- “Divorced… Now What?”
- What Defines You?
- Divorce And Remarriage – “Adultery Defined”
- Divorce And Remarriage – “The Evils Of Forbidding Marriage”
- Divorce And Remarriage – “Biblical Summary On Divorce & Remarriage”
- Divorce And Remarriage – “The Bible Expressly Says A Divorced Man Does Not Sin If He Marries”
- Divorce And Remarriage – Personal Thoughts
- Amazing Grace And Divorce/Remarriage Part Two
- Amazing Grace And Divorce/Remarriage Part One
Does God’s GRACE cover (a) ALL (b) SOME (c) IT DEPENDS ON WHICH ONE (d) NONE, of our sins?
We must learn to avoid extremes when studying the Bible.
Push any truth to an extreme, where it receives more attention than other
truth, results in a loss of Biblical balance. “Once saved always saved” is no
more correct than “once saved never saved or maybe saved”. One lady told dad “I
just cannot accept what you are saying on (grace).” She continued, “Every day
from morning till night, I say to myself, forgive me Lord, forgive me Lord.”
She lacked the confidence of her own salvation.
Now you may be thinking, “We don’t teach that!” No, not in so
many words, but we have the results which have to come from our Bible classes,
and pulpits where inferences, and assumptions have resulted in guilt,
performance, and merit in Christians.
We simply must strive to find balance in our teaching on LAW, SIN
AND GRACE.
We need to realize that grace is a divine concept, not a human concept. Grace is a general term meaning the ‘undeserved gift’ of God’s favor. That’s great, but is not specific until applied to man’s sin problem. The specific application of it is seen in God’s word. Here we find what God has said about it and why it is so important. In order to have real confidence (that Christians are saved from all sin) we need to look to the
grace and promises of God.
God included both grace and law in His New Covenant offer to man.We have to consider both (‘law’ providing guidelines and ‘grace’ providing continued forgiveness and ‘room for growth’). In Hebrews 8:10 He said “I will put my laws in their minds and will write them on their hearts.” His laws are immutable, and provide important, necessary guidelines (while law keeping does not save), grace/faith does. God then says “And I will be merciful to their (His children’s) unrighteousness and their sins and lawless deeds I will remember no more” (Verse 12).This “mercy” and “forgiveness” is just as immutable as His laws.
Now, we know what God says about breaking marriage (divorce). It is sin. But we need to know specifically what His mercy and grace says about forgiveness and the sin of adultery. And His word is specific about this.
For instance in John 8, a woman was brought before Jesus who was guilty of the sin of adultery and asked “What do you say?” His statement to her was “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.” You can’t get more specific than that. If she stopped committing the sin of adultery she was pardoned.
Again, in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, a list of sins is given and the third one on the list is adulterers. Then the text says, “Such were some of you but you were washed, sanctified, justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.” This is the power of grace to one who comes to Jesus… is there less grace for Christians???