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10 Insights from Conference 220

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Here are several things that struck me from Conference 220. I wish all of you could have been there. It was a powerful conference. We plan to do it again next year. Stay tuned for details.

conference220

  1. Love benefits others at the expense of self. Sin benefits self at the expense of others. Frank Viola
  2. We need to pray for a new, fresh revelation of Jesus Christ. He wipes everything else off the table. Frank Viola
  3. The Christian life is becoming what we already are. Frank Viola
  4. Jesus is our forgiveness once and for all. Jesus is our life moment by moment. Andrew Farley
  5. The New Covenant invites us to be obsessed with Jesus Christ. Andrew Farley
  6. We participated in Christ’s death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seating at the right hand of the Father. Andrew Farley
  7. Christianity is not a self-improvement program. Bob Christopher
  8. Jesus lives in us. With Him in our lives, we should have great expectations concerning the Christian life. Bob Christopher
  9. When we die to human effort, we come alive to the fullness of God’s love and grace. Bob Christopher
  10. It is easier to trust someone when you know that they love you. Pete Briscoe

Conference 220

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Today is day one of Conference 220.
I will be tweeting throughout the conference. To follow the thread or to join the conversation on Twitter, use #220.
Galatians 2:20 is the conference theme. “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
This verse lays out the best news ever – the Christian life is 100% Jesus. I tried to live the Christian life. You have too. We can’t do it. But Jesus can, and He does through us.
We simply trust Christ, or as Paul wrote we “live by faith in the Son of God.”
This is such a freeing message. Those who take it to heart experience peace and rest.
How has this passage impacted your life?

The Biggest Problem in the Church Today

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Last Thursday, Pete Briscoe was our special guest on People to People. You can listen to the program here.
He is the lead pastor at Bent Tree Bible Church in Plano, TX. He is one of the voices on the Telling the Truth radio broadcast along with his parents, Stuart and Jill Briscoe.
Pete will be sharing his personal grace awakening this Saturday morning at Conference 220. By the way, there is still room if you would like to attend. All the information is here.
During the broadcast, Pete shared an illustration. One Sunday, as he was teaching from Galatians, he stopped a moment, pulled out a bottle of 10w40 oil and poured a little bit into his coffee cup. He stirred the drink and then lifted the cup to his lips to take a drink.
Oil_and_Water_Do_Not_MixThe congregation shrieked.
Pete responded, “What’s the big deal? I just put a little bit of oil in the coffee.”
Even that little bit presented a danger to Pete’s health.
That was his point concerning law and grace. You can’t mix the two. The law had a purpose. When that purpose was fulfilled in our lives, the law gave way to grace. Now, the grace of God is in charge. My last post covered this topic.
Since we are so comfortable with the law, we naturally want to blend a little law in with the pure grace of God. Religion sends this message to us as well.
Even a little law mixed in with grace can lead to big problems in the Christian life. Talked to just about any Christian on the planet and you will hear them use words like frustration, guilt, fear, shame, struggling and failure to describe their Christian experience.
This is a sure sign that somewhere along the way, they poured a little law into their coffee cup of grace.
Paul explained the problem: “A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.” If we let just a speck of the law in, it want be long until the law is ruling the roost in our lives. You cannot mix law and grace.
It was the biggest problem of the church in Paul’s day. It is the biggest problem in the church today.
It is time for us to fully embrace the grace of God and allow His Spirit to lead us, to guide us into all truth, and to transform us into the image of Christ Jesus.
In your life, how have you mixed law and grace? What was the result.

Who is in Charge — Law or Grace?

Posted on by Bob Christopher

This month on People to People, our theme is law and grace. This particular subject is one of the sweet spots of our ministry.
Understanding the purpose of the law and the purpose of grace is the key to experiencing freedom as a believer.
The law made our need for Jesus very clear. It judged us guilty of sin, condemned us and showed us that we were spiritually dead. And that is where it left us. There is nothing more it could do.
Here is the scoop on the law. It cannot save us. It merely shows us that we need to be saved.
Grace saves us.
Jesus removes the judgment and condemnation of sin. Jesus makes us right with God. Jesus gives us life.
That’s grace.
When this act of grace occurred, the law was satisfied. Its purpose was fulfilled. There was nothing more for it to do. The law gave way to grace.
Now grace is fully in charge. We are led by the Spirit.
Under the law, we were bound up, slaves to sin and death. Under grace we are free. “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” 2 Corinthians 3:17 (NIV).
 

Is it Possible to Misinterpret the Grace of God?

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Carlos from El Paso asked this question on the radio broadcast this week.
The answer is yes. In the short letter of Jude near the end of the Bible we read this: “For certain men whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord” (Jude 1:4 NIV).
Godless people misinterpret grace. They pervert it for their own purposes. To them, it is a Justification for immoral behavior, a license to sin if you will. This view of grace is a denial of Jesus Christ, the One who is full of grace and truth.
We should expect this. As Jesus said, people exist who love darkness over light because their deeds are evil. It follows that these would take the amazing grace of God and pervert it for their evil purposes.
Many wonder if we should alter the way we communicate the grace of God to prevent these “godless men” from turning the grace of God into a license to sin. The answer is a resounding no! We should communicate grace in its purest form, trusting that those who respond to Jesus in faith will be made new, made alive and made right in God’s sight.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones said this: “If your preaching of the gospel of God’s free grace in Jesus Christ does not provoke the charge from some of antinomianism, you’re not preaching the gospel of the free grace of God in Jesus Christ.”
Let’s communicate the fullness of God’s grace and leave the results to Him.
Have you ever thought you needed to change the way you communicate grace to keep some from seeing it as nothing more than a license to sin?

