every good work. Through Christ we will never lack all of the sufficiency that is needed to abound!

Can sin overcome God’s grace? Can sin stop God from exerting His influence on our souls? No! “For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” Romans 6:14 Turn to John 15:1-2, “I am the Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.” If there is anything within us that hinders the production of fruit through us, God prunes it out of us, so that we may produce more and more fruit! We are not under the dominion of sin; we are under grace. And even if our Father has to prune some things out of us, once we are chosen by Him, He never stops exerting His influence on our souls that causes us to have all sufficiency in all things, so that we may now abound unto every good work! Nothing can stop our Father now from using us in every thing; nothing can ever separate us from His love! God can now work through us as He worked through Jesus, and He can even work greater through us, because Jesus has secured the New Covenant that allows Him to, John 14:12! We now always have the needed faith, Authored and Finished by Jesus, to heal the sick, raise the dead, prophecy specific truths, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit those in prison, and to preach the Gospel to every creature! Nothing can stop God from completely and fully using us in all things!

“Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,” 2 Peter 1:2 The knowledge of the Truth of grace allows grace and peace to be multiplied unto us. The world is hurting: tsunamis, earthquakes, Iraq, terrorism, abortion, epidemics, and hopelessness. But through the Truth that has set us free, we can abound in every good work and in every situation, because we always have all sufficiency in all things. God is not limited, so if we only have five loaves of bread and two small fishes, He can use them to feed the multitudes that are starving, Matthew 14:20-22! If we only have a rock, God can flow water from it to quench the thirst of an entire nation that has been displaced, Exodus 17:6! If we are caught in the middle of a storm that will surely kill us and we have no shelter, we still have our mouths! And God can speak through them and cause the storm to instantly cease, Mark 4:39! Our Father has no limits and even if we are in the innermost prisons, or if the body has been in the tomb for four days, God can still use us to bring freedom and deliverance! No matter what the situation, no matter the level of physical resources, and no matter our maturity level. Our Father will always cause all sufficiency in all things through us so that He may use us to abound in every one of His good works! This gift has been measured out to every last one of us according to the limitless measure of the gift of Christ and knowledge of this Truth allows God to abound His grace and peace that passes all understanding to us!

Be blessed this day in the knowledge of this Truth and if God be for us, there is nothing that can be against us! The world needs us to abound in God’s grace, because there are so many problems with absolutely no answers. The only answer is God and the answer will always abound through us unto every good work! Faith comes from hearing this and the Truth sets us free!

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