Love Worth Finding

Guest (Male): Listen closely as Adrian Rogers shares our blessed hope as believers in this second coming. The spirit of Antichrist is in this world, but when 777 comes, he's going to take care of 666.

Adrian Rogers: Jesus is coming. This is what grace has wrought, a blessed hope. Do you have that hope? I mean, do you know your future?

Guest (Male): Welcome to Love Worth Finding, featuring the profound truth of the Gospel presented simply by pastor, teacher, and author Adrian Rogers. The grace of God is what writes our spiritual biographies. In part one of today's message, we learned that without Jesus, we are spiritually dead and separated from God. We are considered devilish and disobedient to God, depraved in our humanity.

We cannot earn salvation from our sins. However, God brought salvation to us because of His grace, but that is only the beginning of the power of God's amazing grace. If you have your Bible, turn to Titus, chapter 2, as Adrian Rogers begins part 2 of "From Grace to Glory."

Adrian Rogers: I want us to think of God's amazing grace today. What a wonderful blessing this grace is. And as we look at this passage of scripture, if you're saved, you're going to see your spiritual biography.

And if you are not yet saved, you're going to see your spiritual possibility, what could happen to you. There are about five things I want us to see, and the very first thing I want us to see is what grace brought. Look in verse 11. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation. What has grace brought?

Grace has brought salvation. The only way that you can be saved is for grace to bring salvation to you. Now, why do we need to be saved? Well, just put a marker there in Titus and turn to Ephesians chapter 2. Ephesians chapter 2 is the parallel passage and the classic passage on grace.

Ephesians chapter 2, verse 1: "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins." Question: Man is terribly sick and he needs to be healed. Answer: Wrong. Man is dead and he needs life. Friend, death is not the separation of the soul from the body. Death is the separation of the soul from God. You don't have to be saved to have eternal existence. You'll have eternal existence somewhere, either in Heaven or Hell.

Elvis is alive. The question is, where? Isn't that right? Listen, you have everlasting existence. But you don't have everlasting life until you have Jesus Christ. Jesus said, "I've come that you might have life and have it abundantly."

Now, I want you to see something else. Not only what grace has brought, but I want you to see what grace has taught. What has grace taught? Go back if you will to our original passage in Titus, chapter 2, and look at it.

In verse 11, "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us." Now the grace that has brought us salvation is the grace that teaches us something. And what does it teach us? "That denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world." This is what grace has taught. What grace has brought is salvation. What grace has taught is sanctification.

Because we're saved by grace, that doesn't mean that we continue to live in sin. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid. The Apostle Paul says, "How shall we that are dead to sin continue any longer therein?"

And so, being saved by the grace of God does not mean that you can get saved and live any way that you want. Once you get saved, you come out of law school and you get in grace school, grace school. And grace school never closes, the teacher never fails to show up, there's a lot of homework to do, and there's no recess.

You are continually being taught. Now learn this about salvation: there is nothing to earn, there is much to learn. Do you know what discipleship is? That just simply means learning. A disciple is a learner. Now, here's a third thing I want you to see. First of all, what grace brought, salvation.

Secondly, what grace taught, sanctification, which is progressively learning to be more and more like the Lord Jesus. Thirdly, what grace sought. What was our God seeking when He saved us by His grace? Well, look if you will in verse 14, "who gave Himself for us, that," that means in order that, "He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works." That's what grace sought. That's what God is in the business of doing.

Now, first of all, we are purchased. Look at that, verse 14. "He gave Himself for us." He bought us with Himself. We were redeemed not with corruptible things, but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ. I was thinking about grace the other day, and I was trying to say, "What is grace? What is the definition of grace?" And I never read a definition in a sentence that I could say was grace that really satisfied me.

But let's try here and see what grace is. Grace is love. Well, it is love, but it's more than love. So grace is love that gives. Well, that is true, but grace is more than love that gives. Grace is love that gives where there is no merit, where we don't deserve to have anything given to us. Well, that is true, but grace is more than that. Grace is love that gives where there is no merit, and where there is much demerit. Grace is love that gives to wicked and vile people.

Well, you say, "Yes, that's what grace is, but it is more than that." Grace is love that gives where there's no merit, where there is demerit, to those who don't want the gift. Did you know that grace has to chase us down? Did you know that if, if God couldn't run faster than you could run, you never would have been saved? Did you know that we love Him because He first loved us? And that grace seeks to give to vile and wicked people that which they don't deserve and can never deserve?

But wait a minute, it is more than that. It is grace that gives. Grace that gives where there's no merit. Grace that gives where there's much demerit. Grace that gives to those who resist the gift. And it is grace that gives at great cost to the Giver. It's not just that He gave, but He gave Himself. He gave Himself in agony and blood. Blessed Redeemer, precious Redeemer, seems now I see Him on Calvary's tree, wounded and bleeding for sinners, pleading, blind and unheeding, dying for me. That's grace.