A Command to Keep — Grow in Grace and Knowledge

Posted on by Bob Christopher

This is the imperative Peter leaves us with at the end of his second letter. The verse reads, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen” (2 Peter 3:18 NIV).
Sunday morning at Metro, Richard and I will be discussing the idea of growing in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. If you do not have a regular church service you attend, join with us via your computer. We stream the service to the internet. Go to http://realanswers.net and click the Metro television icon. The service starts at 10:15 central time.
If you have questions or comments you would like to submit for the discussion, do so in the comment section below.
I do look forward to hearing your thoughts on growing in grace.
I looked up the word grow in the Complete Word Study Dictionary. The definition is fascinating. The word is auxano. The general definition is to grow, increase, or to augment. This growth is not self-initiated. “For someone to grow,” Zodhiates wrote, “he/she must be acted upon by an outside power or have the element of life within him/her.”
Believers have life within them, Jesus’ life. Jesus causes us to grow.
We grow in grace because that is where we live. In Christ, we are never outside the realm of God’s kindness and favor.
This sets the stage for Sunday’s discussion. We will get specific as to what it looks like to grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.
But for now, I leave you with this question. In what ways have you grown in grace and in the knowledge of Jesus?

Grace that Changes the Heart

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Tomorrow is the 40th anniversary of Roe v Wade.
Both draw attention to the issue of sanctity of life and our nations struggle to carry out its most fundamental principle: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
The cause of the struggle is our own sinfulness. We judge some people to be superior to others. We judge the rights of some to be more important than others. No law will fix this. We need grace.
In the days of Christ, Jews and Gentiles did not treat each other as equal. Both groups claimed superiority. This was brought out once Cornelius and his household were saved. Certainly, a Gentile would not be given the same salvation the Jew received? That was the question on the table at the council of Jerusalem.
After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: “Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.” (Acts 15:7-11 NIV)
God does not discriminate. Everyone is of equal value to Him and He extends His grace to all. That changed Peter. And it can change us.

My Favorite Grace Verses

Posted on by Bob Christopher

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions–it is by grace you have been saved. (Ephesians 2:4, 5NIV)
However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me–the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace. (Acts 20:24 NIV)
What are your favorite grace verses?

Six Ideas about Grace that will keep you from Experiencing Grace

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Grace is a big word, a God word, a word that is foreign to our natural thinking and living. It’s a word our natural minds just can’t comprehend.
Yet, we offer up all kinds of ideas about grace, ideas that aren’t true. Here are six of the most common.

  • Grace is necessary only for salvation. Many believers think that they needed God’s grace for salvation, but now that they are saved, living the Christian life is up to them. They lean into rules and regulations to guide their lives. This does nothing but lead them into legalistic bondage.
  • Grace is merely a covering for sins. Is forgiveness all that we need from God? Many answer “yes” to this question, and they look to grace as the covering for their sins. This idea misses our real need. The Bible says that we are dead in sin and in need of life. Grace is God’s act to make us alive together with Christ and to make us right in God’s sight.
  • Grace is a thing. Grace is not a thing. Grace is bound up in the person and work of Jesus Christ. He is the One full of grace and truth. Think about grace as a thing, or a theological concept, and you miss Him.
  • Grace gives us a license to sin. If you think of grace like this, you miss out on the most practical aspect of God’s grace in daily living. The grace of Jesus teaches us to say “no” to sin.
  • Grace and Law are equal. They are not. Believe that they are and you will blend them together. When you do you miss the purpose of each. Law compares to grace as the moon compares to the sun.
  • Grace is insufficient to meet life’s problems. We all have problems. Grace is big enough to get us through each and every one.

God wants you to experience the fullness of His grace, to live the life He gave you to the full. Don’t let any of notions about grace rob you of the riches you have in Jesus Christ.
What other ideas about grace have you heard, and where did you hear them?

Ten Reasons We Need Grace

Posted on by Bob Christopher

Sometimes the truth is hard to take. The truths that are the most difficult to take are found in the bible.
Who likes being called a sinner, or hearing that his heart is wicked, deceitful and beyond cure?
You certainly would not include these in the category of “nice things to say about others.”
The bible not only says these things, it does so with astonishing directness. It also tells us that we were

  • lost,
  • enemies of God,
  • unrighteous,
  • wicked,
  • slaves to sin,
  • deceived and
  • disobedient.

However, the most stunning truth of all is the fact that we were dead spiritually (Ephesians 2:1). Think about that. There was no spiritual life in us at all.
Hard stuff to take indeed.
Jesus had to act on our behalf to change all this. Out of His one act of righteousness flowed His gift of grace to us, a gift that brought to us justification and life.
Without grace, we would still be dead, sinners and all the other things the Bible said about us. In Christ, we are totally alive and heirs of the King.
I do have a question for you. How would you describe spiritual death?