In Touch Ministries

Dr. Charles Stanley: Even though God is holy and righteous, we come to him as those who have been redeemed, cleansed, and are being cleansed continually by the blood of Christ. And so therefore, we have the privilege of coming without fear. We have the privilege of coming, as he says, boldly before him. We have the privilege of coming, asking for great blessings.

When you come to God and you say, "Now, Lord, I know I shouldn't ask too much," let me ask you a question. How much could you ask for that would exhaust the resources of God?

Guest (Male): There's a certain fascination about royalty and the distant, unique lifestyle they live. But God is a different kind of king, one who invites us to love him and get to know him. Stay with us now for In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley, and hear about your access to our creator's throne of grace.

Dr. Charles Stanley: If I should ask you, why don't you think you spend more time praying and talking to God? I wonder how you would answer that. Or if I should ask, why is not your intimacy, your relationship with him, more intimate? And why is it not more meaningful and more rewarding than it is?

Well, I believe if you and I understood who God is and what he's really like, and if we understood what it meant to really come to him, we would come to him far more often. We would speak with him more often. Our relationship with him would be far more intimate than it is. We would sense a greater intimacy with him, a greater joy about him, a sense of fulfillment and contentment and strength and power. Our faith would be stronger, our confidence would be greater if we understood: who is this God to whom we go and what does he mean when he says we can come to him in time of trouble and find grace to help in time of need?

Well, I want you to turn if you will to Hebrews chapter four, and the title of this message is "The Throne of Grace." And it is a throne that all of us, at some time or the other, who are believers, often times, I certainly hope, come to this throne. And some people who think they're coming to it and getting answers to prayer cannot because the door is closed because of their relationship to God.

So I want us to look at this passage and see what it says. And if you'll begin with me in the 14th verse of the fourth chapter of Hebrews, he says, "Since then," speaking of Christ, "we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. Listen to this. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin."

And this is his way of saying, "Look, the one you're speaking to is one who understands where you've been, where you are, and the things you're going to face. Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need." Now listen to that. "Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need."

Now, what is this idea of a throne? When he's talking about the throne of grace, what is he referring to here? When we think about a throne, we think about royalty, we think about power, we think of authority, we think in terms of dignity. And so what he's saying here is that God, our heavenly Father, is seated upon a throne. Dignity, royalty, power, authority. Here is the head of the whole human race, Almighty God seated upon his throne.

And you'll recall in the eighth chapter of Romans, if you'll turn there for a moment, eighth chapter of Romans, he reminds us of who is seated with the Father and what he's doing. He says in the 34th verse that Jesus Christ, who is at the right hand of God, sitting there making intercession for us. So at the throne of God, there's God the Father and God his Son.

And so when we think about the throne, we think in terms of two people seated on that throne, and that is God the Father and God his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, if the only thrones talked about in the Bible was a throne of judgment and a throne of holiness and a throne of glory, frankly, I would be a little bit discouraged. Because think about this: if you and I had to come to a throne of judgment, what would we be concerned about but condemnation?

If we had to come to a throne of holiness, what would we be concerned about but a sense of our own sinfulness? If we came to a throne of glory, what we'd be concerned about is the awe and the wonder of the majesty and the radiance and the glory and the power of Almighty God. So he does not say to us here in this passage, "Therefore, come to the throne of judgment, come to the throne of holiness, come to the throne of glory," but he says, "Let us come to the throne of grace where we will find grace and mercy and grace help in time of need."

So the throne of God is a place of position, of power. And I want you to go back if you will to Isaiah chapter six for a moment because Isaiah, in this sixth chapter, gives us the best description in the Old Testament of the throne of God. And Isaiah tells us here what he saw. He says in the sixth chapter, beginning in verse one, "In the year of King Uzziah's death, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of his robe filling the temple."

"Seraphim stood above him," that is these angel beings, "each having six wings, with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called out to another and said, 'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory.'" And Isaiah says, as he saw this, "The foundation of the threshold trembled at the voice of him who called out while the temple was filling with smoke."

"Then I said, when I saw this, then I said, 'Woe is me, for I am ruined because I am a man of unclean lips. I live among a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.'" Then one of the seraphim, he says, flew to him with a burning coal in his hand, which he had taken from the altar with tongs.

