The Alternative

Tony Evans: Grace is never limited by God's flow, it's only limited by our restriction.

Guest (Male): Dr. Tony Evans says the limits we unconsciously place on God carry real spiritual repercussions. That results in unanswered prayer, that results in spiritual distance, contaminating the spiritual life of the believer.

This is the Alternative Broadcast, featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. Dr. Evans says whether God's grace shows up in our lives as a drip or a downpour depends on us, not because we have to earn it, but because we sometimes choke off the flow. Let's join him in James chapter four and discover ways to remove the blockage and speed up the flow of God's grace.

Tony Evans: When you go to the doctor for a check-up, they're going to take your blood because your blood will tell them a lot about your well-being. One of the things they're going to check when you go to your check-up and they check your blood is the level of cholesterol that is in your body.

Of particular concern will be the level of LDL. LDL is the low-density lipoprotein that's called bad cholesterol. And when enough of that bad LDL cholesterol has gotten into the body, creating enough plaque, it begins to constrict the flow of blood through the artery that's bringing back that life-giving oxygen back through the heart so it can be pumped out through the veins so that the rest of you can be healthy.

God has a flow and it's called grace. Grace is God's unmerited favor. Grace is all that God is free to do that cannot be earned, is not deserved, and could never be repaid. As we have studied thus far, grace is always free. You can't earn it, but you can create an environment that allows it to be freely expressed from God to you, in you, through you, for you, by you, and from you.

It depends on how open the opening is or whether a restriction has occurred that limits the flow of grace. Grace is never limited by God's flow; it's only limited by our restriction. While you can't earn grace because the nature of grace is free, you can access it or limit how free God's grace is to flow his unmerited favor.

There is one thing that will guarantee the restriction of the flow of grace in the life of a Christian. This one thing will cause the grace flow to get smaller and smaller so that God's divine favor is hardly felt at all. The one word that will restrict the flow of God in the life of the believer is worldliness.

Verse four says, "You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." He poignantly says you can't have the world and God. If you have a relationship with the world, don't expect one with me. You can't have both of us.

In fact, not only can you not have both of us, if you are its friend, you have become my enemy. There are many Christians who are literally enemies of God because they have so tethered themselves to the world that God cannot have a relationship with them on an intimate level.

This raises a question. If the world can block my intimacy with God, which constricts the flow of grace from God to me, what is the world? The world is not first a place you go or a thing you do, though it will involve that. The world in the Bible is a concept. The Greek word is cosmos, and the word cosmos meant to arrange something in a particular order.

The word world may be defined as that system headed by Satan that leaves God out. Wherever God is excluded, it's worldly. When you or I exclude God, we are being worldly. We're talking about anything you must exclude God from. At that moment, it is worldly.

He says when you pursue the world, that is you become comfortable in a situation that I am not welcomed in, then you just became my enemy. You are excluded from my intimacy and therefore you have constricted, lessened, turned the valve of the flow of grace off or turned it down from a gush to a sprinkle to a drip and maybe all the way off.

That results in unanswered prayer, that results in spiritual distance. It becomes like a pesticide contaminating the spiritual life of the believer. The problem with the world is its intoxicating nature. The world is intoxicating because everything it offers feels like fun.

First John two, verses 15 to 17 says, "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world, for all that's in the world is the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." The lust of the flesh is unholy pleasure. The lust of the eyes is unholy desires, and the pride of life is unholy position.

When we pursue pleasure or desires or position independently of God, we have become worldly and we have fallen in love with it. First John chapter five, verse 19 says, "This world lies in the hands of the evil one." When you join the world, you just joined the devil. This world belongs to the devil. When you join the world, you just hooked up with God's enemy.

The world is like a drug. It gives you a high. That's what makes it so attractive. It's like a drug addict, and once you get the hit and you get the feeling that comes from the hit, then you want another hit and you want a deeper hit because the world is intoxicating because it's full of pleasure.

There is the world of Disney. The world of Disney is fun. You take a kid to Disney World, or take them to a Disney movie, it's intoxicating. But it isn't real life. It's fun, but you have to explain to your kids we can't live here. This is for visiting only because it's an intoxicating environment.

The Bible declares that we are to be in the world. The Bible does not call us to some sort of asceticism where we disappear out into the forest or out into some monastery and somehow think that that makes us more spiritual. We are to be in the world, but the Bible says we are not to be of the world.

To be in it means you must go to your job, you must be a good neighbor, you must function in society. You must be in the world, but you are not to adopt its value system. That's what it means to be worldly. It means when you adopt the world's value system and make it your value system.

You have to go to work, but you don't have to adopt the values of everybody you work with. Just because everybody else cusses like a sailor, that can't rub off on you because you're operating by a different value system. Worldliness has to do with adopting a value system that leaves God out.