When people understand this, they want to write songs, "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound." Now, what did grace seek? What is it that grace has sought? Well, first of all, He purchased us, and then He purified us. Look at it again here, in verse 14. "He gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself." We are purchased and we're purified. Now, grace doesn't mean that God just says, "Now that I've forgiven your sins, you just live any way you want." Oh, no.

Because the grace that saves us begins to purify us from the inside. You see, works are very important to a saved person also. This passage says we are to be zealous of good works. What is the difference that the works of an unsaved man and the works that he does in order to try to be saved, and the works that we do because we're saved?

Well, the difference is just really a matter of the heart. Why we do it? Not so much in what we do, but why we do it. The Bible says the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in us. It's not that that we say, "Now I'm saved by grace, I'll live by a lower standard." No, we live by a higher standard.

Why, why we do it is because we have the love of Jesus on the inside. The law said, "Don't commit adultery." Grace doesn't mean I can. The law says, "Don't steal." Grace doesn't mean I can. But now the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in us. I cannot work my soul to save. That work my Lord has done, but I will work like any slave for the love of God's dear Son.

See, we're purchased, we're purified, and then it says we're peculiar. "That He might redeem unto Himself a peculiar people." Do you know what the word peculiar means? It doesn't mean odd. Let's forget that. We're not odd. Some of us are, but we're not supposed to be. Peculiar. That means special, special.

When a captain, a general, would go to war and win a great victory, he often would take part of the, the prize, the spoils of the battle. He would get a treasure for himself, and he would bring it back to his home, and that would be a trophy for himself. That was his peculiar possession.

Now, the Bible says in the ages to come, you and I are going to be trophies of His grace. We are His peculiar possession. The Captain of our salvation went to bloody Calvary and defeated Satan and paid the sin debt, and redeemed unto Himself a peculiar people. That's what grace sought. We are purchased, we're purified, we are peculiar, we're different. Grace brought salvation. That's what it brought. It taught sanctification. It sought service. We're to serve the Lord. Listen.

Jesus did not bathe this world with His blood to have you serve the world, the flesh, and the devil. What has grace sought? He gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. "Oh, to grace, how great a debtor daily I am constrained to be." That's what it's all about. Now, I want you to see something else. Not only what grace sought, but what grace wrought. What did grace do? Look in verse 13 if you will.

There it says that we're to be looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ. What has grace wrought? A blessed hope. And we're looking for that blessed hope. It's not over yet. What has begun in grace in verse 11 will end in glory, verse 13. Grace always ends in glory. We're looking for Jesus to come again. And this is what grace has wrought in us, a blessed hope. Don't you feel sorry for people who don't have any hope?

We're looking for the Lord Jesus Christ, that blessed hope. And listen, it is a glad hope, and it is a glorious hope. The blessed hope that Jesus is coming again. I, I would have loved to have been here on this earth when the Lord Jesus was here. Now, I know, I know you theologians, it's better that we're here now than then, because they had Jesus beside them, we have Jesus inside us. We have the Holy Spirit.

But there's still, when I travel in the Holy Land, I walk the Sea of Galilee, the shores of Galilee. I'd like to see Jesus in those sandal shoes walking those shores. And when we get on the Mount of Beatitudes, I would have loved to have been there and hear the Lord Jesus give the Sermon on the Mount, wouldn't you? I would have loved to have seen Him feed the 5,000. I would have loved to have seen the Lord Jesus walk on the water, planting His footsteps on the sea, with the, the wind in His hair, His garments flowing, walking there on the Sea of Galilee.

I would have loved to have seen that. I, I probably needed to see Him on the cross. I think I'd be a better preacher had I seen Him dying in agony and blood. I would have loved to have seen Him that Easter morning, wouldn't you, in His resurrected body? Wouldn't it have been wonderful to see Him ascend into the glory? I didn't see Him in any of those times, but I'm going to see Him. I'm going to see Him. There's a blessed hope. And the Bible says, "the glorious appearing." He's not coming as the carpenter, He's coming as the conqueror.

This is the glorious appearing. He came the first time, He gave Himself for us, verse 14, to redeem us. But He's coming the second time to reign and to rule over us. The spirit of Antichrist is in this world, but when 777 comes, He's going to take care of 666. Jesus is coming. This is what grace has wrought, a blessed hope. Do you have that hope? I mean, do you know your future? Has this been a part of you?

When I was a teenage boy, I lived in West Palm Beach, Florida. I got into trouble that other teenage boys got into. I thank God that I've never known what it is to be drunk or to be addicted to cigarettes. I thank God I went to the marriage altar virgin. All of that by the grace of God. I thank God for that. But I got into the trouble that other teenage boys got into, skipping school, getting in fights, using bad language, taking things that didn't belong to me. I got into those kind of things.