And he touched my mouth with it and said, "Behold, this has touched your lips and your iniquity is taken away and your sin is forgiven." Then Isaiah says, "I heard a voice of the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send and who will go for us?' Then I said, 'Here am I, send me.'" What I want you to notice is this: when he in the presence of Almighty God looked upon this throne of holiness, his first response was, "Woe is me." That is, he felt his own sinfulness and his own condemnation.

And here in this passage, he says, "Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace," not judgment, not holiness, not even a throne of the glory and the awe and the wonder and the majesty of God, but rather a throne of grace where he says we will find mercy and help in time of need.

In 1 Corinthians chapter three, when he talks about the judgment of the Christians and he says we'll be judged so as by fire, and when we stand in the presence of Christ at the Bema seat and give an account for our life, what is it going to be like to stand in the presence of a holy God? Well, we live in an age that is so absolutely unholy and irreverent, we've lost all sense of the holiness of God.

We are very, very irreverent about so many things. And so each generation, it seems, comes into a lifestyle where things are less holy and more irreverent than ever before. So when we think in terms of a holy God and a righteous God, and we hear people talk about, "Well, you just talk to the man upstairs," or, "You just talk to God, just any old way, any old body and any old person, any old way can just talk to God." That isn't what the Bible says.

And in the Old Testament, if you'll think about the sacredness and the holiness by which they entered into the presence of God. You remember in the tabernacle and the temple, the holy of holy places where only the high priest could go once a year? And at the mercy seat on the ark of the covenant, which was the symbolical of the presence of God?

And the very idea of the presence of God, a God of justice and holiness and a God of glory, they wouldn't even think about trying to go past that veil into the holy of holies. And even the high priest appointed by God could go on it once a year and if he violated the rules, God would strike him dead.

You see, God intended for them to learn the lesson of his holiness, and that's why he gave the tabernacle, the holy of holies, and the temple with the holy of holies. Because God was in the process of teaching them his holiness and his righteousness and his justice and his judgment. But what happened when Jesus Christ was crucified? You remember? The Bible says the veil in the temple was rent how? From top to bottom, God flung it open to say now all men can have access to Almighty God.

So he says in this passage that you and I have the privilege of coming to what? Of coming to a throne of grace. Because that means you and I have the opportunity of coming into the presence of Almighty God. And that has been made possible by, if you will remember, he says in this 14th verse that you and I have a great high priest, the Lord Jesus Christ.

How is it and why would God then move from a situation where the symbol of his presence was so sacred and so holy that no one except the appointed high priest could come, and then all of a sudden, he says that anyone and everyone and all persons can come into the presence of God? Because when Jesus died, here's what he did. He took the sin debt of the world upon him at the cross.

And what he did, he took away our guilt, and those of us who receive Jesus Christ as our personal savior have now been clothed in the righteousness of Christ. He says now you and I are living and reigning in righteousness because God has done something on the inside of us that is so absolutely dramatic, he has so changed us that even he says we have become holy. That is, we are sanctified in his sight.

Now listen carefully. You and I may not always act holy, our behavior may not be, but he says on the inside of us that which dwells within us is holy. He calls him the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ says, "I'm abiding in you and you're abiding in me." We are the holy sons and daughters of a holy God. And while our conduct and our behavior on the outside may not always be, on the inside, we are the holy children of God.

So when you look at this throne, we're talking about a throne of grace. Listen, at the throne of grace, God is not dispensing judgment and condemnation. He is not there to remind us of our sinfulness and our wickedness and our vileness. He is there to remind us of what his Son did for us and that he is a righteous, holy God indeed, but he is a God of grace.

At the throne of grace, God is dispensing love and mercy and goodness and kindness. Does that mean that he does not remind us of our sinfulness? No, it doesn't mean that. We have the Holy Spirit living on the inside of us to convict us of our sin. But he says, "Come to the throne of grace where you will find mercy and help in time of need."

God has made it possible for you and I to approach his throne right where we are. Because we're not talking about going some place and entering some place. We are talking about a relationship. The throne of grace symbolizes the presence of God where we talk to him and where we fellowship with him.