The question you and I have to ask if we're wondering whether we're being worldly is real simple: Is God having as much fun as I am? Is he included or excluded out of this scenario, whatever that scenario happens to be?

Guest (Male): Dr. Evans will return in a moment with a story about how to stay spiritually healthy in a hostile environment. First though, if you're ready to experience more of God's grace in your life, Dr. Evans has written a short devotional book that can help get that grace flowing for you. It's called Anchored by Grace, and as you go through the individual devotions, you'll find yourself leaning into God's grace instead of working harder to measure up on your own.

Dr. Evans says we sometimes wind up being our own worst enemy when it comes to this important area. It's vital that we learn to let the Lord change us from the inside out. That's why we want you to have a copy of Anchored by Grace as our gift. Just visit tonyevans.org to make a donation, and we'll say thanks by sending it your way.

If you contact us right away, we'll also include all 12 full-length messages in both volumes of The Magnificent Grace of God audio collection on CD, USB, or digital download. Again, that's tonyevans.org or call 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our resource team members help you. I'll have that contact information for you again after part two of today's lesson and this.

This October, journey through Israel with Tony Evans. We're going to gather together with many of our friends to survey the sites of the Holy Land. We're going to go to the Jordan River, the Sea of Galilee, the Garden Tomb, and the Garden of Gethsemane. We're going to open God's word together and watch its truth leap off of the pages of scripture as we walk where our Lord walked and see God give us new excitement about his greatness and about the truth of his word.

It's an unforgettable experience that'll change the way you understand scripture. Space is limited, so visit tonyevans.org today to get all the details and register before it's too late. That's tonyevans.org. 10 wonderful days in the Holy Land. Looking forward to meeting you as we tour Israel together. Let's return now to Dr. Evans for more on increasing the flow of grace.

Tony Evans: Christians have been redeemed and placed in a different world. But the temptation that we all face is to be tricked or duped by this world's system and over time get us to leave God out of the equation. If you've ever seen a fish out of water, you've seen that fish struggling to survive. Its mouth is going open, its gills are fluctuating back and forth because it's trying to survive. If it's out of water long enough, it is going to die because it was not made for this world.

It can hang out there for a little while, but you leave it out there long enough and the world it is in is going to turn on it. You and I were not made to live in water. You hang in there long enough and you aren't going to make it. You visit the ocean. You don't live in it because you weren't made for that. You were made for oxygen, not the water. That's not your world. Its value systems must not define you or me or us.

The world seeks to draw us from God, to contaminate that which is God in order to draw us from God so that we don't get the flow of the grace of God. Verse five, he says, "Or do you think the scripture says to no purpose?" Let me put that in everyday language. Do you think God is talking smack? Do you think he's just talking noise? Do you think he's tripping?

He says do you think the spirit says to no purpose? You think God's just talking? He says let me explain. "He jealously desires the spirit which he has made to dwell in us." He's talking to Christians. If you have accepted Christ, God the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, is now living inside of you and God says I am jealous for him. I am jealous for the spirit in you.

It's amazing when you hear Christians talk today who are compromising their value systems, adopting the systems of the world because it's popular on television or popular in the marketplace or popular at work. Since everybody else is buying it, we buy it too. God says if you want the world, you can have it. You just can't have me with it or the grace that is greater that can come if you would humble yourself and not think you're all that and a bag of chips.

First Corinthians 10, verses 21 and 22, God says you can't dine at the table of demons and the table of God. You can't eat from both tables. You've got to pick your table because he says God is jealous. Jealous! So if you're going to go to the devil, live with him. But don't be coming back to my crib. Don't be hanging out with me. If you want the world, you can have the world, but you just can't have both tables. You've got to pick your table.

What do you do if you want more grace? If you want to see greater grace, more divine flow, what do you do? God doesn't leave us hanging. He doesn't just say you messed up and this is why and I'm jealous. No, here's what you've got to do. Verses seven through 10, he says, "Submit therefore to God, resist the devil, he will flee from you. Draw near to God, he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be miserable and mourn and weep, let your laughter be turned to mourning, humble yourself in the presence of God."

You can sum up all those verses, seven through 10, with one word: repent. He says it in a lot of different ways, but he's only saying one thing. If you want me, you must repent. Repentance can be defined as the internal determination and resolve to turn from your sin. As you do that, he says resist the devil. Only when you submit can you resist the devil.

While the devil can handle you, he cannot handle God. Once you're submitted to God, he's now battling God, not you. Submit to God, then you will be able to say no to the devil because the devil can handle your no, he cannot handle his no. That's why when Jesus was even tempted in Matthew four, he had to use the scripture to get rid of the devil. He had to submit to God. And he says you can no longer be double-minded.