I knew I needed to be saved. I didn't know quite how to be saved. I didn't understand it. I think I would have been saved a lot sooner had somebody sat down and with an open Bible told me how to be saved and asked me to receive Christ. I would have been, I would have been like a piece of ripe fruit. All they had to do would be just to tell me how to be saved, and I would have been saved, but I didn't know. But I'll tell you what happened to our family.

We were out in the front yard. My dad was doing some yard work there on 38th Street in West Palm Beach, Florida. And Mr. and Mrs. Frank came up, and they said to my dad, "We're having a revival meeting at Northwood Baptist Church." And "AD," that's what they called my dad, "we want you to come, you and your family." My dad said, "Okay, I'll come." And so, that night we were in the revival service, sitting there. I was sitting next to my dad, a teenage boy.

That preacher preached and I don't know what he preached. I really don't know. I couldn't tell you what he preached. But I'll tell you what did happen. When they had the invitation, my dad, who was a good, decent, hardworking man, an honest man, who was not saved, but a good, decent, outwardly honest, moral man, got up and went forward to give his heart to Jesus Christ. That staggered me. I mean, I, I wasn't expecting it. I wasn't even thinking about it.

And I cannot tell you the conviction that put in my heart. And I said to myself, "That's exactly, Adrian, what you need to do. You need to be saved." And on the next stands, I was down there to give my heart to Jesus Christ. And I meant it. As best I knew how, I meant it. I was giving my heart to Christ, trusting Him to save me.

But you know what happened when I got down there? They said, "We're glad that Adrian Rogers has come." And they got a card and got a stubby pencil. And I sat there on that front row and they filled out the facts about me, name, age, address, and then they had the folks stand up and they said, "Among those who've come today is Adrian Rogers." And I really meant business with God, but they didn't give me any scripture. They didn't help me to understand, if they did, I don't remember it, about the new birth and Christ in me, salvation by grace. I didn't understand all that. I was so ignorant.

Spiritually, if I'd have taken a course in ignorance, I would have flunked it. That's how dumb I was. I didn't know. I didn't know. But I meant business with God. And I went out to try to live the Christian life by myself. It was almost as if when God saved me, He forgave the past and just gave me a new start. Now it was up to me, had a new start. Well, I failed. The same old words sometimes would come out of my mouth. That fiery temper would come back.

I used to fight. I'm not proud of that, and if you want to fight now, don't come see me. I'm not a fighter anymore, I'm a lover. But I had that old, that old nature in me. But a new nature. There was that battle going on. That went on for about two years. During those two years, I began to listen, and the grace of God began to teach me some things. I began to learn what it was all about.

I can remember on a night, after I'd walked my girlfriend home, who's now my wife. I stopped one block from her house and one block from my house. We lived two blocks apart. I stopped on the corner of 39th Street and Calvin Avenue in West Palm Beach, and I decided I was going to get it settled. And I prayed like this. I said, "Oh God, I'm so miserable. So miserable. I don't know whether I'm lost and the Holy Spirit has me under conviction, or whether I am saved and the devil's trying to make me doubt it.

But I just don't have peace, God. And I want to get it settled, and I want to get it settled tonight." But you see, by then I had learned the language of grace. I had learned about the grace of God. And so I prayed. I just looked straight up into the sky. I didn't bow my head. It was not irreverence, but I just wanted to look into the face of God. And I said, "Oh God, you remember when I went forward in that church, and I was sincere.

But God, I've been riding a roller coaster, up and down, and I want to get it stopped. I want to get it settled. I want to know for certain that I'm saved." And so I prayed something like this, "Oh God, right now, tonight, once and for all, now and forever, with every inch and ounce, and every nerve and sinew, and fiber of my being, I trust you to save me. I'm not depending upon myself. I don't look for a sign, and I don't ask for a feeling. I stand on your word. You died for me, you paid my sin debt.

I receive you now once and for all as my Lord and Savior. If I was saved, I still am, but if I wasn't, I am now. I'm driving down a peg right now." And folks, I want to tell you something. A river of peace began to flow in my heart, and it's still flowing. Do you know what it was? It was the message of grace that I'm telling you about today. It is the grace of God that bring us salvation. Oh, this is what grace has brought. Oh, to grace, how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be.

And oh, I want you to know that grace. You see, what has grace brought? Salvation. What has grace taught? Sanctification. What has grace sought? Service. We're His peculiar people. And what has grace wrought? Glorification. One day, one day, we're going to be like the Lord Jesus Christ, and we'll look upon His face, the one who saved us by His grace. And the one who opened to us the gates of grace will open to us the gates of glory.

That's the grace of God. Isn't grace wonderful? No wonder old John Newton, that wicked sailor said, "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I'm found. Once was blind, but now I see." Was lost, but now I'm found.