And you see, God doesn't just want us coming to him asking something from him all the time. God's ultimate goal for us is intimacy, conforming us to his likeness. And the more you and I conform to his likeness, the more intimate we want to be with him. The more we're going to desire to be with him and to be like him.

And we are going to want to come often when we are growing in our intimate relationship with him. So he says, "Let us therefore come to this throne of grace." Now let's think about this for a moment. Here God is inviting you and me to come into his presence, so to speak, and talk with him and fellowship with him.

Now you think about this. We're talking about coming in the presence of royalty, power, and authority, and dignity, and majesty. You don't have to make an appointment. You don't have to stand in line. You don't have to do any of that. Listen to this: he says you and I are encouraged to come to the throne of grace.

We're encouraged to come. And so therefore, we don't have to go through all of that. That means we have instantaneous access to Almighty God and his Son Jesus Christ through his Son. Now, I think again, one of the major problems is that a lot of people do not understand what God is like, and so we come oftentimes as slaves.

We come, "Now Father, I know I don't deserve to come and Lord, I know," and what we do is we allow past failures to blind and block and fog our relationship with him in such a way that we come so hesitatingly. We don't come with boldness. We don't come with confidence. We don't come with assurance.

We come oftentimes loaded down with guilt and really fearing that this God we know to be omniscient is going to condemn us for something he sees or has seen that maybe we've forgotten. So Paul, when he was speaking to the Athenians, listen to what he said to them. He said in the 17th chapter of the book of Acts, "For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription: 'To an unknown God.'"

"He's now going to tell you who he is, that all of these gods, he says, this inscription you have to the unknown God, I want to tell you who he is." He says, "Therefore, you worship in ignorance this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, since he is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. Neither is he served by human hands as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all life and breath and all things."

"And he made from one every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and boundaries of their habitation, that they should seek God, if perhaps they might grope for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us."

God is not far from anyone. And so when we think in terms of God being in heaven, yes, he is. But God is not far from anyone. No one is far from God. Now maybe far from him in their attitude, far from him in their relationship, far from him in their understanding, but not in reality far from God.

For what does a lost person, what does a person living in sin have to do to be saved? Travel somewhere, plead, beg, make promises? No. He says, "He that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." No person has ever cried out to God in the sincerity of their heart, crying out for mercy, crying out for forgiveness, crying out for the grace of God that God ever rejected.

So when he says no one is far from God, and God is not far from anyone, what he's saying here in this passage, he is simply saying to these Athenians who were living in ignorance and all of these gods and in their blindness, he says the God to whom you have made an image and inscribed on it "To the unknown God," he says, "I want to identify him to you."

Now, what Jesus did at the cross, he made it possible for us, sinful beings as we are at times, in our disobedience, he made it possible for you and me, symbolically speaking, to walk into the presence of the throne room of God and talk to him without any hesitation whatsoever.

Now, is it because we're worthy of it? No, that's what grace is all about. It has nothing to do with it. It has to do with what Jesus did at the cross to make it possible. That's why I keep emphasizing the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, because without the shedding of blood, there's no forgiveness of sin, and without the shedding of blood, there is absolutely no access to God.

And when Christ died on the cross, what he did, the Bible says the veil was split in the temple from top to bottom. He flung open the doors of access to God so that anyone who wants to come to him, who's willing to come, listen, willing to come his way, which is by his Son, Jesus Christ, has access to the Father.

Now look at this. When he says we're to come, he says we're to come boldly. Look at this. He says, "Let us therefore draw near with confidence," that is with boldness, "to the throne of grace." Now, what does that not mean? Let me tell you what it doesn't mean. It doesn't mean just coming irreverently, casually, crudely, using rude kind of language.

"Well, God, I mean, you know, we're friends." You know, we are friends, but my friend, listen, it doesn't make any difference how well you know him, I want to remind you of something: the better you get to know him, the more reverent you're going to be. And I think there is an awful sense of irreverence even in the body of Christ today.

There's an irreverence about God because we live in a society that is so unholy and so irreverent and has such little respect for anything that is godly and holy. And if we're not careful, we can pick up on the world's attitude. Now, we call it being relaxed. That's what we call it. We say, "Well, you know, just relax and just be casual."

