Sermon Tone Analysis

We’ve been in a series in which each week we look at one of the attributes of God according to the Bible, one characteristic of the character or the nature of God.

This passage, a very famous passage, also a very rich passage, has a theme that’s not that hard to discern.

Three times … In verse 5, it says, “By grace you’re saved.”

In verse 7, it talks about the incomparable grace of God.

Then again in verse 8 it says (just in case we didn’t get it yet), “It’s by grace you’re saved.”

Over and over again, we’re being told in this passage about the God of grace and the grace of God.

Now right off the bat, people will say, “Oh, I like that idea.

The idea of a gracious God, a forgiving God.

I like that idea very much.

I think I understand that.”

I think I’m here to tell you you probably don’t.

If you have been raised in the church, or if you’ve been around the church or around Christians, or if you’ve grown up very much inside the church, and Christianity has not been a life-changing power to you, it has not been a power that you see changing you from the inside … If that hasn’t been your experience, it’s probably because you don’t understand the grace of God.

This is the missing ingredient.

Here’s why.

How do you define grace?

Well, at the heart of the definition … It comes out.

This is one of the classic texts.

What does grace mean?

It means at least this: gift.

Down here in verse 8 it says, “It is by grace you have been saved.”

God’s salvation is a gift.

Then, for emphasis: “Not of works.”

A gift is something you haven’t worked for, you haven’t paid for, you haven’t earned, you haven’t achieved.

It’s free.

So whatever else grace means, it’s a free gift.

But I want you to consider there are all kinds of gifts that are absolutely free, that you haven’t paid for, but they don’t change your life.

For example, if you go to an event sponsored by an organization, and they give you a little gift bag … You get home and open it up, and in it there’s a writing tablet with the logo of the organization on it.

Is it free?

Yes.

Is it a gift?

Yes.

Has it changed your life?

Even after you use it, will it change your life?

No.

Of course it’s not going to change your life.

Why?

Because even though it’s free, it’s not indispensable or costly.

It’s not indispensable.

You probably already have things you could write on right now.

Even if for some reason you’re one of the only people in the whole of America who has no tablets at home with little logos on them to take notes on by the phone, or something like that, it would be so easy for you to get one.

Extremely easy.

So the reason it’s free but it’s not life changing is that it’s neither indispensable nor expensive.

It’s not costly to you.

It would be very easy for you to do it yourself.

But what if you were a poor person in a foreign land where you needed an operation?

Your life depended upon it.

You were going to die if you didn’t have the operation, but either the medical treatment there was unobtainable or too expensive for you to obtain.

Either it wasn’t accessible or it was economically unattainable.

What if you knew someone who was not as poor as you but who liquidated almost all their assets in order to come up with the money to give you that surgery?

What is that?

It’s a free gift just like the tablet, but it’s different.

First of all, it’s indispensable.

You have to have it.

Secondly, it was so costly.

This person went into poverty in order to get you the surgery.

Imagine that.

That’s life changing.

Why? It’s not the freeness that changes your life or doesn’t; it’s how indispensable and how costly the gift is.

I’d like to show you here that in this great passage, which we could essentially take weeks and weeks on (I’m going to give you a kind of summary look at it) …

In verses 1–3, we see that God’s salvation is not just free; it’s indispensable.

Secondly, in verses 4–7, it tells us not only that God’s grace is indispensable, but it was infinitely costly for him.

Lastly, at the bottom, we’re going to see that if you understand the absolute indispensability of God’s grace and the infinite costliness of his grace, it will bring you traumatic tranquility.

1. God’s grace, his salvation, is an indispensable gift

“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins …” Let’s stop right there.

There is a big difference between being sick and being dead.

I may not have to belabor this point much, but let me do it a little bit.

If you’re sick and you need healing, well, there are degrees of sickness.

You might be a little sick or you might be very sick.

Then, of course, you go find a doctor.

You do some research and get a doctor, and the doctor gives you medicine, or the doctor suggests and proposes that you eat these things, or exercise in this way.

So if you’re sick, first of all, there are degrees of sickness, and secondly, you have something to contribute.

You can admit you’re sick.

That’s the first contribution.

Then you go to the doctor and listen to the doctor and do what the doctor says, and so forth.

So if you’re sick and you get better, you contributed to it in some way, and there are degrees of sickness.

If you’re dead, well, first of all, there are different ways to die, but frankly, whether you’re pretty dead or ugly dead, you’re still dead.

If what you need is a resurrection because you’re dead, then not only are there no degrees, but there is nothing you will contribute to it at all.

If somebody resurrects you, you contribute nothing at all.

The Bible says we are not sick in our sins, calling for “Dr.

God.” We’re not saying, “I need something.”

If we believe we’re sick in our sins, then there are degrees.

I’ve had many people actually say to me, “Well, I do need God, but I’m a pretty good person.

I’m not one of those people on skid row or in prison who need a born-again experience.

I just need a little help.”

If we’re sick in our sins, there are degrees and there’s contribution.

In other words, God’s help is not absolutely indispensable, and maybe some people need it more than others.

But if we’re dead in our sins, if we’re spiritually absolutely dead to God and we need to be resurrected, then the salvation of God is absolutely indispensable for all of us.

By the way, when the Bible says we are dead in our sins, it’s not saying every human being is as bad as they could be.

In fact, we’d better look at this; otherwise you will still not understand the grace of God.

It doesn’t say every human being is as bad as they could be.

We’ve talked about this before.

The Bible indicates that in order to make this world a more livable place, in his goodness, God gives all sorts of people, regardless of what they believe about him, gifts of wisdom and the ability to do good things.

We’re not saying everybody here is as bad as anybody else.

What we are saying is everybody is as equally spiritually dead to God, or, as Paul says in Romans 3, no one seeks God.

There are moral people and there are immoral people, there are nice people and there are nasty people, but nobody seeks God.

You say, “That doesn’t make sense to me.

The polls say that most Americans pray, that most Americans believe in God.”

You say, “I see all kinds of people trying to be good and trying to seek God.”

Wait.

Over the years, whenever I’ve talked to people who have been in families with an alcoholic and who have gone, say, through something like Al-Anon or counseling in other ways, I’ve heard this story.