Repentance means no more double-minded. Double-minded means thinking in two ways at the same time. It's like being an AM/FM Christian. You can listen to AM or you can listen to FM. You can't listen to AM and FM at the same time, okay? You've got to decide which channel you want to listen to. You cannot be double-minded. You can't go in two directions if you want intimacy and the flow of grace. There must be a singular direction. The Bible calls it being single-minded.

I told you before I don't like apples. I'm a banana orange guy. I'm not an apple guy. I know an apple a day keeps the doctor away, but I'm not into them apples except at the Texas State Fair. That candy apple, I can dig them apples because those are candy apples. But the doctor tells me I just wasted any nutritional value of that apple once I dip it in liquid sugar, right? The sugar cancels out the nutritional value.

It's easy to come to church and get the word, but then we leave church and dip it in human wisdom. Dip it into worldly thinking. And then wonder why the word that we heard won't work because its nutritional value has been canceled. Once you wrap the double standard, the world, and you wrap it around the Bible, wrap it around God, you just canceled God.

The Bible puts it this way: You do nullify the word of God by your traditions. You cancel it out. He even goes deeper. He says I want you to mourn and stop laughing because this is no joke. This worldly thing is not a minor issue. It ought to make you cry when God's grace cannot flow because we've chosen the world over him. It ought to create misery.

Let me let you get God to help you out. Repentance starts with recognition. You've got to recognize it is a sin. Worldliness or however it's being expressed in actions that are independent of God, it is a sin. Until you call it that, God can't help you because he didn't die for mistakes, he didn't die for bad habits, he didn't die for my bad. You've got to call it what he calls it. You've got to call it a sin. That's why he died, and that's the only thing he forgives.

But then there must be remorse because you can recognize something but not be sorry about the thing you recognized. That's where the mourning comes in: remorse. Sadness and sorrow over the sin. He says I want you to mourn. Let me help you because you might be saying well, I know it's a sin and I know I'm worldly, but I don't feel that bad about it because it feels so good, I don't feel that bad.

Ask God to make it go left on you. The world has a way of going left on you. It might be fun now until it turns. Some of us have been around long enough to see it turn on us. What looked like good turned bad. What looked like fun became misery. God knows how to help you out if you need to cry. He knows how to bring some tear ducts out of your eyes and make them flow because he can make sin that was fun miserable.

He can turn it into misery if you need to feel like you need to feel to get where you need to be. Sometimes you need to be helped to become miserable because we become comfortable until God turns it. Then he says humble yourselves in the presence of God and he will exalt you. There's recognition, there's remorse, and then there's return. Return. He says submit, draw near, humble yourself. That's all returning. Come home.

Guest (Male): If you're ready to come home by receiving God's gift of grace and forgiveness through Jesus Christ, that can happen for you today, and Dr. Evans has written to tell you how. Just visit tonyevans.org and follow the link at the top of the homepage that simply says Jesus. Check it out today.

Dr. Evans will return in a moment with a final story to wrap up the program. First though, his message today was called Increasing the Flow of Grace. You can request that title on its own or get it as a part of Tony's series, The Magnificent Grace of God. A look at how something we don't deserve can give us everything we need.

This set of full-length messages contains material we won't have time to bring you on the air. As I mentioned earlier, it's yours as our gift when you visit tonyevans.org and make a contribution to help us keep Tony's teaching on this station. Remember, it'll come to you bundled with Tony's companion devotional book for this series, Anchored by Grace.

Again, that's tonyevans.org or call our Resource Center at 1-800-800-3222 where team members are available around the clock to help you. That's 1-800-800-3222. Who do you think you are? Dr. Evans says you can't really answer that question until you recognize the spiritual authority God gave you. Be sure to tune in Monday to discover why the Lord can't change your circumstances until he changes your perspective. Right now though, let's listen as Tony wraps up our message for today.

Tony Evans: Before seatbelts was a law, you always knew who the happy couples were because she'd be all up under him and he got his arm all around her. Looked like one person in the car. They just all up under each other before seatbelts was the law.

But then that meant you always knew who the unhappy couples were because she had her door and he had his door and they aren't sitting close anymore. One woman back in that time said to her husband, "We sure are far apart." The husband looked at her and said, "Yeah, but I haven't moved." God says if we're far apart, it's not because I moved. You draw near to me because I haven't gone anywhere. I'm still passionately in love with you and passionately want you for myself, but you've got to draw near to where I am.

That's why the Bible calls it return. Acts chapter three, verse 19, it says repent and return so you can get your restoration, your refreshing, the flow of grace.