Well, I can be relaxed and I can be casual, but I'm going to tell you something: the more I get to know God, when I am in prayer, in his presence, I am more reverent, more aware of his holiness, more aware of who he is than ever before in my life. Not irreverent, not crude, not rude. Are you a little casual with God? Could it be that sometimes we become irreverent in his presence?

And let me ask you a question, where is he? That's not even the right question. The truth is that everywhere is in the presence of God. And he is a holy God. He is a God of grace and mercy, but he's a holy God. And we come to him, we should not come to him casually. He's not a grandfather. He's the Father of grace, the God of all grace.

Listen, while he's dispensing mercy and grace help in time of need, never does he cease to be a holy, holy, holy God.

Guest (Male): Thanks for listening to In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. God loves us unconditionally and has invited us to come boldly into his presence. But that doesn't give us the right to be irreverent. Always be mindful to honor him in the way that his holiness deserves.

If you want to hear this message again, follow the link to "Today on Radio" on our homepage. Log into intouch.org and look around to find information about consistently living a life that honors God. Connect to our online bookstore to order a copy of Dr. Stanley's complete message, "The Throne of Grace," or order his teaching set titled "Grace for Today." Again, that's intouch.org. You can also call or text 1-800-INTOUCH. If you prefer to write, our address is In Touch, Post Office Box 7900, Atlanta, Georgia 30357.

In heaven, God receives a constant chorus of "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty." Makes you wonder if we become too casual in our attitude toward him. Today's Moment with Charles Stanley is coming up.

Dr. Charles Stanley: Have you ever forgotten something God taught you when you were reading the Bible? When we take note of what God reveals to us, it helps us to apply it to our lives. With the Charles F. Stanley Life Principles Journal, you can keep track of your spiritual journey and be transformed by God's truth. This journal features artwork of Dr. Stanley's 30 life principles, lined pages for writing, a prayer journaling section, and more. To order, call 1-800-INTOUCH or go to intouch.org/journal.

Guest (Male): The peace of God is tranquility and quietness of the soul. It is the assurance that no matter what's going on around us, everything is secure. Peace is not determined by circumstances, neither is it a matter of chance; it is a matter of choice.

In a world filled with noise and uncertainty, you can discover peace that cannot be shaken. Get your new free booklet, "Peaceful and Still: A Guide to Experiencing God's Rest in an Anxious Age." Visit intouch.org/peaceful. You're listening to In Touch. God's unconditional love is to be enjoyed, and it should result in reverent respect for his holiness. Here's a moment with Charles Stanley.

Dr. Charles Stanley: Jesus spoke of him as his Father, but he never spoke of him in irreverent fashion. And so I simply say to you as a warning, I wonder sometimes if we aren't too casual in our relationship to him. Father to Son, yes, but he's still God. He's still with all of his dignity and majesty and power and holiness, he's still God. And I'm to honor him as my Father and to honor his Son as my God.

And I have no right at any time to be irreverent and unholy and oftentimes movies and people's comments and their conversations and their jokes about God. I don't think God's ever laughed at a joke about him. And I don't think God will ever bless anything that gives the slightest indication that he's one of us, because he's not.

And I think and I hope and pray that the body of Christ will swing from its casualness back to a sense of the righteousness and the holiness and the power of Almighty God. And I think once we begin to grasp, who is this God the Father, we're going to sense he's a God of holiness and righteousness. But he is also a God of such great, great love that this is the way he had to come to him. He says, "Come boldly to the throne of grace." It means I'm to come without fear.

Guest (Male): Relating to God as Father requires receiving his gift of forgiveness through faith in his Son, Jesus Christ. Trust in him today and visit intouch.org to learn more. How are you challenged to live for God by what you heard today? We'd love to hear about that. Coming soon on In Touch: Heaven is the eternal home for all believers. Hear what you can expect when you get there. I hope you'll join us for our continuing series on grace next week on In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley.

This program is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia, and remains on this station through the grace of God and your faithful prayers and gifts.

Dr. Charles Stanley: God bless you. Thank you. Stay in touch. Intouch.org. 1-800-INTOUCH. Amen. Amen. Praise God.